Post Station

“Mother? Are we still eating bananas tomorrow?”

“…” Xiaoguo smiled helplessly and stroked his head in the darkness. “No, we’re not having bananas anymore. Mother was just teasing you.”

“Mother is so mean…” Zhuang Zhuang snorted unhappily and said, “But I like it.”

Xiaoguo burst out laughing and turned to face Zhuang Zhuang. She patted him and said, “Go to sleep.”

After a while, Zhuang Zhuang fell asleep, but Xiaoguo was getting more and more energetic.

In the past two days, she felt like she had done almost nothing. There was something at the back of her mind, but she just couldn’t remember what it was.

As she tossed and turned, she suddenly heard a male voice. Xiaoguo sat up immediately.

“Jiang Danhe!”

Zhuang Zhuang was suddenly woken up. Xiaoguo quickly comforted him. After he fell asleep, she got out of bed hurriedly. She lit a candle and found the envelope in the pocket of the clothes she had changed out of.

At this moment, she really felt like giving herself a slap on the head. How could she have forgotten such an important thing? Fortunately, she had not washed her clothes!

Looking at the letter that had been delivered five days ago, Xiaoguo couldn’t help but kiss it. She felt so upset with herself.

On the day she received the letter, she was suddenly distracted by Eunuch Su’s letter. Later on, her mind was filled with bananas because she was busy processing them. It was only today that she thought of the letter. What a terrible memory she had!

Afraid of disturbing Zhuang Zhuang’s sleep, Xiaoguo draped her clothes over her shoulders and went outside with the candle.

As soon as she closed the door, she quickly tore open the envelope. She couldn’t wait to read the contents.

Finally, the letter did not start with the same cliche words. Instead, it was very normal.

Xiaoguo was relieved. She was not used to the genteel Jiang Danhe. She still liked him to be straightforward.

“Thump, thump, thump…”

The familiar sound of her heartbeat was starting to stir over the opening words of the letter.

The three pages were filled with words. The regret and shyness in them were conveyed to Xiaoguo. After reading, she put down the letter. The more she thought about it, the more amused she felt. The reason behind it was actually so funny. “Jiang Danhe, oh Jiang Danhe, what can I say about you?”

When she returned to the house, she stuffed the letters into the closet and covered them with clothes. She put away all the letters that Jiang Danhe had written to her.

Lying on the bed, Xiaoguo rolled over and looked at the sleeping Zhuang Zhuang. Under her gaze, the child seemed to have dreamt of something and suddenly smacked his lips.

Xiaoguo couldn’t help but chuckle. One was Jiang Danhe, and the other was Zhuang Zhuang. Father and son both looked very shrewd, but in fact, they were so dorky and cute.

Since she had received Jiang Danhe’s letter and had almost missed it because of her carelessness, Xiaoguo decided to reply to him as compensation.

She had asked for the post station’s address that day. Fortunately, her memory was not bad, so she could still remember it. She just had to find her way to the place.

Although she wasn’t very familiar with the surroundings of the county, she should be able to find the exact location of the place. However, could someone tell her why she had ended up at such a secluded spot when this was clearly the correct route to her destination? There was barely anyone around this place, let alone the post station.

If there were a couple of graves erected here, it would totally look like an unmarked burial site.

“What a miscalculation! It feels like we are getting further away from civilization.”

Xiaoguo frowned and pulled the donkey cart back towards the direction where they had come from. She had better go back to the starting point first. If she continued moving forward, she might deviate too far from the correct route.

Zhuang Zhuang, who was behind her, was quite bold. He ignored his surroundings and hugged Xiaoguo’s neck happily, looking left and right the whole time.

“Zhuang Zhuang, sit down. You could fall off the cart.”

Xiaoguo said helplessly to Zhuang Zhuang, who was wriggling around. Actually, she didn’t plan on bringing him along. After all, the weather was quite cold now. The back of the donkey cart was unsheltered, unlike the car behind a horse carriage. If he were to travel with her, he could catch a cold.

However, after Xiaoguo said that, Zhuang Zhuang was displeased. He was not a clay doll. Besides, he could take the chance to build up his immunity by coming out in this cold weather.

