In the afternoon, the Quiet Seclusion Pavilion was filled with the noisy chirping of cicadas.
Chu Liyuan stood at the entrance of the Quiet Seclusion Pavilion, clutching a bottle of Golden Wound Medicine, feeling somewhat speechless at himself.
He felt that there must be something wrong with this Quiet Seclusion Pavilion. Why else would he feel so bewitched ever since he encountered this madwoman?
He had already made it to the training grounds—since the age of five, he had practiced martial arts daily, rain or shine. But today, when he arrived at the training grounds and saw several bottles of Golden Wound Medicine laid out on the table, the image of Lin Yao’s injured face from yesterday suddenly flashed through his mind.
Then he remembered how she had complained about him being all dirty and sweaty after training…
“…What rotten luck.”
He cursed, but his body was honest. Somehow, against all reason, he had pocketed the finest bottle of Golden Wound Medicine, even gone back to change into his finest dark-purple cloud-patterned python robe that had been buried at the bottom of his trunk, and made a beeline for the Quiet Seclusion Pavilion.
The moment he stepped into the courtyard, he spotted Lin Yao air-drying her long, jet-black hair again.
Her hair was washed impeccably clean, gleaming like satin under the sunlight, yet still hanging loose and utterly unruly, strands flying wildly in the wind, a few even sticking to her slightly damp neck.
His brows instantly twisted into a tight knot.
In this era, a woman wore her hair loose only in the privacy of her boudoir, or in the presence of her husband.
Chu Liyuan had initially assumed she simply liked washing and drying her hair in the courtyard. But yesterday, when he saw her in the palace, she was just as brazen—and worse, she had gone to the Eastern Palace… most likely meeting the Crown Prince.
If Chu Huaian had seen her like that… A nameless fury surged straight to his head.
He knew they were not yet married, and he had no right to interfere. But the moment he opened his mouth—
“Lin Yao, do you truly not know how to write the word ‘propriety’?” Chu Liyuan strode over, his tone harsh. “Hair loose and disheveled, clothes in disarray—are you some wild ghost haunting this palace?”
Lin Yao was enjoying her sunbath when his roar rattled her eardrums.
She lazily lifted her eyelids, saw that it was that ever-present Fourth Prince, and didn’t bother getting up. She simply spread her hands helplessly: “Fourth Prince, you can’t blame me for this. In my… previous life, I kept my hair only chin-length for convenience. Now it’s long and hard to dry, and I don’t know how to do those complicated hairstyles.”
She pointed at her own messy mane: “I’m pretty desperate about it too.”
“Excuses.” Chu Liyuan snorted coldly, but his gaze lingered on that waterfall of black hair for a fleeting moment, his Adam’s apple bobbing slightly.
Lin Yao was getting annoyed by his nagging. Besides, after yesterday’s rather unsavory “eldest grandson” plan, this man before her was likely the best candidate for the “convenient father.” For the sake of the bigger picture, it was better to ease the tension between them.
So Lin Yao stood up and casually snapped a thin branch off the pomegranate tree nearby, stripping off all its leaves.
“Watch this. I once saw a ‘one-chopstick hair-up tutorial’ on… short videos. I think it goes like this—twist it around… then stab it in like this…”
She muttered to herself while winding the branch around her head. But her brain understood the concept while her hands had a mind of their own.
Her hair was as slippery as silk, and the branch was rough and dry. She fumbled and fussed for ages, only making her hair even messier, like a madwoman with a bird’s nest perched on her head.
“…” Chu Liyuan watched from the side, closing his eyes in exasperation.
“Utterly hopeless.”
He suddenly stepped forward, carrying a strange heat that seemed to come from nowhere, and stood behind her: “Don’t move. Let me do it.”
Lin Yao’s hands froze. She was about to refuse, but then thought: if someone’s offering to be a free Tony, why not take advantage?
“Fine, you do it then. Be gentle—don’t pull my scalp.” She casually handed the branch back to him, tilting her neck backward, revealing a large expanse of fair, delicate skin.
For a moment, the air seemed to freeze.
In ancient times, a man tying a woman’s hair was something reserved for the intimate chambers of a married couple, a joy shared only between husband and wife.
Chu Liyuan steeled himself. The wedding was imminent anyway—what was there to hesitate about in merely tying up some hair?
So he took the branch still carrying her warmth, and his fingertips inevitably brushed against her slightly cool earlobe.
In that instant, it felt like an electric shock ran through his fingers, a tingling sensation shooting straight up his arm and into his heart.
He took a deep breath, trying to summon the steadiness he used when gripping his sword.
But her hair was too soft, too fragrant—and that cool, refreshing mint scent kept burrowing into his nose, throwing his mind into complete chaos.
Chu Liyuan had never been favored since childhood. No one cared about his studies, but he had devoted over a decade of hard work to martial arts alone. His swordsmanship was nothing short of masterful, and he prided himself on there being nothing in this world his hands couldn’t hold steady.
Yet at this moment, his hands trembled like a child holding chopsticks for the first time: he tried to wind the hair up, but couldn’t get it tight enough; tried to stab the branch in to secure it, but feared poking her scalp.
