After a long moment, he pulled back a little. “Let’s go to sleep. I’m sorry for keeping Little Xun up so late.”
“We?” Shen Qiuxun recalled some unpleasant memories from Xu Zhiyuan’s heat, and his head shook like a rattle-drum. “No way. What if you lick me while I’m asleep?”
【.】
Xu Zhiyuan thought for a moment, then reached into the tea table cabinet behind him, pulled out an item, and offered it up.
Puzzled, Shen Qiuxun opened the packaging, and his eye twitched: a muzzle.
It had a black metallic texture.
Xu Zhiyuan bowed his head docilely. “Little Xun, if you put it on me, you won’t have to be afraid.”
Unreservedly, he exposed the back of his neck to Shen Qiuxun, like a wolf willingly putting on a dog’s leash.
【Shameless! You’re not allowed to reward him!】
‘What reward? This is clearly an insult, okay?’ Holding the muzzle, Shen Qiuxun was in a dilemma. He glanced at the glass, took a deep breath, and followed the instruction manual to put it on the man.
The black leather straps and metal fit the man’s head perfectly, adding a touch of forbidden handsomeness.
Xu Zhiyuan happily lowered his head and nuzzled Shen Qiuxun’s palm. “Let’s go to sleep.”
Shen Qiuxun sighed. This money really wasn’t easy to earn.
He was simply too exhausted, so he didn’t act coy. Xu Zhiyuan followed closely behind him, and the two returned to the room. It was a super-sized Star Lord suite with a 360-degree view from the heights. Shen Qiuxun had only seen such rooms during university internships.
“Which room are you sleeping in?”
After a long silence with no reply, Shen Qiuxun turned his head and found the other man staring at him in a daze. “?”
“I’m asking you.”
Xu Zhiyuan’s eyes blinked slowly. Subconsciously, he pointed to the carpet beside the large master bed.
“…” Shen Qiuxun opened his mouth as if to speak but ultimately said nothing. After showering, he burrowed into the covers. A moment later, he stretched out a leg and kicked the person beside him. “Get lost and go take a shower.”
Xu Zhiyuan stared for a long time at the foot resting on his waist before suddenly reacting. “Okay.”
Shen Qiuxun yawned, turned over, and fell asleep the moment his head touched the pillow.
Xu Zhiyuan curled up at the edge of the bed. Faint strands of a light fragrance lingered at his nose. With his eyes open, he watched the specks of starlight in the sky. Time ticked by, second by second. Finally, in the dead of night, he carefully knelt up.
He saw that small, makeup-free face wrapped in the light grey bedding. Hair like fine satin scattered across the grey. Thick black eyelashes, a high nose bridge. The mole under the lip that haunted his dreams was exposed to the air because of the slightly pursed lips.
The breathing was very light, rising and falling in a steady rhythm.
It was just like the beautiful dream he had longed for but could never reach over the past five years.
Perhaps his gaze was too obsessive. In his sleep, Shen Qiuxun raised a hand to cover a small part of his face, and his other hand stretched out naturally, landing right at the edge of the large bed, right in front of Xu Zhiyuan.
Xu Zhiyuan swallowed dryly. He cautiously reached out, his fingertips hovering in the air for a long time, before finally mustering the courage to touch the pale knuckles.
It was real.
Xu Zhiyuan closed his eyes. A teardrop, mixed with traces of blood, fell from the air and vanished into the plush carpet.
He lost control, bowing his head. In the silent night, he sobbed uncontrollably.
Lower City District, rental house.
It was already the early hours of the morning. Outside the window, it was pitch-black and completely silent.
Shreds of moonlight spilled from the balcony into the room, touching the shadows of one person and one cat.
Fu Mingchuan sat against the base of a wall, his arms wrapped around his bent knees. Those lifeless dark-brown eyes stared intently at the doorway, but no matter how long he sat there, the familiar sound of footsteps never came from outside.
“It’s good that he’s not coming back. It’s very late now, Xiao Er must be tired.” Fu Mingchuan murmured to himself, reaching out to stroke the kitten seeking warmth in his bedding.
The kitten hadn’t slept either, letting out a tiny meow.
“I wonder what kind of matter it is.”
The moonlight shifted, striking the bridge of his nose and his brow bone, as if pooling a puddle of dark water in his eye sockets.
“So this is how painful waiting feels…” Fu Mingchuan tilted his head back, his skull pressing against the wall. The coolness seeped into his body. “What is Xiao Er doing right now?”
“Where is he?”
“At whose side?”
“And who… who is it that’s competing with me for him?”
“Why must he hide things… why… why.”
