Chasing Jade (Zhu Yu)

Fan Changyu slept restlessly, her fever spiking again during the night.

She was trapped in a nightmare, her vision filled with a vast expanse of white snowfields as heavy snowflakes fell in thick clusters.

Clad in thin garments and barefoot, she ran desperately across the snow, her feet nearly numb from the cold, yet she dared not stop.

At first, Fan Changyu didn't know what she was chasing—until she spotted a couple walking hand in hand through the distant snow. Then she understood why she was in such a hurry.

It's Father and Mother!

She ran even harder, her chest aching with a sour, swelling pain as hot tears welled up in her eyes. "Father! Mother!" she called out.

The two figures ahead weren't moving quickly, yet no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't catch up. Frustration and despair nearly brought her to tears.

Finally, the woman in the snow turned around, her face as gentle as Changyu remembered. "Be good, Changyu," she said softly. "Go back."

Fan Changyu didn't understand why she felt so heartbroken. As tears streamed down her face, her chest throbbed with pain. "Where are you going?" she asked helplessly.

The woman didn't answer, only turned back to continue walking alongside the man.

Changyu stood frozen, feeling as though she had forgotten something. Her chest tightened painfully, and breathing became agonizing, as if she were drowning.

When Xie Zheng returned with a basin of warm water to cool her fever, he found her trapped in the nightmare—her body convulsing uncontrollably, drenched in sweat that soaked her hair and underclothes. Her pale face was flushed an unnatural red from the high fever, her murmurs incoherent, and her eyes damp with tears.

"Nightmare?"

This was the first time Xie Zheng had seen her in such a disheveled, vulnerable state. His chest tightened as if stuffed with damp cotton—soft yet suffocating. He shook her gently. "Wake up."

But Fan Changyu was too deeply ensnared by the nightmare, showing no signs of waking.

Seeing her thrash dangerously close to injuring her left arm again, he carefully avoided the wound and pressed a hand against her shoulder to still her movements. Coldly, he ordered the personal guard outside, "Fetch the physician!"

Earlier, after the physician had examined her and her condition seemed stable, Xie Zheng had sent him back with the guards, as the old woman's home had no spare room for him to stay.

Who could have predicted Fan Changyu would suddenly convulse in the night?

What kind of nightmare was this?

Xie Zheng frowned unconsciously. Noticing blood seeping from her tightly clenched lips, he reached to pry her jaw open but accidentally had his knuckles bitten instead.

He tried to pull free, but her teeth only clamped down harder, instantly breaking skin and leaving a ring of bloody teeth marks.

With only a slight furrow of his brow, Xie Zheng let her keep biting his index finger.

Feeling her entire body tremble in his arms, the sight of her frail, curled-up frame stirred long-buried memories. He had never comforted anyone in his life, yet now, after a hesitant pause, he softened his voice. "It's just a nightmare. There's nothing to fear."

In his childhood, the woman's blood-stained skirt hanging from the beam had been his own relentless nightmare. Every time he woke up convulsing, he was either alone in endless darkness or met with Wei Yan standing coldly by his bed, staring at him like a dead dog.Wei Xuan would lead the children of the Wei clan to mock him, imitating his convulsions during nightmares for their amusement.

Later, he was no longer afraid of nightmares.

Having crawled out from mountains of corpses and seas of blood, the blood on his blade was thicker than the vengeful spirits in his dreams.

At this moment, Fan Changyu’s trembling figure seemed to overlap with the memory of his younger self.

Xie Zheng’s eyes darkened. While waiting for the physician, he let Changyu bite down on his knuckle, half-holding her as he stiffly patted her back in slow, soothing motions.

The words he repeated most often were: "Don’t be afraid."

Don’t be afraid—nightmares always end.

By the time the personal guard hauled the physician from his bed, flung him onto a horse, and galloped back, Changyu had already calmed down, though she had exhausted herself and fallen into a deep sleep once more.

Xie Zheng sat casually on a wooden chair in the room, his left index finger bearing a row of bloody bite marks. His gaze was distant, his lashes half-lowered, strands of hair falling over his eyes as if lost in thought.

