Love Like the Galaxy

Chapter Forty-One:
The Second Scandal of My Life (Part 1)

Since childhood, Shaoshang has adhered to the philosophy of ‘out of sight, out of mind, out of annoyance.’ She had always kept a distance from those who might have caused her troubles she couldn’t afford because it was impossible to be invincible in the world.

For example, she no longer contacted anyone from her old childhood town after she went to study abroad; her rage at Lou Yao for witnessing her take some of the wood out from the bridge that day was in hopes to scare him off forever. Bless Young Master Ling to not think of how he saw her for a half day groping under that bridge on the day of the Wan banquet!!

However, when Shaoshang counted the casualties of the Cheng convoy, she felt that even to reduce this number, let alone seeing Ling Buyi a few more times, would be enough to form a friendship with him.

Injuries in the era of cold weapons may not be as fatal as those in later generations, but they were more shocking. Apart from the common knife and arrow injuries, there were also cases where a large piece of flesh was torn off, a limb chopped off, and some even were kicked by horseshoes. Intestines were pierced and stomachs were rotten. The most horrific thing was the faces of two guards were slashed. One still lived but had no nose.

Madam Sang was both injured and worried and ended up developing a low fever. Old Master Li brought the best doctors in the village back with him. After diagnosing the pulse, he immediately set up a pot to boil medicine. Looking at Madam Sang, who was unconscious and muttering to herself incessantly, the servants who came one after another to ask questions, Shaoshang suddenly realized that she had to temporarily stand in as the head of the Cheng household.

Children had the capital to be willful and deceitful. That was because there were countless parents who were in front of them. Once the elders are unable to continue, they naturally have to learn to mature.

Shaoshang resolved to work hard to fulfill her responsibilities as leader.

First, she sent a few mature stewards to investigate the whereabouts of the kidnapped maidservants among the thieves and prisoners. She sent out others to search for the dozens of left behind luggage; the thieves were busy chasing them and probably didn’t have the time to share the spoils yet.

Those who were not injured set up tents outside the house to rest, chopped down trees to burn charcoal to provide fire pots for warmth in various places. Those who were injured moved into the house. Servants were divided into two groups, one group was burying the pot for cooking, the other group was to boil water to clean wounds and burn grass ash to stop bleeding.

She also took out half of the pocket money given to her by Father Cheng and gave it to the doctor, asking him to quickly send someone to the countryside to fetch ready-made medicine for decoction. The weather was cold and earth frozen and there was blood loss and trauma. Regardless of whether or not there was an injury, approximately everyone needed to drink a few bowls of medicinal soup to dispel cold, stop bleeding, and eliminate inflammation.

Next up was spiritual comfort.

Shaoshang needed to walk over to one place at a time to comfort the injured and reward those who had made contributions. Faced with nearly a hundred soldiers who had been fighting in blood for a day and night, she really wanted to give a stirring speech like a leader of Wei Guangzheng, saying that soldiers were filled with tears, blood boiling, and never regret.

Unfortunately, she couldn’t. Her verbal skills were all lit up in negative aspects like sarcasm and satire. She could only repeat the promise that ‘the deceased and disabled will have their families taken care of, and the injured would be compensated.’

However, she did have the advantage of having a hard heart. The household guards had a lot of work to do, and they set up tents to collect corpses and to go out to inquire about information. The servants had to oversee the kitchen, so most of the injuries were handled by the maidservants. A few young people cried out in fear at the sight of a bloody wound and, no matter how loudly the doctor shouted to command them, they couldn’t take action. Shaoshang saw this while passing by and asked the martial servant to tie her belt. Without saying a word, she started to help.

According to the doctor’s instructions, let the arrow be pulled out, even if blood splashes everywhere; use the soldering iron, even if the hot skin burns and the injured screams loudly. When the maidservants saw their young mistress in this way, they felt embarrassed, afraid, and shy.

