Remarried to a top-tier playboy, her reborn ex-husband is filled with regret.

Shen did not move immediately.

She lay there, feeling a cold sweat seeping from her back, sticking the torn fabric to her skin, making her shiver.

After a long time, she slowly and gradually propped herself up from the kang (a heated brick bed).

Her fingers touched the tear in her clothes, and she tremblingly gathered the two pieces of tattered cloth together, trying to cover her exposed collarbone and shoulders.

She didn't look at her husband, but kept her head down, her fingers slowly smoothing her clothes.

The movements were slow and meticulous, as if by gathering those two tattered pieces of cloth together, he could hide himself again.

Then she stood up, her legs went weak, and she had to hold onto the edge of the kang (a heated brick bed) to avoid falling.

She walked to the stove, picked up the rough porcelain bowl again, and scooped a spoonful of water into it.

The water was cold. She picked it up and took a sip, then began to clean up the messy, haphazardly chopped vegetable leaves on the stove.

She didn't say a word throughout the entire process.

She simply raised her hand and wiped the corner of her eye.

Their movements were so fast they were almost invisible, as if they were afraid of being discovered.

Then he continued bending down to tidy up.

It was as if nothing had happened.

Just like her husband, he didn't treat her roughly.

It was as if this was just an ordinary evening during the days of guarding the tomb.

Post

On the evening the exiled contingent arrived at the post station on the northern border, the sky was ablaze with a blood-red sunset.

After more than three months of travel, of the twenty-odd people who originally set out from the capital, less than ten remain.

The dead were hastily buried by the roadside, while the living dragged their chains and continued walking forward, no one looking back at the shallow graves.

The post station was small, consisting of several mud-brick houses surrounding a square courtyard.

The walls were peeled and mottled by wind and sand, and the paint on the door frame had long since faded, revealing the gray-white wood grain underneath.

This is the last post station before entering the northern desert. Beyond this checkpoint lies an endless expanse of Gobi desert.

The yamen runners drove the exiled criminals into the livestock shed in the corner of the courtyard, then went into the main room to drink and gamble.

The barn was lined with a layer of moldy hay, and the air was filled with the sour smell of animal dung mixed with old grain husks.

Gu Jinghuai leaned against the corner of the wall, the shackles on his hands chafing his wrists raw.

The scabs would scab over and then break open again, over and over, leaving a ring of hideous scars.

He had his eyes closed, as if he were asleep, but his breathing was not steady.

He could hear the sound of horses' hooves mixed with the wind outside, the foreign language conversations of caravans coming and going at the post station entrance, and the shouts of the yamen runners playing drinking games in the next room.

Then he heard a voice.

It was a woman's laughter, coming down from the corridor on the second floor of the inn, short and crisp, with a nonchalant arrogance.

The laughter itself was nothing special, but the timbre and the slightly upward curve at the end of the note were what stood out.

Like grains of sand swept up by the wind in the desert, carrying the roughness unique to northern dialects.

Gu Jinghuai suddenly opened his eyes.

He recognized the voice!

In his previous life, he spent five years at the border, dealing with the Northern Hu people for those five years.

For three of those years, he was negotiating, testing, and scheming against this woman.

She was Princess Saren of the Northern Hu, the Khan's most beloved youngest daughter, and also the most cunning spy chief of the Northern Hu.

In her past life, she disguised herself and infiltrated the border to spy on military intelligence, but was captured by his men.

He interrogated her personally for three days and three nights, and finally the two countries exchanged prisoners before sending her back.

He wouldn't forget these things.

At this moment, Princess Saren appeared in this dilapidated border post station, dressed in the coarse cloth clothes of Han people, disguised as an ordinary Hu woman who was resting with a caravan.

Gu Jinghuai lowered his head, letting his disheveled hair cover his face.

His heart was pounding, but he didn't move.

He quietly curled up in the corner, waiting for the sky to gradually darken.

He only moved after the other prisoners in the livestock shed had fallen asleep and the drinking games played by the yamen runners in the main hall had gradually subsided.

He turned his head and said something to the yamen runner guarding the door.

"I need to use the restroom."

His voice was hoarse and humble, his head bowed and shoulders hunched, like those stray dogs in the capital's prison whose spines had been broken.

The constable glanced at him impatiently, seeing his pathetic state where he could barely stand, and didn't even bother to escort him, waving his hand to tell him to go by himself.

Gu Jinghuai dragged the iron chain out of the livestock shed, across the yard, and around the woodshed where miscellaneous items were piled up.

Behind the woodshed was the wall of the post station, with several broken vats and a broken cart at the base of the wall.

This is the route he found by observing through the cracks in the wall of the livestock shed for half an hour.

He did not go to the outhouse.

Gu Jinghuai pressed himself against the wall, following the shadows, and made his way to the stairwell in the backyard of the inn.

At the end of the second-floor corridor was a separate upper room, with two burly Hu (non-Han) guards standing at the door.

As soon as Gu Jinghuai approached, two knives were crossed and placed in front of him.

The blade was only an inch from his throat.

Gu Jinghuai did not back down at all.

He raised his head, letting the dim oil lamp at the end of the corridor illuminate his scarred face.

Then, in a rough and hoarse voice, he spoke a sentence in the Northern Hu language.

"I want to see Princess Saren."

The two guards exchanged a glance.

Next to the woodshed in the backyard of the post station, squatted a convicted slave wearing iron chains.

They spoke in the grassland language of the Northern Hu people, and could accurately pronounce the princess's name.

This was no ordinary exile!

They didn't sheathe their knives, but they also didn't strike.

The door to the main room was pushed open from the inside.

A woman stood at the door, holding an oil lamp in her hand.

She was dressed in the coarse cloth dress of a common Han Chinese woman, but her high eyebrows, deep-set eyes, straight nose, and wheat-colored skin made her look like a cheetah wrapped in coarse cloth.

Her eyes gleamed with a sharp and cautious light in the dim light.

The princess looked the man up and down; he was covered in scars, disheveled, and had no expression on his face.

"Who are you."

She asked in the Northern Hu dialect.

His voice wasn't loud, but his tone carried the natural authority of someone who had long held a position of power.

Gu Jinghuai bent down and whispered:

"Gu Jinghuai, a sinner, is the heir of the Yong'an Marquis's mansion."

"I have a business deal I'd like to discuss with the princess."

Princess Saren did not order her guards to move aside.

She leaned against the doorframe, raised the oil lamp and shone it on his face. Seeing that he didn't look like an assassin, a hint of disdain and amusement crept into her eyes.

"A shackled slave dares to negotiate with this princess?"

"My identity is none of the princess's concern."

Gu Jinghuai's tone was neither humble nor arrogant.

"But the princess will definitely be interested in my goods."