At the Su Residence, Lichun looked at her young mistress with obvious anxiety. “Miss, are you all right?”
Seeing that Su Niao seemed lost in thought, Lichun carefully tried to comfort her: “This servant knows you must be feeling terrible right now, but what’s done is done. You’ve been cultivating your character and temper lately. If you return to the capital and cause a scene, I’m afraid the Duke and Madam will be displeased. You…”
Su Niao raised her eyes to look at her. “Who said I’m going back to cause a scene?”
Those two unlucky nuisances were now tied together. What was there to make a fuss about? What benefit would she gain from it?
Just then, Steward Jing entered to deliver a message. “Miss, Chen Yan has brought over some wild rabbits. He says he caught them while hunting wolves.”
Chen Yan turned to leave when he heard, from just beyond a wall, the cold snort of a young woman: “What kind of worthless trash is that? Tell him to get lost.”
The moment Su Niao thought of Xie Chenyan, she wanted nothing more than to kill him on the spot. Unfortunately, his martial skills were too good. She had even considered writing to the capital and pretending to reconcile, using the opportunity to request several highly skilled guards. But she already had plenty of ordinary guards around her. Asking specifically for experts would easily arouse suspicion, especially with her “good sister” Su Xuan in the capital, whose schemes against her remained unknown.
As Su Niao sat there with a dark expression, lost in thought, Lichun returned carrying water for her foot bath.
“Miss, Chen Yan requests an audience.”
Without a moment’s hesitation, Su Niao replied, “Tell him to get lost.”
But Lichun added, “He says it’s something important.”
Su Niao was already thoroughly annoyed. When she recalled how, earlier that day, he had acted all righteous and impartial, openly pointing out that her final shot had violated the rules, the anger she had barely suppressed flared up again. Had it been anyone else, she might have let it pass.
But Xie Chenyan was her servant now. Yet he had failed to recognize his place. On one hand, he accepted her benefits and served under her; on the other, he still wanted to stand up for outsiders and uphold justice for them. If one really thought about it, that made him a disloyal servant who sided against his own master.
“Tell him to get in here.” Su Niao wanted to see for herself just what could be so important.
Lichun set down the wooden basin and went out to call him in.
Then Su Niao saw that Xie Chenyan was carrying a cage. Inside were several fluffy gray rabbits, each no bigger than a fist.
She paused for a moment. The round little creatures with their long ears were actually quite cute. But the instant she remembered who had brought them, her expression turned cold again.
“I already told you to take them away. Stop bringing this worthless junk here to offend my eyes.”
But after she finished berating him, Su Niao realized that the audacious Xie Chenyan had not only failed to leave with the rabbits; he had actually raised his head and looked directly at her.
“Miss Su is of noble birth. Ordinary things naturally cannot catch your eye. I imagine you treat people the same way. If you don’t like someone, then you should reject them outright. Why toy with another person’s sincere feelings?”
Toy with another person’s feelings?
For a brief moment, Su Niao was confused. Then she understood immediately and laughed. “So you’ve come on Chen Xu’s behalf?”
Chen Yan gave a quiet nod, his expression indifferent.
“Miss Su once said that commoners like us barely count as human beings in your eyes. If that’s the case, then why say such ambiguous, suggestive things to my younger brother? Why toy with a sincere heart for no reason?”
Su Niao’s face darkened. “You do know you’re still a servant of the Su family, don’t you?”
Curling her lips into a smile, she continued: “And do you know what happens to servants who dare defy and disrespect their master?”
Chen Yan’s expression remained calm. “I will accept whatever punishment you see fit to impose.”
The calmer and more indifferent he appeared, the more the flames of anger inside Su Niao crackled and surged upward. Especially since she had just been thinking about how she and Su Xuan had grown up together for more than ten years, only for Su Xuan to hate her so deeply and harm her so viciously.
And yet Xie Chenyan, who had spent only a few years with the Chen family after they rescued him, was now willing to defy her for that younger brother, regardless of the consequences he might face.
They were both family. So why were her own family members so terrible?
Su Niao wanted to have him dragged outside and beaten. But then she thought of his sturdy build, and how he could suffer injuries without changing expression. Somehow, that didn’t feel satisfying enough.
