Chapter 28: Perilous Encounter in Hard Times

Wen Zhixu arrived in haste, the hem of his moon-white brocade robe soaked through by rain, the water stains light and dark, clinging damply to his ankles. The usually refined young master was now drenched like a drowned rat, yet he paid it no mind, carefully protecting the oil-paper package in his arms.

“Second Master Wen.”

Wen Zhixu recognized the approaching figure. The elderly Housekeeper before him served at Tinghe Courtyard.

Why would Miss Lin’s attendant be here?

The young man’s sharp jaw lifted slightly in acknowledgment as he brushed past the Housekeeper, his indifferent gaze falling upon the object in her hands.

Those were Lin Xihe’s embroidered shoes – he would recognize them even if they turned to ashes.

A glimmer of morning light reflected in his eyes as Wen Zhixu suddenly halted: “Housekeeper Li, is your mistress here?”

The elderly Housekeeper felt quite gratified. The noble Second Master wasn’t as arrogant as rumors suggested, even addressing her politely – though her maiden surname was Yan.

“Second Master, the young mistress is waiting to distribute porridge and will also offer some incense.”

“I see.” The young man nodded and strode forward, entering directly as if familiar with the nunnery’s layout like his own backyard.

The abbess was chanting scriptures inside, the distant Buddhist hymns washing away worldly troubles.

While Huixin and Huici chanted with their lips, their hearts were preoccupied with other concerns.

One thought: After her daughter finished playing in the back hills, could she see her? She wanted to speak with her.

The other remained perplexed: Why would her son eat those extremely sour sugar-coated hawthorns – he had been picky since childhood, disliking sour flavors and overly sweet tastes, his diet as mild as his temperament.

As the sun reached its zenith, smoke began rising from the temple’s kitchen.

After finishing divination readings for devotees, Huici entered the kitchen and encountered a solitary figure.

The tall young man was curled on a small stool, a smudge of ash on his cheek. He held a folding fan, occasionally fanning the stove opening.

Huici froze at the doorway.

“Mother.” Wen Zhixu’s call was interrupted by rough voices outside.

The Lin family coachman shouted: “See this? The wheel hubs need to be replaced with ones like ours from the Lin residence! Premium hardwood wrapped in iron, very expensive! This is why our young mistress never complains about bumpy rides – though of course, she still uses several extra cushions!”

“Our Second Master doesn’t complain either.” The Wen family’s new coachman was an honest man, grinning toothily at the remark. It was said the previous coachman had been dismissed by the furious Second Master after his carriage bumped into Miss Lin.

Being fellow coachmen, the two had crossed paths many times before the mansions. The Lin family coachman familiarly tapped the other’s forehead: “In our line of work, we must always consider our masters’ comfort first.”The Wen family’s new coachman truly took this to heart, scratching his head while humbly asking: ‘How many cushions does your young mistress use?””

The Lin family coachman spread both hands wide: “Ten – count ’em!”

Inside, Wen Zhixu’s fanning hand paused slightly, almost thinking he had misheard.

Upon reflection, it did seem like something she would do.

Ten cushions? Why didn’t she just move her entire bed into the carriage?

As Wen Zhixu was pondering this, the Lin family’s elderly Housekeeper’s vigorous voice carried from outside: “Make way everyone, clear a sunny spot! I need to air the young mistress’s mattress!”

Following this came the sound of mattress beating as the Housekeeper vigorously pounded it while giving orders: “Lin Da! Be quick about it, clean the carriage inside and out! The wheels are covered in mud – be careful not to dirty the young mistress’s mattress and cushions!”

Wen Zhixu’s fanning hand stopped completely: “…”

Well, he hadn’t thought this through enough earlier.

The atmosphere descended into a delicate awkwardness.

Huici finally got a clear look at the fan’s surface: with just a few ink strokes, a pitch-black ghostly face was sketched out.

…It looked like the Black Impermanence from storybooks had slipped right out of the pages.

Her son’s taste… Huici fell silent for a moment.

“Ahem,” Wen Zhixu, noticing his mother’s gaze, explained softly, “I found this fan.”

One day, he had picked up this fan by the courtyard wall—without needing to think too hard, he could almost picture Lin Xihe’s furious stomping, so enraged that she threw this fan into his territory in defeat.

