Chapter 46: Bewildered and Passionate
Did Di Fei shout in surprise?
It was as if he had fallen into lukewarm water; his body was icy cold, yet only he knew that his insides were burning hot. The colder he felt, the more intense the burning heat became; the more intense the heat, the more ambiguous the coldness became. He wanted to look away, but the beautiful woman was irresistible. Everything about Yushanlong was replaying before his eyes, like an old dream being rekindled, another dazzling and mesmerizing experience. He thought of leaving, then thought it would be better to come closer, even closer.
It was a longing; he had a longing.
The longing that arose from countless lonely nights: Di Feijing had no friends, no wife, no family; he possessed only a detached, indifferent heart, which was also synonymous with emptiness. And the emptier a person is, the more they crave to be filled.
But is there really anything in this world that can fill his emptiness, or is it just a deceptive illusion?
He hadn't spoken for too long, and saying "drink" or "don't drink" didn't feel right. He lost to Xie Huailing in this round. Xie Huailing poured him a drink with satisfaction and presented it to him with both hands. She said, seemingly understandingly, "It seems that Master Di has lost. Please drink a penalty cup first. As for the answer, I won't ask."
Di Feijing picked up his wine glass. He not only rarely drank, but he almost never drank, making him quite unique in the Six and a Half Hall. In his memory, wine was just a smell. To stay sober at all times, one should give up all the pleasures of drinking and entertainment. This small glass of wine was so unfamiliar to him, but a loss is a loss, and he drank it anyway.
Forcing Di Fei to drink was akin to forcing someone into the sea. The handsome young man was exceptionally frail; he couldn't even tilt his head back to drink, but could only lower it, like a white bird with its neck bent. After finishing the wine bit by bit, he removed the cup and wiped the remaining transparent liquid from his thin lips. The liquid, however, blurred the light of the lamp, and even after being wiped away, it still softened his complexion.
He put down his wine glass and pursed his lips. Di Fei asked in surprise, "Master Su, in Miss Xie's eyes, what makes it different?"
Xie Huailing pretended to think for a moment, and then replied, "Does Master Di know about the 'Crown of Heroes Under Heaven'?"
"Miss Xie, do you think that Master Su is the 'crown hero of the world'?"
"No, actually, this title is invalid and shouldn't exist," Xie Huailing said calmly. "Because from beginning to end, the only one who can be considered in this category is him."
Di Fei was startled by the weight of her words. Each one carried immense weight, even bordering on treason, treating countless heroes of the martial world with utter indifference, yet speaking of it as if it were the most obvious truth. He memorized her tone, her dismissive expression, and even her face. The smell of alcohol rose in his head, and his thoughts faltered, but fortunately, he still possessed internal energy, which allowed him to easily dispel the urge.
He really shouldn't have been drinking.
By the fifth, sixth, or even seventh round, who knows how many rounds.
The play had already gone through several acts, reaching the part where the talented scholar and the beautiful woman pledged their love, holding hands under the moon, gazing at each other with tearful eyes, promising the cliché of eternal love. Only then was the wine jug upstairs nearly empty. The room was overflowing with wine; if it weren't for the railings that allowed for ventilation, it would have spilled out, revealing the joyous occasion of their drinking to outsiders.
Later on, they kept drinking one cup after another. After Di Feijing asked a tricky and difficult question, Xie Huailing also drank, although it couldn't be ruled out that she wanted to drink on her own. Both of them reeked of alcohol, silently counting how many cups they had drunk. However, people are different. She was still the same person made of jade, her cold and pale face not showing signs of drunkenness, while he was half-drunk under the lamp, seemingly both genuine and feigning intoxication.
There was only half a cup of wine left, so they couldn't continue playing. Xie Huailing sighed regretfully. At the Golden Wind and Drizzle Pavilion, Su Mengzhen would never have let her drink like this without eating. Now that it was over, she felt a little disappointed: "It seems like it has to end here. This wine really ran out quickly."
She twirled the half-glass of wine in her hand, and Di Fei stared at her in surprise. She said, "Who won and who lost again? I think I won."
She did win, six cups to ten.
