By the time Luo Wushuang reached the Imperial Study, the Princess of the Western Regions had already been waiting in the outer hall for quite some time.
After dismissing the attendants, the two women spent a while engaged in a “friendly and harmonious conversation,” which involved a fair amount of table-slamming.
No one knew exactly what was said, but judging by the faint smiles on their faces when they finally emerged, the discussion seemed to have gone well.
A Luo Wushuang who wasn’t blinded by jealousy actually possessed the dignified bearing of a great ruler.
She first ordered the palace staff to escort the Princess of the Western Regions out of the palace, then, at Lou Yanhui’s urgent request, she dispatched several Imperial Physicians to remain on standby at Luo Yunjin’s Princess Manor.
Only after settling these matters did Luo Wushuang remember the physician she had unceremoniously chased away earlier when Shangguan Liqian arrived after the Morning Court.
She hesitated for a moment, torn between returning to Phoenix Hall immediately or letting the physician check her pulse first. Ultimately, she chose the latter.
In the past, she wouldn’t have cared about such trifles.
But things were different now. Her sister had finally agreed to marry her, and she didn’t want any accidents occurring before the wedding.
Now, she had to protect not only her sister but herself as well.
Only then could her sister marry her without worry, right?
At the thought of the upcoming wedding, Luo Wushuang’s phoenix eyes flickered with a burning intensity.
She had waited so long, hoped for so long… and finally, her sister had said yes.
Excitement, agitation, joy… no words could truly describe her mood over the past two days.
After all, her lifelong wish was about to be fulfilled. It was hard for Luo Wushuang not to be happy.
Even though her sister wasn’t by her side at this moment, the mere memory of the scene where she had accepted the proposal made the corners of her lips curl upward.
After summoning the Imperial Physician, Luo Wushuang closed her eyes and waited quietly.
While she tried to calm her racing heart, she mentally reviewed her conversation with the Princess of the Western Regions.
Lou Yanhui had indeed come for a political marriage alliance, but not with the Empress. She wanted to marry the sickly Little Imperial Sister who was reportedly at death’s door.
Luo Wushuang didn’t doubt Lou Yanhui’s words. Before coming to the Imperial Study, her Secret Guards had already tracked the Princess’s movements.
The moment she left the palace today, she had headed straight for Luo Yunjin’s Princess Manor and didn’t leave until the State Banquet was about to begin.
If anyone claimed there wasn’t a private affair between those two, Luo Wushuang wouldn’t believe it for a second!
She just hadn’t expected the cold, icy Princess of the Western Regions to have a taste for someone like Luo Yunjin.
She recalled what Liqian had said during the banquet—that the Princess might prefer someone soft-natured and obedient.
Luo Wushuang narrowed her eyes, trying to recall Luo Yunjin’s appearance.
However, the memories of her Little Imperial Sister were too distant. She couldn’t clearly remember what Luo Yunjin looked like anymore.
She did recall that about two years ago, her little sister had returned to the capital in a wretched state, covered in injuries.
Out of basic humanitarian concern, she had sent a few Imperial Physicians to the Princess Manor back then.
She couldn’t remember much of what happened after that.
But judging by how the Princess was begging for physicians now, the situation was likely grim.
As she was pondering this, the Imperial Physician arrived to take her pulse, and Luo Wushuang temporarily pushed these thoughts to the back of her mind.
As for Lou Yanhui, once she had laid her cards on the table with Luo Wushuang, she bolted from the palace and headed straight for the Princess Manor.
She didn’t know why Little Jin had become like this, nor why she had been so resistant to her touch earlier that afternoon.
However, their brief interaction had given her a glimmer of confidence.
Whether it was love or hate, it was clear that she still held a place in Little Jin’s heart.
For now, that was enough.
The most urgent priority was nursing Little Jin’s body back to health.
By the time she reached the Princess Manor in a rush, the Imperial Physicians sent by the Empress had just arrived at the gates.
As Lou Yanhui led them inside, her expression grew solemn again at the thought of Luo Yunjin’s condition.
Little Jin looked truly terrible.
The entire way into the manor, she prayed in her heart:
May the Great Sky protect my Little Jin. May she regain her health and find joy once more!
Even if Little Jin was truly disappointed in her, she would find a way to move her heart again.
They were still young. They had so much time ahead of them. She would work hard to be good to Little Jin, so good that she would never want to leave… so good that she would accept her again.
In the Princess Manor, Luo Yunjin woke up almost the moment Lou Yanhui left.
Jiuming was right. In the past, when Luo Yunjin was drunk, she could only find a modicum of peace while sleeping inside a coffin.
This habit traced back to two years ago.
Under the manipulation of Hua Yuhu, Luo Yunjin had been led to believe that Lou Yanhui’s affections had shifted. Heartbroken, she tried to flee the Western Regions.
However, she was ambushed multiple times along the way. In the end, a heavily injured Luo Yunjin was hidden by Jiuming and the others inside a coffin meant for the dead.
Jiuming and her subordinates had disguised themselves as a funeral procession, wailing and playing traditional music. Only through this ruse did they narrowly escape the search parties of the Western Regions’ army.
Throughout the journey, Luo Yunjin suffered from a persistent high fever. She drifted in and out of consciousness, certain she wouldn’t make it back to the capital alive.
She had told Jiuming that if she died, there was no need to bring her body back; they should just bury her wherever was convenient.
After all… no one cared if she lived or died anyway.
In the end, thanks to the protection of Jiuming and the others, she survived the trip back to the capital.
However…
With her severe injuries untreated and the exhaustion of the journey, her health was permanently compromised.
Even though the Empress had sent Imperial Physicians, they could only tell her to recuperate carefully. There was no cure-all for her condition.
In the early days after her return, her injuries flared up repeatedly. She drank countless bowls of bitter medicine, but nothing seemed to help.
Over time, she grew tired of the medicine.
When she couldn’t sleep at night because she missed someone too much, she turned to alcohol to numb herself.
She used it to forget the physical pain, and to briefly escape the bone-deep love that haunted her.
Nursing a broken body with wine instead of medicine naturally caused her health to plummet.
In the two years since her return from the Western Regions, she hadn’t stepped foot outside the manor once. Her greatest pleasure was getting drunk, clutching a portrait of her beloved, and lying in her coffin to “play dead.”
She had commissioned the coffin to be an exact replica of the one Jiuming had used to smuggle her out of the Western Regions.
The style, the size, the craftsmanship, and even the materials were identical.
The familiar feel of the coffin gave her a sense of security.
As her health worsened, the pain and longing drove her to spend more and more time in that cramped space. She would huddle there, surrounded by every scrap of evidence that her “Sister Yanhui” had once cared for her, ready to slip into eternal sleep at any moment.
Eventually, she simply had the coffin moved into her main hall.
She figured that if she died in there, surrounded by the portraits she had painted herself and those unopened letters, it would be a decent enough end.
She never expected that after two years, that person would suddenly reappear before her.
In what she had assumed was a dream, that person had treated her with the same gentleness and patience as before.
That nostalgic embrace had made her loath to let go.
For the first time in two years, she had actually left her coffin to get a peaceful night’s rest.
However, upon waking and hearing from Jiuming that Sister Yanhui was here for a political marriage, Luo Yunjin didn’t know how to feel.
There was jealousy, resentment, and sorrow… but also a tiny hint of relief.
