Pei Jue is not given to many words.
Standing in the cold wind, he remained silent for a long ti before speaking again.
"After my mother passed, I lost too much blood and fainted. When I ca to, I searched through the nearby grass, but there was no trace of my sister..."
"I don’t know if she was taken away by the pursuers or if she left on her own, I searched along the way until I found my mother’s remains..."
He paused for a long ti when he got to this point.
"After that, it was my father who took in."
-
To escape from the pursuit of the Qi Army, Madam Xie had chosen to flee toward the borders of Bingzhou...
It was Pei Chong’s close follower who discovered him.
At the ti, the small child was digging a hole to bury his mother; his earth-grey attire was stained with blood, wounds unbandaged, fresh blood seeping into the soil, dripping onto his mother’s body. His small fra had not yet grown, but the resilience on his face was like that of an adult...
The earth was cold as ice, the wind piercing to the bone.
He didn’t even shed a single tear...
The close follower brought the injured child before Pei Chong.
Pei Chong himself was seriously injured at the ti, unable to walk, and he had no sons at ho; his elderly mother was seriously ill and his lifelong wishes unfulfilled.
The child was found just at the right ti.
Lying on the sickbed, Pei Chong asked the child four questions.
"What is your na?"
"Changyu."
The child didn’t lie.
Just two words, not stating a last na.
Pei Chong grunted, "Mr. Seventh Xie, the son of Xie Xian."
Despite his injuries, he was stationed in Bingzhou as the commander, and he wasn’t completely unaware of the Qi Army’s widespread search for the "remnants of the Xie Family."
Then he asked a second question.
"Can you forget it all?"
In a single night, from the pampered legitimate son of the Xie Family to a holess fugitive on the run, with his family destroyed and people killed, an endless abyss, life turned upside-down, and destiny thus rewritten...
The mother in the pool of blood, the father and the souls of the Xie Family Army who died in Bingzhou, they were all watching him.
The child neither nodded nor shook his head.
Instead, he counter-questioned, "If you were in my place, General, could you forget?"
Pei Chong nodded his head and then asked the third question.
"I am Pei Chong. You’ve probably heard of . In the battle of Bingzhou, you lost your father at my hands. I injured my legs because of your father. Do you hate ?"
The child shook his head.
"A General waging war, each serving their own master, leading their own armies. You and my father had no personal enmity, only duty. You did no wrong."
Pei Chong had not expected such a small child to have such breadth of mind and insight, feeling a mix of sorrow, joy, and emotion; and then he asked the last question.
"Would you be willing to be my son? To take on a new identity and carry on my mantle?"
The reply of Pei Jue at the ti was, "You saved my life; I will take care of you in your old age."
Feng Yun felt suffocated once again.
For him.
For that Mr. Seventh Xie who had such a hard fate in those days.
"You have suffered."
Pei Jue did not speak.
In the blink of an eye, more than a decade had passed, and recalling the events of that day, his deep black eyes were filled with desolation.
"This wind... sounds very much like it did that day."
Feng Yun felt a sudden pang of sorrow on hearing this poignant sentint.
"Do you still rember what your sister looked like? Is she... truly Li Sangruo?"
Pei Jue shook his head, his dark eyes cold and indifferent.
"I don’t rember. Whether she is or isn’t, it’s just one side of the story from Tang Shaogong."
Feng Yun had heard everything Tang Shaogong had said.
There was no need for Pei Jue to repeat it.
Tang Shaogong had said he crawled out from a pile of corpses on the battlefield of Bingzhou, lucky to be alive, but found nowhere to go.
The Xie Family Army had been completely annihilated, Xie Xian’s household raided. While fleeing for his life, he learned that the Qi Army was hunting for the remnants of the Xie Family.
Overjoyed to learn that the Young Master was still alive, Tang Shaogong followed in search...
It was he who first discovered the Xie Family’s young lady weeping and looking for her mother. The girl told him her brother was dead, and her mother missing...
He took the child with him in search of Madam Xie, but it was just one step too late...
Seeing Madam Xie violated, he alone with the child did not dare to step forward to rescue her. By the ti he had settled the young lady and looked back, Madam Xie was already a lifeless body...
To avoid alarming the enemy, he left, bearing the humiliation and continued to search for the whereabouts of the Young Master with the young lady. However, he never found any news of the Young Master and, having no choice, he had to take the daughter of his lord and seek refuge with the then Provincial Governor Li Zongxun...
Li Zongxun took a strong liking to the child at first sight. Coincidentally, his wife had lost a daughter and was devastated. He then raised her as his own, naming her Li Sangruo...
Tang Shaogong also said that even after he entered the service of the Li Mansion, he did not stop searching for the Young Master. But in this vast world, finding soone was like searching for a needle in the ocean. Moreover, he could not search openly, and he ultimately missed his chance.
When he saw him again, it was a year later in Central Capital. He recognized the Young Master at first glance, but to his dismay, he learned from others that it was General Pei’s son, surnad Pei and nad Jue...
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