[GL] I'm Just A Side Character... So Why Is The Heroine Chasing Me?!-Chapter 39: Midnight Escape

They moved fast.

Lan Yue stuffed their belongings into bags while Liu Ruyan and Chen Mei scrambled to gather anything they couldn’t leave behind. There wasn’t much. A few changes of clothes. Zhao Lingxi’s cultivation notes. The jar of healing salve that Lan Yue kept refilling from her personal dimension.

"The east gate," Zhao Lingxi said quietly. "The guards change shift at midnight. There’s a five minute window where only one man stands watch."

"How do you know that?" Lan Yue asked.

"I lived here for ten years before my banishment. I memorized every patrol route, every shift change, every blind spot in the walls." Zhao Lingxi tied her hair back with a simple ribbon, keeping the pearl pin secure above her left ear. "I may have been a child, but I was never stupid."

"Nobody has ever accused you of being stupid, Young Miss."

"My father has. Several times, actually."

"Your father is an idiot."

Liu Ruyan gasped. Chen Mei covered her mouth.

Zhao Lingxi’s lips curved. "Careful, Lan Yue. That’s treason against the head of a noble household."

"He can add it to the list of things he’s angry about."

They finished packing in under twenty minutes. Zhao Lingxi led them through the back pathways of the estate, moving through shadows with the ease of someone who had memorized every stone and every corner.

The Clear Frost Garden was located at the farthest edge of the property, which meant they had to cross nearly the entire estate to reach the east gate. Every lantern was a threat. Every distant voice could mean discovery.

Lan Yue walked close behind Zhao Lingxi, her senses sharp, scanning for trouble.

They passed the kitchen quarters. The main courtyard. The garden where Madam Hua kept her prized orchids.

Lan Yue’s foot caught on something.

She stumbled forward with a grunt, knocking into Zhao Lingxi’s back. Her mistress caught herself against the wall, and suddenly they were pressed together in the narrow passage between two buildings. Lan Yue’s hands were flat against the wall on either side of Zhao Lingxi’s shoulders. Their faces were inches apart.

"Sorry," Lan Yue breathed. "Tripped on a root."

"There are no roots here. This is paved stone."

"Then I tripped on... the stone."

"You tripped on flat ground."

"It was a very aggressive stone."

They were whispering. The moonlight fell through the gap above them, illuminating half of Zhao Lingxi’s face. One dark eye watched Lan Yue with something between amusement and patience. Her breath was warm against Lan Yue’s chin.

Lan Yue became suddenly, painfully aware of every point of contact between them. Zhao Lingxi’s shoulder against her arm. The faint rise and fall of her chest. The way she smelled like herbal tea and something else, something warm and clean that Lan Yue could not identify and could not stop noticing.

"We should move," Zhao Lingxi murmured.

"Yes. Moving. Good idea."

Neither of them moved.

From somewhere behind them, Liu Ruyan hissed, "Are you two coming or are we escaping on our own?"

Lan Yue jerked backward so fast she nearly fell again. Zhao Lingxi straightened her robes and continued walking as if nothing had happened.

Chen Mei leaned toward Liu Ruyan. "Were they just..."

"Don’t ask questions you don’t want answers to," Liu Ruyan said firmly.

---

They reached the east gate at exactly midnight.

True to Zhao Lingxi’s knowledge, only one guard stood watch. He was an older man, half asleep on his feet, his spear leaning against the wall beside him.

"I’ll handle this," Lan Yue said.

She walked up to the guard with a casual stride and a friendly smile.

"Evening. Rough shift?"

The guard blinked. "What? Who are you?"

"Servant from the Clear Frost Garden. The First Miss forgot her medicine at the apothecary in town and she’s having a terrible reaction. Spiritual energy imbalance. Very serious. We need to get to the Night Market healer before her meridians collapse."

The guard looked skeptical. "In the middle of the night?"

"Meridians don’t wait for morning."

"I haven’t received orders to open the gate."

"And by the time you send someone to get orders, the First Miss could be permanently damaged. Do you want to be the guard who crippled General Zhao’s daughter because he followed procedure?"

The guard’s face went through several emotions in quick succession. Confusion. Worry. Self preservation.

He opened the gate.

"Be quick about it," he muttered.

"You’re a lifesaver," Lan Yue said, and waved the others through.

They slipped out into the dark streets of the capital. The gate closed behind them with a soft thud.

Zhao Lingxi glanced at Lan Yue. "Meridian collapse?"

"I panicked."

