Thrown out of the house, the wet nurse enters the noble household and becomes a person of high statu

Lu Ye and Xue Bi were introduced to each other without any objection, their expressions varying.

Lu Ye's dark gold eyes held a mixture of astonishment, embarrassment, and indescribable panic.

Xue Bi was relatively calm, but his gaze toward Liu Wenying was complicated, with some indescribable emotions.

Liu Wenying's cheeks were burning hot, and she wished she could disappear into a crack in the ground.

"Aunt Jin!"

She hurriedly interrupted the matchmaker and grabbed her arm.

"What nonsense are you talking about! Let's talk outside!"

"Oh, there's nothing to be embarrassed about!"

Jin Koumei wanted to say more, but Liu Wenying dragged him out the door.

As the evening breeze blew, Liu Wenying felt the heat on her face subside slightly.

She pulled Jin Koumei to a corner of the courtyard, covered her mouth, and whispered:

"Those words were just casual remarks I made earlier, don't take them seriously! I'm currently with Luo Luo, guarding the estate, how could I have the mind to think about such things? Don't mention it again."

Jin Koumei's eyes widened: "Just something you said offhand? Head of Liu Village, how can marriage be treated so lightly!"

"I've sifted through every eligible man in the surrounding villages to meet your request! People like Hunter Lu and Master Xue are hard to find even with a lantern."

Liu Wenying took a deep breath, took out a purse from her sleeve, and stuffed it over.

"Aunt Jin, please take these and have some tea. You really don't need to worry about my affairs anymore."

The purse was quite heavy, Jin Koumei squeezed it, and then a smile appeared on his face.

"Alright, alright, since you put it that way, I'll leave it at that for now. But, Mr. Liu, you really need to think carefully about your marriage."

After much persuasion, they finally managed to send the person away.

Liu Wenying let out a long sigh of relief.

Before he could finish relaxing, he turned around and saw two figures standing at the door of the tent.

Lu Ye and Xue Bi had appeared out of nowhere, standing on either side of the eaves, watching quietly.

As the afterglow of the setting sun shone down, it cast long shadows of the two of them.

Lu Ye was tall and imposing, standing tall and upright.

Xue Bi stood with his hands behind his back, his clothes fluttering slightly in the wind, exuding a refined and elegant air.

Liu Wenying braced herself and walked over.

She spoke, her voice a little hoarse.

"Um, cough, don't take what Jin Koumei said to heart."

"I was annoyed by her pestering me at the time, so I just made some excuses without really wanting to get married."

"I have no plans to get married for the time being. Staying at the estate and raising Luo Luo is good enough for me now."

As Jin Koumei rightly said, marriage is a major life event, and she must be extremely cautious about it.

Xue Bixian reacted.

He nodded slightly and said gently, "I understand. I'll go back and sort out the accounts now."

He then returned to his accounting office, where the curtain fell, obscuring his figure.

Lu Ye remained standing, his eyes filled with disappointment, and stammered, "Then...then I'll go first."

Liu Wenying remained where she was, and the wind made her shiver.

Did she do something wrong?

But where did she go wrong? She was telling the truth.

After standing there for a while, she finally turned around and fled back to her room.

As autumn deepens, a thin layer of frost forms on the field ridges outside Zhiyun Village.

Liu Wenying led two villagers, pulling a cart with a donkey, towards the thatched hut.

The cart was loaded with newly harvested glutinous rice, dried vegetables, and several bolts of thick cloth, all produced locally and intended for distribution to the elderly.

As the wheels rolled over the fallen leaves, Liu Wenying couldn't help but reminisce.

She hadn't seen Lu Ye for five or six days since the incident with the matchmaker.

Xue Bi still came to sort out the accounts every day as usual, but he spoke less than before.

When teaching her to write, their fingertips would occasionally touch, but they would subtly avoid each other.

Having not been born and raised here, her views appeared to be transgressing in the face of the strict separation between men and women.

Liu Wenying comforted herself, saying that this polite distance was just right.

Upon arriving at the thatched hut, the elderly people rushed forward to help unload the goods when they saw the cart, thanking them profusely.