Just then, she remembered the unfinished business from last time. A malicious gleam surfaced in her eyes. Smiling, she said, “No need to rush into punishing you. Come here first and attend to my foot bath…”
Chen Yan slowly lifted his eyes. This spoiled young lady had an arrogant, willful temperament, but when you looked closely, she didn’t seem to have any truly cruel ways of tormenting people. Even the ways she could think of to humiliate him amounted to little more than making him serve as a servant, wash her feet, or kneel before her.
Chen Yan’s expression did not change. “I thought, Miss, that after last time you had already figured it out. With this sort of punishment, the one who loses out is you.”
Su Niao gritted her teeth. “Less nonsense!”
She added: “Kneel while you wash them.”
Su Niao refused to let a single change in Xie Chenyan’s expression escape her notice. She wanted to see anger, humiliation, or resentment on his face. Yet his expression remained completely unchanged.
With a calm nod, he replied, “Yes. However, as we agreed last time, if I kneel before you, then only the two of us may be present.”
Su Niao waved a hand. “Lichun, wait outside.”
Lichun hesitated for a moment. Seeing that guards filled the courtyard beyond the door, she obediently withdrew.
Su Niao curled her lips and lifted one foot, a thoroughly malicious smile on her face. “Come and attend to me, then.”
Then she watched Chen Yan walk over calmly. Setting down the foot-washing basin, he even tested the water temperature first. After that, he knelt on one knee before her with complete composure, took hold of one of her feet, and removed her shoe and sock. Every movement was calm and natural, without the slightest sign of feeling humiliated.
Of course Su Niao knew there should be propriety between men and women. But she had always done as she pleased since childhood.
Besides, in her previous life, when she bullied and toyed with Xie Chenyan, she had gone far beyond this. As a result, she felt no particular embarrassment.
What’s more, even under far more extreme circumstances in her past life, Xie Chenyan had always maintained an unyielding, rather-die-than-submit attitude. So Su Niao didn’t believe the sight of her bare feet would inspire any improper thoughts in him. For this kind of self-proclaimed upright, honorable, and incorruptible hypocrite, making him wash her feet was nothing but naked humiliation.
The point of humiliating someone was to see them look humiliated.
Su Niao seemed almost obsessed with humiliating Xie Chenyan. The calmer he appeared, the more she wanted to provoke him into anger. So she spoke leisurely: “You said I was toying with your brother’s feelings. In truth, that’s not quite right. Because if we’re being honest, your brother isn’t even worthy of being toyed with by me.”
As expected, Xie Chenyan’s movements paused slightly. Then he lifted his eyes to look at her.
Su Niao was inwardly delighted, and her tone grew even more malicious.
Su Niao continued lazily: “I was merely annoyed that a woman obsessed with him dared drag me into her mess. He should have driven her away himself. So why should I make myself miserable for the sake of other people?”
“The things I said to him were only meant to anger Jin Mingzhu. Surely you understand that yourself?”
Xie Chenyan remained silent.
Su Niao clicked her tongue. “And if your brother got the wrong idea because of that, then that’s simply because he’s indulging in wishful thinking. Instead of teaching your brother not to overestimate himself, you’ve come here to blame me for being too beautiful and too charming, for making people devoted to me with just a few words. What kind of logic is that, hmm?”
By now, the young lady’s feet had already been lowered into the water. Ripples shimmered across the surface. Her skin was pale as jade, while the polish on her toenails was a vivid crimson. The stark contrast of red and white only made her small feet look like exquisite works of carved jade.
Chen Yan spoke calmly: “I will naturally keep my younger brother in check. I only ask that Miss Su refrain from giving him any further cause for unrealistic hopes.”
Still the same unshakable calmness.
No matter how hard Su Niao tried to provoke him, he refused to get angry. Instead, she was the one growing irritated. She abruptly kicked out with her foot. “Watch how you speak when you’re kneeling.”
Her bare foot, flecked with droplets of water, struck Xie Chenyan’s cheek. He turned his head slightly and took the blow. And at last, his eyes turned cold.
Xie Chenyan possessed a pair of long, narrow phoenix eyes. Those eyes were usually quiet and emotionless, to the point that over the past few days, Su Niao had almost forgotten the icy dignity and natural authority they had carried in her previous life, when he wore a black imperial dragon robe. Now, after she kicked him in the face, his expression finally changed. Slowly, he raised his eyes to look at her.
