Shadow 2
After closing the door, Duan Lixing sighed: "Actually, the third brother is a meticulous and logical thinker. He could have figured these things out clearly, but today he was just confused because he was worried."
Yang Zheng pushed open the bedroom door and saw Shen Anxia lying on her pillow, crying sadly.
Hearing the door open, Shen Anxia stopped sobbing and looked up at Yang Zheng.
Yang Zheng walked to the bedside and sat down, then helped Shen Anxia up and hugged her tightly.
Shen Anxia leaned all her weight on Yang Zheng. After a long while, Yang Zheng spoke with difficulty: "Anxia, don't be afraid."
Shen Anxia wiped away her tears and slowly complained, her voice still a little hoarse: "You're not by my side."
"My clothes are dirty, and I wanted to change them. I've made your blankets dirty," Yang Zheng explained, noticing the displeasure in Shen Anxia's tone.
"Are you leaving me after changing clothes?" Shen Anxia asked anxiously.
Yang Zheng: "..."
“You can change next to me.” Shen Anxia emphasized again, afraid that Yang Zheng hadn’t understood.
Yang Zheng: "..."
"I'm scared, please don't leave me," Shen Anxia said in a hoarse voice.
"Okay." Yang Zheng gently put his arm around Shen Anxia.
A sense of security enveloped Shen Anxia, and she gradually relaxed. Ignoring the pain that made it difficult for her to lift her arms, she held Yang Zheng tightly and said in a hoarse voice, "Yang Zheng, I was really scared yesterday. I thought what happened yesterday only happened in TV dramas. I thought I could avoid risks by not going to any potentially dangerous places. I thought my life was already very simple, but something like this still happened, and I made you worry."
Yang Zheng apologized with deep feeling: "I'm sorry, it's my fault for not taking good care of you."
He should have realized something was amiss after the last car accident, but perhaps his recent smooth progress with An Xia blinded him to this unusual situation, which led to what happened later.
Noticing that Yang Zheng was in a bad mood, Shen Anxia let go of Yang Zheng and carefully looked him over.
The man before me looked haggard and pained. His usually relaxed brows were now furrowed into an unresolved knot, his eyes were bloodshot, and stubble had sprouted from his clearly defined jawline overnight. His lips, which always wore a smile, were stretched into a straight line, as if he was suppressing something, enduring something, or something was about to erupt.
Shen Anxia suddenly realized that Yang Zheng might also be afraid of encountering such a situation.
Looking back on last night, it was incredibly harrowing, but thankfully she was unharmed, only suffering some injuries. These injuries appeared serious, but they were merely external wounds and wouldn't significantly impact her physical or mental well-being or her career. She still felt the world was beautiful and could continue dancing on stage. She was extremely lucky that she hadn't been slashed or stabbed by the assailant's dagger, nor had she been forced to lose her innocence. Thinking back to the moment she saw Yang Zheng's car headlights, she felt as if she had been brought back from the brink of death.
He must have risked his life to catch up with her.
He saved her.
But he doesn't seem to be doing well.
She had a dream all night long. What about him? Did he also close his eyes and think of the scene of her being pinned to the ground, unable to move? Was he blaming himself?
Shen Anxia lowered her head, wanting to hold Yang Zheng's hand and tell him that everything was over, but suddenly she saw that the protruding parts of the knuckles on the back of Yang Zheng's right hand were all bloody and mangled, with white bone faintly visible where the white flesh was turned outward, and traces of blood seeping out from inside.
"You're injured!" Shen Anxia exclaimed, her voice hoarse and somewhat frightening.
Yang Zheng's attention was forcibly diverted by Shen Anxia's exclamation. He looked at the back of his hand and said, "It's nothing."
Then I tried to hide my hands behind my back.
Shen Anxia grabbed him to stop him from moving, her eyes instantly welling up with tears.
She only wanted to find a sense of security in Yang Zheng, but she overlooked the fact that he might be more afraid.
He beat his own hands until they were mangled like this, but he didn't even bother to treat them.
