Sir Song, do you want to pledge yourself to me?

Song Qiuniang smiled awkwardly, "I just came back and haven't had time to prepare a gift yet. Next time, next time I will definitely bring you a big gift."

Ji Nuan didn't want to listen to Song Qiuniang's nagging any more, so she said bluntly, "Just leave if you have nothing else to do. I'm still busy!"

Song Qiuniang looked hurt, and she said pitifully, "Nuannuan, how could you drive me away? We used to be good friends!" She tried to impress Ji Nuan with their past friendship, but Ji Nuan just glanced at her indifferently without responding.

Song Qiuniang changed her tone again, "I came back specially to take you to live a good life." Although she spoke kindly, her eyes revealed a hint of subtle jealousy and calculation.

She took in Ji Nuan's attire and realized that while her clothes weren't fancy, the white jade hairpin on her head was worth as much as all her jewelry. She had seen a similar jade hairpin before, while helping the young lady with her hair, and the maid had said it was worth over a thousand taels. Unexpectedly, Ji Nuan was no longer the peasant girl who only focused on digging for medicinal herbs.

Song Qiuniang felt even more unbalanced. She gritted her teeth and thought: I have given everything to live a good life, why can Ji Nuan get it so easily?

Ji Nuan just looked at Song Qiuniang with a sneer, as if she was watching a funny show.

Song Qiuniang continued to coax her, "Don't disbelieve me! Look at the maids around me. They are all dressed so well. When they go out, they are looked up to by others. How proud they are! If you are willing to follow me, then I can make you like them."

After hearing this, Ji Nuan crossed her arms, looked around at Song Qiuniang, and said with disdain, "You said you would lead me to a good life, but I guess that means I'll be your maid and be at your mercy? Do you really think you're the wife of a wealthy family?"

Song Qiuniang felt very uncomfortable with this look. She had seen enough of it in the backyard recently, and she couldn't accept Ji Nuan, a fellow village girl, looking at her like this. She couldn't help but shout angrily, "Ji Nuan, don't be so shameless!"

Ji Nuan was too lazy to pay attention to her and directly called Ma Jin, the servant in the front yard, to come over and "drive them out."

"Yes, miss." After hearing the order, Ma Jin immediately stepped forward and pretended to drive the person away.

Song Qiuniang was suddenly a little panicked. She didn't expect Ji Nuan to really drive her away so rudely.

She wanted to say something else, but the maid didn't want to continue to embarrass her and advised: "Aunt Qiu, let's go quickly."

Song Qiuniang was unwilling to leave like this. She wanted to prove to Ji Nuan that she was no worse than her. However, the maid held her arm tightly, preventing her from continuing to pester him.

"Ji Nuan, I will definitely live a better life than you!" Song Qiuniang shouted unwillingly.

Ji Nuan just smiled and waved at her, saying, "I'm sorry I can't see you off, Aunt Qiu!" The sarcasm and contempt in her tone made Song Qiuniang even more angry.

When Song Qiuniang heard Ji Nuan say the word "aunt", she felt that Ji Nuan was mocking her. She said angrily, "Just wait and see!"

Seeing the two maids wisely pulling Song Qiuniang away, Ma Jin couldn't help but say to Ji Nuan, "Miss, who is this person? I almost wanted to slap her in the face. How dare she shamelessly ask you to be her maid? How shameless!"

Ji Nuan said with a joking smile, "Want to know who she is? Just go around the village and you'll know everything."

After hearing what Ji Nuan said, Ma Jin said with a smile, "Miss, I will really go then."

"Go ahead." Ji Nuan waved.

Song Jinbai didn't expect to be slapped in the face so quickly, and Chen Yu really got into trouble right under his nose.

Song Shier caught the person who went out to deliver the letter from Xu Mansion. When he sent back the news, Song Jinbai learned that Chen Yu had left for Qingyun County early in the morning.

Song Shier had already interrogated the person who was captured. He was Xu Zhi, the servant beside Xu Qing.

It turned out that yesterday evening, Wen Jida's confidant, Achang, had secretly slipped a letter to Xu Zhi, asking him to deliver it to Xu Qing. After reading the letter, Xu Qing happily wrote another letter and asked Xu Zhi to deliver it to Wangyun Mountain in Qingyun County. Xu Zhi had done this several times before, so he was familiar with the route. However, this time, as he was about to descend the mountain after delivering the letter, he was caught red-handed by Song Shier.

Song Shier noticed that he was behaving suspiciously today, so he thought of following him to see what was going on. Unexpectedly, he finally found evidence of the connection between the Xu family and the bandits.

The information currently available was not enough to easily convict Xu Tongzhi. But regardless of whether Xu Tongzhi was involved or knew about it, his son was definitely in collusion with the bandits.

Considering that Xu Tongzhi had been running Kaiyun Prefecture for many years, having assumed the prefectural position in a seemingly unrelated manner, and his control over the prefectural troops was comparable to that of the current prefect, Song Jinbai, any movement of the prefectural troops would be immediately detected by Xu Tongzhi, thus alerting the enemy. Therefore, Song Jinbai decided to personally lead a group of twenty or so elite subordinates to Qingyun County in secret late at night.

In the second half of the night, the entire Taohua Village was gently covered by soft moonlight, quietly immersed in sleep.

"Bang, bang, bang..."

There was a sudden and urgent knock on the door of the Ji family, waking up everyone in the sleeping Ji family.

Ma Jin, who lived in the front yard, was particularly alert and was the first person to hear the knock on the door.

He got up hastily, lit a lantern, and walked quickly to the door. As his hand touched the latch, his heart was in his throat.

The door creaked open, and he shuddered involuntarily. Oh my god, I want to scare someone to death in the middle of the night!

A man with a bloody face and disheveled clothes stood staggering at the door, as if he would fall down at any moment. As soon as the door opened, the man lost his balance and rushed straight towards Ma Jin.

Fortunately, Ma Jin was quick-witted and held the man firmly.

The man was breathing weakly and said in a trembling voice, "Hurry... hurry and find Miss Ji, I have something urgent to tell her." After saying that, he seemed to have exhausted all his strength, leaned on Ma Jin's body, and fainted.

When Ji Nuan hurried out from the backyard, Ma Jin was struggling to drag someone into the house.

She hurried forward and carefully identified the man in the dim light. It was Ah Fu. Ah Fu's face was covered with dried blood, which looked particularly shocking under the light. There was a conspicuous knife wound on his back, and his clothes were stained with blood. It seemed that the wound was not shallow.

Ji Nuan suddenly felt uneasy. Ah Fu had insisted on coming to see her despite being so injured. Perhaps something serious had happened to Chen Yu. Not wanting to delay, she quickly helped Ma Jin carry Ah Fu into the house and instructed him to help remove his blood-stained coat.

Ji Nuan hurried back to her room to get some medicine and bandages. In the front yard, she ran into the brothers Ji Shan and Ji He, who were also woken up by the knock on the door.

Several people helped Ji Nuan treat the wounds on Ah Fu's back and head. After bandaging the wounds, she fed Ah Fu some diluted vital water. Then she took out the silver needle and gently inserted it into Ah Fu's acupuncture points, awakening him from his coma.

Ah Fu slowly opened his eyes and saw Ji Nuan right in front of him. He struggled to speak, but seemed weak due to exhaustion.

Seeing this, Ji Nuan quickly comforted him, "Don't be anxious, tell me slowly, what happened?"