The Purple Perilla Star Region · the Su family's home star system · a courtyard upon a snowy mountain.
Su Lan, clad in a white padded coat, stood alone in the courtyard, letting the white snow settle over her body.
Perhaps feeling this was still far from enough, Su Lan stripped off the white coat straightaway; the coat slipped down, baring the thin garments beneath.
The cold wind raged; Su Lan, frozen, shivered and trembled, her lips ashen-pale, frost forming upon her brows.
"Miss!"
A cry of alarm came, and a maidservant ran briskly over, and threw her arms straight around the near-snowman that was Su Lan.
By this moment Su Lan had already fainted away from the cold, her two legs frozen stiff and straight, so that she couldn't so much as bend them.
Xiao Huan looked at her own Big Miss, her heart aching.
"Big Miss, why must you be so foolish!"
It cost Xiao Huan no small effort to drag Su Lan into the room behind her; and under the care of the room's high-tech medical apparatus, Su Lan very soon came round.
Su Lan opened her eyes, and looked at Xiao Huan before her, her eye-rims red and swollen.
"Xiao Huan? Why are you crying again?"
"Big Miss! Won't you stop tormenting yourself so? When you're like this, it grieves Xiao Huan's heart." Xiao Huan choked out.
Su Lan let show a trace of a smile, and stroked Xiao Huan's cheek.
"Set your heart at ease — I won't die. For, after all, this life of mine belongs to the Su family…"
Xiao Huan bit at her lip; she knew the meaning behind her Big Miss's words.
Though Su Lan had all along been an illegitimate daughter, and the Su family's attitude toward her was only lukewarm, Su Lan had always been grateful to the Su family — grateful to that man.
All because that man had, without a backward glance, brought her and her mother back to the Su family, so that the two of them weren't left to drift through the wilderness, without enough to fill their bellies.
And though her mother had, in the end, passed away of an incurable illness, at her passing she'd been happy, and had bidden Su Lan be sure to serve that man with all filial devotion.
And so Su Lan had always been grateful to that man; for all that the other Su family folk treated her with every manner of harshness, she'd carried within her, all the while, the thought of repaying the Su family's kindness.
So much so that, though her heart was ten thousand ways unwilling in this marriage—
still… if this was the Su family's wish… if this was that man's wish…
then she, Su Lan, would marry, and there was an end of it.
At this moment, a knock came from beyond the door.
"It's me." A low, muffled male voice came.
A trace of light appeared in Su Lan's eyes.
Xiao Huan went, then, to open the door.
There stood a middle-aged man beyond it, some snowflakes settled upon his head.
Su Lan rose to her feet and, respectful and deferential, made her bow.
"Honored Father."
"I hear you stood outside for a good half-hour and more," the Su patriarch said coldly.
Su Lan squeezed out a trace of a smile.
"I've made Father worry. I'd only meant to look at the snow-scene; I never thought I'd be so lost in the sight of it that I forgot the time."
"Take more care. You are, after all, to marry the Third Prince. Your health, now, bears upon the Su family's future; you can be willful no longer." Having said this, the Su patriarch turned to go.
Su Lan couldn't hold it back; she looked at that departing back and called out, "Father — do you truly wish for me to marry the Third Prince!"
The Su patriarch's step paused a moment; he said no more, and walked out of the room.
Su Lan sank down to sit upon the floor, tears forcibly held back within her eye-rims — and yet, at this moment, she let show a smile.
"Mother said you'd shown us kindness. Then this time… let it all count as my repaying that kindness, honored Father."
Having said this, Su Lan gave her handheld terminal a stroke.
Within the handheld terminal was set a poison needle — a venom of the most terrifying sort: inject but the least bit of it into the body, and in the space of a single minute, it could let a person die without any pain at all — and it was, besides, a brain-death.
By the Starlight Empire's present technology, one very hard to bring back.
By this moment, Su Lan had already arranged everything of her own.
…
Galactic Star Calendar, year 3033, early May.
