The driver was dumbfounded.
He had worked as the driver for the Wei family for twenty years. To be honest, he had seen a lot of messy things.
In the aristocratic circles of the Imperial Capital City, which family was clean?
Even the Wei family, with this generation being more upright and the family rules more rigid, couldn’t avoid all kinds of scandal. From the main branch to the side branches, there were always various scandals: some nephew of the head of the family keeping a mistress, some relative using power to forcefully marry someone else’s wife…
But no matter how ugly things got, no one dared to bring them to the surface, let alone cause a scene at the main house.
And yet, in just one night, he had witnessed the second son of the head of the family, their promising Second Young Master, rob his good brother’s widow…
And what did this young sentinel just say?
A homewrecker?!
It was over.
It was over.
The driver’s face was pale. How was he going to explain this to the master, to the madam, and to the eldest young master?
The second Young Master was having an affair outside, and the real master even came knocking?!
The real master… the real master came to beat up the homewrecker…
The young sentinel’s face was full of fury. He leaned in close to the one-way window, his fists pounding against the glass with the rhythm of a torrential storm. Through the tinted, curved glass, one could see his sword-like eyebrows and starry eyes, now contorted by rage. His mouth opened and closed nonstop, questioning aggressively.
Until the car door opened and the sentinel inside stepped out.
He was wearing a suit and tie, the white dress shirt underneath buttoned neatly at the cuffs, his muscular arms defined under the fabric. Not a single strand of hair was out of place, and his face was as cold and stern as always.
This sentinel had appeared on the live broadcast of the summit just hours ago, he was the illustrious Lieutenant General of the Empire. No one would doubt his character, if they ignored the fact that his suit jacket was missing and there were undeniable wet marks on the front of his trousers.
Yan Ji caught sight of the suggestive stains on Wei Zhuo’s trousers, and his mind exploded with a deafening roar. His blood surged backwards, and without hesitation, he swung his fist with brutal force.
The sound of his punch slicing through the air was sharp and clear.
Wei Zhuo still had a bit of rationality left. He didn’t want things to get ugly in front of Xin Hexue, so he blocked Yan Ji’s first punch. But before their eyes could even meet, another punch came straight at him.
“Are you crazy?!”
Wei Zhuo’s face was cold as he took a step back. Unable to dodge completely, the punch grazed his cheek, leaving the area around his cheekbone red.
Yan Ji took a deep breath, the red in his eyes like a caged beast barely holding back madness. He growled in a low voice, “You still have the face to show up here?! How could you do this to him after everything that happened before?”
“He had turned you down…can’t you get it?”
The driver was dumbfounded.
“He doesn’t like you, you shameless bastard!”
The words from He Botian’s substitute shouldn’t have hurt Wei Zhuo in the slightest, even though he had just offended the other party’s so-called legitimate boyfriend in a not-so-upright manner.
He could have kept his composure if Yan Ji hadn’t said that final sentence, and hadn’t ruthlessly torn through the last illusion at the dawn of a new year…
—He doesn’t like you.
Fueled by emotion, blood rushed wildly to his heart, but the heart felt like a punctured water bag, boiling blood spilling out in chaos.
The two sentinels brawled like wild beasts, fists and kicks flying. The sound of flesh hitting flesh was heavy and dull. Because of the firework and firecracker restrictions, such thudding sounds during the quiet dawn of the new year were especially loud.
While beating each other senselessly on instinct, they shouted hoarsely, questioning each other:
“You were eavesdropping?!”
“Fuck, so what if I was eavesdropping? You are already stealing my boyfriend! So it’s okay for you to steal someone, but not okay for me to eavesdrop?”
“Filthy language!”
“How dare do something so obscene and then turn around to scold me for foul language? Don’t you have any shame? Is there anyone who can put a stop to this?! I’m going to let everyone know that their revered so-called Lieutenant General is nothing but a shameless sentinel! I curse all you home-wrecking mistresses to suffer from premature ejaculation in your prime!”
The fight only escalated. Not only were the punches becoming more vicious, the argument became more and more unbearable to hear. They even started digging up past grudges.
Yan Ji was furious beyond reason, veins bulging on his neck. “If I were you, after forcing someone once, I’d never dare show my face again! And now you’ve done this again, you really should be shot dead by a White Tower sniper and even that would be too merciful for polluting the land with your filthy blood!”
Wei Zhuo paused slightly, then retorted sharply, “When did I force him again? Is this the kind of education you received…making up baseless lies and shifting blame onto others just to cover up your own guilty conscience?”
