Chapter 22: Scholar Zhou Ding (Extra Update)

   

 Chapter 22: Scholar Zhou Ding (Extra Update)

Chang Suining shook her head directly: "I don't remember at all."

After all, her brain was damaged, so it made sense.

"Who was the maid accompanying Suining that day?" Chang Kuo asked with a frown.

Chang Sui'an replied, "It was Xi'er!"

Chang Suining asked, "Is she still alive?"

Chang Sui'an was momentarily stunned by the question, but quickly nodded, "She's alive! After the night of the Lantern Festival, she was detained for questioning... Uncle Bai, bring her here!"

Soon, a maid around the same age as Chang Suining was brought in. Her eyes were swollen like rotten peaches, and her clothes were somewhat dirty, indicating she hadn’t washed in at least three to five days. She looked quite disheveled and miserable.

As soon as she entered the hall, her swollen eyes immediately sought out Chang Suining. She rushed to kneel before her and cried, "My lady… it's such a relief that you're safe!"

Surprisingly, Chang Suining felt a bit moved.

So far, this was the first person to recognize her immediately.

"…Xi'er has held on just to wait for my lady's return!" Xi'er looked up at Chang Suining with a smile of contentment, as if all her worries had been lifted: "Now that I've seen you, my lady, I can rest easy!"

With that, she bit her lip and suddenly turned to smash her head against the corner of the nearby table.

Chang Suining: "?"

No wonder the Chang family, governed by military law, was so eager to embrace death. They were really too excellent at this.

Quickly reacting, she grabbed Xi'er by the arm: "Don't rush, I still have questions for you."

Xi'er sobbed, nodded in confusion, and postponed her suicide attempt for a moment: "Ask away, my lady."

"First, tell me everything that happened on the night of the Lantern Festival, before and after my accident."

While speaking, Chang Sui'an moved a wide chair behind her and whispered, "Ningning, sit and ask your questions."

Chang Kuo, somewhat satisfied, glanced at his son and also sat down.

Of course, Chang Sui'an remained standing.

Xi'er recounted everything in one breath: "On the night of the Lantern Festival, I accompanied my lady to admire the lanterns. I suggested that my lady solve lantern riddles, but my lady said she didn't want to go where the crowds were, so she led me across the Moon Bridge to the opposite side of the lantern festival. Then, she asked me to wait under the bridge, saying she wanted to take a walk by the river alone. As I watched her walk further and further away, almost out of sight, I became uneasy and chased after her, but it was too late. When I reached the reeds, I couldn't find her anywhere!"

No wonder she was so fluent; after all, she had recounted this to Manager Bai and Chang Sui'an countless times during the past days.

Chang Suining frowned slightly: "…Have I ever shown signs of wanting to end my life?"

Xi'er was momentarily taken aback, then shook her head: "My lady may be sensitive and emotional at times, but lately, there hasn't been anything particularly troubling… plus, you're terribly afraid of pain…"

Still, wouldn't my lady know herself better than I do?

But she continued, "I searched by the river for a long time without finding you, so I quickly had the coachman return to the manor to inform the young master. He said he had lost something valuable in the river and hired nearby boatmen to search the river all night, but found nothing."

Chang Suining thought to herself — by that time, A Li was likely carried far away by the current, eventually landing in the hands of that kidnapper.

Was it truly just an accidental fall into the river?

Chang Suining didn’t want to jump to conclusions so easily: "Before leaving the house, did I say anything? Bring anything with me? Or… did I have plans to meet someone?"

Seeing Xi'er's increasingly confused expression, Chang Suining added, "There are many things I don’t remember right now. The physician said it would take about half a month of rest for my memory to recover. You just need to answer."

Everything Xi'er said earlier was true — if A Li had been the one in trouble before, Xi'er might have been able to deceive Chang Sui'an and Manager Bai with a fabricated story, but now that "A Li" had returned, she wouldn't dare face her with lies.

In other words, this maid had been truthful up until now.

As for her claim of needing half a month to recover her memory — that was purely to deceive.

Upon hearing this, Xi'er first showed a look of shock, then her eyes filled with guilt and self-blame: "My lady has suffered… it's all Xi'er's fault for not taking better care of you, leading to this misfortune…"

"Just following orders, you aren't at fault." Chang Suining interrupted her self-reproach, "Answer my questions first; think carefully."

"Yes..." Xi'er concentrated for a moment and said, "My lady didn’t say anything particularly noteworthy… she normally doesn’t interact much with others and has no close female friends…"

Chang Suining: "And what about close young men?"

Chang Kuo: "?"

Chang Sui'an: "?"

Xi'er opened her mouth: "A young man… no, not really…"

Then suddenly, something seemed to occur to her: "But there is one, not quite young…"

Chang Sui'an suddenly frowned: "You're not talking about Zhou Ding, are you?"

Xi'er quickly nodded.

Seeing Chang Sui'an's expression of disgust, Chang Suining couldn't help but ask, "Who is Zhou Ding?"

This was also the first time Chang Kuo had heard the name.

"He's just a shameless…" Chang Sui'an was about to curse but, remembering how much his sister had once admired this person, he held back and said more tactfully, "He's just a poor scholar who tried to win you over with a few flowery poems after reading a couple of books!"

Chang Suining didn’t respond immediately and instead asked Xi'er, "Since I rarely interact with others, and he’s someone I’ve been in contact with, could it be that I went to meet him on the night of the Lantern Festival?"

Xi'er shook her head: "But my lady didn’t mention him to me that day, so she likely didn’t plan to meet him…"

"Or perhaps… knowing that my brother disapproved of him, I told no one, pretending I wanted to walk by the river alone, when in fact, I was going to meet him?" Chang Suining speculated, "The lantern festival is a lively event. I attended but claimed to dislike crowds, then walked alone to a secluded area. If there wasn’t another reason, wouldn’t that be contradictory?"

Xi'er hesitated to speak.

Chang Sui'an scratched his head and whispered, "Ningning… it's not really contradictory. After all, that's kind of how you are."

You’d say you wanted to be alone, then shed tears later about feeling lonely in the vast world… it was a common occurrence.

Perhaps it was because she had lost her biological parents at a young age that her sister had always been emotionally fragile and unpredictable.

And maybe, needing an outlet for her emotions, she immersed herself in poetry and literature. Meanwhile, as her older brother, he was naturally rough and unrefined. Though she never said so, he sensed that his behavior was clumsy and awkward, and he gradually stopped approaching her, fearing he'd upset her.

In short, his sister admired talent — and Zhou Ding had a bit of it.

Chang Suining paused for a moment, then asked, "How did I meet this person?"

Even though A Li's fall into the water might not be related to this person, if he was prominent enough in A Li's relatively closed life, he was worth paying attention to.

"It was half a year ago, at a poetry gathering…" Xi'er explained the sequence of events.

After meeting at the poetry gathering, they had frequent correspondence, and Suining had even secretly supported him financially several times—

"…I even gave him money?" Chang Suining found it hard to believe.

Xi'er said, "That Young Master Zhou often lamented his family's poverty, saying that although he had the title of scholar and was talented, the road to the imperial examination was long and difficult…"

"So, I wanted to sponsor his studies?" Chang Suining frowned, "…And he promised to propose to me once he achieved high honors?"

"No, no, no!" Xi'er hurriedly waved her hands in denial.

(End of Chapter)

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