Chapter 81 was a very ordinary scene, yet it made Li Xiao's cheeks inexplicably flush.
Everything just happened so coincidentally.
Chang Li's favorite shop turned out to be the very one that Li Xiao had ultimately chosen.
Otherwise, how could we say that birds of a feather flock together?
People who become close friends naturally share some strikingly similar tastes, such as desserts or people.
Since Li Xiao and his companion had to make several turns to get there, when they entered the gate, Yu Qingzhou and Chang Li were already sitting down in a corner.
"If Senior Brother Li likes sweet things, this shop is perfect. I heard that their sweet osmanthus lotus root and fermented rice balls are the best in the area."
Zhuzhu introduced it with great interest.
Li Xiao glanced at her dismissively and said indifferently, "Aren't you new here? Yet you seem to know all the tricks of the trade."
Zhu Zhu stuck out her tongue and chuckled, "Senior Brother Li, please don't make fun of me. It's just that I'm not very bright and can't remember important things. I only remember these random things."
She was about to say something when she suddenly noticed that Li Xiao had stopped and was staring intently at a corner of the shop. Following his gaze, she saw it was none other than her senior brother Yu Qingzhou, whom she hadn't seen for a while.
However, there was a little dumpling next to her senior brother.
Zhuzhu vaguely remembered that the child was transformed from a koi carp that had gained intelligence in the spiritual spring behind the mountain. He had always been raised by the sect leader's side, and took the sect leader's surname, with the single name Li.
Although the transformation has only taken place in the last two years, if you include the fish's sashimi, it's probably over a hundred years old.
I heard that the little guy is very picky about who he's with, and he's usually only close to the master who raises him.
He ignored everyone else, and many female disciples who were misled by appearances and overwhelmed by maternal instincts were rebuffed by him.
But judging from the way the little guy is clinging to him right now, he practically wants to hang himself on Senior Brother Yu like an object.
"What a coincidence..."
Zhu Zhu had just muttered this sentence when she saw the boy beside her already striding away in that direction, and the girl hurriedly followed.
I thought Li Xiao would sit at that table, but unexpectedly the boy suddenly turned his toe and sat at the next table.
Zhu Zhu was puzzled. She looked at the boy who was staring straight ahead, and then at Senior Brother Yu who had a calm expression. In the end, she decided to go up and say hello first.
"What a coincidence, Senior Brother Yu, and this one too..."
Zhuzhu was hesitating about how to address Changli when she saw the latter suddenly point at her with a terrified expression and shout out loud.
"Who let you in? Get out of here now!"
The child's clear, crisp voice was incredibly powerful, especially with the added emotional depth. He buried his face in the young man's arms, as if refusing to look at the girl again.
Zhuzhu was stunned for a moment, standing there awkwardly at a loss.
She has always been a likable person. Although she missed many classes due to acclimatization issues when she first joined the sect, she never received any exclusion from those around her. On the contrary, she received a lot of friendly care from her senior brothers, sisters, and classmates.
This is the first time I've ever been publicly expressed with such dislike.
After all, she's just a teenage girl. No matter how cheerful and outgoing she is, she's still a bit shy.
So, he froze on the spot, his face flushed, not knowing what to do.
"I……"
That's enough.
Just as Zhuzhu was about to cry in despair, Li Xiao suddenly stood up from his seat, walked over to the table where Yu Qingzhou was, and without even glancing at him, grabbed the little brat who was burying his head in the young man's arms and lifted him up.
Chang Li swung his short arms and legs, kicking and thrashing in the air, but he could not break free.
"What are you doing, Li Xiao? Why are you bullying me again for no reason!"
"Who told you to bully that little girl first?"
Li Xiao said coldly, his tone leaving no room for argument: "Hurry up and apologize to Miss Zhuzhu."
Chang Li grumbled, looking extremely unwilling: "Why should I? I didn't say anything offensive. She has a smell that I dislike. What's wrong with me telling the truth? It's you who's acting crazy for no reason!"
