Standing on top of a tree, Zhi Wei lets out a sigh of relief. Her heart that has been pounding nervously once she heard of the news can finally settle down a bit. The moment the tension eased, Zhi Wei immediately felt faint and almost fell off the tree. Gu Nan Yi grabs her as his sparkling eyes stares at her with puzzlement. Zhi Wei grins and says “This tree is sure tall.”
Zhi Wei secretly takes her own pulse and abruptly looks down to hide her expression.
————————————–
Gu Nan Yi suddenly turns his head and flicks out a hand full of walnuts. The walnuts shot out like rain, spreading out towards the back of the crowd. One man, squeezed in among the crowd had an expression of distress as he watched the slowly dispersing crowd. With a flip of his hand, the man pulls out a long knife and stabs it towards another man’s back! Before the knife even made it into his intended victim’s back, the man was already yelling “Someone got kil…” Something yellowish looking abruptly flew through the air and struck his long knife, snapping it in half. The yellow thing falls to the ground, revealing it to be a small walnut. At this same moment, yells of “Catch the thief!” sounded all over in unison, completely covering the yell of “Someone got killed!” the man had tried to shout out. A few people surrounded the men and promptly twisted his arm until he fainted dead away with the accompanying bone cracking sound. Such incidents happened a total of five times, all were taken care of in an instant. The people in the crowd thought there were really thieves, all grabbed their money pouches tightly and made haste to leave the area.
The couple thousand people slowly dispersed and Chang clan’s spies have been captured. Zhi Wei lets out a long sigh and a tired smile. She has been worried that it would be easy for Chang clan’s spies to utilize the chaos to clash with Ning Yi’s guards and make this whole thing spin out of control. Even if Ning Yi was able to stay safe, Chang clan could easily use this one incident to make endless amount of trouble that would have unimaginable consequences. If that happens, one thing for certain is that she would not be able to keep her promise to Minister Zhou, unable to establish the maritime office which means there would be no way to control the noble families and of course, their wish to keep South Sea out of Chang clan’s clutches would be hopeless. Zhi Wei had wondered why Chang clan’s spies had been unsuccessful at creating trouble after so many hours but once the crowd left she immediately understood when she saw the huge tree trunks that have been put up as obstacles at all directions in front of the ancestry chapel. Not to mention Ning Yi’s guards have put up their shields on the tree trunks so there is no way to see past them to figure out what’s going on inside. The moment Ning Yi realized a crowd would be gathering, he had ordered his men to chop down the big trees in front of the ancestry chapel and piled them all around to act as impenetrable obstacles to prevent any contact between his guards and the citizens. Under such circumstances, there was simply no way for the spies to create “accidents”. If it wasn’t for Ning Yi’s quick thinking, things would’ve gotten out of hand long before Zhi Wei could get there.
In all honesty, Ning Yi could’ve made a quick retreat the moment he realized people were gathering but he had instead chosen to stay in such a dangerous situation. One reason is of course because he trusts Zhi Wei could solve the problem but more part of the reason is that he no longer wants to play nice with Yan clan. He had not said anything when Zhi Wei made the decision to back Yan Huai Shi, but he has now thoroughly shown through his actions what his attitude is.
Zhi Wei got down from the tree and was hit with more dizziness. Feeling cold then feverish the next, Zhi Wei forces herself to smile before taking a few steps away from Gu Nan Yi. Spotting Zhi Wei, the guards quickly pull back the shields to let her through. Preparing to take her to jump right over the giant tree trunks, Nan Yi reaches out to pull on Zhi Wei’s sleeve but she doges and says with a smile “I’ll do it myself.” Climbing onto the tree trunk, Zhi Wei moved briskly and waved the guards to back away. Quite unused to seeing Zhi Wei this somber and serious, all the guards promptly backed far away. Once she is on top of the tree trunk and the shields parted, Zhi Wei can finally see a certain person in front of the ancestry chapel. Surrounded by guards, that person is leaning against a tree. On the ground beneath him spread the red cloaks of the guards. Perhaps because he had come out in a rush, he is only wearing his white casual robe with a gold cloak that has the black embroidery of devil’s snare flowers on it. He is playing chess. (Chinese chess obviously) In the midst of such a crowd, in such a perilous situation where one wrong step would be like lighting a fire in a field of hey, he is playing chess with himself. Leaning against the tree in a leisurely manner, there is a wooden chessboard in front of him. Using tree leaves as chess pieces, one side is green the other yellow. Pursing his lips, he “stares” at the chessboard intently, most likely pondering how he is going to use his green side to eat up his yellow general. Gazing at Ning Yi from afar as the sunlight penetrates through the tree leaves landing on his brows, his long eyelashes casting a graceful shadow beneath his eyes, Zhi Wei unexpectedly feels the moment has a rare warmth in the silence. Seeing Ning Yi’s expression, Zhi Wei suddenly felt an ache tugging at her heart. Pursing her own lips, Zhi Wei presses down the sudden turmoil of emotions.