After a busy day, it wasn’t until Old Master Li called out that ‘Lord Ling is here, please meet the young lady’ that Shaoshang hurriedly came out of the room. With her skirt and robe splattered with blood and two hands covered in blood, it looked like she had just come out of a murder scene.

Under the cold sunlight, Ling Buyi’s skin was as white as snow, and his body was tall as a winter cypress. He wore a black fur coat and stood quietly in the open space in front of the house, with six sword guards around him. Shaoshang stood in front of him at a loss, feeling like a pig-killing girl with a fleshy face catching up with the progress of her business.

The female animals in the healing room came alive, and the girls stopped their activities to climb to the window to peek. The exclamation behind Shaoshang was clear and audible. ‘You are so handsome,’ ‘Which general is this?’ ‘Like the fairy prince in the painting…’

Shaoshang suppressed her embarrassment and pretended not to hear anything. She raised her arms and bowed respectfully. “I didn’t know that you had finished chasing those bandits. I’m sorry I was late to meet you.” She straightened up and continued, “If it weren’t for Young Master Ling’s righteous help, I don’t know how far we would have made it. Thank you for your kindness. If you have any orders in the future, the Cheng family dares not follow them!” First, discuss the scene but make sure the details are as vague as possible. Don’t fall on your words.

Ling Buyi smiled slightly when he heard ‘thank you for your kindness’ and said, “Young Mistress, you are too polite.”

Shaoshang decided to become a mature adult and no longer hold back like a child. There were still many things to ask now, and she was hesitant to show her temper. Her tone became more respectful. “This little girl’s strength is weak. I think there are soldiers wounded under your command. It’s too late to march off now, so you might as well leave the wounded soldiers behind, and the Cheng family will take good care of them. I just prepared the two largest vacant rooms, and inside there are charcoal basins, hot water, wound medicine, and manpower for the wounded soldiers.” She raised her arms and pointed to the two rooms behind her on the left. This was the most intimate way she could think of to show her gratitude. 

Old Master Li nodded repeatedly. “Young Mistress, this is a very good suggestion,” he said. “Master Ling, please…”

Before Ling Buyi could speak, a square-jawed young guard beside him interjected, “My lord, the injury can’t be delayed any longer. It’s better to go to the room to be treated…”

Before he finished speaking, another older guard beside him said, “My lord, although Liang Qiu Fei’s words are reckless, they are true. The injury cannot be delayed any longer.”

Only then did Shaoshang see that the elderly guard had an arrow inserted into his left arm, which had probably entered the bone and was difficult to take out. She quickly and eagerly said, “That injury isn’t mild. Hurry up and go into the room to be treated!”

The older guard had a worried expression on his face but, after hearing the words, he looked at Shaoshang in astonishment. Ling Buyi pondered for a moment, nodded, then walked towards the empty room.

Shaoshang was taken aback. Could it be that he didn’t trust the Cheng family to take care of the injured? Did he want to inspect it himself? She turned around with an apologetic smile. “Don’t worry, my lord, the Cheng family will take good care of all the wounded soldiers!”

The guard named Liang Qiu Fei became anxious. “You-!”

Without saying a word, Ling Buyi raised his left arm and lifted the animal hair cloak aside. Under the pitch-black shoulder armor, crafted into the shape of a tiger toothed lion’s head, a broken arrow shaft was exposed on the black woven gold brocade, and bloodstains had already condensed.

Shaoshang choked on her words.

Li Wu Lang on the side exclaimed in response, “Oh, Master Ling, you’ve been injured! How long has it been? Hurry up, go and find the newly arrived medical practitioner. He’s the best at treating sword injuries in our township!”

Shaoshang silently turned away and raised her hand as an invitation – okay, you’re also considered an injured person.

Ling Buyi paused for a moment and looked sideways. The girl’s sleeves were tied up high by straps, revealing her pink snow-white forearms as she raised her hand. Her wrists were only two inches wide, and her skin was crystal clear and soft, making her very cute.

