Still Secretly In Love With My Enemy Today - Chapter 11

Chapter 11:

 

Xie Huaishuang knew the Linlang Pavilion better than I imagined.

 

Yesterday on the street, he could barely move a few steps in half a day. Yet, inside the third floor, he only needed a few light touches to know his exact position. Walking through the halls, one couldn’t even tell he was blind and deaf; every corner of the third floor was etched into his mind.

 

“You’ve scouted the third floor?”

 

“Yes.”

 

As he spoke, his fingertips brushed a corner. His nostrils flared slightly, and he led me by the sleeve, turning right into a narrow corridor. Old-fashioned steam lamps hung every ten paces. It was daytime, so they were off, but the air still held the pungent, acrid smell of burnt lamp oil.

 

I looked at the lamps; they were crude, with technology that seemed stuck thirty years in the past. They wasted oil and smelled terrible. In Iron Cloud City, they would have been sold as scrap metal.

 

“Lower your head, don’t get hit.”

 

No sooner had he spoken than a doorframe appeared ahead. If I hadn’t ducked, I would have walked right into it—and at a fast pace, it would have hurt.

 

Seeing how skillfully he lowered his head, I couldn’t help but grab his right hand and ask: “Did you get hit here before?”

 

The frame was exactly at the height of his forehead. Xie Huaishuang nodded: “In the beginning—alright, we go down from here.”

 

Even if I walked through this place carefully now, I couldn’t guarantee I’d remember every winding corridor, staircase, and hall. Had Xie Huaishuang walked this path a hundred times, or a thousand?

 

He didn’t notice me watching him; he was focused on feeling the way.

 

“I’ve checked; there are usually few people here. This leads to the second-floor storage room.”

 

Xie Huaishuang spoke in a flat, quick tone, very different from his usual dazed self. Looking at him, I couldn’t help but imagine him hiding in some corner, peeking around a doorframe to observe.

 

Should I praise him?

 

After a thought, I wrote somewhat awkwardly in his hand: “If it were me, I might not have been this clear.”

 

I felt this was the highest praise I could offer—I was actually saying I might be inferior to him!

 

Xie Huaishuang froze, his eyelashes lifting. After a moment, he shook his head seriously: “Don’t ‘if it were you’—don’t be like that.”

 

The “deep green pools” of his eyes, separated by the dust in the sunlight, looked at me cleanly. I didn’t know what to say, so I averted my gaze: “Let’s go.”

 

The stairs were narrow, and the wooden boards felt flimsy in places. I held Xie Huaishuang’s wrist, leading him half a step behind me as we slowly descended.

 

Fifteen steps in total, about three feet wide. I told him each detail while surveying the storage room.

 

South-facing, ten feet wide, twenty-six feet long. Boxes were stacked on both sides, leaving a narrow path for one person to pass through to the door.

 

Xie Huaishuang nodded and looked up: “You can be that precise with just one glance?”

 

What was there to be surprised about? Did he not know? Measuring ropes, bows, iron rulers, wooden poles—we never let these tools leave our hands. He looked like he was gaining great knowledge; I realized he truly didn’t know how we worked.

 

So, I told him reservedly: “A small matter, very simple.”

 

After I wrote that, he seemed to want to ask something, his eyes shifting as he thought, but he said nothing. He just raised his hand to slowly feel around the surroundings. I stood still, watching him, only reaching out to pull him if he was about to bump into something.

 

Why did this man love playing riddles so much? I really wanted to fix that habit of his.

 

“Let’s go,” Xie Huaishuang finished his sweep and huddled back. “Let’s look outside. The second floor…”

 

He didn’t finish. His voice stopped abruptly—I had quickly written two words in his hand.

 

Someone’s here.

 

In Iron Cloud City, anyone who showed their face was hunted by the Temple. Consequently, we were not only good at fighting but also experts at hiding—especially me. Even Xie Huaishuang used to only find me three or four times out of ten.

 

This person was actually hiding quite well. If not for that faint trace of breath, I wouldn’t have noticed.

