Meeting Ling Xi’s gaze, Xiao Jue said calmly, “I haven’t paid attention.”
Chen Tianjun had grown up with him and was long used to his indifference toward women. He shrugged boredly. “Don’t even bother asking. Our comrade Xiao is dedicated to serving the country—he’ll never be defeated by any sugar-coated bullets.”
Ling Xi pouted, unbothered. There was no iceberg that couldn’t be melted, only pickaxes that didn’t work hard enough.
She refused to believe that if a sexy bombshell—fair-skinned, beautiful, with long legs, a full chest, a perky rear, and a sultry voice—stood naked in front of Xiao Jue, he would remain unmoved. Unless he wasn’t a man.
As for that sexy bombshell, of course, that would be her future self!
Cai Yu looked at her body, flatter than a broom handle, and clicked twice in disbelief, earning himself a refreshing eye-roll.
“It’s getting dark. Let’s head back.” Xiao Jue glanced at the sky.
Ling Xi also realized it was getting late. With her sickly body, she could only walk slowly—if she didn’t head down the mountain soon, she’d be making her way home in the dark.
She picked up the five fish and put them in her back basket, putting on the face of a well-behaved girl. “Then I’ll head back first. Big brothers, stay safe!”
She had barely taken two steps when she noticed Xiao Jue following behind her. Ling Xi asked with a smile, “Is Big Brother Xiao Jue going down the mountain too?”
“Mm.” Xiao Jue nodded, stepped forward, and took her heavy basket. “I’ll walk you.”
“It’s fine, Big Brother. Xiao Xi can do it herself.” She said this, yet made no move at all to take the basket back. Such handsome free labor—only a fool would actually refuse.
Cai Yu muttered quietly in her Divine Sense, “So fake!”
Ling Xi didn’t pay him the slightest attention. With such an appetizing piece of fresh meat keeping her company, who cared about a mere bird?
And so, the two walked down the mountain, one after the other. Along the way, Ling Xi turned up a nest of wild duck eggs—five of them, even bigger than chicken eggs.
Under Xiao Jue’s fixed gaze, she pursed her lips and tremblingly held out two eggs with her small hands, handing them to him. “I’ll give you two, then.”
Sure enough, she was one to judge by looks. If Xiao Jue had looked like Wang Tieniu, not only would she not have given him any eggs, she might have gouged out his eyeballs to play marbles with.
Ah, beauty truly leads people astray!
Seeing her reluctant expression, Xiao Jue was nearly angered into laughter. Did he look like someone coveting two eggs? He was just afraid an insect might be hiding in the grass and sting her.
But he had no intention of explaining. Calmly, he took the eggs and pocketed them, secretly enjoying the little girl’s look of regret. She was far more interesting than the girls from the art troupe.
Huai Mountain was vast, and since they were returning from the river deep inside, they had walked half an hour and were only halfway down.
To descend, they had to pass through a forest of white wax trees. In early autumn, the leaves hadn’t all fallen yet—a dense, jumbled mix of yellow and green. The moment they entered, their figures were swallowed up, and they had to walk close together.
Wind swept through the trees, and a rustling sound came from directly ahead. Xiao Jue pulled Ling Xi into his arms and darted behind a thick patch of leaves.
A low voice rose—it was a man with a raspy, duck-like voice. “Damn it, how much longer are those sons of bitches going to chase us? Our rations are almost gone—do they want me to eat shit?!”
“Wait a little longer. Someone will come to meet us soon. The list is still in our hands.” A woman spoke, sounding very composed.
“Right, the list is still in our hands. They wouldn’t dare abandon us.”
Held in Xiao Jue’s arms, Ling Xi noticed every muscle in his body had tensed, pressing painfully against her shoulder blades. But she had a vague guess as to who these two people were, and afraid of distracting Xiao Jue, she endured the discomfort and stayed still.
Knowing how sensible she was, Xiao Jue quietly set her down on the ground, his taut body coiled and ready. The instant the figures passed by, he pounced like a cheetah.
