Chapter 190
Heaven knows that just now, as she watched from afar, how Lu Dieqing had spoken so gently to this cousin whom she had only met a few times, both guiding and smiling, and how her heart had been blocked.
Clearly her own treasure, yet so gentle to others.
And she couldn’t even say any harsh words.
Was it because the wedding had brought out her own possessiveness, or was it because of something else?
Zheng Xuening herself couldn’t figure it out.
But it seemed that because she had finally gotten a legitimate status, she had begun to reveal her true self.
Zheng Xuening bent down slightly, held the girl’s fair and white chin, and lightly kissed it. Thinking it was not enough, she lowered her head again.
“Have you thought of how to coax me?”
She was not at all polite and began to demand compensation.
Lu Dieqing was stunned for a moment, then immediately stood on her tiptoes to hug her, and then kissed her and said a lot of good words.
“Why are you jealous? Ningning has always been the person I like and love the most, held on the tip of my heart, and no one can take her away.”
Lu Dieqing’s small voice was soft and sweet. No wonder when she looked at a person, she could so easily make the other let go of their hostility.
“I wasn’t smiling at others like that…” Lu Dieqing explained obediently and softly.
Her sparkling almond eyes were just looking at you, so gentle and full of tenderness.
Zheng Xuening was so moved by this that her heart melted. She suddenly felt that she was not a person, to actually take advantage of her wife’s good temper and bully her in every possible way.
“Forget it. Smile if you want to. At most, I’ll be a little more domineering. In the future, let people know that no matter how beautiful your smile is, you are already spoken for.”
Zheng Xuening pinched Lu Dieqing’s fair cheek, not at all willing to use force to touch her, but just gently holding her.
Lu Dieqing immediately, like a child being doted on, nuzzled into her embrace.
“Ningning is not domineering at all.”
The two of them were almost pressed together, turning into twin flowers.
Originally, Lu Ruyi had had some things she wanted to come back and ask, but the moment she had just lifted her skirt and had run over excitedly, she saw the two of them so selflessly holding each other.
Lu Ruyi turned her head and left.
This was too intimate, just for a little while.
She was indignant, but for a moment she couldn’t figure out who this indignation was for.
The emotions in the illusion formation had dispersed, but a new Lu Ruyi had taken shape.
She felt that she could actually be better.
At least not limited to small love affairs, and not limited to the original world.
Lu Dieqing had let her see something outside of this world.
Then… she would wish this cousin of hers and Zheng Xuening a happy hundred years together.
The steps Lu Ruyi took as she left the Third Princess’s residence suddenly became much lighter.
She had to admit that her cousin was a likable person.
She had come with a lot of anger, hostility, and the unease and madness of being squeezed out of a noble position, but when she left, she noticed that those things had all faded and disappeared.
She even felt that her previous actions were very crazy.
At the very least… if next time she took a fancy to someone, she had to look from the bottom of her heart, besides their looks, status, and the advantages they showed, what else did that person have?
She also wanted… she also wanted to have that kind of indescribable but solid and deep emotion between her cousin and Zheng Xuening—the kind where they could even go to their deaths together.
*
The black dragon had been hovering in the sky for a long time.
How was its palace not yet repaired? There were only three or four days left. Should it still be guarding here?
What if those two little girls covered for each other and ran away?
Such thoughts would pop into the black dragon’s mind from time to time, making its two dragon eyes flash with suspicion.
And so, the craftsmen who were being watched by it were working overtime even at night, quite on edge.
Just as the black dragon had sucked all the delivered pastries into its stomach in a storm and was smacking its lips, the expression on its face suddenly froze, a trace of fear in its eyes, its eyeballs rolling left and right.
“Xiao Hei, I told you to go and pick someone up. How come there’s been no sound for so long?”
Such a voice came from its ear, with a hint of an ethereal and ethereal meaning.
The black dragon was startled and prostrated itself on the ground, almost shrinking into a ball.
It seemed to have been subjected to an unknown pressure, so much so that it could not say a single word, only tremble.
The craftsmen who were busy building the palace in the valley heard this and looked at the sky with curiosity.
A figure had appeared there at some unknown time. This had never happened before.
Another immortal had come?
An existence like the black dragon actually had times when it was afraid?
“Heh, to return to my homeland, I never thought it would be like this.”
The figure in the sky slowly landed in front of the black dragon.
The black dragon’s originally mountain-high figure instantly shrank until it was the size of a bracelet and wrapped around the woman’s wrist.
“Let me see what you’ve been up to these few days. To have taken so long to pick up a successor.”
As she said this, the woman took a projection stone from the black dragon’s body, and her divine sense entered it, quickly looking through everything the black dragon had experienced since it had come to this world.
When she saw the every move of Lu Dieqing and Zheng Xuening when they had appeared, the woman smiled lightly.
“Two little ones,” she said, having tricked Xiao Hei into a tizzy.