“Patron Wen, you needn’t do these things.” Huici hardened her heart, adopting a tone meant to dismiss guests.

The female ghost on the fan surface intruded into Wen Zhixu’s mind, and for some reason, he recalled Lin Xihe’s coquettish manner when she called her father—her voice was just too loud, carrying clearly over the wall into the Wen residence.

As if possessed, Wen Zhixu suddenly uttered: “Mother.”

The medicinal decoction boiled over, its steam reddening his eyes. From Huici’s perspective, her son seemed to be crying.

Before leaving, she tossed out a softened remark: “Leave the medicine here. I’ll drink it.”

Wen Zhixu crouched before the dying embers of the stove, and after a long moment, the corners of his mouth lifted slightly.

So Lin Xihe’s straightforward method of coaxing people actually worked.

The sun was high in the sky.

Huici drank the medicinal decoction her son had personally prepared.

On the way down the mountain, the young nuns weren’t carrying the porridge buckets down as usual.

The Wen family’s carriage was loaded with two large porridge buckets.

Arriving at the porridge distribution point, the refugees who had been waiting for a long time swarmed forward around the gently steaming buckets.

Wen Zhixu stood quietly at a distance, his eyes scanning back and forth, but he didn’t see the familiar figure.

That girl really is unreliable. She coaxed her father into coming to get porridge, but actually sneaked off to play.

He heard from Huixin that she had gone to the back hills. She was always a wild monkey anyway, so returning to the mountains suited her just fine.

The last refugee scraped the remaining rice from the bucket.

The Wen family coachman cleaned the carriage and respectfully invited the Second Young Master to board.

But Wen Zhixu instead followed the group of nuns, attempting to take the porridge bucket that Huici was carrying.

A nearby refugee was greatly shocked: Had times outside become so difficult that even a young master of such bearing and appearance was reduced to fighting for porridge?

Huici wouldn’t let him take it, raising her hand to smack him on the back.

Wen Zhixu then went to the end of the line to take Huixin’s porridge bucket.

Huixin: “…”

The refined young master didn’t mind getting dirty, hanging two large buckets from his elbows as he swiftly moved to the front of the line, striding proudly as if leading the group.

The coachman had no choice but to turn the carriage around. Was the Second Young Master planning to renounce the world? If that were truly the case, he could collect his severance pay from the Wen family and make other plans.

The carriage stopped beneath the green pines of Shu Shi An, parked alongside the Lin family’s carriage, the horses grazing with lowered heads.

The old Housekeeper stood at the entrance, clearly having waited for a long time.

Seeing it was Second Master Wen, the Housekeeper’s face showed disappointment.

Wen Zhixu handed the wooden buckets to a servant, stroked a horse’s mane, lightly kicked at the tender grass, and idly chatted with the horse: “Eat here, there’s more grass here.”

Wen Ba and the coachman crouched on the ground inspecting the carriage wheels.

Suddenly, Wen Ba felt someone kick his backside. Looking up, he met the Second Young Master’s face.

The Second Young Master jerked his chin at him.

Wen Ba: “?”

The Second Young Master frowned, glared at him twice, his expression extremely unpleasant.

Wen Ba: “…”

The master’s thoughts are so hard to guess!

Wen Ba turned aside and said with an awkward smile to the elderly housekeeper, “Housekeeper Yan, when are you setting off? Our two carriages can return together and keep each other company on the road.”

Wen Zhixu gripped the fan handle concealed in his sleeve, thinking to himself: Who wants to return to the estate with someone surnamed Lin! I only asked you to find out when the Lin household is departing.

Upon hearing this, Housekeeper Yan’s brow furrowed with several more wrinkles, and worry washed over her: “My young lady hasn’t come down from the mountain yet. She said she was going to fetch porridge.”

“People who love to play around are like that,” Wen Zhixu remarked.

Housekeeper Yan was displeased. So what if he was the esteemed Second Master Wen? Her young lady was not to be criticized by outsiders. She retorted, “The young lady isn’t on the mountain to play! She has important business!”

Important business? How could someone so frivolous have important business? These servants are truly protective of their master.

