“How long will the ‘marriage of fortune’ last?”
At that moment, Ji Zhilin was asking the monk this very question. Not that he actually believed in such superstitious nonsense, honestly, what era were they living in?
The idea that a wedding could ward off misfortune or bring back luck was nothing more than an outdated custom.
But in the Ji family, the old patriarch’s word was law. If the old man insisted on treating a dying horse like a living one, then no one dared to object.
The answer he received was: one year.
One year… Ji Zhilin’s breath caught in his throat.
That meant if his older brother still didn’t wake up after a year, the old man might finally consider dissolving the marriage. After all, there was no shortage of people in their circle desperate to curry favor with the Ji family.
Families wealthier and more powerful than the Ning family were lined up waiting. If it weren’t for that perfect astrological match between Ji Yucheng and Ning Sui, Grandfather would never have considered the Nings to begin with.
The locker room door swung open. Several basketball teammates saw Ji Zhilin appear at last, though his face still looked worn and spiritless. One of them, curious, asked, “Ji Shao, how come Ning Sui hasn’t been hanging around you lately? Did you two have a fight?”
They must have, right? Something had obviously happened, otherwise Ji Zhilin wouldn’t look so out of it lately, not even wanting to play basketball.
The words stabbed right into Ji Zhilin’s raw wound.
Even though the marriage between Ning Sui and Ji Yucheng had made the news, Ji Yucheng wasn’t someone from S University’s social circle. Unless you were a gossip hound, most people didn’t know a thing.
So, to his classmates, it looked strange. Wherever Ji Zhilin went, Ning Sui was always by his side but now days had passed without the two being seen together even once.
Rumors spread quickly. Had they broken up? Had Ji Zhilin finally chosen Ning Yuanming instead?
Ning Sui’s admirers on campus were beginning to stir restlessly.
“Don’t stick your nose where it doesn’t belong.” Ji Zhilin shut his phone, snapped the words out irritably, and strode out of the locker room.
He had personally handed his lover over to his comatose brother, how humiliating was that? The last thing he wanted was for anyone at school to know.
That day, when he’d heard Ning Sui’s explanation, his mind had gone completely blank, buzzing so loudly he couldn’t think straight.
But after a few days of cooling down, he began to suspect that everything Ning Sui said had been a lie, just an excuse, using his brother as a shield!
If Ning Sui had truly been with him only to get close to Ji Yucheng, why would he have fetched water for him during practice? Why would he rush out to buy his favorite food whenever he casually mentioned it?
If that were true, then why, in all three years of their relationship, had Ning Sui never once brought up his older brother?
Not only that, since marrying Ji Yucheng, Ning Sui hadn’t shown even a hint of joy or affection toward his new “husband.”
He must just be using Ji Yucheng. Ji Zhilin refused to believe otherwise.
Or there was another possibility. Maybe Grandfather had warned Ning Sui in private.
Considering how much the old man treasured Ji Yucheng, and how he knew about Ji Zhilin and Ning Sui’s past relationship, how could he possibly allow Ning Sui to keep seeing him?
Everyone working in the Ji household was essentially the old man’s eyes and ears. Maybe Ning Sui was only keeping his distance because he was afraid they’d report back.
That explanation made much more sense.
Ning Sui had always been the patient type, quiet, enduring, someone who swallowed his grievances instead of fighting back.
Ji Zhilin couldn’t hold himself back any longer. He packed up his things and drove straight to the old Ji estate.
“They’ve all gone abroad?”
When he arrived, the villa was completely empty, save for the driver.
“Yes, Second Young Master,” the driver said. “The old master contacted several foreign specialists. He said there might be hope for the eldest young master’s recovery.”
No one had even bothered to tell him?
Ji Zhilin’s face darkened as he walked into the house.
Hope? What a joke. Ji Yucheng had been in a vegetative state for years. The old man had dragged him to countless countries, seen dozens of experts had a single one of them ever helped?
