In the quiet wild ridges outside Chang'an, a solitary light flickered in the dark night.
Du Yue set aside his small shovel, his head bowed as he concentrated on the herb in his hands. Qin Zhao squatted down beside him, bringing the lantern closer so Du Yue could see better.
After examining it back and forth, Du Yue laughed, "Ah, finally found it. It wasn't in vain that I came digging in the mountains in the dead of night." He stood up, carefully wiping the dirt off the roots, and nodded towards Qin Zhao, "Thanks!"
"It's nothing," Qin Zhao replied, standing up and looking at the unremarkable green grass, "Is this what you were looking for so eagerly?"
"This?" Du Yue mimicked his flat tone, suppressing his voice, "Do you know what this is used for?"
Qin Zhao shook his head.
"This is a secret recipe unique to my master! Just this one, and once it's made into a medicine, I could knock you and those surnamed Chu out for months!" Du Yue bragged, shaking the herb, "Scared?"
"Master Ye is indeed formidable," Qin Zhao nodded.
"Hey, Qin Zhao, I really can't keep talking to you like this," Du Yue rolled his eyes, wrapping the herb and was about to tuck it away when Qin Zhao grabbed his hand, asking curiously, "What's up?"
Qin Zhao, holding his wrist, pulled it towards him and took out a clean handkerchief, meticulously wiping off the mud and dust from Du Yue's hands.
Du Yue spread his palm, contentedly letting him clean it. Amidst the faint chirping of insects in the mountains, Du Yue boredly stared at Qin Zhao's drooping brows and suddenly said, "Qin Zhao, this suddenly makes me think of my cousin."
The hand holding his wrist tightened momentarily, Qin Zhao composed himself before he could hurt him, and after a long silence, he whispered, "Did he do this for you too?"
"Somewhat," Du Yue considered, "But my cousin usually just handed me the handkerchief, never wiped it for me. My mother instructed him not to spoil me; otherwise, he'd have to beat me."
Qin Zhao, wordlessly, continued to earnestly clean even the slightest speck of sand from between his fingers.
Reflecting on his childhood, Du Yue lamented, "Thinking about it, I was beaten every day as a kid, unlike my cousin. He had good handwriting, excelled in his studies, and even had a good temper. My mother always told me to learn from him." He suddenly recalled, "Wait, that's not right. My cousin was also beaten once, and it was severe. Normally, he was obedient from a young age, but for some reason, my uncle decided to discipline him with the family punishment. He was so angry that he left my cousin with a back full of bloody marks and even made him kneel in the ancestral hall for days. My aunt cried for days over it. My mother used to scare me with that, saying if I didn't behave, she would send me to my uncle's house."
"Alright," Qin Zhao said, putting away the handkerchief and releasing his wrist.
"Yeah," Du Yue picked up the small shovel from the ground and got ready, "Let's head back!"
Qin Zhao nodded and followed him, the forest dark and mysterious in the night. As the wind shook the trees, creating a rustling sound, Qin Zhao suddenly became alert, handing the lantern to Du Yue and defensively placing him behind, focusing intently into the distance.
In just a moment, Du Yue heard panicked running sounds, accompanied by increasingly heavy breathing, rapid and desperate, clearly discernible as a woman's voice.
Curious, Du Yue leaned forward to see a figure stumbling towards them under the overlapping shadows of the trees, continuously looking back in terror. Upon seeing someone ahead, she rushed over without hesitation, crying out, "Save me... please save me...!"
Du Yue quickly pressed down on Qin Zhao's hand, which was about to draw his sword, and moved forward to inspect the woman who had fallen to the ground. Indeed, it was a woman, in an extremely disheveled state, her frail body heaving dramatically. When she saw Du Yue, she urgently grabbed the hem of his robe, "Please... save me, save me!" Her plea was so frantic that she suddenly turned her head and coughed out blood.
Du Yue's expression immediately changed. He took out a small porcelain bottle, poured out a pill, and crouched down to administer it to her.
Qin Zhao shifted his gaze back, looking into the distance. He snapped off a tree branch and, with a backward throw, sent it flying like an arrow, creating a sharp whistle through the air before it forcefully buried itself into a tree. The figure half-hidden behind the trunk was startled, hesitated for a moment, and then quickly fled.
The woman coughed violently, struggling to speak, "...Thank you, I beg you... please..."
"What do you want to do?" Qin Zhao asked.
"Take a breath," Du Yue, feeling her pulse, reminded her.
"Chang'an—!" the woman said in a hoarse voice, "I need to get to Chang'an, please... How much further to Chang'an?"
"You're already in Chang'an," Qin Zhao informed her.
"Already here?... Finally, finally," the woman, upon hearing this, struggled to get up, a faint glimmer of light in her eyes, "Take me... to the officials, to the palace, to see the Emperor!" She started coughing again, and Du Yue helped her breathe, his brow furrowed tightly. She insisted, her eyes firmly fixed on the distance, "Save us, Your Majesty, the officials in the capital!... Our Huainan... has turned into hell!"
Qin Zhao bent down closer, "What happened to Huainan? Isn't there a war going on?"
"It's not a war, that's not war, it's demons devouring people! They don't fight; they plunder, they burn houses, they're killing people!" The woman bit out each word, continuously coughing up blood, with droplets of crimson staining the grass, "Those corrupt officials have devoured their own consciences!... My father wouldn't agree, wouldn't join them, so they chased and killed my entire family! They're afraid, they dare not let us reach Chang'an! But... but I still made it..."
