During this period, Xie Tao was often dragged out to eat by Song Shiman, and on weekends, she was even invited to go out for fun.
Most of the time, Xie Tao did not refuse.
Because she felt that Song Shiman seemed a bit different from what she had imagined.
Song Shiman was domineering, mean, arrogant, and looked down upon people.
Often, she indeed verbally insulted those she disapproved of, but Xie Tao had never seen her physically assault anyone.
Compared to Xu Hui and Zhao Yixuan, Song Shiman seemed to be less free.
Because every afternoon after school, a driver would pick her up and take her home, where two teachers awaited her.
One taught piano and the other taught violin.
Her parents were determined to cultivate her into a so-called socialite of the upper class.
If she wanted to go out, she had to ask her mother for permission first.
Xie Tao had seen her calling her mother, looking submissive.
Like a cat that had its claws pulled out, originally showing its fangs and claws.
But this does not mean that she did not have the potential to commit violence against Zhou Xinyue.
What really made Xie Tao feel that something was off was one day, when she and Song Shiman were sitting in a milk tea shop, and Song Shiman casually mentioned Zhou Xinyue.
By then, Xu Hui and Zhao Yixuan had already left.
“Don’t listen to what others say, I don’t have a hobby of hitting people, that’s all nonsense!” As if eager to prove her “innocence” and preserve her image, she adjusted her curly hair, her eyes fixated on Xie Tao, and she smiled a bit awkwardly, “Don’t get me wrong… um, and don’t let your brother misunderstand either.”
She even pointed at her curly hair, saying, “This isn’t permed, it’s natural curls, you know about natural curls, right?”
Seeing Xie Tao purse her lips and remain silent, Song Shiman seemed to think of something, and scoffed, “You must have heard about that incident, right?”
Xie Tao, holding her milk tea, “What?”
“The school is all talking about it, saying that I bullied a girl, and that it was me who caused her to fall from the second floor…” Song Shiman became very angry when mentioning this incident, biting her straw, “That girl is called Zhou Xinyue, her dad is my dad’s assistant, you tell me, if I really bullied her, why wouldn’t she tell her dad that it was me?”
Song Shiman initially did not know that her dad’s assistant’s daughter was her classmate, Zhou Xinyue.
It was when her dad and Assistant Zhou came to pick her up once, she heard her dad saying, “Zhou Ping, isn’t your daughter also studying here? Let’s have her come along.”
Then Song Shiman saw Zhou Xinyue.
“I admit, I might have looked down on her, but I definitely didn’t hit her,” Song Shiman said with her arms crossed and her chin lifted. “Such violent actions are not suitable for me.”
Was Song Shiman telling the truth?
Xie Tao was not sure.
But she clearly understood that Song Shiman was desperately trying to establish a good image in front of her.
Perhaps Song Shiman really thought that Xie Tao and Zheng Hejia were as close as “siblings”?
But she miscalculated.
If the situation was really as Song Shiman described, then how did Zhou Xinyue end up with all those injuries?
During this time, Xie Tao, in her interactions with the three of them, learned the name of another boy.
His name is Yu Chengfei, the class committee member of Senior Year 2, Class 1, and a regular in the top five of the grade rankings.
Due to his outstanding looks and grades, he has always been a topic of private discussion among many girls.
And now, he is Xu Hui’s boyfriend.
They have been together for just over ten days.
This was a secret, and Xie Tao only learned about it because Song Shiman accidentally let it slip once.
“Speaking of which, Zhou Xinyue used to like Yu Chengfei.”
Chewing on her straw as if she suddenly remembered something, Song Shiman curled her lip, “She didn’t even look at herself before daring to write a love letter to Yu Chengfei!”
At that moment, when Xie Tao heard Song Shiman’s words, she froze.
The fingers resting on her knee gradually clenched, and she forced herself to calm down. When she spoke, her voice was a bit dry, “She… wrote a love letter?”
Song Shiman nodded, saying, “Yeah, at that time, Zhao Yixuan wasn’t sitting at the same desk with her, she pulled it out of her diary.”
“You don’t know, Zhao Yixuan even posted that love letter on the blackboard…” As if she found it amusing, she looked up at Xie Tao, only to see the girl sitting opposite her had an expressionless pale face. When her almond-shaped eyes looked at her, they were a dark shadow.
There was even a faint hint of redness around her eyes.
Zhao Yixuan… again, Zhao Yixuan.
Xie Tao pursed her lips and took a deep breath.
At this moment, seeing Xie Tao like this, Song Shiman suddenly couldn’t finish her sentence.
“Why do you find it funny?”
Suddenly, the girl sitting opposite her asked softly.
“What?” She didn’t react for a moment.
“Why do you think it’s funny that she fell for Yu Chengfei?” Xie Tao looked at her steadily.
Song Shiman was stunned.
“Why do you dislike her?”
Xie Tao asked her again.
“She’s so fat, yet she dares to covet the person Xiao Hui likes. Isn’t that a joke?” Song Shiman said this with a clearly lacking confidence.
