Liu Shiting walked away into the distance. Watching his shrinking silhouette, Ye Qisheng suddenly felt a surge of emotion and blurted out, “He and his younger brother are both good people. Given the chance in the future, I must repay them.”
Raphael also glanced toward the departing figure and nodded, “Mm, Village Chief Liu is indeed a good person. Physician Xu said so as well.”
Speaking of Physician Xu, Ye Qisheng inevitably thought of her still-injured face. Raising her hand to stroke the wounded side of her cheek, she said with no small amount of worry, “He’s been out making house calls for two days now, and I don’t know when he’ll return. Earlier, he didn’t mention how my face should be treated either—he only told me that when it comes time to change the dressing, he will come look for me on his own.”
Raphael reassured her, “Physician Xu is a famous doctor. Since he said so, you can wait for him to find you with peace of mind.”
At this point, that was all Ye Qisheng could do.
Physician Xu had said her face was bitten by poisonous insects or something similar in the mountain forest. Nearly more than half her face was slathered with medicine and fixed firmly with thick gauze patches.
With such a large injured area, it logically should have been quite severe, but aside from occasional itching, she felt almost no pain. Apart from taking care to avoid letting water touch it while washing her face or bathing, there was no other inconvenience.
If her face could truly recover as pristine as before, just as Physician Xu had said, that would be wonderful.
Returning from outside into the courtyard, Raphael spread his bundle open on the ground, carrying the small knives and other tools into the kitchen, draping animal pelts over the roof to dry in the sun, and going outside to cut some tree branches and bamboo poles to repair the broken fence wall piece by piece.
Although this fence wall was terribly ruined due to years of disrepair and wobbled precariously whenever the wind blew, it could at least prevent unwanted peeping.
The news of him and Ye Qisheng settling down here would be known to the villagers sooner or later. If he could let them catch fewer glimpses of his face, perhaps their malice toward him might diminish slightly, and the chances of Ye Qisheng being dragged down by association would shrink accordingly.
Ye Qisheng also wanted to help out, but Raphael refused to let her lift a finger. Worrying that burrs or splinters might hurt her, he asked her to sit to the side and just watch him work.
However, Ye Qisheng didn’t actually sit idly by. Taking a crude broom Raphael had brought back from his mountain cave home, she conscientiously began sweeping up the dead branches and fallen leaves in the courtyard.
While repairing the fence wall, Raphael would turn back to glance at her every now and then, his gaze gentle with a low smile, the corners of his upturned lips never coming down.
How wonderful—he wouldn’t be alone anymore.
Although he and Ye Qisheng were only pretending to be husband and wife right now, even if it was fake, that group of bachelors in the village would still take into account her status as a “married woman” and wouldn’t try to snatch her from him.
And he could live together with her out in the open.
Unaware of these inner thoughts of his, Ye Qisheng continued to sweep the courtyard attentively.
With great effort, she swept all the dead branches and fallen leaves into a single pile. Supporting her slightly sore, tired waist, she straightened up, just wanting to catch her breath, when a sudden gust of wind blew straight at her. That pile of leaves instantly scattered all over the ground in a flash, maddening her to no end.
Ye Qisheng muttered a few frustrated complaints. Just as she was about to resign herself to swinging the broom to sweep all over again, a slender, fair hand reached out from the side and took the broom from her grasp.
Looking up, her gaze collided directly with Raphael’s beautiful blue eyes filled with a gentle smile as he said softly, “Let me do it. Go to the side and take a rest.”
Ye Qisheng was dazed for a moment by his smile. By the time she snapped out of it, she hurriedly snatched the broom back, “I’d better do it myself. You’ve already worked hard repairing the fence wall—I can still manage a little chore like this.”
“I’ve already finished repairing it.” Raphael took the broom once again, the smile on his lips deepening slightly, his voice refined and gentle, “The wind is a bit strong today. Go inside the house and sit—be careful not to catch a cold.”
Seeing his insistence, Ye Qisheng couldn’t help letting out a wry laugh and sighed, “Raphael, I’m already useless enough as it is. If you keep spoiling me like this, I’ll completely evolve into an ultimate slacker who can’t do anything without you.”
Raphael’s brow moved slightly, merely holding a faint, subtle smile without taking up her words.
Yet in his heart, he was silently chanting: *It would be best if you truly couldn’t do without me!*
*That way, we can be together forever.*
With her broom snatched away, Ye Qisheng had nowhere left to sweep, so she simply returned to the bedroom, intending to arrange the straw bedding for sleeping tonight.
The room was nearly fifty square meters, looking quite spacious due to the lack of furniture.
The doorway was located near one side of the wall rather than right in the middle. She intended to split her straw mat in half to set up another bed right next to it.
Liu Shiting had only brought her one mattress. Given Raphael’s personality, he would definitely let her use that mattress for herself. She planned to cover the straw with the animal pelts Raphael brought to serve as a mattress, making do with lying down on it loosely.
Fortunately, it was just entering April now; the weather was neither cold nor hot, and the temperature difference between day and night was small, so whether they used a blanket at night made no difference.
They just had to guard against mosquitoes and insects. She was a typical type O blood type; if she wasn’t careful, she could be bitten into two bumps at any moment.
Just as she was thinking of looking for Raphael to get some insect-repelling herbs, Raphael walked in from outside.
Noticing her kneeling on the ground fussing with the straw, he blinked his eyes and asked in confusion, “Qiqi, what are you making?”
Hearing this intimate form of address, Ye Qisheng turned her head to look at him, asking in surprise, “How do you know my nickname? I remember I haven’t told you my name yet, have I?”
When she asked Raphael for his name earlier, she originally wanted to introduce herself along the way. But she was thrown off track by his amnesia and forgot, and Raphael hadn’t called her by name either, so she hadn’t recalled this detail.
Now suddenly hearing him call her nickname, she inevitably felt quite astonished.
An uncomfortable look flashed across Raphael’s face. Lowering his eyelashes, he walked silently to her side, reached his hand into his robe, and quickly pulled out a gold, diamond-encrusted waist bag to hand to her, saying haltingly, “This… is what you left in my cave before. Your name is written on it…”
Ye Qisheng froze, instinctively looking toward the diamond-encrusted waist bag in his hand, her eyes instantly widening in utter shock.
She hastily took it over, furrowing her brows as she flipped it around and examined it for a long while. She quickly confirmed that this was indeed the waist bag she wore when she fell into the water—the bank cards and crucial identification documents inside were all intact, missing not a single thing.
This waist bag was a coming-of-age gift her mother gave her for her eighteenth birthday this year.
A brand-new limited custom edition from Brand G, its entire outline was handcrafted from special metallic materials—waterproof and durable. It was encrusted with 999 tiny diamond chips, and her nickname, Qiqi, was engraved right on the zipper pull.
She thought it looked quite nice and was convenient to use, often hanging it at her waist whenever she went out, thoroughly favoring it for a good while.
On the night before transmigrating, she was wearing this very waist bag while going all-in on the luxury yacht.
When she woke up at Physician Xu’s home, she hadn’t felt the bag and assumed it had been swiped by those scum who ambushed her. Who would have guessed it transmigrated along with her and was picked up by Raphael!
Recalling what Raphael had just said, she snapped her head up, her gaze locking straight onto his eyes, asking in a heavy voice, “You just said this bag of mine was left in your cave—what on earth is going on?! When did I ever go to your cave?”