The moment Xiao Shi fled the Xiao estate, he looked ahead to the jianghu man helping him escape, and behind hi…
The moment Xiao Shi fled the Xiao estate, he looked ahead to the jianghu man helping him escape, and behind him to the servants chasing him, and he laughed. The wind rushed past his ears, his robes flaring wildly. There's a kind of illusion that comes with running into the wind, an illusion of freedom. He felt like a bird loosed from its cage. Not flying to the sky, but into the jianghu.
He only stopped once on the road to freedom by the Shen estate.
He disliked places where the wind didn't stir, and the Shen estate was clearly one of them. The rear courtyard where the Shen family's young lady resided was far too lifeless. He recalled the smile she always wore when they met, always the same, never changing. She was pretty, that he remembered.
But the more he looked, the more she seemed... unreal.
Later, he realized what she reminded him of. Like the ornate rockeries set in noblemen's courtyards. Like the finely carved jade displayed in the great hall. Like the velvet blossoms that never wilt, no matter the season. Every wealthy household wanted one, but they were things that never changed, never moved.
People collect jade. But no one falls in love with it.
That impression stuck with him so strongly that when Shen Yu, whom he had always thought to be just like the lifeless stones and rockeries, suddenly opened her window without a smile, told a lie, and casually used birdseed to tease him, he froze.
That tiny spark of life in her cast him out. He stood outside her window for a long while, confused.
"She wasn't like this before," he thought.
But then, what was she supposed to be like? Like a rockery? Like a piece of jade?
No. She was a person. She was always supposed to be like this. Because people shouldn't be like rockeries. They shouldn't be like jade. People should be like people.
But too many in this world... don't know that.