“You must stay here. Silent Language Building is the safest place.”
She paused, then added, “I’ll have the Escort Team lock the door. Without my order, no one can take you out, and you cannot leave either.”
Mu Xi’s lips pressed together slightly, and the hands resting on her knees curled inward.
She lowered her head, looking at her own clean shoe tops, her two calves beginning to sway unconsciously, like a child whose toy has been taken away.
Her dissatisfaction was obvious, yet she didn’t dare, or perhaps didn’t know how, to resist fiercely.
“This is for your own good, Little Xi.”
Ye Lan’s voice softened a little.
She reached out to touch her hair but stopped midway, letting her hand fall on the armrest of the sofa instead, her fingers tapping lightly.
“The outside world isn’t suitable for you to run around in your current state. Once things are resolved, I’ll take you out.”
Mu Xi was silent for nine seconds before letting out a muffled “Mm.”
She raised her head to look at Ye Lan, her eyes a mix of grievance, dependence, and a trace of confusion she herself couldn’t understand.
“Thank you… Ye Lan.” The words of thanks sounded stiff, like a pre-programmed response.
Seeing her like this, a place in Ye Lan’s heart twinged faintly.
She stood up with her, walking to stand before Mu Xi.
A trace of pity, quickly overshadowed by a stronger emotion, flickered in her eyes.
She leaned down slightly, her shadow falling over Mu Xi, who instinctively shrank back.
“Good that you know,” Ye Lan whispered, reaching out this time without hesitation, gently lifting Mu Xi’s small chin.
Mu Xi was forced to look up, meeting those deep eyes.
Ye Lan’s gaze was complex—pity, possessiveness, and a hint of deeply hidden guilt.
She didn’t speak again, just lowered her head and kissed her.
The kiss was initially domineering and unrefusable, her lips and tongue carrying an air of plunder as they intertwined.
Mu Xi froze, her body tense, her hands clutching her own clothes helplessly.
Ye Lan’s aura completely enveloped her, familiar yet strange, stirring that intense palpitation once more in her blank mind.
She didn’t push away, nor did she respond, merely enduring passively, like a delicate flower unable to control itself in a storm.
Ye Lan seemed to sense her stiffness, her movements slowing slightly.
The kiss became lingering and deep, carrying both comfort and a sense of confirming ownership, as if trying to brand her own mark deep into her soul.
Only when Mu Xi began to gasp faintly, her cheeks flushing an abnormal red, did Ye Lan pull back slightly, resting her forehead against Mu Xi’s, their heated breaths mingling.
“Be good and stay here,” Ye Lan’s voice held a hint of huskiness after the kiss.
“Wait for me to return.”
After Ye Lan left, the heavy metal door outside made a faint mechanical sound, followed by the dull thud of a lock engaging.
Silent Language Building fell completely silent, so quiet she could hear her own faint breathing and heartbeat.
The smell of disinfectant in the air seemed more pronounced.
This massive, fortress-like building now held only Mu Xi.
Even though she knew Ye Lan’s Escort Team was guarding outside, that sense of security felt distant, separated by a layer of cold glass, untouchable.
Loneliness and a nameless panic, like icy vines, silently coiled around her limbs.
Barefoot, she walked on the cold but smooth floor, wandering aimlessly around the first floor.
The living room still held traces of Ye Lan’s presence; the armrest of the sofa seemed to retain the residual warmth from where her fingers had tapped.
Mu Xi reached out a finger, hesitated, gently touched that spot, then quickly withdrew it, as if the warmth could burn her.
She didn’t like this feeling.
Empty.
In her heart, and in the house.
Following the cold metal stairs, she walked step by step up to the second floor.
Her footsteps echoed clearly in the empty stairwell.
She pushed the door open and entered.
The room was simply but cleanly furnished.
A large bed with soft white sheets, a functional dressing table standing beside it.
She walked to the bathroom and turned on the faucet.
Hot water gushed out, steaming up a white mist.
She took off her clothes and stepped under the shower.
The warm water stream washed over her body, carrying away some of the chill and temporarily scattering the chaotic emotions in her mind.
She closed her eyes, feeling the water droplets slide over her skin.
Ye Lan’s unrefusable kiss, that domineering yet complex aura, still seemed to linger between her lips and teeth.
Unconsciously, she raised a hand to touch her own lips, her fingertips trembling slightly.
After her shower, she didn’t get dressed immediately.
Instead, she walked to the sufficiently large mirror in the bathroom.
In the misty haze, the reflection was blurry.
She reached out and wiped it.
A girl so exquisite she seemed unreal appeared in the mirror.
Silver hair, wet, clung to her pale neck and shoulders.
Water droplets slid down her elegant collarbone.
Her skin glowed with a moist sheen under the light, her waist slender, her legs straight.
She looked at herself in the mirror, her gaze shifting from initial confusion to a kind of almost obsessive focus.
She raised her hand, touching her own cheek, then her neck, then her shoulder.
Where her fingers passed, they left faint trails of water.
This body was hers.
It was the only thing that proved her existence.
She tilted her head, offering the reflection a faint smile—a bit naive, yet with an indescribable strangeness.
She admired every inch of her skin, every curve, as if confirming a perfect work of art.
This act of self-admiration seemed to bring her a brief moment of solace and a sense of control.
***
Mu Xi lay on the cold, large bed, her body curled up.
Night fell quickly.
Ye Lan’s lingering scent still seemed to hover at the tip of her nose, carrying an aggressiveness that made her heart palpitate and feel uneasy.
She closed her eyes, her consciousness sinking into darkness.
The dream descended abruptly, without transition.
Before her eyes was no longer the simple bedroom of Silent Language Building, but raging flames.
To the left, the blurred outline of a Manor from memory twisted and collapsed in the firelight, the sound of wood cracking piercingly loud.
To the right, what seemed to be the entrance to a mine was also engulfed in a great fire, reflecting off the sky.
Even continuous rain couldn’t extinguish that despairing blaze.
Rain mixed with soot fell, hitting her face, cold and dirty.
Her vision was a gray blur, with only the fire as the sole source of light, yet it brought destruction.
The scene shifted sharply.
A cold metal operating table.
The blinding glare of surgical lights.
She felt like an object, immobilized, unable to move.
Figures in white lab coats moved about.
Medical instruments clinked with crisp sounds.
Luoyuan’s face, with its bewitching smile, flashed by, her blue eyes holding not a trace of warmth.
Then came the faint vibration of something drilling into her skull, and an indescribable, bone-deep chill as something was implanted deep within her brain.
The pain wasn’t intense, but the feeling of being violated, being altered, made her soul tremble.
It felt as if something snapped.
“Crack—” A barely audible, low hum sounded deep in her mind.
Mu Xi’s eyes flew open.
She sat bolt upright in bed, her forehead covered in cold sweat.
She gasped for air, her heart pounding wildly in her chest, almost ready to burst.
It wasn’t a dream!
Those sealed, forcibly distorted memories surged forth like floodwaters breaching a dam.
The despair of being abandoned.
The humble obedience when she met Luoyuan.
And…
And Ye Lan!
Ye Lan’s face, sometimes blurry, sometimes clear.
Not the current version, pretending to be gentle, eyes filled with guilt.
But the past one, with its cruel smile, using every method to torment her, to train her!
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