Inside the car, the young man was wrapped in the sentinel’s suit jacket, head buzzing and heavy and eyes closed in a daze. Upon hearing this, he finally stirred.
Xin Hexue was worried that the two would keep fighting and dig up more old dirt, finally realizing that the two sentinels had been taking the blame for each other from the start. In fact, the traces left back then had come from the vines, not from either of them.
He propped himself up with difficulty, but his waist was sore and weak, which made his movements slow.
Xin Hexue pushed aside Wei Zhuo’s coat draped over him. His shirt inside was wrinkled, and a few buttons were undone, revealing a snow-white slender waist that was covered in finger-shaped bruises left by the man’s grip.
His skin was thin, and just a few touches and rubs would leave red marks. So even if the sentinel had tried to restrain himself during the scene, the end result still looked like he had suffered inhumane torture.
As he stretched out his long legs and pulled on his trousers, thick white fluid overflowed from between his thighs. Xin Hexue frowned and couldn’t help but curse softly, “Bastard.”
He looked around but couldn’t find any tissues within reach. With no time to care, he tried his best to ignore the sticky feeling between his legs and tidied up his clothes.
“Yan Ji.”
He cleared his throat, but his voice was still slightly hoarse, and just hearing it made the mind involuntarily fill in the blanks, and a tingling electric pleasure surged across the cerebral cortex.
Yan Ji turned his head, no longer caring about fighting with the other sentinel or trying to beat his love rival into the ICU. He returned to Xin Hexue’s side like a dog responding to its master’s call.
“You…you’re injured?!”
Yan Ji stared at the gauze wrapped around Xin Hexue’s ankle like an ankle brace.
He had no idea about this.
Earlier, Yan Ji had been so furious that he broke up with him on impulse. Then, unable to control himself, he smashed his communicator, shattering the screen so badly there was a liquid leak in the upper right corner. The second it left his hand, he regretted it. What if Xin Hexue called or sent him a message and he missed it?
He rushed to salvage the communicator, barely managing to restore the touchscreen. Then he called Xin Hexue.
But what he heard instead was the sound of Xin Hexue’s communicator seemingly slipping to the floor, and then came Wei Zhuo’s drunken confession to Xin Hexue.
But at the most crucial moment, the communicator gave out completely, finally burning out the last of its life and dying for good.
Yan Ji felt like he died too at that moment.
He waited at the second-floor window, watching as the long black car stopped in front of the villa. But the front passenger door didn’t open. Could it be that Xin Hexue was still considering how to explain things to him?
Explain what happened with He Botian, and explain what happened tonight?
He didn’t even dare blink as he stared, hoping the black-haired young man with fair skin would step out from the passenger side.
As a result, the first person to get out was the driver with an unfamiliar face.
Wait. If Wei Zhuo wasn’t in the driver’s seat, then no one was in the passenger seat either.
What was that bastard and Xin Hexue doing in the back seat?!
And so Yan Ji stormed out of the villa, furiously pounding on the rear car window like a madman.
Now that things had reached this point, Yan Ji felt completely hopeless. He regretted acting on impulse and saying they should break up. If he hadn’t said it, he could’ve pretended to not care and stayed by Xin Hexue’s side. After all, He Botian was dead, he wasn’t some white moonlight returning from overseas to make Xin Hexue give him up on the spot. He still had a chance to rise in the ranks later.
But now, he had messed up everything.
And if that wasn’t enough, now came a Wei Zhuo.
Yan Ji gritted his teeth in hatred, wishing he could immediately call for a White Tower sniper to get into position.
Xin Hexue avoided Yan Ji’s outstretched hand and said calmly to Wei Zhuo, “You should go back.”
Wei Zhuo took two steps forward. He looked a mess; his suit was stained with dust from who knows where, his cheekbone was bruised purple, and there was dried blood on the corner of his lips. He and Yan Ji were in the same condition, and neither one had the upper hand.
Xin Hexue turned his head away. The driver in the distance stood there helplessly, unsure of what to do. He cast a pleading glance toward Xin Hexue, who was at the center of the chaos.
He didn’t look at Wei Zhuo and simply said, “Go back. Uncle and Auntie will be worried about you.”
Wei Zhuo pursed his lips tightly, his expression resolute. “No matter how you reject me, I’ll come again.”
At this point, he couldn’t back down like before. Even if Xin Hexue called him a beast, a bastard, or any kind of scum, he wouldn’t retreat anymore.
