Chapter 48 Hug in the Hot Spring
Two minutes later, Ruan Xingfeng's assistant came in and told him that the car was ready. Ruan Xingfeng came to his senses, picked up his coat, and walked out of the office. His steps were so fast that the assistant behind him could not keep up.
Ruan Xingfeng's pace slowed down as he went up the stairs. He didn't know how he should face them. Although he comforted himself in his heart that he just did what he wanted to do, he didn't mean to hurt Liao Feng. He hurt Liao Feng because of misunderstanding.
But the thought of Song Xuexi's disappointed and disgusted look at him, and the distant tone and address on the phone shattered all his psychological defenses. He didn't know how he could face Liao Feng and Xu Nuoyan in any state.
But in the end, he took a deep breath, forced himself to lift his legs that seemed to be filled with lead, and walked up the last few steps one by one, towards the ward door that seemed to separate life and death.
The door was ajar, and he reached out and gently pushed it open.
The first thing that caught his eye was Xu Nuoyan and Ran Yian, who were sitting on the bench outside the door and looking up at him at the same time. The moment Xu Nuoyan's eyes met his.
He moved away abruptly as if scalded, revealing a complex mix of emotions he couldn't conceal—repulsion and a sense of despair at having nowhere else to turn. Ran Yian sighed heavily and turned away.
Ruan Xingfeng didn't have the energy to interpret their gazes. His entire attention was fixed on the scene in the ward and he couldn't move his gaze away even a little bit.
When he saw the appearance of the man on the hospital bed, Ruan Xingfeng felt a buzzing in his brain, as if someone had hit him hard on the back of his head with a sledgehammer!
His eyes instantly turned red, and a sharp pain rushed into his nose and eyes.
His legs went limp uncontrollably, and he had to subconsciously reach out to hold onto the cold door frame to barely steady himself.
He had seen Liao Feng weak and sick, but he had never... never seen him like this.
It was like a broken body whose soul had been sucked away by the god of death, leaving only a faint breath.
Liao Feng lay there quietly, his body pierced with tubes of varying thicknesses and monitor wires. The numbers and curves dancing on the screens coldly told of his precarious condition. His eyes were covered with white gauze, obscuring those once affectionate and piercing eyes.
The hands that once gently stroked his hair and also restrained him forcefully now hung limply at his sides, their knuckles clearly visible but pale and bloodless.
Liao Feng's skin, already fair, was now frighteningly pale, like a lifeless, grayish-white wall, even faintly revealing a bluish-gray aura of death. The veins on the backs of his hands and arms, bulging with unusual clarity due to his weight loss, snaked beneath the thin skin.
He was so thin that he looked unrecognizable, as if only a skeleton was left, loosely covered with a layer of skin. The man who was once so strong, aggressive and full of vitality was now so fragile that he seemed like he would shatter and disappear before his eyes in the next second.
Ruan Xingfeng's heart felt like it was being tightly grasped by an ice-cold hand, causing him so much pain that he could hardly breathe. Was all this... indirectly caused by him?
He was satisfied with all his achievements - the establishment of the association, the signing of the law, and the hope that ignited in the eyes of the herbivores. Except... except for the appearance of Liao Feng in front of him.
He had never really intended to hurt Liao Feng to such an extent from the beginning. In his cognition, Liao Feng was always powerful and indestructible.
He thought that his calculations and escapes would only make Liao Feng angry and frustrated, just like being pecked on the hand by a carefully raised canary, which was harmless and the other party would recover soon and still be the powerful Liao Feng who controlled everything.
But……
But reality gave him a hard slap in the face.
Because of the causes he had sown, Liao Feng was lying here half-dead, his life like a candle in the wind.
Is this the revenge he wants? Is this the result of his deliberate pursuit?
No.
What he has always wanted is freedom, dignity, and equal treatment with herbivores like him so that they can live with their heads held high.
It was not Liao Feng's dying breath, nor the disgust and hatred in the eyes of Xu Nuoyan, Song Xuexi and others that almost turned into substance.
He was overwhelmed by the immense regret and heartache. He looked at Liao Feng, who seemed to be still shivering slightly under the quilt, and felt that he looked so cold, so weak, and so in need of warmth.
Driven by an instinct, he subconsciously and tremblingly stretched out his hand, wanting to touch Liao Feng's pale and cold hand, wanting to hold it, as if this could convey a little insignificant warmth and make up for the one-tenth of the mistake.
However, before his fingertips touched Liao Feng's skin, a cold and powerful hand suddenly grabbed his wrist like an iron clamp!
A sharp pain instantly came from his wrist bones. The force was so great that it seemed as if it was really going to crush his bones!
