“Senior Brother, what are you saying? How can something like this be treated as a competition?” Gu Ning found it utterly absurd.
A person suffering from hysteria had gone missing, and an accident could happen at any moment.
In the past, Senior Brother had treated these patients with more care than the most fragile porcelain.
She reached out and touched his forehead, somewhat worried. “Senior Brother, have you been too exhausted from taking care of me these past few days?”
Otherwise, given Senior Brother’s gentle nature, how could he say such a thing?
A cool sensation spread from his forehead, and below it were her concerned and surprised eyes. A feeling of helplessness, frustration, mixed with faint threads of relief, crept into his heart. Chi Yan hadn’t expected that, after the argument last night, she could still trust him so much.
“But then again, you’ve been working nonstop for months. As soon as you recovered from your illness, you had to take care of me again. And just now in the carriage, to prevent me from slipping up in the future, you went to great lengths to help me extract information from Madam Shen…”
He must be so exhausted that his mind is foggy and he’s starting to talk nonsense.
Gu Ning ignored the fleeting sense of unease in her heart and sighed helplessly. “Senior Brother, if there’s something you want me to agree to, just say it directly. I’ll agree to anything. But for now,” she beckoned A Qi and the servant at the entrance of the General’s ancestral residence, “Senior Brother should hurry and follow them to the guest room to rest. Once I find the person, I’ll let you know.”
Before she finished speaking, she turned and hurriedly ran through the main gate.
Without looking back even once.
Chi Yan stood alone in front of the empty gate. Looking up, the two gilded characters “Shen Residence” on the dark plaque seemed to be covered in a faint layer of dust, far less vibrant than they had been over a decade ago. Yet, though things had changed, the peach blossoms remained the same. He sighed, shook his head, and followed the servants across the threshold.
…
Gu Ning’s offer to help find the person wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment impulse. She recalled an amusing story Shen Jinyan had shared with her three years ago.
“When I was little and still living in the ancestral residence, I hated studying. My parents forced me to read, even locking me in a room with three locks. But then,” he said proudly, brushing aside the stray hairs on his forehead, “I taught myself how to pick locks. Every time they left, I’d sneak out to play polo with Lu San and the others from the Duke’s residence.”
“But as they say, the higher the virtue, the greater the challenge,” he added, pursing his lips as if remembering something. “Later, my parents discovered I was climbing out through the crooked peach tree in the peach garden, and they threatened to cut it down.”
The fragrance of peach blossoms grew stronger, like layers of peach-colored gauze curtains floating in the wind. At the end of these curtains was a massive pink cloud. A few pale pink peach blossom petals landed at her feet.
The peach garden.
Gu Ning stopped, panting heavily.
“What happened then? Was the tree really cut down?” she remembered asking at the time.
“Of course not. Do I seem like the kind of person who would stand by and watch my ‘good companion’ meet an untimely end?” he replied with a smug grin. “The day before they planned to cut it down, I stole my mother’s favorite illustrated book and my father’s prized wine, which he had hidden for over a decade. I made a big fuss, threatening to throw all of it into the river if they insisted on cutting the tree. In the end, they both gave in.
“That crooked peach tree… I remember it was in the southwest corner of the peach garden. It was hidden behind another peach tree, about three people tall. If you didn’t walk over and look carefully, you’d never notice it…”
The southwest corner, the three-person-tall peach tree…
Gu Ning lifted her skirt and ran deeper into the peach blossom grove. Pink peach blossoms densely covered the branches, blotting out the sky and sun, their fragrance so rich it was almost suffocating—the further she went, the more intense it became. Finally, a peach tree as tall as three men appeared before her. Gu Ning looked up, feeling as if even the clouds in the sky had settled upon the peach blossom branches.
She stopped and patiently circled the trunk, searching.
Petals spread like a pink carpet, flanked by pink-white walls and dark blue tiles. There was no crooked-neck tree in sight.
Gu Ning refused to give up and carefully searched several more times.
Still nothing.
Had the people from the general’s mansion cut down the tree later?
Well, it had been so many years after all…
“Ouch!”
Suddenly, a sharp pain shot through her scalp as if something had struck her. She glanced around—only a gentle breeze rustled the leaves, and petals drifted down, but there was no one in sight. Yet, out of the corner of her eye, she spotted something on the ground…
“A dried plum?”
Gu Ning blinked as fragments of memory surfaced in her mind.
“Hiss…”
Suddenly, another sharp pain struck her scalp.
Gu Ning clutched her head, anger rising within her. She turned around, planting one hand on her hip. “Shen! Jin! Yan!”
“Hahahaha!” A hearty laugh echoed from the corner above the wall.
A flash of red descended. His dark hair was tied high, his eyes bright and teeth gleaming, and a slight smile revealed a pair of sharp little canine teeth. He wore a vermilion robe embroidered with golden threads and a hundred flowers, holding a small packet of plums—an appearance she had never seen before.
“Sister, how do you know my name?”
He leaned in slightly, studying her closely.
Gu Ning stood still. Though she knew she was disguised and he was suffering from delusions, she couldn’t help but hear her own heartbeat growing faster and faster.
“I…”
“Oh, I know,” he interrupted her before she could answer, grinning smugly. “It must be because I’m as dashing as jade, as handsome as Pan An. It would be strange if you hadn’t heard of me before, right?”
“…”
Gu Ning forced a smile. “Shen Jinyan, how old are you now?”
“Graceful and slender, just over thirteen, like a budding flower in early spring,” he lifted his chin slightly. “I’m thirteen, in the prime of my youth!”
Gu Ning suddenly remembered what Jia Xiangwei had mentioned earlier.
“One moment he says he’s in his thirties or forties, a father of two. The next, he claims he’s thirteen or fourteen, the flower of Jiangnan,” Jia Xiangwei sighed, at a loss for words. “Doctor Gu, please, I beg you! You must help me!”
Gu Ning stared at Shen Jinyan, whose mental age was that of a blooming flower: …
“Well… little flower,” she sighed. “Do you know that poem describes a young woman?”
“Oh, really… Wait! What’s wrong with that? I’m even more beautiful than a woman! So that poem is about me!”
So, the thirteen-year-old Shen Jinyan not only lacked literary refinement but also loved to talk nonsense.
Gu Ning suddenly understood Jia Xiangwei’s urgency.
“But that’s not right either,” Shen Jinyan suddenly frowned. “It’s not strange that you know my name, but how did you find this place?”
He had never told anyone about this crooked-neck peach tree.
“You suddenly ran off, and everyone in the Shen mansion is looking for you,” Gu Ning thought for a moment. “They’ve searched everywhere else… so I came here.”
“So that’s how it is,” he handed her a few plums from his hand, “Here, these are for you. Keep me company here for a while, no need to rush out.”
“…Huh?”
Shen Jinyan raised his chin high: “A beauty like me should have at least five, six, seven, eight, nine, or ten people searching and chasing after me! Only when they compete and fight over me can my true value be revealed!”
The more Gu Ning listened, the harder she tried to maintain a gentle smile, yet her fists clenched tighter uncontrollably. Though reason told her she shouldn’t mind the ramblings of someone suffering from delusions.
But…
Was this the reason he suddenly betrayed her three years ago and went to kiss Gu Lin?