memory
It was the most desolate night.
It is also the noisiest night.
The heart in his chest was beating non-stop. When Jiang Nian felt the kiss coming, all he could see was the bright moonlight in the room and the portrait of the woman hanging on the wall.
The warmth on the lips seems to be transmitted to the tip of the heart, promoting harmony between each other, or the temperature that can be felt on the skin when they touch each other.
Could it be that someone who is so cold and evasive can also convey emotions that are so scorching that they make your whole body feel hot?
The cold moonlight in his sight was covered by slender fingertips, and Jiang Nian's world fell into a soft darkness.
She never thought about what the future would be like, so she would not imagine what would happen in the scenes she had passed through, where, or how it would happen.
Until now, when she sat on the wooden chair where she used to talk, with the person in front of her being the one who had become distant and unpredictable, and the chair back behind her being the one that made her calm down when it felt cool, Jiang Nian truly felt the sense of disparity.
It seems that time and space overlap, but when I look into the eyes of my past self, the environment I am in is different.
Cold and complicated affairs, or a hot and unavoidable kiss.
A sense of difference arose from the bottom of her heart, but she did not have the strength to retreat or break free.
At different times, she accepted her own part of what had happened, calmed her mind, and continued to move forward calmly.
And the person who will accompany you in the future may have already been decided in your heart before this moment.
—
Jiang Nian chose a room in the mansion to rest.
Before every trip, she would feel somewhat nostalgic for the room she was about to leave.
But this time, those thoughts did not arise in my heart.
When leaving Jiang Mansion, it seemed so hasty.
Now she fled desperately, looking at the room that was no longer guarded and had nothing to worry about, she felt like she had survived a disaster.
Just take a good rest here.
There was nothing here that could touch her nerves, and no one she didn't want to see for the time being.
Outside the empty room there is only a cool moon and the autumn colors.
Jiang Nian closed the door gently, turned back and took a deep breath for a moment, and his slightly uncomfortable mood finally eased.
It is not appropriate to think so much. What she should do most is to rest.
With the fatigue of forcibly suppressing it, she began to rise into the air again. The moonlight that filled the room was blocked by her gauze curtain, and only a little light came in.
Before she fell into her dream, she seemed to hear words rising from the bottom of her heart.
This moment has finally arrived.
—
We set off the next day, but the journey was not as smooth as we had imagined.
During this period, a letter was delivered by a crow from outside the window. The letter was from Meng Hao about the border.
The content of the letter sounds incredible, but it also makes some sense in the strangeness.
As winter approaches, Donglan's autumn harvest has failed, sparking public outrage.
The common people particularly disliked the Wumi people, believing that the court's adherence to them was a matter of divine retribution. Those loyal officials who tried to offer sound advice were deemed to lack reverence for these metaphysical teachings and were expelled and exiled. During the normal grain collection process, conflicts arose across Donglan.
This series of actions accumulated and triggered a popular uprising. The emperor, who was confused by the slander of the Wu Mi people, finally became angry. He listened to the opinions of the Wu Mi people and told the civilians who had already revolted that they would be able to get new food after they captured the Huandu city.
Jiang Nian was silent for a while, and finally figured out the real purpose of the war caused by "insect repellent".
She had previously wondered why Donglan sought the insect repellent formula without negotiating peace with Huandu. Instead, based on their old grudge, they directly and forcefully demanded the formula from Huandu.
It turns out that the person in charge was not the emperor at all, but people like Wu Mi who drove the puppet emperor to make such a choice.
She didn't want to know how long Donglan had been eroded by the Wumi people.
Jiang Nian rubbed his brows and continued, "So, is it necessary for me to be the bait?"
Xiao Yingzhu said calmly: "If you can get it, the Wu Mi people will definitely pull you into their group."
Her abilities are very versatile, and if used effectively, she can solve many problems. A cult like the Wu Mi Zhong, which wants both, will certainly not miss any opportunity to succeed. Jiang Nian nodded and said nothing more, but she still felt a little heavy in her heart.
Xiao Yingzhu had already informed her of the subsequent arrangements, and she only needed to do every step that she was supposed to do. If an accident occurred along the way, she just had to hold on until the people sent by Xiao Yingzhu came to rescue her.
But Jiang Nian had no idea how long she could remain as bait without being caught, given her current skills and the weapons she carried.
The sky when she set out seemed to echo her unhappy mood. The bright horizon ahead was gradually covered by dark clouds. The dense clouds blocked the beam of bright light. In the midst of the darkness, the faint sound of thunder resounded through the sky, tearing out a bright light on the sea of clouds.
Jiang Nian raised his eyes to look at the cloud layer above. The dull cold wind coming from outside the bamboo curtain of the car window blew on his face. In the depressing atmosphere, all the scenes passing by his eyes seemed to disappear, like a stack of colorful shadows, passing by him in an instant.