Ruan Xingfeng felt pain and raised his head, meeting Xu Nuoyan's fox eyes that were almost spitting fire.
The gentleness that was usually pretended was gone, leaving only cold hatred and extreme repression.
"President Ruan," Xu Nuoyan said in a very low voice, each word squeezed out from between his teeth, with a chilling tone like poison. "You've finished reading 'The Spoils of War'. You must be feeling... very happy, right?"
He deliberately used words to pierce Ruan Xingfeng's heart, twisting all his concern and guilt into ulterior motives.
"Now," Xu Nuoyan tightened his grip on his wrist, his eyes sharp as a knife, filled with an unquestionable sense of oppression, "can we start saving him? Or do you need to admire your 'masterpiece' for a while longer?"
Those words were like the sharpest ice spike, piercing Ruan Xingfeng's most painful wound and stirring it a little. His face instantly turned almost as pale as Liao Feng's, pale as paper. The excruciating pain in his wrist was not even one-tenth as intense as the pain in his heart.
He wanted to defend himself and say that it was not true, but all his words seemed so pale and powerless in the face of the reality that Liao Feng was dying and Xu Nuoyan's overwhelming hatred.
He could only swallow hard, suppressing the sob in his throat and the burning in his eyes. He met Xu Nuoyan's gaze and answered in a hoarse but unusually clear voice:
"You can go to the Linlu Clan's holy land now. I will save him." Ruan Xingfeng's voice was hoarse, but it was filled with unquestionable determination. He no longer looked at Xu Nuoyan.
Instead, he quickly took out his encrypted communicator and contacted the Elders Council of the Linlu Clan directly. He gave a concise order: "Sacred Spring, highest authority, prepare to treat the important wounded. No mistakes are allowed."
There seemed to be a moment of hesitation and whispering on the other end of the phone. Obviously, using their sacred holy spring to save the life of a carnivore, especially a lion, made many people of the Linlu tribe feel instinctively dissatisfied and resistant.
However, Ruan Xingfeng did not give them time to question. His tone instantly became cold and majestic: "Follow orders." These four short words were transmitted through the radio waves.
The tribesmen immediately remembered the iron-fisted approach of the young chief and high priest in reorganizing the association and his unfathomable power belonging to the "Divine Deer". All dissatisfaction was suppressed and no one dared to rebel at this moment.
Xu Nuoyan carefully carried Liao Feng to the special medical vehicle. Ruan Xingfeng's outstretched hand froze in mid-air, and he could only silently withdraw it. Xu Nuoyan drew a clear line with his actions, and he would not allow Ruan Xingfeng to touch Liao Feng again.
Inside the car, the atmosphere was suffocatingly oppressive. Liao Feng lay quietly on the fixed medical bed, his face pale and his breathing weak.
Ruan Xingfeng sat in the passenger seat, but his eyes couldn't help but look through the rearview mirror at the lifeless figure in the back seat. Every time he looked, his heart seemed to be tightened by an invisible hand.
Ran Yian, wearing a white coat, sat on the other side of the medical bed, staring intently at various life monitoring instruments, always ready to deal with any accidents that might occur along the way. His professionalism allowed him to temporarily put aside his personal emotions.
Xu Nuoyan said nothing as he sat beside Liao Feng, one hand always resting lightly on Liao Feng's cold wrist, continuously and carefully transmitting his gentle healing ability to him, like a trickle, barely maintaining that little bit of life.
His face gradually turned pale as his supernatural power was consumed, but he had no intention of stopping.
Outside the car, on the seemingly peaceful road, several inconspicuous black vehicles were vaguely seen following at a tacit distance. They were Song Xuexi's men.
Although she herself does not appear, her power and vigilance are everywhere.
She didn't trust Ruan Xingfeng at all, especially in this situation where the other party was completely in control. She was afraid that Ruan Xingfeng would take the opportunity to take Liao Feng's life.
Ruan Xingfeng saw those vehicles through the rearview mirror and also received a report from his subordinates that "the Tiger Guard has arrived at the outskirts of the holy land." He understood Song Xuexi's concerns and felt a little bitter in his heart, but he did not stop it.
He simply calmly added a command through the communicator: "Tiger Tribe guards are permitted to enter the outer courtyards of the holy land for security, but are strictly prohibited from even setting foot in the inner hall or the holy spring area. Any disobedience will be considered an intrusion and will be dealt with according to tribal rules."
This was the biggest concession he could make. He could do his best to treat the victim, but he would never allow the power of the carnivores to penetrate into the core sacred place of the forest deer tribe. This was related to the dignity and bottom line of the race.
The convoy sped along, heading towards the sacred site hidden deep in the snow-capped mountains, guarded by the Linlu tribe for generations. Outside, the wind and snow were biting, while inside, there was a heavy silence and a constant flow of anxiety.
