Chapter 9 Why Hate Wang Chang?
Jing Ye felt a momentary unease, then solemnly shook his head: "I'm not afraid."
Wang Yuying propped herself up and left Jingye's embrace.
Jing Ye panicked and stood up as well. Wang Yuying smiled and said, "Go back quickly. You are the commander and should set an example. Don't wait until all the soldiers are in formation and you are the only one missing, arriving late."
Jing Ye said seriously, "That won't happen."
Wang Yuying smiled, slipped on her shoes and got out of bed. She brought Jing Ye some arrow sleeves, which Jing Ye tied up and put on himself. She reached out and helped him straighten his collar and cuffs, then patted his arm: "Go quickly."
Jingye nodded: "I'll come again tonight."
Wang Yuying curled her lips slightly. As soon as Jing Ye left the room, she lay back down on the couch and went back to sleep.
A cool breeze was blowing, and with a thin blanket draped over her stomach, she could sleep soundly through the night. The rooster crowed, and a hazy white light appeared in the east, but Wang Yuying remained fast asleep, oblivious to the commotion.
...
The emperor's imperial carriage was heading towards the camp on the outskirts of the capital when Xu Heng, sitting in the carriage, heard a rooster crow.
Through the window, I could faintly sense the sudden brightness outside.
Xu Heng thought to himself: When the rooster crows, the world turns white.
He raised his hand and pushed open the car window, and his first glance involuntarily went towards the direction of Fuyou Mountain.
The green hills rise and fall, stretching endlessly, like the delicate eyebrows of a beautiful woman.
What am I looking at?
The camp on the outskirts of Beijing is less than five miles west of Fuyou Mountain. Could he possibly run into that person by chance?
Just imagining it made Xu Heng's heart race.
Before turning west, Xu Heng glanced one last time in the direction of Fuyou Mountain, suppressed his secret feelings, and entered the camp.
The commander and deputy commander were already waiting outside the gate to welcome the emperor. The commander was Yuan Wancheng, who had been promoted from the Imperial Guard, and Xu Heng was fairly familiar with him. He looked at the deputy commander—Jing Ye, a young general transferred back from Yumen Pass. Apart from meeting the emperor, Xu Heng rarely spoke to him in private.
But when Xu Heng thought about how this man had started out under the General Who Conquers the West and was Wang Yuying's classmate, having blown sand with her at Yumen Pass, he couldn't help but look at Jing Ye a few more times, full of questions he wanted to ask.
Xu Heng pursed his lips and gritted his teeth, deciding to take care of business first.
Accompanied by his commanders, he ascended the sentry post. The sky was clear and windless, and the colorful flags at the four corners of the drill ground remained motionless until the infantry entered, at which point the flags began to flutter and wave incessantly.
The infantrymen were arrayed, with the younger ones in front and the older ones behind. The taller ones carried bows and the shorter ones carried spears. Jing Ye, clad in silver armor and riding white horses, led the drills, wielding halberds.
The drums sounded to advance, the gongs to halt; the formations shifted, numbering seven or eight at a time.
Xu Heng inspected the camps every year, and soon he noticed that Jingye's command was better than that of his former deputy general, and it was also among the best compared to the other camps.
Xu Hengsheng felt a sense of relief, and the corners of his lips turned up.
"Your Majesty, please observe the cavalry!" Jing Ye requested loudly. After Xu Heng gave his approval, the cavalrymen, in groups of eight, charged into battle. Although the engagement was brief, they displayed their strength and style to the fullest.
After the troops were mustered, the commander invited the emperor to dine in the main tent, with the generals in attendance. Jing Ye was about to remove his heavy armor and arrived a step late. When he lifted the tent flap, everyone looked towards the entrance. Xu Heng also looked at him warmly, stopped eating, and said with a smile, "General Wuwei, you've had a hard day. Please, have a seat!"
Jing Ye cupped his hands in thanks: "Thank you, Your Majesty."
He sat behind the second desk to the left of the emperor, one seat away from him, as was customary. The emperor, sitting across from Commander Yuan Wancheng, took the initiative to strike up a conversation with Jing Ye: "General Wuwei, what is the name of your seventh formation? I am ignorant and have never seen it before."
Jing Ye quickly bowed his head: "Your Majesty is too kind."