Qin Zhao's expression turned grave. As he was about to ask more, the woman suddenly clutched Du Yue's sleeve, her fingers trembling spasmodically, "Are you a doctor? Are you a doctor?... Please, I beg you! Save me!... My family was killed, I'm the only one left... I can't die... I haven't seen the Emperor yet, I haven't..."
The words choked in her throat and abruptly stopped.
Du Yue felt his sleeve loosen and saw the woman collapse to the ground, the sound dull. He stared wide-eyed, stunned for a moment, before frantically searching her body.
Qin Zhao reached out to check her and found she had no breath left. His gaze swept over the woman's waist and abdomen, slightly surprised, he pressed gently, then stood up with a sigh. However, he saw Du Yue efficiently pulling out a roll bag, spreading it on the ground with one hand, and drawing several silver needles in the cold light, about to pierce them down.
Qin Zhao stopped his hand, "Enough."
"Let go!" Du Yue strained his wrist, but could not break free.
Qin Zhao softened his voice, "Du Yue..."
"Let me go, let go of me!" Du Yue was irritated, turning his head to glare at him, "She just called me a doctor, she begged me to save her!"
"Her lungs were half shattered by the impact, it's rare she lasted this long. How could you save her?"
"I could have saved her; no one under my care has ever died!" Du Yue exclaimed.
"...Even doctors eventually face someone they can't save," Qin Zhao said softly.
Du Yue shook off his hand, moved forward, and half-kneeled beside the woman. The cold light flashed as he accurately placed the needles, but when he withdrew his hand, he clearly felt the body had cooled down. His fingers trembled as if touched by ice, and Du Yue stared blankly for a long while, at a loss.
"Du Yue," Qin Zhao said.
"She's really dead... so quickly..." Du Yue was in a daze.
"The ones chasing her must have been sure she wouldn't survive, that's why they retreated so easily."
Du Yue, as if not hearing, stared at the woman's wide-open eyes. He reached out to close them but found that they refused to shut. Slivers of moonlight filtered through the leaves, casting a serene glow over the forest. The woman's pupils gradually faded into a cloudy grey-white, "But she said she couldn't die, she so desperately wanted to live... If I had acted just a bit faster, maybe there could have been a chance, maybe there was a way to save her..."
Qin Zhao squatted down in front of him, "Life and death are unpredictable, it's not your fault. We should get used to it."
"I don't want to get used to it." Du Yue's voice was muffled, and after a while, he whispered, "...She just called me a doctor."
The lantern had been placed aside, casting a thin warm hue over his blue robe. Qin Zhao, caught in a moment of reverie, absentmindedly reached out towards the light on the clothing until he heard Du Yue's words and realized something was amiss. He looked at Du Yue's face, "What's wrong?"
"I've never had anyone die under my care, not a single one..." His voice trailed off, then added, "...So this is what it feels like, it happened so quickly..."
Qin Zhao, struggling to find words of comfort, simply watched him silently. His gaze softened and deepened, and finally, as if making a decision, he wrapped an arm around Du Yue's shoulder, pulling him into an embrace.
Du Yue stiffened slightly but didn't pull away. After a moment, he rested his head on Qin Zhao's shoulder, took a deep breath, and said softly, "...It was the first time someone called me a doctor."
His voice was so low, Qin Zhao barely caught it. Just as Qin Zhao was about to lean in and ask, Du Yue said, "Qin Zhao, don't move. I just need to lean here for a while."
"Okay," Qin Zhao responded, slowly tightening his arms.
As the crescent moon descended and dawn broke, Chu Mingyun leaned against the window, watching a black-feathered bird soar into the distance before turning his attention to Qin Zhao, who entered through the door, "What's the matter?"
Qin Zhao approached, noticing the piece of paper in Chu Mingyun's hand, "Is there news from somewhere?"
Chu Mingyun glanced at the paper nonchalantly, "You first, what happened to you?"
After Qin Zhao recounted the tale of the woman from the previous night in detail, Chu Mingyun, with a slight smile of interest on his lips while staring at the letter, nodded. After Qin Zhao finished speaking, Chu Mingyun said, "Guess how the situation is with the troops Luo Xin led to suppress the rebellion in Huainan, sent by the court?"
Qin Zhao thought for a moment, "They set off more than half a month ago, so they should have reached Huainan and engaged with the rebels by now."
Chu Mingyun laughed softly, "Wrong guess." He handed the letter to Qin Zhao, "That army disappeared the day after they arrived in Huainan, along with the Huainan king's rebels, vanished overnight without a trace."
"They disappeared without a trace, and the cities occupied by the rebels became ghost towns." He stood up, walking towards the inner room while taking off his outer robe and tossing it casually onto a nearby table.
Seeing his actions, Qin Zhao asked in surprise, "Senior brother, what are you doing?"
"Changing clothes," Chu Mingyun replied, loosening his collar without turning back, "Going to the palace."
Qin Zhao put down the letter, walked out of the room, and carefully closed the door behind him.
Lamps still lit the corridor below, where the leader of the imperial guards hurried up to him, respectfully saying, "Please inform the leader that His Majesty commands his immediate presence in the palace."