The sky was covered with dark clouds, and people were in a state of panic.
The carriage stopped in the middle of the road. Passersby looked panicked and quickly packed up their things and rushed to nearby shops to take shelter from the rain.
The carriage was silent. Jiang Nian put away the wooden box in his hand. The box smelled of agarwood and contained the book that recorded his experiences along the way.
She planned to present the notebook when she met the emperor.
She knew about the grudge between Xiao Yingzhu and Chang Dediana, but before everything settled, she still had room to change.
She didn't want Xiao Yingzhu, who had sacrificed so much, to become just an insignificant speck of dust in history, lost in the long river of time. She wanted to be able to see traces of his deeds and his legacy even a thousand years later—even if it was just a few strokes.
People today may never know what he has done in their entire lives and only regard him as a negative person.
But in later life, she was still able to work hard to change.
There was no soft aroma of tea in the carriage, and the bitter smell of water vapor spread from the surroundings. The cool rain outside the window passed through the gaps in the bamboo curtains and fell on Jiang Nian's tied hair and soft face.
She raised her hand to tuck away her windblown hair and said, "...I didn't ask too many questions about your past last night."
"Now that I have some free time, could you please tell me about it based on our current relationship?"
Take some time out from your busy schedule to let her know everything about his past.
There was no need to go back to childhood, she just wanted to know how Xiao Yingzhu spent the most difficult years.
Although I heard some fragments and snippets from other people's mouths.
But Jiang Nian still wanted to hear the complete story of that series of events, and learn it personally from Xiao Yingzhu's mouth.
After all... in terms of knowing each other's past, she thought, in this era, there is nothing more dramatic than them.
Now, let's take a deeper look at these dramatic past events that have fostered our mutual appreciation.
—
The rain outside the car was drizzling, and it seemed that it was going to get heavier.
Through the dim light of Jiang Nian, those bright eyes were like a hot seal, overlapping the past and the present.
The weather seemed familiar, but back then, he had not seen those eyes that could dispel all his troubles.
Everywhere you look, you see piles of corpses, heavy rain drifting down, an airtight and stuffy environment, and the smell of corpses and blood lingering in your nostrils.
Empty hands.
Coming back to his senses from his trance, his sight first focused on a corpse that was trying to protect him.
That was his father's confidant.
During the period when the Duke's Mansion was under the suspicion of Emperor Changde, a rumor reached his ears - Emperor Changde, who was far away from the battlefield, was sitting on the throne in the capital, trying to use this battle to eliminate all the people belonging to the Duke's Mansion.
Because some people in the court believed that the Duke's Mansion was suspected of collaborating with the enemy and committing treason.
This matter suddenly emerged from some dark corners of the capital before he could react.
Those people pointed and talked about his father, and whenever he went out, he would be stared at with strange and hateful eyes by the outside world.
Xiao Yingzhu knew that he never felt anything about the gossip about their mansion from outsiders.
Because most of the people discussing this were mediocre individuals who would never reach such heights in their lifetimes. Some others came wearing masks with ulterior motives, appearing to respect the Duke's Mansion but actually revealing their ugly faces after secretly receiving benefits.
I've seen so many people like this that it's not worth investing any emotion in them.
So when his mother was still alive, she always told him to understand the emotions of people around him and empathize with their feelings.
Heavy rain fell from the sky, hitting his cold palms.
It's obviously summer.
But he felt particularly cold, as if he had fallen into an ice cave.
Surrounded by lifeless fellows, Xiao Yingzhu no longer had the energy to distinguish who belonged to which side. He could only barely move out from under the stiff corpses while being completely exhausted. Then he lost all his strength and fell on his back on the ground.
I don’t know how long it was before someone touched my body and then pulled me up.
His head was dizzy and he was not very conscious, but out of his body's alertness, he reflexively grabbed the other person's neck and used all the strength he could muster to cut off the other person's vulnerable point.
The other person cried out, quickly broke free from his grip, and staggered away.
In the pouring rain, the man who wanted to bring him over spat at him from afar: "I, Qin Lan, have traveled thousands of miles from outside to find this land, covered in mud to find you, just to bring you back to the capital, and you treat me like this!"
A female voice was faintly heard from behind. I didn't know what she said, but soon, the person became quiet, and all the fluffy hair on his body was gathered up. He reluctantly dragged Xiao Yingzhu up from the ground.
Qin Lan, who was arrogant and thought he was the new leader of Huandu Intelligence Bureau, but was still weak after practicing countless times, picked up Xiao Yingzhu's arm with one hand and dragged him outside.
The female voice that was standing far away just now suddenly appeared in his ears the next second.
"Well, he's not in great shape. Don't hold him with one hand like that. Let me do it."
The other person's strength was gentle, but it made Qin Lan feel safer than before. He didn't know what kind of magic he used, but his floating thoughts were thrown into the air and he suddenly lost consciousness.
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