Chapter 101 Alliance Alliance
The clan leader closed her eyes in painful struggle, then as if making up her mind: “Alright, I agree to your proposal.”
Qiu Shuzhi felt relieved.
With the help of Miao territory, the chances of winning this battle had greatly increased.
She left the bamboo house. Jiang Si was anxiously waiting outside. Seeing Qiu Shuzhi come out, he hurriedly approached: “Wife-master, what did the clan leader say?”
Qiu Shuzhi smiled and held his hand tightly: “Don’t worry, the clan leader has agreed to join forces with the imperial court.”
Jiang Si smiled, but the smile didn’t reach his eyes.
Reason told him that it was best for Miao territory to cooperate with the imperial court, but this meant that Qiu Shuzhi would have to return to Yue Guanyi’s side. It was inevitable that during this process, Qiu Shuzhi might be seduced by Yue Guanyi.
Yue Guanyi was her officially married husband. Their reconciliation would be proper and justified, but what about him?
Jiang Si’s heart tightened, unwilling to give up the happiness that was within his grasp.
“Lan’er, you don’t seem happy?” Qiu Shuzhi asked in a low voice.
Jiang Si held her hand tightly, his other hand clutching her sleeve even more anxiously, seeking some comfort: “Wife-master, you won’t leave me, will you?”
Even if she returned to Yue Guanyi’s side, she wouldn’t forget him, and she wouldn’t fall in love with Yue Guanyi again.
Qiu Shuzhi lowered her eyes and smiled slightly, her slender fingers playing with the silver collar on his long neck: “What are you thinking? I have already promised to marry you, so I will certainly be good to you.”
“Only good to me?” The light in Jiang Si’s eyes was exceptionally bright, his voice anxious yet strong, as if he had to make Qiu Shuzhi prove her sincerity.
“Of course……” Qiu Shuzhi bent down and lightly kissed his cheek, murmuring: “Only good to my Lan’er.”
The unease on Jiang Si’s face vanished, replaced by endless joy and pleasure. He took the initiative to kiss Qiu Shuzhi’s thin lips.
His bewitching eyebrows and eyes swayed with a thousand charms, but in his eyes was the purest and most moving light: “Wife-master, let’s get married.”
He wanted to have a legitimate status like Yue Guanyi, to stand openly by her side.
Qiu Shuzhi kissed him back affectionately, full of tender love.
Jiang Si had initially appeared to be a player in the capital, but in reality, he was someone who didn’t even know how to breathe during a kiss. He had the most bewitching and charming face in the world, but his personality was the purest.
A long, deep kiss made Jiang Si’s face flush, layers of rosy clouds spreading across his face. His soft body clung to Qiu Shuzhi like boneless, his enchanting and deep eyes reflecting her loving gaze.
“Lan’er, we can’t get married now.”
The emotions in Jiang Si’s eyes receded like the tide, and he questioned: “Why? Do you still have that man in your heart?”
Qiu Shuzhi shook her head calmly: “I am still Yue Guanyi’s nominal wife-master after all. Now that Miao territory is to cooperate with the imperial court, at this crucial moment, how can I, as a consort, openly marry you? The Imperial Guard has eyes everywhere. If the news leaks out, with Yue Guanyi’s ruthless nature, he might do anything. I can’t let the alliance break because of this……”
“Then what about me? Were all those things you said before lies?” Jiang Si’s eyes were blurred with tears, full of heartache and pain: “You still care about Yue Guanyi, don’t you? Being with me is just for fun, you never really wanted to marry me, right?”
When Qiu Shuzhi refused him, Jiang Si felt as if the sky was falling. Endless darkness surged towards him from all directions, compressing and deforming his heart.
Qiu Shuzhi hurriedly comforted him: “I have never lied to you. It’s just that the current situation is special, and we can’t risk the lives of the entire Miao territory for the two of us.”
She cupped his devastatingly charming face: “Don’t worry, after we quell the Dian King’s rebellion and Her Majesty establishes Yunnan Prefecture, I will divorce him and stay in Yunnan with you forever, alright?”
Jiang Si’s face, originally full of sorrow, lit up with excitement when he heard Qiu Shuzhi say she would stay in Miao territory with him forever, almost biting through his lip: “Do you really mean it? Stay in Miao territory with me, not going back to the capital?”
Qiu Shuzhi gently stroked his face, looking at him with eyes full of tenderness: “Since I’ve decided to marry you, to give you a legitimate status, I must cut ties with Yue Guanyi. The capital is his sphere of influence, so I can only stay here with you… I just hope you won’t find me useless then.”
“I won’t, how could I find you useless.” Jiang Si was immediately overcome with tears of joy, his face breaking into a childlike smile, crystalline tears falling uncontrollably from the corners of his eyes.
With Qiu Shuzhi’s current status as a consort, if she quelled the Dian King’s rebellion and returned to the capital, she would undoubtedly be gloriously honored, perhaps even reaching the highest official positions.
But for his sake, Qiu Shuzhi was willing to give up all that easily attainable status and glory, to live in seclusion with him in the mountains and forests.
An almost crazy joy spread wildly in his heart, dispelling the gloom that had just been out of control.
How fortunate he was to have such a wife-master.
As Qiu Shuzhi watched Jiang Si immersed in fantasies about the future, the smile on his face was like that of a pure seventeen or eighteen-year-old boy, simple and infinitely beautiful.
She sighed endlessly in her heart, if Jiang Si hadn’t done those things to her back then, perhaps she wouldn’t have been able to see this different charm beneath his bewitchingly beautiful bones.
