Xin Yi was stunned for a good while, feeling like she almost couldn’t hold back her overly joyful heartbeat.
Who exactly was seducing whom here? She had originally planned to tease the villain, but she had nearly been seduced by him instead.
Deep breaths, deep breaths.
But him saying sweet nothings with that face was really against the rules!!
Xin Yi felt her face heating up a bit. She gave a perfunctory smile and said she understood, then yawned to indicate that she was sleepy and wanted to go to bed.
She didn’t miss the fleeting loneliness in the youth’s eyes, but she still showed no reaction to it.
Before getting into bed, however, she followed routine and lit some calming incense in the small incense burner in the corner of the bed curtains, just as she had done for the past two or three days.
She had even specially told Shen Ru Jie that it was because her sleep was light, and lighting the calming incense allowed her to sleep deeply.
The system hadn’t understood at the time. “Why do you need to sleep so deeply?”
“Of course it has its uses,” Xin Yi had said.
Staying put for the first two days was to avoid making the youth suspicious about what might happen tonight.
After all, she was a proper and reserved young lady from a noble family. She would absolutely never make any proactive seductive moves. So if something did happen, it had nothing to do with her.
At the third watch of the night, there were no other sounds in the courtyard. The moonlight was cold and exceptionally clear and quiet.
Only in the side room were two light breaths, each in their own dreams.
Suddenly, from within the silk curtains on the bed seemed to come faint sobs from a woman, very soft but indeed intermittent.
Shen Ru Jie was startled awake by the sobbing. He opened his eyes on the mat outside the screen, dazed and confused for only a moment before realizing it was Xin Yi crying.
His heart suddenly tightened. He didn’t even have time to light the candle on the table before hurriedly getting up to check.
Lifting the bed curtains and borrowing the faint moonlight filtering through the window paper, he saw that the woman on the bed seemed trapped in a nightmare. She bit her lip and cried pitifully with wu-wu sounds.
Shen Ru Jie reached out to brush away the pale little face buried in her waterfall-like black hair and touched the icy cool tears covering it.
It made his own breathing hitch, and the dense pain in his heart grew even more intense.
“Xin Yi, wake up…” While gently wiping her tears with his sleeve, he frowned and called to her.
Unfortunately, after calling many times, the woman on the bed still didn’t wake. Her sobs gradually stopped, and no new tears flowed.
Shen Ru Jie’s fingers were still stained with her damp residual tears. He stared blankly at the woman’s sleeping face for a long time.
Just as he thought to get up, a soft pale hand randomly grabbed his sleeve. Her beautiful brows and eyes were tightly closed, and she spoke weak, pitiful dream words of plea. “Don’t go… Marquis, don’t go.”
Perhaps because she hadn’t fastened her nightclothes properly before sleep, with this movement, her moon-white undergarments came loose and disheveled, revealing the spot where the tooth mark had faded.
Shen Ru Jie heard that indistinct “Marquis,” and he had already been struck by grievance and jealousy, his eyes even turning red with hate.
But when he clearly saw that tooth mark, he suddenly froze. Then his handsome face slowly heated up and turned red.
It was his bite.
Some days ago, in his madness, he had uncontrollably bitten her. The first tooth mark had landed on her shoulder, and the rest were on… He hadn’t expected the mark to still not have fully faded even now.
The pretending-to-sleep Xin Yi: Of course it hadn’t faded.
She hadn’t even bothered to apply ointment to that spot, just waiting for tonight to “accidentally” let him see it and stir up indecent memories.
Sure enough, Shen Ru Jie didn’t leave. After a moment of silence, he sat down at the edge of her bed.
Then he carefully refastened the loosened sash of her undergarments for her. It was a simple action, yet he went through it like prolonged, unbearable torment. Thin sweat beaded on his handsome forehead.
Just as the undergarments were about to be fully refastened, the woman on the bed whimpered again, furrowing her delicate brows and calling out, “Marquis…”
It was as if even in her dreams, she was obsessively yearning for another man.
The youth’s figure completely stiffened. Beneath his lowered lashes were dense, impenetrable thick darkness. After a long moment, he let out a soft chuckle.
Then he hooked his finger and tugged open that thin soft sash hanging at the woman’s chest.
