Tang Dynasty Hidden Guards

Yuan Min's face darkened, but as she slowly turned around, she managed a smile.

Sure enough, it was Wu Suisui behind me. It had been almost two months since I last saw her. She seemed to have grown taller and thinner than a bamboo pole, looking just like Minnie Mouse from the cartoon. She looked quite well, with a rosy complexion and her hair styled in a double-looped bun. She still looked like a minor.

"Sui Sui, did you come alone?" Xue Wei asked gently.

"I came with my second sister, and my brother Chongjian came too."

It turned out his brothers had also arrived. Xue Wei quickly asked, "Where are they?"

"I don't know, I'm just looking for them. I want to go home. My father says he's going to arrange blind dates for me, and I'm so annoyed."

Xue Wei and Yuan Min exchanged a glance, and suddenly realized that the Emperor had not yet told Wu Sansi about that matter, and Wu Sansi was unaware of the Emperor's plans.

Just then, Xue Chongjian's voice came from afar, "Sui Sui, I've been looking for you everywhere. Didn't I tell you not to run around?"

Xue Chongjian strode forward and immediately spotted Xue Wei and Yuan Min.

"Hey! Why are my older brother and sister-in-law both here?"

"We just ran into Sui Sui. Where are your younger siblings?"

"She...she's not feeling well, I want to take her back, and then ask Sui Sui if she wants to come along."

"Brother-in-law, I'll go back with you!"

Wu Suisui quickly grabbed Xue Chongjian's arm and shook it.

Xue Wei nodded. "Your wife isn't feeling well, so you should go back now! We can talk again when we have time."

"Big brother, I'll be going now."

Xue Chongjian left in a hurry with Wu Suisui.

Halfway there, Xue Chongjian remembered something and hurriedly ran back to say, "I forgot to tell my elder brother that Sanlang has returned to Luoyang."

"Saburo?"

"It's Li Longji. The Prince of Xiang was appointed as the Governor of Bingzhou and the Marshal of the Anbei Road Army, leading the army to resist the invasion of the Turks. Li Longji also returned to Luoyang. I saw him a few days ago, and he said he missed you and wanted to get together with you again."

Could the sudden appointment of Prince Xiang be related to his report? Xue Wei's investigation report to Wu Zetian omitted the fact that Li Longji had killed Zhu Ling, and gave a relatively positive evaluation of Li Longji and his son. Perhaps his report dispelled the last trace of doubt in the emperor's heart.

Xue Wei nodded. "You go ahead! I've been quite busy lately. We'll get together again when we have time."

"I'll be going now!"

Xue Chongjian waved his hand, turned around and ran away.

Watching his brother run off into the distance, Xue Wei said to Yuan Min, "Amin, I want to go back too."

"Okay! I'll tell Gillian, and then we'll go."

"Would it be impolite to leave early?"

Yuan Min smiled and said, "Don't worry, we are the younger generation, it's normal for us to leave early. We always sneak away early, the elders won't mind. Wait for me, I'll be right back."

Yuan Min hurried into the room, and came out a moment later, her pretty face slightly flushed. "Let's go!"

"What did you see?" Xue Wei asked with a smile.

Yuan Min spat, her face flushed, and said, "I saw something I shouldn't have seen!"

Xue Wei wanted to ask what it was, but Yuan Min refused to say. Xue Wei could only hold her hand and say, "Let's go back quickly."

"What are you thinking about?" Yuan Min rolled her eyes at Xue Wei.

"I want to rush back to the basement to see my precious treasures! And whether that original Wang Xizhi painting is still there."

Yuan Min was also tempted, and holding his hand, she smiled and said, "Let's go back!"

..........

Inside the carriage, Yuan Min whispered, "Wu Sansi doesn't seem to know about you and Wu Suisui."

Xue Wei nodded. "That's normal. The Emperor only had this idea after listing me as a candidate for the Hidden Guard. But if I don't pass the test in the end, she won't mention the Wu Sui Sui arrangement anymore, so she hasn't told Wu Sansi yet."

"That makes sense; that should be the reason."

Xue Wei then asked, "Is Chongjian's wife in poor health?"

Yuan Min smiled bitterly, "You haven't seen her yet. You'll understand when you see her next time. She's obviously congenitally weak and very thin. She gets out of breath after walking for a short while. The imperial physician said she won't live past twenty. She takes more medicine than food. Your mother has never liked her."

"She's not in good health; her mother should cherish her even more."

Yuan Min shook her head. "My mother doesn't like her. It's not that she's in poor health, but that she can't distinguish between what's important and what's not. Last time when you had your polo match, she was in the stands. She's clearly a daughter-in-law of the Xue family, but instead of sitting with her mother-in-law, she sat in the Wu family's stands with Wu Chongxun and Li Guo'er. Your mother didn't say anything, but I could tell she was very dissatisfied."

