Chapter 49
Proofreader : Mim
The closed door and windows reflected the shadow of a man outside.
“Open the door… open the door…” A man’s drunken voice echoed outside as he pounded on the wooden door. From the slurred tone alone, Li Zhi recognized that it was Lu Congruan, whom she had encountered earlier that day.
She calmly rose to her feet and opened the door.
Lu Congruan staggered in, reeking of alcohol. His face was flushed red from drinking, and without sparing Li Zhi a glance, he stumbled straight into the room and collapsed onto her bed.
Li Zhi glanced at the empty courtyard before turning back to look at him.
“Young Master, did you come here alone?”
Lu Congruan didn’t respond. He simply lay there, staring vacantly at the bare ceiling, mumbling, “Why didn’t you choose me…?”
“Young Master, you’re drunk. There are servants outside—I’ll call someone to come assist you.”
“No one. No one… I came here alone,” Lu Congruan murmured as he pushed himself up into a seated position, his face filled with despair. His red, bleary eyes glistened with tears, as if he had just cried.
“Tell me… what do I lack compared to that useless prince, Xie Lanxu?”
Li Zhi remained silent, but he continued talking to himself, as though pouring out years of pent-up frustration.
“I know you are a proud person. I’ve never forced you to accept me. Even though you’re nothing more than a servant now, I’ve never treated you like one. Tell me, which master would give a servant gold and silver, fine food, and clothing? More than that… I have genuine feelings for you, and yet I’ve never once forced myself on you. I respect you, I wait for you, hoping that one day you’ll see me in a different light…”
“Xie Lanxu may still hold his noble title, but in the emperor’s eyes, he’s no different from a lowly commoner. During the time of the Crown Prince, enemies were countless; countless people wanted him dead. He cannot even protect himself—how can he possibly give you a happy future?”
“Tell me… what does he have that I don’t?”
Li Zhi’s expression remained calm. “Young Master has his merits, and His Highness has his strengths.”
“The first time I saw you… I knew you were different. I’ve never lost my composure before a woman, but when I saw you, I nearly tripped over my own feet. I’d never felt so flustered. From the moment we met, I’ve treated you well. But Xie Lanxu—he’s never even cared about you.”
“When you first arrived at the Mansion, he told my father himself that there was no special relationship between you two. That’s why you were sent to the laundry house. If he had truly wanted to protect you from the beginning, would you have suffered so much?”
“Do you know… after you left the Mansion, I dismissed every maidservant from the Fufeng Courtyard, keeping only the stable boys to serve me? I did it because I hoped you would change your mind and return to me. I dismissed them all just to show you—I don’t need anyone else, as long as you’re by my side. Can Xie Lanxu make such a promise?”
Li Zhi quietly regarded him. “Young Master, you misunderstand something.”
Lu Congruan’s chest heaved as he stared at her.
“My feelings for His Highness… have nothing to do with how he treats me.”
Lu Congruan froze, unable to process her words. His face twisted with pain and humiliation.
“So no matter what I do for you, it’s useless? Even if Xie Lanxu tramples you into the mud, you’ll still love him hopelessly?”
“I am but a criminal’s daughter. Marrying me will bring Young Master no benefit. My appearance is not unique either—if Young Master wishes, it wouldn’t be difficult to find someone just as beautiful as me. Have you ever thought about why you are so fixated on me?”
Lu Congruan opened his mouth but could not answer.
Li Zhi’s voice remained calm. “To me, it seems that your focus on me has more to do with a desire to surpass His Highness in some way than genuine affection.”
Lu Congruan’s expression wavered before he muttered, “…Even if that’s partly true, my feelings for you are real.”
“You truly will not look at me?”
Li Zhi bowed deeply. “My heart is not a stone; it cannot be moved. Please, Young Master, forget about me.”
The last glimmer of light in Lu Congruan’s eyes extinguished. His drunken gaze turned clear, yet fatigued and filled with anger. The flushed redness on his cheeks faded, replaced by an unhealthy pallor.
“Forget you? No. You’re a slave of the Lu Mansion. How I treat you is my right.”
His words took on a twisted, reckless tone as he rose from the bed and advanced toward her. The oppressive masculine force radiating from him sent warning bells ringing in Li Zhi’s mind.
“Young Master, stop where you are.”
