“Jiang Xiao, let me explain!”
Song Qiuyu held her breath, seizing the opportunity to snatch her phone back.
“Fine, explain.”
Jiang Xiao’s mind was filled with the images he had just seen on her phone screen. He stared at the device and spoke in a low voice.
Song Qiuyu took a deep breath, her expression grim. ‘I’m sorry, Xia Qi, but I have to use you as a shield!’
She then offered a frantic explanation. “Actually, after you left, Xia Qi came to see me. She gave me a gift and even recommended some manga to me!”
“A gift?”
Jiang Xiao arched an eyebrow, looking rather indifferent.
“Yes, this!”
Song Qiuyu turned around and picked up a rectangular box resting by the bed. She sighed and turned back.
“It’s the same style as the Red String Gold Bell I used to tie around my left foot. Xia Qi said it looked like it would suit me, so she gave it to me.”
Jiang Xiao squinted at the Red String Gold Bell lying in the box, remaining silent.
“As for the manga, she probably thought… thought that I…”
Song Qiuyu racked her brain, her teeth biting her lip. Her heart rate continued to accelerate, and she was panicking internally.
“I see,” Jiang Xiao suddenly said in a deep voice.
“I—I haven’t finished explaining yet. How do you already know?” Song Qiuyu became even more flustered.
“Because you would never admit that you wanted to see them and asked Xia Qi for the manga yourself. No matter how much more you say, it’s all just an excuse. The meaning is the same,” Jiang Xiao said calmly.
Song Qiuyu pursed her lips. “Fine, I admit it. It was indeed me who brought it up first before Xia Qi recommended those manga to me.”
Hearing this, Jiang Xiao couldn’t help but chuckle. He looked at the bowl of brown sugar water in his hand, his gaze deepening. He took two steps forward and extended his arm.
“Drink the brown sugar water first.”
“It’s already past 10:00 PM. Where did you get brown sugar water?” Song Qiuyu took the opportunity to change the subject, no longer wanting to bring up the previous topic.
She set down her phone and the box, reached out to take the bowl, and sat on the edge of the bed.
Right then, Jiang Xiao’s scent brushed against her face. He took both her phone and the box away, causing Song Qiuyu’s pupils to shrink slightly.
“Jiang Xiao, why are you taking my phone?” Song Qiuyu was so anxious she almost stood up.
“I know you’re anxious, but don’t be just yet. I’m simply a bit interested in the rest of the manga too.” Jiang Xiao tried to open the phone. “The password is—”
“I am not telling you the password!”
“Unlocked.”
“?” Song Qiuyu was stunned.
“Does Xi’er really care about the time I send messages that much? To think you’d use it as a password.” Jiang Xiao blinked.
“Just how did you guess it instantly!” Song Qiuyu grit her teeth.
“A wild guess.”
Jiang Xiao wasn’t lying.
He simply considered that since her brain wasn’t working very well lately, she might set the password to a number she had been obsessing over recently.
Because she cared so much, she wouldn’t forget it. Besides, who would expect someone to use the timestamp of a message as a password?
Jiang Xiao looked at the images on the phone screen, scrolling down.
“Stop looking! It’s getting late, go back to sleep!” Song Qiuyu no longer had the heart to drink the brown sugar water.
She clenched her hands and spoke quickly.
“That brown sugar water.” Jiang Xiao picked up her previous topic.
“It’s because I had brown sugar in my backpack, so I just mixed it with some boiling water.”
“Uh…” Song Qiuyu was suddenly at a loss for words.
It was one thing to carry candy all the time, but to carry brown sugar too—did he have to be this considerate?
“How about it? Are you moved by this?” Jiang Xiao looked up at her.
Hearing those words, Song Qiuyu looked at him strangely.
For some reason, she felt the atmosphere shifting slightly.
The old Jiang Xiao wouldn’t have said something so direct.
“Qia’er, the knight who silently guarded you is gone.” Jiang Xiao gripped her phone.
“Since I’m going to pursue you fairly and squarely, a knight needs to drop the silence and become more like a charging Berserker, professing love even more feverishly!”
Hearing those words, Song Qiuyu clearly felt her heart thumping wildly.
Her eyes widened, and she found it hard to breathe.
She instinctively sensed danger, yet many parts of her body were also faintly filled with anticipation.
“Yan’er, want to try with me?” Jiang Xiao glanced at the Red String Gold Bell in the box.
“What?” Song Qiuyu clutched the bowl in her hands.
Her entire body was trembling, causing ripples to form on the surface of the brown sugar water.
This line matched the one from the dream!