After drinking his tenth cup, Di Feijing's handkerchief was covered with tiny water rings from the wine, like a delicate flower in bloom. He had a faint blush, as light as a cloud, as pale as the evening glow embroidered from the sky, or perhaps not, as if one had mistaken it for something else and had to look closely.
But of course, this is also fake. Just like he doesn't know martial arts, Di Feijing can't get drunk.
Di Fei asked in surprise, "What question does Miss Xie want to ask?"
Xie Huailing couldn't think of anything for a moment. It seemed that she had already asked all the important questions, and Di Feijing had raised his eyes "whoosh" when she asked a few of them. Now, if she had to think of something again, she could only speculate about Di Feijing's personal privacy from the perspective of spreading rumors, but that was meaningless. She might as well go back and make up stories for Su Mengzhen.
She touched her face, and in Di Feijing's peripheral vision, she looked like a palace lantern, its flame flickering, very eye-catching.
"I don't have any more questions to ask." Xie Huailing was unusually honest, mainly because she was really sleepy. "Besides, it's getting late, and if I don't go back soon, I'll get scolded by my cousin again. How about this, we can talk about this last question another day, and tonight, Master Di, just finish this cup of wine and that's it?"
She was referring to the remaining half of her glass; she didn't really want him to drink it, and whether he drank it or not wasn't that important. After saying that, Xie Huailing got up to get her coat.
Di Feijing's voice was neither too close nor too far: "Miss Xie, you should ask. I don't want to drink this glass of wine."
"Why don't you want to drink?" Xie Huailing replied casually. "We've chatted, played games, and in the end, it's just a drink. What other relationship do you and I have?"
Her cold-hearted nature was laid bare, and Di Fei, standing behind her, remained silent.
Then, just as her hand was about to touch the doorknob, Di Fei spoke up. His voice, squeezed from the depths of his heart, was clouded and not very clear, and it suppressed something, as if someone had wronged him.
This was an inappropriate remark. He said, "Miss Xie, I hope you will behave yourself in the future."
Xie Huailing turned around.
She was a little confused. Di Feijing looked down at the table. She walked back step by step, but Di Feijing still kept his head down.
The smell of alcohol seemed to solidify, the air stopped moving, and the snowy night outside the building receded into the distance. The lyrics on the stage became distant and blurred, leaving only her gaze between the two of them. With a soft flicker of the lamp, a single, scalding candle tear slowly slid down its cheek.
Her movements were slow; her skirt brushed the ground, and a faint fragrance wafted through the air. Xie Huailing bypassed the calculations and probing between the two and returned to Di Feijing's side.
Di Feijing's body stiffened the moment she approached. He hadn't expected her to act this way so suddenly; even though she was still a step away, his thoughts had already wandered. He maintained his bowed posture, his gaze fixed on the back of his hand resting on his knee, and could only look at this side of the room. His heart pounded uncontrollably, pounding painfully in his chest, one beat after another, trying to drown out the lingering, poignant opera singing from downstairs, but only he could hear it.
Xie Huailing repeated the two words he had uttered: "Self-respect?"
Her words were as delicate as a feather, brushing against Di Feijing's taut nerves. She wasn't angry, not at all angry, far from angry; she was genuinely puzzled. This wasn't a word Di Feijing should utter at this moment: "Master Di, isn't it inappropriate of you to use this to describe me?"
"From the moment you asked me to come out, to sitting here playing this game with me, to this moment, and to before..."
She recounted the things she had deliberately avoided mentioning, and from her perspective, each one was ruthless: "From our first meeting, when I 'invited' you for drinks; to our meeting at the theater, the mutually agreeable conversation; and then our chance encounters, how many things I did and how many words I said, it all adds up to quite a lot."
"You had many opportunities to refuse, to flip the table, to walk away, but you didn't."
Her gaze slowly moved downwards, and the two red moles looked eerily strange under the light, overshadowing her otherworldly aura.
"You didn't refuse the drink I offered, you didn't refuse my questions, you chose to continue this charade with me, you chose to ask me out yourself—"
Xie Huailing bent down and covered the back of his hand, which was resting on the edge of the table. Her hand was delicate and cold, like a piece of ice that could not be warmed, yet it ignited a flame on his skin.