"That's just sophistry." Li Xiao snorted coldly, and with Chang Li in tow, he was about to bring Zhu Zhu to her side.
Seeing that he was getting closer and closer to the girl, Chang Li was really going crazy. Seeing that his attempts to persuade Li Xiao were ineffective, he quickly turned his pleading gaze to Yu Qingzhou.
"Brother, save me! Li Xiao must have gone mad!"
Upon hearing Chang Li begin to plead for help from Yu Qingzhou, Li Xiao subconsciously paused and glanced at Yu Qingzhou, who was sitting motionless.
Seeing the other person slightly furrow their brows, as if they were dissatisfied with them, a surge of pleasure welled up inside them.
—Are you unhappy?
—You feel offended, don't you?
Li Xiao thought to himself, a malicious smile involuntarily curving his lips.
He just wanted to make Yu Qingzhou unhappy, otherwise all that self-doubt he had spent on the roadside would have been for nothing.
So all this tiff was just a one-man show by Li Xiao from beginning to end?
He stood there anxiously wondering when the other person would come to see him, but the other person had already calmly gone off to have dinner with someone else.
Li Xiao simply couldn't imagine what a joke it would have been if he had continued waiting there instead of running into Zhu Zhu.
Li Xiao was holding his breath.
In comparison, Zhuzhu wasn't as serious.
After all, they were fellow disciples and would see each other all the time, so there was no need to make things so tense. She couldn't help but step forward and whisper to dissuade him, "Forget it, Senior Brother Li, it's just a small matter. I don't mind, we can always go to another place..."
But before he could finish speaking, Chang Li screamed even more hysterically.
Zhuzhu was startled when something fell out of her arms. It landed softly at the girl's feet with a thud, and she was almost stepped on in the panic.
—It turned out to be the kitten we had found before.
The kitten, which had been fast asleep in the girl's arms, opened its eyes to a thrilling escape from death. It was lucky that it didn't fall to the ground and die.
"Meow meow meow..."
The kitten kept meowing sharply and weakly until a pair of hands lifted it from the ground.
Yu Qingzhou stroked the kitten's trembling head and sighed. He then called over the waiter who was watching the scene in a daze and asked if there was any goat milk in the study.
"We don't actually have goat milk here, but if you really want it, I can make a special trip for you," the waiter said with a smile.
Yu Qingzhou didn't waste any words, took out some silver and placed it directly on the table: "A bowl of goat milk, this should be enough, right?"
The waiter deftly collected the money: "That's enough, more than enough."
He then smiled and nodded, turned around and ran out the door in a flash.
This little incident brought the tense atmosphere to an abrupt end.
Li Xiao casually put Chang Li down. The latter stared at the kitten that Yu Qingzhou was holding in her palm, as if she wanted to get rid of it as soon as possible, but she could not make a move because the person holding the cat was Yu Qingzhou.
Only then did Zhuzhu belatedly realize where the problem lay.
She looked apologetically at the child with a resentful expression and said softly, "I'm sorry, I didn't think of that for a moment..."
Upon hearing this, Chang Li immediately turned his head away, seemingly not wanting to pay any attention to the other person.
Zhu Zhu couldn't help but think to herself, "She really is as unapproachable as the rumors say."
"Tch, so what if you're afraid of cats? You could have just explained things clearly... why did you have to make such a mess of things?" Li Xiao muttered disapprovingly, arms crossed.
"You started it!"
"You were the one who went crazy first!"
"It's you..."
The two were about to start arguing again when Yu Qingzhou silenced them with a single sentence.
"If you want to argue, go outside and argue."
Upon hearing this, the two exchanged a glance, clearly neither wanting to be kicked out, especially since...
Glug glug.
Li Xiao's stomach growled.
"Hahahaha, Li Xiao, you big idiot, your stomach is growling like thunder, it's hilarious!"
However, before Chang Li could laugh a few more times, his own stomach started growling.
Yu Qingzhou looked at the two equally matched individuals and couldn't help but sigh. Then she sent them to sit at the next table.