“You said, if it’s not an Azure Dragon, it won’t work.” Jiang Xiao took out the Red String Gold Bell.
“But have you ever considered that maybe it’s not just an Azure Dragon who can give you satisfaction and happiness?”
Song Qiuyu’s pupils trembled. She unconsciously looked at the Red String Gold Bell in his hand, her expression turning subtle.
When she said those things back then, she had two intentions.
The first was to avoid causing trouble for Jiang Xiao, and the second was that she still couldn’t handle these feelings.
Jiang Xiao’s love was too heavy. Unluckily, her love for him seemed just as heavy.
What would happen when two heavy feelings collided? She was afraid. Her fear was like a boundless sea, and she felt as if she might drown in it at any moment.
“Instead, it’s because this person can give you happiness and satisfaction that he is called an Azure Dragon. A person with those physical traits is called an Azure Dragon, but must an Azure Dragon only be like that? Is the data compiled by others necessarily reliable?”
Song Qiuyu’s breath hitched. She thought of her own situation; there were indeed no examples online of a mysterious gender swap like hers.
“Therefore, it’s just that the men who happen to be able to take care of White Tiger women look like that.” Jiang Xiao tightened his grip on the Red String Gold Bell.
He looked at the provocative images on her phone screen and frowned.
“So, Xi’er, you haven’t even tried with me yet, so how can you decide on your own that I’m not good enough?”
Hearing this, Song Qiuyu couldn’t help but be moved.
All those explanations he had painstakingly tried to tailor to her logic were just a cover for this final sentence.
This last sentence was likely what Jiang Xiao truly wanted to say.
During this time, Jiang Xiao seemed to have been working hard to prove he could take care of her, yet she had selfishly dismissed all his efforts with a single sentence.
“You’d rather look at this kind of manga alone than accept me, even though you clearly like me, don’t you?” Jiang Xiao’s voice became lower and raspier.
Song Qiuyu didn’t know what to think.
As she watched him, her lips suddenly twitched, and she couldn’t help but let out a small laugh.
Jiang Xiao froze. He looked at her with confusion, not understanding why she was laughing.
After all, even if one crushed his words into powder and analyzed them, there shouldn’t be anything funny about them.
After a long silence, he said, “Qia’er, what are you laughing at?”
Song Qiuyu didn’t reply immediately.
Holding the bowl, she tilted her head back and quickly drank more than half of the brown sugar water.
Finally, she kept one small mouthful in her mouth, her slightly fleshy cheeks puffing out.
Stretching out a slender hand, she grabbed Jiang Xiao’s collar and yanked him down.
Then, with tears in her eyes, she pressed her lips against his.
Jiang Xiao’s eyes flew wide.
Feeling her effort to push past his lips, he subconsciously cooperated and opened them. The brown sugar water was then slowly transferred into his mouth.
‘Mmm…’
Song Qiuyu closed her eyes, suddenly feeling immensely guilty and heartbroken.
Because they were too familiar with each other, she had overlooked certain things.
She was like a bad woman even worse than a typical bad woman, constantly hurting the person who treated her best with her supposed understanding and gentleness.
Now, finally, Jiang Xiao was angry again.
It was only natural. Jiang Xiao was a person, not a piece of wood; of course he would get angry.
But because of the gentleness Jiang Xiao constantly released, she had learned to simply enjoy and exploit it, ignoring the fact that a person couldn’t possibly be nothing but gentle.
Thinking about how Jiang Xiao was willing to be her emotional trash can yet started bottling up his own emotions just to take care of her, her heart ached terribly.
‘I’m sorry, Jiang Xiao.’
A single tear slid from the corner of her left eye. It felt like a sharp blade piercing through Jiang Xiao’s chest, leaving him stunned and at a loss.
While he was still dazed, the person who had finished transferring the brown sugar water gripped his collar even tighter.
She then leaned back, bringing him down onto the bed with her.
Jiang Xiao’s heart rate spiked, and his arms instinctively braced himself on either side of her body.
Their lips parted.
Jiang Xiao watched her bite her lip and slowly open her eyes.
He felt a burning sensation in his chest that was becoming hard to bear.
The taste of the brown sugar water in his mouth constantly reminded him that everything just now, including this moment, was real.
He looked at the tear sliding down her cheek, and his heart tightened.
Why was Xi’er crying? Had his words just now been too harsh? Why did Xi’er feed him brown sugar water and do this?
“Jiang Xiao, let’s…”
Song Qiuyu looked at Jiang Xiao with moist eyes.
She pursed her lips tightly, summoned her courage to meet his gaze, and spoke with a sense of shame.