Perhaps that was also why their enemies had dared strike the Song family. After all, the Feng clan was powerful and full of accomplished masters. Feng Feiyang passed his assessment and naturally became the clan leader.
But before he could share the good news with his lover, he learned of the Song family’s destruction and Song Bingqing’s fall into the valley, her fate unknown.
Down in the valley, Song Qin had suffered extremely serious internal injuries after his fall. For all Xianyue’s skill, she could only keep him alive for a little over two years.
The female lead was even more pitiable. Already frail, she had also been poisoned by the miasma. Without Xianyue keeping her alive, she would have died long ago.
It was not entirely fair to call the female lead wicked. She was simply too clever. Whoever she met, she instinctively calculated whether that person could be useful.
The valley was so lonely that Song Bingqing talked about her life outside, naturally including her time with Feng Feiyang. She feared that if she stopped thinking of those things, she would no longer be able to hold on.
Isolated from the world, Xianyue had never heard of such mutual love, much less the many ways Feng Feiyang had courted Song Bingqing.
Through Song Bingqing’s descriptions, she fell helplessly in love with Feng Feiyang. It was not that she meant to steal someone else’s lover. In the end, she was simply young and inexperienced.
How clever Song Bingqing was. After discovering Xianyue’s feelings, she deliberately spoke even more about Feng Feiyang. Perhaps only she knew her reasons.
Xianyue desperately wanted to see the outside world. Almost every day, she climbed the cliff, trying to escape that immense abyss.
For a young girl experiencing her first feelings of love, one reason was to see the world. Another was to meet the Feng Feiyang Song Bingqing spoke of, the man she could never forget.
The miasma in the valley was too dense, and few medicinal plants could survive it. Even with extraordinary skill, Xianyue could only keep Song Bingqing barely alive.
Song Bingqing talked of many things: her moments with Feng Feiyang, the massacre of her family, and all the bitterness in her heart.
Xianyue was resilient. She knew she could rely only on herself if she wanted to leave. During those years in the valley, she chipped footholds into the cliff almost every day, hoping to see the outside world someday.
In the third year after Song Bingqing’s fall, Xianyue finally completed a route they could climb. But Song Bingqing refused to leave. She would rather grow old and die in the valley.
What could a frail woman do once she escaped? She did not even know who her enemies were. Besides, she was now disfigured beyond recognition. Even if she left, who would recognize her?
Moved by compassion, Xianyue promised to avenge her. Granny, who had raised her, had been skilled in disguise, and Xianyue had mastered that art too.
And so, wearing Song Bingqing’s face, Xianyue carried Song Bingqing out of the valley on her back. The valley was close to the Feng clan. Almost immediately after leaving, she met Feng Feiyang.
By then, he was the Feng clan’s leader and still unmarried. His former exuberance and frankness had become a deep reserve. Xianyue naturally became entangled with him, since she was wearing Song Bingqing’s face.
Meanwhile, the real Song Bingqing, using the alias Wulei, watched Feng Feiyang pursue Xianyue relentlessly. However much Xianyue loved him, she would never betray Song Bingqing.
During those three years in the valley, she had genuinely come to regard Song Bingqing as family. They had supported each other. Without that companionship, Xianyue herself would long since have given up.
Feng Feiyang did not know this Song Bingqing was not his Song Bingqing. He merely thought their three-year separation had created distance between them. While helping Song Bingqing search for her enemies, Xianyue also had to consider her feelings and reject Feng Feiyang.
Later, while Xianyue helped her take revenge, Song Bingqing was accidentally injured and left dying. She begged Xianyue to marry Feng Feiyang. All along, she had known Xianyue’s feelings.
With no way to refuse, Xianyue married him. Unfortunately, the male and female leads loved each other deeply. Although Xianyue lived with Feng Feiyang for decades, their marriage remained in name only.
Eventually, Xianyue died in sorrow. Her first dying wish was to do everything possible to cure Song Bingqing. Her second was for Song Bingqing and Feng Feiyang to be together. Finally, she wanted to go out and see the world.
She had spent the first half of her life in the valley and the second in the Feng clan, seeing little of the world. If possible, she hoped to meet a companion who truly shared her feelings.
Watching Xianyue’s life, Jiang Chan could only sigh. From her perspective, it was a tragedy: a lifetime spent loving a man whose heart belonged to another woman, never receiving what she longed for.
One could not call Song Bingqing entirely wicked. She truly had considered Xianyue’s future. Knowing that Xianyue was innocent and Feng Feiyang trustworthy, she had deliberately steered Xianyue’s feelings toward him, hoping the two would care for each other after her death.
Nor would Jiang Chan call Feng Feiyang utterly heartless. Apart from their marriage being in name only, he had given Xianyue everything he could. But love was selfish. It could belong to only one person for a lifetime.
He and Xianyue kept each other company and cared for each other as family. Yet he could never see her as his beloved. That left Xianyue longing in vain and suffering unbearably all her life.
Such were the ways of the world. Only when she was near death did Xianyue finally understand how foolish it was to entrust her heart entirely to someone else.
She did not hate Song Bingqing. She knew how painful and bitter it had been for Song Bingqing to push Feng Feiyang toward her.
Song Bingqing had possessed a distinguished family, exceptional beauty, and a lover who returned her feelings. Yet she suffered that catastrophe and was disfigured after her fall, living a life worse than death. Naturally, she could not accept it.
Three years together in the valley had made them as close as sisters. Xianyue understood why Song Bingqing had acted that way.
To Song Bingqing, Feng Feiyang was the best man in the world, while Xianyue was her dearest younger sister. She loved them both so much and could not bear to leave them.
Nor did Xianyue hate Feng Feiyang. From beginning to end, he had never wronged her, apart from being unable to give her love.
The only person she blamed was herself. Despite all her abilities, she had limited herself to this tiny corner of the world and imprisoned herself for a lifetime.
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