Chapter 17 "Aren't you worried about that Uchiha...?"
You and Bai stayed at the teahouse for a while. After drinking a cup of tea and eating a couple of pastries, you felt that you were already full and probably wouldn't be able to eat much for dinner.
After leaving Konoha, you decided to take a break in the Land of Waves. Although the Land of Waves is a small country surrounded by the sea, it boasts beautiful scenery and abundant resources, including marine resources and other mineral resources. After your business developed and you had some spare money, you bought a lot of land in the country. Some of it was used to build resorts, and some was used to open factories. The canned fish produced by the factories here is sold all over the world. It is the development of these industries that has finally brought some improvement to this small country.
Given that you are a rare major taxpayer in this small country, even the country's magistrates and nobles treat you with great respect. After all, no one can afford to offend money, and everyone knows that.
The ruling class of small countries is often easier to talk to, so you treat this country as your stronghold, no, I mean your headquarters, and decide to stay here for the time being.
Traveling from the Land of Fire to the Land of Waves requires not only overland travel but also several days by ship. You are prone to seasickness. If the sea were calm, it would be fine, but unfortunately, this time, waves kept crashing against you, making the passenger ship rock and sway. You curled up on the bed in your cabin, looking listless. The seasickness medicine you had just taken was vomited up again by a wave.
"Damn this weather!" you muttered to yourself. Why "mutter"? Because you were so dizzy and disoriented that you didn't even have the strength to say it aloud.
You went to the bathroom to brush your teeth and rinse your mouth. Bai stood beside you worriedly. Despite the huge waves outside, he was completely unharmed and even walked around the cabin as if it were flat ground. Unlike you, you walked unsteadily, as if you had been drinking fake alcohol.
"Mingxi..." Seeing that you were about to fall to the ground, he quickly caught you and brought you back to the bed. You rested your head on his chest and said in a muffled voice, "I hate wind and waves."
Bai gently patted your back. Although he was younger than you, he seemed so mature and gentle at that moment. He said, "The storm will pass."
You clicked your tongue weakly. Later, the storm did indeed pass, and you fell asleep in his arms. When the sunlight streamed into the cabin the next day, you frowned, and Bai reached out to shield your eyes from the sunlight, saying, "Do you want to sleep a little longer?"
“…Hmm.” You turned over, and Bai drew the curtains, got up, and went out of the cabin to prepare breakfast for you. After a long time, maybe an hour, or more, until you were almost asleep, you propped yourself up on your arms, leaned against the headboard, and shuffled to the bathroom to wash your face and brush your teeth. When you came out of the bathroom, Bai seemed to have timed it perfectly, carrying a steaming breakfast into the room, placing the food on the table, and saying, “The weather is nice today; there shouldn’t be any more waves.”
You slowly ate a croissant, resting your chin on your hand. The crust was baked to a golden brown and had a crispy texture. You also took a couple of sips of juice, your favorite citrus-flavored juice, which was sweet and sour.
After breakfast, you finally recovered from the seasickness of the previous night. You stretched and said, "Let's go out and take a look."
If you're always hiding in the cabin, you'll feel like you're going to get moldy.
You put on a sun-protective shirt and went out onto the deck, saying you were there to sunbathe, but you didn't stand in the sun for long before you felt it was too hot, so you went to a shady spot and sat cross-legged. Bai used his ability to cool you down; it was actually a combination of his Ice Release and Wind Release, turning him into a walking air conditioner. You moved a little closer to him, and Bai said, "Are you hot?"
"Fortunately, White's ninjutsu has a very good cooling effect."
“Mingxi’s appearance yesterday scared me to death.” He was worried that you would get dehydrated and sick, so he prepared a glass of salt water for you this morning to replenish your fluids. You frowned as you drank the glass of salt water.
“But I’ve recovered now.” You smiled at Bai, who then said, “I’ve already had the villa in the Land of Waves cleaned in advance. If you have any complaints, please let me know.”
You have complete confidence in Bai's efficiency. Since he became your secretary, your workload has been significantly reduced. You no longer have to stay up all night reviewing documents. More importantly, you hired him as your secretary, and he didn't even ask for a salary. His exact words were, "Because Miss Mingxi brought me out of my previous hell, I don't need any reward for everything I've done."
People in this world are very good at manipulating themselves. You don't even need to say anything; they've already managed to adjust themselves naturally, sometimes even to the point of overdoing it.
You still have to pay him his salary, otherwise you'll feel like you're really exploiting him (although there's no real difference in essence), so you'll transfer money to him regularly in the middle of each month. As for how he uses that money, that's not your concern.
