Chapter 101 "...You bastard, clean this up."...
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Inside the high walls was the family Jiang Ling'er had just sought help from. They weren't a wealthy or powerful family, but they were certainly well-off.
The boy who led them in was thin but tall, agile and light. Jiang Ling'er noticed that he was wearing a coarse linen shirt, and his hands, which had been used to climb over the wall, were rough and covered with many small wounds. He obviously did a lot of hard work and should be a servant of this family.
Sure enough, the boy led them to the woodshed in the backyard, where there were stacks of straw displayed all over the walls.
“You’re hiding here.”
After the boy finished speaking, he turned around and reached out to push them towards the haystack, but Jiang Ling'er suddenly grabbed his hand:
"Are you a golden man?"
It was dark, and Jiang Ling'er could only make out the boy's face when he was right in front of her.
The people of the Song Dynasty were mostly Han Chinese, especially those raised in the water towns of Jiangnan. Both men and women there generally had fair skin and dark hair, and good complexions. This young man, however, had yellowish-brown hair. One reason why the Jurchens were called "Yellow-Headed Slaves" was because of this. Although the young man's face was dirty, one could vaguely discern that his features possessed an androgynous, youthful charm somewhere between adolescence and adulthood. Yet, his eyes did not lie.
Those eyes, almost bluish-gray in the moonlight, were clearly...
It looks like a Jin person.
The boy paused, his grey-blue eyes fixed on her:
"If I were a golden man, would you still be standing here talking to me?"
As soon as he finished speaking, a commotion arose from the front yard; Jin soldiers had broken down the door and stormed in.
"search!"
"Don't miss a single corner!"
"yes!!!"
A pair of almond-shaped eyes and a pair of grey-blue eyes stared intently at each other. Jiang Ling'er and the boy locked eyes for a long time. Jiang Ling'er gripped the boy's hand so tightly that her knuckles turned white and the veins on the back of her hand stood out. It was a silent standoff. Finally, before the Jin soldiers stormed into the backyard, Jiang Ling'er frowned, released her grip on him, and hid behind a haystack with the unconscious Pei Xuan.
The boy staggered a step the moment Jiang Ling'er released him. Looking at his red and burning wrist, he realized that under the piercing gaze of those almond-shaped eyes, he had forgotten to breathe. When he came to his senses, his heart was pounding, cold sweat soaked his back, and he was panting heavily.
The next moment, a large number of Jin soldiers wielding long spears rushed into the backyard. The leading Jin soldier saw the boy, strode forward, grabbed him by the back of his collar, forced him to raise his head, and shouted:
"Who are you?!"
Upon seeing the boy's features, which clearly resembled those of a Jurchen, the leading Jurchen soldier was slightly taken aback. However, seeing his pale face and lingering fear, he quickly frowned.
"What are you afraid of? Are there other people around?"
"I...I'm just a lowly stable boy. When I suddenly saw these officials barging in with knives, I was naturally...naturally terrified. Please, sirs, spare my life..."
The boy cowered and curled up.
The leading Jurchen officer wanted to ask a few more questions, but his superiors were in a hurry. Seeing that the boy wasn't the person depicted in the portrait, he quickly released him, picked up two portraits, shoved them in front of the boy, and said gruffly:
"Have you seen these two people before?!"
The boy looked at the man and woman in the portrait, his gaze lingering for a moment, especially on the woman's almond-shaped eyes, before finally shrinking back and shaking his head.
--
Jiang Ling'er, who had witnessed everything through the gaps in the haystack, relaxed her tense shoulders slightly and breathed a sigh of relief. However, she did not completely relax and instead focused her gaze on the boy, observing him.
Upon closer inspection, it became clear that while the young man, who called himself a stable boy, resembled a Jurchen, he wasn't entirely the same. Jurchens typically had high cheekbones and rugged features, but aside from his hair and eye color, his facial lines were smooth, possessing the delicate elegance unique to people from the Jiangnan region.
