The Shadow Guard kept his head lowered, his expression unreadable. He opened his mouth and said haltingly, “What… does the Master wish this Subordinate to do?”
So he was tossing the problem right back? Yin Wuji found it amusing. Even his perpetually gloomy expression lightened somewhat, like skies clearing after rain. He said carelessly, “Shadow Twelve, Shadow Nine was thrown into the Punishment Chamber for your sake. If you want him out… surely you must pay some price.”
Otherwise, how could he comfort the Manor Master of Listening Crane Manor, who had just lost two blades at once?
Everything was Shadow Twelve’s doing. Yin Wuji couldn’t allow him to keep occupying his Rose Garden, living here in comfort, undergoing what the Physician called “nurturing the pregnancy.”
Yin Wuji rubbed his fingers together, wanting to see what exactly Shadow Twelve would do.
The Shadow Guard’s neck flushed red from his neck down. Tormenting such a rigid, old-fashioned Shadow Guard seemed rather pointless, actually.
Yin Wuji thought no further—just in time to watch the rigid Shadow Guard suddenly kneel. His knees slammed down with a bang, and even the spot between Yin Wuji’s brows jumped.
Shadow Two already knelt before Yin Wuji. For that unreachable distance, Shadow Twelve chose to advance on his knees.
He kept his back straight, his rounded belly somewhat prominent, but it didn’t hinder his movements. Gritting his teeth, inch by inch, Shadow Twelve shuffled forward until he reached Yin Wuji.
Trembling with pale lips, Shadow Twelve pressed a kiss to Yin Wuji’s boot.
Yin Wuji: “!!!???”
Yin Wuji glanced at Shadow Two beside him, whose face remained unchanged but whose eyes flickered, and burned with fury to the roots of his ears. What had this Shadow Guard just done?
Ordering Shadow Two to get out and the matter of Shadow Nine to wait, what Yin Wuji needed to deal with right now was this audacious Shadow Guard.
He knew perfectly well that what the Master despised most was his touch, yet he still dared to press forward so shamelessly.
Yin Wuji drew his foot back, seized the Shadow Guard’s collar, and lifted his head. The Shadow Guard’s face was terrible, his shoulders hunching uneasily.
Not a trace of his former devotion—more like a man undergoing torture.
Yin Wuji froze. He hadn’t even begun to humiliate him, yet the Shadow Guard was already terrified?
Before Yin Wuji’s punishment could fall, Shadow Twelve asked in a shaking voice, “Master… is it not enough?”
Pressing down the trembling hands that wanted to undo his own waist sash, the veins on Yin Wuji’s hands surging, he demanded sharply, “What exactly are you trying to do?”
Sweat in his palms, every inch of him cold, Shadow Twelve lifted his eyes to Yin Wuji and answered, “To please the Master.”
As long as the Master was pleased, Shadow Nine—implicated through no fault of his own—would be released.
Wonderful. Yin Wuji pressed the Shadow Guard’s hands down even harder. In this Shadow Guard’s eyes, he looked exactly like one of those depraved Manor Masters who, upon taking a fancy to his own Shadow Guard, forced the man into his bed.
Yet he had genuinely only taken this Shadow Guard once. Apart from that, he had kept himself scrupulously clean—nowhere in the entire Manor could a single lover of his be found.
Riiip.
Because he pulled too hard, Yin Wuji snapped the waist sash the Shadow Guard held in his hands.
The scene became even more unseemly.
A Shadow Guard’s clothes were always close-fitting, and the waist sash’s role was critical. Once the sash came loose, everything else naturally followed.
Snow-white underclothes spread open beneath Yin Wuji’s eyes. The sun hung high; the Shadow Guard wouldn’t be cold, but Yin Wuji saw the back of his neck spasming unnaturally, goosebumps rising in dots.
The Shadow Guard’s body was rigid—he was clearly even more nervous than Yin Wuji.
“Manor Master……”
It was time for the Shadow Guard’s pulse to be taken. The Physician entered Rose Garden carrying his medicine chest, and the scene before him left him unable to advance or retreat, frozen in place.
All three of them were silent.
Until Yin Wuji gave the Physician a cold glance. “Get out.”
The Physician fled at once. In the silent Rose Garden, only Shadow Twelve and Yin Wuji remained.
Releasing his grip, Yin Wuji stared at the red marks on the back of Shadow Twelve’s hands and said coldly, “Fix your clothes.”
Shadow Twelve struggled to pull his clothes together, even quietly tucking the broken length of sash into his hand.
Watching Yin Wuji enter the room, Shadow Twelve followed him inside.
He didn’t kneel this time. Yin Wuji sat down at the edge of the bed.
That was the bed he had slept in. Shadow Twelve’s heart stirred, and then he knelt wordlessly before Yin Wuji once more. This time the movement was smaller, but the Shadow Guard’s face grew worse and worse.
Yin Wuji asked, “Just now—what were you trying to do?”
A moment ago he’d looked like a man under torture; now, at Yin Wuji’s question, his earlobes went red. Shadow Twelve explained stiffly, “This is all this Subordinate knows.”
A Shadow Guard who had never once failed an assassination mission said this was all he knew—all he could do was undo his sash and beg for Yin Wuji’s mercy.
The blade he had trained with his own hands knew only this.
Yin Wuji’s eyes darkened, turmoil churning inside him. He easily parted the clothes the Shadow Guard was clutching closed, tipped up the Shadow Guard’s chin with the toe of his boot, and mocked, “Only this?”
A flash of panic crossed the Shadow Guard’s eyes. He didn’t know what he’d done wrong. The Master wanted him to pay a price, but he had nothing but himself. Apart from himself, he didn’t know what to give the Master.
His sincerity?
He knew that in the Master’s eyes, his sincerity wasn’t worth a thing.
Despite knowing the Master’s thorough, complete disgust for him, to save Shadow Nine, he was willing to do this.
That covetous look began surfacing in the Shadow Guard’s gaze again. Not as furious as imagined, but Yin Wuji’s face remained impatient.
Just as he was about to withdraw, he heard the Shadow Guard ask, ever so carefully—
“Master, may Shadow Nine… be released now?”
