Chapter 59: Awakening Part 2

Somehow deemed gravely ill out of nowhere, Yan Xinfeng: “…Got it. You may go.”

The butler bowed in relief and withdrew. The study fell silent once more.

Yan Xinfeng stared blankly at the page for a moment, then suddenly stood, grabbed the withered tree branch that had sat on the desk all day from the corner, hid it behind his back, and strode out of the study.

He arrived at Wei Tingxia’s courtyard and smelled the bitter scent of medicinal soup from afar.

He had inspected all those gifts before they were sent over and knew they carried a harmless fragrance. But in Wei Tingxia’s courtyard, the scent lasted less than half a day before being completely overwhelmed by the medicinal smell.

Yan Xinfeng stepped into the courtyard and pushed open the room door, his path blocked by several gold and silver accessories that had rolled onto the floor.

“I thought you wouldn’t come by lately,” Wei Tingxia said from the bed.

He stared at the gauze canopy above the bed from start to finish, paying no attention to the door, yet he knew exactly who had arrived.

Yan Xinfeng said nothing. He half-squatted to pick up the accessories and placed them in a small dish nearby.

The crisp clink of gold and silver against ceramic echoed in the room.

“Don’t like them?”

He walked to the bedside, and his tall figure cast a shadow.

Wei Tingxia tilted his head, propped on the pillow as he watched Yan Xinfeng approach step by step. “Not bad, but I don’t particularly like it.”

“Then what do you like?” Yan Xinfeng asked.

Wei Tingxia did not answer the question. He waited for Yan Xinfeng to stop at his bedside before he countered, “Why the sudden interest in this?”

“I’ve always been concerned,” Yan Xinfeng said. “It’s not just from today or yesterday. I’ve always hoped you could live comfortably and at ease.”

He spoke very earnestly, and the hand he kept behind his back hesitated to come out.

Wei Tingxia’s originally languid gaze shifted slightly at that subtle movement behind him. His eyes precisely landed on the arm Yan Xinfeng deliberately hid, with a sly curiosity. “What did you bring?”

Yan Xinfeng thought to himself that he must be sick in the head, but he steeled his resolve and brought out the dry branch he had hidden behind his back.

“Ruo Chi sent it to you,” he said in a low voice, too embarrassed to mention himself.

The branch had lost the fresh green tenderness it held those days ago and now resembled any withered twig from the borderlands, faded to the most ordinary brown.

Wei Tingxia’s gaze fell on the withered branch, and it sharpened slightly.

He reached out a hand, his movements unhurried. When his fingertips touched the rough, dry bark, they carried an indescribable gentleness.

He did not speak immediately. Instead, he took the withered branch and held it before his eyes. In the hazy daylight filtering through the window, tinged with the medicinal fumes, he examined it inch by inch.

“…Very pretty.”

Yan Xinfeng had never expected his intuition to be correct.

He confirmed hesitantly, “You really like it?”

“I do!”

Wei Tingxia held the branch in his hand and looked it over from every angle. He could not quite explain why, but the more he looked, the more pleasing it became. After admiring it for a long time, he casually placed the wild jujube branch by his pillow, propped his arm half under it, and smiled at Yan Xinfeng.

“You’re not angry anymore?” he asked.

Yan Xinfeng was honest and shook his head before nodding. He said, “I was also at fault back then. Besides, getting angry at you wouldn’t help.”

No one knew whose temper Wei Tingxia had inherited—fierce and belligerent. He could argue a point even when ignored. If Yan Xinfeng got angry at him, he would only get even angrier.

So he had to stay calm.

Wei Tingxia blinked at his words and smiled even more deeply. “Really?”

Yan Xinfeng nodded again. “Really.”

The Grand General was truly a good man. As expected of a proper young master raised by a noble family—steady and upright, not easily angered, and quick to soothe when he was.

Wei Tingxia had been wondering how to coax him, but now he did not need to. He sat up and took the branch back into his hand. “Help me find a flower pot.”