“Xin Yi.” He leaned to her ear and said with a very obedient tone and a smile, “That day at the teahouse, when Shen Gui brought Zheng Wu to drink tea and eat next door, it was me kissing you.”
“The one you charmingly sobbed and held in your mouth back then was also the tip of my tongue.”
Xin Yi listened to him say such lewd words and really wanted to slap him.
But at this moment, she could only continue pretending to be completely unaware and asleep, to let everything tonight proceed smoothly.
After a moment of silence, Shen Ru Jie tilted his head until their noses touched, the kind of intimate closeness between husband and wife.
Then he chuckled, wetly and precisely capturing her lips.
The woman in his arms was especially kissable tonight. Her lips parted after just two grinds, as if to hook away his life.
Faint moonlight shone into a corner of the dim gauze curtains, making it impossible to distinguish the youth’s and woman’s tangled black hair and blue-black tresses.
It was also at this time that Xin Yi gradually “woke up.”
She pretended to be kissed breathless and finally whimpered as she opened her hazy, sleepy eyes. But for a moment, she couldn’t distinguish dream from reality.
The water clock had already passed the hour of the rat. The calming incense in the copper burner had long burned out.
She was forced to blush and tilt her neck upward until she felt something off. He, he seemed like…
The Xin Yi who hadn’t even started her performance yet: “…”
Maybe she should pretend a bit longer.
Right now, it didn’t seem suitable to put on a pear-blossom-in-rain innocent act, nor to go with “I won’t listen! I won’t listen!” while questioning.
However, holding onto this mindset and persisting for a few more moments, she realized the situation seemed to be getting worse.
“…………”
Fortunately, Shen Ru Jie also knew he couldn’t continue like this. He finally panted and parted from her lips.
He touched her thin eyelids, which she tried hard to keep closed but trembled uncontrollably, betraying her. He kissed the corner of her lips once more before getting up from the bed and pushing the door open to leave without stopping.
The system was puzzled. “What is he doing in the middle of the night?”
Xin Yi looked helplessly at the sky, thinking of that scene just now, her face also a bit red. “He probably went to take a cold bath.”
Shen Ru Jie was gone for about half an hour before he returned from outside, his black hair wet and loose.
After coming in, he lit the candle on the table and the other glass lamps set up in the side room.
Then he went around the screen to look at Xin Yi.
He knew she was awake by now—at least by the end of their kiss. That was good too. Those thoughts tormenting him to near madness no longer needed to be hidden.
He liked Xin Yi. He wanted to serve Xin Yi.
If he were Xin Yi’s husband, he would certainly do better than his useless older brother.
Then he saw the woman on the bed with her dazed pale little face. Her almond eyes were red-rimmed, her sharp little chin pitiful. She sat there holding her loosened undergarments, at a loss.
Following her slender neck downward were kiss and bite marks. Even the undergarment hanging on her body was rumpled.
Hearing his footsteps, she looked up. Her red, swollen, moist lips still had a few strands of hair stuck to them.
Her thick lashes blinked lightly, and tears fell, as if she had suffered a great fright and grievance.
“Don’t come over, A Jie…”
She pleaded helplessly with him, as if desperately maintaining her last shred of dignity. “Don’t come over. I was just… just having a nightmare.”
It seemed that as long as he didn’t approach tonight, didn’t force her to face reality, all this absurd debauchery could be treated as if it never happened.
When dawn came, he would still be her obedient and well-behaved good A Jie—just A Jie.
“You weren’t dreaming. I kissed you.”
The youth walked over and caressed her face. He suddenly chuckled softly. His seemingly calm ink-black eyes held a paranoid intensity like burning jade and stone together. “I kissed a lot of places. I kissed you that day at the teahouse too. At first it was just kissing, but later I wanted to bite everywhere…”
Pa—
The woman on the bed bit her lip, trembling as tears flowed. She raised her pale hand and slapped him hard, staring at him as she suddenly sobbed uncontrollably. “Get out! Get out right now!”
Marquis Mansion, study.
The handsome man in indigo robes was gloomily flipping through official documents. The servant boy stood by, not daring to breathe, and it wasn’t his fault for being nervous and afraid—the marquis’s temper lately had been too unpredictable.
Even those priceless inkstones had been smashed several times.
Seeing Shen Gui’s expression worsen, the servant boy tentatively suggested, “How about the marquis goes to Miss A Wu’s courtyard to rest? Sit down for a cup of tea and listen to her talk with you?”