With a moment’s thought, he walked into the room.

It wasn’t until Ling Buyi and the Li father and son entered the house that Shaoshang began to hesitate. She knew she still had to find the whereabouts of her uncle Cheng Zhi, so she mustered up the courage to go inside.

The two maidservants beside her finally couldn’t stand it anymore. One said, “Young Mistress, you’d better wash yourself before you go in.” The other hurriedly brought hot water and soap.

Shaoshang secretly sighed that her busy head was numb, smiled bitterly and went to wash her hands. She hurriedly entered the house, and the two martial maidservants hurriedly caught up to her.

The room was baked warm and dry, causing everyone to take their fur coats off one after another. Another guard with a scar on his face led several soldiers into the room to inspect and placed four stools down. Ling Buyi sat high at the head, while the Li family father and son sat on the left two. The one on the right was obviously reserved for the temporary head of the family, Shaoshang.

When Shaoshang entered, she saw Physician Cheng and the Scar Guard standing behind Ling Buyi, carefully removing his cloak and shoulder armor, then his chest armor and outer robe, followed by his middle coat and underwear, revealing fair shoulders.

Shaoshang was a bit embarrassed and wanted to turn around and leave. However, from the martial maidservants beside her to the Li family father and son, they didn’t feel anything was wrong with it. That’s right, the bare arms and legs she had seen in the healing room just now had to be at least eighteen to twenty.

Since everyone didn’t mind, why did she? She’s seen everything before, anyway.

The father and son of the Li family had left their seats and approached Ling Buyi to see the arrow wound. Shaoshang followed Old Master Li closely and poked her head out to look. When the doctor removed the bandage covering the wound, everyone gasped in unison.

A thick, rusty arrowhead was protruding ferociously two inches to the left of the back shoulder blade, and a circle of black and red had condensed around the wound. It had obviously been there for a while.

The best narrator Li Wu Lang exclaimed, “How long as Master Ling been injured? Why didn’t you treat it immediately? This injury is getting worse and worse!”

“We haven’t rested for two days and nights to suppress the bandits. Where did we have time to heal the wound?!” The young guard named Liang Qiu Fei was both proud and angry. “We did have a moment of free time today, but who knew that we would meet you halfway, crying and pleading with our young master to save your father? Isn’t that going on now?!”

“A’Fei, don’t be rude,” the guard with the scar said in a deep voice.

Shaoshang’s ears twitched, and she slowly inched behind Old Master Li; she understood his words. She didn’t expect for him to excitedly step forward and completely exposed the girl behind him.

“Lord Ling is righteous!” he said loudly, excitedly clasping his fists together. “Thank you! From now on, whenever you ask anything in our village, we will obey!”

Those words were similar to what Shaoshang had just said, but Old Master Li was the head of his family, the head of his clan, and one of the three elders of the village. His words were much more resounding and was undoubtedly much more reliable than Shaoshang.

Shaoshang lowered her head even further and hoped that no one would notice her.

Ling Buyi glanced at the girl indistinctly. “Don’t say that, old man,” he said with a smile. “If you talk about righteousness, then you are even more so. After all, you insisted on accompanying the Cheng women and children to such a dangerous situation because of a single request.”

Shaoshang was initially unhappy with that, then felt as if… as if there was nothing wrong with that statement. Old Master Li was able to send people to seek help and naturally could leave on his own, but the old man persisted in not leaving.

She was not only grateful for Old Master Li’s kindness to the Cheng family, but also was unwilling to humbly admit that she was a burden, so she hesitated and said, “Uncle once said Grandfather Li is from his own family, and Uncle will slowly repay his kindness. The two families will last forever…”

That was very appropriate. Old Master Li laughed loudly, “Young Mistress said it well! The two families are very close, what kind of kindness is there to say?”

Shaoshang lowered her head again and secretly praised her wit.

Ling Buyi glanced at her and lightly said, “Pull the arrow.”