She wasn’t sure if it was her misconception, but Xie Tao, who she remembered as gentle, seemed to speak with a bit of toughness in her voice now.
Xie Tao suddenly laughed, lowering her eyelids as if trying to restrain something.
At that moment, she had countless questions she wanted to ask, but in the end, she held back.
Now was not the time.
“I have a part-time job, I’m leaving first.” She stood up, shouldered her backpack, and turned to walk out of the milk tea shop.
Song Shiman didn’t even have time to call out to her before she saw her push open the glass door and leave.
“These two siblings really are somewhat alike… Both are quite capricious?” Song Shiman muttered softly.
After finishing her work at the dessert shop, Xie Tao got home at nine o’clock.
Sitting at her desk doing homework, Xie Tao found herself stopping at some point, staring blankly out the window at the night sky.
A few sparse stars, no moon in sight.
The night wind was blocked by the glass window, only managing to sway the shadows of the trees, shaking gently.
Remembering what Song Shiman said today, Xie Tao felt both angry and amused, but she couldn’t completely fall out with Song Shiman just yet.
Just as he said.
She needed to keep her cool.
In a moment of slight eye soreness, Xie Tao suddenly felt a severe pain in the palm of her right hand.
As if it was cut open by an extremely thin blade, deeply slicing through.
The pain made her instantly drop the pen in her hand, and sweat beads gradually appeared on her forehead.
Meanwhile, in another dimension, Wei Yun sat in a carriage, his right hand holding a sword blade emitting a chilling light.
The blade was so thin it had already cut through his palm, the blood staining the blade, with droplets falling down, blossoming a mark on his dark brocade robe.
Yet his brows did not move, his eyes soaked in frost, his gaze sharp and filled with hostility.
“Milord!” A worried voice came from outside the carriage.
Wei Yun immediately turned his body, swiftly using the momentum to leap out of the carriage. As he turned his wrist holding the blade, the black-clothed, masked person holding the sword hilt was forced to retract his arm, and in an instant, the black-clothed man’s throat was slit by his own blade.
The moment his blood spurted from his neck, Wei Yun, standing behind him, finally loosened the left hand that was gripping the blade.
Blood flowed down from his deeply cut palm, yet he didn’t even frown.
Above the empty alleys and long streets, the dim yellow light from the lanterns swaying in the night breeze illuminated his side face, casting a blurred outline in the light and shadow.
The remaining dozen assassins were also dealt with by Wei Jing and a few other guards.
“I am at fault,” Wei Jing immediately knelt down upon seeing the blood on his hands.
The other guards present also knelt down at once.
At this moment, the sound of armor clashing and orderly footsteps approached, as someone rode in on a horse, followed by dozens of soldiers armed with swords.
The man on the horse, sporting a goatee, immediately dismounted and knelt with a fist in palm upon seeing Wei Yun, “I am late, please forgive me, Imperial Advisor.”
This man was the leader of the Yidu Night Patrol Army—Li Tianheng.
Wei Yun casually wiped the blood off his left hand with a brocade handkerchief handed to him by Wei Jing, then tossed it at Li Tianheng’s feet. His voice was clear and emotionless, “Commander Li, you’re not too late.”
“Just in time to collect their corpses.”
He glanced at the dead bodies on the ground, his lips barely curving in a smile, his eyes dark and unfathomable.
For some reason, his voice sounded extremely light, with no significant fluctuations, but to Li Tianheng, it felt like a thorn in his back, making him break out in cold sweat.
He always felt that this Imperial Advisor seemed to have seen through everything.
After Li Tianheng took care of the dead bodies and left, Wei Jing, looking at Wei Yun who remained standing in place, couldn’t help but step forward and ask, “Why not leave one alive?”
“Their instigator is not hard to guess.”
Ignoring the still bleeding wound in his palm, Wei Yun moved his left hand, his expression very light. His jade-like face was spotless except for a few specks of blood, which were splatters from when he had gripped the sword blade with his bare hand and slashed the man’s neck in reversal.
“Keeping a survivor would be meaningless. Might as well kill them all.”
Wei Yun turned, “Let’s return to the mansion.”
Just as he was sitting down in the carriage again, he distinctly felt as though his chest was scalded.
Wei Yun’s expression turned stern, and he reached into his robe to take out a copper pendant.
At that moment, a pale golden light spread out, gradually forming a slightly stiff small piece of paper.
His blood-stained left hand reflexively caught the suddenly appearing small piece of paper.
Under the light of the night pearl embedded in the carriage’s wall, Wei Yun saw clearly that the paper bore the image of a girl.
It was so clear that even the bench she was sitting on and the shadows of the bamboo trees behind her were vividly realistic.
The sunlight bathed her, a beautiful girl with clean features, opening her apricot eyes and slightly parted lips in a somewhat silly demeanor. Wei Yun could even make out a small red mole on the lobe of her right ear.
This is not the work of a brush.
Traces of blood still lingered on the fingertips, even staining the edges of the paper.
Wei Yun fixedly looked at the girl on the paper, and after a long while, he suddenly chuckled.
Truly a young girl.
