It was late at night. Time to sleep.
Xu Baizhou froze. What did Jia Wujie mean by that? Surely he didn’t actually intend for him to bathe with him?
He shook his head again. Jia Wujie couldn’t possibly be this kind, no doubt he was scheming in his head about some way to harm him. He absolutely must not let his guard down.
But Xu Baizhou didn’t dare disobey Jia Wujie’s orders. Besides, it was just taking off clothes, right? That was something he was well versed in. Having spent years in hospitals undergoing all kinds of examinations, Xu Baizhou had long since lost any sense of bodily modesty. He undid his robe at once, peeling off the elaborate layers of clothing one by one, until only a thin inner garment remained.
The pool water soaked through Xu Baizhou’s entire body, and the rising steam flushed his cheeks red. His eyes, glistening with moisture, made him look utterly pure and harmless. Water droplets fell from his slightly long bangs, sliding down his smooth, slender cheeks to his pale, sharp chin, before finally disappearing into the slightly parted collar of his garment. The thin, translucent fabric clung tightly to Xu Baizhou’s body, outlining the slender, delicate frame of a young man.
Yet Jia Wujie frowned as he looked at Xu Baizhou before him. He seemed to have glimpsed something different beneath that barely-there layer of fabric.
“Keep going,” Jia Wujie said in a low voice.
Xu Baizhou undid the last layer of his inner garment. The fabric slipped away, revealing his pale, thin body. Though frail, his figure was well proportioned, a layer of lean muscle lay beneath his fair skin, wrapping his beautiful bone structure just right, with only the faint outline of his ribs showing.
Xu Baizhou faced Jia Wujie with complete composure, but as he shed that final layer of clothing, Jia Wujie’s brow furrowed deeper and deeper, and his expression grew considerably darker.
There, at the center of Xu Baizhou’s chest, a long, narrow scar ran from just below his throat all the way down to his lower chest. And along his ribs and on both sides of his waist and abdomen, there were scars of various sizes as well.
Realizing that Jia Wujie seemed to have noticed something, Xu Baizhou finally remembered his body was covered in scars left behind by surgeries.
If not for Jia Wujie, Xu Baizhou himself would have nearly forgotten those scars. Perhaps having endured those pains, he no longer thought they amounted to anything.
Xu Baizhou had been born with congenital heart disease and had undergone his first open-heart surgery when he was only a few months old. But as he grew older, his illness only worsened. The prolonged insufficient blood supply not only left him thinner and weaker than his peers, but also impaired the normal function and development of his other organs. By now, several of the organs in Xu Baizhou’s body had already begun to fail.
Xu Baizhou looked at his own reflection in the pool.
His incomplete physical development made him look younger than he actually was, but beneath this shell was a heart riddled with wounds.
Jia Wujie approached Xu Baizhou, stopping in front of him.
Looking at the scars on Xu Baizhou’s body every one of them deep enough to show bone Jia Wujie asked, “How did you get these?”
There was a trace of concern in Jia Wujie’s frowning voice, and for a moment, Xu Baizhou was moved.
It had been a long time since anyone had cared about his illness, his injuries, about whether he was in pain.
Xu Baizhou’s brow creased. Uh oh, he thought.
How was he supposed to explain open-heart surgery, this marvel of modern medicine to Jia Wujie?
To avoid unnecessary trouble, Xu Baizhou decided it was best to just make up some excuse and get past it, so he said at once, “I was playing wild on the mountain as a kid. Fell down.”
“Fell down?” Xu Baizhou’s lie was so clumsy that Jia Wujie actually laughed out loud. Seeing the corner of Jia Wujie’s mouth curl up, Xu Baizhou gave a couple of dry chuckles in return.
“This Venerable One finds it strange, are you stupid, or do you think this Venerable One is stupid?”
Xu Baizhou couldn’t laugh anymore.
Jia Wujie leaned down close to him. Xu Baizhou instinctively shrank back, but a hand clamped onto his chin. Jia Wujie’s face, so flawless it seemed almost unreal, was right in front of him Xu Baizhou could even feel the faint current of air stirred by Jia Wujie’s breathing. That old problem of his, getting dizzy whenever he looked at Jia Wujie, flared up again.
“This Venerable One has said before: I only like the obedient. You had best answer this Venerable One honestly. This Venerable One does not like his belongings to bear traces left by others.”
So that was it, Xu Baizhou thought bitterly to himself.
To Jia Wujie, he was a toy, a pet, something to be casually given away once he’d had his fun, or simply killed off for a clean end. And yet Xu Baizhou had actually detected a hint of concern in that remark of Jia Wujie’s. How laughable.
It must be because no one had cared about him for so long, Xu Baizhou thought.
But try as he might, Xu Baizhou really couldn’t come up with any plausible excuse in this world to explain the wounds on his body.
Days of constant fear and worry had already left him utterly exhausted, and on top of that, in all these days he’d had only one proper meal and he’d thrown even that back up. In the warm water of the pool, Xu Baizhou’s vision grew blurrier and blurrier, his thoughts heavier and heavier, until finally his eyes rolled back and he passed out.
Xu Baizhou opened his eyes to a vast expanse of white ceiling. Sunlight spilled in through the window, falling on his face, a little dazzling.
The numbers on the heart monitor jumped and jumped, emitting a piercing screech that irritated Xu Baizhou. He tore off the sensor strapped to his arm; the dial dropped to zero, and the machine wailed even louder.
The old man in the next bed clapped his hands, shouting excitedly, “Another one died! Another one died!”
