After the New Year, when spring arrived and the flowers began to bloom, Zhu Qingyu decided to take a long trip.
She searched through every history book she could find, but there was no more mention of Gu Zhao, nor the slightest trace of Gu Heng. Still, she refused to give up. Clinging to that one-in-a-million possibility, she wanted to revisit the places they had once traveled to together and see whether Gu Zhao might have left her a message.
Mei Tang had initially objected. The moment she heard Zhu Qingyu planned to leave, she was so frightened that she looked like a startled bird.
“No. You haven’t recovered yet.”
Because Zhu Qingyu planned to visit many places, she packed lightly. Her entire family gathered at the door to watch her pack, every face filled with worry.
“I’ve recovered,” Zhu Qingyu said. “I’ve been lying around for almost half a year. I can’t stay home for the rest of my life. I’m only going out to clear my head.”
Mei Tang said, “Then I’ll go with you.”
Pushing up his glasses, Zhu Qingfeng said, “I can take annual leave. I’ve saved up nearly ten years of it and haven’t used any.”
As the head of the household, Zhu Lansheng waved his hand grandly.
“Then we’ll all go together. Our family hasn’t taken a trip in years. We might as well take this opportunity to travel together!”
What had originally been planned as a spontaneous solo trip instantly became a whole-family expedition, thanks to these tag-alongs.
Their first stop was the capital. After touring the imperial palace, Zhu Qingyu stood for a long time outside the plain, locked side room in the Eastern Palace.
They also visited Huangjue Temple, an ancient monastery with a history of a thousand years, where the incense still burned as brightly as ever.
The back mountain, once open only to members of the imperial family, was now accessible to the public. Zhu Qingyu searched for a long time, trying to find Yongfu Manor. But where it had once stood was now an entire village scattered across the mountain. Not the slightest trace of the sprawling manor remained.
Zhu Qingyu went to Dingsheng Pass as well. There, the ruins were even more desolate. The old friends who had once laughed and chatted together were gone, leaving behind only weather-beaten relics—and the tiny purple flowers that had bloomed there since ancient times, swaying in the wind across the mountains.
As she was leaving, Zhu Qingyu picked a large handful of them. She had just settled into the car with the purple flowers in her arms when the clatter of a horse’s hooves approached from outside.
Zhu Qingyu immediately sat up and looked out the window. But instead of Vice Minister Gu, who had once brought her flowers, she saw only an unfamiliar herdsman riding past on horseback.
The Vice Minister Gu who had once held out those little purple flowers to her was already very far away.
Her final stop was Jiangning.
The Jiangning Governor-General’s Residence was one of the few ancient buildings that had survived from the Mu Dynasty into modern times. Zhu Qingyu paid forty yuan for a ticket and toured the place where she herself had lived only a few months earlier.
She walked from the front courtyard to the rear, passing through the residence of the successive Jiangnan governor-generals over the past five hundred years. Every brick, every tile, every blade of grass and every tree had changed. The more she looked, the more she felt that everything had changed while the people were gone. Not the slightest trace of the past remained.
Time could wear everything away. Even if Gu Zhao had truly left her a message, it would have vanished long ago in the passage of the years.
Zhu Qingyu found nothing. She returned to Shu and went back to her busy life in the emergency department. She worked from spring into summer, then from summer into autumn, trying to fill the emptiness in her heart with work so exhausting that she had no time to think of anything at all.
One night, while Zhu Qingyu was on duty, an ambulance suddenly brought in a string of car accident victims.
There had been a massive pileup on the highway, with dozens of vehicles colliding. The casualties were severe. The most seriously injured among them was a young man with a penetrating chest wound.
At first glance, his injuries bore some resemblance to Gu Zhao’s. Even his age and features were somewhat similar.
Because of that, Zhu Qingyu froze for half a second. But that was all the time she allowed herself. She immediately pushed the patient into the operating room.
Despite suffering such severe injuries, the man was still conscious. He looked at Zhu Qingyu with an appraising gaze.
What was he appraising? Did he think she was too young? Did he want her to find him some white-bearded miracle doctor to perform the surgery instead?
The emergency department did not indulge patients. Anesthetic was administered, the patient was put under, and the operation began.
The surgery continued from night until morning. The monitors sounded alarms several times, and the patient was repeatedly declared to be in critical condition. It was not until morning that his condition finally stabilized.
When Zhu Qingyu came out of the emergency operating room, the family members waiting outside turned out to include Yuan Hui.
The moment Yuan Hui saw her, she hurried over, her face full of anxiety.
“Little sister, how is Mr. He?”
Zhu Qingyu had been standing all night. Exhausted, she leaned against the wall and replied, “Sister Hui, do you mean the patient with the penetrating wound? He’s out of danger and can be transferred upstairs to thoracic surgery.”
Yuan Hui looked at her with open admiration.
“Little sister, you’re incredible! I’ll go take care of the paperwork first. We’ll chat later!”
On Zhu Qingyu’s way home after handing over her shift, a message from Yuan Hui arrived.
It turned out that Mr. He was Yuan Hui’s investor. She had been waiting for him to invest in her latest project, which explained why she was so worried about him.
Zhu Qingyu read the message and thought no more of it. To her, even the emperor was simply an ordinary patient. She certainly had no reason to care about some Mr. He or Mr. Zhang.
But some time later, Yuan Hui sent her another message.
“Little sister, Mr. He has been discharged and wants to take you out to dinner to thank you. He asked me for your WeChat. Is it okay if I give it to him?”
Zhu Qingyu was already busy enough to be worked to the bone. Ever since she had independently completed the penetrating-wound surgery, the department director had begun to look at her with new respect and seemed intent on cultivating her. As a result, she had become even busier. After work, all she wanted was to go home and collapse. She had no energy whatsoever for socializing, so she declined.
Some time later, someone sent flowers to the emergency department for her. The card was signed He Jiang and included a phone number.
Zhu Qingyu did not call He Jiang. Instead, she messaged Yuan Hui directly.
“Sister Hui, could you tell Mr. He to stop sending me flowers?”
Yuan Hui replied that it would be no problem.
Zhu Qingyu assumed that would be the end of it. But on the day of the Beginning of Winter, when she came off duty, an unfamiliar car was parked outside the hospital. It was the sort of car that looked expensive at first glance.
When he saw her come out, a man got out and called to her, “Dr. Zhu, would you have time to join me for a meal?”
Zhu Qingyu glanced at him. She did not recognize the man or the clothes he was wearing, but both looked expensive.
Because he bore some resemblance to Gu Zhao, she finally remembered who he was and asked tentatively, “Mr. He?”
He Jiang opened the car door and smiled.
“Just call me He Jiang. Could you give me a chance to take you to dinner? At least let me express my gratitude?”
Why was this man so persistent?
Zhu Qingyu rejected him once again.
“It’s not convenient. My daughter is turning one today, and I need to get home to celebrate her birthday. Goodbye, Mr. He.”
Leaving the stunned Mr. He behind, Zhu Qingyu went home on her own. On the way, she bought a small cake, stuck a candle into it, and sang Gu Heng a birthday song by herself, celebrating her first birthday.
At the same time, Gu Zhao climbed to the summit of Qingyun Mountain with the one-year-old Gu Heng in his arms.
The clouds and mist dispersed. The mountaintop was empty. There was no Qingyun Temple, its roof glittering gold beneath the sun, as she had described after the clouds cleared.
If she had said it existed, then it should exist.
Gu Zhao said to Gu Heng, “We’ll build a temple for your mother. We’ll call it Qingyun Temple, and we’ll enshrine the Medicine Buddha.”
