In the water pavilion, everyone was bandaging their wounds and resting.
The loss this time was huge, with many casualties. Although Duan Yelin gave a lot of compensation, it was still a matter of life and death.
When he woke up, Duan Yelin felt his hand was a little heavy. He turned his head and saw Xu Hang sleeping on the bed with his head pressing on his arm.
His profile was relaxed, with a few wrinkles between his brows. Duan Yelin reached out his hand to smooth them out but withdrew his hand before he could touch him.
Shaotang.
He always remembered how he bumped into this stunning youth and how he got entangled with him in the Qiyuan that year. Now thinking about it, he was wearing makeup when they first met, and for four years, he never wiped it off.
He thought he had already brought Xu Hang out of the play, but in fact, it is unknown whether he and Xu Hang are still characters in the play or not.
It’s a pity that after singing for so long, he still doesn’t know what the script is.
Xu Hang made a muffled sound, then frowned, slowly opened his eyes, met Duan Yelin’s gaze, and then straightened up, his voice a little hoarse: “Are you hungry?”
He pounded his shoulders lightly. Sleeping while sitting made his back and waist ache, and he felt a little uncomfortable.
Duan Yelin shook his head, chuckled, grabbed Xu Hang’s hand, and pulled him towards himself. Xu Hang was naturally unprepared as he just woke up, and he rushed towards him and bumped into his chest.
“You…” Xu Hang didn’t dare to move, so he put on the dignity of a physician and said, “Be careful with your wound.”
“It’s fine, you’re very light.”
The two of them lay there for a while without saying anything.
“Shaotang, have you ever thought about leaving me?” Duan Yelin touched Xu Hang’s hair.
It was a very nonsensical question. Xu Hang was a little confused by his question. Perhaps the thrill of last night had caused some changes in Duan Yelin’s heart. He began to worry about gains and losses.
Xu Hang listened to his heartbeat, which was faster than usual, and lowered his eyes: “Yes.”
Duan Yelin’s heart skipped a beat.
“When I first arrived at Xiaotong Guan, I thought about it every day.”
An inexplicable feeling lingered between the two people. Duan Yelin traced Xu Hang’s arm and touched the back of his hand. “When I went to the battlefield before, I had no worries. I thought that if I died, then so be it. There was nothing worth it. But last night, I was really a little scared. I was afraid that if I died, you would be sad, and I was also afraid that if I died, you would not be sad.”
If he were to really compare it, he might be more afraid of the latter.
“Good people don’t live long, evil people last for thousands of years. You have a long life ahead of you.” Xu Hang said in a low voice.
Duan Yelin, who was cursed as an evil, laughed so hard that his chest trembled. He pulled Xu Hang up again: “I really didn’t expect to be saved by you. I have always been used to protecting you, but I didn’t expect that one day, I would be saved by you.”
Xu Hang’s mouth curled up: “Why, you’re not willing?”
“No, I am very happy.” Duan Yelin began to speak his heart out to Xu Hang, “You don’t know, when we first met, every time you looked at me, you wanted to kill me. At that time, every time you looked at me, it felt like a piece of meat was dug out of my heart.”
Looking back on the past, Duan Yelin felt a little emotional. He patted Xu Hang on the shoulder and said, “Shaotang, after this incident, we can be considered to be together through life and death and be together forever. From now on, can we no longer hide anything and live honestly?”
The burning body temperature was transmitted from Duan Yelin’s palm to Xu Hang with warm expectations, and that warmth was heart-touching.
Xu Hang lowered his head: “I…”
To be honest.
He can’t do it.
Xu Hang suddenly felt that his hand was a little hot, and he immediately pulled it back.
“I need to change a new bandage on my hands. I’ll go out first, I’ll keep an eye on the medicine for you later.”
Xu Hang walked out of the room without noticing the disappointment gradually rising in Duan Yelin’s eyes, just like a meteor falling into a quagmire, swallowing up the light.
Outside the room was a whole row of medicine jars, where all the wounded soldiers were placed.
Xu Hang never thought that the final outcome would be like this. After all, Shanghai is not Hezhou City. He was too impatient this time.
Xu Hang was also injured. He looked at the palms of his hands. The skin and flesh were turned out. It would take at least half a month to recover. His hand was trembling slightly, and the meridians connected to the arm above were twitching.
He quickly reached into his pocket, took out something like leaves, and stuffed it into his mouth to chew. The leaves were astringent and bitter, and he swallowed them hard, and only then did he feel better.
When Xiao Yan came in while smoking a cigar, he saw Xu Hang standing in the yard, staring at the medicine jar in a daze. He couldn’t help but smile: “What’s wrong, Young Master Xu? Do you feel that you have made a mistake?”
“……”
“Alright, be more sober. Zhang Yaochen and I have been fighting for so long, and I only managed to divide the world in Shanghai with him equally. If you really hit him with one strike, wouldn’t it make me look incompetent?”
