She asked herself: if she pretended not to hear right now, could she outrun the several military men present?
The answer was no.
At one meter eighty-nine tall, catching her would be as easy as catching a chicken.
Sang Zhi hesitated for just a moment before stopping in her tracks.
Before him, the young woman bit her lip in silence. Her dark hair was thick and fine, and tears flickered between her fluttering, duck-feather-like eyelashes. Her clear, almond-shaped eyes looked elsewhere, radiating a stubborn defiance.
A cold wind blew, turning the tip of her proud nose red, and she sneezed.
The sentry, who had been chatting pleasantly with her just moments before, felt a twinge of sympathy at the sight.
"Divisional Commander Cai, although this is your family business and outsiders shouldn't meddle, I feel Comrade Sang Zhi isn't as overbearing as that other comrade claims. Without investigation, one has no right to speak; it's always better to gather information from all sides before judging."
He had seen Sang Yun on duty several times.
She was slick, worldly, and exceptionally good at sucking up to people.
It was obvious that these two comrades-in-arms and Divisional Commander Cai had already been fooled by her.
Naturally, out of sympathy for the underdog, his loyalties leaned toward Sang Zhi.
Sang Zhi understood his kind intent and smiled at him gratefully.
But that smile fell upon the man and vanished.
With sun-bronzed skin, a high and straight aquiline nose, and deeply set eyes, he looked exceptionally cold and haughty.
"You say you're her cousin—can you practice medicine? Have you been to the train station recently?" Actually, he wanted to ask if she had been to the hospital lately.
But that night's encounter had been too absurd and intoxicating, and with his rigid disposition, he couldn't bring himself to say it.
Before Sang Zhi could reply, a guilty Sang Yun eagerly chimed in first: "My cousin learned medicine from a barefoot doctor in the countryside for a few years, but it's all shameful, amateur stuff."
This person truly was beyond stupid.
Whose medicine did she learn? Granny Cai. And who was Granny Cai?
She was the own sister of the very head of the family she was trying to cozy up to! Regardless of whatever feud existed between the two elders, how could an outsider publicly dismiss her as a mere barefoot doctor?
That was truly like an old star god hanging himself—growing tired of living.
Clearly, she also realized she had blundered. She lowered her head and fumed in secret. Old Master Cai had a notoriously eccentric temper.
Seeing the younger generation finish their fuss, he stated flatly: "Let's go home."
Jiang Yan watched her like a towering Buddha, as if he wouldn't let her leave until he had squeezed some useful information out of her.
She was reluctant to go inside.
Sang Yun, playing the villain suing first, repeated all the same tiresome clichés from before. In short, she was entirely innocent.
It was Sang Zhi who had been unwilling to come, and she had only tried to help out of the goodness of her heart.
Causing a huge scene in a setting like this would only damage her image.
Yet remaining completely silent didn't fit Sang Zhi's personality either.
So she had to strike the right balance.
"The hospital job was snatched from my hands by your older brother, and this great-uncle here was also stolen through the painstaking scheming of you and your parents. You claim you've always felt a guilty conscience—then let me ask you: over these past few days, have you confessed the truth to great-uncle? If I hadn't come today, were you planning to keep hiding it forever? Furthermore, do you dare let someone make inquiries at the family quarters about what kind of people your parents and your oldest brother really are? How did your brother's good job at the hospital get lost, and where is he right now?"
She wasn't being aggressively overbearing, but every single sentence pressed down on Sang Yun until she couldn't lift her head.
Perhaps because it concerned Granny Cai, Sang Zhi was unusually emotional.
Feng Xiangdong stared in slack-jawed astonishment: "What a formidable tongue."
The scrawny old man looked them both over, formed his own judgment in his mind, and coughed awkwardly when he met the gaze of the newly arrived girl.
If she had arrived two days earlier, knowing of the mix-up, he could have simply sent that Sang Yun girl packing with some monetary compensation.
Yet that night when his attack struck, she was genuinely the one who had arranged his rescue, and according to the Feng kid, she had also saved Jiang Yan a couple of days ago.
Throwing out his life-saving benefactor right in front of the young man he favored didn't seem viable either.
After turning it over in his mind, he had no choice but to settle both of them in for now.
"Since Jiang Yan is injured and needs to recuperate here for the next couple of days, if both of you know medicine, you can help take care of the patient."
They would just make do for a couple of days, letting both cousin sisters stay until the inquiries he had entrusted to someone bore fruit.
Arranging a place for the first girl would also settle his debt of gratitude.
As for Sang Zhi—though the little lass had a sharp tongue, he had fought in wars all his life, and he loved this kind of genuine, unvarnished spirit.
Sang Zhi couldn't leave, and Sang Yun had gotten her wish to stay, so the atmosphere suddenly became somewhat harmonious.
Seeing that she was dressed too thinly, the old man specifically told Sang Yun to fetch a thick coat for her.
During the first couple of days, he had given her food stamps and fabric coupons.
