Chapter 26: Drunk

Though his heart had wavered, Lou Xun had not yet been so thoroughly blinded by a momentary surge of emotion that he lost all reason.

The gangs of Huangcheng Walled City were deeply entrenched and tangled together. Although bloody conflicts broke out constantly, if these local tyrants wanted to survive safely on land controlled by the great families, they had to maintain a tacit balance of power.

Lou Xun had come from a proper government department. He understood all too clearly what would happen if that balance were rashly destroyed.

His mind was still in chaos. Strange emotions rampaged through his chest. Only after a long while did he say with difficulty, “Let’s go back first.”

“Have you decided?” Xiao Changxuan asked flatly. “They’re right upstairs.”

As he finished speaking, his divine sense domain spread outward.

Once again, without regard for Lou Xun’s wishes, he shared the connection with him, rendering the entire restaurant in three dimensions across that vast field of vision.

Third floor. Heaven Room.

Flower petals mingled with the color of wine. Desire and sin raised their cups together. Mortals fitted with cybernetic prosthetics held beautiful wine-serving girls in their arms, admiring the shifting holographic projection at the center of the private room. One after another, stunningly beautiful bionic humans swam out of the projection like fish, sheer gauze tied around their waists, their bodies slender and graceful—yet blood flowed from their toes.

【The one in the seat of honor. As long as you want it, I can make him die silently right now.】

His voice, soaked in wine, seemed to carry temptation. Lou Xun’s fingertips curled slightly, and he raised his head, meeting Xiao Changxuan’s gaze.

Xiao Changxuan understood his answer. With a helpless faint smile, he stopped wasting time and asked instead, “Then home?”

Lou Xun severed the divine sense connection and turned first, walking out of the restaurant.

Xiao Changxuan followed behind him at a leisurely pace, but his gaze was dark and heavy.

There were no good places to live in Huangcheng Walled City. They had arrived in a hurry, and the money they found on the two public security officers who had died from spiritual loss was not much. After the security team refused to arrange lodging for them, they had taken over a thug’s shop—strictly speaking, it was not taking it over, but rather…

Lou Xun passed beneath the signboard and entered an umbrella shop. The proprietress had tied on an apron and was sitting on a small stool, sharpening umbrella ribs.

Hearing the bead curtain stir, the proprietress looked up and saw Lou Xun lift the curtain and enter the inner workshop.

There were no incandescent lights lit in the workshop, only a few electronic candles burning. The dim, warm candlelight shone over that beautiful face, adding three more parts charm.

As soon as she saw it was him, the proprietress immediately wiped her hands and rose, about to greet him—only to notice the red around Lou Xun’s eyes had not faded at all.

“…Need help?” Lou Xun glanced at the bamboo strips piled around her feet.

“Aiya, how big a deal is this? I’m used to it.” The proprietress smiled and shook her head. “Didn’t you go out to look for Little Zhou?”

The “Little Zhou” she spoke of referred to Xiao Changxuan. That man had given himself the rotten alias “Xiao Zhou” while they were outside and even liked pretending to be young. The moment Lou Xun heard it, the pressure around him sank a little lower. Without saying a word, he walked toward the proprietress, wanting to help shave the umbrella ribs, but she stopped him.

“You must be tired after going out. Go upstairs and rest. I can handle this myself.” The proprietress pushed him toward the stairs. “Shanyou and Qingqing have gone to school too. There’s no one to watch the child. If you want to help, help me keep an eye on him.”

Hearing that, Lou Xun was even less willing to go upstairs—he did not know how to take care of children.

The proprietress smiled. “He just fell asleep. As long as you don’t let him roll off the bed, that’s enough.”

Lou Xun was persuaded. He nodded to the proprietress, then went upstairs.

The moment he went up, Xiao Changxuan came in after him carrying a basket of umbrella ribs, peeking inside. His face was slightly flushed, and the scent of alcohol clung to him.

“He went up?” Xiao Changxuan asked cautiously.

The proprietress smiled helplessly. “He went up. Give me the umbrella ribs. I just left them outside to dry the lacquer. Don’t get it on your clothes.”

Xiao Changxuan handed the umbrella ribs over. The proprietress took them and asked softly, “What are you two little partners quarreling about this time?”

“Nothing.” Xiao Changxuan casually picked up the apron on the table and prepared to tie it on so he could help. “This time, it wasn’t my fault.”

“Reeking of alcohol. Forget Little Lou, even I would be angry at you.” This time, the proprietress did not stop Xiao Changxuan. She handed him a strip of green bamboo and let him sand the bamboo splint.

Xiao Changxuan placed the bamboo strip onto the laser table to cut it. “How can drinking be avoided when one is socializing? Sister Huan, why must you side with him?”

