The man's long, slender, white fingers casually ran through her dark hair, his long fingers digging into her hair and gripping her tightly. His questions, one after another, almost drove her to the brink of despair.
Jiang Yue looked up at his eyes, unable to quite put her finger on what was wrong.
But his eyes seemed different. His dark eyes were like a calm, deep sea, where a storm was brewing beneath the surface. You couldn't see anything clearly, and you couldn't understand anything.
Jiang Yue hadn't felt such an uncomfortable sense of oppression in a long time. It pressed heavily on her heart, leaving her with almost no strength to resist. Her territory had been plundered, and she even felt a little breathless.
She swallowed hard, unwilling to admit that she was a little afraid of him at this moment.
"Zhou Ji, you're too fierce."
In the end, only these few words came out of his mouth.
That's too fierce.
That's too aggressive.
The situation was cold and stern, as if it were forcing her to give in.
Zhou Ji apologized softly, his humble tone sounding as if he were trying to coax someone.
Jiang Yue stood up and sat up straight again. "You can't question me."
Zhou Ji didn't think he had just questioned her. He grabbed her waist and pulled her back to him. He leaned in and bit her ear. "It wasn't a question."
It was coercion.
It was almost a gentle form of coercion.
It seemed that only by getting that clear answer from her again and again could he satisfy his increasingly morbid anxiety.
Zhou Ji's hot breath made her flinch as it touched her skin. She backed away, and his grip tightened. "Answer me," he said.
Jiang Yue has a somewhat rebellious nature. She wasn't so happy at the moment. She knew what answer he wanted to hear, but she deliberately refused to give it to him.
Even if you insist on calling him, he won't be so happy.
Jiang Yue pretended to think for a moment and said, "I don't like it."
She tried to push him away after she finished speaking, but the man was stronger than an ox and grabbed her wrist rather roughly.
His calm gaze darkened.
His calm demeanor was all the more terrifying.
Looking at his silent demeanor, Jiang Yue felt a pang of regret. She should have broken free from him first before saying those unpleasant things.
That way, I won't be forced to stay in his arms now, bound by his constraints.
"My hand hurts."
Zhou Ji seemed not to hear what she whispered. He lowered his eyes, his expression unreadable, and he showed no emotion whatsoever.
Jiang Yue looked at his profile and the way he lowered his eyes; he seemed familiar to her.
The image that flashed through her mind startled her.
Zhou Ji's head-down, silent demeanor bore a striking resemblance to Zhou Fuwei, who was also a man of few words when he was recuperating in Yanzhou.
He doesn't talk much.
While recuperating in bed, I couldn't move much. Sometimes I would get up, put on my clothes, walk to the window, and, by the light from outside, look down at the books I had read.
Jiang Yue returned to that villa several times, quietly, without Zhou Fuwei noticing. She would pass by his courtyard and stand far away outside the long corridor. The dappled shadows of the trees in the courtyard would make his appearance in front of the window appear and disappear.
It was like looking at flowers through the fog, hazy and indistinct.
He wore a moon-white long robe, his black hair hung down, his skin was fair, and his features were stern. Amidst the swaying branches, he exuded an even more otherworldly and refined air.
The princess, just beginning to experience romantic feelings, would stare blankly at such a handsome and outstanding face, lost in thought from time to time. Only after the young man closed the window would she belatedly come back to her senses.
At this moment, the two scenes seem to overlap.
Two people who seem to have no connection at all, yet they seem to share a strange resemblance.
Jiang Yue raised her hand and couldn't help but touch his face.
I never thought their expressions were similar before, but these past two days I've been getting a strange feeling from her.
Zhou Ji grabbed her mischievous hand, held her wrist, and with only a calm expression in his eyes after he had calmed down, he said, "You have to like me."
Zhou Ji's voice was gentle, but his attitude was forceful: "You can't say no."
His poor, fragile heart seemed to only be able to slowly descend from the high-hanging air in this way.
Jiang Yue could see a hint of fragility in his pale, cold face, and she also felt a chill as if she were being stared at intently, as if those dark eyes held endless madness.
She wondered if she had gone too far with her words.
This is what made Zhou Ji so anxious and insecure.
She raised her hand, but before she could touch his face, he grabbed her fingers, holding them one by one as if playing with them.
Jiang Yue said, "Don't be nervous."
She continued, "I was just trying to annoy you."
Jiang Yue lightly touched his lips with hers, the soft, sweet taste seeming to seep deep into the man's very being.
Jiang Yue thought for a moment and then let him hear the words she had been hoping for: "I like you."
