Chapter 638: No Contact With Men

Mo Lingwei was eager to marry Shen Ningning, afraid she might change her mind again.

He therefore did his utmost to cut out the majority of the Imperial Family’s complex procedures, such as requiring the prospective Crown Princess Consort to eat a vegetarian diet for a month and light incense before the ancestral tablets daily.

Mo Lingwei waived these troublesome procedures outright, largely because he didn’t want Shen Ningning to endure any hardship.

However, no matter how anxious he was, he had no choice but to wait patiently when it came to the wedding gown.

The wedding of a Crown Prince and Crown Princess Consort was always a grand affair, and a fitting wedding gown was indispensable.

The fabric for Shen Ningning’s gown was the luminous Phoenix Returning Nest. Its pale gold embroidery stood in stark contrast to the crimson silk.

The dazzling pearls on the phoenix’s wings alone would require over a thousand, and the embroideresses had to sew each one on by hand, stitch by stitch.

Mo Lingwei had found fifty embroideresses to work around the clock, but even so, the gown wouldn’t be ready until the end of the year at the earliest.

Shen Ningning, however, was in no rush. Ever since Shen Siyi returned, she wanted to spend every day by her mother’s side.

At first, mother and daughter slept together every night. Shen Siyi would hold her and tell her stories about the world of the future, making Shen Ningning exceptionally curious about that place.

After half a month of this, before Mo Lingwei even had a chance to protest, Xie Suzhi was the first to object.

He found Shen Ningning and spoke to her privately. “Ningning, it’s been many years since I’ve been properly reunited with your mother. For the next few days, would you mind sleeping on your own?”

Shen Ningning blinked her big eyes. “Uhm… but Mother said she was going to continue her story tonight about how she fought eight burly men all by herself.”

Xie Suzhi gave a resigned smile. “You can hear her stories anytime. Take some pity on your father.”

Shen Ningning’s expression brightened into a smile. “Alright. As it happens, I was planning to go back to Wolf Mountain for a while starting today.”

Recently, two lone she-wolves had appeared on the mountain. They seemed to have been driven out of their own pack, and with nowhere else to go, they had wandered into Wolf Mountain’s territory.

Since they were outsiders and the pack was highly territorial, the two she-wolves were nearly mauled to death.

Fortunately, Grandma Qin had stopped them in time. The two she-wolves had now been taken into the pack, and she’d heard that one of them was always hanging around the Black Wolf King.

Shen Ningning figured her Wolf Father was about to fall in love, so she had to go back and see for herself.

Having finally managed to send Shen Ningning away, Xie Suzhi didn’t forget to dispatch his two sons as well.

No one would be there to disturb them tonight. Shen Ningning was off to Wolf Mountain, Xie Suzhi had arranged for Xie Mingxu to sleep at the barracks, and Xie Ming’an had two cases to wrap up, so he wouldn’t be back for a while.

However, when evening came, he lay in their bedroom for a long while, but his wife, Shen Siyi, still hadn’t come in.

When midnight passed and Shen Siyi still hadn’t appeared, Xie Suzhi could wait no longer. He threw on a robe and went to the study.

He knew that Shen Siyi had recently been helping to develop Cangyun Country—she called it “urban planning.” Their daughter would become the Crown Princess Consort and, one day, the Empress, so she wanted to prepare for her future in advance.

As Xie Suzhi neared the study, he saw that a light was indeed still on inside.

His heart ached at the thought of his wife being so busy she had forgotten the time.

However, when he gently pushed the door open, he found that Shen Siyi had already fallen asleep, slumped over the desk!

Xie Suzhi froze.

‘He’d thought she was busy working all this time. Had she been so exhausted that she’d fallen asleep long ago?’

He tiptoed over and saw that the entire desk was covered in sheets of paper. They were filled with dense script, and some were marked up with a pile of strange symbols.

Shen Siyi had also drawn a few diagrams of a pavilion of her own design, naming it the “Office.”

Seeing she had so many ideas, Xie Suzhi couldn’t help but smile.

