Having his thoughts called out by the young man, Mu Yansheng was like an irritable lion.
As if every sentence had stepped on one of his landmines, his expression visibly turned ugly.
Jian Yue observed him steadily for a long while, and when he noticed the guy’s face growing darker and darker under his gaze, he helplessly looked away and stopped staring at him.
Still, that Sichuan-opera face-changing performance had been quite spectacular. Although Jian Yue couldn’t understand what this young man was thinking, from the countless scenes of him getting angry and then calming himself down in the past, he had sensed an illusion that was almost like bluster masking weakness.
“Forget it. I know you’re not that kind of person anyway.” So Jian Yue retracted his speculation.
After all, he genuinely thought Mu Yansheng’s current expression was terrible, like a volcano about to erupt, strange and unsettling. So Jian Yue guessed this was the type of person who would be disgusted by well-meaning assumptions, and thus took back his words.
Maybe the guy simply didn’t like him much, but out of his nature, would unconsciously offer to help anyway?
He’d encountered that kind of prickly personality before.
Thinking this, Jian Yue had no idea that Mu Yansheng’s expression had grown even more gloomy, those sharp hawk-like eyes now carrying a trace of… irritation and anger as they looked at him. After a brief pause, he pressed with considerable force: “Then what kind of person do you think I am?”
That tone, that expression, that aggressive posture… he was clearly angry.
Jian Yue: “?”
Seriously, why is he so hard to placate?
Mu Yansheng saw the young man look startled by his counter-question. Those upturned eyes were full of something subtle, his expression shifting from detached to a kind of coldness, as if he were looking at an unreasonably tantrum-throwing puppy.
Mu Yansheng realized he always showed his emotional side in front of this young man.
Sometimes he would realize it belatedly, but whenever he was alone with Jian Yue, he would once again lose all that restraint and rationality.
This feeling of being out of control always made him irritable, and yet, annoyingly, he didn’t want to restore his sanity by distancing himself from Jian Yue.
Just then, the young man voiced what was on his mind.
“Why are you always angry at me? Did I do something to offend you before?”
As the young man asked, his dark brows knitted slightly, his eyes full of confusion and displeasure, looking at him as if he were genuinely troubled.
Looking at that expression, a sense of absurdity washed over Mu Yansheng.
“You think everything I’ve been doing is targeted at you?” Mu Yansheng asked, unconsciously pressing forward as he spoke. He backed the young man into a corner, asking with a stern face.
But after asking, Mu Yansheng noticed that the young man’s body had gone taut under his approach, lips pressed tightly together, no longer speaking. Clearly, the other party was demonstrating through action the fact that he ‘indeed believed he was being targeted, and even thought he was some bastard who would hit people on impulse.’
Did he really come across that badly?
Mu Yansheng couldn’t help thinking.
Jian Yue was straining to keep his back straight, trying to keep his only clean white T-shirt from touching the wall.
This outfit was the only clean change of clothes he had. If it got dirty, wouldn’t he have to wash another one?
Although he couldn’t figure out why Mu Yansheng was angry yet again, he clearly wasn’t going to be easily intimidated by the other’s attitude. Besides, this kid only talked tough sometimes he actually did things.
For the sake of today’s lunch, Jian Yue wasn’t about to fall out with Mu Yansheng over such a trivial matter.
With that thought, he opened his eyes and looked at the man’s expression, which seemed lost in thought about something, and instinctively took a step closer to avoid the wall behind him.
From Mu Yansheng’s perspective, it looked like the other had stepped toward him for some unknown reason and given their current posture, it resembled a somewhat forced throwing of oneself into his arms.
The young man’s face was mere inches away.
A faint warmth, barely perceptible, was slowly drawing near, carrying the scent of a fresh shower.
Mu Yansheng noticed that the other’s body seemed to be trembling slightly?
Was he scared? No, it didn’t look like it… Thinking this, his gaze swept over the young man inch by inch, and he saw… beneath that loose T-shirt, a chest rising and falling with the rhythm of his breathing.
“Feeling cold?” His voice was startlingly hoarse, as if his throat had dried to the point of catching fire.
The sound of involuntary swallowing came one after another, leaving the young man looking puzzled.
“Mm.” Jian Yue did indeed feel a bit cold, but the moment he got close, he could feel the obvious heat radiating from the other’s body.
Watching Mu Yansheng’s Adam’s apple bobbing again and again, Jian Yue didn’t think the man was feeling cold like he was.
Especially when his gaze happened to drift over the other’s forearm, catching sight of the bulging muscles and winding veins beneath that dark skin.
No wonder the man was running so hot.
Receiving the young man’s reply, Mu Yansheng’s eyes stayed fixed on that spot for a long moment. His hand reached out unconsciously, pulling the man in by the nape of his neck and into his embrace, pressing him against his body for a moment, while his gaze remained locked firmly on the white-tiled wall before him.
He felt the touch of the young man’s body heat merging with his own, and the struggle of the person in his arms once he belatedly realized what was happening.
He didn’t know exactly which parts of the young man his body had come into contact with, but his mind was visibly growing agitated.
Until, at some moment, sensing that if this continued something wrong would be discovered, Mu Yansheng grabbed the back of the man’s collar and yanked him sharply away.
Then he turned sideways, looking at the latter’s clearly confused and dissatisfied expression.
Mu Yansheng made up an excuse on the spot: “There was a bug on the wall just now. It almost crawled from you onto me.”
The moment he said this, he watched the young man whip his head around to search for the nonexistent bug on the wall, so Mu Yansheng had to say gruffly, “Stop looking. If you’re cold, go back to your own room. Do you need me to teach you?”
His tone was like he’d swallowed gunpowder.
Jian Yue genuinely felt his own temper was too good otherwise, who else could put up with this man’s constantly shifting moods?
Still, as he was leaving, he remembered his clothes weren’t dry yet, so he ran over to check the remaining time on the dryer, planning to come back for them in a bit.
But Mu Yansheng, as if sensing his intention, spoke up first: “I’ll be heading back to the dorm later. I can bring your clothes back for you.”
At that, Jian Yue’s expression grew even more complicated.
In the end, after hesitating for a moment, he opened his mouth to thank Mu Yansheng for his help. Then he glanced at Mu Yansheng, who didn’t feel cold at all, standing in place with his back turned, looking thoroughly annoyed.
“I really don’t understand you young people,” Jian Yue muttered, unconsciously complaining to the system in his head.
The system’s tone was calm and matter-of-fact:
[Please do not generalize from individual cases to all young people.]