Even the commander Yuan Wancheng, who was standing between the two, dared not drink anymore, his body stiffening.
Jingye replied, "This seventh formation is called Liuru."
"The Six Formations..." Xu Heng murmured, smiling faintly, "Is it swift as the wind, silent as the forest, aggressive as fire, immovable as a mountain, unknowable as the shadows, and moving as thunder?"
"Exactly."
"Did you come up with this formation yourself?" Xu Heng gazed at Jing Ye, his eyes and tone equally warm.
"No," Jing Ye said slowly, "it was personally taught by my mentor."
"Could it be the former General Who Conquered the West?" Xu Heng suddenly felt the sunlight shining into his heart. He himself did not realize that his face shone as he spoke, and his eyes became bright.
"Exactly."
"The General has taught him well!" Xu Heng smiled at Jing Ye, his lips pursed. He admitted that he was a bit biased towards Wang Yuying, and even appreciated Wang Yuying's relatives and childhood friends as a result. No matter how he looked at Jing Ye, he found him pleasing to the eye.
A voice inside Xu Heng cried out: Quick! Quickly ask Jing Ye about Wang Yuying's past!
He had previously inquired with many people in the know and learned what Wang Yuying looked like as a child and a teenager, and what kind of life she led in Yumen Pass.
He just wanted to know more, he was never satisfied. Everyone is different, and perhaps there were still interesting stories he had never heard before in Jingye.
With so many people around and so many people around, it was inconvenient to speak, so Xu Heng held back with difficulty.
As they were about to leave the camp, Xu Heng finally managed to spend some time with Jing Ye. He asked her in rapid succession, "Did you grow up by the side of the General Who Conquers the West?"
“When I was nine years old, I was adopted by the General and learned skills from him.”
"After that, you were together?" Xu Heng glanced down at his and Jing Ye's shadows on the ground, occasionally intersecting.
"Yes, Your Majesty, I will be staying at the General's residence."
Xu Heng opened his lips, then closed them, suddenly feeling a pang of homesickness and unable to ask the question.
After a long pause, she said softly, "Then you grew up with Immortal Master Miaojing, right?"
Upon hearing this, Jing Ye's mind hadn't fully processed what was happening when his heart sank and turned cold.
"I am not familiar with it," he quickly replied to Xu Heng.
A sense of regret quickly filled Xu Heng's heart, like the miasma of Lingnan and the damp rain. A thought that he would never have any new news about Wang Yuying suddenly sprang out from the rainforest like a snake, its red tongue flicking at Xu Heng.
He was so frightened by the snake that he trembled, and his fear surged like a dam breaking and could not be stopped.
As Yuan Wancheng, the commander, and Ma Yu, the cavalry general accompanying the emperor on his inspection tour, approached, Xu Heng took a deep breath, suppressing his fear. He couldn't show his weakness in front of everyone.
He conversed with his generals as usual.
At the time of parting, Yuan Wancheng and Jing Ye saw the emperor off respectfully outside the camp gate. After the emperor's carriage disappeared from sight, the two commanders turned around one after the other, passed through the camp gate and headed towards the central military tent. Yuan Wancheng put his hands behind his back and said to Jing Ye, "General Ma just informed me that Consort Shu's family is not far from our camp. The Consort will be visiting her family and a sick relative soon, and she may also be praying for blessings. We will have to help escort her back and forth."
Jingye listened silently.
Ma Wancheng glanced at the sky, frowned, and continued, "Remind all the brothers in the camp to be observant and not let us down."
Immediately afterward, Jing Ye replied, "Alright, I will go and do it."
During the day, he arranged this matter and led the troops in drills, and at night, without anyone noticing, he would go up Fuyou Mountain again. Jing Ye felt as if there was an invisible string in Wang Yuying's hand; he was a kite, and once the string was reeled in at night, he would gently fall back into her arms.
Jingye, dressed in night clothes, climbed the mountain on foot, but sensed something unusual about the night.
He held his breath and stopped walking on the well-carved mountain path. Instead, he hid in the roadside bushes, weaving through trees and avoiding thorns. It seemed like he was asking for trouble, but after walking for a short while, he spotted a carriage parked by the roadside.
Jingye stopped and silently observed through the gaps in the tree branches—it was an extremely ordinary, inconspicuous carriage, and the driver was dozing against the door.
