BLPSG Chapter 15: Unexpected

The scene on the evening of the Sheri turned into a nightmare without even realizing it.

The heavy snow covered the ground gently like a blanket, and faint traces of blood could be seen.

Xie Bufeng brushed away the snow little by little…

The next moment, he suddenly woke up from the nightmare.

The young man stood up reflexively and looked towards the other side of the screen.

Wen Qingci was not here—

Xie Bufeng’s heart sank heavily, and an inexplicable panic surged within him.

Ignoring the chilly spring air, he walked straight out of the bedchamber.

The night in the capital was cold, and the dew was heavy. The sun had not yet risen, and the air was tinged with an indissoluble blue hue.

There were two wing rooms in the small courtyard, filled with medicinal herbs.

A few days ago, Wen Qingci had someone tidy up for half a day and cleared one room to turn it into a kitchen.

Through the small window of the wing room, Xie Bufeng saw—

In the cramped kitchen, there was only enough space for a small clay stove.

Wen Qingci lit the firewood with a fire striker, placed a purple sand pot filled with spring water on top, and turned to soak magnolia petals in the water before washing glutinous rice.

The water in the purple sand pot had already boiled, bubbling gently.

Accompanying this was the crackling sound of the firewood burning in the stove…

The warm firelight danced in Xie Bufeng’s eyes, adding a hint of warmth to his originally cold gaze.

Before long, the sweet fragrance of magnolia porridge permeated through the air and seeped into his body.

Xie Bufeng’s rapidly beating heart gradually calmed down.

The bubbling sound from the pot inexplicably reassured him…

But this unfamiliar calmness suddenly made Xie Bufeng feel confused.

After a while, he slowly lowered his head and chuckled self-mockingly.

He almost forgot that Wen Qingci’s name as the “Immortal-Faced Demon” had spread far and wide.

He could be extremely considerate, but at the same time… he could also take away his life at any moment.

The Prince Zhong’an, who smuggled beast traps into the palace, came from the Zhong’an Marquis family, which had survived two dynasties, with a long history of serving the court, accumulating wealth, and generations of distinguished service. He was a tough nut to crack.

The lamps in the study were lit every night until the wee hours.

Under excessive fatigue, the emperor’s old ailment recurred, and this time the symptoms were even more severe than before.

Wen Qingci found an ancient prescription from the medical books left by the original owner.

In this world, there was an herb called “Fuxuan Flower.” Pills made from it as the base could quickly relieve headaches and dizziness after ingestion, making it nothing short of a miraculous medicine.

Fuxuan Flowers grew in the valley where the river flowed out of the mountains, not particularly rare.

However, once they were harvested, their medicinal properties would gradually diminish after half an hour and needed to be processed into medicine immediately.

After much deliberation, only Wen Qingci himself could go out of the palace to complete this task.

He was accompanied by several physicians from the Imperial Medical Bureau.

Seeing so many people, Wen Qingci took the opportunity to bring Xie Bufeng out of the palace under the pretext of needing to test the medicine on the spot.

—If he remembered correctly, Xie Bufeng, like himself, had not set foot outside the Taishu Palace for months.

Wen Qingci hoped the young man could take this opportunity to go out and explore.

The carriage rolled through the streets towards the outskirts of the city.

The breeze lifted the curtain of the carriage, letting in the scenery outside.

Wen Qingci’s gaze fell slowly on the streets below.

Outside the Taishu Palace, where the nobility resided, it was usually bustling with activity.

But today, all their courtyard gates were tightly shut, refusing to receive guests.

The tense atmosphere had unconsciously spread from the Taishu Palace to the entire capital.

As they reached the outskirts of the city, the oppressive feeling gradually dissipated.

Fuxuan Flowers had strict requirements for water quality. Only the valley in the lower reaches of Wanghe near Yongdu is suitable for growth.

The sun was shining brightly at noon, and greenery had grown at the foot of the mountain, but from a distance, there was still accumulated snow on the top of the mountain that had not yet melted.

The valley entrance was narrow, and gusts of wind blew by from time to time.

For convenience, Wen Qingci tied up his hair with a ribbon.

The sunlight rendered his face as white as paper, and the vermilion between his eyebrows was particularly dazzling.

Without the softening effect of stray hair, his features appeared even colder and more refined.

After getting off the carriage, Wen Qingci said to Xie Bufeng, “Your Highness, I’ll take the physicians to collect the herbs ahead. You can take a stroll around here first. Come back in about half an hour.”

“Alright.” Xie Bufeng seemed uninterested.

Whether it was an illusion or not, Wen Qingci always felt that Xie Bufeng’s attitude had been particularly cold in recent days, and he no longer stuck by his side like he did a few days ago.