“No.” Shen Gui’s expression was coldly sullen.
He set down the scroll in his hand and glanced at the terrified servant boy beside him, feeling even more irritated. He simply waved him out.
Now the study held only him.
Shen Gui’s thoughts drifted far. He thought of the woman he had encountered on the street a few days ago—Xin Yi, who had quickly left the marquis mansion after being repudiated by him.
He had originally thought she would have a hard time, for a woman who was chronically ill and repudiated by her husband would naturally face endless gossip.
Once she had enough of others’ mockery and pointing fingers, and enough of the hardships outside, she would naturally regret her choices and turn back tearfully to beg him.
At that time, for the sake of their once-shared marriage, he would soften with pity and give her a place to stay.
Though the position of principal wife was impossible, he could give her a child, letting her have her own flesh and blood heir.
But he never imagined that not only had she not ended up as miserable and destitute as he pictured—instead, she seemed happier than when she was in the marquis mansion.
Standing beside Shen Ru Jie, she smiled so gently and beautifully. Right there on the street, she pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve and shamelessly wiped the pastry crumbs from his lips, utterly ignorant of what avoiding suspicion meant!
And that little bastard actually obediently curved his lips and leaned in, asking her to look closely before wiping.
“Xin Yi.” He called her Xin Yi and fed her the candied pastry with such a natural attitude. When the sugar crumbs fell into Shen Ru Jie’s palm and she blushed refusing to lick them, he low-laughed and licked them with his own lips.
Damn it! Shameless!!
They hadn’t noticed Shen Gui’s presence, so naturally they didn’t see the hatred and fury surging in his eyes at that moment.
Wu Xin Yi actually dared. She actually really dared!
Shen Gui could only repeatedly warn himself: She was just a fickle woman, one he had long discarded. There was nothing worth remembering or lingering over.
Unfortunately, he still couldn’t convince himself in the end.
Because that smile was too dazzling and piercing, making him jealous, making him unable to forget. She should have been his wife, dressing and binding his hair for him, bearing his heirs after shedding her girlish innocence.
Shen Gui was too jealous. He had thought of killing that little bastard Shen Ru Jie, making him completely disappear from the world.
The other had seen through his intentions.
The youth simply stopped pretending and bared his cold fangs at him, smiling faintly as he asked, “Brother, with your skills, even adding all the guards of the entire marquis mansion, you still couldn’t kill me. And if something happened to me, at most two days later, news of ‘Marquis Shen harming his own kin’ would spread throughout the entire Capital City, known to court and commoners alike. Does brother really want to take such a risk at this critical juncture?”
Shen Gui was struck at his sore spot, his face instantly turning ashen.
But he knew the bastard was right. Many things had happened on the court lately.
The crown prince had been making frequent mistakes, botching several important tasks assigned by His Majesty one after another. Instead, the Seventh Prince—that debauched playboy and notorious libertine—seemed to have gained even more favor.
For some reason, he had a feeling that the current court appeared calm on the surface, but in reality, a storm was brewing.
At such a critical juncture, he truly couldn’t act rashly against Shen Ru Jie.
Thus, with all these matters weighing on his mind, Shen Gui’s mood grew increasingly irritable. Even his patience for A Wu was gone.
Before, he had adored Zheng Wu. No matter what she did, it all seemed wonderful and enchanting to him. Even her occasional antics and tantrums were delightfully endearing.
But lately, he felt A Wu only knew how to laugh and play around, unable to understand the heavy burdens and fatigue on him at all.
Instead, he began to miss that pair of soft hands adding fragrance with red sleeves, those pair of timid and quiet almond eyes.
He didn’t want this unfamiliar Xin Yi who only smiled at others. He wanted to get back the original Xin Yi.
Yes, get her back.
Because she was originally Shen Gui’s wife.
Xin Yi gave Shen Ru Jie the cold shoulder for several days.
She didn’t take the initiative to speak with him and pretended not to see him even when they met. Even when he silently went to sleep on the roof at night again, she showed no intention of stopping him.
Even A Ying, that simple-minded silly girl, could tell that her young miss was avoiding him.
But she thought this was for the best. As the saying went, men and women shouldn’t be too intimate. It was better for her young miss to keep her distance from him.
