The Seventh Princess Insists on Making Me Live Off Her - Chapter 21

Lian Liejin’s face nearly turned the color of pig liver. She stammered, “Hey, you… Even spreading rumors requires evidence.”

“Ahem. You probably don’t know that the imperial palace keeps a Princess Consort Evaluation Form, do you?” Little Radish chuckled, planting her hands proudly on her hips. “The princess, the momo in charge, and the maids all give separate scores. Low-scoring candidates like you receive special attention from the imperial physicians.”

“How do you know that?” Lian Liejin asked stiffly. If this was true, the seemingly minor matter had already left an indelible wound on her young heart.

“I naturally have my own sources. Actually, I started suspecting you a long time ago. And I’m not the only one—the entire Stellar Medicine Sect suspects you. So many senior and junior sisters showed interest in you before, yet you ignored every one of them. Over time, the sort of speculation that old men, young men, maidens, and married women all love to hear naturally began circulating.”

Lian “No Longer Able to Smile” Liejin said, “Impressive. I never knew the Stellar Medicine Sect could be so disgraceful.” She stuffed a dry flatbread into Little Radish’s mouth, choking her into immediate silence.

After washing down the flatbread with tea, Little Radish continued enthusiastically, “Hahaha! I heard several servants talking about it when I went to the Duke of Yan’s Residence to retrieve medicine for you. In my opinion, the princess truly isn’t very satisfied with you. Otherwise, how could you have been married for a month yet met only three times? One of those was even your wedding night.”

When Lian Liejin failed to react for a long time, Little Radish changed her tone. “Still, you have plenty of time ahead of you. It doesn’t look like you like the Seventh Princess either. Wouldn’t everyone be happy if the two of you simply did your own thing? Isn’t that how people in your social circle usually behave?”

Lian Liejin lowered her head dazedly and stared at her hands.

“Has something happened at the imperial court recently? Why are troops being mobilized everywhere?”

“Oh, you still haven’t heard? The Seventh Princess’s consort was abducted by assassins during this year’s Poetry and Literature Gathering! The Seventh Princess is now leading people all over the country searching for her consort.”

At the neighboring table, two elderly customers began chatting over a plate of peanuts. Their voices were so loud that everyone in the tea stall could hear them.

The old man dressed in deep blue continued, “This old man remembers that the Seventh Princess’s consort is a young lady from our Duke of Yan’s Residence. The Duke of Yan’s family has remained loyal and honorable for generations. More than ten years ago, when the northern Kingdom of Luoz tried to invade us, it was entirely thanks to the Lian Family Army under the Duke of Yan that they were driven back, preserving the peace of our Lan Geng Kingdom…”

Little Radish also listened with her ears pricked up for quite some time. She nudged Lian Liejin’s hand. “Your princess is searching everywhere for you. I was wrong earlier. Perhaps you aren’t quite that incapable. You need to believe in yourself.”

Lian Liejin: “…”

Little Radish drained the remaining tea from the pot and placed some silver on the table. “All right, let’s head up the mountain. Talking to you for two sentences is less entertaining than playing with A-Huang for two shichen.”

A-Huang was the local mixed-breed dog Little Radish raised.

Qingyue Mountain was, in truth, merely an obscure little mountain. Weeds grew everywhere, and jagged rocks covered its slopes.

Long ago, it had been nothing more than a deserted mountain until the Stellar Medicine Sect settled there. The sect had been founded by the divine physician Hua Qiu, who had reached the rank of Astromancer, and had now existed for over a century.

The Stellar Medicine Sect was not some strange jianghu sect of eccentric physicians. It received patients on the first, fifteenth, and sixteenth days of every month and produced medicinal decoctions and pills throughout the year. Its products were sold in pharmacies across numerous towns and villages. In fact, its medicinal-herb business was even more famous than its reputation for divine physicians.

Guanxie Residence Pharmacy was particularly renowned. Its business had now spread throughout the land, earning enormous profits every day.

The formerly barren mountain had also been cultivated into medicinal fields filled with precious herbs.

Today happened to be the fifteenth.

