Unable to come up with a plausible idea, Nie Ling decided to put the matter with the pendant aside for the moment.
She moved her focus to taking care of her little brother instead, whose forehead was now entirely drenched in cold sweat. Nie Xiaoyun's face looked entirely bloodless. And noticing this, Nie Ling's heart couldn't help but ache even more for him.
Looking around, she found a cloth. After making sure that it's clean, she folded the cloth a few times before gently dabbing it against Nie Xiaoyun's forehead, wiping his sweat away.
When she saw the boy's sorry state, Nie Ling recollected her first lifetime where she had numerous times been met with such a situation.
She was a very strong and capable assassin at that lifetime. Although she wasn't entirely resistant to common illnesses such as suffering from cold or a fever, she would never let herself fall into such a helpless state.
However, it was entirely different when it came to the blind little boy she brought back to raise. Due to having to suffer from malnutrition for a long time, the boy's physique had always been in a very frail condition.
Whenever he accidentally got himself ill, it would be like contracting a very serious disease – demanding her, who was his guardian at that time, a huge amount of time and patience to nourish him back to health.
Nie Ling recalled the times when she would stay up all night to take care of the boy, her little Nie Yongqi. It had also been like this, with him laying on the bed clutching his quilt tightly and her guarding by the side, wiping his cold-riddled body and continuously exchanging the cloth on his forehead with a warm one.
When she thought of this, Nie Ling's eyes started to move around to search for something, only sighing a huge relief when she landed her sight on a bunch of dried branches sitting on the darkest corner of the room.
Fortunately, the previous body had been well-prepared or else, she would have had no choice but to search for some firewood in the middle of the night.
Standing up, she carried some of the branches to the backyard and brought back a bucket of water from a nearby well, intending to boil some water to soak the cloth warm.
As she waited for the water to boil, she sat on a wooden log and peered at the sky above her head. The sky of the night was a bright one today, with countless twinkling stars hovering around the softly-glowing full moon.
Her mind inevitably went back to the night when she and Nie Yongqi, or to be exact the oh-so-high-above crown prince Zhou Yingyuan, had last met in their second lifetime.
They had given each other a task and a promise to be fulfilled, and although she had died too early to claim her reward for solving the Withering Moon Venom, she had indirectly accomplished her wish in the third lifetime, which was to be free from all that had tied her in the past and live her life as she wants.
Nie Yongqi and the crown prince Zhou Yingyuan were both a part of her past. Though she held some sort of affection and attachment towards the two, she still wished for them to part in peace.
The current her had decided that she wanted to live a normal life as a village girl of the Ming Guo Village, dedicating her life to raising her little brother and striving to make a better living for the two of them.
As for Zhou Yingyuan… Had he received the Gu worms? Fortunately, she had written down all the things that were needed to be known to raise the worms before her death.
***
The next day, at the break of daylight, Nie Xiaoyun was stirred awake by the slight weight pressing on his arm. He groaned in discomfort, startling the sleeping young woman by his side.
"Xiaoyun, you're awake!" Nie Ling pleasantly cried out as she jumped from her seat.
When she saw the young boy struggling to prop himself up, Nie Ling quickly stopped him. "Don't move too much. The doctor had especially asked you not to force yourself too much and tire yourself. Xiao Yun, be good. Lay down and take a good rest."
"Sis," Nie Xiaoyun paused and merely looked at her with watery eyes, before continuing to ask her. "What happened to you? Why are there so many wounds on your face?"
Nie Ling tried to comfort him with her soft voice, "Sis is fine. Don't worry about me, these are all minor scratches. It didn't even sting for me."
She forced out a smile, saying in a light manner when suddenly, beads after beads of glistening fat tears started rolling down the boy's cheeks. Nie Ling was struck dumb by the sudden water tricks.
She frantically used the cloth in her hand to wipe off the tears on his face. "This child, you're the only male in the family. Why do you shed your tears so easily?" She lightly chided, and this exactly made the boy sob even louder than before.
"Sis, have you been hit? It must've hurt a lot. I'm sorry… Xiao Yun is sorry… It is all Xiao Yun's fault that the villagers all look down on sister."
Nie Xiaoyun said in between his broken-hearted sobs.
"Sis, why don't you leave Xiao Yun to die? Without a deadweight like Xiao Yun, sister would've lived a far better life…"