Xiaoguo couldn’t out-talk him, so she had to bring him along.

“Mother, why are we turning back?”

“Mother seems to have taken the wrong path.”

Xiaoguo was also a little hesitant. That shouldn’t be the case. She couldn’t have remembered the address wrongly. Besides, the address given to her by the courier was easy to remember.

“Where are we going?”

“There’s a river about fifty meters east of the county entrance. There’s a bridge over the river. After crossing the bridge, we will reach our destination.”

Xiaoguo repeated what the courier had said to Zhuang Zhuang. She had not noticed any rivers along the way. Now, she could only place her hopes on Zhuang Zhuang, who had been observing the route while they were on the road.

“East?” Zhuang Zhuang looked up at the sun. Fortunately, it wasn’t cloudy today. He could still see the sun. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. “Mother, this isn’t the east. We should have gone the other way at the fork just now.”

As soon as Zhuang Zhuang said that, Xiaoguo tried to recall where the fork in the road was. She really didn’t notice it.

“Mother, it’s that way.” Zhuang Zhuang pointed ahead to show Xiaoguo where it was.

Xiaoguo poked her head out and saw it for herself. There was actually a road that had appeared out of nowhere. Why didn’t she see it earlier?

“Mother, how could you have seen it? You’ve been lecturing me since we left the house. You kept telling me to sit down and behave. How could you possibly pay attention to where we were going?”

Zhuang Zhuang complained about Xiaoguo’s behavior in a calm and unhurried manner. She was so embarrassed that she almost flew into a rage. She was on the verge of giving him a hard knock on the head.

“If you had behaved properly, I wouldn’t have taken the wrong path.” Since she couldn’t defend herself, she had to find an excuse to push away the blame. In order to maintain her dignity as an adult, Xiaoguo refused to admit that she was in the wrong.

“Yes, yes, yes. How could Mother make any mistakes?” It was true that she hardly made any big mistakes, but with regards to smaller matters, it was hard to say.

Zhuang Zhuang didn’t dare to finish his sentence. He was confident that if he said that, it would be the end of their mother-son relationship.

After a long and eerie silence, Xiaoguo silently drove the donkey cart towards the true east. She was filled with regret. Even though she was an adult, she still had to rely on Zhuang Zhuang. It was all her fault for being overconfident. As soon as she left the county city, she subconsciously took the main road and did not notice the relatively narrow road beside her.

Fortunately, she realized that something was wrong and returned in time. Otherwise, she would have brought Zhuang Zhuang and the donkey to another county.

“Mother, I can see the bridge.”

“We’re finally on the right track!” When Xiaoguo saw the bridge, she felt relieved. In fact, halfway through the journey, she had suspected that she remembered wrongly.

However, the outcome was proof that her memory was still good…

It had been so many days, but she could still remember the address word for word. This was not something an ordinary person could do. She was really quite good…

“Hahahaha…”

Thinking of this, she couldn’t help but laugh out loud. Zhuang Zhuang was confused. He couldn’t figure out what his mother was up to.

After crossing the bridge, there was indeed a post station not far away.

Xiaoguo and Zhuang Zhuang’s eyes widened. This was the first time they had seen a post station. Although they had been to the palace and the general’s residence, this was the first time they had seen an actual post station.

Xiaoguo, in particular, couldn’t take her eyes off the place.

She couldn’t help but sigh in her heart. “How was this a post station? This was clearly a small-scale fortress!”

The relay station that she had in mind was just like an ordinary inn. There would be horses and rooms and it was a small place, but the relay station in front of her was really an eye-opener!

As soon as they entered the courtyard, they were surrounded by countless rooms. It was a two-storey building. Looking at the rooms, they looked like guest rooms. There were nearly a hundred horses and stables in the backyard. There was also a large warehouse, and a cell with heavy shackles hanging on the walls.

In addition to these, she saw countless carriages in the corner of the courtyard. There were even boats placed neatly together.

With Zhuang Zhuang by her side, Xiaoguo looked exceptionally small with a donkey beside her. Looking at this scene, she inexplicably felt the urge to retreat.