“What can I do for you?” The curtains of the window fluttered, blown into the room by the fierce wind swirling around the hillside. “Bang! Bang! Bang!” From time to time, the curtains hit the wooden frames, making the very loud sounds. Such constant noise gave people the creeps.
It was especially terrifying when a figure was standing still on the windowsill in the dark, moonless night.
All of a sudden, Ning Qingshan woke up from her dream. Before she could scream, she heard a cold and weird voice coming from the window. In the darkness, the figure there was facing her. However, she could see nothing except the outline of the figure.
“That’s the one I’m waiting for!” Ning Qingshan nearly cried out with surprise. She raised her head, touched her swollen feet, and said in a hoarse voice, “I want Ning Xueyan to die!”
“You? Just with what?” The person in the dark sneered with unconcealed sarcasm. Ning Qingshan seemed to have sensed that the person’s cold eyes were on her, and so she shivered a little. But then, she said, “I’m the princess. Isn’t that enough to give you such an order?”
In fact, Ning Qingshan didn’t know who the person was. Nevertheless, she was clear that he was powerful. It was him who told her that she was the princess of the previous dynasty and that he was willing to help her. However, Ning Qingshan was quite annoyed because he offered scarcely any help after that.
In her heart, she had guessed the identity of “him” several times. “It is most likely that he was an official in the previous dynasty. Otherwise, why would he help her?” Thinking of this, she was full of courage. As long as this person still thought of his old master, she would be the master of “him”. No matter what his purpose was, he must follow her orders.
“That’s enough! But what can you do as a princess of the previous dynasty?” In the dark, Ning Qingshan heard the sarcasm in his voice, feeling humiliated and resentful.
“As the princess of the former dynasty,” she thought, “I, who is even nobler than the present princess, can be proud enough to look down on everyone.” And she said, “If you help me, I will do anything I can to help you in the future. You know, I will marry into the Third Prince’s Manor soon.”
These words came straight out of her mouth.
“Oh? But what is the use of that?” The person in the darkness responded with an enchanting sneer.
“Help me. Once I become the empress, even the dynasty can be changed.” Ning Qingshan gritted her teeth and said. She couldn’t help confiding these words hidden deep in her heart to the person who kept sneering in the dark.
As if he were frightened by her ambition, the person in the dark remained silent for quite a long time. When Ning Qingshan nearly lost patience in waiting, he asked, “You want to be the empress, don’t you?”
“Yes,” Ning Qingshan gave him a firm answer. “Of course, I will become the empress.” She thought.
“I can help you, but now I can’t kill Ning Xueyan for you because if I do that, you may not marry into the Third Prince’s Manor without hindrance. But I certainly can help you kill her if you think it’s worthwhile for you to change the position of the empress for Ning Xueyan’s life,” The person said with ease as if he were not talking about taking someone’s life but something extremely common. Though there was no murderous intention in his clam tongue, it made Ning Qingshan’s blood run cold.
“Exchange my position of the empress for Ning Xueyan’s life! No way! The high status can guarantee my extraordinary life. How can I be so stupid to ruin my way up because of such a humble bitch?” She thought to herself.
From her long silence, the person had known her answer so that he didn’t ask it again. Instead, he, who was in the dark, came up with another question in his airy tongue. “Have you found the military medallion from the previous dynasty?”
“No, I haven’t. It was not in the study of Ning Zu’an nor in any other places that I have searched,” Ning Qingshan said with embarrassment. He asked her to deal with this matter a long time ago, but she hadn’t done it well until now. Last time, she even lost her people. Thus, Ning Qingshan felt a little guilty when this person moved on to this topic.
“You’d better find out the truth about the Lord Protector’s Manor. As for the position of the empress, we’ll talk about it after you marry the Third Prince. I’ll come to you if something happens in the future. Don’t ask me to come at will,” said the person in a cold voice, which sent Ning Qingshan a chill down her spine. In the dark, his shadow turned longer and much weirder as if it was going to envelop Ning Qingshan.
“I don’t care how many tricks you’ve played. Remember that your identity as the former princess is a secret, and don’t let anyone know it.” The person gave her a warning that sounded so devoid of feeling. Suddenly, the black figure approached her, putting his ice-cold hands around Ning Qingshan’s neck and squeezing it a little. Subconsciously, Ning Qingshan reached out, trying to pull the pair of hands away. The feeling of suffocation told her that she would die if this man tightened his hands a little more.
A cold sweat started to break out on her forehead. She regretted what she had done—asking Mammy Luo to contact this person on impulse. However, it seemed that that person really didn’t care about her. “But how can it be possible? This person must need me because I am the princess of the previous dynasty. If not, he wouldn’t have spared so much effort to find me and helped me more than once.” Ning Qingshan thought in her mind.
“Let go of me! I’m the princesses from the previous dynasty, and I can help you!” With her throat in his hands, Ning Qingshan shouted in a hurry for fear that he would strangle her for real.
“Yes, my honorable and beautiful princess!” There followed low, soothing laughter. He whispered in her ear, but she couldn’t hear his voice clearly. His muffled voice was like a layer of mist that separated him from her. Sometimes, Ning Qingshan felt he was close to her, but sometimes, he seemed to be far away. The voice continued, “Military medallion. Keep the military medallion from the preceding dynasty in mind. Check Ning Zu’an’s wife and Madam Ming’s Bright Frost Garden. Perhaps, you can get something unexpected from them.”
