After he said his farewell to YuLan and her entourage, Third Prince Zhang GuoFu - along with Crown Prince KongJing and Second Prince JunLi, and Zhen BuFeng - mounted their individual carriages and horses to return to their estates.
To Zhang GuoFu's slight puzzlement, he did not feel as sad as he originally expected to be when YuLan's figure finally disappeared around the corner of the building at the end of the street. Sure, there was melancholy, but the yearning to always be close to YuLan was definitely no longer felt.
If anything, he was more worried about Ji LanBai's reaction when she found out that YuLan had gone. It was bound to happen.
Therefore, he commanded his guards to direct his horse-drawn carriage to the Palace. He knew at that day, Ji LanBai was in an audience with his Imperial Mother - the Empress.
After parting ways with his older brothers - both decided to return to their own estates, he made his way to the Palace. Zhen BuFeng also returned to his own residence.
Of course he could not disturb Ji LanBai's personal attendance session with the Empress, and he also found out that the Emperor - his Imperial Father - was meeting Ji ChanFang as well. Therefore, Third Prince GuoFu could only be idle for a few hours at the expansive Imperial Garden.
Truth be told, although the Imperial Garden was immaculate and aesthetically pleasing, he always thought that it was not much different from other pretty landscapes in other households.
His own estate's garden was also similar, though smaller in scale. In fact, when building and designing his own garden and yard area, Zhang GuoFu modeled them after the Imperial Garden.
Whatever should be there, was there. The fake mountains - made of large boulders and stones, the ponds complete with the colorful fish, the bridges connecting the ponds, the sporadic undercover podiums and small structures for people resting in between walks... .
The garden was expansive, but tastefully constructed. As it was the first month of autumn, the trees just started to change colors, casting colorful hues everywhere he laid eyes upon.
To ease his boredom, he chose a larger of the gazebos in the garden to practice his sword movement. He had earlier borrowed the sword from one of the Imperial Guards that were always stationed at every corner and turns of the garden.
"GuoFu-ge?", a slightly confounded pitched voice - a female's - was heard from a distance behind him. Prince Zhang GuoFu smiled. Even without turning around, he knew the owner of that voice.
Finishing his last sword stance to steady his breath, he finally turned to see Ji LanBai dashed into a slight run towards him - causing the palace maids trailing behind her to panic as they tried to keep pace. Soon, the young woman reached where he was at.
"What are you doing here?," her eyes were sparkling, clearly delighted to see a familiar face. Zhang GuoFu could only chuckle.
YuLan was right. With Ji LanBai, what you saw, what you heard - they were always the real her. She was pure and honest.
"How was the audience with Imperial Mother?", Prince GuoFu asked back, without addressing her question.
Ji LanBai sat on a bench, and glanced warily at the palace maids who were still waiting for her outside the gazebo. From their distinguished attires that were more lavish than normal palace maids, Zhang GuoFu realized that they were maids of the Empress.
The Empress must have sent them to properly see LanBai off. After all, the Palace's grounds were extensive - it would be easy to get lost. Zhang GuoFu waved his hands, signifying for the maids to leave them. With him here, they were not needed anymore.
After the group of young maids left, LanBai let out a big sigh of relief.
"Her Majesty has been good to me, I guess...," she muttered softly, "It's just... it's been very tiring to maintain a straight posture for hours, even when I was sitting... ."
"And I could hardly talk as I was dead afraid I would say the wrong thing. Mother asked me to speak as little as possible...," she pouted.
Zhang GuoFu laughed. However before he could say anything further, he suddenly realized - with his honed heightened sense from his martial art training - that there was another person presently close to them. And it was definitely not the Imperial Guards, as he could feel the stranger's aura to be very sharply focused on them.
He spun his head rapidly at the direction of the presence.
True to his concern, merely two feet away outside the gazebo, stood a lone young man.
The stranger had wheat colored skin, his hair was deep brown and messy, the upper half of his face was currently hidden behind a mask. He was wearing a simple brown robe made of cotton and animal skin.
As the stranger walked closer, GuoFu stepped to put himself in front of LanBai, hiding her behind his body. Then GuoFu saw that the man was holding a miserable looking bird, holding it by its claws. He could not tell if the bird was still alive.
By the size and the look of the beast, it seemed to be a breed of a mountain eagle - one that he had never seen before in Zhang Empire. He seemed to recall that he had seen smaller sized ones at areas closer to the Northern Plains when he was still training in the military and was dispatched there as part of his training. There were plenty of high terrains and mountains in that area, which was favored highly by mountain eagles for places to live and breed.
The hand that was holding the bird had some already dried red scabs that looked suspiciously like the marking of claws or beaks.
"Had he been fighting with the bird?" Zhang GuoFu's brows furrowed. Although his palm was already gripping his sword hilt tightly, he did not sense a killing intent from the strange man.
Nevertheless, that person was an intruder.
"Where are the Imperial Guards? Did no one notice this man? Is he really an intruder? Or Imperial Father's guest?"
Then the stranger lifted his free hand and pointed at GuoFu's direction as he spoke with a low husky voice,
"... . Miss... Ji family?"
His words came out disjointed and strange, and his accent was definitely not of Zhang Empire.
While Zhang GuoFu was still comprehending what the strange man meant by his words, Ji LanBai suddenly peeked her head from behind his back,
"I am the daughter of Ji clan. So yes, I am Miss Ji."
Zhang GuoFu groaned at her carelessness, but kicked himself inwardly for not acting quicker as well. He was about to call for the Imperial Guards - surely there were some just around the corner... . But then he noticed the strange man's lips drawn into a wide smile - almost a grin. With the mask on, the sight became more peculiar, bringing slight shivers to the Prince GuoFu.