"Oh, right..."
Sang Yun's expression turned ugly.
To maintain her persona and appear magnanimous, surely she couldn't give Sang Zhi her old clothes?
That left only one option: the woolen overcoat she had spent a fortune on at the department store to lure a golden turtle-son-in-law.
They say clothes make the person, and it was true.
While the coat hadn't looked like much on Sang Yun, its nipped-in waist design accentuated Sang Zhi's slender neck and willow-thin waist.
Upon seeing this, Feng Xiangdong sucked in a sharp breath of air.
She truly lived up to being pretty as a picture—clear-complexioned, exquisite, and charming.
Jiang Yan, on the other hand, withdrew his gaze nonchalantly. Even though she had looked pitifully underdressed a moment ago, one look told him it was all an act.
He didn't expose this minor charade; his primary focus remained his suspicions regarding her motives for coming here, as well as... her identity.
Enemy agents were constantly active behind the scenes, and he was a man who held critical intelligence.
Sang Zhi possessed suspicious traits.
This was why he paid her extra attention.
Sang Zhi knew he was suspicious of her, but she didn't care. To reiterate: without evidence, what was there to fear?
Sang Yun wanted to display her virtues as a dutiful wife and mother, telling the group to sit while she went to cook in the kitchen.
In truth, at a Divisional Commander's rank, families usually had domestic helpers, but unluckily, the helper's daughter-in-law had given birth over the past couple of days, so she had returned to her hometown.
Otherwise, Sang Yun wouldn't have grabbed this chance to suck up so aggressively.
If she wanted to do chores, let her.
Sang Zhi, feeling leisurely, took the opportunity to inspect the house.
The apartment assigned to the Cai family was in the northeast corner of the cadre district. The environment was quiet, and the two-story building came with its own small courtyard.
The walls inside featured the currently trendy color scheme—white on top, green on the bottom—and a family portrait hung on the wall. Tall cabinets, modular wall units, a sofa, and a dining table were all fully equipped.
There was even a black-and-white television, a radio, and a sewing machine, items absent from ordinary households.
Perhaps because the rest of the family wasn't around, the place carried a sense of emptiness.
Divisional Commander Cai was also at an advanced age.
His personality wasn't exactly eccentric, just a bit awkward. He subtly probed her with numerous questions about her life in the countryside.
Knowing he was fishing for information about Granny Cai, but realizing she wasn't the original owner and didn't know much, Sang Zhi gave a mix of truth and fabrication.
The old man nodded, looking somewhat fatigued, and pointed at Jiang Yan: "He's someone I watched grow up. By seniority, you could call him uncle. But you young folks don't bother with such things; calling him brother or uncle is up to you."
Sang Zhi nodded, drawing out her tone as she prepared to say "uncle," but before she could open her mouth, she was suppressed by the man's warning glare.
"Comrade Jiang, please take good care of me from now on."
That earned her only an impatient, averted gaze.
At noon, Sang Yun pulled out all the stops to cook a meal, but the old man's spirits were low, and he barely touched his chopsticks. Aside from Feng Xiangdong, no one cheered her on.
After finishing the meal, the old man handed her some grain stamps and fabric coupons, telling her to find a chance to move in. But with Jiang Yan, that ticking time bomb, living here, how could she dare?
She could only decline, claiming she would move in after a few more days.
Sang Zhi didn't take the grain stamps, but she genuinely coveted the fabric coupons.
Although she had bought clothes over the past couple of days, they were a bit thin, and winters in the north were bitterly cold. She needed to procure some heavier garments soon.
She did have padded cotton jackets and down coats in her Space, but their styles were far too modern, and the materials clashed completely with this era, making them impossible to wear outside.
Thus, buying some fabric to make an outer smock or a quilt cover would solve her problem.
The moment Sang Zhi stepped outside, Jiang Yan followed right behind her.
Sang Yun would have loved to spend more time interacting with him, but since her housework wasn't finished yet, she could only glare helplessly.
Current tailors required people wanting clothes to bring their own purchased fabric and coupons to the shop.
The shop provided lunch and charged two yuan for labor, but since she couldn't conveniently handle providing meals for the tailor, she would just pay a bit extra for them to make it so she could pick it up later.
It was only when she reached the outside of the tailor shop that she realized someone was following her.
It was none other than Jiang Yan, the person she most wanted to avoid.
She still didn't know she had been suspected of being a spy.
Yet recalling the oppressive aura he projected and his earlier cross-examination, her own temper flared. She was someone who naturally hated taking a loss.
Her eyes rolled as she hatched a plan.
Seeing a customer approach, the tailor woman adjusted her reading glasses, hung a tape measure around her neck, and greeted her warmly.
"What can I do for you, young comrade?"
The door curtain shifted slightly. Smiling without a word, until she caught sight of a pair of shoes beneath the hem of the curtain, she said with mischievous malice:
"I want to make some underwear—the kind worn right next to the skin!"