Zhou Ji, I like you.
Fearing he might feel unsatisfied, she generously repeated herself.
Zhou Ji held her close, his chin resting gently on the top of her head. His deep breaths fell slowly as he held her close. She curled up in his arms and could hear the sound of his heart pounding.
Perhaps it was this afternoon, in the afterglow of the sunset, when his profile was downcast, that reminded Jiang Yue of those carefree, youthful days in Yanzhou in her dreams late at night.
She picked up a handsome man.
The servants helped him wash his face, and she stood quietly by the bed, looking at the boy's delicate, pale face, and knew that he was really handsome.
The doctor cautiously asked her to leave.
Jiang Yue stared at his face for a while, then reluctantly uttered a few words: "He is quite good-looking."
The doctor and the maid kept their mouths shut, not daring to say anything more, for saying too much would surely lead to trouble.
Jiang Yue looked at the unconscious person on the bed and heard him groan in pain. She thought to herself that he was quite good at enduring pain.
He has a resilient character.
Looking at that attractive face, she felt increasingly uneasy. "Could he be someone sent to use his good looks on me?"
I deliberately injured myself so she could see!
Feeling agitated, Jiang Yue looked at the doctor and asked, "Is his injury serious?"
The doctor replied respectfully, "His life is in grave danger; I will do my best to try."
Jiang Yue nodded. "Take good care of him."
The girl had already reached the door, but then turned back and looked at the doctor again, instructing him, "Don't let him die."
She's so good-looking, she shouldn't die.
Even if he was sent by someone else to seduce her, she accepted it.
It wasn't until he woke up that Jiang Yue returned to the small courtyard. She didn't come here often, or perhaps more accurately, she rarely appeared in front of the boy.
Sometimes, even when he returned, he wouldn't go to his house. He would dismount, throw the whip to his attendant, enter the house, stop, and ask, "How is he?"
The little maid was slow-witted and it took her a moment to guess who the princess was asking about.
"He's awake. He's been recuperating in the backyard for the past few days and hasn't come out of the house."
"Will the princess go to see him?"
Jiang Yue's expression was somewhat indescribable. She pursed her lips and asked unhappily, "Why should I go see him? I'm not going."
As long as the person isn't dead, that's fine.
Even so, after a while, Jiang Yue couldn't resist running to the backyard. She walked very quietly, and the backyard was quiet and made no sound.
Jiang Yue stood in the corridor for a while, and just as she was about to leave, she heard the sound of the window door being slowly pushed open.
Jiang Yue stood in the shadows, in a place unknown to him, and quietly watched for a while.
This happened several times later.
Jiang Yue could secretly watch him from under the eaves without being discovered by him.
The dream was neither long nor short, a hazy, dreamlike state, until finally, the features of the elegant and aloof young master in the shadows beneath the window gradually overlapped with Zhou Ji's face.
Jiang Yue was startled awake from her dream. Her hands and feet were a little cold, and she subconsciously shrank into the arms of the person next to her, her icy toes burrowing into his embrace.
The man's embrace was warm; burying myself in his body felt like being close to a scorching furnace.
Zhou Ji didn't ask her what was wrong, but patiently patted her back to comfort her.
Jiang Yue had previously only thought that Zhou Ji looked like Zhou Fuwei, but tonight, their expressions were remarkably similar.
The resemblance was so striking that it made her almost doubt herself.
Jiang Yue grabbed his hand and, after calming down, stopped overthinking.
He held her in his arms, and she drifted off to sleep. This time, she didn't dream of Zhou Fuwei, who had fallen on hard times in his youth.
the next day.
Jiang Yue woke up in Zhou Ji's arms again. She lifted her heavy eyelids and glanced at the clock on the wall.
Nine o'clock in the morning is hardly early.
Most working people would be at the office by now, but the person next to her is still lazily lying in bed.
I managed to steal half a day of leisure from my busy life.
Jiang Yue can be a homebody at times, but she can also go out and cause a ruckus for a long time.
After breakfast, her ex-husband still didn't seem to be going to the company. He turned on the TV for her and patted the empty seat next to the sofa, saying, "The show you like to watch is being replayed."
Although Jiang Yue has watched it no less than ten times, she still enjoys watching it every time it is replayed.
The man sitting on the sofa was wearing a thin white shirt, the buttons undone, revealing a few glimpses of his collarbone and lean chest.
The thin shirt revealed the man's lean and powerful abdominal muscles.
Clean and crisp, yet brimming with vitality.