Sensing the agitated emotions of its human companion beside it, the kitten sat up and watched him curiously for a moment, then looked back at the tranquil doorway. It lowered its head to nuzzle the human’s calf. “Meow, meow, meow.”
Why isn’t my Master back yet?
“Meow, meow, meow.”
Has he abandoned you?
“Meow, meow, meow, meow.”
You’re so useless.
The night was cool as water. Fu Mingchuan stroked the kitten’s head and kept his eyes open until dawn.
Shen Qiuxun remembered setting an alarm, but he ended up sleeping until he woke naturally. When he opened his eyes, he felt a bit dazed for a moment. He rubbed his eyes, and upon seeing his Lightbrain, he jolted in fright and sat upright. Great, he’d set it for seven in the evening.
In front of him, a man, bare-chested and wearing a black apron, was bending over to prepare breakfast.
Hearing the sound, the man turned his head. The black muzzle flashed with a hint of cold light. The black material wrapped around his face and body, and streamlined lights glided over his very toned muscles. It was clearly an angle that had been carefully adjusted. “Little Xun, good morning.”
Shen Qiuxun’s lifted heart suddenly settled. In that blurry moment when he first looked over, he actually thought it was Fu Mingchuan.
If he knew that out here, he was watching another man wearing an apron and cooking breakfast for him…
Fu Mingchuan would probably cry his eyes out.
Xu Zhiyuan was very different today… he had an extra black tail behind him!
It was a fluffy black, glossy and smooth, raised up like a spirit creature, swaying along with Xu Zhiyuan’s movements.
【He’s so damn flirty.】
Like a curious baby, Shen Qiuxun approached and grabbed the tip of the tail. The tail swayed and wiggled, as if nuzzling his hand. It looked so real, could it be…
“Does Little Xun like it?” Xu Zhiyuan threw him a flirtatious glance and then saw Shen Qiuxun starting to tug at his pants. “No… this is a bionic mechanical tail, it’s fake.”
“Oh.” Shen Qiuxun gave it a few vigorous strokes. “I want one too. I want a… nine-tailed fox one.”
He thought for a moment, remembering bloggers he’d seen before on videos: So incredibly cool!
Xu Zhiyuan felt the situation developing a bit off-track, but it was clearly a runaway horse already, beyond control. He felt somewhat helpless. “Alright, I’ll give you one next time you visit.”
Shen Qiuxun suddenly felt a slight shiver of unease. He sat down on the sofa near the floor-to-ceiling window. The entire bustling prosperity of the Blue River Bank was laid out before his eyes. A brilliantly glowing skybridge seemed to stretch across the horizon, majestic and magnificent.
A line of somewhat inappropriate poetry came to mind: “Rolling clouds are born within my breast; straining my eyes, the homing birds return.”
He stood before the massive floor-to-ceiling window for a while, remembering things from his childhood.
Before he started living at the middle school dormitory, he had always lived in the orphanage dormitory. One dorm room could hold twenty-six people. Beside Shen Qiuxun’s bed was a small window without curtains. Outside it was an evergreen pine tree.
At night, the orphanage’s streetlights were very bright. Light crept through the window, shining exactly on his bed. He would often lie in bed, looking up out the window, and stare blankly at the rising and falling pine branches outside. In winter, to keep warm, they’d usually have two people sleeping in one bed.
He’d look at the ice crystals forming on the tips of the pine branches at night, and his good friend would crawl over from the foot of the bed to hug his shoulders. His body was nice and warm, seeping warmth into his cold shoulders.
“Little Xun, what are you looking at?” Xu Zhiyuan walked over and gently placed his hands on his shoulders. In a place the Beta couldn’t perceive, the heavy liquor-scented pheromones climbed up his body like a serpent, coiling and entwining.
“Hm? That building across the way is quite nice-looking.” Shen Qiuxun casually made up an excuse.
Xu Zhiyuan followed his gaze and looked for a moment, seeing the two letters “WW” emblazoned atop the building.
Shen Qiuxun ruthlessly rejected Xu Zhiyuan’s application to help him wash his face and brush his teeth, dealing with it all very quickly.
Breakfast suited his tastes very much, but he ate somewhat absentmindedly.
How come both his mission targets are fugitives? System, is something worrying you?
【If I recall correctly, you’re the one who reported this current one, aren’t you?】
Xu Zhiyuan was sitting to the side, cutting his steak. He raised his eyes to gaze at Shen Qiuxun with deep affection, then got inexplicably glared at.
“?” Xu Zhiyuan looked down and meticulously appraised himself. He had gotten up extra early to spruce himself up from head to toe. Was something wrong?
