The carriage stopped abruptly, causing Yu Lingxi to sway and nearly hit her head.
She frowned, lifting the curtain to ask, “What happened?”
“Miss, someone is lying in the middle of the road,” the coachman’s voice struggled to reach her through the bitter north wind.
Yu Lingxi looked up, following the dim light of the lantern, and indeed saw an undulating black silhouette not far ahead. A thin layer of snow had already fallen on the body. If not for the sharp-eyed coachman, the person would have been trampled into a bloody pulp by the carriage.
Probably a drunk, Yu Lingxi guessed.
In previous years in the capital, drunkards who passed out in the snow would freeze to death if not discovered in time.
A human life is still a human life. Yu Lingxi said, “Wake him up and move him to a sheltered, warmer place.”
The guard obeyed and carried a lantern toward the person lying in the snow.
Before long, the guard came running back, his steps noticeably more hurried and disorderly.
“Miss! It’s not a drunk, but a young man with severe injuries!”
Thanks to Ning Yin, Yu Lingxi now instinctively tensed whenever she heard the words “young man.”
But thinking it couldn’t possibly be such a coincidence, she relaxed slightly and bent down to exit the carriage.
The snow whirled around her, nearly blowing off the hood of her cloak.
The guard quickly came over with an umbrella to shield her from the wind and snow.
After just a few steps, Yu Lingxi sensed something wasn’t right.
The warm three-foot glow spread across the ground, illuminating the young man’s familiar yet pale face. The swaying light flashed across his pitch-black eyes, reflecting no warmth at all.
Only the beautiful and noble young woman stepping into the light amid the heavy snow created a scene in his dim vision more beautiful than snow and moonlight.
The lantern fell to the snowy ground with a soft hiss and was extinguished.
Yu Lingxi and Ning Yin awkwardly met each other’s gaze on this snowstorm night once again.
Encountering Ning Yin in such a miserable state for the third or fourth time, she didn’t know if heaven was punishing Ning Yin or punishing her.
A thousand words condensed into two: fateful entanglement.
Had he escaped from the Realm of Desire, or was he being hunted down?
The details no longer mattered, and Yu Lingxi had no mind to guess.
She only wanted to resolve the immediate problem, and asked with furrowed brows, “How far is the nearest medical clinic? Carry him there, quickly.”
“Miss, it’s about two li away,” the guard answered. “However, this person seems to have internal injuries affecting his organs. He shouldn’t be moved carelessly.”
Unable to send him away or move him, was he supposed to just lie there and wait for death?
Just as she was wondering if they could take another route, the guard urgently said, “Miss, he’s lost consciousness.”
…
Ning Yin hadn’t dreamed of that woman for a very long time.
He walked through a damp, dark dreamscape until a familiar palace gate appeared before him. A warm light shone through the crack in the door, illuminating the spattered bloodstains on the steps.
Ignoring those bloodstains, he walked up the stone steps. The palace doors slowly opened before him, and in the dazzling orange-gold sea of light sat a woman in imperial robes with flowing long hair.
Seeing Ning Yin, the woman turned her blurry face toward him, opened her arms, and said weakly with a smile, “Yin’er, come to Mother. Mother will take you away.”
For someone whose body temperature was rapidly dropping, that warm light and embrace were undoubtedly a fatal attraction.
But Ning Yin remained motionless and even gave a mocking smile. “No.”
“Why not?” The woman’s voice held a hint of resentment.
“Because,” his thin lips parted, almost self-torturingly, “you’re already dead.”
The smile on the woman’s lips instantly froze.
A dagger appeared in her chest, and fresh blood quickly spread along her exquisitely embroidered clothes, looking exactly like a blooming double-flowered Chinese crabapple…
Ning Yin woke up from this bloodstained dream, first seeing the slightly shaking roof of a carriage.
His first reaction was to reach for the short blade in his sleeve, but instead, he touched a soft bedding. He was covered with a small, delicate moon-white cloak that belonged to a young woman.
The bleeding had stopped, and the broken bones in his chest had been set and wrapped with thick bandages.
The small space was filled with a warm fragrance, completely at odds with the heavy smell of blood on his body.
The sweet, soft scent of a young woman—a scent he had smelled twice before.
Ning Yin recalled the stunning sight he had seen before losing consciousness. He turned his head slightly and indeed saw a slender, graceful figure sitting against the carriage wall, keeping far away from him.
Her eyelashes were half-lowered, and behind the gently swaying face veil, a pair of beautiful autumn-water eyes were faintly visible, showing extreme warmth in the lamplight.
Behind the veil must be hidden a face of incomparable beauty and charm.
The owner of those eyes noticed he was awake and started.
Yu Lingxi hadn’t expected Ning Yin to wake up so quickly. Ordinary people with such injuries would either die or be permanently disabled, or at the very least remain unconscious for a day or two.
But Ning Yin had woken up after less than a quarter of an hour, his beautiful dark eyes gleaming with light that made one’s heart go numb.
Yu Lingxi frowned, her gentleness turning into slight annoyance.