“If Little Lou hadn’t suddenly appeared, my child and I would already have been beaten to death by that man.” The proprietress lowered her head and scraped the bamboo strip with the tool, stroke by stroke. “You two helped me deal with that man. That means you saved me and my child.”

“You don’t even suspect where we came from.” Xiao Changxuan lowered his eyes. As the candle flame flickered, light fell into the depths of his gaze. “Sister Huan, be careful of inviting wolves into your home.”

“We’ll talk about it when that day comes.” Sister Huan seemed not to hear the deeper meaning in Xiao Changxuan’s words. “I’m just a mortal. Other than my child and this shop, I have nothing. I only know that a life-saving debt should be repaid like a gushing spring.”

She finished sanding the bamboo strip and looked up with a smile. The fine lines at the corners of her eyes inexplicably made one feel at ease.

“Besides, whether you’re good people or bad people outside has nothing to do with me. I only know that after you came, no one on this street dares come looking for trouble at my shop anymore.”

Xiao Changxuan said nothing. Sister Huan placed the finished umbrella rib on the table, went to Xiao Changxuan’s side, and helped him take off the apron.

His sleeves fell back down, and Xiao Changxuan straightened.

Like she was taking care of a child, Sister Huan patted away the wood shavings on his sleeves and lifted her chin toward the staircase. “What grudge between husband and wife lasts overnight? A good person like Little Lou couldn’t be found again even if you searched with a lantern. Aren’t you going up to coax him?”

Xiao Changxuan glanced up at the staircase. Resting upstairs was a sharp-eared, sharp-eyed semi-immortal. He was probably perfectly clear on everything happening below. What need was there for coaxing?

“I’m worried he won’t talk to me,” Xiao Changxuan said with utter sincerity.

“What does he like?” the proprietress asked.

“…I don’t know,” Xiao Changxuan said honestly.

“What does he want?”

“…I’m not clear on that either.”

“You really are…” Sister Huan was rendered speechless. “Then when the two of you do anything, is it all according to your wishes?”

Xiao Changxuan froze. He could not deny it.

Everything Lou Xun had experienced since the Xu family’s underground palace had all been according to his wishes.

He suddenly thought of that boundless wasteland in the underground palace. The white haze, the black grass. Lou Xun had lain down in the coffin amid the prairie fire and asked him: after leaving the Xu family, could he let him go?

At that time, Xiao Changxuan had nodded and agreed, yet he had treated that promise as if it had never happened. He had bound himself and Lou Xun tightly together, taking him to Qingshan, then coming with him to Huangcheng Walled City.

In total, Lou Xun had only asked him for three promises.

The first was to let him go.

The second was to let him live with his mind clear.

The third was to protect Lin Kongqing’s life.

Aside from the last, he had not properly kept a single one.

“Do you have wine, Sister Huan?” Xiao Changxuan suddenly asked. “I’ll take a jar upstairs.”

“…Are you sure?” Sister Huan was half-doubtful, but she still turned to fetch wine. “There’s a child at home, so I only have a little sweet pear blossom wine I brewed myself.”

“This is fine. Thank you, Sister Huan.”

Xiao Changxuan accepted the small wine jar from the proprietress and turned to go upstairs.

The decor upstairs was entirely different from the cramped mess below. It was simple, clean, and had been repaired neatly. Xiao Changxuan passed the facial recognition scan, walked in, and saw Lou Xun sitting beside a chair. In one hand, he held a small rattle. The index finger of his other hand was being lightly gripped by the child lying in the crib.

The main room was unlit. The city’s neon glow poured through the floor-to-ceiling windows, draping softly over Lou Xun’s thin back. He rocked the crib. When he lifted his eyes, the dim red light at the bottom of them was like the last trace of embers after fireworks.

“Why didn’t you turn on the light?” Xiao Changxuan softened his footsteps.

Hearing the sound, the baby whimpered. Xiao Changxuan immediately fell silent. Lou Xun shot him a sidelong glance, activated the crib’s smart system, and waited until the child fell asleep again before he rose and walked toward Xiao Changxuan.

【Back to the room.】

The shop was not large, so naturally there were not many rooms.

Lin Kongqing and the proprietress slept in one room. Wan Shanyou had taken the living room. That left only one room. No matter how unwilling Lou Xun was to share a room with Xiao Changxuan, he could only compromise.

The two of them entered their room one after another. Lou Xun leaned against the louvered bay window. Outside the window, green light from artificially planted bamboo seeped through the gaps, stretching long shadows all the way to Xiao Changxuan’s feet.

“Talk business, or chat for a while?” Xiao Changxuan asked, holding the wine jar.

“Is there any need for us to chat?” Lou Xun asked in return.

“Yes.” Xiao Changxuan walked closer to him. “We need to deepen our feelings sooner or later. Otherwise, what do you and I count as now?”

