The entire scene fell silent.
Lü Fusheng, unwilling to believe his ears, dug a finger into his ear.
“Who did you just say? Whose wife are you going to join?”
Qianxing raised an eyebrow. Was their reaction really that big?
“Huo Yuan.”
After hearing the same name again, Lü Fusheng, Li Zhongyi, and the others finally gave up any hope that they had misheard. They all turned to look at Battalion Commander Huo, who had been standing there with his lips pressed together from the beginning.
Their eyes were filled with the excitement of discovering some huge gossip, along with a hint of reproach.
When did he secretly get married? Why hadn’t they known about it?!
Their gazes were simply too obvious. Qianxing looked at them in surprise.
“Don’t tell me…”
Li Zhongyi nodded heavily.
“Our battalion commander is Huo Yuan. You two haven’t met before?”
There was a hint of probing in his voice.
Huo Yuan lightly smacked him on the head.
“Let’s go back first and talk there. You come along too.”
The last sentence was directed at Qianxing.
Qianxing also felt that this wasn’t a good place to talk. She had just taken a step to follow them when a handkerchief suddenly appeared in front of her.
“There’s blood on your neck. Wipe it.”
“Blood?”
Qianxing took the handkerchief and touched her neck. The soft blue cloth remained completely clean.
“Where’s the blood?”
Huo Yuan vaguely pointed at her neck.
“Did Luo Ping injure you just now?”
Qianxing turned her face in the direction he pointed.
Then she suddenly realized something, and her eyes widened.
“You can see it? This isn’t blood…”
It was a blood-red gourd-shaped birthmark.
It was also the mark of her Gourd Treasure Realm. About the size of a fingernail, it was as red as blood.
When Qianxing was little, she had always worried that someone would see the mark on her neck and misunderstand it. But her master had merely smiled.
“Only you and the person destined for you can see this. Other people won’t be able to see anything.”
Qianxing had lived for twenty-five years without ever meeting anyone who could see the mark on her neck.
Yet she had encountered someone who could see it here.
She looked at Huo Yuan several more times, unable to stop the corners of her lips from curling upward.
Heaven really was treating her well.
At the very least, her destined man had a face that perfectly matched her taste.
“What do you mean?” Huo Yuan asked, confused.
Qianxing happily waved her hand.
“We’ll talk about it when we get back.”
The smile on her lips made her look like a little cat that had just stolen a piece of fish.
Huo Yuan glanced at her and, strangely enough, didn’t ask anything more.
……
The Southwest Military Camp wasn’t particularly far from here. They could reach it after crossing over a mountain.
At noon, the group arrived at the entrance of the military camp. They had just finished registering when someone came running over from a distance, gasping for breath.
“Battalion Commander, you’re finally back!! You don’t know, there’s a fool claiming to be your wife, and she’s already on her way here to join you! But I went to the train station yesterday to pick her up and couldn’t find her. Did she get lost? What are we going to do?”
The “fool” himself, Song Qianxing, poked her head out from behind Huo Yuan and waved at him.
“I didn’t get lost. I’m right here.”
Zhao Jianshu’s gaze slowly shifted toward Qianxing.
Then his face became so hot it felt like it was on fire.
“I’m sorry.”
One second.
Two seconds.
Three seconds…
After watching him suffer through his embarrassment as though he wanted to find a hole to crawl into, Qianxing smiled.
“It’s fine.”
Huo Yuan glanced at her.
So she wasn’t particularly hot-tempered after all.
“Let’s talk while we walk. What happened?”
Zhao Jianshu told Huo Yuan about the phone call he’d received. Seeing that Huo Yuan’s expression barely changed, he assumed the man already knew about it.
“You wait at home for me. Jianshu, show her the way. I need to report to the regiment commander first.”
Zhao Jianshu quickly agreed and cautiously led the way.
Qianxing nodded as well, looking around the military region curiously.
Zhao Jianshu couldn’t figure out what she was thinking, so he changed the subject and began introducing the place.
“That area over there is the training grounds, the mess hall, the barracks, and so on. The family compound is up ahead. The apartment building is where the battalion commanders live. The detached houses next to it are where the regiment commanders and people above that rank live.”
Qianxing didn’t understand the ranks.
“The regiment commander is higher-ranking?”
She had heard Huo Yuan say he was going to report to the regiment commander, so that person should be above him.
Did that mean she’d eventually get to live in one of those houses?
It looked a little cramped, though.
Could she really be a fool?
Zhao Jianshu muttered inwardly but simply gave her a basic introduction to the military region.
“This is a large military region, with nearly seventy thousand people. So besides the things I mentioned, we also have a hospital, market, school, and so on. It’s basically like a small county town…”
As Qianxing listened and looked around, she noticed many people seemingly watching her intentionally or otherwise.
“Are they looking at me?”
Zhao Jianshu froze and looked toward the distance.