He listened for a while, and the breathing in the carriage was even, and most of the passengers had fallen asleep.
He had previously worried that the emperor was still thinking about Wang Yuying and had come to Fuyou Mountain to spy on her, but now he realized that the person in the carriage was unlikely to be the emperor and was probably a male traveler who was not comfortable staying at the female Taoist temple. He breathed a sigh of relief and his mood instantly became lighter.
He quietly left, bypassed the mountain gate, and climbed over the back gate to find that Wang Yuying's room was still lit.
It was reserved for him.
Jingye felt a warmth in his heart. In the long night, regardless of the cold or heat, there was always someone waiting for him to come home. It felt so good.
He climbed into the bedroom with a big smile on his face.
Wang Yuying, lying on the bed, looked at the emperor and raised an eyebrow with a smile: "What, is seeing the emperor making you so happy?"
Jing Ye's smile vanished instantly; it wasn't because of the audience with the Emperor! He hurriedly explained, recounting his words about leaving a lamp at home, but Wang Yuying remained silent with a smile. Jing Ye then said, "Today His Majesty wants to inquire about you from me."
Wang Yuying continued to smile, without opening her lips.
Jing Ye sat down beside her, took off his boots and robe, and recounted to Wang Yuying in detail how Xu Heng had asked him questions and how he had answered them. He snorted, "I don't want to tell him a single word about you!"
Wang Yuying smiled and raised her hand to gently stroke Jing Ye's back, as if to comfort him. Jing Ye turned around and snuggled up to her, holding the beauty he had been longing for day and night tightly in his arms.
Wang Yuying tilted her head back and exclaimed, "It itches!"
Jing Ye still wouldn't let go, and Wang Yuying said again, "You're squeezing me so tight I can hardly breathe!"
Jingye immediately released her.
The two lay flat.
Wang Yuying turned to Jing Ye, and he turned to meet her gaze, a smile playing on his lips.
Wang Yuying raised an eyebrow, and Jing Ye's lips curled up even more.
Upon seeing this, Wang Yuying sighed: He didn't understand what she meant.
So Wang Yuying took matters into her own hands, grabbed Jing Ye's arm on the side facing her, and pulled it up straight—she wanted an arm to use as a pillow!
She smiled and rested her head on the pillow.
Jing Ye smiled and said, "You can do what you want, but don't confront him directly."
Jing Ye was stunned for a moment before realizing that they were talking about the emperor again.
He felt displeased, but then thought: This is her showing concern for me, why be jealous? His displeasure instantly turned into warmth: "Don't worry, I'm not that stupid. Whether it's His Majesty today or the Imperial Concubine tomorrow, I will only pretend."
"The Imperial Concubine?" Wang Yuying frowned, her smile fading. She disliked Jiang Mei, and never would. "She's coming to your camp too?"
“No, it’s said that the Imperial Concubine is going to visit her family—” Jing Ye suddenly frowned at Wang Yuying, his expression becoming tense, “and she also wants to pray for blessings, and may come to your temple.”
Wang Yuying curled her lips, and Jiang Mei, fearing a beating, dared not come. She also found it strange: "What kind of relatives is she coming to the outskirts of Beijing to visit?"
"They say the Imperial Concubine's family is from this area..."
"You're mistaken. It's not Consort Gui, it's Consort Shu."
"Yes, yes, Consort Shu!" Jing Ye couldn't distinguish the many titles bestowed upon the emperor's concubines; in his eyes, they all looked the same, unlike military unit designations, which were different and easy to remember.
While Jing Ye was still trying to memorize the names, Wang Yuying's face gradually darkened, and she slowly opened her lips: "Back then, when Consort Shu miscarried, His Majesty came to my palace in a rage to question me. I said it wasn't me, but he didn't believe me. He was convinced that I had been treacherous and harmed Consort Shu." Wang Yuying pursed her lips, her eyes deep. "I remember his eyes. It was as if he was saying, 'If I can't have children myself, I won't allow others to have them.' How vicious."
Wang Yuying suddenly felt a warmth on her hand. Looking down, she saw Jing Ye holding her hand firmly.
His eyes were filled with pain, but his tone was firm: "You're not that kind of person, you wouldn't do such a thing."
Wang Yuying's lips curled up into a self-deprecating smile: "Yes, you can tell the difference, but His Majesty doesn't believe me."
A note from the author:
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