Only the system vaguely worried. “Host, don’t play Shen Ru Jie to death.”
Such a method of giving a sweet date and then hitting with several big sticks truly frightened it that it would drive the villain mad.
Xin Yi said indifferently, “It won’t happen. He can endure it, and I’m just adding a bit of fuel before thoroughly breaking through the shackles.”
Wasn’t it more fun for him to hold back to the utmost and then erupt?
That day, Xin Yi read a book while reclining on a chair in the courtyard.
The youth watched for a while, then walked over to pour her fresh tea. When he saw her pinch the book’s spine as if about to frown, he lowered his eyelashes and said softly, “It’s cold. You can’t drink cold tea.”
“I’m not bothering you. I’m just pouring tea for you.”
The youth’s narrow phoenix eyes fixed on her, the corners reddening with sadness. “Xin Yi, don’t reject me.”
She fell silent for a moment, then finally turned her face away and said in a muffled, stuffy voice, “……I’m not rejecting you.”
Shen Ru Jie’s breathing trembled as he stared tightly at her face.
It was as if the low mood that had lingered for several days suddenly crumbled because of her words, but his heart still felt aggrieved to the point of soreness. “Xin Yi……”
“Stand farther away. Don’t block my reading.” Her voice was also muffled.
Soon, a guest came to visit—Lu Yuan.
She had come specifically to invite Shen Ru Jie, of course at someone else’s request. It was said that at the poetry gathering two months prior, the daughter of Governor Gu had also attended. Miss Gu had fallen in love at first sight with the youth’s handsome face.
But she had left early that day due to family matters.
Thus, she hadn’t spoken to the youth she admired. Only later did she learn that he had been bullied by the children of aristocratic families, which infuriated her so much that she specially wrote a poem satirizing that misbehaving scoundrel.
A few days ago, Miss Gu heard her close friend Lu Yuan complaining about Shen Ru Jie in front of her and realized they knew each other.
So she asked Lu Yuan to come invite him, hoping Shen Ru Jie would teach her to ride a horse.
Shen Ru Jie listened patiently until the end, then his face showed no emotion as he coldly spat out two words, “Not going.”
Lu Yuan saw his wooden demeanor and nearly stomped her foot in anger. “The girl is actively inviting you—don’t be ungrateful!”
The youth sneered, “I’m precisely ungrateful.”
Seeing that neither soft nor hard tactics worked on him, Lu Yuan had no way to deal with him. She couldn’t very well tie him up and drag him there.
Fortunately, she thought of how Shen Ru Jie only listened to a certain someone, so she ran to Xin Yi’s side, hugged her arm, shook it, and pleaded, “Little Lady Wu, quickly help me persuade him! I’ve already promised Miss Gu—it’s embarrassing if my boasting gets exposed.”
Xin Yi was shaken into a chuckle. She raised her eyes to look at him. “A Jie, go ahead.”
Shen Ru Jie’s expression could no longer be described as merely unpleasant.
His eyes suddenly reddened sourly, as if she had done something ruthlessly excessive.
With the get-out-of-jail-free card in hand, Lu Yuan grinned and said, “See, Xin Yi said to go. Are you going to make her angry?”
In the end, Shen Ru Jie gazed at her indifferent, beautiful profile for a long time.
Finally, he curled his lips in a self-mocking smile, then said to Lu Yuan, “Fine. Isn’t it just teaching horseback riding? I’ll go.”
With that, he expressionlessly picked up the sword from the stone table. As he passed Xin Yi, he said nothing more and turned to leave the courtyard with Lu Yuan.
But just as he was about to step out of the courtyard gate, the system precisely captured the change in favorability. “Ding-dong~ Detected Shen Ru Jie’s favorability drop by ten points. Now at 80!”
Xin Yi: “……”
She finally probed by calling out, “A Jie.”
Then in her mind came, “Ding-dong~ Congratulations, host. The villain’s current favorability has risen to 85%. Keep at it!”
The youth turned around. The previously gloomy dark eyes gradually filled with a bit of amusement. “Since Xin Yi doesn’t want me to go, then I won’t.”
Xin Yi fell silent.
According to this pattern where every ten-point drop allowed only a five-point recovery.
If she now said it wasn’t to keep him but to remind him he could come back late, would the favorability drop below the passing line?