He was deluding himself.
He’d rather cling to a miracle than let Ji Zhilin handle the company’s affairs.
Ji Zhilin clenched his jaw.
But that was fine. He could wait.
In Jiang City, the old man’s eyes were everywhere, but overseas… overseas, he might finally find a chance to be alone with Ning Sui again.
The thought filled him with a feverish anticipation. He took out his phone and booked a ticket.
…….
Meanwhile, Ning Sui returned to the hospital room.
There’s a theory that if you see two people back-to-back and the second one strikes you as more beautiful, it means the second person’s looks surpass the first.
Setting down the things he’d brought beside the window sofa, Ning Sui walked over to the hospital bed and glanced at his “vegetative husband.”
The man lying there had skin as pale and smooth as porcelain. His high-bridged nose was a rare masterpiece, his brows sharp but softened by the black fringe brushing his forehead, giving him a youthful delicacy.
Eastern beauty truly did have the upper hand even though their pores were finer than those of that blond foreigner.
“I’ve been struck again by how handsome my vegetative husband is,” Ning Sui said aloud to 001.
001 responded in a deadpan tone, “Judge A-Sui’s evaluation is accepted. Although the blond man looked cheerful, purely in terms of appearance, Ji Yucheng indeed comes out on top.”
“Haha, I knew it! I didn’t marry badly!” Ning Sui laughed, his fingertip teasing as he brushed against Ji Yucheng’s chiseled cheek.
Ji Yucheng, trapped in his unmoving body, fumed silently.
Ridiculous. He’d just caught his spouse admiring another man, and now he was touching his face again! Oh, that blond vegetable, sure, he must’ve appealed to Ning Sui’s sense of novelty. Another pretty invalid to feed his controlling streak, was that it?
If Ji Yucheng could move, he would’ve turned his face away coldly. But he couldn’t, so he could only endure his little spouse’s shameless teasing.
He couldn’t even send his emotions through their faint psychic connection, and that only made him more frustrated.
Ning Sui, completely unaware of the storm in his husband’s head, merely felt that the room had gotten a little chillier.
Frowning, he walked over and turned up the heater, then returned to tuck the blanket around Ji Yucheng more securely. Pulling out his textbooks, he began reviewing beside the bed.
After finishing his study session, he received a group message from Fang Dacheng.
Last semester, he’d signed up for a “couples camping trip” organized by the student council’s external affairs department.
He’d only joined to support a senior he knew, never expecting they’d actually hold the event this term. The date was set for next week.
“Cancel it for me,” Ning Sui typed back.
He’d broken up with Ji Zhilin, and Ji Yucheng obviously couldn’t go.
Then, after a moment, he added, “Also, refund my money!!!”
Fang Dacheng replied with a crying emoji. “The senior says you can skip it, but the fee’s already been paid to the event team, no refunds.”
“…Then I’ll go.”
It wasn’t like he couldn’t attend alone. He could just hang out with his roommates.
Two thousand yuan wasn’t a small sum, no way he was wasting it.
As Fang Dacheng grumbled about Ning Sui’s terrifying frugality, he still dutifully filled in Ning Sui’s name in the group form.
Putting away his phone, Ning Sui stowed his textbooks, walked to the window for some fresh air, and, bored, took out his sketchbook.
He’d planned to draw the scenery outside but the hospital view was nothing but buildings. No beauty at all. Not as beautiful as his own comatose husband, that’s for sure.
He couldn’t help but go back to the bedside and start sketching Ji Yucheng instead.
Lying motionless, Ji Yucheng could hear the faint rustle of turning pages, the tapping of phone keys, and now the scratch of pencil against paper. Irritated, he summoned 009. “What is he doing now?”
009 sighed. “This is the fifth time you’ve asked me that today.”
Really, ever since the young spouse had moved in, Ji Yucheng, once so aloof, had become obsessive, like a possessive maniac. Not that 009 dared say that out loud.