 

No one else knew I was coming here with Xie Huaishuang, so the person hiding probably had nothing to do with us. Xie Huaishuang likely thought the same and nodded silently. I tugged his sleeve to leave, but suddenly heard a rustle behind us.

 

A thick, dusty felt cloth was flipped over, and a childish face popped out. Her face and clothes were covered in black soot, but her round eyes were bright, and she glared at me fiercely.

 

“How did you find me?” The child had thick, black eyebrows and clutched a bundle. She was aggressive. “I don’t care how you found me. If you dare tell anyone else, I’ll—I’ll tell everyone you’re here stealing things too!”

 

“…”

 

She didn’t seem very bright; before I even asked a question, she had confessed.

 

“Not just stealing,” she seemed to realize her mistake and glared even harder, like a little wolf. “I’ll tell the madam that you two… you’re here to tryst!”

 

…What?

 

I was shocked by her words. The child immediately looked smug: “Be sensible. You and this blind man get out of here right now and pretend you didn’t see me.”

 

“What blind man?” I frowned instinctively. “He has a name and a surname. Why call him that? Would you like it if someone called you blind?”

 

She didn’t speak. I thought she was reflecting, but the next moment she said sinisterly: “Protecting him so much, you two really are here for an affair.”

 

“Give me ten taels of silver,” she crawled out from between the boxes, excitement poorly hidden in her eyes. “And I’ll pretend I didn’t see. Otherwise—”

 

She let out a very threatening sneer.

 

I was really seeing something new today. I asked Xie Huaishuang: “Why are the kids in this place so different from the ones outside?”

 

Xie Huaishuang frowned for a moment and shook his head: “Where would children come from in a place like this?”

 

Then who was this big-talking kid?

 

“Ten taels… Is ten taels not okay?”

 

I looked at her again and saw her sneer was failing.

 

“If ten taels is no good… then five! ” She rubbed the bundle in her hands, her voice dropping lower. “Five? Two… two taels of silver? It can’t be any less!”

 

I estimated she was about ten years old. Her clothes didn’t fit, and she looked thin and small. While I felt around my pockets to see how much money I had left, I asked her: “What do you need money for? Buying food?”

 

“What do you care?” she snapped. “Stop talking and just give it!”

 

I translated every sentence she said for Xie Huaishuang—I couldn’t be the only one she was being mean to.

 

Xie Huaishuang looked down and thought for a moment: “Are you in some kind of trouble?”

 

She didn’t answer, but looked surprised: “Wait, you can speak? I thought you were a mute!”

 

In an instant, her face changed again, and she glared at me: “No trouble! Just give the money!”

 

“…”

 

I was truly gaining experience today.

 

“I’m in trouble,” I put my money back and looked at her. “How about you give me two taels of silver?”

 

She glared at me, about to speak, when suddenly the sound of distant footsteps came from outside. Her expression changed instantly. She clutched her bundle, turned, and scrambled out the window, agile as a monkey.

 

Though it was quite a sight, it had nothing to do with me, and I didn’t plan to chase her. There was nothing left to scout in this storage room. I listened to the movement outside the door. From the corner of my eye, I saw Xie Huaishuang pause at the spot where the child had been standing before he followed me.

 

“What is it?”

 

Xie Huaishuang shook his head: “Nothing, it’s just the smell seems a bit familiar, but I can’t quite place it.”

 

I sniffed, sniffed hard, then sniffed even harder—and then sneezed twice from the dust.

 

Xie Huaishuang seemed to sense it and tilted his head toward me. I suspected he was messing with me, but I had no proof.

 

“I don’t smell anything. How did you?”

 

Xie Huaishuang spread his hands: “A small matter, very simple.”

 

“…”

 

He actually threw my own words back at me. How hateful.

 

…

 

Yesterday, I thought Xie Huaishuang had never been to a market in his life; now I felt he had never looked closely at plants or trees either.

 

After scouting several spots on the second floor, Xie Huaishuang memorized them. I asked if he wanted to go to the pond we talked about yesterday to soak up the sun.