As soon as this statement was made, the Li family father and son, as well as Shaoshang, immediately held their breath and craned their necks to look. The doctor was sweating profusely and still could not pull out the broken arrow.

When Ling Buyi had been struck by the arrow, the situation had been urgent. In order not to disturb the morale of the army, he broke the tail of the arrow off on his own, leaving only the length of the arrow shaft the width of his palm, and covered it up with his armor and cloak. He planned to pull out the arrow on his own later.

He wasn’t aware that the arrow that came out of the shoulder only exposed less than half an inch of skin, and even the shaft of the arrow was sunken into his flesh, so the doctor couldn’t pull it out no matter what.

“Why not use forceps?” Li Wu Lang said.

The doctor sighed and raised the broken small iron tongs in his hand. A country doctor like himself could at most pull a few nails that penetrated the flesh of the wounded. They weren’t strong enough to grab the arrow.

There were only two ways to proceed.

Either go back to the military camp to find a medic in the army and use their specialized forceps and other tools or use poison to fight poison and use another arrow shaft to push the broken arrow out. But whether the former immediately returned to the military camp, or quickly called for a military doctor, it was too time-consuming. The latter required Ling Buyi to suffer twice.

Without hesitation, Ling Buyi immediately said, “A’Fei, take an arrow for your brother.”

Liang Qiu Fei pulled a feather arrow from behind and, trembling, handed it to the nearby Scar Guard. “Young Master, please bear the pain!”

Ling Buyi ignored him and fixed his gaze to the side. The girl in the bloodstained hemp robe stood there, her right hand holding her left elbow and her left palm supporting her small white and tender chin. She tilted her head and bit her lips like a child as she thought.

He watched her for a long time, and everyone fell silent. Only then did Shaoshang realize that everyone was looking at her. She gave an embarrassed smile. “I have an idea, but I don’t know if it’s feasible or not.”

As she spoke, she took a string of pearl shells hidden down the front of her dress from around her neck.

Dozens of pearl oysters were hanging under the neck rope and were colorful when they were shaken. Each small pearl oyster had been polished into different shapes, such as round, oval, flower, and clover shaped. It made a crisp sound when it moved together.

Shaoshang took out her dagger and cut the necklace, carefully pouring the pearls into her kit bag. With just the necklace in her hand, she walked towards Ling Buyi. It was only then that everyone noticed that the necklace seemed to be made up of several thin threads.

The others were still confused, but Ling Buyi knew what she intended. “Is it strong?” he asked with a smile.

“I made it myself,” Shaoshang quickly said, “it’s very secure!”

That day it had rained heavily, and everything was wet and cold outside. She and Wan Qiqi hid on the porch and found many brocade threads, gold threads, and even iron threads in different colors from the bottom of a press box. She taught Wan Qiqi to weave bracelets and cross knots, and if there were any left over, she weaved long necklaces to string pearl shells.

She remembered very clearly that three flexible vermilion brocade threads, three black iron threads, and one shiny gold thread could lift even heavy scales and desks. 

Shaoshang stood behind Ling Buyi, carefully inserted the necklace into the flesh with her slender fingers and hooked it under the rusty arrow cluster. She didn’t dare use force and could only embed it a little bit. Because of the distance, the disadvantages were full of the smell of blood and rust, and the line of sight couldn’t help but expand.

Ling Buyi’s frame was tall and stretched, his bones slender and powerful, shoulders were as wide as a goshawk spreading its wings, his waist slender and strong, back was straight, but his muscles were restrained and not very thick. He was known to have amazing strength. His arms looked like a male model, and he even split the head of the bandit in half with a knife. 

After looking at it for a while, Shaoshang realized that her face was slightly hot and quickly moved away. The two-dimensional one couldn’t compare with the three-dimensional living color and fragrance.

Ling Buyi felt itchy on the back of his neck, and suddenly turned his head and asked, “Is that necklace a gift from a sweetheart?” He looked kindly, as if he were asking a little girl in a friend’s house casually.