Lu Congruan froze when he saw the dagger Li Zhi had drawn from behind her back. He laughed bitterly, his steps unfaltering.
“Good. To die by your hand, I’m willing.”
“I have received the Lu Mansion’s grace and would never harm Young Master.”
Lu Congruan stopped abruptly, disbelief flashing across his face as he saw the dagger now pressed against her own neck.
“If Young Master continues to press me, I will have no choice but to end my life to repay the Mansion’s kindness.”
“You would rather die than…”
Lu Congruan’s voice trembled, his face a mask of anguish. The words he wanted to say caught in his throat.
After a long silence, a single tear slid down from his red-rimmed eyes.
As though he could no longer endure the suffocating air in the room, Lu Congruan turned abruptly and stumbled out of the courtyard without looking back.
Li Zhi stepped outside, her gaze lingering on Xie Lanxu’s door.
The door remained shut, and there was no light visible within—as though its occupant had long since asleep. But Li Zhi didn’t believe that for a moment.
Xie Lanxu must have known everything that transpired in her room. The absence of light only made his knowledge more conspicuous.
She returned to her room, closed the door, extinguished the oil lamp, and lay down.
—-
The next day, everything was as usual.
By evening, however, messengers from the Lu Mansion arrived.
Steward Li gathered everyone in the courtyard and asked if anyone had seen Young Master Lu Congruan since the previous night.
The workers exchanged puzzled glances. No one spoke.
Li Zhi looked across the crowd toward Xie Lanxu.
He noticed her gaze almost immediately. Their eyes met, and he smiled faintly.
His smile was gentle and unassailable—flawless.
Countless thoughts flashed through Li Zhi’s mind.
Had Lu Congruan’s unannounced visit been impulsive, or had someone encouraged him?
Had she been part of Xie Lanxu’s plan since the moment they exchanged jewelry at the market stall?
Chapter 49
On the third day, Lu Congruan still had not returned to the Duhu Mansion.
Because someone had witnessed Lu Congruan leaving the town gates on the night he went missing, Lu Han mobilized the army to conduct a full search of all the nearby areas he might have gone.
For this reason, all the usable horses were borrowed from the horse farm. Even the oxen were not spared. With nothing to do, Steward Li gave Li Zhi and the others a day off.
Li Zhi instinctively sensed that this was a turbulent spring.
In order to keep herself out of it, she had planned to remain indoors all day. But at this moment, Xie Lanxu invited her to go see the flowers at Agate Lake.
When they set off, a light drizzle was falling from the sky.
Li Zhi brought an oil-paper umbrella, which she opened and held above their heads. To avoid the rain, they walked side by side.
Since all the adult horses at the horse farm had been borrowed for the search, they couldn’t even take an ox. They had no choice but to walk to Agate Lake.
For Li Zhi, who had once walked 3,000 miles, this distance was nothing. What surprised her, however, was that the frail-looking Xie Lanxu managed to walk for half an hour without breaking a sweat.
The two climbed over a small hill and stood at its peak. Li Zhi saw a scene of shimmering silver and lush green.
Under the vast sky of azure blue, clear streams branched out like countless silver threads, weaving through the dense, verdant trees, before gathering into a mirror-like lake that reflected the sky.
A fresh mountain breeze mixed with the drizzling rain blew toward them. In the vastness of heaven and earth, Li Zhi felt as small as a grain of sand.
To the world, her existence, her ambitions, her calculations and plans were probably nothing more than childish tricks others had attempted countless times before—utterly insignificant.
She closed her eyes and felt the soft kisses of the spring rain.
“Do you truly want to return to the capital?”
Xie Lanxu’s words woke her from her thoughts.
“What does Your Highness mean by that?” She instinctively used the formal honorific.
Xie Lanxu looked at her calmly, as if he had been watching her like this the entire time she had her eyes closed.
“Just what it sounds like.”
“Of course I want to go back,” Li Zhi said with a deliberate smile. “That’s my home.”
Without waiting for Xie Lanxu to respond, she started walking down the hill.
“Ah-Li, let’s see who gets to the lake first! The loser has to carry the winner for two steps!”
Xie Lanxu watched her back as she walked away. Her carefree demeanor still lingered in his mind. In the moment when she closed her eyes to savor the rain, he almost believed she was a free spirit born of these mountains.
“Ah-Li, what are you waiting for? Hurry up!” Li Zhi called, waving to him with a smile.