The man then unmasked his face.
The stranger's face was handsome enough with chiseled jaw and deep eyes. However, his expression, despite smiling, still looked flat - seemingly the person himself was not used to express joyful expression. Therefore, his smile still looked horrific.
Worse, he then proceeded to put the unconscious bird on the ground, and then began to disrobe himself.
"Hey~!" Zhang GuoFu's eyes widened at the strange turn of events, but his words were stuck in his throat as he then saw an astonishing sight:
On the man's chest - illuminated by the sunlight that had started to show its orange hues - was a tattoo of a mighty beast. It was a lion, intricately etched onto his skin on his chest. The beast's front paws were on the man's left shoulder, and the body extended to his toned muscly abdomen, with the beast's tail wound around his waist, presumably extended to his back.
"Whoaaaa....," an astonished voice was heard from behind him, "That looks amazing~!"
Zhang GuoFu was conflicted. He really should not be letting his fiancee to blatantly stare at another man's naked chest, right?
"Guar~!" he was about to continue his call for some guards, but the man interrupted him,
"Miss Ji!", he still looked at their direction, which Zhang GuoFu now realized that it was actually Ji LanBai the man had been interested at, since the very beginning. The man's eyes were bright and he once again pointed his finger at Ji LanBai and spoke clearly,
"Strip!"
"GUARRRDDDSSS~!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
This time, in the blink of an eye, more than a dozen of uniformed Imperial Guards suddenly appeared from different directions of the garden. The guards were bewildered at the stranger's presence, but quickly unsheathed their swords and spears.
Zhang GuoFu held LanBai's hand tightly with his left hand, and he pointed his sword at the stranger with the other.
But to his dismay, even then, the intruder still had not exuded any ill or killing intent.
The guards were closing in on the intruder, but they were also a bit unsure of the whole situation. Zhang GuoFu finally was about to decide to detain him first for questioning. After all, at the moment, Ji LanBai was present, and they could not possibly let her be hurt in a fight.
"Third Prince!", another familiar voice was heard, and a familiar figure walked past a few Imperial Guards who had blocked the route to the inner areas of the Palace.
It was Ji ChanFang.
The General glanced at the intruder, furrowing his brows slightly, then he eased his facial expression. Zhang GuoFu became more confused than ever.
"Does General Ji know this person?" - the Prince thought to himself.
Ji ChanFang looked at Zhang GuoFu, then shifted his gaze at his hand that was still holding onto Ji LanBai's own hand. The old man squinted his eyes.
Zhang GuoFu reflexively released Ji LanBai's hand from his hold, his back sweating.
If earlier he could not sense any ill-intent from the stranger, he definitely just felt a killing intent from his future father-in-law.
"Father!" Ji LanBai merrily greeted her father. Ji ChanFang smiled at her and gestured with his hand for her to wait. She nodded.
Ji ChanFang then walked towards the stranger, stopping only an arm's length away. His stance was relaxed and he did not even bring any weapon as he just stood, putting his hands behind his back.
"JingHan," he said, after examining the intruder's face for a while.
There was a trace of doubt on the stranger - the one called JingHan -'s face as he also furrowed his brows, examining Ji ChanFang in turn.
"Do you not remember me? I am uncle Fang."
Zhang GuoFu blinked, "The mighty General Ji let a disorderly-looking man to call him 'uncle'? and with his little name, too?"
There was a moment of silence and myriad of expressions could be seen on JingHan's face as he seemed to begin to recall the memory from a long time ago. The young man's face then turned ecstatic.
"Uncle! Fang!", he stepped forward and without warning, JingHan walked up to Ji ChanFang and wrapped his hands around the older man,
"Uncle! Fang!", he laughed loudly, while still hugging Ji ChanFang.
Prince GuoFu could hear some sound of bones cracking, he hoped his future father-in-law did not accidentally get hurt... .
"Ugh!", Ji ChanFang groaned. Truthfully, he was already feeling uncomfortable as he tried to flex his whole body's muscles to withstand JingHan's iron hug-grip. Not only Ji ChanFang had not been training his body ever since he became a martial invalid, JingHan did not hold back on his strength at all. Or perhaps, like the Old Jing leader - his grandfather - he never knew how to hold back.
"JingHan! Let me go, please!"
Then JingHan obediently eased his grip and let go of Ji ChanFang. The latter coughed a few times to catch his breath.
"I really need to make SongLi the General soon. This body is too old.", he muttered under his rapid breath. Once he recovered, he straightened his body and looked at JingHan with a smile on his face.
Even for Zhang GuoFu and Ji LanBai, it was pretty rare for them to see Ji ChanFang smiling, the smile this time carrying a trace of sorrow. There was a story and memory behind that smile, that none of them could ever possibly understand or know.
"It is good to see you well," Ji ChanFang said, "But the 'Miss Ji' you have just met is not the person you have been seeking.",
He nodded his head at Ji LanBai's direction,
"This one is my daughter. So she definitely is NOT related to you."
"But, the young man standing by her side, he IS."
"And you may well be already very close to the person you seek."
Ji ChanFang said further with a low voice to himself, "Although I am the culprit that you might have just missed her... . YuLan would already have left by now...".
"Regardless. You are already here. Go see your Uncle SongWang. He is expecting you."
Ji ChanFang then walked towards Zhang GuoFu and Ji LanBai as he spoke to the prince,
"Third Prince. Take our guest to the Emperor's study. The Emperor is expecting him...," he paused as he patted the Prince's shoulder, "And you."
"Later, properly listen to his story. But now, I will take LanBai home."
Zhang GuoFu became dizzier as his brain could not keep up with all the words he had heard and everything he had seen.
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runexi's notes:
suspense... suspense...