The old woman pulled Liu Wenying down to sit by the hand, and tremblingly reached for the earthenware pot on the table: "Liu, have some hot water to warm yourself up."

Liu Wenying took the rough pottery bowl, and the water temperature passed through the bowl to her palm.

She looked around and said softly, "How have you been lately, Grandma? Please tell me if you need anything."

A smile spread across the old woman's wrinkled face. "Good, all good. The firewood that Lu boy brought a few days ago hasn't been used up yet; it'll last until winter."

Mentioning Lu Ye, Liu Wenying's heart skipped a beat: "Brother Lu is here again?"

The old woman nodded. Once she started talking about something that interested her, she became very talkative and chattered on and on.

"That child is kind-hearted. He comes to our place every few days, sometimes with pheasants and rabbits, sometimes with firewood."

"If we catch a big one, we'll get a share of the meat. We old folks, without children, rely entirely on his kindness."

The old man sitting next to him chimed in.

"That's right. I have trouble walking. I fell last winter, and he carried me to the doctor in town."

"He paid for all the medicine himself, and when I went to pay him back, he absolutely refused to accept it."

The elderly people all spoke highly of Lu Ye.

Liu Wenying listened quietly, his image appearing before her eyes.

At first glance, it seemed sharp, but later I realized what kind of sincerity was hidden within.

"But... I haven't seen him for four or five days. He usually comes every two days at most, but this time it's been so long. Could something have happened?"

The room fell silent.

Grandpa frowned as well.

"Yes, this child never stays away for this long. Could he have run into trouble in the mountains?"

Liu Wenying's heart tightened.

She put down the ceramic bowl and comforted him, "Grandma and Grandpa, don't worry, I'll go visit Brother Lu later."

The old woman was a little surprised. "You're going? Young Master Lu lives far away, at the foot of the mountain, about eight miles outside the village."

"Eight miles?" Liu Wenying was taken aback.

Tanxi Village is not large; it's only about four or five li (about 2.5 kilometers) from one end of the village to the other. Eight li away, you're already at the edge of deep mountains and forests.

"Why do you live so far away?" she asked.

The elderly people looked at each other, their faces showing complex emotions.

Finally, the old woman spoke up, "It's a long story..."

She slowly began to recount her past.

The Lu family was originally a prominent family in the village. Lu Ye's grandfather had passed the imperial examination and was highly respected in the village.

By the time of Lu Ye's father's generation, although he no longer studied, he was tall and strong, and had served in the army and fought against the Western Rong when he was young.

He was injured and then returned to his hometown to get married and have children.

"When Lu was born, we all went to see him. Upon closer inspection, his eyes were actually golden. Who has ever seen anything like that? The midwife said at the time that the child was born strangely and that it was probably an omen of bad luck."

"His mother died in childbirth, from postpartum hemorrhage, and didn't make it to dawn. His father had old injuries from his time in the army, which weren't very good to begin with, and this blow killed him within two years. The villagers said it was Lu Xiaozi who brought this bad luck."

Liu Wenying couldn't believe it; Lu Ye's eyes were indeed stunning when she first saw them.

But after looking at it for a while, I felt that the gold was like the setting sun melting into a deep pool, which had a different kind of beauty. How could it be considered an omen of misfortune?

"...That child was precocious; he understood gossip when he was three or four years old, and he ran to the back of the mountain to cry by himself."

Later, when he grew older, he moved out of the village with his grandmother and built a thatched hut at the foot of a mountain eight miles away. Over the years, they have made a living by hunting.

"At first, we were afraid when he came to deliver things."

Grandpa smiled wryly, "But as time went on, we realized he was a good child."

"He is kind-hearted and honest, and he can't bear to see people suffer, but no one believes what we old folks say."

"The young people in the village would avoid him when they saw him, and the children would throw stones at him and call him a monster with monster eyes..."

"Liuzhuangtou".

The old woman held her hand and said, "If you go to see him, please tell him that there are many confused people in the village, but we old folks still remember his kindness."

Liu Wenying couldn't bear to hear this and nodded, saying, "Don't worry, Grandma, I'll go right away."

…………