The man let out a cry of alarm. Ling Xi peeked through the gaps in the branches and saw that both were dressed in coarse blue cloth shirts. The man had already been tackled to the ground, yelping incessantly, while the woman—tall and lanky—took one look at Xiao Jue and bolted, running straight toward Ling Xi’s hiding spot.
Seeing her move, Xiao Jue’s heart lurched. He delivered a vicious kick that incapacitated the man and gave chase.
By the time he caught up, the scenario he’d envisioned hadn’t happened at all. There was no pitiful little one waiting tearfully for her rescue—not even close.
At this moment, the agile, tall-thin woman had already been knocked flat on the ground, while the little girl stood nearby clutching a tree branch, her watery eyes gazing up at him, looking utterly adorable.
As he approached, he saw a purplish-red welt on the woman’s face, its thickness and height matching the branch in Ling Xi’s hands almost exactly.
Even the unflappable Battalion Commander Xiao’s mouth twitched.
Ling Xi was so small and frail that she obviously couldn’t have knocked out a full-grown adult with sheer strength. What she had done was calculate the woman’s escape route, find a thick branch at roughly the right height, and pull it back hard, using the branch’s rebound force to successfully knock the criminal unconscious.
White waxwood—tough yet hard—was perfect for the job.
Xiao Jue honestly didn’t know what to say to her. Remembering that Chen Tianjun’s vocabulary was always much richer, he decided to leave this arduous task to him.
“I’ll take you back in a bit, okay?”
Ling Xi actually wanted to say he didn’t need to walk her back, but figured he wouldn’t agree, so she nodded. “The important thing comes first.”
Tying the two targets together, Xiao Jue pulled a signal flare from his waist and lit it. Before long, Chen Tianjun and Luo Fei came rushing over—much faster than when they’d been carrying Ling Xi.
“Whoa! Battalion Commander, you’re incredible!” Luo Fei was awestruck at the sight of the targets they’d been hunting for half a month captured by Xiao Jue all on his own.
“Tsk tsk tsk,” Chen Tianjun said, circling them and spotting the welt on the woman’s face. “You’re just supposed to catch them—why’d you have to disfigure her? That’s brutal!”
No sooner had he finished his remark than he noticed Xiao Jue looking at him with a complicated expression. “It wasn’t me.”
“Stop denying it. If it wasn’t you, who else could it be—little Xi?” Chen Tianjun laughed, then lost his nerve mid-laugh. He glanced at his candid childhood friend, then at Ling Xi’s sheepish face, and gasped, “No way… it was really little Xi?!”
He lived up to Xiao Jue’s expectations, showering Ling Xi with flattery like it was free of charge, praising her from every angle with no blind spots. If he’d been born thirty years later, he’d have made a first-rate fan club president.
It wasn’t until Xiao Jue couldn’t stand it anymore and shooed them off that he and Luo Fei escorted the targets back to the military camp, still calling over his shoulder as they went: “Little Xi, I’ll come visit when I’m on leave!”
Please don’t.
Ling Xi frowned in distaste. Chen Tianjun talked far too much—Xiao Jue, on the other hand, would be fine.
So that’s what she thought, and that’s exactly what she asked: “Xiao Jue-gege, will you come visit me?”
“You want me to come see you?” Xiao Jue raised an eyebrow in surprise.
He didn’t like to talk, and even as a child he was unpopular with the kids. After he grew up, every time he came home, the boys and girls in the compound would hide far away from him—some aunties even used him to scare their naughty kids into behaving. So why didn’t it work on her?
The little thing was nodding her head rapidly, her round, bright eyes full of anticipation.
Recalling her feats of bravely fending off a wild boar and outwitting a thug, Xiao Jue’s lips curved up almost imperceptibly. Right—only a fearless girl like her would be willing to get close to him.
“On the 23rd of next month, I’m on rotation leave.”