Chapter 4656 — A Letter of Six Characters
The Blossom Guardian · Page 1 of 2
While Xu Lingchong and Kang Jingming were here scheming and plotting, every other faction was likewise rousing itself, making all manner of preparations for the coming West Island trial. Wei Zhao alone remained as he always did: once back in his room, he sat down to meditate and cultivate.
This time, however, he ended his meditation in less than half an hour. There was no other reason—Ning Xuefei's expression, at once faintly reproachful and faintly hopeful, kept rising unbidden in his mind, and at such a moment he truly had no heart for cultivation.
Though he had secretly made up his mind at the banquet to enter this West Island trial, now that the hour had come Wei Zhao still hesitated. The whole business had descended far too suddenly, and his relationship with Ning Xuefei had hardly ripened of itself—they were nowhere near the point of discussing marriage.
And if he truly succeeded this time, what of his other confidantes? Would that be fair to them? What would they think once they learned of it?
Yet Wei Zhao could not bring himself to harden his heart and simply abandon Ning Xuefei either. Every time he recalled the look on the girl's face at the banquet, an ache he could not suppress rose in his chest.
He was still caught in this uncertainty when the door was suddenly pushed open. Wei Zhao looked up at the sound and saw, to his surprise, that the arrivals were Shangguan Lan'er and Han Jingyi. Why had the two of them left the comforts of the island mistress's palace to come out so late at night?
"What are you two doing here? Not sleeping at this hour?" Wei Zhao asked, eyeing them curiously. Then he added, "Where's Feifei? Why hasn't she come?"
Only the one who tied the knot can untie it. To resolve this awkward predicament, Wei Zhao felt he had to speak plainly with Ning Xuefei face to face—at the very least, he first had to understand her intentions beyond all doubt. What if those so-called hints had all along been a misunderstanding born of his own wishful thinking?
This concerned Ning Xuefei's lifelong happiness, and not the smallest carelessness could be permitted. Even if he was to help her out of this deadlock, Wei Zhao felt the one who must take the lead had to be Ning Xuefei herself. Only if she stated her wishes with her own lips could Wei Zhao devote himself wholeheartedly to fulfilling them; otherwise everything rested on guesswork, and his heart would never be at ease.
"She couldn't come." Shangguan Lan'er shrugged helplessly. Near vermilion one grows red, near ink one grows black—she had mastered Wei Zhao's little habitual gestures to perfection.
"Couldn't come?" Wei Zhao was taken aback, then could not help asking anxiously, "Why? Has something happened?"
"Don't worry, Brother Wei Zhao, Feifei's fine. The reason she couldn't come out with us is the rules of West Island. Any noble lady who has reached the age of eighteen must remain in her chambers awaiting the choice of a husband and may no longer go running about outside. Feifei is the princess of West Island—so many eyes across the island are fixed on her," Han Jingyi explained.
"So that's how it is. In other words, until a husband is settled, she's effectively lost her personal freedom?" Wei Zhao could not help feeling that Ning Xuefei's lot was rather pitiable. To be born princess of West Island was her good fortune, and at the same time her great misfortune.
Though he had been on West Island only a few days, Wei Zhao had noticed a most interesting phenomenon. West Island was said to be a place where feminist thinking prevailed, yet the higher one went, the less pronounced that feminism became; in their conduct and dealings, the upper echelons resembled a patriarchal society more and more, and in some respects even surpassed it.