Chapter 60: Blood Jade, Dead Infant
This nanny was the person who had taken care of Shen Yunqian since he was a child. She had worked in the Shen family for more than twenty years. She was getting on in years; her son and daughter-in-law worked out of town, leaving only a little granddaughter to be raised by her side.
After the Shen family’s accident, Su Zhuo, following Shen Yunqian’s instructions, settled her here. Her salary continued as usual, but she couldn’t sit idle, saying she couldn’t take money for nothing, and insisted on taking up the cleaning job.
Shen Yunqian quickly supported her, his expression softening. “Guo Yi (Auntie Guo).”
Guo Yi spoke of how much she missed them over the years and the injustice the Shen couple had suffered, finally crying while holding Shen Yunqian.
Shen Yunqian leaned in to give her a hug. “It’s all in the past. I’m back.”
Once Guo Yi calmed down, she looked at the two unfamiliar faces. “These two are?”
Shen Yunqian was silent for a moment. “…Friends.”
“Good, good, good. It’s good to have friends.”
Guo Yi was full of anger when speaking of this.
“Back when the Master and Madam were still around, everyone called themselves brothers with our Shen family. After the accident, everyone avoided us like the plague. Truly a pack of white-eyed wolves.”
“Oh, enough of that.” Guo Yi looked at Shen Yunqian’s thin face, her heart aching even more. “Have you eaten? Guo Yi will make your favorite crab meat lion’s head meatballs.”
Her enthusiasm made it hard to refuse, so Shen Yunqian had to agree.
“This old woman had nothing to do, so seeing the backyard empty, I planted some vegetables. Since Young Master is back, if you don’t like it, I’ll pull them up right now and plant… the flowers from the Shen family residence.”
Guo Yi looked at Shen Yunqian cautiously, afraid her words would trigger bad memories.
Shen Yunqian comforted her. “Planting vegetables or flowers is the same. You should still call me Xiao Shen.”
“Eh! Xiao Shen.” Guo Yi looked at him with a beaming smile. “I’ll ask my little granddaughter to go to the field and pull some carrots and lettuce later. I’ll go buy the rest of the ingredients.”
Guo Yi beamed with joy and bustled off to buy groceries, but turned back at the door. “Look at me, I was so happy I forgot. Young Master’s friends, what do you want to eat?”
When asking the fractured Gu Jiang, just as he was about to name a dish, Shen Yunqian preempted him: “He’s not hungry. He needs to rest.”
The injured patient himself: “…”
“Ah.” Guo Yi had no idea Shen Yunqian was holding a grudge. She turned regretfully to Lu Xunye, who was playing dead and petrified. “Then what about this friend?”
Lu Xunye, trying his best to lower his presence, anxiously bit his bent knuckles one by one. Hearing this, his shoulders shook. Feeling Shen Yunqian’s gaze on him, he wanted nothing more than to burrow straight into the ground.
Pretending not to hear was obviously inappropriate at this moment. His Adam’s apple bobbed. Before he could speak, he heard Shen Yunqian name a few dishes.
They happened to be his favorites… Lu Xunye panicked even more.
Because before the amnesia, he and Shen Yunqian weren’t close enough for this level of familiarity. The number of times they had eaten together could be counted on one hand.
After Guo Yi went out happily to buy groceries.
Shen Yunqian’s gaze fell on the fingers being constantly gnawed by their owner. “If you have questions, ask.”
Look, look, look!
Lu Xunye’s heart was dead as ashes.
He’s here to settle the score. His tone is so cold; sure enough, it’s the same old Shen Yunqian.
Aren’t identity reveal plots usually satisfying?
This isn’t satisfying at all!
Seeing the person burying his head and turning his back, Shen Yunqian didn’t know the ten thousand horses galloping through his heart. He said displeasedly, “Turn around.”
Lu Xunye, like a dilapidated machine in disrepair, scooted around bit by bit. After a bout of silence, he finally squeezed out a sentence: “You… remembered everything?”
As soon as the words left his mouth, he wanted to slap himself twice. Why bring up the pot that isn’t boiling?
Lu Xunye laughed dryly twice, secretly contemplating the possibility of pretending he hadn’t sobered up.
He waited a long time for the notification of points dropping, but it didn’t come. Instead, he got a softly spoken question.
“Do you hope I remember?”
Caught off guard by this soul-searching question, Lu Xunye didn’t have time to think. He subconsciously shook his head, then hesitated halfway and nodded.
He couldn’t say clearly whether he hoped Shen Yunqian would regain his memory or hoped the other party would never remember.
Perhaps Shen Yunqian was right; people make judgments and take actions for their own interests.
And he was doing it for the mission, which equated to interests.
Seeing his reaction, Shen Yunqian wasn’t surprised; it was within his expectations. He approached expressionlessly, leaned over, and pinched Lu Xunye’s chin with two fingers, lifting it up.
Forced to look him in the eye, Lu Xunye’s palms sweated. He had to bite his cheek to withstand the impact of his wildly beating heart. It wasn’t about embarrassment or anger, just the awkwardness of having his lie punctured.