Only when the trembling physician was carried through the door did Xie Zheng’s lazy yet oppressive glance sweep over him. "She had a nightmare," he said flatly.

The physician, dragged from his bed in the dead of night like a sleepwalker, had expected some dire emergency—only to find it was just a nightmare!

Indignation clogged his throat, yet he dared not voice a single complaint. Under the man’s piercing gaze, cold sweat broke out down his back, and he resigned himself to checking the unconscious woman’s pulse with trembling hands.

To his surprise, her pulse, which had been weak that afternoon, was now much steadier.

Stealing a glance at the strikingly handsome yet grim-faced man beside her, the physician didn’t dare say the woman was perfectly fine. After much deliberation, he prescribed a sedative. "Your wife must have suffered a fright. This calming draught will help her sleep more soundly."

The personal guard looked to Xie Zheng, who gave a slight nod, before escorting the physician to the kitchen to prepare the medicine.

Once the sedative was ready, Xie Zheng pried open Changyu’s jaw again and fed it to her spoon by spoon.

Only then did the two rows of bloody bite marks on his left index finger begin to throb faintly.

He glanced at them after finishing the task but said nothing.

The guard hesitantly offered травма medicine. "Marquis, should you tend to your wound?"

Xie Zheng dismissed the minor injury with a wave. "It’s nothing."

As the guard retreated with the bowl, he stole another glance at the unconscious Fan Changyu, his mind reeling.

Though her looks were pleasing, she was hardly a peerless beauty—so why had the Marquis taken such an interest in her?

Then he recalled how she had single-handedly lifted a grown man and hurled him across the room, and a shiver ran down his spine.

That arm strength… was probably on par with their Marquis’s, wasn’t it?

After taking the sedative, Changyu indeed slept deeply for the rest of the night without fever returning.

Xie Zheng dozed lightly by the bedside for two hours. At the first light of dawn, a soft knock sounded at the door.

He checked on Changyu, noting her deep slumber, then took the cloak from the stool and left the room without a sound.The personal guard outside the house lowered his voice hastily upon seeing him emerge: "Marquis, we've located Sui Yuanqing's whereabouts—he was indeed hiding in Clear Breeze Stronghold! When the stronghold was raided, he escaped with some of its members through a rear mountain path during the chaos. Now our men have driven them to Pineshade Mountain."

Xie Zheng's eyes gleamed with icy resolve: "Block all mountain exits and release the hounds. Let's see how long he can hide."

The guard couldn't conceal his excitement as he clasped his fists: "I'll see to it immediately!"

A cold wind swept by. Xie Zheng watched a frost-laden withered leaf drift to his feet and suddenly remarked, "The wind blows from the southwest today."

Before the guard could grasp his meaning, Xie Zheng continued: "Create heavy smoke upwind. Bring the bandit leader's corpse along too—flog it posthumously."

After a startled pause, the guard's face lit up with greater delight: "As you command, my lord!"

Flogging the Clear Breeze Stronghold chief's corpse at Pineshade Mountain's base would surely terrify the remaining bandits hiding above. After the smoke had choked them thoroughly, releasing the hounds would guarantee flushing out the remnants. With all exits guarded, it would be like catching turtles in a jar—

Another heavy snow day, yet Pineshade Mountain was shrouded in thick smoke. Massive piles of burning pine and cypress branches sent billowing clouds drifting deep into the forest with the wind, while hounds weaved through the dense woods, their barks rising and falling like wolves chasing prey.

The bandits scattered in panic, only to be ambushed by waiting soldiers whenever they appeared on mountain paths. Yet when the smoke cleared and the troops tallied their captives, neither Sui Yuanqing nor the female bandit from Clear Breeze Stronghold was among them.

The young officer pressed his blade against a bandit's throat: "Where are Qin Yuan and that Yan woman?"

The bandit pleaded: "I don't know! When the smoke came, we all scattered running from the dogs in the woods."