Xin Hexue lowered his eyes, casting a faint shadow beneath his lashes, and said nothing.
Before getting into the car, Wei Zhuo gave the young man a long look.
Yan Ji stepped in front of Xin Hexue possessively and blocked his view, unwilling to give even an inch of space. He really wanted to gouge out Wei Zhuo’s eyes.
…
Warm golden light rose from the city skyline, piercing through the green trees and flower-covered walls of the villa district. The light of the new year finally shone softly upon the two of them.
Without a word, Yan Ji carried Xin Hexue in his arms and walked quickly back into the villa, finally placing him gently on the sofa.
He kept his head down. “Did you drink? The hangover soup in the pot seems to have gone cold. I’ll go make you a fresh one.”
He kept talking, getting more and more nervous, trying to skip over everything that had just happened. But in the end, it was useless.
Until Xin Hexue said softly, “I’m sorry.”
This one sentence completely threw off his rhythm. One standing, one sitting, the two of them faced each other, frozen in place, like a portrait. Only silence flowed through the air.
Yan Ji said dryly, “Why are you saying sorry to me? Haha, so weird. What’s there to be sorry for? It’s all that shameless sentinel’s fault! He’s a so-called Imperial Lieutenant General, I…”
Xin Hexue slowly interrupted him, “You know that’s not what I’m talking about.”
Yan Ji’s shoulders seemed to slump all at once.
He could only listen to Xin Hexue explain gently, “At the beginning, I really wanted to have a completely new start with you. But… I’m sorry. Just like I said when I was hesitating before, I still haven’t been able to walk out of my last relationship. Rushing into a new bonding relationship only ended up hurting you…”
“Even though I never meant to treat you as a substitute for He Botian, the truth is I can’t forget him. That means I couldn’t fully give myself to a new relationship without distractions.”
“As someone older, what I did was really irresponsible.”
Yan Ji met Xin Hexue’s eyes, which were so gentle they filled him only with sorrow. He heard the other party say, “I’ll make it up to you. But we’re over now. I don’t want to keep going.”
“Over?!” Yan Ji immediately reacted like a startled dog, raising his voice. His hands at his sides trembled. “You say you’ll make it up to me, you say it’s over, and that’s it? Xin Hexue, how can you be so cruel!”
His voice choked and almost broke at the end. Veins popped along his neck as if he were being forced into a corner.
Xin Hexue looked at him like he was watching a child throwing a tantrum for not getting candy. His long eyelashes lowered, and there were faint bluish shadows beneath his eyes from exhaustion. “But… you’re the one who said we should break up. That means this relationship was already bringing you more pain than happiness.”
“I don’t want to keep delaying you, and I don’t want to let this mistake drag on. I’ll do everything I can to make it up to you.”
As the only 3S-level guide, already a Major General and backed by the White Tower…just how many resources and connections Xin Hexue had at his disposal was impossible to measure. Whatever compensation he offered would certainly leave the recipient well taken care of in every way.
But Yan Ji didn’t care.
When he chose to be with Xin Hexue, he never cared about those things. He just wanted Xin Hexue and he didn’t want to separate.
“What do you take me for? You call me when you want me, and send me away when you don’t. Am I your pitiful stray dog?”
His Adam’s apple felt like a sharp, cold stone, and he had to use all his strength just to swallow the sobs, and as he spoke, his eyes turned completely red as he spoke.
He clenched his fists so tightly that his nails dug into his flesh.
Xin Hexue reached out his hand, and Yan Ji instinctively crawled closer, pressing his face into the soft flesh of Xin Hexue’s palm.
The pad of his finger gently wiped away the sentinel’s rare tears. The young man’s voice was extremely tender. “This is my fault. Don’t be like this, Yan Ji. It won’t look good.”
[Yan Ji heartbreak value +15]
[Yan Ji’s current heartbreak value is 75]
…
The sentinel’s figure disappeared from the doorway, taking nothing with him.
With his back turned to Xin Hexue, his voice dropped to freezing point, cold and hard. “Let’s part on good terms.”
Xin Hexue’s ankle sprain from last night wasn’t actually serious. It was just a minor twist. After Wei Zhuo’s emergency treatment, walking wasn’t too difficult. But because of his physical condition, the injured area still looked bruised and purple, making the injury appear worse than it actually was.
From where he sat, he could look down from the floor-to-ceiling window. He caught a glimpse of Yan Ji still pacing angrily and anxiously outside the villa, about thirty meters from the house.
…Like a stupid dog that ran away from home but didn’t dare go farther than thirty meters.