That's right, in the end, Li Xiao and Chang Li sat at one table, while Zhu Zhu, Yu Qingzhou, and the kitten in Yu Qingzhou's arms sat at another table.
Li Xiao was clearly dissatisfied: "That cowardly cat-fearer can cool off somewhere else, but why should I, the great one, have to—"
"Because I don't want to see you for the time being."
Yu Qingzhou stared at the boy quietly, her tone extremely calm, yet the impact she had on him was extraordinary.
"If you don't want to watch it, then don't watch it. It's not like I'm willing to put up with that cold face."
Dejected, Li Xiao absentmindedly snapped at his chopsticks.
Chang Li, not one to shy away from trouble, chimed in, "If you're so capable, speak louder so your brother can hear you."
"Go! Go! Go."
Li Xiao quickly waved his hand; he got angry whenever he saw Chang Li.
That's really bad luck.
If I hadn't listened to their terrible advice to go down the mountain and look for stray dogs for reference, would this whole mess have happened?
"I haven't settled accounts with you yet."
Chang Li was equally unwilling to swallow his anger: "You're the one who brought that little girl with the cat here."
He paused, then lowered his voice, continuing with a hint of schadenfreude, "I saw it myself. You and that girl were chatting away on the street, and she even invited you to dinner. Tsk tsk tsk, you didn't even notice?"
Li Xiao felt wronged, because it was Yu Qingzhou who had gotten together with Zhuzhu in the first place.
Suddenly, as if he had just discovered something, he looked at Chang Li with a deep gaze and asked, "When did you see us on the street?"
"When, isn't it..."
Halfway through his sentence, Chang Li suddenly realized that he might have let something slip, and immediately covered his mouth tightly, refusing to say another word.
But Li Xiao wasn't so easily fooled.
After a barrage of threats and inducements, Chang Li finally had to betray his beloved brother, albeit with a heavy heart.
Then he revealed in detail that Yu Qingzhou was actually present at the time.
After saying that, he repeatedly reminded Li Xiao that he absolutely must not tell anyone.
Having learned the inside story, Li Xiao no longer cared about keeping it a secret and absentmindedly agreed.
"By the way, you said he didn't seem very happy at the time?"
"Yeah, that's about right... Oh dear, I didn't really pay much attention."
Faced with Li Xiao's repeated questioning, Chang Li finally became a little impatient.
Li Xiao showed rare patience, and even unusually shared his dessert with Chang Li.
This is abnormal, extremely abnormal.
Chang Li was so frightened that he thought Li Xiao had been possessed by an evil spirit.
Li Xiao, however, didn't seem to care at all; in fact, he couldn't help but smile. He suddenly realized that his place in Yu Qingzhou's heart might not be as insignificant as he had imagined.
—Yu Qingzhou really did come to see him.
—I have wronged the other party.
Moreover, Yu Qingzhou seemed to be a little unhappy because she saw herself getting close to others.
Does this not suggest that there are some similarities between Yu Qingzhou's feelings for Li Xiao and Li Xiao's feelings for Yu Qingzhou?
Thinking of this, Li Xiao felt his heart pounding. He couldn't help but turn to look at Yu Qingzhou at the next table, only to see the latter carefully feeding the kitten in her arms goat milk bit by bit with the handle of a spoon.
Her eyes, usually calm and expressionless, were now slightly lowered, revealing an indescribable gentleness and tenderness. Her light-colored lips parted unconsciously, revealing a dark lip line, as if in a silent invitation.
It was an ordinary scene, yet it made Li Xiao's cheeks inexplicably flush.
—Not only my face, but other parts of my body also started to heat up for no reason.
Li Xiao looked away, still feeling parched.
A fleeting image of a body, barely visible beneath loose clothing, flashed through Li Xiao's mind, causing him to pause involuntarily. A surge of heat coursed through his entire body, especially...
He dared not think any further, grabbed the herbal tea beside him and gulped it down.
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