When he felt the burning person beside him slowly crawl onto his lap, Huo Yan frowned slightly but remained still.
At this moment, Xian Yuzhu’s rationality had long since vanished. He was simply following his instincts to seek out coolness, sitting in a small heap in Huo Yan’s embrace while his dazed peach blossom eyes stared straight at the man’s pale, thin lips.
“…”
Yuzhu licked his lips, feeling an inexplicable itch in his gums. His soft, burning palms pressed against the thin fabric of Huo Yan’s chest. The misty fragrance radiating from Yuzhu grew stronger as Huo Yan felt him clutching his shoulders to pull himself upward.
The bead flower holding Yuzhu’s side braid had loosened, causing his ink black hair to spread out like a waterfall. A few cool strands of hair slid across the back of Huo Yan’s hand.
His heartbeat was accelerating. Just as Xian Yuzhu tilted his face up and was about to press his lips against him, Huo Yan seemingly could no longer keep up the act and snapped his eyes open.
Once again, their eyes met.
Xian Yuzhu’s nose was damp and red, and his full lips exhaled heat. He ignored Huo Yan’s profound and dark gaze, closing his eyes recklessly and ignorantly to crash his mouth forward.
“Mph!”
Xian Yuzhu’s elegant brows furrowed; he seemed quite dissatisfied with the sensation. He opened his eyes and discovered that at the last second, Huo Yan had instinctively raised his hand to block him. Consequently, what Yuzhu had kissed was not those indifferent thin lips, but the man’s palm covered in thick sword calluses.
“Wooo.”
He frowned and began to protest, raising his hand to slap the back of Huo Yan’s hand several times. His expression and movements seemed to accuse Huo Yan: How did he have the nerve to refuse?
“Xian Yuzhu.”
“Open your eyes wide and look carefully at who I am before you consider doing that.”
The voice from above was deep. A large hand easily clamped onto Yuzhu’s two slender, snow white wrists and pulled him back slightly. Xian Yuzhu froze in confusion.
After a short while, he finally propped up his upper body and tilted his small face close again. The handsome, cold man cooperated by lowering his gaze to stare at him, leaning down to slowly press closer. The distance between them gradually shrank until their noses were almost touching.
Xian Yuzhu struggled to widen his misty eyes as his sluggish brain began to operate slowly.
Hmm. This face in front of him looked alright; he was quite a handsome simp! But for some reason, he looked extremely annoying, so annoying that a certain part of Xian Yuzhu became hard.
Do not misunderstand; it was his fist.
A moment later, something flashed through the mind of the beauty whose face was flushed red. He widened his eyes slightly and let out a startled cry as if he had seen a ghost.
“Ah! Huo Yan?”
Huo Yan watched Xian Yuzhu’s panic with cold eyes, his gaze filled with malice. Raising a hand to pinch the soft cheek of the person in his arms, he spoke in a flat tone, “Now, looking at my face, do you still want to kiss me?”
Xian Yuzhu’s pale pupils contracted slightly, and his lips quivered. With a cry, he pushed the man away. Shaking his head like a rattle, he used both hands and feet to crawl down, muttering as he went, “No, not kissing Huo Yan!”
He could not kiss him. He was annoying; he would hit him; it would hurt. The Ylang fragrance made him sluggish, and Xian Yuzhu’s small brain could only remember these things.
What a pitiful fool. He possessed soul snatching beauty, yet he was toyed with and frightened like a small animal in the wild.
Xian Yuzhu wanting to run was an expected reaction, and it was the reason Huo Yan had intentionally intimidated him. But for some reason, despite enjoying Yuzhu’s disheveled state, Huo Yan’s expression darkened the moment Yuzhu pushed him away to crawl off.
“Where are you going?”
A powerful surge of spiritual energy wrapped around Xian Yuzhu’s waist without a word, dragging the small person who had almost reached the door back to him.
“No! No!”
