Wei Liuying sat on the carriage prepared by Huo after finishing conversing with Feng Chun. She sighed as she felt tired for putting up an act like that. "Huo, when will we depart back to the capital city?"

"The general said that we can return back after all family members is complete or already confirmed to be dead," Huo replied.

"The servants."

"They're excluded."

Hearing that, Wei Liuying was silent for a moment. The one who had lower rank compared to concubine daughter would be the servants. After all, no one would care about them. Whether they died or alive didn't matter to most of the nobles here because many of them were not even treated as human.

And if they tried to run away from here, they would die because they would be suspected as bandits. The soldiers would not give any lenience just simply because they were former servants. If they didn't have any high position in their owner's mind, they didn't worth anything.

And aside from some servants who were close to their master, the rest didn't worth much. Which was a sad truth from this place.

"I see," Wei Liuying replied after a while. She gazed at a distance. "I'll be sleeping now. Wake me up when it's time to depart."

"Yes, Young Master."

Huo stood beside the carriage and looked at Wei Liuying's visage. Her body was small due to malnutrition and forcing herself to train even under that condition. After years of such treatment, it wouldn't be weird to see her smaller than her peers to the point that even Wei Hong Zheng could be of the same height.

After all, boys grew up latter compared to girls.

At this time, he could clearly see the fatigue that was accumulating on Wei Liuying's face and expression. She must have been working hard to be able to survive in the forest and return back safely in one piece. If she got hurt, it would undoubtedly cause them some problems because Wei Hong Zheng back at the residence would have to get hurt too.

'She's pitiful.'

That was all the thoughts Huo always had towards Wei Liuying. Despite her skills, intelligence, and capabilities, she was born in a place where she couldn't use any of them all properly.

All she could do was to become a doll in the hand of Feng Chun and Wei Hong Zheng who couldn't use her properly. Compared to those two, Huo was capable to see Wei Liuying's mask and knew some of her extreme emotion such as anger.

As a servant, it was a given that he had be keen of his master's change of feelings and emotion. Thanks to that, he could gauge Wei Liuying's feeling a bit more accurately compared to Feng Chun and Wei Hong Zheng.

'But I can't help her.'

Huo knew that Wei Liuying was in difficult position in Wei Family Residence, but he could never help her. He had to follow Wei Hong Zheng until the end and never ever betrayed him. It was his duty and he would fulfill it until the very end.

It didn't take a long time before the commanders told them to depart. The soldiers will guard them on the way.

"Second Young Master, please wake up. We're going to depart now."

Wei Liuying opened her eyes. She straightened her sitting position and nodded. "I understand."

The journey to return back took longer than expected. They were moving at even slower pace because they were being careful. Even the soldiers were tense almost all the time. In the carriage, Wei Liuying was sitting with Wei Yijun on the opposite side. They have to share carriages because the number was not enough.

Glancing outside, Wei Liuying furrowed her brows. "First Brother, do you hear anything about the bandits?"

"I only know that they have been captured. There were some unfortunate casualties and their names have been reported to their families," Wei Yijun replied.

Wei Liuying nodded. This was not the first time an incident occurred during hunting, but it was rare. This incident happened before anyone could stop it, thus the casualties were very big.

"Did this happen last year?"

"Last year?" Wei Yijun arched his eyebrows and shook his head lightly. "I have never experienced it happening this bad if that's what you want to know. However, you don't need to worry about the after effect because the guards would surely do a good job to clean up the bandits."

Wei Liuying blinked her eyes. "Can you please elaborate, First Brother?"

"They already have suspects of which bandit group this is, so they wouldn't need to take a long time to capture the real culprit," Wei Yijun explained unhurriedly. He smiled and looked outside calmly. With his neat robe and sharp complexion, he did look very suitable as a scholar.

Hearing her brother's words, Wei Liuying gained some picture about what was happening behind the scene. While it wouldn't be released to public yet, the guards were actually already tracking who were actually responsible for this incident.

'They're fast.'

But considering that three different armies were working together, Wei Liuying could guess that they must be working hard. As for how they managed to collaborate, she would not dare to entertain the thoughts.

"Also, Commander Hu wants to have a talk with you later."

"Commander Hu?"

There were several commanders in the capital city. However, this name bore weight because he was part of the Imperial Family guards. To be able to attract his attention meant that there was also the possibility that Wei Hong Zheng would be called to the palace to be an Imperial guard.

Wei Liuying's eyes narrowed. While the position was not low, the danger was completely different with the frontline. If they failed to protect the Imperial Family or offend them in the slightest bit, it was death's sentence.

Wei Yijun nodded, his tone was a bit envious. "He was interested in your journey, Second Brother. If you have the time after things have settled up, he wanted you to come and visit him."

"In that case, I'll go visit him."

"That's a good decision."

Wei Liuying obviously would not want to share any of her real story with Commander Hu. She would just leave it all to Wei Hong Zheng to concoct a believable story about how he managed to escape.

Of course, it would be impossible for Wei Hong Zheng to make up the story. It was more likely that Huo would be the one to be handed the task. And it must be easy for him to do it as well because he was quite familiar with the route.

She didn't want to bother with this matter again and simply leave it all for her brother and mother to handle.

They were the one who threw her to this mess, so don't expect her to be the one to clean up too. All the glory and achievement already belonged to Wei Hong Zheng, so all he needed to do was to make sure he could keep it all for himself.

Looking out of the window, Wei Liuying noticed that Prince Ji Sheng was riding horse not far from their carriages. He was wearing stern expression that didn't seem to be capable to change. His eyes were looking upfront, while occasionally look around indifferently.

'He's keeping his guard up.'

As a general, it was clear that Ji Sheng was awfully familiar with how things worked at the frontline. He would not make a mistake such as dropping his guard in the middle of a mission. Besides, there might be other bandits group who passed this area and chose to target them.

Even with the numerous soldiers around them, the possibility was not zero.

"Do you want to become a general, Second Brother?" Wei Yijun asked curiously.

General?

Internally, Wei Liuying laughed coldly. How could a woman become a general who stood at the frontline and fought the enemies with sword? Besides, she didn't like to be bathed in blood and sweat all the time. If she could choose, becoming a strategist who helped on the back would be much better.

She smiled faintly. But she didn't know what Wei Hong Zheng's aspiration, so she couldn't say anything with certainty. "I don't know, First Brother."

"Entering the military is a good option too. I'm sure Father will be happy if you pick this path," Wei Yijun encouraged.

Wei Liuying smiled and didn't continue the conversation.

The two of them stayed silent until the carriages finally entered the capital city once more. It was only at this time that the soldiers relaxed a bit and the nobles were already impatient to get back home. The Wei Family was not an exception.

The moment the carriages entered their household, Wei Liuying alighted down. She walked over to her father and cupped her hands. "Father, Hong Zheng is tired, so I would like to retire myself first."

Wei Hong nodded. "Go and have some rest. I'm sure that surviving on your own has taken a toll on you."

"Thank you, Father."