Chu Yu now sees that although she doesn’t mind all the gossip about her, the gossip can hit the people around her and hurt them. It’s not looking good for her relationship with Wei Yun.
On the up, the incident has helped mend the relationship between Chu Yu and Chu Jin. After hearing about Chu Yu’s mission, Chu Jin sees Chu Yu outside and apologises to her for blaming her earlier. Now, when anyone talks badly about Chu Yu, Chu Jin’s the first to defend her. Compliments about Chu Yu also make Chu Jin proud.
The Song siblings, as well as the Wei sisters-in-law, also show their support for the Chu family. Song Wenchang and Song Shilan guarded the Chu family’s gate all night, while Jiang Chun, although she doesn’t approve of the relationship between Wei Yun and Chu Yu, won’t let gossip tarnish the Wei reputation—which, we suppose, is Jiang Chun saying she still considers Chu Yu as her sister-in-law and as part of the Wei family, she won’t let gossip stand without fighting back.
Meanwhile, Wei Yun’s been looking into the person behind the gossip. So far, he’s discovered a hooded woman was behind Young Master Sun. It was this hooded woman who instigated him to spread the book. A man called Guo Liu is the seller.
This Guo Liu is tracked down and taken to court for selling and telling the story of the book and slander by both Chu Yu and Wei Yun. Wei Yun and Wei Qiu had been waiting for Guo Qiu to show up at his usual time and place, watching from above at a restaurant. It’s Chu Yu who suddenly shows up to pin the book seller down, and he (as well as Young Master Sun) is taken to court.
Guo Liu claims innocence, while Young Master Sun claims to have done nothing wrong. The latter also tried to accuse Gu Chusheng of being incapable of fair judgement because of his past relationship with Chu Yu.
Chu Yu responds if she sees Gu Chusheng showing favouritism, she’ll willingly accept the punishment. Meanwhile, Gu Chusheng promises to step down if he neglects his duty to be fair and impartial.
Without evidence to support the rumours, Gu Chusheng rules to have Guo Liu and Young Master Sun flogged 50 times and fined 20 taels.
Young Master Sun eventually is made to reveal that he was instigated to avoid the flogging. Guo Liu submits as well, confessing that he had been asked by a hooded woman to spread the story and the book. In return, she’d pay him 50 taels. This hooded woman pointed at Xiang, verifiable by a good-quality jade bangle on her wrist and a drawing from Guo Liu, which resembles her.
Wei Yun, Chu Yu, Gu Chusheng and the guards head straight to the Eldest Princess’ Mansion to see Li Changming only to find no one except Xiang there. Xiang claimed everyone had gone to the villa that was out of town to see the blooms.
The actual situation is (as per the plan), Li Changming has been drugged and was on her way out of Huajing City. Xue Hanmei had managed to convince the guards at the gate to let them through using an edict (supposedly) from the Emperor.
Xiang claims that she remained at the mansion to clean the place, but it’s looking like she’s been sacrificed and made to look like she was behind everything. She denies knowing anything behind the charges initially. However, the Wei Qiu had discovered a letter under the bench that served as evidence that she was behind Yao Yong’s rebellion and had also attempted to kill Li Changming during it.
When taken into custody, she didn’t hold back from confessing to being a spy from North Qi and being behind everything either. In fact, she was not only a North Qi spy but the adopted daughter of Princess Yunyang of North Qi. Her willingness to confess to everything without the need to use force has them believe Xiang isn’t the real mastermind.
Clearly the point was not to make Wei Yun and Chu Yu believe Xiang was the mastermind. She was only there to give Xue Hanmei time to leave Great Sui and distract them all from stopping him.
Rumours cleared, Gu Chusheng takes the opportunity to see if Chu Yu would give him another chance now that he’s divorced and marry him. Chu Yu rejects him. She had meant it when she said that once she stops liking someone, she stops.
Seeing as Chu Yu had no interest in him, he thought to propose a deal to help her have access to information for her investigation on the North Qi spies. He was offering to be like how Wei Yun was to her during her investigation into the octagonal crossbow, serving as her partner and giving her access to information through him as the Commander of the Arsenal Bureau.
Gu Chusheng believes with his position and his promotion trajectory of third-grade minister and later the head of civil officials, he would be able to help her in whatever she wanted to look into. He sees himself as someone who could protect her in the right way and was the correct choice as partner (while Wei Yun wasn’t). He admits that in the past he didn’t do right by her and broke her heart, and so, he was now willing to make it up to her for the rest of his life.
Chu Yu rejects him again. She didn’t believe she had to marry anyone to live a happy life. So, she was choosing neither one of them—not him or Wei Yun. It’s a refusal that saw Gu Chusheng interpret as not being over Wei Yun, and her heart was still with him. However, what sounds like her heart was still with Wei Yun (which isn’t false), she suggested that she didn’t throw out the idea and not consider it at all. Her final words before leaving Gu Chusheng were that liking and choosing someone were different things, and that the events that happened earlier in the day, told her she actually can’t choose either.
We’re not exactly sure what’s she means by that, but maybe Chu Yu was talking about the fact that Gu Chusheng and Chu Yu used to be together. Their past relationship would be used to against her in could to claim biased treatment and unfair judgement. Even if she wanted to use him to achieve her goals, she may not be able to.
The whole time Gu Chusheng and Chu Yu were speaking, Wei Yun had been standing outside their private room inside Spring Breeze House where they spoke. He had dropped by and had heard it all. These final words were not missed by Wei Yun. He wasn’t sure what she meant by them, but he read it as Chu Yu having considered returning to Gu Chusheng but rejected the thought after thinking about it.
There was negligible surprise in Chu Yu’s expression when she opened the doors and saw Wei Yun in front of her. Hurt was in his gaze. Chu Yu didn’t pause long before she hardened her gaze and walked past him.
In silence, she let Wei Yun follow behind. He had kept his distance, never getting closer than the length of Chu Yu’s shadow, as she allowed herself to walk Wei Yun all the way back to the Marquis of Zhenguo’s Mansion.
Chu Yu never clarifies what she meant when she said she could choose neither Wei Yun nor Gu Chusheng. What she does seem to suggest is that she cares about Wei Yun and does love him. She tells him that he is the most important man in her life, apart from her family. Because of this fact, she can’t allow any dirt to get on him, on his family or on her family because of her. As Chu Linyang had pointed out to Wei Yun, the pain felt from people insulting the military spirits of their families was greater than the pain inflicted on her own body.
She has Wei Yun see that the existence of love between two people doesn’t have to be shown through being together or through marriage. She tells him that with the country in a fragile state, they needed to focus on stabilising Great Sui and defeating North Qi. Until then, they really can’t think about things like marriage. With this said, Wei Yun agrees to go back to the way they used to be.
At Chu Mansion, Chu Linyang decides to go to Fengling City to guard it and see if he can discover more clues relating to the octagonal crossbow case. It’s a desolate city. His decision to go there is suspected to be more than just about searching for more clues. His pageboy Chu Shan suspects he’s also using this assignment to avoid Tuantuan. He doesn’t deny it. He tells Chu Shan he’s doing it for Chu Yu to try to reduce the burden on her, but also he hopes this separation will make Tuantuan forget him or he forgets her.
