Chapter 102 Tuo Baxiao

Chapter 102: Tuoba Xiao

Her drowsiness melted away. Jiang Congyan gazed at the man’s chest so close to her, as if hearing both his heartbeat and her own—a sound like the first powerful pulse of a beast awakening from hibernation after a long winter.

After a moment’s thought, she whispered softly against him, “I do (want to know).”

“I was curious before, but you never spoke of it, so I knew it might be a private matter for you. If you want to tell me now, I’m here to listen.”

Yet after she said this, Tuoba Xiao did not immediately begin his story. Instead, he asked, “Do you believe what Tuoba Wuxi said?”

Jiang Congyan went quiet. Her silence made Tuoba Xiao uneasy, and just as he was about to speak, he felt her pushing him away.

His body stiffened, and he loosened his grip in surprise.

Jiang Congyan pulled back slightly, tilting her face up to look at him. “Do you truly think I lack the sense to believe the words of someone who bears only ill will toward me?”

Her tone was cold, her expression solemn.

Tuoba Xiao faltered under her gaze, his eyes darting away.

It wasn’t that he didn’t trust her—it was that he was doubting himself. He could dismiss everything else, but when it came to his mother, he would not tolerate even a single word of slander.

Her reaction, however, reassured him. Of course, with her wisdom and discernment, she would never believe Tuoba Wuxi’s vile words.

Finally letting go of his hesitation, Tuoba Xiao began to speak of his mother’s past: “You know my mother was Han.”

Jiang Congyan nodded. Propping herself up on her elbow, she shifted slightly to face him directly, her calm gaze offering him quiet comfort.

He continued, “Her name was Wang Fu. She was taken to the grasslands when she was sixteen. My mother was beautiful enough that even the Xianbei King recognized it. So, she was presented to the previous Xianbei King, my birth father.”

“Because of her uncommon beauty, my mother was favored for a time. She became pregnant the following year and gave birth to me, but she soon lost his favor.”

Tuoba Xiao was too young to remember that time. These were details he gleaned later from whispers among others.

Jiang Congyan was puzzled. If Wang Fu had been so cherished, why did she die so young? But she didn’t ask, waiting silently for him to continue.

Tuoba Xiao sensed her confusion. “Because my mother didn’t love Tuo Bata.”

“Her family had been slain by the Xianbei—she could never love her enemy. Besides, she had once been betrothed to a man of her own station. They were supposed to marry, but then everything changed.”

“My mother remained cold toward Tuo Bata. Over time, he lost patience. And because she was Han, others whispered in his ear that she was disloyal. So, Tuo Bata cast her out.”

By now, hatred tinged Tuoba Xiao’s voice.

Jiang Congyan reached out, gently resting her hand on his arm.

Wang Fu’s tragedy was entirely Tuo Bata’s doing. He had slain her family, then took her by force. And when he failed to win her affection, his pride wounded, he discarded her.

A concubine cast out by the king had no chance of mercy—especially a Han woman alone on the grasslands, shunned everywhere. Survival alone was a battle, let alone raising a child.

Though she hadn’t yet heard the rest of the story, Jiang Congyan could already tell from how Wang Fu had raised Tuoba Xiao and even taught him to read and reason that she was an incredibly strong and remarkable woman.

Jiang Congyan thought to herself that if she were in Wang Fu’s place, she might not have done half as well.

“From the time I can remember, it was always just me and my mother. Our life was hard. Tuo Bata stopped providing for her, so we squeezed into a tattered tent made of bark, struggling every day just to survive…”

Tuoba Xiao still remembered those years—when he was five, six, seven years old, trailing after his mother as she begged for work from the herders, washing clothes for meager scraps of food. The labor was exhausting, the pay pitiful, but it was the only way they could eat.

They labored like slaves from dawn till dusk just to stay alive. They had no land, no possessions, not even a single sheep.

He was too little for heavy labor, so he scoured the wild grasslands searching for wild fruits, vegetables, and bird eggs. Because of his black hair, everyone knew this child had part-Han heritage. They discriminated against him, despised him, and some even egged others on to bully him—throwing stones, snatching the food he had painstakingly gathered. Refusing to back down, he picked up stones and threw them back, only to have them swarm and beat him.

At first, he couldn’t win. Every time he returned home, his face was bruised and swollen. His mother treated his wounds with herbs while asking why he had fought. He replied that he only fought back when others bullied him, and besides, their hard-won food was stolen—without it, they would go hungry again.

His mother said, *"Since you can’t win and always get hurt, stop fighting from now on. Steer clear of them."* But he stubbornly refused. He’d done nothing wrong—why take their abuse? One day, he would defeat them.