Wen Ba was at a loss for words. Even he thought that aside from playing, what important business could there be on the mountain?

After the rain cleared, the sun couldn’t dry the slippery mountain path.

Wen Zhixu said leisurely, “It’s cold on the mountain. If she overindulges in play, forget that she’s a young lady—even robust woodcutters and herb gatherers can easily fall ill.”

At these words, Housekeeper Yan grew even more anxious: “What should we do then! The young lady has just recovered from a serious illness. Her constitution can’t withstand it!”

Wen Zhixu’s brow twitched. Why did the Lin Xihe described by the servants seem so different from the one he knew? Recalling how Lin Xihe had stepped on a maid’s back and stubbornly scrambled over the wall with brute force, her constitution was as strong as iron!

“Trouble, trouble!” Shouts came from the mountainside, and everyone turned to look.

It was a servant from the Lin household, only two years older than Lin Pinyan. Upon hearing that the young lady was going to Yueling Mountain to play, he had begged to come along. Lin Xihe, taking pity on him, had brought him.

“Panicking like this—what kind of behavior is that?” the old housekeeper scolded, then noticed no one was behind him and hurriedly asked, “Why have you come down alone? Where are the young lady and Qingwu?”

The servant’s face was deathly pale, and his words came out in fragments: “There are snakes on the mountain. I got separated from the young lady.”

“You!” The housekeeper was furious and raised her hand to strike the boy’s head.

Everyone knew that snakes were common on the mountain in spring.

Wen Zhixu grabbed the servant by the collar. “Was she bitten by a snake?”

“…No, she wasn’t.” The servant suddenly felt ashamed. Glancing at Wen Zhixu’s frosty expression, he stammered, “Sister Qingwu was screaming in terror, but the young lady stepped forward and crushed the snake’s head with her foot, then picked it up with a branch and waved it in front of me… I’ve been afraid of snakes since I was a child, so in my panic, I ran down the mountain.”

Thump—the servant knelt straight down and kowtowed repeatedly to Wen Zhixu.

That woman—afraid of insects but not snakes? Was that reasonable? And to think he had worried for nothing. Without another word, Wen Zhixu lifted the carriage curtain and stepped inside.

“Return to the estate.”

The carriage had only traveled a few meters when the wind brushed the curtain, carrying in the sound of the old housekeeper scolding the servant.

“How could you abandon the young lady? Go back up the mountain and find her now!”

“The young lady has already obtained the flower stamen stone. I thought she would be on her way down.”

“That’s no excuse for leaving her behind!”

The old housekeeper, losing her usual composure, roared so loudly it seemed to shake the nunnery gate. The abbess, dressed in nun’s robes, approached and bowed, asking, “Amitabha, what is the matter, benefactor?”

“…Flower stamen stone?” Huixin, standing behind the abbess, rushed to Housekeeper Yan’s side. Regardless of what her master might think, she urgently asked, “What does He’er need that for?”

The housekeeper had no choice but to speak the truth: “The young lady found a sparrow with an injured wing and sought a renowned physician to treat it. Unexpectedly, the prescription required one last ingredient—fluorite. She searched every pharmacy in the entire Shengjing city but couldn’t find it…”

The abbess of the nunnery certainly knew about fluorite.

Huixin turned pale and exhaled sharply: “Last month, the herb gatherer who went into the mountains fell to his death!”

The nuns in the convent joined the search and rescue, finding the herb gatherer’s body below the fluorite cave.

A sudden gust of wind carried only fragments of conversation into the Wen family’s carriage.

The coachman, catching only the tail end of the words, muttered while driving: “That Miss Lin, really—if the medicine wasn’t available, she should’ve just waited. Why would she go up the mountain to play herb gatherer? So dangerous!”

“Stop the carriage.” The dignified young master inside spoke.

The coachman replied anxiously: “Second Young Master, is the mountain road too bumpy? I’ll prepare more cushions next time…” Just like Miss Lin, who had piled all her pillows and blankets into the carriage.

“There won’t be a next time.” Wen Zhixu said coldly.

The coachman didn’t understand.

Of course, he didn’t need to comprehend the Second Young Master’s thoughts—after all, this was his last day working for the Wen family.