Chapter 67 - 58: _1

Chun Tao originally listened to the intermittent heavy and restrained sobs from inside, tears streaming down her face but not daring to enter to comfort. At this moment, hearing Bai Qingyan’s hair-raising laughter, she suddenly felt like an ant on a hot pan, not knowing what to do.

Chun Xing heard the noise, hurriedly put on her clothes, fastened her buttons, and rushed out from the small room, asking Chun Tao: “What’s wrong with the girl?! Why are you standing at the door and not going in to check?”

Chun Tao wiped away the tears covering her face and grabbed Chun Xing’s hand: “You stay here, don’t let anyone go in! I’m going to get the Third Young Lady!”

“Okay!” Chun Xing’s face turned pale with fright, and she nodded repeatedly.

Chun Tao ran and slid through the snow, heading straight for Bai Jintong’s courtyard. As soon as she entered, she knelt in front of the main door, crying: “Third Young Lady! Third Young Lady, please go see our Eldest Young Lady quickly!”

Bai Jintong, who had just finished her morning exercise, lifted the curtain and came out: “What’s wrong with the Eldest Young Lady?!”

Chun Tao’s eyes were severely swollen from crying, making her a weeping figure: “I beg the Third Young Lady to go and see her!”

Bai Jintong’s face turned ashen. She hastily strode towards the courtyard gate without bothering to put on her cloak.

The Green Bamboo Pavilion of Bai Jinxiu was very close to the Bitong Garden of Bai Jintong. Bai Jinxiu, who was accustomed to getting up early and reading by the window, also heard the commotion. She promptly instructed Mrs. Liu to stay in the Green Bamboo Pavilion to take care of Qingshu while she went out to see what was happening.

As soon as Qingshu reached the courtyard gate, she saw Chun Tao and Bai Jinxiu’s maids hurrying behind Bai Jintong towards the Qinghui Courtyard.

Qingshu quickly turned back to report to Bai Jinxiu: “Second Young Lady, I saw Chun Tao, who is always beside the Eldest Young Lady, hurrying with the Third Young Lady towards the Eldest Young Lady’s place.”

Bai Jinxiu’s hand, which was holding the book, tightened. Thinking about Bai Qingyan’s cold condition, about Bai Qingyan’s recent travels, Bai Jinxiu suddenly felt a chill down her spine. She lifted the brocade quilt: “Qingshu, help me change, I must go to the Eldest Young Lady!”

“Second Young Lady, it’s still snowing outside, and your head’s injury…”

“It doesn’t matter, I’m much better now! Just get me a thicker fur hat!” Bai Jinxiu, anxious and worried about the Eldest Young Lady, was in a panic. Qingshu dared not persuade her further, hurriedly prepared the clothes, and supported Bai Jinxiu through the snow towards the Qinghui Courtyard.

Bai Jinxiu had just reached the entrance of the Qinghui Courtyard when she heard Bai Jintong softly calling from the doorway: “Eldest Young Lady, it’s Jintong. May I come in…”@@novelbin@@

Receiving no response from Bai Qingyan, Bai Jintong stood outside, not daring to enter without permission. She could only turn and ask Chun Tao: “What’s wrong with the Eldest Young Lady?!”

Chun Tao knew the gravity of the situation. She could only bite her lip and shake her head with tears in her eyes.

“What’s wrong with the Eldest Young Lady?!” Bai Jinxiu, whose hand gripping Qingshu’s arm was now sweaty, hurried to the eaves, “Is it the cold condition acting up?!”

“Second Sister, you… why are you here too?!” Bai Jintong hurriedly supported Bai Jinxiu.

Just then, the inner door frame creaked. Chun Tao hurriedly lifted the curtain, only to see Bai Qingyan, whose white undergarments were half stained with blood, standing between the two doors.

Bai Jinxiu’s legs went weak, nearly causing her to fall: “Eldest Young Lady!”

Bai Qingyan’s pale face was calm as water, her eyes bloodshot, her disheveled hair already tidied up. Her whole aura was as fierce as a demon from the depths of hell.

