Phoenix's Requiem

“Miss, Miss, please stop struggling.” Xiangcao tried to grab ahold of her rampaging mistress. “Miss, the physician said that you can’t irritate your wounds further, or they’ll take longer to heal.”

Yun Ruoyu shrugged off Xiangcao and yelled for her to leave. Before she could do so, however, Madam Qin walked in.

“Ruoyu, how are you?” Qin Jianmei walked toward her daughter anxiously, but before she could help her up, Yun Ruoyu had tossed her hand aside.

She looked at her mother with eyes full of tears. “Mother, are you here to laugh at my wretched appearance?!”

“Oh, silly child…” Qin Jianmei couldn’t help but cry with her daughter. “You’re my precious daughter. How could I bear to laugh at you? If only I could ease your pain and suffering!”

She hugged her daughter as the two of them began to cry anew. 

“I’ve already spoken with Ruoyan, and you won’t be subject to house arrest any longer.” She used her handkerchief to wipe away Yun Ruoyu’s tears. “Take what happened this time as a warning, alright? In the future, let’s live out our lives in peace without provoking anyone else.”

But Yun Ruoyu pushed her aside, disbelieving. “Mother, look at me, look at my appearance! A simple warning?!”

When Madam Qin’s gaze landed on Yun Ruoyu, she couldn’t help but suck in a deep breath. “Who gave you this poison?! Was it Madam An?!”

Yun Ruoyu had never seen her mother so angry.

“This is a poison from the Wu kingdom, isn’t it? Rotting your body, layer by layer…” She couldn’t ever recall seeing such an ugly expression on her mother’s face. “Madam An gave you such a vicious poison to use against Ruoyan?! If your father were to find out, we’d both be expelled from the family! Oh, silly child, how could you do something like this?!”

“I… I…” Frightened by her mother’s almost manic appearance, Yun Ruoyu could only stammer, “It was a moment of folly, and Mother said no one would find out.”

“You mean, no one would find out that she was responsible,” Madam Qin quickly corrected. “Don’t you know that your supposed mother’s taking advantage of you?!”

Yun Ruoyu couldn’t refute that accusation. Although she was rash and impetuous, she wasn’t an idiot. Even in the pavilion itself, Madam An and Yun Ruoyao had heaped all the blame on her!

And while she was under house arrest, Madam An had only sent someone to check on her wounds at the beginning. She hadn’t heard from her since.

“Mother, I know I’ve made a mistake,” Yun Ruoyu finally cried out. “Mother, please help me. How am I ever going to be presentable in front of someone else again?”

Madam Qin sighed deeply before lifting Yun Ruoyu up. Gently, she continued, “This wound will only heal with a high-grade antidote. The best treatment would probably involve combining a green lotus pill along with a restoration salve for your ruined flesh.”

 Before Madam Qin had married Yun Lan, she had been a somewhat famous physician, and was familiar with treating poisons.

Yun Ruoyu’s eyes brightened before going dim once more. A high-grade spiritual herb? How would she ever acquire that?

“Yu’er, for you, Mother’ll do anything.” Madam Qin hugged her daughter as she looked outside the window. Twilight had fallen, and the skies were dark and gloomy.

As night came, strong gales morphed into thunder and lightning, then a huge downpour.

Within her residence, Yun Ruoyan was flipping through the manual that Lin Zainan had given her. Recorded in the manual were recipes for making all sorts of low-grade pills, and Yun Ruoyan was able to memorize most of it after having flipped through it twice.

In her boredom, she put down the manual and entered her pocket dimension. Qiuqiu was cultivating, floating in midair with its eyes shut. Instead of disturbing it, Yun Ruoyan began to tidy up the various bits and pieces she had lying around.

Ever since she returned from the imperial realm, her pocket dimension had had a number of treasures she’d tossed into it, which she hadn’t yet examined carefully.

But Yun Ruoyan didn’t expect that Qiuqiu had already done most of the grunt work for her. As a very organized mystical beast, it had already separated the spiritual herbs, pills, and all sorts of manuals into their own little piles.

Yun Ruoyan could see her entire collection at a single glance.

The high-grade pill furnace was placed in the most eye-catching position, and all around it were the herbs that she had collected from the thousand-herb valley.

Most of the herbs were for refining low-grade spiritual pills. When she learned the basics from Lin Zainan tomorrow, she would be able to try refining her own pills at that time.

Yun Ruoyan couldn’t help but smile when she thought about this.

“Right, there’s also this treasure,” Yun Ruoyan muttered to herself as she opened up a red sandalwood box and a faint medicinal fragrance began to spread through the air.

This was the inner core of the medicinal rabbit, a prime ingredient for concocting mid-grade spiritual remedies.

Yun Ruoyan took a deep breath of the medicinal fragrance before closing the box and putting it back in its original spot. As she did so, she noticed that there was a book right by the side of the box. That book’s cover was a curious faded yellow, just like the color of a dried leaf.