Xian Yuzhu flailed in place, his fingertips leaving shallow scratch marks on the floor. He naturally wanted to run out of this room, yet that unwanted black hem of a robe appeared in his vision again. Huo Yan forcefully gathered Xian Yuzhu into his arms, much like a typical cultivator holding a pet spirit beast at home.
“…”
Xian Yuzhu’s back trembled slightly. Meeting Huo Yan’s dark, heavy eyes, his face was full of bewilderment. He covered himself with both hands and said pitifully, “Huo Yan.”
Huo Yan found it amusing and asked, “Will you be willing to listen to Senior Brother this time?”
Xian Yuzhu nodded like a chick pecking at grain. Huo Yan let out a light chuckle, his desire for control greatly satisfied. He gently patted Yuzhu’s back a few times to soothe the shivering person.
After a while, Xian Yuzhu finally stopped being afraid. His cheek pressed against Huo Yan’s chest, and he settled down with his wet, long eyelashes lowered. Huo Yan liked his well behaved and obedient appearance; a strange hint of tenderness actually appeared on his usually frost covered face.
When he was a child, Huo Yan was busy fighting with beggars for food. On the streets, he often saw nobles in carriages, dressed in fine silks and eating delicacies, raising cats, dogs, or foxes, or holding rare and exotic beasts he had never seen before.
Among them, the one who left the deepest impression on Huo Yan was the City Lord, who held the highest power at the time. Every time the kindly faced City Lord patrolled the streets to receive worship, he held not an animal in his arms, but a shivering beauty.
Huo Yan did not know what the beauty looked like or how beautiful they were. He also did not know if they were male or female, or if it was always the same person. At that time, he did not even have enough food to fill his stomach, so how could he have the mind to look at the appearance of the person in the City Lord’s arms?
All of this was learned from the old beggar kneeling beside him. Every time the City Lord’s luxury carriage, inlaid with gold and silver, passed before their eyes, the old beggar’s low whispers of envy and curses filled his ears.
The eight year old, skin and bones Huo Yan knelt on the ground with a face full of indifference, thinking only of how to survive for half a month on a single steamed bun. But perhaps it was from that moment that a seed of desire was quietly planted in his heart.
Twenty years had passed, and Huo Yan’s status and power were no longer what they used to be. That seed representing absolute control had finally broken through the soil and sprouted because Xian Yuzhu had walked into his trap.
The dignified Chief Disciple of the Yuxian Sect, a man of justice with a far reaching reputation in the cultivation world, had actually designed a trap to lure his most ignorant and stupidly beautiful Junior Brother into his snare. If word got out, likely no one would believe it. How could someone like Huo Yan, who looked completely asexual, lay a hand on his own Junior Brother?
Moonlight atop the Branches
Huo Yan held the beauty with the tear-stained face in his arms, his expression cold.
“Wooo.”
Tears had long since flooded Xian Yuzhu’s face. The effects of the Ylang fragrance were still in his body, but they had nowhere to go.
“Go away, Huo Yan.”
Since he could not escape, Xian Yuzhu bared his fangs and brandished his claws, kicking and hitting. Several times, he even struck Huo Yan’s jaw. Why was it that Huo Yan did nothing but simply hold him, yet he himself lost all his strength? It seemed that in this confrontation, he had lost again.
“Calm your breathing and regulate your energy. Do not throw a tantrum.”
Huo Yan raised his hand to wipe the tears from Xian Yuzhu’s face, but his hand was slapped away. Xian Yuzhu felt as if he were burning with fire; the more he looked at the deadpan face in front of him, the more annoyed he became. He cried and cursed, “I do not want you to care! I feel terrible! Let me go! Boohoo, I want to go back!”
Huo Yan’s attempts to soothe him were fruitless; instead, he received several slaps. His face darkened, his cheek and jaw showing various marks, as he frowned and stared at the person crying and making a scene in his arms.
He had tried coaxing him; what else would it take to make him quiet?
After a short while, as Xian Yuzhu broke down in loud sobs once more, unable to endure the effects of the Ylang fragrance, Huo Yan, who had finished reviewing his books, finally lowered his head. For the first time, he attempted to silence those noisy lips.