Why Did You Keep This From Me For So Long?
When Su Yang and Gu Feidi followed Mei Shisan to the suspension bridge, Tongyun Monastery and the Xuanji Temple’s elite units pushed the intercepting petal retainers step by step until they finally set foot on the boundary of the Bamboo Garden Island.
Seeing Gu Feidi and Pu Lingyun following the Evil Sect’s Young Master, the righteous fighters were surprised as they exchanged looks with one another, feeling confused about the current situation.
The leader of the Xuanji Temple raised his eyebrow slightly, and his eyes met Gu Feidi’s within the opposite crowd.
However, before he could speak, a swordsman from the Wujiang Sect among the team gave a sarcastic sneer first. “Oh, isn’t that Tengyun Pavilion’s Young Lord, Young Hero Gu? Why are you with the Young Master of the Evil Sect, trying to block our forces from the Central Plains Wulin’ way?”
Then, he glanced at Pu Lingyun and mocked, “And this lady fighter...I heard that Wulin Alliance Leader intended for you to lead a section of the Pavilion meant for disciplinary action. Could it be that you wanted to follow your beloved to rely on help from the Evil Sect?”
Pu Lingyun clenched her pearly white teeth, and as she was about to step forward to say something, Gu Feidi stopped her.
“Shimei,” Gu Feidi called. “Don’t waste your breath on him. Since my father has expelled me from the Tengyun Pavilion, I won’t go back with you. Return to your team.”
Pu Lingyun turned to Gu Feidi. Her surprised expression gradually turned into one of sadness. She complained angrily, “My effort to infiltrate alone in spite of my safety to persuade you were in vain. I never thought you would act this heartless! If you want to be with him, then so be it!”
As she finished, she shed tears without saying farewell. She raised her hand to wipe her face, stamped her feet in rage, turned and ran to the front line between the Tengyun Pavilion and the Village of Mount Qianfeng.
Su Yang: “...”
This reaction, this acting skill, if she was in modern times, she could probably outshine a little white flower小白花 directly translated as ‘little white flower’. Describing someone who was pretty on the outside and rotten on the inside or two-faced. capable of stringing her audience.
Gu Feidi drew his Cherished Heart and announced, “The Bamboo Garden Island doesn’t allow unwelcome guests. Please leave.”
Su Yang was also prepared to draw his sword for battle. But as soon as he heard Gu Feidi’s speech, he was at a loss for words as he thought, ‘Don’t you know the more a villain talks, the more likely they will die? You’re now on the Evil Sect’s side, making you a villain. I beg of you. Less talking and more fighting!’
Unbeknownst to him, as soon as he thought of that, the leader of the Xuanji Temple raised his eyebrow again and commented, “The Young Lord is, after all, the only son of Wulin Alliance Leader. Although the Young Lord has been deceived by Su Yang of the Evil Sect, we believe you can distinguish right from wrong. If you pull back your reins before your horse reaches the edge of the precipice, by breaking away from evil ways and returning to the orthodox path, we, the righteous men from the Central Plains Wulin, will forgive your young, frivolous mistake…”
Gu Feidi rebuked, “I’m not being deceived, but fully willing to be with him. I know that the righteous members of the Central Plains came to fight against the Evil Sect for the Sword Sage’s inheritance, but how is that a righteous and stern purpose?”
The leader bellowed, “The Sword Sage’s inheritance is only one of them. The Evil Sect has taken root in the wasteland for too long. Its forces have penetrated into our Central Plains and conducted many unruly acts. For many years, the Leader of the Evil Sect has also slaughtered and caused bloodshed to our community...Now the Tengyun Pavilion gathered the strength of everyone in the Central Plains Wulin to uproot the Evil Sect. If we succeed, they will never harass and invade our Central Plains…”
Su Yang: “...”
No, why are they talking now? They aren’t being filmed, they don’t need water to diluteIf I could translate the whole thing, it would be ‘water to dilute the content’. It means dragging out the time 水時間 (water + time). This is common in filming when they add anything to drag out the time like talking slower, having the actor eating, etc. Why water? Because they are essentially watering the content down.…
...Wait, or do they?
Thinking of this, Su Yang turned to Gu Feidi, who was acting abnormally, and back at the leader who was having a spitting war with Gu Feidi. Suddenly, he realized—this leader might also be in on the scheme with the Wulin Alliance Leader and knew about the purpose of this war. That was why he would act so cooperatively with Gu Feidi to delay invading the Bamboo Garden Island.