Ji Yucheng gave a cold snort. “I’m not obsessed. A husband has the right to know what his spouse is doing. Any problem with that?”
“…Did I say you were obsessed?” 009 muttered.
Ji Yucheng fell silent.
Seeing his master’s face grow darker by the second, 009 shrank back and quickly changed the topic. “He’s drawing a man…”
It peered closer. “Kind of ugly.”
“…He wouldn’t be drawing that blond guy, would he?” Ji Yucheng’s mood sank further. “Does he have gold hair?”
Ugly thing. Not even worth remembering and he’s sketching him?
009 squinted. “It’s a pencil drawing. No color. Hard to tell who it is…”
Then it noticed something. “Wait! The wrist has a string around it. Looks like the red cord he tied on your wrist. Oh…. ohhh, that ugly thing is supposed to be you.”
Ji Yucheng fell silent.
He very nearly wanted to reach inside his own head and throttle the idiotic system but knowing that his spouse had been drawing him instead of anyone else, the dark clouds in his chest finally began to lift.
If Ning Sui thought that blond man looked better, he would’ve drawn him instead.
Clearly, in his spouse’s heart, he was still one of a kind.
For the first time, Ji Yucheng found himself rather grateful for his superior looks.
009, however, only grew more appalled. The more it watched, the more it realized how awful Ning Sui’s drawing was. Apart from that red string, nothing resembled Ji Yucheng at all.
“I didn’t think your spouse who looks like such a top student would draw like such a remedial kid,” it muttered.
When it first saw Ning Sui take out the sketchbook, it had actually assumed he was some kind of artistic genius.
Ji Yucheng’s voice was cool and distant. “You’re just an electronic product. What would you know about art? Human works are measured by emotional depth, not accuracy. Van Gogh also distorted figures, but that didn’t lessen the greatness of his paintings.”
009 was speechless. It did know who Van Gogh was but still, comparing a stick figure to Van Gogh? Ji Yucheng must’ve lost his mind.
While Ji Yucheng was mentally lecturing his system, a soft knock came from outside the room.
A nurse spoke in English, saying dinner had arrived.
The orphanage Ning Sui grew up in had only provided basic education. They didn’t have good teachers, and he’d only begun learning English in high school.
His grades in college came entirely from his stellar performance in science.
So the nurse’s fluent English threw him for a loop, he barely understood. But judging from the time, it must be dinner.
He went to open the door.
A burly male aide with a beard entered, carrying a tray.
Ji Yucheng only received nutrient solutions intravenously, so this meal was obviously for Ning Sui. Someone, either the old man or the butler must’ve instructed the staff to prepare Chinese food for him.
Ning Sui gestured for the aide to set it on the bedside table.
The aide blinked in confusion before finally catching on to what Ning Sui meant.
Ning Sui’s cheeks reddened a little; he rose on tiptoe awkwardly. Thank goodness no one else was around and his vegetative husband couldn’t hear or see, otherwise this would have been so embarrassing.
Listening quietly, Ji Yucheng recalled that his little spouse had grown up in an orphanage, where he’d had little chance to study or pursue hobbies. Even if he’d liked drawing as a child, he wouldn’t have had the resources to…
He bathed with practiced ease, clearly not the first time he’d done work like this before. For some reason, Young Master Ji’s mood dipped a little.
The nurse’s movements were rough and careless; when she set the tray down, it landed with a thud, making the steaming porridge slosh in its bowl several drops splattered out.
Ning Sui, following behind, felt his eyelid twitch.
God forbid those drops land on Ji Yucheng’s face. Anywhere else, fine but if that perfect face was ruined, it’d be a crime against beauty!
He lunged forward without thinking, hand outstretched.
Startled, the nurse gasped and mumbled a string of apologies.