Lian Liejin had just passed through the peach-blossom illusion barrier, lifted the curtain woven from medicinal herbs, and entered the Stellar Medicine Sect’s main gate when a woman in a green floral dress rushed toward her. “Senior Sister Guan Xie, thank goodness you’re back. The physician on duty today has diarrhea, so you’ll have to fill in for her.”

Little Radish and Lian Liejin exchanged glances before asking in unison, “Junior Sister Zhao, where is Eldest Senior Sister?”

The woman in green looked at them strangely. “You two actually don’t know? Eldest Senior Sister went home to visit her family.”

“Visit her family? Isn’t Senior Sister… an orphan?” Lian Liejin frowned deeply, astonishment filling her heart.

“It only happened within the last few months. Enough, Senior Sister Guan Xie, hurry and come with me. If any patients arrive, you can take over first.”

“Wait. I need to put on my mask and return to my room to change clothes.” Lian Liejin raised her left sleeve. Her black brocade robe was torn in two places, though the damage was difficult to notice without looking carefully.

The woman in green was shocked. She asked anxiously, “Senior Sister Guan Xie, who did you fight?”

Remembering the First Imperial Prince jumping and rolling around, Lian Liejin could not suppress a laugh. “No one. My clothes were merely cut by the arrow aura of a ridiculous clown. There’s no need to make such a fuss.”

The woman in green quickly grabbed Lian Liejin’s sleeve and turned her around several times, carefully checking her from front to back. Only after confirming that she was unharmed did she complain, “If you were injured, Eldest Senior Sister and Master would go insane with worry. Think about it. When you first arrived, you nearly died several times. You finally managed to grow up alive, so if anything happened to you now…”

“Junior Sister Zhao, stop frightening people with exaggerated nonsense. I’m perfectly fine. I’m going to change.” Afraid that her talkative junior sister would continue until sunset, Lian Liejin hurried away and vanished in the blink of an eye.

After passing through several corridors and continuing farther inside, she reached the small courtyard where she lived within the Stellar Medicine Sect. Air-dried beef and flower petals meant for steeping in water were still spread out in the courtyard. A thin layer of last night’s snow rested on the bare branches of the osmanthus tree.

It appeared that someone had continued taking care of everything while she was away.

Sure enough, her room was spotless, and the few clothes she had left behind carried the clean fragrance of soap pods. She walked toward the bronze mirror. Her mask rested on a wooden stand beside it—a pure-black wooden mask painted with red spider lilies.

Its most distinctive feature was that it completely covered the eyes while leaving the lower half of the face exposed.

She put the mask on before the bronze mirror, and the world immediately plunged into darkness. Had anyone been standing behind her at that moment, they would have seen the corners of Lian Liejin’s lips rise, her smile taking on a somewhat uninhibited and arrogant quality.

After all, darkness felt intimate and familiar to her. Wearing the mask was almost like returning to her natural state.

At the same time, inside Carp Companion Inn, very few guests came and went because of the bitter winter. Occasionally, beggars dressed in rags entered to ask for food.

The innkeeper, normally miserly and stingy, had suddenly changed his ways. Smiling cheerfully, he brought out several baskets of cold steamed buns for the beggars. This was solely because two groups of extremely generous customers had unexpectedly arrived over the past two days.

Beside the stables behind the inn, a suspicious figure looked repeatedly from side to side. After confirming that no one was nearby, she finally prepared to enter and take a horse.

The person was small and petite. The way she walked with one arm hanging limply looked somewhat comical. She muttered continuously, “As expected, pretty-faced weaklings are all rotten people who only use despicable demonic tricks. The ointment she gave me ran out after three days, and now the slightest movement makes my hand hurt like hell!”

Unable to contain her anger, Luo Qian’er pulled the celadon medicine bottle from her robes and smashed it forcefully against the ground. Only after watching it break into several pieces did she feel slightly better.

Unexpectedly, a fair and delicate hand resembling a tender jade shoot picked up one of the broken pieces. The hand’s owner spoke in an indifferent voice.

“As expected, you are still here.”