"That was the least panicked lie I’ve ever heard."

"I was panicking on the inside."

---

The streets of the capital were different at night. Quieter, but not empty. Night vendors still sold steamed buns and soup from small carts. Lanterns hung along the main roads, creating pools of warm light between stretches of darkness. Stray cats watched them from rooftops with glowing eyes.

They made their way toward the Academy’s city office, a small building near the central market where students could arrange transportation back to Spirit Crane Mountain.

The office was closed, naturally. It was midnight.

"Now what?" Liu Ruyan asked, shivering in the night air.

"We wait until morning," Zhao Lingxi said.

"In the street?"

"There’s an inn two blocks north," Lan Yue said, remembering the layout from her trip to the market with Tang Xiaoli. "Nothing fancy, but it’ll have rooms."

They found the inn easily. It was called the Jade Sparrow, which made Lan Yue think of General Fluffbottom and smile despite everything.

The innkeeper was a stout woman with kind eyes who didn’t ask questions when four women showed up at her door in the middle of the night with hastily packed bags.

"Two rooms?" she asked.

"Two rooms," Lan Yue confirmed.

She paid with her remaining two spirit stones. Her entire savings, gone.

Worth it.

---

Liu Ruyan and Chen Mei took one room. Zhao Lingxi and Lan Yue took the other.

It was small. One bed. One table. One candle that flickered weakly in the corner.

Lan Yue looked at the single bed and then at Zhao Lingxi and then back at the bed.

"I’ll sleep on the floor," she said immediately.

"Don’t be ridiculous. The floor is freezing."

"I’ve slept on worse."

"I know you have. That doesn’t mean you should." Zhao Lingxi sat on the edge of the bed and began untying her outer robe. "The bed is large enough for two. We’re both adults. Stop making this complicated."

Lan Yue’s brain was very much making this complicated.

She stood awkwardly by the door while Zhao Lingxi changed into her sleeping garment behind the screen. When her mistress emerged in thin white silk, her hair loose around her shoulders, the pearl pin placed carefully on the bedside table, Lan Yue had to remind herself to blink.

"Your turn," Zhao Lingxi said, climbing into bed and pulling the covers up.

Lan Yue changed as fast as humanly possible, keeping her back turned the entire time. She blew out the candle and climbed into the other side of the bed, pressing herself against the very edge of the mattress.

The bed was not as large as Zhao Lingxi had claimed.

Lan Yue could feel the warmth radiating from her mistress’s body. Could hear her breathing. Could smell that familiar scent of herbal tea and something warm.

She stared at the ceiling, every muscle in her body rigid.

"Relax," Zhao Lingxi said in the darkness. "You’re so tense you’re shaking the entire bed."

"I’m perfectly relaxed."

"You’re holding your breath."

Lan Yue exhaled loudly.

A pause.

"Thank you," Zhao Lingxi said quietly. "For getting us out."

"The guard did most of the work. I just lied to him."

"You lied beautifully."

"Is that a compliment?"

"Take it however you want."

Silence again. The sounds of the capital filtered through the thin walls. Distant voices. A cart rolling over cobblestones. A dog barking somewhere far away.

"Zhao Lingxi," Lan Yue said.

"Hm?"

"What your father did tonight. The forced apology. The engagement." She paused, choosing her words carefully. "You know he won’t stop, right? He’ll keep trying."

"I know."

"So what do we do?"

"We get stronger." Zhao Lingxi’s voice was calm in the darkness. Certain. Like she had already mapped out the entire war and was simply waiting for the battles to begin. "We go back to the Academy. We train. We build allies. And when the time comes, we make sure he can never touch us again."

"Us?"

"You’re part of this now, Lan Yue. Whether you like it or not."

Lan Yue turned her head slightly. In the darkness, she could just barely make out the outline of Zhao Lingxi’s profile. The straight nose. The sharp jaw. The gentle curve of her lips.

"I like it," Lan Yue said softly.

Another pause. Longer this time.

Then Zhao Lingxi shifted slightly. Just barely. Enough that their shoulders touched under the blanket.

She didn’t move away.

Lan Yue didn’t either.

They lay like that in the darkness, shoulders touching, listening to each other breathe.

"Good night, Lan Yue."

"Good night, Young Miss."

Lan Yue closed her eyes.

Her heart was doing that stupid thing again. But for the first time, she didn’t try to explain it away as low blood sugar or breakfast settling or allergies to moonlight.

She just let it be.

Just for tonight.

Tomorrow she could go back to being confused.