Only then did Yun Ruoyan remember that she had indeed found such a book in the wild vine spirit’s den, but even she didn’t remember when she had tossed it into her pocket dimension.

Yun Ruoyan reached out for the book and began flipping through it. The pages were as yellowed as the cover, but they felt surprisingly smooth to the touch. She flipped through the book again and again, scrutinizing it closely. Nevertheless, she found not a single stroke, let alone a complete word.

Who would be so bored as to bind a book with nothing written in it? Feeling that this book was exceedingly strange, she decided to take it with her to see if she could unlock its mysteries. She cast one last glance at Qiuqiu, still deep in cultivation, before leaving the pocket dimension.

She blinked once as she returned back to her room, with the mysterious book in her hands. As she laid it out in front of her, she told it seriously, “You must be hiding something. I won’t stop until I uncover your secrets.”

She walked up to the table, removed her oil lamp’s lampshade, and placed the book directly over the fire. The book didn’t start burning, or even smoking. In fact, when she took the book out and placed one finger on its cover, she found it still cool to the touch. Of course, not a word popped up either.

Could it be that regular flames were ineffective? Yun Ruoyan tried summoning her spiritual fire. But even that fire, which could char a man’s face black in an instant, couldn’t do anything against the book.

Outside, the storm was still raging on. Silence had descended on the Yun household, but Yun Ruoyan had no intention of sleeping. Instead, she had become fully engrossed in this strange, wordless book.

If fire wasn’t effective, then perhaps water would do the trick. Otherwise, perhaps a knife…? But when even her knife failed to leave even the slightest indentation, Yun Ruoyan gave up. She threw the book by a corner of her dresser, yawned loudly, blew the lamp’s flame out, and went to bed.

In the dark of the night, as the storm finally petered out, Qin Jianmei stood under a green parasol. She was dressed in a lotus-colored gown adorned with peach blossoms, and she stood erect outside Yun Lan’s rooms.

Unusually, she had even dressed up that night. Her combed hair was adorned with a ruby hairpin, and a faint layer of makeup hid the wrinkles on her face. Her brows were fine, her lips plump. Once more, she became the dainty maiden who had brushed by a young master in the streets at the prime of her beauty. 

As Yun Lan checked over the last of the court documents, stood up, and prepared to retreat to his sleeping quarters, he saw Madam Qin standing in the yard. He stopped moving. No expression could be seen on his serious face, but his hand on the doorframe trembled.

“Master, it’s been quite a while. Are you still doing alright?” Qin Jianmei bowed from afar.

The next day, in Yun Ruoyu’s cottage, Qin Jianmei applied the salve that she’d made overnight on Yun Ruoyu’s wounds. The salve, cool but not chilly, soothed her skin. The itchiness and pain that had plagued her for two weeks seemed to vanish in an instant.

“Mother, where did you get this salve?” Yun Ruoyu asked curiously.

“Your father, of course,” Qin Jiamei replied.

“My father!” Yun Ruoyu opened her eyes wide. “My father was willing to grant me such precious medicine?! No…” Yun Ruoyu frowned as she looked at Madam Qin before exclaiming even more disbelievingly, “Mother, you went to see my father?”

Qin Jianmei nodded.

Yun Ruoyu was so happy that she almost jumped out of her seat. Her sudden action tore at her wound and made her hiss, inviting another round of rebukes from her mother.

Qin Jianmei handed two bottles of salve to Yun Ruoyu. “I’ve written down how to apply this medicine to your skin. Do it twice daily, and your wounds will recover within three days.” Then she sighed and continued, “It’s just that the scars won’t fully vanish, but this is already the best I can do.”

“Mother, aren’t you going to help me apply the salve?”

Qin Jianmei reached out to caress her daughter’s face. “Buddha’s still waiting for my worship, Ruoyu.”

Disappointment clouded Yun Ruoyu’s eyes as she brushed Madam Qin’s hand aside. “Get out! Get out now! I don’t want to see you!”

There was more that Qin Jianmei wanted to say, but Yun Ruoyu had already plugged her ears with her fingers. Before she left her daughter once more, she couldn’t help turning back. “Yu’er, heed my words. Don’t bind yourself to Madam An.”

“Leave, leave!” Yun Ruoyu shook her head in frustration.

Madam Qin sighed before finally walking out. Yun Ruoyu heard her mother’s footsteps get fainter and fainter before vanishing.

She lay in bed and gritted her teeth. You’re not going to shield me, and you won’t even let me approach others either? You might be fine minding your own business and keeping a low profile, but I want to stand out!

“Xiangcao,” Yun Ruoyu called for her maid. “Get me some clothes! I’m going to pay my respects to Mother!”

It was particularly crowded in Madam An’s yard. Because of the downpour last night, the weather was no longer as oppressive as it had been.

Madam An had instructed her servants to set up a tea table by her peonies and invited Yun Ruoyao and Yi Qianying over for a little tea party.

Just as the three had gathered and sat down, one of her maids called out, “Madam, the third miss is here.”