He sat with his long legs crossed, his posture languid. The sunlight from the window slanted into the living room, adding a touch of otherworldly aloofness to the man's cold and arrogant demeanor. His slender figure was also like that of someone who had stepped out of a comic book.
Excellent bone structure and outstanding bone structure.
Jiang Yue looked at him; the way he sat there quietly always easily brought back memories of the past.
She had absolutely no intention of treating Zhou Ji as someone else.
Zhou Ji is Zhou Ji.
It is not a substitute for anyone.
Jiang Yue said, "I have to go home today."
She hadn't been back to the Qin family home for several days. Qin Zhao had called several times, but he didn't say anything else, just normal inquiries about her well-being. However, Jiang Yue could tell that Qin Zhao was urging her to go home.
Zhou Ji stood up, his long legs were perfectly straight and slender thanks to the suit trousers, made of expensive materials and tailored perfectly. His waist was slender, and the hem of his white shirt was tucked into his waist, creating an alluring waistline that was sure to make anyone drool.
The man, wearing leather shoes, strode up to her and said, "I'll take you home."
The Zhou family and the Qin family are less than ten minutes apart, very close on foot, and belong to different residences in the same area.
Jiang Yue shook her head: "No need, I'll walk back myself."
Zhou Ji stepped forward and took her hand, saying, "I happen to be free anyway, let's go."
The two walked very slowly along this stretch of road.
Jiang Yue couldn't quite put her finger on what had changed, but something just felt different. She stared at her reflection on the ground, lost in thought. Could it be that she really had taken Zhou Ji as a substitute for Zhou Fuwei?
Princess Mingyi in the past was not enlightened.
Unbeknownst to her, her hesitant concern for the seriously injured boy was a sign of budding, innocent love.
Now, she seems to have come to understand love.
But I still don't quite understand.
How much did she actually like the boy she saved back then? She herself couldn't say for sure.
If she likes him, she will find someone to take care of him and she will secretly watch him.
But when he confessed his feelings, he was also able to calmly set this person aside. As a young man, Zhou Fuwei had nothing and was not worthy of her.
In the midst of a turbulent dynasty, he, weak and incompetent, was unable to protect her.
Thinking about all this, Jiang Yue kept her head down and walked forward, stepping on the shadows of the two of them. When she arrived at her doorstep, she was still holding Zhou Ji's hand and walking forward silently, completely unaware that something was wrong.
Until the butler called her "Second Miss".
That's how I woke her up from the chaos.
Jiang Yue subconsciously shook off Zhou Ji's hand, "I'm home, you should go back too."
Zhou Ji asked, "Aren't you going to invite me in for a seat?"
Jiang Yue: "Haven't you had enough of sitting these past few days?"
Zhou Ji: "I'd like to go to your room and take a look."
Jiang Yue was tempted to agree, but after thinking about it, she declined, saying, "Next time, next time."
She seemed like an honest man trying to fool his young lover.
He was vague and seemed quite guilty.
Before entering the living room, Jiang Yue glanced back at the courtyard. Zhou Ji was still standing there silently, tall and elegant, like a bamboo shoot, his silence seemingly concealing many emotions.
Jiang Yue turned her face away and went inside.
Qin Zhao and Jiang Zhi were both at home; they happened to be on holiday that day.
The elder brother and younger brother sat in the living room, looking at each other in silence.
It was nothing but quiet.
Neither of them were talkative, and the deathly silence didn't feel awkward to either of them.
However, Jiang Yue couldn't stand the stiff atmosphere, so she turned on the TV. Because of their work, the Qin family members mostly watched serious news channels.
Midday news always contains less important information.
"According to our reporter, the bamboo slips and other well-preserved documents unearthed from the recently discovered unmarked tomb have been restored."
Next up is the breaking news.
As for the repaired content, it was not described in detail.
It only briefly described some less important details.
"It records in detail how, during the third year of the Yuanqi era, the regent Zhou Fuwei sought immortality and the art of immortality."
"The newly discovered materials further corroborate that this historically renowned powerful minister may have died because of his alchemy practice, rather than by hanging as rumored."
Seeking immortality and enlightenment.
The art of rebirth.
Jiang Yue had seen Zhou Fuwei entering and leaving the Taoist temple in her dream, but she didn't think Zhou Fuwei was such a muddle-headed person who often disregarded people's livelihood, listened to the Taoist priests' words, and insisted on being reborn in the Pure Land.
None of them ended well.
Furthermore, Zhou Fuwei was still very young at that time, healthy and without illness or disaster, and would not have been so greedy.
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