Ning Sui dashed into the adjoining bathroom, thrusting his hand under the cold tap. The searing sting eased only a little, but he quickly came back out and waved at the nurse to show he was fine.
The nurse let out a breath of relief and hurried away.
It all happened in a blink. Lying on the hospital bed, Ji Yucheng could only hear the nurse’s repeated “sorry, sorry,” without quite understanding what had just happened, until he heard the sound of running water from the bathroom.
009’s voice echoed in his mind: “Your little wife seems to have burned his hand.”
Ji Yucheng’s chest tightened. “Is it serious?”
009 replied, “Not really. Just a few small blisters. But those drops of porridge were originally headed for your face.”
At that, even 009 sounded a little surprised. It had always assumed Ning Sui’s feelings toward Ji Yucheng were nothing more than a twisted kind of possessiveness.
A textbook case, someone who eagerly hacked into the internal network just to monitor another’s data, who was physically domineering, and viciously jealous.
People like that usually treated their target like a toy. They didn’t care if their toy got hurt.
But Ning Sui had reflexively shielded him.
009 hesitated. Could it be hidden somewhere in Ning Sui’s possessiveness… Was there something dangerously close to love?
Listening to the sound of water running for over twenty minutes, Ji Yucheng could imagine how much it must hurt.
Even knowing that, why would he rush forward like that?
……
A strange ache spread in Ji Yucheng’s chest.
He had been born with a silver spoon in his mouth, the illustrious son of the Ji family. And yet, how absurd, no one had ever treated him this way before.
His parents had always been devoted to their careers, aloof and untouchable, carrying the cold pride of their class. They never stopped ruffling a child’s hair.
His grandfather favored him the most within the family, but the old man’s affection was rigid, expressed only through high expectations, harsh discipline, and relentless criticism.
To 009, the little wife’s actions might look “deranged.”
But to Ji Yucheng who had never once been the recipient of such warmth, it felt fierce. It felt burning.
When Ning Sui finally came back out, rubbing his palm carefully after holding it under cold water for so long, Ji Yucheng’s heart tightened.
For the first time, he was bitterly frustrated, frustrated that he could do nothing, that he was trapped in the body of a motionless vegetable.
Meanwhile, Ning Sui was overjoyed. He reached out to gently stroke Ji Yucheng’s face again.
That flawless, jade-like face was still unmarked, good.
But being in this passionate, uninhibited foreign country stirred another thought in Ning Sui’s mind. Something he’d always been too shy to try back home.
He licked his lips, glanced toward the door. No footsteps. No sounds.
His gaze returned to Ji Yucheng.
Just one touch… just to test it.
This kind of thing required a bit of ceremony. He washed his hands again, dried them with the heater, then lifted the blanket and climbed onto the bed, lying down beside Ji Yucheng.
Holding his breath, he closed his eyes, and his right hand slowly began to move downward
“…”
Ji Yucheng, still sunk in his muddled emotions, was instantly yanked back to reality.
In that split second, he knew exactly what his little wife was about to do.
Finish the unfinished business from last time?
In a flash, the cold, untouchable lion of the savannah turned into a helpless lamb about to be defiled, utterly still, waiting for Ning Sui’s hand to reach him.
That hand drifted lower and lower; Ji Yucheng’s heartbeat raced faster, his cheeks flushed crimson.
A few seconds stretched out like an eternity.
Finally, Ning Sui reached his destination.
And at that moment, he froze.
“Hubby, you’re… really impressive.”
Ji Yucheng: “…”
Even as his ears burned scarlet, somewhere inside, Young Master Ji let out two silent, smug laughs.
Outside the room, Ji Zhiling who had just arrived and happened to be eavesdropping by the door
“…”
Fuck.