So Su Yang shouldn’t act in a hurry. He crossed his arms and enjoyed the rare scene of Gu Feidi arguing with another.
When they tossed meaningless wordsIn Chinese, 沒營養的話 or words without nutrition, means the content of the chatting is hollow, meaningless, etc. (Very interesting to this translator). back and forth, one of the members from Wujiang Sect finally couldn’t take it.
He quickly drew his sword, blocked the leader of the Xuanji Temple’s view and shouted, “Why are you talking pointlessly with him? We should just rush in and kill them.”
The leader argued, “Young Hero Gu is a bright pillar in our community. I want to persuade him back to the Tengyun Pavilion with positive influence. It’s better than crossing swords…”
The fighter of Wujiang Sect couldn’t bear the continuous chatting. “Only you bunch from the Xuanji Temple handle everything with excessive kindness! If your Temple refuses to fight, then step aside! People of the Tongyun Monastery, what do you say?”
Hearing his group being called on, the leader of the Tongyun Monastery slowly raised his long sword and yelled, “In my opinion, killing straightforwardly will save time and effort.
Seeing the situation had changed, Gu Feidi sighed and turned his head to give Su Yang an eye signal.
The war was still inevitably going to start.
The petal retainers stationed on the Bamboo Garden Island were all the top tier fighters in the Evil Sect. At that moment, Su Yang and Gu Feidi fought against the leader from the opposite side. In addition, Gu Ruohai and Feng Lin were not present, and Xu Yunzhan had long left. That meant Tengyun Pavilion and the Village of Mount Qianfeng were not as dominating under Pu Lingyun’s leadership, which temporarily brought stability to the Evil Sect’s frontline.
However, although Su Yang and Gu Feidi joined hands, they were still against several experts’ attacks from two directions. It was unavoidable to be worn out from the battle. The defensive line still had to slowly retreat closer to the Bamboo Garden Island. Originally, the Central Plains fighters were attacking from two directions, but now they finally converged on the hillside platform as the two large forces assembled together on the battlefield.
Now with things ending like this, although the defence front of the Evil Sect were facing greater pressure, Su Yang and Gu Feidi harmonised with each other as they fought more and more like one.
* * *
Inside the Green Velvet Hall…
The moonlight passed through the window and through the layers of gauze curtains, leaving only a faint light scattered on the slightly messy bed in the chamber.
Gu Ruohai tidied up his robes and turned to Su Huaizhu, who was meditating. His eyes stayed on the calm face for a long time, and his eyes were filled with deep regret.
After a moment, Su Huaizhu slowly opened his eyes and released a long breath.
He turned to Gu Ruohai and whispered, “How are you feeling?”
Gu Ruohai answered, “Not a bother...How about you? Why did you keep this from me for so long?”
After twenty years of separation, his mental state was no longer as young and vigorous as he was before. Even if he had just learned about the Emotion Gu, he could still ask this question so calmly and easily, without the slightest degree of anger or annoyance. It seemed that all the waves that should have surged into a giant sea swell were worn down by the twenty year period till it was practically a tiny ripple.
Su Huaizhu remained silent and didn’t immediately answer the question.
Gu Ruohai paused with the other man, but he must get to the truth. “Was it Luo Jin?”
There was still no answer.
“Since things have dragged on to this point, why do you still refuse to explain yourself?”
Gu Ruohai stood in front of Su Huaizhu and demanded with a cold voice, “You and I have been together for so many years, but you still can’t reveal the truth to me? Do you think you can just burden yourself with this out of deep affection? You don’t care about the slander of the Jianghu rumours, nor do you care about my misunderstanding of you...Do you think only you swallowed the bitter fruit? Do you know...how much pain I was in all these years?
Su Huaizhu closed his eyes slightly and said in a hoarse voice, “My apologies.”
Gu Ruohai sighed, “...Don’t apologise.”
Su Huaizhu suddenly admitted, “The Emotion Gu...is really from Luo Jin.”
Hearing this answer, a bitter smile reflexively appeared on Gu Ruohai’s face.
“Back then, I didn’t realize she had a deep affection towards you.” He mumbled. “If there were any obvious clues, then I would never have agreed to Luo Yu’s request to allow her to travel with us.”
After a short silence, Su Huaizhu humphed softly.
“Her deep affection wasn’t towards me.” He replied. “That letter she left in our room, it was an invitation addressed to you, to admire the moon by the lake…”
Gu Ruohai was shocked. “...What?”