Without warning, Su Niao remembered the cold, condescending gaze he’d given her when he ascended the throne, and the unbearable agony after drinking that cup of poisoned wine in the side courtyard.
Alongside her hatred, a trace of fear surfaced involuntarily. Doing her best to maintain a calm expression, she said: “You were the one who agreed to kneel.”
Xie Chenyan raised a hand.
Su Niao immediately shrank back. Instinctively, she was about to call for help. But then she realized that he was not trying to strangle her. Instead, he simply reached out and grasped her ankle.
Su Niao was intimidated, yet unwilling to admit it. Forcing herself to remain defiant, she snapped: “What are you doing?”
In the next instant, she saw Xie Chenyan glance at her, then lower his head and pick up the soft cloth beside him to wipe the water from her feet.
He was clearly angry, yet he could only suppress it and continue wiping her feet.
Only then did Su Niao remember. That’s right. At this moment, he was not some exalted Son of Heaven. He was merely a penniless nobody dependent on others for shelter.
“At least you know your place.”
Xie Chenyan’s silent endurance immediately put Miss Su in a better mood. But then she saw that after finishing wiping her feet, he calmly used the very same cloth to wipe the droplets of water from his cheek where she had kicked him. The movement was so natural that Su Niao didn’t even have time to stop him. Seeing the cloth that had just wrapped around and wiped her feet now being used on his face, her eyes widened. “Who gave you permission to use my handkerchief to wipe your face?”
The words had barely left her mouth when she noticed his gaze instinctively fall toward her feet. Her crimson-painted toes immediately curled back beneath her skirt.
Both shocked and furious, the young lady snapped, “Get out!”
Without looking at the tips of her ears, which had turned red from either anger or embarrassment, Xie Chenyan silently set down the cloth, turned, and walked out.
Lichun entered the room and, seeing her mistress’s expression, hurriedly asked, “Miss, what happened? Did that servant upset you?”
Su Niao gritted her teeth for a long while before finally forcing out a sentence. “I’m going to kill him! That bastard!”
After spending all that time deliberately trying to humiliate him, Su Niao had not felt the slightest bit satisfied. If anything, she had the faint feeling that she was the one who had been bullied. He was still just a nobody now, yet he already dared to act like this. She could hardly imagine what would happen if she failed to kill him.
Once he eventually returned to the capital and recovered his memories… How would he treat her then?
Once she had already cursed him and made him kneel, and since she could gain no satisfaction from humiliating him or seeing him humbled, it would be better to get rid of him as soon as possible and avoid future trouble.
Chen Yan knew that he had done it on purpose. He had deliberately bullied that blustering, inwardly timid young lady. But he really had warned her before… The little tricks she used to humiliate him did not make him feel humiliated at all.
In fact, when he had knelt on one knee before her, holding in his hands those jade-white feet tipped with crimson polish, he could not help but wonder: Why was she so certain he was not a lustful, dishonorable rogue? For what she considered humiliation and punishment, was it possible that, to a man, it did not necessarily carry the meaning she imagined? But he also knew that, toward the end, the pampered young lady had sensed that something was wrong.
Spoiled though she was, she was honestly rather simple-minded. Even after noticing something was off, she could not figure out exactly what it was. She could only flare up in anger and order him to get out. Perhaps, in one way or another, she had realized that she was the one being bullied. Bullied by a lowly man whom she believed she was humiliating.
Chen Yan had never known that he possessed such a malicious side. Even after losing his memory, neither his ways nor his temperament had changed. He had always considered himself upright and honorable. His aunt had saved his life, so he had stayed behind to repay the debt, caring for that family in return. Thanks to his exceptional martial skills, he had often stepped in when he witnessed injustice. Everyone who knew him regarded him as righteous and loyal, someone who never preyed upon the weak and never feared the powerful.
Chen Yan had always believed he was an openhearted gentleman—until just now. For the first time in his life, he wanted to bully someone. To bully a pampered young lady who, from the perspective of a poor nobody like him, stood impossibly high above him.
That little peacock carried herself with all the arrogance of nobility. Yet, she didn’t even realize that if he truly harbored ill intentions, the guards and retainers around her household would be utterly incapable of protecting her.