Yang Zheng dared not pull his hand away forcefully, lest he aggravate Shen Anxia's numerous wounds. Seeing Shen Anxia holding him with her head down and not saying a word, Yang Zheng leaned down to look at her and just saw two tears fall from Shen Anxia's eyes and land on the back of his hand.
He panicked, cupping Shen Anxia's face in one hand and repeatedly wiping away her tears with his fingertips. His words were incoherent, his lips opening and closing several times, finally managing to utter only two words: "Anxia..."
Shen Anxia leaned on Yang Zheng's shoulder, buried her face in his collarbone, and cried desperately, almost sobbing. Yang Zheng's eyes reddened instantly, his eyes gleaming with broken light. His hands holding Shen Anxia trembled uncontrollably, and he could only repeat incoherently, "Don't be afraid, I won't leave you, Anxia."
After crying her heart out against Yang Zheng, Shen Anxia felt much less oppressed. She complained, "Why wasn't it bandaged?"
"I'm fine. I often get injured in this hand during training, and it scabbed over this afternoon."
Shen Anxia was not comforted at all and muttered unhappily, "You don't take care of yourself."
Yang Zheng: "...I'll go apply the medicine in a bit, okay?"
Shen Anxia hummed in agreement but didn't move.
After a while, she chuckled softly.
Yang Zheng didn't hear her clearly and wanted to bend down to take a look at her, but Shen Anxia held him tightly and wouldn't let him move, so he had to give up.
After a while, Shen Anxia said with a sense of relief that she had survived the ordeal, "Yang Zheng, I was very brave yesterday. I smashed that person's head with my phone."
Yang Zheng spoke with a dry throat: "That's very brave... Let's not think about yesterday anymore, okay?"
Shen Anxia continued, "I want to recall how brave I was back then. Yang Zheng, it's a good thing you were in Xinfeng yesterday, and it's a good thing you didn't come to pick me up."
Yang Zheng was stunned for a moment, realizing that Shen Anxia's words were exactly the same as what Duan Lixing had said earlier.
Shen Anxia added, "Yesterday I saw you walking towards me against the headlights, and it felt like I was seeing my guardian angel. Yang Zheng, my boyfriend, is so handsome."
Upon hearing this, Yang Zheng helped Shen Anxia up and looked at her carefully.
"It hurts." Shen Anxia frowned and smiled. "You touched my wound."
Yang Zheng quickly let go of her hand, lifted up Shen Anxia's sleeve, and looked at the abrasions on Shen Anxia's arm. They had stopped bleeding, but they were still very gruesome.
Seeing Yang Zheng's expression change several times over a long period of time without him saying a word, Shen Anxia asked, "What's wrong with you?"
Yang Zheng asked with difficulty, "An Xia, were you scared just now?"
Shen Anxia lowered her eyes: "Yes, I am afraid, but I am not afraid when you are by my side."
Shen Anxia leaned back into Yang Zheng's arms and whispered, "Yang Zheng, I like you so much."
Yang Zheng was stunned again.
Shen Anxia didn't receive a response from Yang Zheng, but she felt as if water droplets were falling on the side of her neck. She looked up at Yang Zheng and saw tears streaming down his handsome face.
Shen Anxia tried to raise her hand to wipe away Yang Zheng's tears, hoping to distract him. She said in a coquettish voice, "I'm so hungry."
But given that her voice was so hoarse, the sounds she made at that moment didn't sound like she was being coquettish at all; instead, they were rather funny.
Yang Zheng forced a smile out of his deep emotions: "I'll go cook some porridge, you can sleep a little longer?"
Shen Anxia shook her head, lifted the blanket to look at her ankle, which was still very swollen. She said to Yang Zheng, "Could you get me some water? Let's order breakfast, I want you to keep me company. Oh, and bring in the first-aid kit, I'll help you apply the medicine."
"I don't need any medicine, the injury will be fine by the afternoon," Yang Zheng said nonchalantly.
Shen Anxia pouted and lowered her head unhappily.