Su Huaizhu continued, “I was selfish and didn’t want you to meet her. So I hid the letter. That night, I put on your clothes and went to the appointment in your place. I wanted to take the opportunity to warn her to stay away from you, but I would never have thought…”
He paused for a moment, then sighed sadly. “I wasn’t on guard against her surprise attack. She stabbed me with her hairpin from behind...and planted the Emotion Gu in me. When she saw her target was me, and not you, she flew into a rage out of humiliation, while my wrath burned bright from her frantic action. We fought...until...my internal energy surged. I really...couldn’t suppress...the Poisonous Gu…”
Neither of them brought up the aftermath. They both understood.
After a long silence.
Gu Ruohai asked, in an extremely soft voice, “Why didn’t you tell me at that time?”
They entered another long silence.
Su Huaizhu replied, “I didn’t know...how to face you during that situation, even more on how to forgive myself.”
“The Mother of the Emotion Gu was inside of Luo Jin. There was nothing that I could do...to escape her.” Su Huaizhu murmured. He closed his eyes and leaned against the bed frame behind him. “That was why I brought her back here to find a way to suppress the Poisonous Gu. I tried to contact Luo Yu, but unfortunately, he was preoccupied with his own issue. It was impossible to locate him with the resources I had at that time only as the Evil Sect’s Young Master.”
Gu Ruohai knew what Su Huaizhu meant.
According to the Jianghu rumours, once a person was tainted by the Emotion Gu, they couldn’t be separated from the Mother Gu for too long, or else the Poisonous Gu would begin its torment which would lead to death. Moreover, in theory, the only way to temporarily bring relief from the agonising pain from the Emotion Gu was to be intimate with the one carrying the Mother of Emotion Gu. Doing it with anyone else will not suppress the Gu Bug, instead, it would be counterproductive as the Emotion Gu’s poison would intensify and result in the other party getting hurt.
It went without saying, even if Su Huaizhu confessed to him at that time, both their hands would still be tied—it would have been a crueller reality for him to face, knowing the fact that Su Huaizhu had to bed Luo Jin—to bed someone else.
Gu Ruohai quietly asked himself that if they were in a different situation at that time, he would also not want to face Su Huaizhu at that moment.
But neither of them realised that everything would go down sharply because of this subconscious concealment.
“I…” Gu Ruohai slowly collected his thoughts and hesitated. “...The day of my marriage, did you...find a way to suppress the Emotion Gu?”
Su Huaizhu nodded. “I just found the Half-Withered Crimson at that time, but...I didn’t have the E’Luo Gui Faction’s blood running through me. It was a very difficult mental skill to master...But I firmly believe that I could learn it and free myself from the Poisonous Gu’s control…”
It was obvious there were countless omitted details from these few words, but Gu Ruohai could guess how painful and desperate Su Huaizhu was at that time, even just pondering for a little bit. How the other man clung to the last straw, even if he didn’t know whether his life could be saved or not. Carrying a burden that shouldn’t be done alone.
While he, when Su Huaizhu needed him the most, gave the other party the deadliest knife wound.
Gu Ruohai smiled bitterly, “But I didn’t wait for you...and I didn’t believe you either.”
Su Huaizhu lowered his gaze and said nothing back.
“Zhu Zhi-er,” Gu Ruohai called gently. “I’m truly sorry.”
Su Huaizhu suddenly smiled at his nickname and the apology.
He lifted his head and stared into Gu Ruohai’s eyes. “You don’t have to apologise. It’s only logical for you to not wait for me. The Half-Withered Crimson...couldn’t completely suppress the Poisonous Gu. Although I don’t have to be restrained by Luo Jin, I also...have to be intimate with other people from time to time to suppress the Gu Bug. No matter what, I was the unfaithful one first, being so fickle in love, I no longer deserved you. Just now...I never dared to think…”
Before Gu Ruohai could interrupt, Su Huaizhu quickly brought up, “I don’t know what’s happening outside. The next step of the plan must be executed as soon as possible. If you...feel unwell in any way. Don’t join the battle.”
Seeing that he didn’t want to continue on the topic of the past, Gu Ruohai sighed helplessly and said, “I’m fine...What’s the next step of your plan? Is there anything that I can help with?”
Su Huaizhu pondered for a moment, looked back into Gu Ruohai’s eyes and answered, “Matter of fact, there is.”
I’m waiting for fluff from ancient time…but author is only distributing angst. Hmmp