Although he felt a little strange in his heart, he couldn’t help but breathe a sigh of relief.

In the Valley of Divine Physicians “Compilation of Medicinal Herbs,” the growing environment of Fuxuan Flowers was detailed.

Accompanied by a few others, Wen Qingci followed the stream upstream towards the location of the rocky shore.

The Wanghe had winding and narrow channels, overgrown with moss on both sides, making it almost impossible to find a foothold.

Wen Qingci led the people up the stream and towards the rocky shore.

Wen Qingci learnt some Qinggong, so he managed, but the other physicians with him struggled.

However, influenced by the rumors, they were all eager to keep their distance from him and inadvertently increased their pace.

In just over twenty minutes, they arrived at their destination ahead of schedule.

The narrow river valley suddenly widened, and Wen Qingci saw at a glance that among the crevices of the rocky shore, there were clusters of red flowers growing.

“This is it.” Wen Qingci breathed a sigh of relief.

Seeing the Fuxuan Flowers with their own eyes, the physicians were extremely excited. “They’re really here!” one of them exclaimed and quickly brought over a wooden box he had been carrying on his back. “I’ll go pick them now!”

Wen Qingci coughed lightly and did not stop him.

For the physicians from the Imperial Medical Bureau, picking Fuxuan Flowers was not a problem.

In just a few moments, they picked the flowers and stored them in the wooden box.

However, before everyone could relax, the physician who was picking suddenly screamed.

Then, he fell straight down.

The wooden box fell out of his arms and into the riverbed.

What’s going on?

Wen Qingci instinctively looked at the physician’s feet.

…The trickling stream had somehow overflowed onto the stones of the rocky shore, making the path underfoot even more slippery.

After a brief silence, there was a sudden rumble from the distance, deafening.

Wen Qingci immediately looked upstream—

Huge blocks of ice and boulders were flowing down with the current, filling the riverbed in an instant.

In the blink of an eye, they rolled onto the rocky shore.

“Get away from here!”

“Y-yes!” The physicians immediately scrambled to higher ground, using both hands and feet to climb up a nearby cliff.

The people on the riverbed also struggled to get up and stumbled towards them, asking, “W-what is this?!”

“It’s an ice flood, the dam upstream has burst.” Wen Qingci answered quickly.

The peaks upstream of the Wanghe had an altitude of nearly three thousand meters. During the flood season, the river flowed extremely rapidly, but in spring and winter, the upstream river water and waterfalls froze entirely, leaving only about a tenth of the usual water flow.

But this did not mean that ice floods were not dangerous.

At this moment, the sunlight shattered the ice and river water, turning into a torrent.

All the accumulated ice from the winter, along with the unfrozen stream, flowed down from upstream.

Although the river during the dry season couldn’t drown people, the ice in the river could easily sweep people on both sides of the riverbed, crushing them to death.

Not to mention that the ice had also broken through the upstream stone dam, bringing down boulders.

Hearing this, the physicians’ faces turned pale instantly.

When they came to their senses, the rocky shore had already been filled with ice, and the small wooden box had long been swallowed by the ice, disappearing without a trace.

Oh no… How are they going to explain this?

“Pull him up and… cough… stay here and don’t move.” After saying this, Wen Qingci followed the river, heading downstream along with the ice.

He must find Xie Bufeng!

It hadn’t been long since the onset of his Tianci, and Wen Qingci’s body hadn’t fully recovered.

After a few steps, he tasted a strong metallic taste of blood in his mouth, his chest burning, and his vision turning black.

Unable to care so much, Wen Qingci endured the pain and went down the river.

Even if he uses Qinggong, his speed is still not as fast as flow of ice.

When Wen Qingci arrived at the entrance of the valley, what he saw was this scene——

Giant icebergs filled the narrow river channel, and piled up nearly ten meters high in the center, like countless sharp flying swords, pointing toward the sky.

The cold air illuminated the river.

The situation is slightly better on the banks at the bends of the river.

At this time, Xie Bufeng was half-kneeling there, and his calf was heavily pressed by the ice, making it difficult to move.

As luck would have it, the wooden box was also brought here by Cold ice.

Xie Bufeng’s eyes fell on Wen Qingci.

…Is he here to look for the pill box?

Without thinking too much, Wen Qingci tapped his toes and stepped directly on the still moving ice to Xie Bufeng’s side.

Then he tried his best to pull the young man out.

“Cough cough cough… follow me, follow me.” Blood overflowed from Wen Qingci’s lips at some point, and his voice became extremely hoarse.

But at this time, he still didn’t look panicked.

The next moment, there was another loud rumble at the entrance of the valley.

Under the pressure of the ice behind them, the previously stable ice began to move again.