She stared at her empty hands, her mind racing rapidly. In the real world, Lu Zhanye was still running a high fever, and his wounds needed cleaning and healing…
“Bring it out…” she murmured, her focus returning to the palms that had held the spring water.
She withdrew from the space.
The scene before her shifted back to the darkness deep within the haystack. Lu Zhanye had fallen into a semi-conscious state, his breathing rapid and scorching, and his forehead burning dangerously hot.
Su Wantang raised her hands, and there, clearly visible on her palms, were a few glistening drops of water!
She had actually brought it out!
Without pausing to rejoice, she immediately pressed her palms against Lu Zhanye’s forehead. The spiritual spring water seeped into his burning skin, and almost instantly, the intense, scorching heat subsided a little.
It worked!
Su Wantang felt a surge of renewed energy. She closed her eyes and entered the space again; this time, she went straight to the well, leaned over the edge, and dipped her entire arm into the water to soak it.
The icy, biting spring water enveloped her arm, and she could distinctly feel the strange sensation of it seeping into her skin through her pores. A few seconds later, she withdrew from the space, her arm soaked and carrying far more spring water.
She carefully pressed her arm against the wound on Lu Zhanye’s waist.
As the spiritual spring water mixed with blood and flowed over the injury, the bleeding stopped at a visible rate, and the frayed edges of the wound began to draw together and heal. It hadn’t fully recovered, but at the very least, it was no longer worsening.
Lu Zhanye let out a comfortable sigh in his stupor, and his tightly furrowed brows relaxed slightly.
Su Wantang breathed a sigh of relief and slumped down onto the hay.
She dared not stop. She went in and out of the space repeatedly, using her body to carry out spiritual spring water time and again to wipe Lu Zhanye’s forehead, neck, and wounds. The time difference inside the space gave her plenty of time to work; only a few minutes had passed in the real world, yet she had made dozens of trips back and forth within the space.
Eventually, Lu Zhanye’s body temperature dropped to a normal range, and his breathing steadied. The wound on his waist, though not fully healed, had formed a thin scab and was no longer bleeding.
Su Wantang was so exhausted she felt on the verge of collapse.
She leaned against the haystack and looked at Lu Zhanye’s sleeping profile. Under the moonlight, his sharp, angular features appeared softer; his thick eyelashes cast deep shadows on his eyelids, and faint traces of the water she had just used still clung to his high, straight nose.
This man… would have children with her in the future.
The thought made Su Wantang’s cheeks burn. She instinctively touched her flat abdomen—there was nothing there yet, but the system had told her that confirmation of implantation would come within 24 hours.
A child who would carry the bloodline of both him and her.
“Wantang…” Lu Zhanye mumbled in his sleep, his arm tightening unconsciously as he pulled her even closer against his chest.
Su Wantang froze.
He had called her that name again. The pet name he used only in his dreams.
She suddenly remembered what the system had told her at the very beginning: “Original storyline: The supporting female character, Su Wantang, out of jealousy toward her twin sister Su Wanrou, plotted to ruin her sister’s reputation. Later, she grew close to a scoundrel who had been her childhood playmate, Zhao Jianguo, became pregnant unexpectedly, and died from complications during childbirth after being abandoned.”
If that was the original storyline, then what about this life?
Su Wanrou had been reborn. She had drugged Lu Zhanye ahead of time, intending to claim the role of his “savior.” And she herself, forced by the system, had ended up in this situation by sheer coincidence…
“Have I changed fate?” she whispered, tears welling up in her eyes again.
What was the cost of this change? Was it the chaos of this night? Was it being tied to a stranger for the rest of her life? Was it the child who might arrive soon, a child she was completely unprepared for?
A rooster’s crow rang out in the distance, cutting through the silent night.
Su Wantang shuddered, jolted out of her tangled thoughts. Only then did she notice that a faint streak of pale white light had appeared along the eastern horizon.
Dawn was approaching.
And once daylight came… what would happen? What would Su Wanrou do when she discovered Lu Zhanye was missing? What would the villagers think when they realized she had been gone all night?
“No… I have to leave before he wakes up…” she murmured, trying to pull herself free from Lu Zhanye’s embrace.
But the man’s arms were like iron bands, holding her firmly in place. The more she struggled, the tighter he held her.
“Don’t leave…” Lu Zhanye mumbled again in his sleep, his brows furrowing once more. “Wantang… don’t go…”
Su Wantang’s heart clenched.
She looked at his face, so close to her own, at the scar that ran across his side, and at the unyielding grip he refused to let go of even in his dreams.
What if… if he remembered everything that had happened this night when he woke up?
What if he learned that she had only done this because she was forced by the system…
“I’m sorry,” she said softly, tears falling onto his chest. “I’m sorry, Comrade Lu… I… I have to go.”
She steeled herself and pulled hard at his fingers.
One by one.
Lu Zhanye let out a disgruntled grunt in his sleep, but gradually, the strength in his arms faded.
Su Wantang finally broke free. She scrambled to pick up her scattered clothes—her coarse linen dress was badly creased and covered in hay and bloodstains. She pulled it on haphazardly, then glanced back at Lu Zhanye.
He was still unconscious. His bare upper body looked unnaturally pale in the early morning light, the wound on his waist had scabbed over, and the scar stood out starkly in the dim glow.
Su Wantang gritted her teeth, grabbed a handful of hay from the ground, and spread it over him to cover his body as best she could.
Once she had done that, she turned to leave the haystack.
WARNING: Multiple individuals detected approaching. Direction: Threshing ground entrance. Distance: 300 meters. Estimated time of arrival: 3 minutes.
The system’s cold alert sounded like a clap of thunder crashing down on her.
Su Wantang felt the blood drain from her entire body.
She rushed out of the haystack and peered toward the village path through the faint morning light—sure enough, the flickering glow of oil lamps was drawing near quickly, and the murmur of voices could be heard faintly.
“Keep looking! They must be somewhere around here!”
“Wanrou, don’t worry. Comrade Lu will be fine…”
“How can I not worry? He was so badly injured. What if… what if something happened…”
It was Su Wanrou’s voice! And Dr. Li’s, and several other villagers!
They had come looking for him!
Su Wantang’s heart felt like it was about to beat out of her chest. Her first instinct was to hide back inside the haystack, but that would only get her caught red-handed. If she ran, the threshing ground was completely open, with nowhere to hide!
What should she do? What could she do?
SUGGESTION: Host may enter the Spiritual Spring Space to take temporary shelter. The difference in time flow within the space will provide a buffer period.
The space!
Su Wantang’s eyes lit up. She immediately focused her mind and thought firmly: “Enter!”
Everything went black, and when her vision cleared, she was standing on the dark soil of the spiritual spring space.
The well water shimmered with a faint glow, and silence reigned all around. Su Wantang collapsed onto the ground, gasping for breath, her heart still pounding wildly.
She had made it inside.
But Lu Zhanye was still out there, unconscious, with all the traces of their night together left beside him.
What would Su Wanrou think, what would she say, when she found him?
And how would she… explain her own disappearance throughout the night?
Su Wantang wrapped her arms around her knees and buried her face against them, her shoulders shaking silently.
She suddenly remembered the words Lu Zhanye had spoken at the height of the drug’s effect—words that had been terrifyingly clear:
“Su Wantang… I remember you.”
Yes. He remembered.
After this night, they would both remember each other.
But what came after remembering?
Was it the beginning of a tangled fate, or the descent into an even deeper abyss?