Hearing some commotions, Ning Yi turns to smile at her and waves “You are here.”
“Mhmm.”
The question was casual and the answer was simple as if she had just finished her work for the day and they were simply exchanging a casual greeting. It was as if all the danger and the thousands of people who just dispersed had never existed.
“Come here.” Ning Yi calls again.
Zhi Wei slowly walks over but stops a few feet away from him.
Listening to her footsteps, Ning Yi asks with a frowning smile “Why are you being skittish today, did you get scared?”
Zhi Wei smiles but doesn’t move closer “How is it inside?”
“Still the same.” Ning Yi stands up, scattering his chessboard of leaves and reaches out to pull her “Do you have something to eat? I haven’t eaten all day, I am starving to death.”
Backing away in a flash, Zhi Wei replies “I don’t.”
“What’s wrong with you today?” Ning Yi frowns and stops where he is at “Are you blaming me for not getting them out by force? The ancestry chapel is a serious matter, this could severely impact you so I decided to wait…”
“No.” Zhi Wei quickly says “We can’t use force. If it was me, I would’ve made the same choice.”
“That’s hard to say.” Ning Yi’s lets out a chilling grin “My patience is limited. If Yan clan really dares to cross the line with us then I dare to cut off their path of retreat.”
All text copyright @ www.Ninja-Reflection.com
Oh no, Zhi Wei is sick!! This is the opposite of the scene in the drama… one problem solved another one appears… so full of suspense!!
Thanks again for your translation and look forward to next week. Take care!
Uh oh- what’s wrong with ZW? Ugh waiting till next Monday is so hard!! 😋
ah…man…this was too short. LOL
Oh no what’s wrong with ZW? In the drama at this point, Ning Yi gets sick . I am a little perplex as to where we are in terms of the drama and what about the cave scene did we past that or have we not gotten there yet? ZW is suppressing her feeling………… Can’t wait for next week.
That’s a good question… I’m curious about that myself
We are at about episode 45-46. As you guys should be able to tell by this point, the drama chopped and changed a lot of the story. I actually don’t remember there being a cave scene in the novel, I think that was supposed to be the old temple scene when our two leads were trapped in a little room off to the side of the temple and they almost died of poison fume? The drama added a lot of political characters I don’t remember being in the novel (or it could just be that I wasn’t paying attention) and they definitely water-downed a lot of super cool characters. Anyhow, I think due to the trouble the show met towards the end (remember it was supposed to be quite a bit longer), the story really got messed up so you guys will start seeing more and more dramatic differences between the novel and the show as we go.
Forever grateful for the translations 🙂 I do have a question between the drama and the novel.
In the drama, Ning Yi was a tailor. Was it a drama “fabrication”?
One thing to keep in mind is that Ning Yi in the drama was a prince who was trying very hard to lay low since he had just returned to the capital after years of banishment. So the whole tailor thing was our hero’s way to show everyone that he is harmless. In the novel though, our hero was in a completely different situation. In the novel, our hero was never banished which meant he had plenty of time to set up his own network. The drama spent a lot of time showing the enormous effort our hero had to go through to get rid of his brothers but that really wasn’t the case in the novel. His enemy in the novel had always been the emperor, he really could’ve gotten rid of his brother anytime he wanted to.
The emperor in the novel is not a savory character. Maybe the drama did the right thing by in-cooperating some respect for the father figure to make it more palatable for the audience. Ning Yi is a rather sentimental character in the novel despite his traumatic upbringing. I can imagine all sort of psychological issues, but then this is fiction after all.
Thank you for the translation! Very much appreciated!
Esperar é a minha dona neste romance que cada vez fica melhor.E a ansiedade toma conta.kkk
Muito grata😘
I am very curious about how a seven-year old NY finds himself facing a formidable enemy like the Blood Pagoda – and what happens to that beautiful, inteligent and brave little boy ?
The suspense is killing! Every week I am ever appreciative of your translation, and your time; your precious commodity that brings all of us so much pleasure. THANK YOU!