Xu Hang fanned himself lightly with a palm leaf fan: “Success or failure is not important, but innocent people are still innocent.”
“You don’t have to blame yourself too much. Originally, Duan Yelin and Zhang Yaochen were bound to fight, and you just moved the war forward in advance.” Xiao Yan comforted, “Why don’t you think about what to do next?”
“How is the Zhang family?”
“Zhang Xiuming’s leg was broken, so he is considered useless. Fortunately, he caused such a scene at the dock and aroused public resentment. The higher-ups are very dissatisfied with their private deployment of troops and have temporarily withheld Zhang Yaochen’s power.”
“How could the gunfight at the dock have caused such a big stir? Since Zhang Xiuming dared to do it, he should have the ability to deal with it.”
“Because afterwards, someone found a large amount of opium on the wreckage that was blown up at the dock. The civilians discovered this first, and the news spread quickly. We can find excuses to blame the prisoners for the gunfight, but the presence of opium is no easy matter. Moreover, many people saw the soldiers roaming around the dock last night, so even if Zhang Yaochen wanted to find someone to suppress them, it was also too late, so he was punished.”
Xu Hang glanced at him and said, “You are really good at swordplay.”
Xiao Yan put his hands on his waist for a while and said, “Why don’t you thank me? Although he bled a lot, but the ban on smoking in Shanghai will last for a long time. I issued an order to burn all the opium found in the city and in the suburbs early this morning. I’m afraid that there won’t be much opium left in Shanghai even if I dig three feet deep. All the opium dealers must hate Zhang Yaochen to death.”
The implication was that he couldn’t move for the time being.
The medicine furnace was sounding, and the heat made the medicine jar lift up. Xu Hang watched for a while and said, “I also don’t know what to do now. Let’s just be like this for now and wait until Duan Yelin recovers. Anyway, the Zhang family has suffered such a big loss, they will not sit still. Let’s just wait.”
He spoke casually, but Xiao Yan looked at Xu Hang through the smoke rings he exhaled and always felt that there was a hint of complicated emotions in his lowered eyes.
What used to be a calm and shrewd mind now seems to have turned into a chaotic confusion.
Xiao Yan didn’t want to cause any more trouble either. He had already done what he promised to do for Xu Hang, so he said, “Then fine, I’ll go in and make up a lie for you in front of Duan Yelin, and we’ll be even now.”
The help from the Yan Gang this time was thanks to Shen Jingmo, so it made sense.
“I’m afraid this lie won’t be easy to cover up. I was too reckless this time, and I left too many things exposed.”
Xu Hang sat on a small stool, buried his face between his knees, and fell into a faint gloom.
All he had been thinking about was the intersection of Wuhua Tianbao. He gave up the chance to kill Zhang Yaochen and turned his horse around. At the time, he thought he was simply repaying Duan Yelin’s favor, but now, looking back, he realizes that regret is completely meaningless.
He endured humiliation and hardship, was imprisoned in Qiyuan, and the city was on fire. And then he just said, Put it aside for the time being. This is not like him.
He became stupid.
Although Xu Hang was sitting with his head down, suddenly a figure stood in front of him. He raised his head and saw Qiao Daosang standing there with angry eyes.
Qiao Daosang, who came all the way from another place specially for this incident, couldn’t help but miss Duan Yelin. Although he was not happy with Duan Yelin’s disregard for the overall situation, he couldn’t really watch him go to his death either.
He glared at Xu Hang but said nothing and turned to walk into the room. Duan Yelin’s legs were still tied in a brace, so he couldn’t move. Qiao Daosang didn’t know how to punish him, so he just glared at him.
“I warned you last time, why didn’t you listen? That guy will kill you sooner or later. Do you believe it now?”
“Fourth Uncle,” Duan Yelin knew he was in the wrong, so his tone softened, “I’ve said this before, this is the only thing I can’t ignore.”
Qiao Daosang put one foot on the bed, his elbows propped up on his knees, staring at Duan Yelin with an experienced look: “Don’t say that Fourth Uncle looks down on him. Fourth Uncle has been around the world and has seen this kind of fetish before. Fourth Uncle doesn’t despise him because he is not a woman. But you are different. You are the commander. Your gun and your life must be used on the battlefield! Not for love affairs! Do you understand?”
Duan Yelin sighed, “Fourth Uncle, this won’t happen again, alright?”
“This won’t f*cking happen again! If there’s a next time, you’ll definitely do the same thing as you did now!”
Qiao Daosang really wanted to kill this evildoer for Duan Yelin, but he knew that he couldn’t do that, he couldn’t hurt Duan Yelin in such an extreme way.
“You’ve always been very smart, how come you can’t see how much trouble you’ve been in since that guy got by your side? If you didn’t die this time, you might die next time!”