Lou Xun said, “Enemies.”

“If you say it like that, I’ll be very hurt.” Xiao Changxuan leaned sideways beside him. “I truly regard you as…”

He thought Lou Xun would step away, but in the next instant, he was caught off guard and crashed into those eyes.

The two of them were extremely close. Amid the illusory light and shadow, their breaths tangled. Xiao Changxuan’s frivolous disguise was suddenly burned away by the embers in those eyes. Doused by the surge in his heart, it transformed into something thick and ambiguous, hidden in the roll of his throat.

He looked at Lou Xun’s features in the dim light—blurred, yet still like crabapple blossoms drunk beneath the moon—and thought: he was drunk.

His gaze slowly shifted downward and landed on Lou Xun’s moist lips. For the first time, with such clear-headedness, he thought:

Very drunk, in fact.

“You.”

Xiao Changxuan came back to himself and silently reined in his gaze. “Mm.”

“Regard me as what?”

Xiao Changxuan stepped back two paces. “Ah, what?”

Lou Xun stared at him expressionlessly. “You truly regard me as… Forget it.”

He changed the subject. “The information that lunatic from the Xie family sent into my head said that to investigate spiritual-power bionics, we need to start with the restaurants and pleasure houses in Huangcheng Walled City. You’ve been cracking down on prostitution and gangs with the security team for days now. Did you discover anything?”

“…No.” Xiao Changxuan said, “It’s only been a few days. It’s still early. What about you? You still haven’t told me how that lunatic wanted you to kill him.”

“Does it have anything to do with you?” Lou Xun asked directly.

Xiao Changxuan choked, not knowing what to say. Holding the wine jar, he sat down by the bed.

These past few days, they had not actually discussed any of this. About a week ago, after settling down in Huangcheng Walled City, Lou Xun had explained some basic information, then fallen asleep directly from excessive weakness. Xiao Changxuan had also been busy with the security team and handling the two children’s schooling, leaving early and returning late every day.

That dessert wine shop just now had actually been the first time they had formally seen each other since coming to Huangcheng Walled City.

“What if I told you I feel sorry?” Xiao Changxuan asked tentatively. “Would you believe me?”

“Why would you feel sorry?” Lou Xun leaned against the wall. When he lowered his eyes, the shadow of his lashes was clear. “My emotional state wasn’t right at the time, and I couldn’t guarantee I wouldn’t agree to him. Maybe you agreeing on my behalf saved me trouble. As for what came after—whether he didn’t die or Qingshan hunted me down—what does any of that have to do with you?”

After speaking in a tone full of sarcasm, Lou Xun added coldly, “After all, there’s nothing between us.”

Xiao Changxuan: “…”

Xiao Changxuan said, “Actually, I can explain…”

“Explain what? Explain that the one who wanted me alive was you, the one who wanted me dead was you, the one who thought the Xie family’s pursuit was troublesome and wanted to protect me was you, and the one who sold me out for spiritual-power bionics was also you?” Lou Xun struck the heart of the matter. “Whatever you want to do, I have to accompany you. Whatever I want to do, you have to weigh and consider.”

“Deepen our feelings?” Lou Xun snatched the pear blossom wine Xiao Changxuan had set aside. “Only equals can talk about feelings. What do you take me for?”

“…”

Xiao Changxuan did not answer, and Lou Xun did not continue asking. He merely opened the jar, frowned, and drank.

Amid the lingering fragrance of wine, Xiao Changxuan suddenly realized this was the first time they had spoken so directly about their relationship.

Sooner or later, there had to be such a conversation between them, especially since he had made decisions for Lou Xun three times in succession—participating in the underground palace, going to Qingshan, and entering Huangcheng Walled City.

Even a rabbit would bite in such a situation, let alone someone as independent and self-respecting as Lou Xun.

“What do you want to know?”

After a long silence, Xiao Changxuan gave in.

He leaned back and fell onto the bed. His voice carried a light, languid drunkenness, softening the stiff and serious atmosphere. Lou Xun set down the wine jar, his attitude easing slightly.

“If I ask, you’ll answer?”

“Mm. Anything.”

“…Fine.” Lou Xun nodded. “Why is your attitude toward me so unstable? Why do you want to restrict me within the framework of a bionic human?”

“…But if I say it, will you believe me?”

“You speak first,” Lou Xun said.

“Fine.” Xiao Changxuan closed his eyes. “Because I hate you very much—”

As expected, Lou Xun had just been about to sneer when, in the next instant, Xiao Changxuan added:

“And I also like you very much.”

“Lou Xun.” He softly called his name.

“Whether you believe it or not…”

“In this world, there will be no one who loathes you more than I do, and there will be no one who… cherishes you more than I do.”