“As for your request, I’ll consider it. When Fifth Young Lady becomes worthless, I’ll kill her as you want!” A burst of creepy laughter rang in her ear, and then the feeling of being smothered around her neck disappeared. After waking up from the sensation of faint dizziness, Ning Qingshan limped to the window and closed it hard, as if she wanted to leave all the bad things outside the window.
Leaning against the window, Ning Qingshan wiped away the cold sweat on her head and then calmed down. It seemed that she could not turn against Ning Xueyan now, for she was of some use to them. She could deduce from his words that the military medallion from the preceding dynasty should have something to do with the Bright Frost Garden that Ning Xueyan was living in. Thus, she could not lay hands on Ning Xueyan for the time being.
Fortunately, Ning Qingshan didn’t have the impulse to offend Ning Xueyan openly. Secretly, she thought, “Since she is still valuable, I may as well let someone else handle her.”
Ning Xueyan was now dreaming. In her dream, lofty palaces collapsed one after another in the fire. Meanwhile, a tremendous crash came from a distance. She looked back and saw that everyone was running. There were a few people beside her, who also seemed to be running. Her hand was in someone’s hand, but she couldn’t see clearly who was pulling her along.
What she could see was a pair of tender, snow-white hands holding her tightly.
Quite a number of people were there. Many palace maids walked past her, and beside her, there were several eunuchs. All of them gathered together, trying to prevent her and the person who was pulling her from something.
“Your Grace, come here. Hurry up! Come here!” Someone was shouting. The sound was so clear as if the person was right beside her. Ning Xueyan looked back suddenly but found no one. She only saw that the huge palace fell down in front of her, and the flying flames fell on her…
“Ah!” Ning Xueyan screamed and woke up. Abruptly, she sat up, covering her wildly thumping heart. A trace of blankness flashed in her eyes. For a moment, she didn’t know where she was. She only felt that in her mind still remained the lights of the flames, which were burning brightly.
Suddenly, she consciously turned to a corner of the room, and a figure sitting on a chair by the window jumped into her eyes. “Who are you?”
Ning Xueyan lowered her voice and asked, and the blankness in her eyes turned into vigilance. She was sure that this man was not Ao Chenyi. But how could he appear in her room without a sound?
“I come here to see you!” The voice of the comer was very erratic, so Ning Xueyan could not recognize this voice at all. Nevertheless, it sounded familiar to her. “I heard that you have been seriously injured. Would you like me to feel your pulse to see where you have been injured?”
“I’ve seen the doctor, but thank you anyway.” Ning Xueyan’s eyes slightly narrowed and fixed on the person in the dark.
“Do you need my help? Or maybe I can help you investigate the matter about your Sister Ziying. You want to revenge for her, don’t you? I know something about her. Do you want to know that?” the man said with a smile. It seemed that he was friendly to Ning Xueyan. Also, his voice was full of temptation.
But since he appeared in the room of Ning Xueyan with such an image late at night, she would undoubtedly be on the alert.
“What do you want?” There was no free lunch in the world, so Ning Xueyan didn’t think that she could let a strange, mysterious person come over to help her.
She blinked her watery eyes in the darkness and did not let down her guard the slightest.
“Fifth Young Lady, don’t worry. I have no evil intention. Well, forget it. It seems that you won’t believe me for the time being. Let’s see if we have any chance to cooperate in the future. If you want to know what happened to Ning Ziying, you can ask me. I believe I’m the most suitable one to answer such a question. Maybe I can come up with an unexpected answer.”
The man in the dark said with a smile.
“Who is Sister Ziying?” Ning Xueyan could not help but ask. Since he thought that she just wanted to revenge for Ning Ziying, she was willing to make him misunderstand. After all, in Ning Xueyan’s opinion, no one could figure out the secret of rebirth…
“Fifth Young Lady, if you want to know it, shouldn’t you show some sincerity?” The voice was gentle, and the person still seemed to smile, which made him appear stranger.
“What kind of sincerity do you want to see?” Ning Xueyan bit her lip, being fully aware of the fact that this person would never simply tell her the answer. Nevertheless, since her rebirth, he was the only one who took the initiative to tell her that he knew everything about Ning Ziying.
“Fifth Young Lady, I heard that your mother was the daughter of the former Minister of War. Did your maternal grandfather leave your mother anything? Or did your mom give you something? If there is anything, I can tell you all the information I know about Ning Ziying, including some private things about her.”
“Something left by the former Minister of War… Military medallion?” These two words jumped into and exploded in her mind all of a sudden. “This person wants military medallion, too. Besides, he knew everything about Ning Ziying! What was Ning Ziying’s identity? The princess of the former dynasty? But few people in the world knew this secret. How could this person know? Who exactly is he?” Ning Xueyan thought in her mind.
“Moreover, judging from his words, he seems to know quite a lot. He may even know some private matters that even I don’t know about.”
“What are the secret things?” Totally shocked, she finally managed to utter a simple question, her hands clenching the sheets under the bed tight. She had a faint suspicion that there must be someone who knew all of this and the secret about her last life. “Can it be the person before me?” She guessed.