As soon as he moved, Yan Xinfeng moved too, watching him tensely for fear he would faint after two steps.

“What do you need a flower pot for?”

“To plant it,” Wei Tingxia kicked Yan Xinfeng’s calf lightly. “Hurry, or it’ll really die.”

The branch had been picked nearly half a month ago and was long dead. Even if planted now, with ample water and fertilizer, it was unlikely to sprout new leaves.

But before Yan Xinfeng could say anything, his gaze drifted downward as if pulled by a string, landing on Wei Tingxia’s calf.

That section gleamed with a moist luster in the light. Yan Xinfeng glanced briefly, then shifted his eyes away as if scalded.

How hateful it was that the world was full of gentlemen unmoved by such sights, yet none of them was him. From childhood, his tutors had drilled nonchalance into him—do not look where improper, do not speak improperly—yet he had only heard it with his ears, not engraved it into his bones?

Yan Xinfeng raised a hand to shield his eyes. “Don’t get up. I’ll go.”

With that, he glanced around the room and zeroed in on a celadon flower pot with painted designs on the windowsill.

“How about that one?”

Wei Tingxia held the branch in one hand and squinted toward the direction Yan Xinfeng pointed. After a moment, he nodded. “That’ll do.”

Yan Xinfeng fetched the flower pot and placed it by the bed. Then he went outside to dig up some soil. Like coaxing a child, he found a small iron shovel and half a bowl of water. He watched as Wei Tingxia carefully planted the branch inside.

To avoid splashing water outside, Wei Tingxia dripped it in with his fingers, extremely cautious. The dead, withered twigs swayed slightly, showing no sign of reviving.

Yan Xinfeng half-squatted beside him. The soft light fell gently, especially tender on Wei Tingxia’s brow, as if time itself slowed.

He could not muster any anger—only fondness.

The more he looked, the more he liked it, so much that the teachings of his first twenty-odd years seemed wasted. His heart and eyes were filled with the conviction that this man should be his marquis consort.

“I heard the marquis has some good news lately?”

Wei Tingxia’s voice sounded in his ear, scattering his thoughts. Yan Xinfeng looked up to see the man still idly fiddling with the branches and leaves, as if it were just a casual question.

“Not good news,” Yan Xinfeng said. “Just rumors spread by word of mouth.”

“Is that so?” Wei Tingxia paused his movements and said thoughtfully, “They seemed so happy, I thought the marquis was going to take a marquis consort.”

“…No.”

Yan Xinfeng denied it repeatedly, but Wei Tingxia latched on and followed the train of thought. “If the marquis takes a marquis consort, what about me? Can I still live in this little courtyard?”

He looked around, picked up a few beads to play with, and asked again, “Can I still play with beads? If I want to plant something, will the marquis still help me dig soil?”

He grew more animated. “What if the marquis consort doesn’t like me? What if she makes me go dig wild vegetables? With my body like this, I’m useless—ten days or half a month for one basket, not even enough for her to eat. If she finds me in the way and drives me out, Marquis, I’d have nowhere to go. What then…”

His tone held deliberate grievance and sadness, as if he already saw himself tormented by that nonexistent marquis consort—miserable and pitiable—while also resenting this do-nothing marquis.

Wei Tingxia poked Yan Xinfeng’s shoulder hard. “Yan Xinfeng, if you do this to me, even as revenge, it’s not the act of a gentleman.”

Yan Xinfeng almost laughed at his wild imaginings.

He looked up. “Are you that afraid of the marquis consort bullying you?”

“I am. Then let me go,” Wei Tingxia said. “Let me leave so she can’t find me, and I won’t be afraid.”

At those words, Yan Xinfeng replied without thinking, “Don’t even think about it. Where could you go?”

The world was vast—anywhere could be gone to—but Wei Tingxia did not voice it. The mood was good today; no need to argue.

“Yeah.”