Although Xiao Hei had lived for over a thousand years, it had never seen much of the dangers of the human world and lacked experience in interacting and communicating with humans. So much so that even if Lu Dieqing and the other had deliberately delayed, Xiao Hei still could not make up its mind.
“Sect Master…” The black dragon, in front of this woman, had completely lost its previous arrogance and looked like a little pitiful thing.
Even if its body had shrunk into a small black bracelet, it did not dare to say anything and could only complain for itself in a wronged tone.
“I said long ago that I would take these two little girls away, but they refused, saying that they wanted to sever their mortal ties, and that they did not know when they would be able to return after this trip. I was just soft-hearted and went along with them.”
The woman, who was called the Sect Master, looked to be no more than in her twenties, but from her eyes, one could see that she was also a person who had lived for at least a few hundred years.
If she were really a young girl in her twenties, she would not have such a calm yet time-precipitated gaze.
“Xiao Hei, you actually thought of building a separate palace here? What great airs.”
The Xuanqing Sect Master said this lightly, and the small black dragon bracelet wrapped around her wrist immediately broke out in a cold sweat, its body even beginning to tremble slightly.
“They insisted on building it for me,” it tried to explain.
“Heh, Xiao Hei is so eloquent,” the Xuanqing Sect Master just smiled faintly.
The little black dragon immediately felt that it could not make a sound, and its body also became stiff, as if it had completely turned into a fixed black bracelet, having lost control of its body.
It immediately understood that the Sect Master was dissatisfied with its answer just now, which was why she had used a spell to turn it into this state.
Awooo! The Sect Master had come, and its trip was a failure.
It didn’t know how long it would have to stay in the sect after it returned this time. It was afraid that it would not have a chance to live in the palace in this valley.
Thinking this, the black dragon was filled with regret. If it had known this outcome earlier, it should have just snatched Lu Dieqing and run away the moment it had arrived in this mortal small world, and had finished this task early.
“Let’s go. Let’s go and see my descendant.”
The Xuanqing Sect Master suddenly said, and with one step, she was already a thousand li away.
The craftsmen in the valley looked at the suddenly disappearing figure and looked at each other in dismay.
“The Dragon King seems to have been taken away by an immortal?”
“Are we still building our palace?”
“Let’s keep building. There’s no great harm in being careful.”
The craftsmen were only in chaos for a short while, and then they continued with the palace in an orderly manner as before.
Now that the foundation was completely laid, the palace had a prototype.
No doubt, in a while, this place would have a different appearance.
*
On the wedding day.
The Third Princess’s residence had been in a mess since before dawn.
The trays in the palace staff’s hands were filled with all sorts of things, and they went in and out of Lu Dieqing’s side room, helping her with her makeup and changing into her wedding dress.
The Second Princess, as Lu Dieqing’s own second aunt, also appeared in the side room at this time.
“Looking at our Qingqing, she’s really not bad. So beautiful. To have just returned to the Shan Kingdom and to be getting married, I’m really reluctant to part with her.”
Lu Jin looked at the beautiful girl in the bronze mirror and sighed with such emotion from the bottom of her heart.
The girls of their Shan Kingdom were so precious. It had been so hard to raise them to this age. Even if they were to get married, it would be to marry someone over.
However, because the one Lu Dieqing was marrying was the heir of the Chaoying Kingdom, this matter had another layer of meaning.
In fact, the common people were very much looking forward to it.
Today, people had also come from the Chaoying Kingdom, and had sent many things in a grand procession, which had been carried into the garden that Zheng Xuening had just bought not long ago.
It was clear that Zheng Sixin was also very supportive. When she had learned that her elder sister was getting married in the Shan Kingdom, she had immediately taken out the good things from the state treasury and had had them sent over overnight without the slightest bit of heartache.
Zheng Sixin’s original words were, “How can my elder sister’s wedding be simple? It has to be a grand affair! Add more betrothal gifts for this Princess!”
These few days, the old emperor’s health had been fluctuating, and he had almost not dealt with any court matters at all. It had all been supported by Zheng Sixin.
Perhaps because she had been the backbone for so long, she had also developed a certain spirit.
Zheng Sixin was no longer the submissive person she had been before; on the contrary, she now carried a few more traces of boldness and resolve.
And so, on the wedding day, these boxes that had just been transported to the Shan Kingdom were again ordered by Zheng Xuening to be carried to the Third Princess’s residence for a temporary addition to the betrothal gifts!
And so, everyone watched as the boxes tied with red silk were sent to the Third Princess’s residence in an endless stream, like an escort agency escorting goods.
By the time Zheng Xuening came to pick her up, the atmosphere on the entire long street had already become very lively.
Everyone in the Shan Kingdom had flower petals in their hands. When Zheng Xuening was riding a horse to pick up her bride, they threw flowers at her.
There were those who stood on the teahouse, using the height of the teahouse’s windows to throw flowers down, and there were also those who stood on the side of the long street and shouted, “What a handsome bridegroom!”
And then they would throw the flower petals in their hands as if their lives depended on it.