Di Fei shuddered violently, instinctively trying to pull his hand back, but he didn't. The flames spread along his body, and he felt his breath catch in his throat. All his senses were focused on the small patch of skin where her fingertips had brushed against, and on her increasingly close and unsettling breath.
"—Even now, they haven't really pushed me away."
Her voice was even lower, reaching Di Fei's ears with a start: "You said those two words as if I had betrayed you. But, am I seducing you, or perhaps, am I the one who seduced you?"
"Master Di, between the two of us, who should 'respect themselves'?"
"And what gives you the right to say that?"
She was genuinely curious, curious about this sudden change; she needed an answer that was under her control.
Di Fei didn't want to look at her, but he did anyway. She was so clever that she could catch something amiss in an instant. He could no longer suppress his gaze, and the dryness in his throat, which had been suppressed by the wine and tea, never disappeared.
What he wants, what he wants is...
Di Fei was startled when their eyes met.
Xie Huailing was stunned in his eyes.
It was a very short time, so short that Di Feijing didn't even notice. No one knew what she was thinking, and then, as if to verify something, she picked up the glass with the remaining half-full of wine.
Instead of staying at a safe distance, Xie Huailing slightly bent her knees and truly bent down, as if she were about to throw herself into Di Feijing's arms.
The distance vanished in an instant, completely devoured by her. Di Feijing could even see the patterns on her clothes at the chest; there was indeed a layer of dark lines. Then came the scent, the skin… She overwhelmed him once more, closer than ever before, an undeniable invasion. He instinctively tried to lean back, his fingertips resting on the table curling into his palm, but she pressed them down with her hand, and he immediately stopped moving.
Then, she moved her hand away, her five fingers lightly yet weightily caressing Di Feijing's lowered chin.
An extremely offensive touch; her beautiful fingertips traced the lines of his jaw, gently lifting his lowered head and forcing him completely and utterly exposed to her gaze. His neck stiffened in her hand, his head tilted back as she pulled him upward, his gaze meeting Xie Huailing's eyes, which were inches away. Her eyes were unmoved by anything, like a frozen lake in deep winter, reflecting his inescapable expression and his incomparably superior appearance.
Immediately afterwards, she held the half-empty glass of wine to his lips, the rim of the glass touching his warm lips and teeth.
Pushing it open further, the spicy liquid and her fragrance, along with her moonlit gaze, flowed in irresistibly.
His Adam's apple bobbed with difficulty.
The flickering candlelight cast long, intertwined shadows of the two figures pressed together on the wall. On the stage, the talented scholar and beautiful woman were singing their wedding song, about to drink the nuptial wine. There was no resistance; Di Feijing swallowed the wine along with her words, her breath, and all the chaos and heat she brought.
Everything is compliant; time passes here, and there's no need to go any further.
After he finished the wine in her hand, Xie Huailing threw down the glass. She had gotten her answer, and stood up, releasing Di Feijing.
Then it was as if she had never been there. The door opened and closed, downstairs lovers were celebrating their wedding night, having crossed the social divide, while upstairs only one person remained.
.
Shaman's legs were almost numb from waiting outside when Xie Huailing finally came out. She quickly followed him and checked her boss from head to toe, finding not a single hair missing.
Her boss was muttering something in a language Shaman couldn't understand, so Shaman interrupted her and asked, "Miss, how did your conversation with Di Feijing go? Shall we go back upstairs now?"
"Hard to say." Xie Huailing stroked his chin and switched back to the official Song Dynasty dialect. "It seems like things have gone wrong. How did things get to this point? No matter what, I'm sure I bear no responsibility at all. This is really bad."
But the next second, she quickly changed her mind and said, "No, maybe it's a good thing. But if we're going to develop this kind of business, should we charge overtime pay?"
Shaman couldn't understand anything anymore, but Xie Huailing had already left her behind and headed out of the theater, so she had no choice but to follow.
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Regarding the questions raised by readers about buying stocks and CP (Content Provider):
The main story will most likely not have any romantic pairings, and even if it does, it won't affect the side stories. I'll write side stories for the characters I've paired with.
Moreover, before writing this book, I had already outlined many of the romantic storylines ( ), and I will write them out in the side stories.
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