Chapter 353: Letter from afar (fourth update)
Princess Qinyang stayed here until the evening and went back only after dinner.
——If her brother was in the capital, how could she dare to stay so long?
After having a good meal and a good drink, Princess Qinyang returned home contentedly and even gave Ye Chutang two pots of snow drink.
Ye Chutang saw her out, and after everyone left, he returned to his room.
As soon as she opened the door, she paused.
But the movement was extremely subtle, and the next moment, she walked into the house as usual.
Walking around the screen, Xiaowu was lying on the bed and had fallen asleep because it was too late.
Ye Chutang went over to tuck in the quilt for her, his eyes falling on the round table beside him.
A letter lay quietly on it.
She walked over and picked up the letter. There was no writing on it, only a black eagle with its wings spread out drawn on the seal.
Its eyes are like lightning and its claws are like hooks.
Just by looking at it like this, you can seem to feel the fierce fighting spirit that almost bursts out of the paper!
Ye Chutang opened the letter.
There was only one line of words written on it: Ye Hengwei.
Ye Chutang stared at the words, his eyebrows slightly raised.
Can't bear it anymore?
She put the letter away, placed it on the candle beside her and lit it. The flames devoured it silently, leaving only a wisp of smoke.
Xiaowu seemed to sense something, opened his eyes drowsily, and climbed out of bed.
The letter in Ye Chutang's hand had already been completely burned.
She turned around, walked over and pinched Xiaowu's chubby little face.
"Did it wake you up?"
Xiaowu shook his head and leaned into her arms.
Ye Chutang's heart softened, and he touched her hair with a smile.
"Go to sleep."
…
Outside Tongbei City, it is a desolate place.
A group of people moved slowly forward in the night. They were all skinny, ragged, and had chains on their hands and feet.
This is a felon who was exiled.
After nearly two months, they had been tortured beyond recognition.
In the crowd, Ye Heng had an untidy beard and looked numb and haggard.
The prison uniform he wore was stained with bloodstains, some new and some old. His boots had long been gone, and he was only wearing a pair of worn-out straw sandals. He looked extremely miserable and disheveled.
Who could have thought that not long ago, he was the most powerful Shaoqing of Dali Temple?
At the beginning, he still had hope, but after only three days on the road, he was beaten all over.
There were smart ones who gave benefits to others when they were exiled so that they would suffer less on the way. But he was in too much of a hurry at that time and was dragged out of prison directly. He didn't even have time to see his family, let alone other things?
His life along the way was extremely difficult.
Ye Heng felt that everything he had experienced in the past six months was like an extremely absurd dream.
Although he was not born into a wealthy family, he was protected by his brother since he was a child and never had to worry about trivial matters in life. Later, he passed the imperial examination and rose to prominence thanks to his brother.
The suffering he had endured in the past six months was more than in the entire first half of his life.
The further north you go, the more desolate the place becomes. You often have to walk for days and nights without even a place to shelter from the wind and rain.
Now, there was only one thought that kept Ye Heng gritting his teeth and persevering - they were about to reach Tongbei!
As long as he reaches Tongbei, he will be saved. There are His Highness's people there, and they will definitely take good care of him.
Once you enter the city, you will be assigned an easy job, and you will just have to wait for an opportunity to make a comeback in the future!
Suddenly, Ye Heng felt a chill between his brows.
He tilted his neck stiffly and saw tiny pieces of white falling under the dark night.
“It’s snowing!”
The first ones to react were the officers escorting the prisoners. They looked at each other and their faces turned ugly.
October in Tongbei is already cold, and when the cold wind blows, it feels like a knife.
It’s snowing now!
If we are not careful, someone might freeze to death here!
"Hurry up!"
An officer swung his whip and hit the man who was walking at the end.
There is an inn just ahead. If they hurry up, they can still rest inside for a night. Otherwise, they will have to sleep here under the snow and use the snow as a blanket!
Of course, in such a desolate frontier area, the post stations were usually very dilapidated and could only accommodate a few officials. The rest of the people still had to sleep outside.
But this is not what they need to consider.
The people who were beaten had probably been hungry for too long and had no thick clothes to cover their bodies, so their bodies were frozen stiff.
After being hit by the whip, his body shook a few times, and finally he could not hold on and fell down.
"You idiot! Get up now! If you delay our journey, I'll make you pay!"
The officer had a ferocious look on his face and went up to whip him twice more.
But the man on the ground didn't react anymore.
Everyone stopped.
Another officer came over, kicked him, then squatted down and sniffed the man's breath.
"Dead."
He spoke expressionlessly.
The officer who was whipping him spat at the still warm body of the man: "Bah! What a damn bad luck!"
Every pair of eyes was watching this scene, and everyone remained silent.
Because this was not the first time such a thing happened. It was normal to die on the way from the capital to Tongbei, a thousand miles away.
Deathly silence spread among the crowd, almost suffocating.
"Walk!"
The officer ignored the dead man and urged everyone forward again.
Ye Heng walked forward numbly. After walking for a distance, he felt it was too cold. He tugged at his tattered clothes and hugged his arms, trying to warm himself up.
It's all in vain.
Ye Heng felt that he had lost feeling in his limbs, and his whole body was like a puppet, moving forward step by step. He didn't know when he would fall down like that man and many others before him.
Finally, he couldn't help but look back.
The snow fell heavier and heavier, and the man was already covered with a thin layer of snow. From afar in the dark night, he looked like just a tiny, inconspicuous arc on the ground.
It won't be long before the arc flattens out and everything disappears.
Ye Heng was suddenly filled with unprecedented panic - if he couldn't hold on until Tongbei, wouldn't he end up like this?
Ye Heng couldn't help but quicken his pace, as if he wanted to escape quickly.
In a panic, he bumped into a man's shoulder.
The man turned his head and looked over with a sinister look in his eyes.
Ye Heng recognized him. This man had been in the group of exiled prisoners since the capital. He looked to be in his thirties and was thin. It was said that he had committed murder, but he rarely spoke and Ye Heng was not very familiar with him.
"I'm sorry."
Two months is enough to polish Ye Heng's character.
It's obvious that this guy is not someone he is going to deal with, so he'd better avoid causing trouble for himself.
After Ye Heng finished speaking, he was about to continue moving forward, but he suddenly froze in the next moment, with all the hairs on his body standing on end!
At his lower back, the cold and sharp blade seemed about to cut through his thin clothes and pierce his flesh!
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