“Lunatic,” Xu Baizhou cursed under his breath, thinking: I can’t stay in this godforsaken place a single day longer. I have to get out of here fast.
He rose to get off the bed, only then discovering that he was strapped down firmly to it.
The feeling of being bound made Xu Baizhou’s heart seethe with agitation. He struggled hard, trying to break free of the straps restraining him, but no matter how he exerted himself, the straps stayed tightly bound around his body without the slightest sign of loosening.
Xu Baizhou grew more and more agitated, and he couldn’t help shouting loudly.
At that moment, a group of people in white coats apparently doctors burst into the ward and pinned Xu Baizhou down, all hands and feet.
“What are you going to do to me? Let go of me! Let go of me!” Xu Baizhou shouted with all his strength as he struggled.
But those people ignored his resistance. One of them produced a syringe and stepped forward; someone rolled up Xu Baizhou’s sleeve, and then the long needle was driven into his arm.
A wave of searing pain shot through him, and Xu Baizhou struggled even harder.
“Let go of me! Don’t touch me!”
Probably because Xu Baizhou struggled too violently, the slender needle hadn’t pierced the spot it was supposed to. The person pulled the needle out, picked a different spot, and stabbed it in again.
This repeated several times, until Xu Baizhou finally gave up struggling and looked at the person holding the syringe in confusion.
“Dude, you a newbie?”
Xu Baizhou jolted awake. The dim lighting left his consciousness hazy for a moment, before the waves of pain from his arm pulled him back to reality. He turned his head toward the source of the pain and came face to face with Jia Wujie’s faintly amused expression.
“……”
Xu Baizhou was lying on an extremely comfortable soft couch, and Jia Wujie was lying right beside him, one arm propping up his head as he watched Xu Baizhou, while his other hand idly pinched at Xu Baizhou’s arm.
Jia Wujie didn’t seem to be using much force, yet each pinch left a red mark on Xu Baizhou’s arm. By now, his entire forearm was covered in red marks, all presumably Jia Wujie’s handiwork.
Xu Baizhou closed his eyes and wished himself back into unconsciousness.
“How are you this weak? I barely dare to touch you.” Jia Wujie’s voice came from beside his ear.
Fainting attempt: failed. Xu Baizhou resignedly opened his eyes and pulled his arm out of Jia Wujie’s grasp.
He rubbed his much-suffering arm, thinking: so this is what “barely dare to touch” means?
“Does Your Excellency have any further orders?” Xu Baizhou said.
Apparently not expecting that to be the first thing out of Xu Baizhou’s mouth upon waking, Jia Wujie froze briefly, then lowered his propping arm and lay down. “No. It’s late. Sleep.”
“Okay.” Just as Xu Baizhou was about to get up, Jia Wujie stopped him.
“Sleep here.”
Huh? This couch was indeed very comfortable, but… Xu Baizhou glanced at Jia Wujie lying beside him.
“That’s… not really proper, is it?”
Who knew whether this Jia Wujie might get up in the middle of the night and kill someone? The farther away from him, the better so Xu Baizhou thought.
Seeing Xu Baizhou refuse, Jia Wujie looked somewhat displeased. He had only wanted to let the weakened Xu Baizhou sleep comfortably, but even a dog knows to jump onto a bed yet this little Medicine Guide dared to refuse him. Utterly ungrateful.
“Then choose for yourself. Sleep here, or sleep over there.” Jia Wujie said in a low voice.
Xu Baizhou followed Jia Wujie’s gaze. On the floor by the entrance of the bedchamber sat two cushions, each about a meter square. Though placed on the ground, they were embroidered with exquisite patterns and looked quite luxurious and beautiful.
But compared side by side, the two cushions made for a strange sight.
The embroidery on one of them looked as if something had raked across it, leaving it somewhat disheveled, apparently its previous owner hadn’t treasured this obviously expensive cushion very much. The other one was brand new.
In conclusion: clearly, these were two dog beds.
Xu Baizhou stared at the two magnificent cushions, his feelings somewhat complicated.
It seemed Jia Wujie truly had doted on that three-headed hound in the past even a cushion left by the door for it to sleep on had been made with such care. And the better-preserved cushion was clearly newly made; apparently Jia Wujie had seen that the old one had been scratched up by the hound’s claws, so he’d had a new one made for it.
At this thought, Xu Baizhou shuddered. The new cushion had clearly just been placed there, so recently that the old one hadn’t yet been removed. It seemed that at least up until the birthday banquet, Jia Wujie had still doted on it.
Something so beloved, yet killed without a moment’s hesitation, without the slightest reluctance wasn’t this Jia Wujie a bit too cold-blooded and heartless?
Looking at the two cushions, Xu Baizhou felt a jumble of emotions, but the situation at hand didn’t allow him to dwell on it. Better to pity himself than to mourn a dog.
After weighing comfort, safety, and every other angle, Xu Baizhou resolutely chose the dog bed.
“Fine, you may scram,” Jia Wujie said coldly, then rolled over with his back to Xu Baizhou and went to sleep on his own.
Xu Baizhou walked to the hall entrance and pushed the two cushions together, just enough for one person to lie on. Since arriving in this world, Xu Baizhou had slept either in the woodshed or the dungeon; having a dog bed to sleep in was satisfaction enough, and it even felt rather peaceful.
But when deep night fell, just as Xu Baizhou was sleeping soundly, a pained moaning sound drifted over and woke him.
Xu Baizhou climbed up from the floor and rubbed his eyes, looking toward the source of the sound by the dim glow of the fireflies.
The moment he saw what was making that sound, all of Xu Baizhou’s drowsiness vanished in an instant.