There were also those who looked at Zheng Xuening riding over like this, with a look of amazement on their faces, and were foolishly stunned there.
“Our Shan Kingdom has also made a name for itself, to be able to get the heir of the Chaoying Kingdom to marry over.”
“She is truly worthy of the honor of being the first beauty.”
“I heard that the Third Princess’s daughter is also a heavenly beauty.”
“When I’m old, I can also tell my granddaughter that I attended the wedding of fairies when I was young.”
The people of the Shan Kingdom were so supportive of this marriage that they wished they could raise both their hands and feet.
It was rare for a marriage to be able to move so many people’s hearts.
When Zheng Xuening and Lu Dieqing really met, the two of them, surrounded by the crowd, looked at each other and smiled, and they both had a long-lost shyness.
That feeling of the heart pounding, as if the whole world had disappeared and only the person in front of them was left, was so strange.
This was not the first time Lu Dieqing had seen Zheng Xuening. She had long since known that her Ningning was a devastatingly beautiful woman.
But when this person really changed into her wedding dress, and changed into red for you, and hung a red embroidered ball on her chest, aaaah, she wanted to cry.
Zheng Xuening’s face was originally of a rather cool and detached aura, so much so that she had ten parts of color, but in the eyes of others, they did not dare to let their gaze linger, and on the contrary, they could only leave the impression of “cold” in their hearts.
Everyone would subconsciously forget her beauty.
Power and the things that existed with it had created Zheng Xuening’s serious and unsmiling personality, which made people subconsciously step back.
Only Lu Dieqing could cross the invisible barrier and enter her heart.
Lu Dieqing did not wear a red veil. When a woman of the Shan Kingdom got married, she would be meticulously dressed up, but she would never hide her face. On the contrary, she would be adorned with all kinds of hairpins to make that face even more bright and moving, so that everyone who attended the wedding could see how beautiful she was.
This was a grand display.
She quickened her pace and went to take Zheng Xuening’s hand.
When her soft and tender hand touched Zheng Xuening, the other took her hand in turn.
The onlookers watched as Zheng Xuening curved her lips into a smile and openly intertwined her ten fingers with Lu Dieqing’s.
Although women in the Shan Kingdom had a more revered status than men, it was still rare for a woman and a woman to be together.
Especially for the great families, who valued marriage alliances and cared about how to preserve the family’s status and procreation.
And so, invisibly, it made the noble women, no matter what they did, carry a sense of responsibility for their family.
Even women who were truly in love did not dare to get married so openly in public.
Lu Dieqing and Zheng Xuening had undoubtedly broken the convention.
How many women’s eyes had become wet because of the two of them standing together now, and they had thought of the person in their own hearts.
“Originally, I thought this had nothing to do with us. How could a fairy’s wedding be the same as a mortal’s?”
“But looking at the way they look at each other, my heart is suddenly so moved.”
“I want to discuss it with my mother and get married after the New Year. I also want to marry a wife.”
“The fairies have dared to do it. Why don’t we dare?”
“Am I the only one thinking that the heir of the Chaoying Kingdom is getting married here, and in the future, will she also be a person of our Shan Kingdom?”
Lu He and Bai Ming looked at the pair before them, their hearts filled with an indescribable complex emotion.
A year ago, they had just been hostages living under another’s roof, without even freedom.
How could they have ever thought that there would be such a day, sitting in the high hall, watching their daughter Qingqing get married to the heir who had been brought over from the Chaoying Kingdom?
The couple’s eyes were both a little red.
“In the future, I hope you two will support each other and share honor and disgrace.”
“Your father and I can’t be with you for a lifetime. The person who will really spend a lifetime with you is the person by your pillow. Treat her well.”
Ever since Lu He had returned to the Shan Kingdom, she had received countless rewards. Now her private treasury also had some savings. To give them to her daughter now, she did not feel a bit of heartache.
She knew that for a cultivator like Lu Dieqing, yellow and white things had become a mere decoration, but marriage was the most important thing in this life. She still gave all the wealth she could take out to her daughter.
“Let’s go. Don’t miss the auspicious time.”
Lu He took a pair of specially made phoenix bracelets and put them on Lu Dieqing and Zheng Xuening one by one, her tone a little sentimental and reluctant.
Lu Dieqing pressed her lips together, trying her best not to have her eyes redden and shed tears, or the makeup on her face would be ruined.
But she couldn’t hold it in.
Zheng Xuening took her hand and silently raised her hand to wipe her tears at the side.
When the two of them walked out of the Third Princess’s residence, they looked at Zheng Xuening’s horse and the bridal sedan chair behind her. Lu Dieqing stood there and said in a small voice, “I also want to ride a horse.”
She didn’t want to sit in a sedan chair alone.
Lonely.
Zheng Xuening pulled her to her side. “You didn’t have to sit in a sedan chair in the first place. Just ride a horse with me.”
With that, the two of them directly got on the same horse, just like when they had come out of the Chaoying court to go to Jufengxiang Restaurant for a meal, with no distinction between you and I, snuggling together.