Finally, Xie Lanxu lifted his foot and walked toward her.
As they neared the foot of the hill, Xie Lanxu quickened his pace, taking two steps at a time, and overtook Li Zhi at the last moment.
“Ah-Li, you’re not going to make a weak girl like me carry you, are you?” Li Zhi widened her eyes in mock indignation.
Xie Lanxu looked at her and said, “I’ll owe you.”
He continued walking toward the lake, and Li Zhi followed closely behind.
“Ah-Li, where are the flowers?”
“You’ll see soon enough.” As they neared the lake, Xie Lanxu suddenly reached out and covered her eyes. “Close your eyes and wait for me.”
The warmth of his palm pressed gently against her eyes. Without realizing it, Li Zhi responded, “All right.”
Xie Lanxu withdrew his hand.
Li Zhi closed her eyes, hearing only the sound of his footsteps fading away. Soon after, there was the sound of something being dragged. Whatever it was, he pulled it to the lakeshore, and Li Zhi heard the splash of water.
Then he walked back and took her hand.
“Open your eyes.”
Li Zhi opened her eyes, and he led her to the lakeshore.
There, a small boat gently swayed in the water.
The two of them boarded the boat one after the other. Xie Lanxu picked up the wooden plank and rowed toward the deeper part of Agate Lake.
At first, the boat was still near the shallows. The lake’s surface was covered in floating water plants, while smooth, patterned pebbles lay on the lakebed, half-hidden among the tangled plants like flowers blooming in the water.
Li Zhi reached her hand into the water, playing with the icy-cold lake water.
As the boat glided beneath the canopy of tall trees, large shadows fell over them. The drizzle had not stopped, yet the sun had already appeared. Fragments of sunlight scattered like gold across the two of them.
“Look, the flowers are here,” Xie Lanxu said.
The boat broke through the dark green water plants, rippling the silver surface of the water. Countless pure white flowers, with tender yellow stamens, bloomed in the direction of the current. Their green stems swayed with the gentle waves.
A thin mist hovered above the lake’s surface, merging with the golden morning light.
Li Zhi couldn’t help but fold up her oil-paper umbrella, allowing the fine rain to fall on her.
“What are these flowers?” she asked.
Notes for Context:
- 3,000 mile:- A unit of distance in ancient China. Roughly, 1 mile equals 0.5 kilometers.
- Oil-paper umbrella (油纸伞): A traditional Chinese umbrella, often seen as elegant and romantic in literary and artistic depictions.
“Hai Cai Hua (Waterweed Flower).”
“I’ve never seen flowers like this before.”
“That’s why I brought you here,” Xie Lanxu said.
An inexplicable feeling floated between them.
“Come closer.”
Xie Lanxu gestured, and Li Zhi obediently leaned toward him.
He wrapped her in his embrace, letting her half-recline against him to watch the dazzling sunlit rain and the drifting waterweed flowers.
The overlapping green sleeves and water-blue skirt blended together. The pure white flowers with a hint of soft yellow intertwined with the glistening green waves. Xie Lanxu’s chin rested gently on her head. The two of them seemed to merge into one, like the waterweed flowers themselves—drifting along with the current.
As the morning sun rose to the peak of Xian Naiyue Mountain, the silver-needle rain gradually ceased.
The two leisurely basked in the warmth of the sunlight.
“Banban, when we return to the capital, what do you want to do?”
“I want to revive the Li family.”
“That’s all?”
“That’s not simple at all,” Li Zhi said. “Although my father’s younger brother still serves the former dynasty, he separated from our branch of the family years ago. After the split, the two brothers cut off all contact. I imagine my uncle has little affection for us. Now, the only ones left in the Li family are clueless juniors. To rebuild a family tainted by the crime of treason is no easy task. What’s more—”
“What’s more?”
“What’s more, only when the Li family returns to prominence can my sister’s injustice be cleared.”
“How did your sister die?” Xie Lanxu asked.
“…She fell ill but didn’t dare let anyone know. She secretly took medicine, but it led to massive blood loss,” Li Zhi said. “The person I want vengeance against is the one who caused my sister to fall ill.”
“Who is it?” Xie Lanxu asked.
“Someone with great power.”
“You can’t say?”