 

Sometimes I didn’t know what he was pretending for. He had been re-drawing the map in his head, but upon hearing this, he looked up and then down again, his voice muffled: “No need.”

 

Liar. I saw his eyes brighten for a split second.

 

I told you, my ten years of research on him wasn’t for nothing. No one can fool me, least of all him. Sure enough, once we reached the spot, he couldn’t keep the act up anymore.

 

Xiling is a land of mist and rain; several consecutive days of sunshine were rare. It was a pity Xie Huaishuang couldn’t see the shimmering golden light on the water, but he didn’t seem to care. He curiously poked at every flower and blade of grass he could touch and asked me about them.

 

They were all very common plants. Usually, I’d barely give them a glance, so where did he get all these questions? More importantly—why did I have to answer just because he asked?

 

“These are wood peaches,” I wrote in his hand as his other hand tentatively touched the clusters of small pink flowers. “They bear fruit—but they have thorns, touch them gently.”

 

“Are they edible?”

 

“I don’t know… probably. They’re said to be very sour.”

 

Xie Huaishuang hummed, tilting his head as his fingertips brushed the stamens. Being forced to look closely at them with him, I realized that instead of the blurry cloud of pink in my memory, each flower was quite delicate, with layers of thin petals cradling the sunlight.

 

I usually feel restless when doing “useless” or “purposeless” things. If it weren’t for the excuse of “waiting for Xie Huaishuang,” I would never have stood under a bush of flowers for this long. I always felt it was a waste of time, like walking through a market from start to finish. After all, there were always so many blueprints waiting for me. Even if there weren’t, I’d imagine many more and hurry back to draw them.

 

“In that case, can they be used to make soup?”

 

“I think so… haven’t tried.”

 

As I wrote, I secretly decided: this is the last one. If he asks again, I won’t write—I’m not his walking, talking encyclopedia.

 

He stood on his tiptoes, leaning in to sniff them, then turned back, his eyes lit up by the sun: “You know so much.”

 

There it was again. That trick doesn’t work on me.

 

He hopped down, his hem catching on the reeds. He went back, leaning over to touch them, his palm cupping a fuzzy cluster.

 

“These are reeds, right?”

 

Simply answering yes or no didn’t count as giving him a name directly, so it didn’t violate my internal rule. I said yes, and he seemed very happy. I asked: “You’ve seen these?”

 

“When I was very young, my Master took me out,” he stood up. “He pointed them out to me from afar.”

 

Wasn’t his Master that mystical, profound-acting Great Priest who rarely showed his face? When he did appear, it was never for anything good, and he wore layers of cumbersome, flamboyant robes—a man a hundred times more hateful than Xie Huaishuang. I really couldn’t imagine him taking a young Xie Huaishuang out to identify reeds.

 

At this point, Xie Huaishuang seemed to remember something and stopped talking. The reed stayed in his palm for a moment before he let it stand back up, swaying.

 

A young Xie Huaishuang—I suddenly thought of the child from this morning—was he also aggressive and unreasonable like he is now?

 

“And what is this?”

 

He crouched by the water, his finger lightly parting the surface, sending out circles of ripples. This time he touched water shield—I only just noticed there was water shield here. The round green leaves swayed with the ripples.

 

I ignored him. The “deep green pools” of his eyes, carrying the shimmering light of the water, looked at me in confusion.

 

It absolutely wasn’t for his sake; it was only because water shield porridge is delicious. I can’t stand someone not recognizing water shield. I wrote it in his hand, thinking: just this one, never again.

 

Following him through a dozen more types of plants under the “never again” rule, we eventually sat by the river. Xie Huaishuang was still twirling a peach blossom he had picked, spinning it slowly between his fingertips, lost in thought.

 

“Zhu Pingsheng,” he called my name suddenly, his expression very serious. “Tell me, who manages all these things?”

 

“Their colors, their scents, their origins and destinations, the seasons they bloom and fall—is there truly one person managing it all?”

 

I didn’t expect him to ask such a question. I looked at the peach blossom in his hand and shook my head.