‘No wonder she’s so exhausted,’ he thought. ‘She must have been thinking too hard for too long.’

Xie Suzhi gently scooped her up into his arms. The slight movement caused Shen Siyi to stir, waking up in a daze.

“Mmm? Hubby…” In private, she always called him this, and Xie Suzhi was used to it.

He knew that “hubby” was just what people from her world called their husbands.

Shen Siyi leaned sleepily on his shoulder, her eyes closed, still looking drowsy. “I was just dreaming… about when we first met.”

Carrying her in his arms, Xie Suzhi walked slowly down a long, open corridor. Fireflies danced in the summer night air, and the hanging wisteria blossoms looked especially gentle in the moonlight.

The sound of his deep, steady laugh made Shen Siyi feel even more secure, and she couldn’t help but nestle deeper into his embrace.

“I was so young when I first met you. Now, I’m a forty-year-old man,” Xie Suzhi said, a hint of regret in his voice.

Still muddle-headed with sleep, Shen Siyi murmured, “That’s not true at all. When we met, you were a rebellious youth. Now, you’re the husband who makes me feel completely safe.”

She was yawning nonstop. Xie Suzhi laid her down on the bed, but he no longer had the heart to disturb her.

Seeing how exhausted she was, he went to fetch hot water, helped her wash her hands and feet, and changed her into a fresh set of clothes.

Their interactions were as natural as they had been more than a decade ago, back when Shen Siyi had just given birth to their children.

That night, Xie Suzhi lay on the pillow next to hers, watching his wife’s peacefully sleeping face.

He gently held her hand, thinking, ‘Thank heavens for taking pity and allowing our family to reunite.’

‘For the rest of his life, he would ask for nothing and want for nothing, as long as his wife and children could remain by his side.’

…

Liang Yici felt that Xu Jingxi had been acting a little strange lately.

He was always following her.

Since Liang Yici had already come of age, her dream was to become a female general like her mother, Fang Qingdai.

Thus, whenever she had free time during the day, Liang Yici would go to the military camp to train.

Although Fang Qingdai was a female general, the majority of the soldiers under her command were men.

However, since Liang Yici started training, she proved to be fiercely competitive, not losing to any of the male soldiers in sparring.

The more she practiced, the more excited she became. She felt a new sense of purpose each day and even wanted to participate in next year’s military examinations, a plan Fang Qingdai fully supported.

But Liang Yici never expected Xu Jingxi to pop up and thwart her at every turn.

She would be in the middle of a perfectly good training session, sparring with a soldier, when Xu Jingxi would appear out of nowhere and suddenly call a halt.

Then he would walk over, hand her a waterskin, and casually remark, “You’re fighting against men. Why are you wearing such thin clothing? Do you really have to engage in such close-contact brawling?”

After taking a drink of water, Liang Yici eyed him suspiciously. “What do you know? Using weapons is for when conditions are ideal. But my mother says that on a real battlefield, your weapon can get knocked from your hand or you can be thrown from your horse. If you don’t know any hand-to-hand combat, all you can do is wait to die!”

With that, she returned the waterskin and climbed back onto the sparring platform.

Xu Jingxi watched from below with a frown. A moment later, he shouted again, “Sparring is one thing, but you need to have some boundaries! You, yes, you! Don’t put your hand on her waist.”

The soldier sparring with Liang Yici was a big, burly man. He looked utterly bewildered, having no idea what he’d done wrong.

But not daring to offend Xu Jingxi, he could only clasp his hands together and say with a dopey grin, “Er… Miss Liang, I’m actually getting tired anyway. How about we take a break?”

With that, he scurried off.

Liang Yici glared at Xu Jingxi. “Are you here to watch me spar or to make trouble? No one else says anything, so why are you always meddling with me! I’m not your little sister, Shen Ningning!”

Xu Jingxi looked like he wanted to say more but stopped himself. Finally, with a grim look on his face, he insisted, “No matter what, it’s improper for you to be grappling so closely with men!”