"I hear Qin Hu's bride-fetching procession set out over half a month ago, calling upon a great many lords and nobles along the way. And now it's about to sail into the Purple Perilla Star Region! Your brother — how is it he's still made no move?" Xue Xiaoxiao, upon the bridge, watched Zhao Wan'er, who was carrying out the daily inspection.
She'd been here nearly a month now.
From the full-to-brimming interest of the outset, she'd come, by now, to find it a touch dull.
For this interstellar warship had all along stayed hovering in this region, and few Owl Dragon fleet warships appeared round about.
Up to now, Xue Xiaoxiao had seen only a few patrolling T2 Black Rhinos and interstellar transport ships.
Apart from that delectable fare of the starship dining hall, Xue Xiaoxiao truly did feel it all so tedious.
And with Senior Su Lan's wedding date drawing nearer and nearer, and yet Zhao Chen — who'd agreed to take charge of this matter — showing no movement all the while, how could Xue Xiaoxiao help but worry?
"Set your heart at ease — my brother has his arrangements," Zhao Wan'er said.
Xue Xiaoxiao walked to Zhao Wan'er's side, propped her chin on one hand, and looked at Zhao Wan'er with curiosity.
"Wan'er, why do I feel your attitude toward your brother is completely different now? When you bring up your brother, it's for all the world as though your very eyes are glowing. You must remember — back in our days at the Northstar Academy, whenever you brought up this brother of yours, it was nothing but disdain. You did no small amount of badmouthing him in front of us."
"I… I did no such thing!" Zhao Wan'er shot Xue Xiaoxiao a peevish glare.
Xue Xiaoxiao pursed her lips.
"Let me cast my mind back a bit — I recall you saying that this second brother of yours was an utter blockhead, that he'd actually go and take a liking to a woman like Jiang Shasha…"
Zhao Wan'er's cheeks flushed faintly; she quibbled, "I… when did I ever say such a thing?"
"Then let me just flip back through those old comm chat-records of ours." As Xue Xiaoxiao said this, she did, in fact, take out her handheld terminal.
Zhao Wan'er had never imagined this lass had kept all this embarrassing old history; she at once made to stop Xue Xiaoxiao.
And it was just at this moment that a comm window popped open.
On the far side was Lilith.
"Conveying the Commander's order: all interstellar warships that receive this are to proceed immediately to the coordinate [redacted x,y] region and assemble, carrying, at the same time, sufficient combat resources and supply materials!" Lilith said gravely.
"Understood." Zhao Wan'er's manner of a moment ago was gone in an instant; she gave no more mind to whatever embarrassing history was on Xue Xiaoxiao's end.
At once she returned to her own captain's chair, and began setting out a whole series of tasks.
The whole of this interstellar warship, from top to bottom, began to swing into operation.
Xue Xiaoxiao stood there, somewhat dumbfounded.
Before long, this interstellar warship got under way, making for the assembly point.
Just as it was about to reach the assembly point, Xue Xiaoxiao saw interstellar warships docked here, scattered here and there.
The overwhelming majority were T2 Black Rhinos and a portion of T3 Blizzards, along with a great mass of interstellar transport ships and interstellar supply ships.
These transport and supply ships were, in all likelihood, made ready to resupply whatever warships had need of it.
"What's all this for?" Xue Xiaoxiao asked in astonishment.
Zhao Wan'er tossed Xue Xiaoxiao a white-eyed look.
"That thing you brought up yourself a moment ago — you've forgotten it already?"
Xue Xiaoxiao was stunned a moment, then came to with a jolt.
"Zhao Chen's about to make his move!"
Xue Xiaoxiao was overjoyed — but very soon grew worried again.
"But the one this is to be used against is the Third Prince, isn't it? Can the bride truly be snatched by relying on just these interstellar warships?"
"And who said it was only these?" The corner of Zhao Wan'er's mouth quirked; she pointed at the starry sky in the distance.
Xue Xiaoxiao looked over — and in an instant her very expression froze.
For she'd caught sight of glowing point after glowing point.
Only on looking closely did she realize: those were the flashes of interstellar-warship engines — they were interstellar warship after interstellar warship!