Seeing no answers forthcoming, the officer sent search parties uphill—only to find two soldiers with slit throats, stripped of their armor.

"Damn it!" the officer swore darkly. "After them—down the mountain now!"

At a mountain foot where a stream gurgled, two figures in soldiers' garb who had galloped dozens of miles along the official road finally reined in. They tumbled from their horses to the riverbank and, ignoring the snow, knelt to gulp the icy water greedily.

One—a woman by her high-pitched sobs—suddenly broke into wrenching tears by the bank. The man beside her, having drunk his fill, lay gasping in the snow without offering comfort. When recovered, he removed his armor and hurled it into the river before striding toward the warhorses.

Seeing him prepare to leave alone, the weeping woman's cries hitched in alarm. She scrambled after him: "Brother Qin! Where are you going?"

These were Sui Yuanqing (now "Qin Yuan") and Yan Thirteen Sister—having killed two soldiers for their uniforms to escape Pineshade Mountain. As Sui Yuanqing mounted, the woman desperately clutched his arm.

He looked down at her tearful face. Tall for a woman, with plain features and the windburned cheeks of mountain girls, she'd have been fit only for menial work in Changxin Prince Manor.He thought he had fallen for women who were skilled in martial arts and wild at heart, but now it seemed that wasn’t the case.

The only one who truly made his heart itch was that woman.

He had a pair of mesmerizing peach-blossom eyes, especially charming when he smiled.

Now, as he curled his lips, he slowly pried Thirteen Sister’s fingers from his arm: "The world is vast, and I have my own path. Farewell."

His smile was cold, yet still captivating.

Thirteen Sister froze. When she came to her senses, she clutched Sui Yuanqing desperately, her nails digging into his flesh through his clothes as she shrieked hysterically, "What do you mean? You’re leaving me behind?"

Sui Yuanqing raised a brow slightly, as if her question was foolish, and smirked. "Why not?"

Her nails were too sharp, stinging his arm.

Frowning, he lost all patience, yanked her hand away, and mounted his horse in one swift motion.

Thirteen Sister cried bitterly, "Qin Yuan, you heartless bastard! My brother distracted the officers so we could escape! How can you betray him like this?"

Sui Yuanqing scoffed. "Escaping the authorities is a matter of skill. Or do you think those people on Yansong Mountain died for nothing?"

Thirteen Sister wailed, "Have you forgotten I saved you from the riverbank? You can’t do this to me—"

Sui Yuanqing suddenly grinned, even leaning down from his horse to meet her gaze. "You saved me, but didn’t I also get you out of Yansong Mountain? Why can’t I do this to you?"

With that, he straightened, tugged the reins, and rode off without another glance.

Thirteen Sister screamed curses after him, "Qin Yuan, may you die a wretched death!"

Sui Yuanqing ignored her cries, galloping away before finally pulling out the painting he had later retrieved from the Fan Family.

The painting depicted what seemed like a family of three—a strikingly handsome man, a woman with a lively, sweet smile, and a mischievous little girl who looked just like her.

The wound on his shoulder, stabbed by Fan Changyu, still ached, but Sui Yuanqing’s mood suddenly brightened.

From the moment he found this painting, he had guessed that the masked man who wounded him was Xie Zheng.

As for the woman in the painting and her connection to him…

Could she be his secret lover?

And the child—their daughter?

Sui Yuanqing studied the painting again. The woman appeared to be a young maiden, but if she had a child that age, she’d have to be at least twenty.

Then he recalled his elder brother’s runaway concubine, who had borne a son yet still looked like a girl, and slowly accepted the possibility.

No wonder that woman had guarded the dry well so fiercely. Xie Zheng must have left Qingping County due to the war, and knowing she couldn’t escape with a child, she hid the girl inside.

The thought that she had already borne Xie Zheng a daughter darkened Sui Yuanqing’s expression. He tucked the painting back into his robes, spurred his horse, and rode on.

No matter what, this trip to Qingping County wasn’t entirely fruitless.

At the very least, he had discovered the Wu'an Marquis’s weakness.