He... is like a hybrid of the people of Nanjing and the people of Jin.
The next second, the homeowner came running from the front yard, looking both anxious and fearful:
"Sir, look, there's no one else in the backyard except for that bastard dog... cough cough, except for my stable boy..."
Upon hearing the homeowner's words, the Jin soldiers kicked the boy hard in the stomach in frustration. The boy, in pain, clutched his stomach and rolled on the ground, groaning but not daring to make a sound, swallowing everything whole.
These men, seemingly eager to find the two figures in the portrait, searched the house thoroughly, moving on to the next dwelling whenever they couldn't find them. Only when the Jurchen soldiers finally gave up and filed out did the homeowner breathe a sigh of relief. Then he heard the leading Jurchen soldier glance at the overflowing haystacks in the room and utter a single sentence:
"Search thoroughly before you leave."
The boy, who was writhing on the ground clutching his stomach in pain, suddenly stopped and looked up to see two or three Jin soldiers raising their hands to plunge long spears into the haystack!
He stabbed from beginning to end before finally stopping.
Not content with that, the leading Jurchen soldier grabbed the homeowner by the collar and slapped the cold blade against his face.
"Listen up, anyone who dares to harbor these two will die! On the contrary, anyone who can provide information on their whereabouts... no, anyone whose whereabouts are suspicious, will be rewarded with a hundred taels of silver. Remember that!"
The homeowner's face turned ashen: "I...I've remembered!"
The Jin soldiers then strode away, leaving no trace of them.
“…You bastard, clean this up.”
The homeowner, still shaken, finally regained his composure, hastily uttered a few words, and returned to the front yard, closing the doors tightly.
During this time, the young horse slave stared blankly at the haystack. Even after the golden man and the homeowner left, leaving behind a mess, he did not look away, staring at the haystack as if he were dumbfounded.
Suddenly, the haystack shook, and bits of straw fell like snowflakes.
Jiang Ling'er pushed aside the thick haystacks that were blocking her and Pei Xuan, and hissed softly as if in pain, clutching her chest. She gritted her teeth and tore off the Dongpo scarf covering her face, taking out a string of Buddhist beads from her collar. One of the beads was cracked and split in two, falling to the ground.
She then discovered that the prayer beads she had exchanged with Liansheng in exchange for a promise were not ordinary prayer beads, but were made of purple sandalwood, which is known as the "wood of emperors".
Fortunately, these prayer beads protected me, otherwise...
Jiang Ling'er carefully put the prayer beads back into her collar, then suddenly paused. In the blink of an eye, she used her elusive footwork to instantly appear at the threshold, blocking the boy's path. Before he could react, she had already grabbed his throat with one hand and said coldly:
"Where are you rushing off to? Are you trying to tip someone off for a reward?"
Seeing the boy still struggling, and fearing to alert the owner of the front yard, Jiang Ling'er used her other hand to press on his chest acupoints, but it felt as if she had pressed on a piece of cotton; her fingertips froze in mid-air, and she looked utterly astonished.
"You...you're a woman???"
The boy, after all, was not a martial artist, and no matter how hard he struggled, he couldn't break free from Jiang Ling'er's grasp. His grey-blue eyes glared fiercely at Jiang Ling'er, at her fair and flat neck exposed after she tore off her Dongpo scarf, and he gritted his teeth:
"Aren't you the same!"
Jiang Ling'er: "..."
"…………"
Seeing that the "boy" was still struggling, and fearing that he would alert the Jin soldiers again, Jiang Ling'er said coldly, "I won't hurt you, don't move!"
Suddenly, the boy said something completely out of the blue:
"He was badly injured."
Jiang Ling'er paused, and as if possessed, looked back—
Blood droplets were visible seeping through the straw...
Following the blood droplets, Pei Xuan was still unconscious, his handsome face devoid of color, and blood was continuously flowing from the corner of his mouth.
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