Touching the trace of mockery in those light-colored eyes, his pupils trembled slightly. When Shen Yunqian leaned his face close, he subconsciously turned his head away.
Lu Xunye clearly felt another person’s warm breath on his cheek. The fingers resting on the table tightened abruptly.
Thump, thump, thump. Gu Jiang tapped the table with a spoon, interrupting the strange atmosphere between the two. “Hey, hey, hey, what are you doing? Not treating me like a human being, are you?”
Only then did Lu Xunye notice that their posture really invited wild flights of fancy.
He leaned back, but Shen Yunqian had no intention of letting him go. He turned Lu Xunye’s head back to face him with considerable force, making Lu Xunye frown in pain.
Shen Yunqian, however, revealed his first smile of the day. A shallow smile hung on his lips, as if the noise Gu Jiang was making had been blocked by an invisible barrier.
His eyelashes lowered, gazing at Lu Xunye, his tone frivolous and containing a smile. “Aren’t you my boyfriend? What are you hiding from?”
Lu Xunye was stunned for a long while. Before he could probe the deeper meaning of his words, the hand on his chin withdrew.
Is Shen Yunqian settling the score later, or has he not recovered his memory?
“Finished flirting?” Gu Jiang looked at Shen Yunqian, continuing to tap the spoon in his hand, commanding him like a lord. “I’m hungry. I want to eat.”
The thumping noise was incessant. Shen Yunqian first looked at his right hand fixed with a steel plate, unable to move, then swept a cool glance over his red and swollen left hand that kept making noise.
He raised an eyebrow. “I guess you’d prefer to eat with your feet in the future, is that it?”
Gu Jiang’s spoon-smashing left hand froze. “…”
…
The sensation of the restraint on his chin hadn’t faded, making him scratch his head in irritation.
Lu Xunye squatted in the radish field, staring blankly at the lush green leaves, playing with a broad radish leaf in his hand.
What exactly does Shen Yunqian mean?
“Brother, you have little strength, let me do it.”
A little girl, not much bigger than a radish head in Lu Xunye’s eyes, threw the vegetables in her arms into the basket.
Her short legs chugged over. She snatched the radish leaf from his hand, heaved with effort, and pulled out a carrot the size of an arm. She then plopped her butt down on the dirt pile.
The radish coming out of the soil splattered dirt on both of them.
With dirt on her face, holding the radish, the little girl stared at Lu Xunye, big eyes meeting small eyes.
Lu Xunye burst out laughing. He quickly picked up the little girl, patted the dirt off her, and teased, “Whose little mud figurine is this?”
The five- or six-year-old girl, carved of jade and ice, pouted and said with a straight face, “I am not! It’s clearly Gege (Brother) who kept thinking about Xiao Shen Gege (Brother Xiao Shen). You weren’t focusing on work. Shame on you.”
Lu Xunye was stunned by her words. He immediately flushed red, retorting without caring that she was just speaking childishly, “What are you saying? Why would I think about him?”
“Then why did Gege call out Xiao Shen Gege’s name just now?” The little girl looked at him in confusion.
“…”
Lu Xunye covered his face: I muttered it out loud. So embarrassing.
He explained, trying to cover it up, “We are good friends. What’s wrong with calling a good friend’s name?”
“Gege is really childish. My friends and I don’t say each other’s names behind their backs.” The little girl scratched a spot on her face where the dirt itched.
Lu Xunye saw a beaded bracelet slide out from her sleeve when she raised her hand. His mood to argue paused.
When she finished scratching, he took her small, dusty hand to look at the beads on her wrist. “Blood Jade?”
Beads of translucent, blood-red pure color, without impurities, tightly strung on a hand rope.
It looked a bit like the ones on the old man’s stall that day, but the old man’s color wasn’t pure; blood streaks interlaced like spiderwebs within white jade.
“Grandma said Blood Jade can’t be worn.” The little girl looked solemn. “This isn’t Blood Jade, it’s red agate. Grandma said children in our village all wear this when they are small; it can ward off evil.”
Lu Xunye propped his head with one hand and played with the radishes in the bamboo basket with the other, disinterested, asking casually, “Why can’t Blood Jade be worn?”
Isn’t it just dyed? I was stupid that day to be scared by that old man.
“Grandma said real Blood Jade is dug out from coffins. It locks part of the deceased’s soul and has resentment. Wearing it for a long time brings bad luck.”
Lu Xunye saw her speaking earnestly and couldn’t help poking her head. “Little Radish Head, let Gege tell you, there are no ghosts or monsters in the world. Those are all to scare people, specifically to scare kids like you, understand?”
“Gege is lying.” The little girl covered her head and took a step back to stand further away so he couldn’t touch her. “Once, there was an uncle in our village. After his family gave birth to a dead baby, he kept having bad luck.”
“Then,” she paused, seemingly recalling, “then a granny gave the uncle a piece of yellow paper and told him to stick it on the dead baby and bury it with a piece of jade. After a long, long time, take the jade out, then dig up the bones and bury them deep in the mountains so he wouldn’t have bad luck anymore.”
Some old people indeed liked to tell such supernatural stories to scare children into behaving.
