Jian Lan still took Cuocuo and left in the end.
Xie Lian saw the Rain Master off after she finished the deliverance service for Xuan Ji, then he returned to Mount Taicang. He’d meant to tell Feng Xin that Jian Lan had left, but he couldn’t find him. As he was searching for him in the rowdy crowd, he heard someone shout.
“Great timing, Tai Hua! Are you free? Come help us figure this out!”
They were still trying to find someone, anyone, to do the books, and Lang Qianqiu was desperate to get away. “Don’t bring that stack of papers here—I’ve got things to do!” he responded from afar. “Go find someone else!”
Xie Lian sighed, wondering if he should go over and take a crack at the books. Unexpectedly, he had only taken a few steps when he heard a voice from behind.
“Mas— Sta— Your Highness.”
Xie Lian turned his head to see Lang Qianqiu standing right behind him.
“Do you have a minute?”
“Of course,” Xie Lian replied.
Thus, he and Lang Qianqiu walked out of the giant hut, that sad excuse for a palace. As they went, Xie Lian asked, “How’s Guzi doing? Is he all right?”
Lang Qianqiu chuckled helplessly, sounding a little bitter. “I don’t know if I’d say he’s ‘all right.’ The kid asks me for his dad every day—it’s pretty sad. I could only…gather a few bits of the Green Ghost’s soul. I put them in a lamp, but now the kid shows up daily, hugging the thing and asking when the soul inside will grow bigger! I honestly…”
At the sight of his gloomy, dispirited face, Xie Lian could understand his feelings. Why did he have to do something like this for Qi Rong, who had murdered his entire family? Xie Lian unconsciously reached out to pat Lang Qianqiu’s shoulder, but he held back as he remembered what he himself had done in Yong’an.
“You’ve worked hard,” he said gently. “What did you want to speak with me about today?”
After some hesitation, Lang Qianqiu reached into his robes, took something out, and passed it to Xie Lian. “This.”
Xie Lian’s breath hitched as soon as he saw what it was: an exquisite, luminous, small, smooth, crimson-red coral pearl.
His voice trembled as he said, “This is…?!”
“This coral pearl was a secret treasure of the founding father of Yong’an,” Lang Qianqiu said.
Only when Xie Lian heard that did he realize this wasn’t the one tied at the end of Hua Cheng’s braid but the one he had once given to Lang Ying. It wasn’t Hua Cheng’s. Although Xie Lian felt a little disappointed, he still took the pearl.
“The founding father once said that the man who gave him this pearl was someone who had helped him,” Lang Qianqiu continued. “He was his savior, and a very good man.”
“…”
“But all the same, that man lost everything due to his actions,” Lang Qianqiu went on. “The founding father said he didn’t regret what he’d done; he’d had no choice. Still, when he thought about it after the fact, he still felt that he’d wronged the man.”
“And then…?” Xie Lian asked.
“And then,” Lang Qianqiu said, “I saw the bead at the end of Crimson Rain Sought Flower’s braid that day at the Heavenly Capital. The more I looked at it, the more I thought it resembled the one Father left me. I heard General Xuan Zhen and the others talking later and learned that those pearls were actually a pair, and that they belonged to you. So I came to ask—is this yours?”
Xie Lian paused for a long moment before nodding slowly. “It’s mine. It’s one of a pair that my parents gave me when I was young.”
Lang Qianqiu scratched his head. “Then…I’m giving it back to you.”
He still didn’t know how to address Xie Lian, and after he returned the pearl, he dawdled for a bit before leaving without a word. Xie Lian just stood there, clutching the red coral pearl tightly in the heart of his palm.
It had been over eight hundred years. After so many twists and turns, one half of the pair of crimson coral pearl earrings had returned to him. It belonged to him, but also to him.
The other pearl should’ve been there as well. They should’ve been able to complete the set.
Right then, Feng Xin’s loud, overjoyed voice came from the foot of the mountain. “Your Highness! Everyone! Come quick!”