“Hiss—ouch!” Lin Yao flinched, drawing her neck in.
“Stop moving!” Chu Liyuan growled, fine beads of sweat actually forming at his temples.
“Do you even know what you’re doing?” Lin Yao couldn’t help but complain. “Chu Liyuan, are you using the strength of someone butchering a pig?”
Chu Liyuan’s handsome face flushed bright red. To cover up his embarrassment, he scowled and picked up the branch to examine it. “It’s this wood—too rough. It snagged my hair.”
As he spoke, he drew the blade at his waist with a sharp shing.
It was a short dagger presented as tribute from a foreign land—cold light glinting off its edge, its killing aura enough to make one’s hair stand on end. And now its owner was using it to whittle a pomegranate branch.
“I’ll trim it for you.”
Chu Liyuan pressed his lips together, his expression as focused as if he were facing an army of thousands.
But whether it was because his heart was racing too fast, or because Lin Yao was standing too close, those hands—capable of slitting a throat with a single stroke—were now stiff, as if they didn’t belong to him.
The first cut was too shallow.
The second nearly snapped the branch in two.
Lin Yao watched from the side, growing anxious, her obsessive-compulsive tendencies flaring up. “Hey! Your cutting angle is all wrong! When you whittle wood, you have to go with the grain, and the angle needs to be tilted… Just let me do it myself!”
With that, she instinctively reached out to snatch the branch.
“Don’t move!”
Chu Liyuan, terrified that the sharp blade might cut her, instinctively twisted his wrist to pull the knife back and avoid her.
But they were standing far too close. In dodging, the blade veered off its original path and sliced straight across his own left hand, right at the web between his thumb and index finger.
“Hiss—”
Blood welled up instantly, dripping from his fingertips onto the pomegranate branch, staining the half-whittled wood a shocking crimson.
Lin Yao was startled, her teasing words catching in her throat.
“Chu Liyuan!”
She grabbed his hand, brows furrowed, her gaze carrying the helpless exasperation of someone watching a little kid get into trouble.
“Are you stupid? You cut yourself whittling a piece of wood! Is there rust on this blade? The wound is this deep—you could get tetanus…”
She bowed her head, cradling his hand in hers, and without another word, began pressing firmly around the wound.
Chu Liyuan instinctively tried to pull his hand back, but found her grip surprisingly steady, her technique precise.
“Bear with it. I need to squeeze out the dirty blood.”
So he stopped moving.
Once she’d pressed out enough, Lin Yao looked around, then simply lifted the hem of her outer robe, pulled out the clean inner lining of her undergarment, and tore off a strip.
She moved quickly, wiping away the blood, then applied some of the Golden Wound Medicine he’d brought to the wound.
Watching the medicine—originally meant for her face—now being used on his own hand, Chu Liyuan felt such frustration he wanted to slam his head against a wall.
How stupid!
Lin Yao didn’t notice his expression. She just carefully wrapped the cloth strip around the wound at the base of his thumb, finishing it off with a little bow.
“Did you bring this medicine for me, or for yourself?” Lin Yao teased, then added sternly like a strict physician, “Don’t get this wet for the next few hours. Once the wound has initially closed, wash it and apply fresh medicine.”
Chu Liyuan looked at his bandaged hand, then at the few stark drops of blood on her skirt hem. His Adam’s apple bobbed slightly.
This wound was nothing to him. In all his years of martial training, he’d suffered wounds ten times deeper without so much as a frown, and never once sought anyone to bandage them.
But right now, he could clearly feel the wound pulsing with the rhythm of his heartbeat—throbbing, burning, one beat at a time.
Lin Yao noticed him standing there like a wooden post, staring blankly at his own hand, and asked, “What’s wrong? Does it hurt?”
Chu Liyuan instinctively wanted to shake his head and say “It doesn’t hurt”—that was his pride as a man, as a prince. But when he met Lin Yao’s clear, concerned eyes, something inexplicable made him swallow the words on the tip of his tongue.
He pressed his lips together, then nodded stiffly. “…It hurts.”
The moment the word left his mouth, the tips of his ears turned crimson.
But Lin Yao suddenly noticed something rather amusing: every time this man saw her, he was either making domineering threats or angrily scolding her. Yet now, because of a tiny scratch, he was frozen in place, like a big cat with its fur puffed up, refusing to meow.
Lin Yao couldn’t help but laugh. “A grown man like you, scared silly by such a small wound?”
Her eyes curved as she spoke, her tone carrying the teasing lilt of someone coaxing a child. “Want me to blow on it for you?”
Before he could refuse, she took his hand again and brought it close to her lips.
“Whoosh—”
A warm breath, carrying the faint fragrance of mint, gently swept across the wound at the base of his thumb.
Chu Liyuan’s whole body jolted.
Her lips were barely an inch from the back of his hand. That breath, carrying a hint of coolness, softly brushed against the burning wound—yet it ignited an unquenchable fire in his chest.
And at that moment, outside the half-open courtyard gate of Jingyou Pavilion.
A tall, slender figure stood silently in the shade of the trees.
Chu Huaian clutched a bottle of Golden Wound Medicine in his hand, his knuckles white from the force of his grip…