"Okay, I'll go get the first-aid kit." Seeing her like this, Yang Zheng helplessly returned to the living room, poured a glass of water, and handed it to Shen Anxia. He watched her drink the whole glass of water in one go, then put the first-aid kit aside and prepared to treat her wound.
"I'll do it." After finishing her water, Shen Anxia took the cotton swabs and hydrogen peroxide from Yang Zheng and began to treat his wound.
Yang Zheng told Shen Anxia, "My elder brother and the others have come to Xinfeng to handle this matter. You don't need to worry. This kind of thing won't happen again."
"Do your older brothers know?" Shen Anxia asked.
“Yes,” Yang Zheng grasped Shen Anxia’s hand, “I attended the banquet yesterday mainly because Xin Feng also attended. At that time, in order to make things smoother for you in the group, I asked Secretary Liu for help quite a bit. So this time, I made a special trip to visit him. He also told me that I must attend the event on Friday.”
“He left after you called yesterday, and I managed to come out, but I still didn’t have time to pick you up. I’m sorry, Anxia.”
Shen Anxia noticed that Yang Zheng's pupils were filled with darkness when he said these words, and she realized once again that he was in more pain than she was when he encountered such a thing.
Why apologize?
Yang Zheng felt as if an invisible hand was gripping his throat. His knuckles turned white as he held Shen Anxia's hand, and the purplish-blue veins under his skin bulged. He blamed himself, saying, "I didn't take good care of you."
Shen Anxia took Yang Zheng's hand in return, leaned forward and gently kissed him, and said solemnly, "No one is better than you, Yang Zheng. I've only ever seen such a long knife in TV dramas yesterday. You actually managed to subdue three knife-wielding thugs with your bare hands. If it were any other man, he would have been terrified. But my boyfriend is as handsome as Tuxedo Mask—I always thought that the free fighting you mentioned was just like a regular extracurricular class."
Yang Zheng was embarrassed by Shen Anxia's serious attitude. He asked, "Ye... what mask? Anxia... you don't need to be afraid of anything. We have practical training. No one among the coaches can beat me."
Seeing Yang Zheng blush, Shen Anxia didn't explain anything about the mask and returned to the previous topic: "Who else did you say came besides Big Brother?"
"Second Brother, Fourth Brother and Fifth Brother are here."
"Brother Da Jing is here too?" Shen Anxia exclaimed in surprise. "What about my parents?"
Yang Zheng shook his head: "My family doesn't know. I told them."
Shen Anxia breathed a slight sigh of relief: "Can they handle it? Shouldn't the parties involved go?"
"The fourth and fifth brothers have gone. Secretary Liu was introduced by the eldest and second brothers, so they will definitely visit him today. I have to take care of you and can't leave. There are too many things to deal with, but this matter must be resolved as soon as possible."
Shen Anxia hadn't felt much before, but at this moment she really wanted to go back to Yi'an.
"Yang Zheng, I want to change my clothes."
Yang Zheng got up and opened the wardrobe as instructed, asking, "Which one do you want to wear?"
"It will be all right."
Yang Zheng thought for a moment, realizing that Shen Anxia needed to apply medicine, so it would be better for her to wear something simple. He picked up a set of short-sleeved shirt and shorts and asked, "Will this set be okay?"
"good."
Shen Anxia took the clothes, glanced at Yang Zheng, whose expression remained cold and resolute, and then looked at the two storage boxes in the cabinet with her big eyes.
Yang Zheng noticed her subtle movement and asked, "Which other item do you want to take?"
Shen Anxia was too embarrassed to say that she wanted to take a shower and change her underwear. Although Yang Zheng had carefully wiped away the bloodstains and mud from yesterday's fall and tumble, it wasn't something that could be easily wiped away in this season. Besides, she was covered in sweat after last night's performance and couldn't stand it anymore.
Otherwise, she wouldn't have taken a taxi so urgently to get back to her place to take a shower, only to encounter something like this.
"Anxia?" Yang Zheng asked again, "Which one do you want to take?"
Shen Anxia said softly, "I want to take a shower."
Then change the soiled underwear, pajamas, and bedding.
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