Everyone's hopes and doubts are tied to the mysterious holy spring and Ruan Xingfeng's upcoming treatment, the details of which no one knows.
When they arrived deep in the sacred land of the Linlu tribe, at the holy spring shrouded in mist and emitting a faint white light, Ruan Xingfeng finally had the opportunity to get close to Liao Feng.
The air is filled with an ancient and pure energy. The spring water is so clear that you can vaguely see the smooth pebbles at the bottom and the slowly flowing milky white halo.
Xu Nuoyan and Ran Yian were extremely careful and coordinated with each other, removing the life-sustaining instrument tubes from Liao Feng's body one by one.
Every time one was removed, Liao Feng's vital signs seemed to weaken, which made people's hearts tighten.
During this process, Ruan Xingfeng kept his hands firmly on Liao Feng's cold back.
He closed his eyes, and a soft and holy light shone around him. The energy belonging to the High Priest of the Divine Deer, which contained powerful vitality, was continuously and carefully injected into Liao Feng's almost stagnant body, barely holding on to his last breath.
When all the instruments were removed and Liao Feng was completely dependent on Ruan Xingfeng's strength, Xu Nuoyan and Ran Yian looked at each other, silently left the stone chamber surrounding the holy spring, gently closed the door, and left the space to the two of them.
Ruan Xingfeng also fell into the water and hugged him. In fact, there was no need for him to go into the water, nor did he need to get so close, but he had his own selfish motives. He didn't know what their relationship would be like after Liao Feng woke up, but he wanted to be close to Liao Feng now, and lie in his arms again to feel his warmth.
Liao Feng's embrace was cold, and what he touched were no longer the firm, full, and vital muscles in his memory. Instead, there was a frightening thinness and coldness.
In the past, no matter if it was a forced confinement or an occasional display of tenderness, Liao Feng's hug was always filled with unquestionable power and scorching body temperature, like a solid and warm fortress, trapping Ruan Xingfeng firmly in his world.
But now, this embrace only filled Ruan Xingfeng with boundless fear and heartache. Liao Feng's body was cold and fragile, as if at any moment it would dissipate into a wisp of smoke, quietly fading from his embrace and leaving him forever. Ruan Xingfeng had never been so frightened before. He channeled all his energy, holding the person tightly in his arms, afraid that if he let go, he would lose everything, afraid that Liao Feng would die completely in his arms.
This long ceremony lasted a whole day and night.
Ruan Xingfeng almost exhausted his mind and resonated with the power of the holy spring, guiding the majestic and gentle energy to wash and repair Liao Feng's broken body again and again, and dispel the strange cold poison that penetrated deep into his bones.
When the last trace of coldness was completely purified and the light of the spring water gradually subsided, Ruan Xingfeng finally reached his limit. He leaned exhaustedly on Liao Feng's chest, which was still thin but no longer cold, and fell into a deep sleep.
When Liao Feng woke up, the first thing that came into his perception was the long-lost light.
He blinked subconsciously, adjusting to the soft light in the stone chamber. The gauze covering his eyes had been removed at some point, and his vision gradually cleared from blurry to clearer.
The misty water vapor, the smooth stone walls, the clear spring water... and Ruan Xingfeng, who was now nestled in his arms, sleeping defenselessly.
His little fawn baby looked extremely tired, with tiny water droplets on his eyelashes, his breathing was even and long, his fair cheeks were faintly pink due to the steam from the hot springs, and he leaned quietly on his chest.
If it were in the past, seeing such a scene, Liao Feng would definitely press the man deeper into his arms without hesitation, rub his chin against the top of his head, and maybe even whisper a few teasing words with a smile.
But now...
He just leaned against the wall of the hot spring quietly, not moving.
The joy of seeing the light again lasted only a moment, and was followed by a deeper confusion and an empty exhaustion. His body was no longer freezing cold, but a feeling of powerlessness from the depths of his soul enveloped him.
Those fragments of memories of being deceived, betrayed, and severely hurt, along with the extreme pain of the body before falling into a coma, flooded into his mind.
He looked at the sleeping person in his arms, his emotions were extremely complicated. It was this person who had dealt him the most fatal blow. It was also this person who had now pulled him back from the brink of death.
Love and hate intertwined, guilt and resentment coexisted, and all emotions eventually turned into a kind of almost numb calm. He didn't know how to face Ruan Xingfeng, nor did he know what to say first after waking up.
So he just waited silently, waiting for the person in his arms to wake up, waiting for the unknown and perhaps more difficult next step. The warm spring water surrounded them, but it seemed as if there was an invisible barrier between them.
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