 

“How could there be one person managing all this…”

 

How could I explain it to him?

 

My fingertips stopped. I glanced at the distant horizon. In my memory, I rarely had moments where I thought of nothing and simply let myself be soaked by the surrounding scenery. I saw the red sun nestled against the side of the mountains at the end of the long river, the crimson light pushing back the indigo sky as it stretched for thousands of miles. Flocks of silver pheasants flew past, and the water’s surface rippled as fish were startled.

 

After a thought, I continued writing: “…All things follow the rotation of the seasons; each lives its own life, and each finds its own place.”

 

At the very least, it certainly wasn’t the “God of Xiling” managing it.

 

Xie Huaishuang didn’t speak, his hair fluttering in the evening breeze.

 

“All things find their own place,” he said after a long silence. “There is no power that governs everything, is there?”

 

I didn’t expect him to say that. I looked at him; his features were vivid, like a beautiful ink painting.

 

“What do you think?”

 

It was very strange for him to ask this. He was a follower of the God of Xiling; according to them, the God was the source of everything.

 

“I don’t know.” He was silent for a long time before slowly speaking. “I have seen too little.”

 

“I only feel that perhaps… perhaps what I heard before was wrong,” Xie Huaishuang continued. “I don’t know anything else, but if the God of Xiling were truly in charge, why would the Linlang Pavilion exist? And… if the women there want to leave, they have to find their own opportunities and places to go. It all depends on themselves.”

 

I suddenly realized that while I was hurrying through mountains and rivers for thousands of miles, he was always deep inside the Temple, behind nine turns of corridors and layers of misty curtains, with strings of pearl veils hanging before him.

 

“Once you see more, you’ll have the answer,” I suddenly found him a bit more tolerable. “No need to rush.”

 

Xie Huaishuang nodded, pursing his lips. I took his sleeve, letting him touch a yellow iris he hadn’t noticed.

 

As he touched the petals, for some reason, he looked at me quietly, a silent shadow crossing his brow.

 

“You only want to win against me, right?”

 

I froze, realizing what he was talking about. Why was he so fixated on this?

 

I thought and thought, and could only conclude that he cared about winning and losing even more than I did. Hearing me say I wanted to “win against him” made him unhappy.

 

“Not entirely. I just want to have a fair and square match with you,” I took his hand and changed my wording. “As for who wins or loses, it’s impossible to tell right now.”

 

—Though I would bet ten pieces of the finest black iron on myself winning.

 

But since I’d said that, he should be happy, right?

 

Xie Huaishuang didn’t show the smile I expected. His gaze wavered on my face for a moment before dropping back to the iris petals he was rubbing between his fingers.

 

“Don’t you have other things to do?”

 

He paused, then continued: “I mean, if you have other things to do, you probably can’t stay here forever…”

 

Why was this man always obsessing over whether I’d stay or leave?

 

“It’s the same for me here, it doesn’t affect anything.”

 

The various ceremonies of the Temple weren’t that frequent. Normally, Iron Cloud City wouldn’t give me any missions for at least half a month. I could draw blueprints anywhere. These past few nights, I’d been sitting by the lamp, deleting and revising my work.

 

—I was secretly drawing blueprints to improve my weapons further, while Xie Huaishuang wasn’t practicing his sword. Part of me felt it was unfair, but another part of me felt great about it.

 

Xie Huaishuang blinked. I thought he was going to find a new excuse to drive me away, but his expression softened, and the smile I hadn’t expected flickered across his face.

 

Wait.

 

A ridiculous thought suddenly popped into my head.

 

—Maybe Xie Huaishuang… wants me to stay?

 

Wait.

 

That’s not right. Aren’t we arch-nemeses who hate each other most? Is he not afraid I’ll kill him?

 

In my daze, I realized we were sitting too close. There was only a sliver of sunlight between our shoulders. Xie Huaishuang raised his eyes, which reflected a blurry image of me. I was suddenly startled, realizing the absurdity of my recent days—he and I are arch-enemies. We shouldn’t be this close.