He reached out to activate his Lightbrain, kneeling beside Shen Qiuxun. The tail behind him swayed back and forth. A sheet of transparent holographic screen displayed in the air. “Shall we go skiing? Yesterday, Planet Simu happened to have a heavy snowfall. At night, when you’re tired from playing, we can soak in the hot springs at a private hot spring.”
“I’m heading back once I finish eating.” Shen Qiuxun paused slightly, thinking for a long while before speaking. “Yesterday was Thursday. I’ll come every Thursday then. You wait for me at this hotel.”
Xu Zhiyuan still wanted to say something, but meeting that pair of calm, indifferent eyes, he suddenly swallowed the words in his mouth. “Alright.”
Shen Qiuxun yawned, picking up two strawberries in his hand. The strawberries were particularly large; with one in each hand, he couldn’t carry anything else.
Walking out the room door, Shen Qiuxun looked back and hooked his fingers downward a little, his eyelids lifting lazily.
The foot Xu Zhiyuan had just stepped out of the room with immediately retreated back inside. He held onto the door frame, and even his flamboyant hair seemed to droop dejectedly. The apron, already tied very loosely, sagged slightly, revealing clearly defined, evenly arranged eight-pack abs. “Alright, I’ll be good and wait for you obediently.”
He knew. He had to take it slowly. Slow down, don’t be impatient.
Shen Qiuxun glanced at the abs, then raised his eyes to look at the man’s face. Frowning, he left. The way he acted, you’d think no one else had them.
He truly didn’t have any.
I’m so bitter.
He walked into the elevator and saw Xu Zhiyuan awkwardly reach his hand up, threading it from below through the apron, then slowly climbing from his collarbone to his Adam’s apple. Those dark-green eyes carried a hint of seduction.
The elevator doors closed.
Shen Qiuxun saw his own shocked expression reflected in the elevator’s metal walls. ‘Has this guy’s brain short-circuited?’
【.】 Cheeky bastard.
He reached to lift the hem of his own shirt, seeing his slender waist. His muscles clung obediently to his bones, but the contours weren’t very obvious. He compared them himself, then put his shirt hem back down, waiting with a cold face for the elevator number to steadily decrease and finally reach the first floor.
【My database is feeling a bit fried again. I’m going to go deal with it.】
‘Why do you keep running a fever every other day? How about getting a loan to swap out your mainframe, kid?’
The elevator doors opened. Standing in the doorway was a young man in a suit. To Shen Qiuxun, who was used to seeing handsome men, this man looked truly rather plain, his only advantage being an approachable air.
“Madam, you may call me Little Zheng. I am your guide. This way, please.”
“Don’t call me Madam.”
Little Zheng’s smile remained unchanged. “Certainly, Mr. Shen.”
Shen Qiuxun remembered not agreeing to Xu Zhiyuan’s pick-up and drop-off transport. He actually disliked cars, and hated the smell of leather and perfume inside them even more. Truthfully, for him, taking the train was more comfortable.
They stepped onto a shuttle cart. Shen Qiuxun’s mind was wandering as he followed Little Zheng to the station. There wasn’t a single pedestrian around, only scattered staff members, all wearing identical smiles.
Shen Qiuxun finally stopped before the train, then walked inside. Seeing the furnishings within the carriage, he suddenly formed a suspicion.
“This is a round-trip train that President Xu has commissioned for your exclusive use. Whenever you have need, simply perform an iris scan at the station, and it shall be available. We await your command at any time.” Little Zheng explained gently. He guided Shen Qiuxun to sit down, then prepared a thin blanket, fruit, desserts, and turned on a movie for him.
After doing this series of tasks, he left softly. “If you require anything, Mr. Shen, please press the call bell.”
A woman in a business suit took Little Zheng’s place. She offered up an electronic document. There were many words; Shen Qiuxun didn’t read them carefully, but the title was incredibly conspicuous: “WW Interstellar United Company Share Transfer Agreement”
He followed the woman’s pen as she pointed and saw the number of shares being transferred: 79%.
The woman smiled. “This has been prepared by President Xu. Would you like me to explain it to you clause by clause?”
【Sign it. You might as well; it’s free.】
Shen Qiuxun hadn’t even considered refusing. After all, signing an agreement was just a temporary thrill and didn’t count for much. With a wooden expression, he signed his name. Once the woman had left, he reactivated his Lightbrain to search for what exactly “WW” was. But as the Lightbrain booted up, he saw two small letters at the bottom of the holographic screen.
Exactly “ww.”
Dizzy. You rich people are terrifying.
The sweet female voice announcing the train’s departure came over the broadcast.
“…” Shen Qiuxun let out a cold sneer born of resentment for the wealthy.