Duan Yelin listened carefully, but he couldn’t correct this mistake: “Fourth Uncle, it’s not that I’m not smart, it’s just that when I came to my senses, I had already done this.”
When facing Xu Hang, he always acts emotionally. It’s like an instinct, and people can’t go against instinct.
Qiao Daosang put down his feet, sat down on the bed, and patted his arm: “Yelin, when I went out of town this time, I happened to pass through the central region and went to Shucheng. Although I didn’t stay there for a long time, I know an interesting thing. Are you interested in listening to it?”
Duan Yelin’s eyelashes flickered, and it was obvious that he was aroused.
Qiao Daosang smiled and said, “Didn’t that one named Xu Hang come from Shucheng? Isn’t his ancestral home there? I met a temple keeper from Shucheng, and he said that among the families in Shucheng, there is no family with the surname Xu.”
Under the quilt, Duan Yelin’s hands suddenly clenched.
“I was afraid that the temple keeper was old and had a poor memory, so I went to the ancestral hall to look through the tablets of the hundreds of families in Shucheng. There was indeed no family with the surname Xu. Think about it carefully, if he was really a young master from a noble family, how could there be no tablet for their surname in the ancestral temple?!”
With Jin Hongchang’s wealth, the man his sister could marry must be quite good and must have been from a prominent family twenty years ago. But how could such a big family name just disappear like that?
Either Xu Hang is not from Shucheng, or he is not ‘Xu Hang’ at all.
No matter which point, Xu Hang must have lied to him.
Duan Yelin coughed twice to hide his inner shock and asked, “What else?”
“That’s all. I didn’t continue investigating.” Qiao Daosang took off the pipe from his waist and stuffed tobacco into it. “This is your business. It’s up to you to decide in the end. I just want to ask you, do you still want to investigate or not?”
If he investigates further, it means that he may find the truth. The truth often means cruelty and shame, it means breaking the peace and exposing everything.
If this is all a misunderstanding, then it’s fine to check it out, but…
Duan Yelin could have investigated it but didn’t because he didn’t want to touch upon Xu Hang’s past that he didn’t want others to know. But now, this unknown seems to have become an unwarranted suspicion and estrangement between him and Xu Hang. This hurdle is difficult to cross, but it will not disappear even if he doesn’t cross it.
A knife cuts the same, whether it comes early or late.
“Fourth Uncle,” Duan Yelin closed his eyes and made a decision. “Let’s check it out.”
Qiao Daosang was very satisfied with Duan Yelin’s reply. He took a few deep puffs of his cigarette, smiled slightly, and went out.
Qiao Song, who had been standing at the door holding the medicine jar for a long time, finally walked in. He heard all the conversations just now and was a little surprised by Duan Yelin’s final decision.
“Commander, you…”
“Are you surprised that I’m beginning to doubt Shaotang?”
Qiao Song lowered his head and just pounded the medicine. In fact, he didn’t know what to say. After pounding for a while, he looked up again and said, “I thought that since Young Master Xu came to save you, you two should be in the best relationship now.”
Duan Yelin held his forehead, feeling a dull pain. In fact, what was more uncomfortable was his heart: “Speaking of him coming to save me, I remember that last night… his skills were very good, did you see it?”
Qiao Song’s hand, holding the medicine, trembled slightly. He wants to say something, but in the end, the words he meant to say never came out.
His shot when he was on horseback was absolutely stunning. However, this was not the first time Qiao Song had seen it.
“Commander, people always do surprising things when they are in a hurry. Don’t think too much.”
“It’s not that I think too much, maybe I didn’t think enough before. The prisoners became rescuers, and the rescuers became the rescued. These things have gradually gone beyond my expectations.”
Qiao Song frowned: “But wasn’t it Ghost Master who rescued us last night? Wasn’t Ghost Master invited by Shen Jingmo? What’s so strange about this?”
Duan Yelin felt that the wisdom he had lost for four years had finally returned today, so he said, “If Xiao Yan really wanted to save us, why didn’t he come to discuss countermeasures with me in advance? It would obviously be the safest to join forces with me, but why would he chose to do it himself?”
“He…”
“Alright, let’s just assume that Xiao Yan likes to work alone. Then how do we explain Qiyan Villa? We have been investigating in Shanghai for a few days, and we still have to go to the Zhang Family’s Manor to check. Is he so sure where the person is being held?”
Qiao Song was stunned by what he said.
Duan Yelin waved his hand. The medicine made him sleepy, and he was a little tired. In fact, there were still many doubts that he didn’t mention, such as why Shen Jingmo didn’t come to ask him for help first, such as Chan Yi not showing any worry at all, such as…
Let’s check it out. Let’s check it out.
Let the truth come out, let the facts be known, and let the final conclusion be drawn.
He began to wonder whether this fight was true or false.