"And you? You don't seem to like her either."

Yuan Min sneered, "We have different paths and cannot work together."

Why?

"When you wanted to take Zhou Yinfeng as a concubine, I firmly disagreed. She thought I was pretentious and jealous, but I thought she had no bottom line. She knew that your brother was sleeping with Li Guo'er, but she didn't care. Your brother often went to brothels with his colleagues to find women, but she didn't care either."

"Did she know about Chongjian and Li Guo'er sleeping together?"

"She knew that Chongjian had confessed to her, and Qiaoqiao had told me, but she wasn't angry. She believed that it didn't matter if a man cheated physically, as long as his heart was still there. My principles in this regard are completely opposite to hers."

Xue Wei nodded, then suddenly raised his hand and said, "I want to reiterate that today it was Ajiao who suddenly hugged me, and I had no ulterior motives whatsoever."

Yuan Min rolled her eyes at him. "With your skills, you could have easily dodged it. I saw you hesitate for a moment, probably because you were hesitant to push her away, but you seemed to enjoy it. I could tell."

"Why are you so smart!" Xue Wei said with a bitter expression.

Yuan Min sighed, "I don't blame you for this, but I still want to remind you to keep a little distance from Gillian. Gillian isn't very loyal; she actually likes you."

Xue Wei was startled. "No way! Don't you like your brother?"

"She loves my brother deeply, but it's a fact that she's not faithful; it's her personality. You can tell by looking at her blind date. She and my brother had agreed to wait for each other, but she still carefully put on makeup for the blind date. In order to succeed in the blind date, she even specially changed to the thinnest hairpin. This was an idea given to her by the fairy Houmochen to leave a hook to catch the other party, and she actually adopted it."

I'm not saying her feelings for my brother were fake; they were real. It's just that her heart was divided into many pieces, and my brother received the largest piece.

"I understand, so I also got a small piece."

"Yes! She likes you. On the night of your polo final, she and the substitute fairy went to watch it together. They both admired you to the point of worship. But what truly moved her about you was the poem 'Night Rain to the North'."

Later, when you drew cute little pictures for her, her eyes lit up when she looked at you. It was the kind of look a woman has when she likes a man; I could see it clearly.

Xue Wei nodded. "I will keep my distance from her."

Yuan Min grasped Xue Wei's hand. "Old Xue, Ajiao is my best friend. I'm not saying anything bad about her, do you understand? I'm just afraid that one day when you two are alone together, she's a bit impulsive and might not be able to control herself. You'll also find it hard to resist, and in the end, it will hurt me and my brother. You should know very well how much my brother cares about her."

Xue Wei recalled Yuan Mao's displeased expression when he smelled the fragrance on him. But thinking about it, it made sense. If he smelled Yuan Min's fragrance on another man, he would have reacted even more strongly and might have killed him.

"Does your brother know Gillian Chung's scent?"

"Of course I know. Gillian only uses ambergris, which is very strong and long-lasting. She's the only one among all my friends who uses it. You can still smell her scent on you."

"What kind of incense do you use?"

"Smell it!"

Xue Wei hugged her, sniffing her nose as he moved down her neck. "It smells so good! The meat smells so good, and there's even a hint of milk!"

"Be serious!" Yuan Min pushed him away, her face flushed with embarrassment.

Xue Wei released her and said with a grin, "Actually, I already knew. You used rose and winter plum fragrances before, but you used daphne today."

Yuan Min rolled her eyes at him before laughing and saying, "I won't use the same scent all year round. In winter and spring, I like the scent of roses and wintersweet. In late spring and early summer, I like the scent of daphne. In midsummer, I like the delicate scent of jasmine and gardenia. In autumn, I like the scent of fruit, especially citrus."

Xue Wei's heart skipped a beat. "I'll make you perfume!"

"Can you do it?" Yuan Min asked curiously.

"meeting!"

Xue Wei does know how; he did it when he was pursuing his junior sister in his previous life, and he did it quite well. He still remembers the method.

Yuan Min lowered her head, and after a long while said softly, "Did you learn that from Zhou Yinfeng?"

Isn't Zhou Yinfeng famous for her complex collection of perfumes?

Xue Wei missed a step, but luckily he reacted quickly and explained, "It has nothing to do with her. I saw some people making perfume when I was shopping in Taipei not long ago, and I... I secretly learned how to do it."

Yuan Min preferred to believe he was telling the truth. She thought for a moment and then smiled, "The perfume of the Hu people is too strong. I don't like it."

"I know I can use their methods to make the perfume you like."

Yuan Min's beautiful eyes crinkled into crescent moons with laughter. "Okay! I'll wait for you to finish making it."

Xue Wei thought that he was bored and instead of fishing to kill time, he might as well make a few gadgets for the future.

…………