Chapter 12.1

A Woman’s Fragrance (12) – She Looks Like a Cat (1)

The spring was cold and precipitous, interspersed with the slightest drizzle to moisten the earth.

There was a simple carriage driving on the official road, with a string of wind chimes hanging from the eaves of the carriage, tinkling as it walked.

Lu Fei Yue lifted the curtain and looked at the drizzle with worry.

They had a mission to go to Cangzhou, and it happened that the detoxification herbs Li Ruo Shui needed were also in Cangzhou, hence they travelled together so that they could also take care of each other on the way.

The carriage had been travelling for two days. It was the 15th of March and it was also the first night of Li Ruo Shui’s poison outbreak.

Lu Fei Yue and Jiang Nian were both worried and feeling a little guilty.

After all, they were the ones who let Li Ruo Shui lead the way, so they felt responsible for what had gone wrong during the journey.

The atmosphere inside the carriage was not solemn, except for Lu Zhi Yao, who was unsurprisingly sleeping, and Li Ruo Shui, who was looking out of the window at the spring rain, forgetting all about the sadness she felt on the day she was poisoned and cried so hard her eyes were red and swollen.

Lu Fei Yue patted her on the shoulder with a serious look: “Don’t worry, Cangzhou has fire grass, your poison won’t last long.”

Li Ruo Shui smiled back at Lu Fei Yue and patted her hand in relief.

“Sister Lu, you don’t have to blame yourself, this is all my own choice, it has nothing to do with you.”

Jiang Nian, who was at the side, thought of how dejected she looked on the day of the poisoning and couldn’t help but come over and asked her.

“You were so sad before, why is it like nothing’s wrong now? I heard that the poison is very powerful.”

Lu Fei Yue covered his mouth, glared at him, and turned to Li Ruo Shui with an apologetic smile, “His mind is not well, don’t take it to heart.”

“It’s alright.” Li Ruo Shui was inexplicably cold and lowered the curtain that was shielding the wind: “I was afraid at first, but nothing has happened in the past two days, so my mind has naturally relaxed.”

She pointed her finger at Lu Zhi Yao, unsure if he was really sleeping or not: “He said that he had been poisoned by this poison before, and there was nothing particularly uncomfortable about it except the cold.”

Li Ruo Shui had read the original book and heard Lu Zhi Yao’s story of the poisoning, so her heart had already relaxed a lot.

Afterall in the book, he didn’t seem to be in too much pain when he was injured, he just covered himself with an extra layer of quilt.

Lu Fei Yue shook her head in disapproval: “We can’t be careless, we can’t stay in the carriage tonight, we have to find a place to rest.”

Li Ruo Shui nodded but her mind was not on this.

Compared with the poison, she was more worried about the bet with Lu Zhi Yao.

Logically speaking, she must have won but what if he didn’t play by the rules and forced her to swallow the sword, what should she do?

The man beside him who seemed to be asleep suddenly moved, his eyelashes twitching slightly, as if he was about to open them in the next second.

Li Ruo Shui looked into his eyes and recalled what happened to him during his childhood, and she couldn’t help but sighed.

His temperament had been a little twisted when he was a child, and it had become even more twisted when he grew up.

Furthermore, the way he curled his lips up in a smile looked like his mother, could this be the power of blood?

“You’re looking at me again.”

Lu Zhi Yao, who was leaning against the wall of the carriage, moved his body slightly, and his bodice spread a little, revealing the small mole on his collarbone.

Some people were born with good-looking collarbones.

Li Ruo Shui averted her eyes and responded as usual, “Yes, you’re good looking.”

She didn’t know why she always said yes to him, but it had become a habit for her to turn her head to look at him whenever she had nothing to do.

The spring breeze blew in through the curtain of the carriage, and the rain had dwindled to a dense mist.

It was not going to rain tonight.

The carriage rocked on, pressing through puddles of mud and grass, and finally stopped in front of a ruined temple.

This was where they would rest for the night.

The temple was in a state of disrepair for a long time, with several holes in the roof and stagnant water in several places in the temple. They went to the open space in front of the Buddhist altar to rest.

They lit the dry firewood they had collected and baked flatbreads and steamed buns over the fire in a circle.

After a day’s journey, Li Ruo Shui and the others had long been hungry.

Except for Lu Zhi Yao.

He just casually ate a steamed bun and sat aside, tapping his fingers lightly on the pillar, holding a steamed bun in his other hand, not knowing what he was doing.

“Look at this Buddha statue.” Jiang Nian looked around and his eyes settled on the stone Buddha next to them.

This Buddha statue was missing half of its face, leaving only one eye and a compassionate smile.

Jiang Nian pretended to be scared and approached Lu Fei Yue, his head resting slightly on her arm: “Will there be anything strange at night?”

Lu Fei Yue straightened her back, she looked at the Buddha statue carefully, and found nothing strange.

“What’s strange……your head, move over there!”

She quickly glanced at Li Ruo Shui, a little embarrassed, and hurriedly reached out and pushed Jiang Nian away.

Jiang Nian had an idle temperament. He was still in front of Li Ruo Shui back then, but now that he was familiar with her, his true nature was revealed.

He glanced at Lu Zhi Yao and called Li Ruo Shui with a low voice, as he came closer to ask.

“You and him……”

Looking at Jiang Nian squeezing his eyebrows, Li Ruo Shui immediately shook her head, then remembered her mission and nodded hesitantly, pointing to herself.

Curiosity was human nature, even a serious and self-disciplined person like Lu Fei Yue couldn’t help but raise her eyebrows, somewhat surprised.

It was hard to interpret the details of how people got along with each other. She had been a constable for so many years, she could see very clearly who had love with whom, but she could not feel Li Ruo Shui’s preference for Lu Zhi Yao at all.

However, she took the poison in his stead, so it seemed that the feeling of love was justified.