Shaoshang sighed. “It would be great if it was.”

Ling Buyi stared at her for a while, then turned around and hummed.

The pearl shells were collected by Wan Qiqi outside, and the two girls ground them into various interesting shapes and strung them into necklaces, one for each of them. Thinking about it now, if Wan Qiqi was a man, Shaoshang would definitely marry him. She wouldn’t say that they were immortal couples, but it was more than enough to be a couple of wolves, tigers, leopards, and thieves. How perfect that would be!

“It’s hooked up…” Shaoshang heaved a heavy sigh of relief. She felt that the hook was firm and now she only needed to pull the broken arrow out by pulling on the necklace.

Liang Qiu Fei couldn’t help but ask, “What if the arrow cluster is off the stick and only one arrow is pulled out?”

Surprisingly, everyone burst out laughing. Liang Qiu Fei then realized that if there was no arrowhead, he could simply pull the arrow shaft from the front. His face turned red.

Shaoshang also was very happy. Suddenly, she felt a chill on her right hand. Ling Buyi pulled her palm and wrapped a snow-white brocade handkerchief around it. Liang Qiu Fei wanted to come forward and pull the arrow but was grabbed by his brother behind him.

Ling Buyi smiled at the girl. “Be careful, don’t scratch your hand.”

Shaoshang was taken aback, then numbly nodded. She wanted to say that she hadn’t planned to personally draw the arrow. She was a skilled worker and didn’t do manual work. However, seeing Master Li’s puzzled gaze, Shaoshang felt that others might not necessarily understand and could only do it out of kindness.

She wrapped the necklace several times around her wrapped right hand and pressed her left hand against the man’s fair and tight shoulder, holding her breath, and pulled it out in one go, nearly exhausting all of her strength. With the sickening sound, the broken arrow that had been dyed red and black was finally pulled out, and then the man’s strong back muscles contracted rapidly. The congealed wound ruptured again, and a thin stream of blood flowed down the white and slender spine.

Shaoshang was taken aback by the amount of bleeding and let out a soft cry.

“Does your hand hurt?” Ling Buyi turned his head to look back at the young girl.

Shaoshang quickly shook her head. “My hand doesn’t hurt. Are you hurting?” The wound on his back was almost turning into a bloody hole!

Ling Buyi smiled, and in an instant, he was as beautiful as the winter snow melting. “I don’t feel any pain,” he said.

The two were close together and Shaoshang was caught by his beauty. She only noticed that his eyes were a kind of clear, thick brown, like beautiful amber in a crystal box.

She thought to herself that she had always been too sharp about this world, but in fact there were many good people in the world, and they came to save lives even when they were injured, so she should stop thinking the worst of people.

The next time she sees Yuan Shen and Lou Yao, she would be more polite. Walking in the rivers and lakes was to form good karma, and it would be good for her and the Cheng family!

Seeing that the broken arrow had been pulled out, Physician Cheng, who was standing beside them, was about to step forward for treatment. Ling Buyi raised his right hand on his knee and shook it slightly, and he was clamped by two guards on either side of him, unable to move.

All the guards, including the lively Liang Qiu Fei, waited quietly.

In fact, the few conversations between Ling Buyi and the daughter of the Cheng family were very simple and normal but, for some reason, Li Wu Lang felt that the atmosphere in the room was off; as if it had a weird softness.

He turned his head to look at his father, using his eyes to express his thoughts: Father, do you feel… as if…

Old Master Li: Shut up and pretend you see nothing.

Unmarried men and women, with so many people in the room, had nothing to fear by looking at each other. Not to mention – Old Master Li looked at the man and woman ahead of him.

Ling Buyi’s heart was as deep as a sea, he could not see clearly or speak clearly, but the young mistress of the Cheng family… The old man was happy, either he didn’t understand it at all, or he could be wrong.