"I trust you to handle things," you said casually. Haku's ninjutsu adjusted the temperature around you to a very comfortable range, and your mood improved considerably.
Bai lowered his eyes and said, "Thank you for your trust."
You turn your head to the side and say, "You don't need to say thank you for these things, because Bai is like family to me. Do family members say these kinds of things?"
Sigh, I bet no one in this world has ever heard a boss say something like "Treat the company like your own home, we're all one family." Of course, you're different from those heartless bosses; at least you get paid the full amount, and they don't deliberately withhold money.
This is just a platitude, you know that perfectly well, but Bai seems to have taken it seriously. He said helplessly, "Can someone like me become your family? But... I..."
“Sure.” You said, taking his hands in yours, and then your hands were frozen. Bai checked your hands even more anxiously to make sure they weren’t frostbitten, but he still felt guilty. “I’m sorry, I almost hurt you just now.”
"What's this? I'm not hurt at all, I'm fine." You show him your palm and the back of your hand. Apart from your palm being a little red, there's nothing wrong with it. He's just making a big fuss over nothing.
Bai blinked, looking somewhat uneasy. "But I remember, Mingxi, you grew up in Konoha. Aren't the people there your real family?"
Ah, he's talking about the Uchiha clan, right? You said, "Yes, but family isn't static. Now I feel that Haku is also my family. Is that not okay?"
You hold his hand in return. His palm is slightly larger than yours, with slender and long fingers that look delicate. His palms and fingertips are covered with calluses. He is worried that the calluses on his hands might irritate your skin. He says, "...Then it would be my honor."
"It's my honor to meet Bai. I must have had incredible luck, umm, maybe it's fate." These clichéd lines, often found in novels and used to death, still left the boy in front of him stunned. A faint blush appeared on his cheeks, and he said, "I..."
"Just accept it gracefully now." You pulled your hand back, but his hand remained frozen in mid-air. After a few seconds, he reluctantly closed his fingers.
The ship docked, and another familiar figure was waiting for you at the pier. You stood on the deck and waved to Zabuza: "Yo—long time no see."
Zai Buzhan, who was in charge of meeting you, dutifully carried your bag. Having seen the large bags you carried on your last trip, he was a little surprised to see that you only had a small bag this time. He asked, "Have you changed your ways? You're only carrying so little luggage?"
"It happened so suddenly, I had to get out of Konoha as soon as possible, I didn't have time to pack my bags." Your intuition told you that if you stayed there any longer, you would probably be completely entangled by Itachi Uchiha, so you made a quick decision and packed your bags and ran away overnight.
You haven't told Haku about this yet. Zabuza is a man who has seen a lot, and he saw through the truth at a glance: you almost messed things up. He said, "I remember the last time we met you were praising him as a good lover."
As you walked and talked, you shrugged and said, "It's not contradictory. Although I think he's a good lover, it's not okay for him to want to become my husband."
Zabuza sneered, "No wonder you ran so fast, so he wants to marry you."
What's so funny? So what if you're someone who lacks a sense of responsibility in relationships? You shrug. "Otherwise, what would I be thinking to get married?"
Haku, who was standing to the side, hadn't heard you mention anything about lovers. When he heard you and Zabuza discussing words like "lover" and "marriage," he instinctively felt some resistance. Although he had never met your lover—no, it should be your ex-lover—that didn't stop him from disliking that guy, especially since the other party didn't even recognize his own position.
Towards the end, it turned into Zabuza criticizing the Uchiha clan, and you asked curiously, "You really hate the Uchiha that much?"
"Is that not allowed?" He still remembers the look that Uchiha brat gave you; it was extremely unpleasant.
As you walk to the villa entrance, this is your first time visiting this villa. You've only seen photos before, but the actual place is even more to your liking than you imagined, especially the rooftop swimming pool. You can soak in the water at night and enjoy the night view, paired with a glass of wine. Just thinking about it makes you feel very comfortable.
As you walked into the villa, he suddenly said, "Aren't you worried that Uchiha will come looking for you?"
"Ah, didn't I already leave a letter severing ties?"
The recipient stared at the letter for a long time after opening it. In the end, the boy calmly put the letter back in the envelope. When Sasuke asked about his whereabouts, he smiled and said, "Her? Hmm... she's probably just out for a walk. Don't worry, I'll bring her back."
He spoke calmly and casually, but it was only a facade of composure. What was he really like? He read the letter over and over again, finally realizing a harsh reality—
He was abandoned by you.
A note from the author:
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