On the contrary, he sighed, looking very worried. “I can’t go anywhere, so Marquis, you must say less about me in front of the marquis consort, lest she finds me an eyesore and leaves me not even this tiny plot of land.”

Yan Xinfeng laughed.

“There’s no marquis consort, and no one to bully you. Wei Tingxia, you really don’t know your own charm.” His tone held admiration. “But there is one way to make you stop being afraid.”

“What way?”

“Be my marquis consort,” Yan Xinfeng said. “The three letters and six rites, none omitted. I’ll report to heaven and earth above, inform the ancestors below, and respectfully welcome you through the door. In death, we’ll be buried together, our names on the same plaque. How about it?”

As he spoke, his eyes held a smile, and his tone was light, as if discussing a mere amusing trifle, a joke needing no deep thought. But deep in that smile lurked an unmistakable seriousness.

Hearing the seriousness, the playful smile and feigned worry on Wei Tingxia’s face dispersed like mist in the wind, vanishing clean in an instant.

They gazed at each other for a long time, so long that the forced smile in Yan Xinfeng’s eyes nearly faltered. Only then did a slight ripple stir in those deep waters.

Wei Tingxia slowly, extremely slowly, shook his head.

It was not fierce rejection, nor shy evasion—just calm negation, carrying a weary clarity.

Yan Xinfeng’s heart plummeted heavily.

The curve at his lips had not fully faded, but his eyes dimmed first. His throat bobbed almost imperceptibly.

Just as the heavy silence threatened to crush everything, Wei Tingxia spoke. His voice was soft but exceptionally clear. “Yan Xinfeng, you’re not thinking straight right now.”

Yan Xinfeng’s throat tightened. “Where am I not?”

“Losing and regaining—rage, joy, sorrow—it’s enough to daze you.” Wei Tingxia tapped the edge of the flower pot casually. “This is a lifelong matter, not child’s play. You need to think it through carefully.”

Yan Xinfeng’s voice grew low. “Think what through?”

“I’m not some noble miss who’ll watch her husband take seven or eight wives. I’m strong-willed and jealous. If you really plan to entangle with me,” Wei Tingxia’s voice floated lightly as his fingers brushed the texture of Yan Xinfeng’s robe over his chest, “you’d better prepare for the Yan family to have no heirs from now on—”

“Are you prepared for that?”

At those words, the last traces of levity between them vanished, leaving only suppressed undercurrents surging to the limit, ready to lose balance at a single glance and upend everything irreparably.

‘How do you know I wouldn’t?’ Yan Xinfeng wanted to say.

But urgent footsteps shattered the taut silence, drawing near.

“Marquis! Marquis!”

A guard’s voice rose lowly outside the courtyard gate, laced with urgency that could not be ignored. “Urgent dispatch! From the capital, eight hundred li expedited!”

The voice was like cold water into boiling oil. Yan Xinfeng tensed, the complex emotions in his eyes receding like the tide.

“Understood.”

He responded to the door in a deep voice, his tone restored to its usual stern authority.

He met Wei Tingxia’s eyes one last time, then rose and strode toward the courtyard gate. His back was upright but carried a stiff haste.

The footsteps quickly faded, vanishing beyond the gate.

In the small courtyard, only Wei Tingxia remained. He stayed in his thoughtful pose, his fingertips unconsciously stroking the withered branch.

At that moment, the sensation under his fingertips seemed to change subtly.

That segment of dry, black twig trembled faintly under his unconscious touch.

Then, a tiny, almost imperceptible tender green emerged, as if dotted by an invisible brush, slowly drilling out from beneath the desiccated bark.

That speck of new green was fragile as a newborn’s breath, yet it brimmed with vigorous life force that made the heart race, instantly illuminating the dead twig and reflecting in Wei Tingxia’s suddenly contracting pupils.

He jerked his hand back as if burned, a strange, warm throbbing lingering on his fingertips.

A foreign power surged within his body.