“Bai Jinxiu, Bai Jintong, come in. Everyone else… guard the gate of Qinghui Courtyard. No one is allowed to approach!”

“Eldest Young Lady, the blood on your body…”

She walked into the inner room first: “It’s not my blood. Come in!”

Bai Jinxiu and Bai Jintong ordered the servants to wait at the gate of Qinghui Courtyard, and the two sisters entered the main room together. They saw Bai Qingyan standing with her back to them by the fire, and Bai Jinxiu softly called: “Eldest Young Lady…”

Bai Qingyan closed her sore and aching eyes. She had been reborn to protect her family, her elders, her sisters! Therefore… she could not collapse! She could not go mad! She could not fall! No matter the hatred, she couldn’t recklessly kill for revenge like a fool.

She had experienced this once before. She was the daughter of the Bai family of the Duke of Zhen’s Mansion. She had to hold on and see with her own eyes those treacherous and sinister people dragged to hell to atone for her Bai clan!

After a while, she spoke in a hoarse voice: “Jintong, close the door. I have something to say.”

Bai Jintong closed the door and walked behind Bai Qingyan with Bai Jinxiu: “Eldest Young Lady.”

She looked up at the five blood-stained bamboo slips on the desk, her breath chaotic and warm. She closed her eyes before saying: “The reason I didn’t tell you before was because I didn’t have confirmed news…”

Bai Qingyan turned around, looking at the tense and bewildered faces of Bai Jinxiu and Bai Jintong. She choked on her words: “Grandfather, my father, my second uncle, my third uncle, my fourth uncle, my fifth uncle… along with all seventeen members of the Bai clan, all… died in battle in the southern border.”

Bai Jinxiu’s eyes widened and she nearly fainted, feeling like the sky had fallen. The wound on her forehead throbbed wildly, and her blood seemed ready to burst through the scab.

“How could they… all… all…” Bai Jintong’s tears flowed continuously, her voice choked with grief, “There must be some mistake in the information!”

In the previous life, when this news arrived, the Bai family also couldn’t believe it.

She walked to the desk, placing her hand on the five bamboo slips. The veins on the back of her hand bulged, the grief and anger almost exploding, but she forcibly swallowed it back. Having lived two lives, how could she be easily crushed?

“This is the record of the marching and combat status by the Bai family army’s attached historian.” She picked up two bamboo slips, “Bai family army’s Tiger Camp leader Fang Yan, with Shen Qingzhu and our Bai family guard Wu Zhe, risked their lives to save these five bamboo slips. Now Shen Qingzhu’s whereabouts are unknown… Fang Yan and Wu Zhe are dead. The blood on these bamboo slips is Wu Zhe’s… it is Fang Yan’s, it is also the blood of hundreds of thousands of Bai family soldiers!”

Bai Qingyan handed one bamboo slip to Bai Jinxiu and another to Bai Jintong.

Looking at her two tear-filled, heavy-faced sisters, she said: “It would be good for you to know that our Bai family men did not die in battle against foreign enemies, but died because of the Emperor of Jin’s suspicion, because of… the hands of their own people in the Jin Kingdom!”

Bai Jinxiu’s tears flowed continuously as she trembled and unrolled the bamboo slip in her hand.

Bai Jintong also hurriedly opened her bamboo slip, scanning it rapidly through tears…

After reading one bamboo slip, Bai Jintong’s tears overflowed, and she stumbled to the desk, opening another. She trembled violently, her cries wretched.

Bai Qingyan stood rigidly by the fire basin. Even though she had cried out madly and vented her grief, her eyes were still painfully tearful. She felt a bone-chilling coldness that even the proximity to the fire basin could not alleviate.

Standing by the desk, Bai Jinxiu trembled as she picked up the bamboo slip, feeling a suffocating despair. Hugging the bamboo slip, she collapsed to the ground: “Little Seventeen… he’s only ten! He’s only ten years old!”

Bai Jintong, suppressing her sobs, turned her grief into anger. Her eyes blazing, she clenched her fists so tightly that they cracked, and she turned to leave.