Back then, he didn’t understand why they only bullied him. When he asked his mother, she thought for a long time before answering, *"Because I’m Han, and you have half Han blood."*

*"Does being Han mean we deserve to be bullied?"*

Wang Fu shook her head. *"Not just that. It’s because we’re weak."*

Weak.

Because they were weak, everyone bullied them.

*"Then I’ll become strong—so strong nobody would dare touch us."*

*"Good. I’ll wait for Xiaonu to grow up."* Wang Fu gently stroked his head.

At that moment, the conviction to grow stronger was burned into his heart. He carried it with him ever after. Every fight made him tougher than the last. By the time he was eight, even older Xianbei boys were no match for him.

*"...Those days were hard, but my mother gave me all her love. Sometimes, under the starry night sky, we’d sit by Yanzhi Lake. While pounding laundry, she’d tell me stories of the Central Plains and write Han characters in the sand. That’s how I learned to read,"* Tuo Baxiao said.

*"...That sounds like your happiest memory,"* Jiang Congyan responded softly.

*"Yes."* His childhood held no sweeter moments than those. For a while, he forgot hunger and hardship, lost in the tales his mother spun—especially the ones about heroes. He longed to grow up and become like them.

*"Later, because my mother did such good work washing clothes, the herdsmen handing out work finally changed their attitude. Though life remained bitter, we slowly scraped together steady supplies and even traded for two lambs..."*

They finally had sheep of their own. Back then, Tuo Baxiao was overjoyed. Once the sheep grew and bred, they could have more and more lambs, escaping their current misery.

*"It was one of the few peaceful periods we had. We were so close... until someone stole our sheep!"*

Tuo Baxiao’s voice turned sharp with anger. Even though he had taken revenge, the memory still made his blood boil. If their sheep hadn’t been stolen, if they hadn’t had to search for food in a far-off stretch of woods, perhaps his mother wouldn’t have suffered what came next.

Jiang Congyan felt the man’s body grow increasingly tense, his muscles trembling under the strain. She grasped his bandaged hand.

He gripped hers in return, his grip bone-crushing.

*"...The day it happened, we were overjoyed to find a cluster of wood-ear mushrooms. I never could have imagined it would mark the beginning of another nightmare for my mother and me."*

This was Tuo Baxiao’s most forbidden memory—yet now, he was sharing it with her.

Jiang Congyan lowered her lashes slightly, her calm gaze tinged with sorrow. She could guess what had happened. A woman abandoned by Tuo Bata had long lost any protection. The steppe’s wolves wouldn’t spare her. Once they confirmed her former master no longer cared, they would pounce.

Young Tuo Baxiao had watched as a man pinned his mother to the ground. He lunged at the man, punching, biting—but he was too small, not yet nine. He could defeat boys of twelve or thirteen, but not a grown man who had seen battle.

Knocked down, he got back up. Kicked away, he crawled back. All he wanted was to save his mother—but in the end, he was beaten unconscious.

It happened anyway. He couldn’t stop it.

At the time, he didn’t grasp the full horror of it, but his mother’s struggles and the despair in her eyes told him enough.

He hated himself for not being able to grow up instantly, for not being the hero from the stories who could rescue her.

When he woke, his mother held him tightly, murmuring reassurance: *"It’s all right, little owl. As long as you’re safe, I’m fine."*

After that, they grew bolder. Sometimes, it wasn’t just one man. They took their brutality out on her, leaving her covered in wounds.

The young Tuo Baxiao tried desperately to stop them every time, yet he was crushed in defeat every time. Once, they even tied him up, making him listen to their disgusting remarks.

"I swore then that I would kill every single one of them! Every one!"

Tuo Baxiao trembled violently, his limbs shaking uncontrollably. His emerald eyes seethed with hatred. Even after all these years, the mere mention of it still filled him with gut-wrenching pain and rage. His emotions were so intense that his features twisted, and with his unhealed facial wounds and bulging veins, he looked like a fanged monster in the dimly lit bed curtains. Even the hair at his nape seemed charged with his rage.

Yet Jiang Congyan felt no fear—only pity. A pang of sympathy shot through her. In truth, whether in her past life or this one, her childhood had been relatively happy. Though the truth later turned that happiness into a blade that wounded her, she had indeed known joy back then. She had never endured what Tuo Baxiao had. Any claim of understanding his pain would be a lie, but now, she genuinely ached for him.

This proud man, who scorned the world, had once carried an unspeakable past of suffering.

She gently pressed her forehead against his temple and wrapped her arms around him. At this moment, she didn’t know what words could comfort him, so she simply stayed by his side.

"You did it. You avenged your mother," Jiang Congyan said.

"No, I didn’t. My mother still died. She took her own life when I was eleven."

Jiang Congyan’s eyelids lifted sharply. "Why...?"

"I was eleven when I killed the first man who had abused her."