Chapter 85: Standing Up for You

Liang Jinshang’s nerves suddenly relaxed, and she fainted on the spot.

The leader quickly knelt down, propping Liang Jinshang’s upper body onto his knee. His movements were practiced as he checked her external wounds and vital signs.

Le Quan urged from the side, “Chao Jingyu, how is she?”

“She has some external injuries, is dehydrated, but nothing serious. The rest can be checked with a CT scan at the hospital.”

Chao Jingyu’s aura of professionalism and reliability allowed Le Quan’s anxiety, which had lasted all night, to finally ease. “Thank goodness you’re here! This time you really are an angel in white, descending from the heavens!”

“By the way, what brought you to Province C?” Le Quan had called him in the early morning to ask if he knew anyone in the medical system of Province C, and he had replied that he was already there. Le Quan knew Chao Jingyu probably had some feelings for Liang Jinshang, but surely it couldn’t be so telepathic that he sensed her distress in advance?

Chao Jingyu lifted Liang Jinshang and carried her out, answering as he walked, “I came at someone’s request.”

He didn’t say what the request was, nor who made it, and since Le Quan saw he had no intention to elaborate, she didn’t press further.

In any case, luck was on their side this time.

But most importantly, she had acted quickly, dragged Shang Yiming out, and forced him to reveal Liang Jinshang’s whereabouts.

“We really are her lucky stars. If she’d only encountered people like Shang Yucheng, she might truly have met her end in that ruined temple. Amitabha.”

Chao Jingyu caught her reference to Shang Yucheng with a trace of amusement in his eyes. After a brief pause, he said, “Actually, Yucheng…”

“What’s this…?” Le Quan pulled a crumpled sheet of paper from Liang Jinshang’s hand. “Ha! She actually wrote a will? That’s hilarious, she…”

Just as Le Quan tried to read it, a hand reached from behind and took the paper away.

Yuan Xi folded it so the written side faced inward. “This is a personal matter. Don’t look.”

Le Quan shrugged and boarded the helicopter first.

Yuan Xi lowered her head to examine the paper; on the back was a drawing.

If anyone who had participated in Fang Xin’ou’s “Landscape Concert Hall” project eight years ago were here, they would be amazed. This young woman in her early twenties had drawn the original inspiration sketch for that magnificent, romantic project.

…

When Liang Jinshang awoke, it was already evening.

Her eyes opened to a familiar hospital environment and a very familiar figure.

“Doctor Chao.”

Chao Jingyu was sitting nearby reading a journal. He looked up when he heard her, “Did you sleep well?”

Liang Jinshang had no idea how, after falling asleep on Qingchi Mountain in Province C, she had ended up in Chao Jingyu’s hospital in Province A.

Chao Jingyu explained: he had hired an ambulance from there and brought her across provinces directly.

She was injured enough that she wouldn’t be able to travel for the next few days anyway.

“Who brought me back?” Liang Jinshang vaguely remembered writing a “will.” She didn’t know if it had been lost or picked up—if lost, all the better, if picked up…

“Was it Shang Yucheng who brought me back?”

She recalled that the last thing she saw before losing consciousness was a man in a trench coat, tall and striking as a model.

Chao Jingyu pulled a chair to her bedside and pointed to himself. “I brought you back.”

“Ah?” Liang Jinshang was surprised. When they went to the sanatorium, Chao Jingyu’s leg injury had just healed. Why would he travel all the way to Province C?

“Yucheng asked me to go,” Chao Jingyu said straightforwardly. “Last night around eight or nine, he called me and said we might need to deploy an air ICU. That’s a specialty of the Chao family. When I heard it was you in trouble, I thought I’d better go myself.”

Liang Jinshang focused on the latter half of his words.

Whether or not Shang Yucheng had instructed it didn’t matter much to her. What mattered was that Chao Jingyu had actually saved her.

“Doctor Chao, thank you! Counting me, you’ve saved three members of my family. I really don’t know how I could ever repay you!”

Chao Jingyu smiled, the evening glow filtering through the window onto his expression. Both the light and he were gentle.

Liang Jinshang’s ears grew warm. Perhaps she had spent too much time joking around with Shang Yucheng, but Chao Jingyu’s quiet, smiling demeanor made her inexplicably think of the phrase “offer oneself in marriage.”

It felt almost disrespectful to Chao Jingyu!

The air was silent for several seconds before Chao Jingyu spoke first. “You haven’t eaten all day. What would you like?”

Liang Jinshang listed a few things she particularly craved—mostly flavorful, spicy, and sweet foods.

“I’ve noted them. I’ll treat you next time.” Chao Jingyu produced a thermos containing porridge. “For today, you’ll have to make do with porridge.”

Liang Jinshang didn’t like porridge, but as both her lifesaver and her doctor, she obeyed Chao Jingyu unconditionally.

After finishing the porridge, she shyly asked if Chao Jingyu had seen a sheet of paper in the ruined temple.

“Yuan Xi picked it up. She seems very concerned about you. You can ask her, and thank her as well.”

Chao Jingyu didn’t mention that Le Quan had already guessed the paper’s purpose.

After all, for anyone, what they write when they think they’re dying is probably the thing they care about most in life—and not something they’d want others to know.

…

Liang Jinshang’s mild concussion required two days of hospital observation.

That evening, alone, she took out her phone and found Chao Jingyu had even charged it fully for her.

He truly was perfect in every detail.

She opened Yuan Xi’s chat window but didn’t know how to start.

What she had written in that “will” wasn’t anything she couldn’t let others see—except for one line.

That was her greatest secret, unknown to even her closest family, the Liangs.

“Facing death,” she thought of that person who would lose her without ever realizing it—the last person in this world related to her by blood.

Her heart ached unbearably.

But since she was still alive, she didn’t want anyone else to discover that secret.

No matter what, she first sent a thank you: [Director Yuan, thank you so much for saving me. If there’s ever a chance, let me treat you to a meal.]

When Yuan Xi received the message, she was sitting in a pavilion at Cloud Creek Manor with Shang Yucheng, enjoying the moon.

She showed the message to Shang Yucheng. “She thanked me. Any thoughts?”

Shang Yucheng replied, “Why should I have thoughts?”

Yuan Xi said, “A sense of loss, gloom, melancholy.”

Shang Yucheng scoffed lightly, “Is this your first day knowing me?”

Those emotions were far from him.

“In love, everyone goes through these,” Yuan Xi said, pursing her lips and looking at him. “Take me, for instance. Since yesterday, I’ve been wandering through all those feelings.”

“If you can think about all that while saving someone, you can’t be too sincere. She needn’t thank you either.”

Yuan Xi smiled.

Whether she was sincere, she knew herself.

Last night’s accident, aside from Shang Yucheng, she was the person who least wanted anything to happen to Liang Jinshang.

She replied to Liang Jinshang, and seeing Shang Yucheng’s phone remain silent, couldn’t help but sigh, “I don’t want her to thank you, yet I can’t help feeling indignant on your behalf.”