That place should be under martial law at this time.
Gu Qiaoqiao and Uncle Gu’s party boarded a plane and finally left the Imperial Capital once more.
Then, at night, they arrived at the provincial capital of the Great Northwest.
This jade mine is the same as the one in Diannan.
It is not located in the provincial capital.
It’s more than a thousand miles away from the provincial capital.
And the road covering those thousand miles is not in good condition.
However, there is a train.
Without delay, Uncle Gu led Gu Qiaoqiao and the others to buy train tickets and head to the station; when the time came, they boarded the train.
Fortunately, they didn’t have to change trains along the way and went directly to the terminal station.
The terminal station is just over two hundred miles from the jade mine.
In that small town, there is an office of the Gu Family’s jade mine.
There are cars and people there.
It’s much more convenient once you reach the office.
By now, it was already past seven in the evening.
The night was darkening, as if one could hear the howling of the wind deep in the desert.
This was Gu Qiaoqiao’s first time coming to the Great Northwest.
The landscape here is completely different from the south and the central plains.
Now that it’s the end of September, there’s a pervasive sense of desolation, along with the feeling of the setting sun’s long afterglow stretching over the vast desert.
It spontaneously brings to mind the scenes described in martial arts novels.
This train had no sleeping berths.
Because there were always few passengers, the rail department provided this train service only to accommodate the local people.
Because the roads here hadn’t been completely fixed yet.
At this time, there were indeed very few people on the train.
They didn’t need to stick to their assigned seats either.
Gu Qiaoqiao and Uncle Gu, along with three others, found a carriage with few passengers and sat down.
At this moment, the sky outside had turned completely dark.
Then, after a long whistle, the train began to move.
They estimated that they would reach their destination by ten o’clock the next morning.
Although it was evening, no one felt much like sleeping.
Gu Qiaoqiao pulled out a book and began to read.
On the other side, Uncle Gu started drinking his health tea.
After all, it wasn’t bedtime yet, and things were quite monotonous.
The four bodyguards, however, were playing poker.
They paired off into teams of two and seemed to be enjoying themselves a great deal.
At this time, the carriage was very quiet.
Only the clattering sound of the train could be heard.
Gu Qiaoqiao, quietly reading her book, suddenly felt something was off.
She quickly looked up and saw a cat standing in the aisle of the carriage, a cat she didn’t notice when it had appeared.
This cat was all white, and in the dim light, its purple eyes glowed brightly.
It looked as beautiful as the purple gemstone in the Treasure Room of Gu Garden.
Gu Qiaoqiao was very fond of these fluffy little animals.
She just hadn’t expected to encounter a cat in the carriage.
Then the cat, sensing Gu Qiaoqiao’s gaze, walked elegantly towards her.
In that instant, Gu Qiaoqiao felt as if she were watching a graceful, jade-like young lord slowly approaching.
Gu Qiaoqiao chuckled and shook her head, chastising herself for being so engrossed in the mythical story she had just read.
Because the story Gu Qiaoqiao had been reading was about a monster.
The protagonist of the story was a fox spirit that had transformed into a beautiful young man.
Of course, that was a fox spirit, not the white cat in front of her now.
This white cat was not very large, more like a kitten, and now it was walking towards Gu Qiaoqiao neither too quickly nor too slowly.
Gu Qiaoqiao put her book down.
The little cat stopped in front of Gu Qiaoqiao’s seat.
It looked up and quietly observed Gu Qiaoqiao.
Gu Qiaoqiao was sitting on a long bench seat.