At present, Su Yushan was begging Hongli to do something, so she had no choice but to go along with his wishes and say, "I will follow your orders, Fourth Master."
"It was not an order, but a discussion."
Since she rarely asked him for a favor, he naturally seized this opportunity to shorten the distance between them. Gazing into her bright, watery eyes, Hongli's voice was unusually low and husky, his gaze unabashedly bold, "I want to eat you..."
As she expected, it wouldn't be anything nice. However, if she wanted to leave the manor, she had to pay a price. Su Yushan was about to agree when she heard him add, "I want to eat your tomato fish."
"..." It turned out he hadn't finished speaking. Such a request seemed far too simple, and Su Yushan couldn't help but suspect a trick. "Is that all?"
"What else did you think? That I wanted to eat you?" Hongli laughed out loud, looking like he was watching a good show. Su Yushan then belatedly realized that he was deliberately pausing and saying such ambiguous things to make her misunderstand, and then watch the joke.
Su Yushan, feeling annoyed, wanted to retort, but she didn't want to waste her breath on him, so she didn't respond. Unexpectedly, he teased her again, "If you want me to eat you, it's not impossible, but it's broad daylight and your sister is here, so it's not very convenient. Let's wait until tonight, and I'll savor you properly."
As they spoke, Hongli lifted her chin with his finger, feigning a flirtatious manner. However, Su Yushan looked directly at him, her face completely composed, showing none of the shyness he had imagined.
"If Fourth Master desires it, I will gladly serve you."
If she had scolded him or refused, he would have felt better. But her calm acceptance left him speechless.
“I don’t need you to serve me, I want you to be close to me from the bottom of your heart.”
Sincerity? How could she dare to offer him her sincerity?
Whenever the topic of their relationship came up, he was always met with silence.
She stopped arguing and remained silent, leaving Hongli helpless.
With a long sigh, Hongli tactfully changed the subject, "Make me a tomato fish dish, and I'll take you to Baozhenlou."
Last year, she made a cold tomato salad, which Hongli couldn't forget. In addition, Su Yushan loved to eat tomatoes, so he specially spent a lot of money to collect dozens of tomato plants from all over the capital and planted them in the backyard for her to enjoy.
Therefore, he issued an order that no one other than those in the Huatang Pavilion was allowed to pick the fruit.
Su Yushan was unaware of this rule; all she knew was that there seemed to be an unusually large harvest of tomatoes this year, so she didn't have to worry about running out.
Hongli's request was a piece of cake for her; it was just tomato fish! She could make it by noon.
Carp meat is more tender, but it has too many bones, which Su Yushan doesn't like, so she asked someone to prepare a grass carp instead.
Yu Chan could also cook. She originally wanted to help her sister, but the Fourth Master's eyes clearly indicated that she shouldn't get in the way in the small kitchen. So, Yu Chan cleverly made an excuse and slipped away.
To get closer to her, Hongli offered to help, but Su Yushan said the dish was very simple and required no preparation, telling him to just rest.
Upon spotting the grass carp, Hongli steeled his resolve and decided to give it a try. "I'll help you scrape the fish."
The dignified Fourth Prince, actually having to scale fish? Su Yushan looked at him in confusion, holding back for a moment before finally asking, "You...can you do it?"
Unwilling to be questioned, Hongli scoffed dismissively, "How could I not know how to scrape fish, something as simple as that?"
To prove himself, Hongli resolutely picked up a stick and knocked the fish's head unconscious. Demin, standing ramrod straight with his sword in the distance, frowned upon seeing this and reminded Li Yu...
"The fish is very fishy. How can you let Fourth Master do this kind of work? Hurry up and go help!"
Li Yu leaned leisurely against the tree, unhurried and showing no intention of approaching. "What do you know? This is the perfect opportunity for Fourth Master and Princess to ease their tensions. If I interfere, Fourth Master will not only not be grateful to me, but will also think I'm in the way."
"But Fourth Master has never scraped a fish before."
Li Yu, however, had great confidence in his master. "There's always a first time for everything. Fourth Master has seen others scrape fish before. He should be able to do it too if he just follows the example."
As it turned out, he had overestimated his master's abilities. Scaling fish seemed simple, but the fish was very slippery, and it was not easy to do without certain skills.
Sure enough, before Hongli could even scrape a few times, the knife in his hand went astray.
Seeing that Fourth Master's finger was injured, Demin could no longer stay still and was about to step forward when Li Yu stopped him, saying, "If you don't want your master to deduct your monthly salary, you'd better stay here obediently!"
"Didn't you see that Fourth Master is injured?" As Fourth Master's bodyguard, Demin was naturally responsible for protecting him, and therefore extremely concerned about his safety. Li Yu sighed inwardly, realizing that Demin only had loyalty and was completely unaware of his master's subtle intentions.
“Su Gege isn’t blind, she can see it too.” Li Yu raised her head in greeting, and Demin looked over accordingly. Sure enough, she saw her mistress cry out in pain. Su Gege, hearing the commotion, immediately put down her work and went outside.
"What happened? Did you cut your hand?"
Su Yushan went closer and saw that Hongli had a bloody cut on his index finger, and blood was flowing out!
"The ten fingers are connected to the heart, and the wound isn't shallow; it must hurt a lot, right?" Su Yushan sighed inwardly, realizing she shouldn't have let him scrape the fish. Hiding her worry, Su Yushan scoffed unhappily:
"I told you not to do it, but you insisted on doing it!"
He was injured, and she didn't even say a word of concern. Instead, she blamed him. Hongli felt even more aggrieved. "I was just trying to help you!"
"Who asked you to help? You're clearly just causing trouble!" Although she was scolding him, she had already grabbed his arm and walked to the bucket, where she scooped water with a ladle and poured it on his finger to wash the wound.
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