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[Translator]
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ChaptersChapter 1 · The WeddingChapter 2 · New Target!Chapter 3 · Moved OnChapter 4 · Personal Information of Ji YuchengChapter 5 · Liked Ji Yucheng for 3 Years?!Chapter 6 · Love Rival?!Chapter 7 · Domineering PossessivenessChapter 8 · Obviously Very CuteChapter 9 Part 1 · Can’t be SeperatedChapter 9 Part 2 · Can’t be SeperatedChapter 10 · A blonde Guy…Chapter 11 · Dangerously Close to love?Chapter 12 · Confrontation with Ji ZhilinChapter 13 · Accidental DiscoveryChapter 14 · System 009 upgradedChapter 15 · Battery charging!Chapter 16 · Young Master was MiserableChapter 17 · Did Ning Sui treat you like this before?Chapter 18 · Was this what happened last night before you went to bed?Chapter 19 · He really got to the bottom of thisChapter 20 Part 1 · Don’t look at him, he was shocked too!Chapter 20 Part 2 · Don’t look at him, he was shocked too!Chapter 21 · Because I like it so muchChapter 22 Part 1 · Pull up your pantsChapter 22 Part 2 · Pull up your pantsChapter 23 · Why does it sound like he’s jealousChapter 24 Part 1 · I will protect himChapter 24 Part 2 · I will protect himChapter 25 · He’s quite gentleChapter 26 · Young Master Ji suddenly started to stutterChapter 27 · Ning Sui’s timeChapter 28 Part 1 · They ran away as soon as they were scaredChapter 28 Part 2 · They ran away as soon as they were scaredChapter 29 Part 1 · Are you looking for death?Chapter 29 Part 2 · Are you looking for death?Chapter 30 · Hurry up and say your last wordsChapter 31 · Ji Yucheng collapsed into his armsChapter 32 · Mr. Ji, I never expected you to be such a good person.Chapter 33 · He’s so well-behaved when He sleeps…Chapter 34 · His expression was incredibly varied in an instantChapter 35 · How could it be Ning Sui?Chapter 36 · Does the young wife only like people in a vegetative state?Chapter 37 · State-based controlChapter 38 · The young master was so happy he dropped his phoneChapter 39 · You were 37 minutes lateChapter 40 · I don’t plan to get a divorce.Chapter 41 · Otherwise, would it be your turn?Chapter 42 · Both perverted and cuteChapter 43 · If they sneak away again, I’ll hold them even tighterChapter 44 · I sprained my ankle tooChapter 45 · A cat jumping on a lion’s head to play with fire.Chapter 46 · Your young master has fainted!Chapter 47 · Sui Sui, come downChapter 48 · Are you going to lock me in there?Chapter 49 Part 1 · I love you, Ning SuiChapter 49 Part 2 · I love you, Ning SuiChapter 50 · Give the snowman a heartChapter 51 · Miss you.Chapter 52 · To hold in one’s mouthChapter 53 · You are in the cloudsChapter 54 · Ning Sui hugged him for the first timeChapter 55 · Can you sit on my lap?Chapter 56 · It’s either you or it’s not.Chapter 57 · From this moment on, I am your vegetableChapter 58 · Young Ji YuchengChapter 59 · They kiss tirelessly.Chapter 60 · RipplingChapter 61 · You want to compare this?!Chapter 62 · It’s 001!Chapter 63 · I like everything about it.Chapter 64 · It seems to have been filled up a little more.Chapter 65 · Wedding rings should be exchanged between the couple.Chapter 66 · Love-struckChapter 67 · Why can’t we even be apart for a day?Chapter 68 · PerfectChapter 69 · A lifelong contract was madeChapter 70 · Extra 1Chapter 71 · Extra 2Chapter 72 · Extra 3Chapter 73 · Extra 4Chapter 74 · Extra 5Chapter 75 · Extra 6Chapter 76 · Extra 7Chapter 77 · Extra 8Chapter 78 · Extra 9Chapter 79 · Extra 10Chapter 80 · Extra 11Chapter 81 · Extra 12Chapter 82 · Extra 13Chapter 83 · Extra 14