Chapter 21: Her Fragility

Before nightfall, they found a cave.

Luo Xifeng found some dry branches and lit a fire.

His whole body was wrapped in coldness and a faint murderous aura. Chu Yangyang hugged her knees and shivered with cold.

She watched him spread snake-repellent powder at the entrance of the cave, and every footstep felt like stepping on her tense nerves.

"come over."

Chu Yangyang huddled in the corner, shaking her head. The firelight cast her shadow on the stone wall, trembling like an autumn leaf in the wind.

Luo Xifeng suddenly snorted coldly and shook the medicine bottle in his hand, "Are you afraid that I will poison you?"

Chu Yangyang thought about it and realized that if he really wanted to kill her, he would have done it many times before.

She moved over stiffly and stopped three steps away from him.

Luo Xifeng walked forward and squatted, took out the medicine powder and sprinkled it on the wound on Chu Yangyang's calf. She gasped in pain, but bit her lower lip tightly and dared not make a sound.

The fingertips with thin calluses suddenly pressed against the bruise on her waist, and Chu Yangyang jumped back as if she had been electrocuted, "Ah, it hurts..."

The cave suddenly became silent.

Chu Yangyang forgot that just because he didn't kill her, it didn't mean he wouldn't abuse her.

It's always possible to make her suffer a little, let her vent her anger, and make her wish she were neither alive nor dead.

Chu Yangyang slowly raised her eyes.

Luo Xifeng's hand holding the medicine bottle froze in mid-air, and the familiar brutality appeared in his eyes.

That was the expression he had when the original owner whipped him.

Chu Yangyang ran out in a panic, but was tripped by a dead vine and her palm scraped against the sharp gravel.

"If you take another step, I'll sever your hamstrings."

A sinister voice came from the back of her neck, and Chu Yangyang lay on the ground trembling.

Luo Xifeng dragged her back to the fire like a chicken, and the action of ripping open her clothes startled her so much that she screamed.

Originally he just wanted to scare her, but Luo Xifeng stopped when he saw the injury on her back.

The crisscrossing purple bruises, mixed with blood, were out of tune with the fair skin.

Thinking about how she had suffered a lot in recent days, she didn't complain at all.

It is completely different from his previous arrogant personality.

He sighed softly.

"Does it hurt?" he asked suddenly.

Chu Yangyang looked up blankly and met his deep eyes.

Something flashed in there, so fast that it seemed like an illusion to her.

When she came to her senses, Luo Xifeng had already smashed the medicine bottle at her feet.

“Apply it yourself.”

Chu Yangyang pouted and applied the ointment in the bottle on her calves, muttering, "This guy is so moody!"

As the sky grew darker, Chu Yangyang curled up beside the fire, and the wound on her calf gradually began to feel a strange stinging pain.

She looked down and saw two tiny blood holes glowing purple in the moonlight, and the wounds seemed to be even more red and swollen.

"Luo Xifeng..."

As soon as she opened her mouth, she felt dizzy, and the firelight on the stone wall split into countless jumping green snakes.

This was the scene Luo Xifeng saw when he turned around.

The girl's fingertips dug deep into the mud, her thin shoulders rose and fell violently, and the skin exposed through her neckline was abnormally flushed.

He frowned, took three or two steps towards her, and pulled open her skirt, bringing up a gust of cold wind.

"The poison is starting to take effect." He stared at the swollen wound and sneered, then casually took out another medicine bottle. "It's time for you to suffer a little."

Chu Yangyang could no longer hear what he was saying.

The heat wave rushed through my blood vessels, and in a trance I saw the pale walls of the hospital again.

She smelled the odor of disinfectant and her mother's red eyes overlapped in the flickering firelight.

She reached out to grab it, but only touched the cold corner of the man's sleeve.

"Mom, I miss you so much..." Hot tears fell on the back of Luo Xifeng's hand, "I'm sorry..."

The hand that was about to apply the medicine suddenly stopped.

Luo Xifeng looked at the trembling girl and suddenly remembered how she protected him in the Prime Minister's Mansion a few days ago.

She said stubbornly that no one was allowed to bully him. Anyone who dared to insult him would die.

At this moment, her hot forehead was pressed against his palm, and she whimpered weakly like a wounded cub.

This was completely different from the evil woman in his memory who stepped on the scarlet cloak and used a silver needle to pry open his belt.

"It's so cold..."

Chu Yangyang suddenly twitched violently, scratching the boy's wrist with her nails, leaving bloody marks. "I can't die. I haven't seen my parents yet..."

The broken mumbling made Luo Xifeng startled.

He pinched the girl's jaw and forced her to look up, but was stunned when he saw the pair of misty eyes.

What is filled there is not the arrogance of the past, but bottomless fear and sorrow.

"What did you say?" He heard his voice was a little hoarse.

Chu Yangyang suddenly laughed, tears sliding down the corners of her eyes. "Doctor Luo, you're holding the scalpel upside down. How come you don't even know how to use the oxygen tube... You're so funny!"

She gestured randomly, and her hands occasionally touched Luo Xifeng's chest.

Luo Xifeng gripped her wrist with astonishing force, with sneer in his eyes.

She tilted her head and rubbed his tense knuckles, her hot breath brushing against the side of his neck, "Don't be angry... I brought you osmanthus cake."

A strange sourness rose in my throat.

When he was a child, his mother loved to make osmanthus cake for him.

Luo Xifeng suddenly let go of his hand and watched Chu Yangyang fall to the ground like a dead leaf.

She was still talking nonsense intermittently, sometimes begging, sometimes laughing foolishly, and her mud-stained skirt spread out like broken butterfly wings.

Thunder exploded outside the cave and heavy rain poured down.

When Chu Yangyang regained consciousness, the first thing she felt was the bitter medicinal fragrance between her lips and teeth.

Someone supported the back of her neck, and warm medicine was slowly passed into her mouth.

She swallowed instinctively, it was bitter.

The moment she opened her eyes, Chu Yangyang felt as if she had fallen into an icy cave.

Luo Xifeng's pale face was close to her, his thin lips slightly pursed, and she was held in his arms, their black hair entangled in the firelight.

"Get up by yourself when you wake up." After saying that, he suddenly let go of his hand, and the back of Chu Yangyang's head hit the stone wall heavily.

The pain made her completely awake, and the scattered fragments of memory just now made it difficult to distinguish between truth and falsehood.

The sound of rain outside the cave gradually stopped, and a spark popped from the fire.

Luo Xifeng was tidying up the medicine box, and the black hem of her clothes still had wrinkles from her gripping it.

Chu Yangyang hugged her knees tightly and heard her own hoarse voice, "Last night, I seemed to have had a lot of dreams."

"Golden Viper venom can cause hallucinations." He wiped the silver needle with his back to her, a cold light flowing between his fingers. "You said you saw a glowing iron box. What kind of surgery is that? Opening the chest..."

Chu Yangyang's blood froze.

She watched Luo Xifeng turn around. In those eyes that were always frosty, a frightening inquiry danced, "Chu Yangyang, who are you?"