The Double
Chapter 161 - 161 87 Mid-Autumn_3

161: Chapter 87 Mid-Autumn_3 161: Chapter 87 Mid-Autumn_3 “What brings you here?” Jiang Li asked.

“The Mid-Autumn Festival is in three days.

There will be a lantern fair in the evening.

Are you going to see it?”

Jiang Li: “No.”

“You’re not?” Jiang Jingrui widened his eyes, looking at Jiang Li as if she were some kind of monster.

“Why won’t you go?

There are so many delicious foods and fun things at the Mid-Autumn Festival lantern fair.

You haven’t been before…cough, or it’s been many years since you have.

It’s even livelier now than it was.

So why not go?”

Jiang Li said, “I just don’t feel like going,” and stood up to walk back into the house.

She didn’t expect Jiang Jingrui to be so pestering, as he immediately stood up and followed her, nagging incessantly, “Jiang Li, there’s something really off about you!

All the other young ladies look forward to the bustling Mid-Autumn lantern fair every year, but not you—why is that?

Everyone from our residence will be going out that day.

If you don’t go, what will you do staying at home?

Play leaf cards with the grounded Youyao?

Or keep Grandmother company while copying Buddhist scriptures?”

Jiang Li, normally patient, was becoming impatient with him and said, “There’s no reason, I just don’t want to go.”

Jiang Jingrui stood still, and Tong’er and Bai Xue also turned to look at Jiang Li.

Jiang Li realized she might have spoken too harshly.

She calmed down and said in a gentle voice to Jiang Jingrui, “I don’t like crowds.

With so many people, it’s inevitable to bump into others, and I’m really afraid of that.

You can go by yourself if you like, there’s nothing wrong with me not going.” Despite her mild tone, her resolve was clear and non-negotiable.

Jiang Jingrui dallied around for a bit, but eventually realized with resignation that Jiang Li seemed to have no intention of changing her mind.

He left, looking dejected.

After Jiang Jingrui had left, Jiang Li stopped sunbathing in the yard and went inside her house.

Once Jiang Li was inside, Bai Xue asked Tong’er with confusion, “Why is the young miss unhappy?”

Tong’er shook her head: “I don’t know.

Maybe it’s because the Second Master is too annoying.”

Inside the house, Jiang Li sat facing the window.

The osmanthus tree bore its tiny, light-yellow blossoms among the lush green leaves.

Though inconspicuous, their fragrance was stronger than that of other flower clusters.

Many wilted blooms had also fallen beneath the tree, turning from light yellow to golden and finally to fragrant flower paste, becoming one with the earth.

Another Mid-Autumn Festival had come, Jiang Li thought silently.

She remembered the first time she came to Yanjing City with Shen Yurong, the first Mid-Autumn Festival she spent there.

The Mid-Autumn Festival was a time for family reunions, and she would miss her father and Xue Zhao back in Tongxiang, feeling intensely wistful.

Shen Yurong had taken her hand and told her, “From now on, this will be your home.

You haven’t seen the Mid-Autumn lantern fair in Yanjing City, have you?

It’s no worse than Tongxiang’s.

I’ll take you to see it, and I will keep taking you every year.

You will come to love it here.”

Shen Yurong took her to the lantern fair.

Unlike the small place of Tongxiang, if Tongxiang was simple, natural, warm, and lovely, Yanjing City was prosperous, winding, bustling, and crowded.

It was her first time seeing so many lanterns.

The riddles written on them by the vendors were always particularly easy; she and Shen Yurong could guess them right every time.

They ended up winning so many lanterns they couldn’t carry them all, so they gave them away to children they encountered on the street.

She still remembered one riddle that went “searching for him a thousand times in the crowd,” to which she guessed the answer was “longing.” Shen Yurong whispered in her ear, “This character ‘longing’ is how I feel for you.”

He “longed” for her, and at that time, she believed it to be true and really trusted him, not knowing that behind that “longing,” there was also a “death.”

He longed for her death, so nothing could stand in his way.

Jiang Li clenched her fist tightly, took a deep breath, and then slowly relaxed her hand.

She did not want to wallow in memories of the past, but the later cruelty made the memories seem all the more vivid.

Jiang Jingrui had wanted her to go out and see the Mid-Autumn lantern fair, but Jiang Li was scared.

She feared that once she stepped out, every place would hold memories, and each spot would remind her of the past.

That would be too cruel.

She would rather not see it, forever remembering the repulsive side of the other person, as if to preserve the tender beauty that seemed unbroken, buried underground, as though it had never existed.

She would not ask for trouble.

…

In a guesthouse in Yanjing City, the light in one room was particularly bright.

Ye Shijie sat inside, meticulously adjusting the candle wick, and as he did so, he heard a noise from behind, someone pushed the door and came in.

Ye Shijie stood up and turned around, his face showing excitement, “Uncle!”

The newcomer was a slender middle-aged man, seemingly genteel with a scholarly air, wearing a feather crown, dressed in white, with two silver ribbons falling from it, giving the impression of a learned man.

However, there was a shrewd glimmer in his eyes.

He closed the door and quickly moved forward, exclaiming, “Shijie, you’ve really made something of yourself, haven’t you!”

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