Seeing her pulling sentences from here and there, speaking enthusiastically with the clever look of an adult in a child’s body.
Lu Xunye acted as the supportive audience on the side, occasionally nodding. “Wearing it brings bad luck… so why didn’t that uncle have bad luck after wearing it?”
The little girl put her hands on her hips. “Because the yellow paper stuck on the dead baby sealed the resentment! This way, the child soul inside the Blood Jade will treat the person wearing it as a good friend and bring him good luck.”
Following her words, Lu Xunye guessed, “So if you want the Blood Jade to bring good luck, you have to find the corpse of the ‘blood’ owner and seal the resentment with yellow paper?”
“En!” The little girl nodded heavily, praising him unreservedly, “You are as smart as me.”
Lu Xunye pinched her chubby cheek. “Narcissist.”
He didn’t show it on his face, but he took these unguarded childish words to heart.
“Has Niuniu finished picking vegetables?” Guo Yi’s voice came from behind. “Eh, why is Mr. Lu here?”
Hearing the approaching footsteps, Lu Xunye pulled the little girl to his side and whispered, “Niuniu? What we just talked about is our secret. Don’t tell anyone, okay?”
“Okay.” Niuniu nodded obediently.
Afterward, he stood up, exchanged a few words with Guo Yi, and watched the grandmother and granddaughter leave one after another.
“Oh my, Niuniu, how did your face get like this?” Guo Yi wiped the dust off her face.
Niuniu, carrying the basket, looked back at him. Lu Xunye put a finger to his lips and made a silent shushing motion.
When he was the only one left, he squatted on the brick path again.
Looking at the lush vegetable patch before him, he casually picked up a small stick and gestured randomly on the bricks, his thoughts drifting away unknowingly.
Jian Luoqing had heart disease, and the final ending was also death from illness.
That shouldn’t count as a hidden plot.
Then what was the trigger for the progress increase?
Could it be that this hidden plot isn’t unlocked slowly based on the overall plot progress?
It’s not completely blank; is it that only relevant characters know the hidden details?
Is it classified as hidden only because it has nothing to do with the main emotional line of the Protagonist Gong and Shou? Or is it the result of this world’s self-consistent logic correcting the plot?
Since this mission is bound to the Host, could it be related to his actions as the Host?
Lu Xunye thought hard: What did I do that day before the notification sound rang?
The fortune-telling old man, Blood Jade?
No, that happened later.
Visiting the flower shop?
Paying respects to Shen Yunqian’s parents?
But didn’t his parents die in a car accident?
Is there a hidden story or…
Lu Xunye suddenly had a flash of inspiration. They had paid respects to one other person.
Jiang Qingran!
Combined with the last progress bar increase, it was because of… the magnolia bracelet!
Lu Xunye suddenly saw the light, muttering to himself, “The bracelet is hers? Jiang Qingran is the protagonist of the hidden plotline?”
Ding.
【Congratulations Host for unlocking a key character, Jiang Qingran. Unlocked degree +15%. Current unlock degree of “Death of the White Moonlight” mission completion: 40%.】
In his excitement, Lu Xunye snapped the wooden stick in his hand.
Just now, he had unconsciously scratched the brick surface with the stick, using some force. Now, the soil on the end of the stick had drawn a crooked pattern on the ground, resembling some kind of talisman.
It looked a bit familiar.
He tried to replicate it but couldn’t draw the same thing again. He leaned in to look, staring intently, and accidentally asked aloud, “Where exactly have I seen this before?”
“The Shen Family Old Residence.”
A sudden voice overhead startled the person deep in thought.
Lu Xunye’s spine went cold. Looking back, Shen Yunqian was standing behind him at some point.
He clutched his chest in retrospective fear, complaining, “Why do you walk without making a sound?”
Shen Yunqian was noncommittal. “It’s because you were too focused.”
Lu Xunye threw away the stick that was broken in half, took a deep breath, and stood up, deciding to smash the pot since it was already cracked. “Since you’ve remembered everything and know I lied to you, if you want to scold me, just scold.”
Shen Yunqian grabbed his collar and pulled down. “What… did you lie to me about?”
“Hmm?” Lu Xunye had a face full of question marks. He blinked and probed tentatively, “You… didn’t remember?”
“I remembered a little bit about the past.” Having achieved his goal, Shen Yunqian released his hand with measured relaxation.
His hand moved up, his thumb gently wiping away a speck of dirt on Lu Xunye’s face. “What, you don’t want me to remember?”
Shen Yunqian’s cold expression instantly became gentle as before, showing the total dependence he had when he first lost his memory and was convinced Lu Xunye was his boyfriend.
“Do you like my current personality? Gentle, well-behaved?”
Lu Xunye’s brain was buzzing from the current situation. Did he remember or not? Is he a face-changing monster?
He really has schizophrenia, right!
Lu Xunye grabbed Shen Yunqian’s arms and pushed him away. Learning the other party hadn’t fully recovered his memory, he inexplicably breathed a sigh of relief.
Ignoring that insignificant bit of disappointment in his heart, he stiffly changed the subject. “What were you saying about the Shen Family Old Residence?”
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