It was lunchtime and the beginning of the midday break. Groups of people were gathered around the mess hall and family buildings, talking while looking in their direction.
More precisely, they were looking at Song Qianxing.
He scratched his head, feeling that this was probably his fault.
“Sorry. They’re probably just curious. They really want to see what the battalion commander’s wife looks like. You don’t know how popular our battalion commander is around here.”
She could tell.
Qianxing lifted her eyes and met the disdainful, contemptuous, and unwilling gazes of those people.
Every single one of them looked like they wanted to tear her to pieces.
Good.
Life here wouldn’t be boring after all.
Qianxing curled her lips into a smile and arrived at the entrance of the apartment building.
A group of women wearing gray padded jackets were standing there.
They clearly knew Zhao Jianshu. As soon as they saw him, they greeted him.
“Comrade Zhao, is this Battalion Commander Huo’s wife?”
Zhao Jianshu gave an awkward smile.
“I’m not sure either. You’ll have to ask the battalion commander yourselves.”
“What do you mean you’re not sure? Didn’t everyone say that the wife Battalion Commander Huo was bringing here was some fool he picked up?”
“Don’t say that. At least she’s the battalion commander’s wife.” Someone tried to stop her.
“What are you afraid of? Can a fool even understand what I’m saying? Let’s ask her.”
Ren Weihong smiled at Qianxing.
“Hey, can you understand what I’m saying?”
Qianxing shook her head.
“I don’t understand.”
“Hahahaha, look at her—”
“I’m a person. I just can’t understand a dog’s barking.”
Ren Weihong was halfway through saying, “What barking? Where’s there any dog barking—”
when she finally realized Qianxing was insulting her.
Her face immediately turned bright red.
“You! You stupid fool! I’ll tear your mouth apart!”
She raised her hand to hit her, but a deep voice appeared at just the right moment.
“Sister-in-law Ren, are you planning to hit someone?”
Huo Yuan’s voice made Ren Weihong’s heart tremble.
His reputation in the military region wasn’t exactly good. There was nothing to gain from offending him.
After weighing things in her mind, Ren Weihong turned around with a cheerful smile.
“How could I? Battalion Commander Huo, are you taking her home? There are some things I shouldn’t say, but you two haven’t submitted your marriage report yet, have you? This female comrade has come all this way to follow you and will be alone in the same room with you. If people see that, they’ll inevitably call her frivolous. In the end, it reflects badly on all of us military wives. Why don’t you send her back as soon as possible?”
This fool wanted to stay here and marry Huo Yuan.
She absolutely wouldn’t let her have her way!
Huo Yuan glanced at her.
“You’ve been here for so long. How much more face can the military wives still lose?”
The implication was clear:
You’d already disgraced the military wives enough.
Hearing the suppressed laughter behind her, embarrassment flashed through Ren Weihong’s eyes.
“Battalion Commander Huo, you—!”
Huo Yuan had no intention of paying her any further attention. He gestured for Qianxing to follow him, and the two went upstairs one after another.
The apartment building had five floors.
Huo Yuan lived on the fifth floor, in the room closest to the bathroom.
When he opened the door, the room was extremely neat. There wasn’t much furniture. The living room contained only a cabinet, a dining table, and a few chairs, making the already small apartment look rather spacious.
“Sit.”
Huo Yuan pointed to the only two chairs.
Qianxing pulled one out and sat across from him.
Seeing Huo Yuan’s serious demeanor, combined with his complete lack of joy, she guessed that he probably intended to ask her to leave.
“Why did you look so surprised last night when you realized you could see that birthmark?”
The question struck like thunder out of nowhere.
Qianxing looked up in surprise, meeting Huo Yuan’s sharp eyes.
His first question was actually about that?
After her surprise passed, Qianxing suddenly laughed.
Without hiding anything, she told him about the mark and what her master had said.
Her master had never been wrong about such things.
Since her master had said that he was the person destined for her, she had nothing to worry about.
It wasn’t that Qianxing trusted him.
She trusted her master.
“The person destined for you?”
Logically speaking, Huo Yuan felt that this was ridiculous.
Yet, absurdly enough, some part of him actually wanted to believe it.
After all, despite how ridiculous the words were, they didn’t make him feel the slightest bit annoyed with her.
“Wait here.”
Over the next few minutes, Qianxing watched him leave the room and return with a woman.
He asked the woman whether she could see the birthmark on Qianxing’s neck.
After the woman shook her head in confusion, Huo Yuan rubbed his forehead and escorted her out of the room.
When he turned around, he saw Qianxing sitting there with both hands propping up her chin, calmly watching him.
Her cat-like eyes glittered with playful light.
“Now that I’ve proven I’m not crazy, what do you want to do next?”
For some reason, a competitive streak suddenly rose inside Huo Yuan.
He planted both hands on the table. His broad body leaned over her, completely enveloping her in his shadow.
With a low chuckle, he said:
“Get our marriage certificate. Get married!”