Chapter 246: Memory
The big man carried Su Rende on his back and ran through the door.
Zhang Zhaodi followed behind, extremely anxious.
She shouted to Jiang Jing: “Jing’er, come out quickly and save him.”
Jiang Jing was in the consultation room. Hearing Zhang Zhaodi’s trembling voice, she instructed Jia Chunni to stay and look after the other patients, then hurried over.
Upon seeing Su Rende covered in blood, Jiang Jing’s expression was extremely serious.
“What happened to him?”
“An assassin rushed over from the street side and tried to assassinate him. He got stabbed while protecting me. Jing’er, you must save him!”
“Don’t worry, Mom. A healer’s heart is benevolent; if I can save him, I will do everything I can.”
Zhou Wangshu came in from outside and handed a stack of papers to Su Yaoguang, saying: “This is the information I sent people to gather from the border. It contains important doubts about the Great General Who Protects the Nation. You look at it first; if there’s anything you don’t understand, I’ll send people to investigate further.”
“General Su is right here.” Su Yaoguang said, “He just encountered an assassin, and Jing’er is saving him.”
“Inside?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll go take a look. Don’t worry.”
Su Yaoguang stopped at Zhang Zhaodi’s side and hugged her, saying: “Mom, don’t worry, it’ll be fine.”
“It’s my fault. He kept pestering me earlier about his amnesia, and I didn’t want to hear him talk about those things, so I kept driving him away. If I had found a place to listen to him, he wouldn’t have encountered the assassin, and this wouldn’t have happened. He is the Great General Who Protects the Nation; if he dies at the hands of an assassin like this, I, an utterly ordinary village girl, would become a sinner to the world.”
“Mom, how could this be your fault? Even if he avoided it this time, those assassins wouldn’t let it go, and there would still be a next assassination.” Su Yaoguang handed Zhou Wangshu’s things to Zhang Zhaodi. “This is the information Wangshu sent people to investigate about General Su. Why don’t you take a look? Maybe there’s some clue inside to provide to General Su.”
Zhang Zhaodi hesitated for a moment but eventually opened it.
It detailed Su Rende’s daily eating habits, as well as his every move, likes, and dislikes in daily life.
“Mom, Mom… what are you thinking?”
Zhang Zhaodi’s eyes reddened: “Yaoguang, he really might be your dad.”
“Why?” Su Yaoguang took the information from Zhang Zhaodi’s hands and read the text on it one by one. “There’s no such record here. How did you deduce that?”
“It details the changes in his habits over these years. He is now a great general; I could never connect such a dignified man with my honest and simple-minded silly husband. But after so many years, I, a new wife, have become an old lady—why couldn’t he become a majestic great general? It indeed doesn’t say his name here, what kind of life he lived before his amnesia, or even that none of his comrades who enlisted with him survived, so it’s hard to gather news about him.”
“However, it says here that he likes staring at the moon in a daze, likes picking sour apricots to eat, and likes blowing strange tunes with leaves. You know what? These are all his habits. Especially the sour apricots—normal people don’t like them, but I do, so he followed me and ate them too. When he left, he said that although he wasn’t by my side, we could see the same moon, so when I missed him, I should look at the moon.”
“As for that tune, it was our little romantic pastime when we first met. I was up the mountain collecting firewood, he was hunting, and he was sitting there blowing leaves, which caught my attention. I stood there listening to him play, and then a wild boar charged down from the mountain. I was scared half to death, and he held me as we climbed a big tree. We watched from the tree as the wild boar rammed it, trying to knock us down.”
“What happened later?” It was the first time Su Yaoguang heard Zhang Zhaodi talk about her and her dad’s love story.
“That wild boar refused to leave and kept ramming the tree. Seeing the situation was bad, he drew the sickle from his waist and jumped down to fight the wild boar. I clung to the tree trunk watching him battle it. He had great strength, but the wild boar was too strong; he still got injured and was running out of strength. I was collecting firewood, so I definitely had a cleaver in my back basket. I swung the cleaver and jumped down to chop at the wild boar.”
Su Yaoguang never imagined that Zhang Zhaodi was so fierce when she was young.
In some ways, her temperament was quite similar to her mom’s.
“You killed the wild boar?”
“Yes.” Zhang Zhaodi blushed. “The wild boar died. We killed it together. He was injured but still carried the wild boar down the mountain. Guess what he did next?”
Su Yaoguang shook her head.
Zhang Zhaodi fell into memory, her expression infinitely gentle.
“He carried that wild boar to my home and asked my parents for my hand, saying he wanted to hold the wedding ceremony with me.”
Su Yaoguang let out an “ah,” her face full of surprise: “You had only met for the first time, and my dad wanted to marry you?”
“Yes, he said he had never seen a bolder woman than me, and he just liked that type and wanted to hold the wedding ceremony with me.”
At that time, under those circumstances, her dad was not favored at home, her mom was like a laborer at home, and the two unloved little bitter melons fell in love at first sight on the mountain and suddenly wanted to build a small family with two little bitter melons relying on each other.
Su Yaoguang felt that Zhang Zhaodi’s evaluation of her dad was wrong.
How could such a brave and decisive man be honest and dull? Was it that her memory of her dad was distorted, or had too much time passed and she was about to forget what he looked like?
“Mom, didn’t you say before that he wasn’t? If he is, you should have some feeling.”
“I don’t dare believe it’s him. Daughter, he has no memory—what if I recognize the wrong person? In other words, even if I don’t recognize wrongly and I’m
“I just encountered the assassin earlier. He protected me with that look in his eyes, which confirmed to me that he is him, the boy I liked back then. He has always been such a brave and responsible man.”
“General Su is awake and clamoring to see you.” Jia Chunni came out from inside and said to Zhang Zhaodi.
Hearing this, Zhang Zhaodi pulled Su Yaoguang and ran inside.
“Where is Chaoci? I want to see her.” Su Rende tried to get out of bed but was held down by the person beside him.
Zhang Zhaodi heard this familiar form of address and trembled in her heart.
This time, she ran over without hesitation and threw herself into Su Rende’s arms.
“Big Strength Brother.”
“Chaoci…”
The two hugged each other tightly.
Jiang Jing opened her mouth beside them but in the end could only swallow her words.