Li Zhi turned around, bracing her right hand against Xie Lanxu’s chest. She gazed at him with pleading eyes, “I know that if Your Highness knew who it was, you would eliminate that person for me. For Your Highness, it would be easy. But I want to rely on my own strength to avenge my twin sister. I want to use my own schemes to bring that person to ruin and personally seek justice for my sister. Ah-Li—can you let me be willful, just this once?”
Xie Lanxu thought for a moment before answering, “All right.”
To him, this matter posed no threat.
Xie Lanxu didn’t care who the person was, because he knew with certainty that her sister’s death had nothing to do with him. Whoever she sought revenge against was a trivial matter of no concern to him.
What mattered to him was something else entirely.
“Do you have other motives?”
Li Zhi looked up at him, her bright, jet-black eyes reflecting his image.
“What motives?” she asked innocently, as though she didn’t understand the question.
“Other than avenging your sister, do you have another reason for staying by my side?”
Li Zhi looked at him and smiled. The crescent curve of her eyes held shards of sunlight.
“Ah-Li, you’re being suspicious again.”
Her gaze was gentle as she reached out and touched his face, her fingertips still chilled from the lake water.
“Ah-Li, look into my eyes.” She stared steadily into Xie Lanxu’s deep, dark eyes and spoke each word clearly: “I linger like a young swallow because you are you. No matter how many times Ah-Li asks, my answer will never change—”
She paused, her mouth suddenly dry.
Under Xie Lanxu’s watchful gaze, her heart pounded like a drum. Perhaps because she was still a maiden, the words she spoke felt so bold and fiery.
“I want to stay by Ah-Li’s side because looking at Ah-Li brings me joy.”
Xie Lanxu stared at her, observing every shift in her expression.
Every word she spoke sounded so real that he couldn’t detect any flaw. His emotions rose and fell with her words. He couldn’t help but want to believe her, yet a seed of doubt still lingered inside him.
What he cared about were the traces of lies on her.
Her face was so close that Xie Lanxu felt as though he were looking into a mirror—seeing himself, a person full of lies.
He could see it, but he couldn’t touch it—this tangled web of truth and falsehood.
“Do you mean it?” he asked softly.
“Absolutely,” she replied.
“I have a gift for you,” Xie Lanxu said.
He was curious—both intrigued and excited—about this game of hide-and-seek with lies.
Li Zhi looked at him in confusion as he turned the boat toward the shore.
When the boat docked, the hull shook sharply before settling. Once it stilled, Xie Lanxu stood up first and stepped onto land. Then he extended his hand toward Li Zhi, who was still on the boat.
Li Zhi grasped his hand and carefully stepped ashore.
“What surprise does Ah-Li have in store?”
Xie Lanxu didn’t say a word.
He released Li Zhi’s hand, walked to the side of the boat, and with a powerful grip, flipped the boat over.
Lu Congruan’s pale, swollen face stared up at the rainy blue sky, his eyes bulging in fury and fogged with death. His mouth was stuffed with a piece of waterlogged cloth, and his body was tied securely to the bottom of the boat with hemp ropes.
Li Zhi’s entire body stiffened, and nausea churned in her stomach. She suddenly remembered how the boat had swayed earlier when it was placed in the water.
The image of Lu Congruan struggling desperately flashed through her mind. Perhaps, in his final moments, the last thing he saw was her fingers playfully dipping into the water.
His bulging eyes might have been mere inches away from her touch.
She nearly vomited on the spot, but Xie Lanxu’s sharp gaze pierced her like needles. She forcibly swallowed her nausea and turned her eyes away from Lu Congruan’s corpse.
Xie Lanxu stepped in front of her and stopped.
The dark green hem of his robe hung over the damp ground, like a stalk of green bamboo growing from muddy earth.
“With him, we’ll soon return to the capital,” he said, lifting her chin and forcing her to meet his gaze.
“Aren’t you happy, Banban?”
“…What does Lu Congruan have to do with us returning to the capital?”
“You’ll understand soon enough,” Xie Lanxu replied with a smile.
He gently touched her cheek, mimicking the way she had touched him earlier.
“Now, when you see me, do you still feel joy?”
Notes for Context:
- Hai Cai Hua (海菜花): Also called “waterweed flower,” these aquatic flowers often symbolize purity, serenity, and transience. Their delicate presence contrasts sharply with the grim discovery later in the chapter.
Translator’s Note: – Oh my god !!! Even I am afraid of Xie Lanxu now…..