After pacifying Jiang Si with a few words, Qiu Shuzhi picked up her brush to write a letter, intending to convey what had happened in the Miao village to Yue Guanyi.
Since she had fallen into the river, she had lost contact with the outside world and didn’t know how Yue Guanyi was doing now. She was very worried, so she also briefly mentioned a word of concern in the letter.
She dared not write too much, because Jiang Si was by her side attentively grinding ink, and could see what she was writing with just a glance. She could only restrain herself to avoid arousing Jiang Si’s suspicion.
Just as she put down her brush, Jiang Si’s voice came from beside her, filled with strong jealousy: “Wife-master, you seem quite concerned about him.”
Qiu Shuzhi chuckled softly, gently pinching the soft flesh of his face: “Why so jealous?”
Since the two had clarified their relationship, Jiang Si had become very anxious around her, like someone holding a treasure, constantly worried about it being snatched away.
Especially after she promised to marry him, Jiang Si wouldn’t even let the Miao men around her off the hook, absolutely forbidding any tribe member over 14 years old from approaching Qiu Shuzhi, fearing she might become interested in those men.
He hadn’t even officially married her yet, but he was already showing a full-on jealous husband attitude.
“I am jealous, I just can’t stand you being nice to him.” Jiang Si didn’t mince his words. Born with a naturally alluring disposition, he leaned softly against her, helping her seal the letter, his wrist jingling with silver bells.
Qiu Shuzhi’s hand caressed the back of his hand, her voice gentle: “Yue Guanyi is after all my husband. I’ve been missing for so long, I should show some concern for him, just for appearance’s sake.”
“Husband?” Jiang Si whined in her arms, his slender, snow-white wrists like slippery silver snakes climbing up her neck: “Wife-master, you only have one husband, and that’s me.”
Qiu Shuzhi covered his snow-white wrists: “Don’t say that. Although I don’t like Yue Guanyi, he is after all the one I married with the three letters and six etiquettes. After I divorce him, you will be my only husband.”
Jiang Si’s alluring eyes were almost soaked through with jealousy: “Yue Guanyi is nothing but a tool. Someone who isn’t loved by the wife-master doesn’t count as a husband, he’s just a decorative arch in a grand mansion.”
Qiu Shuzhi laughed dryly. What kind of twisted logic was this?
An ancient version of ‘the unloved one is the mistress’?
Little did she know that Jiang Si had been deeply jealous of Yue Guanyi from the very beginning.
He and Yue Guanyi had both first met Qiu Shuzhi at the Qionglin Banquet, but Yue Guanyi had used his status and position to force Qiu Shuzhi to marry him and favor him alone.
Yue Guanyi came from such a lowly and disgraceful background, with a violent and distorted personality, and even his body reeked of the stench of blood and rotting corpses year-round. Such a person wouldn’t be married even by common folk, yet he had managed to climb up to the Qiu Shuzhi he had once silently liked.
If it weren’t for the fact that he had to conceal his male identity back then, if it weren’t for being forced by circumstances.
Then the person Qiu Shuzhi admired wouldn’t have been Yue Guanyi, but him; the person Qiu Shuzhi married with a grand procession wouldn’t have been Yue Guanyi, but him. That night, the fireworks filling the sky of the capital would have been a witness to his happiness, rather than being constantly overshadowed by Yue Guanyi’s status as the official husband as he was now.
Jealousy and resentment can distort one’s mind, transferring dark and sinister thoughts.
The deeper his love for Qiu Shuzhi, the more intense his hatred for Yue Guanyi became. He wished Yue Guanyi would go to hell along with the child in his belly, so that no one could monopolize his wife-master anymore.
Two days later, the letter was delivered to Yue Guanyi’s tent.
The thin, fragile paper was almost crushed in Yue Guanyi’s hand. He repeatedly looked at the familiar handwriting on the paper, the lingering fragrance on the paper. His hand trembled uncontrollably as he shakily pressed the thin paper to his face, closing his eyes to feel the remaining warmth.
“Qiu Niang is still alive, Qiu Niang is still alive,” Wild joy after a narrow escape surged on his pale, sorrowful face, tears constantly overflowing from his bloodshot eyes, wetting the thin paper.
“It was indeed that slut Jiang Si who schemed to kidnap Master Qiu and found someone to fake her death.” Chang’an was indignant. If it weren’t for Jiang Si, Master Qiu wouldn’t have been in danger, Your Highness wouldn’t have become like this, and that child wouldn’t have died prematurely.
After the tidal wave of wild joy, Yue Guanyi wiped away the tears from the corners of his eyes, placed the letter paper on his chest, and slowly spoke: “Bring the medicine.”
Chang’an held the medicine bowl with joy. This was the first time Yue Guanyi had voluntarily taken medicine. The gloom and deathly aura on his face was gone. Indeed, in this world, only Qiu Shuzhi could save Yue Guanyi.
Yue Guanyi looked at the black medicine in front of him, as dark as ink, without even frowning, and drank it all in one go. He must get better quickly, Qiu Niang was waiting for him.
The burning heat flowed from his throat into his abdomen, warmly accumulating in his lower abdomen, where once a life had been nurtured.
Yue Guanyi’s long-numb nerves finally pulled away from the news of Qiu Shuzhi’s death. His pale face suddenly became as cold as if he had fallen into an ice cave.
He had killed Qiu Niang’s child with his own hands.
Qiu Niang would surely resent him if she knew.