Because Xuan He suffered from both vomiting and diarrhea, Jiang Li panicked, ran outside to knock on the neighbor’s door, and had the neighbor help call an emergency ambulance to save Xuan He.
Afterward, as Xuan He lay in the hospital bed, she cursed up a storm internally.
Why was it that she, the dignified Main God with extraordinary abilities who could summon underworld emissaries from below and control the life and death of others from above, was reduced to such miserable vomiting and diarrhea by mere food?
This was not right, deeply not right!
The little ball of light explained with a trembling heart, “Lord Main God, those abilities belong to your divine soul, but the food you consumed was processed through a mortal body.”
Xuan He: “Heh.”
The little ball of light thought, 55555, I am definitely going to be taken apart, I am definitely going to be taken apart, I am definitely going to be taken apart.
After this incident, Xuan He no longer dared to eat indiscriminately. Jiang Li also learned culinary arts, trying her best to personally prepare meals for Xuan He out of fear that something else might happen to her.
Coming home from school and opening the door, Jiang Li heard the loud and chaotic noise of the television, mixed with the crunchy sound of potato chips being chewed.
“You’re back?” Xuan He’s gaze lingered on Jiang Li for only a second before shifting back to the television, unconsciously sucking on the remaining seasoning on her fingertips.
Jiang Li’s gaze instinctively followed Xuan He’s fingertips all the way to her mouth.
Those rosy lips were sucking on her fingertips, as if one could almost feel that moist and warm environment.
The fingertips withdrew, leaving a glistening residue behind.
A cherry-red tongue tip inadvertently poked out from between her lips, flashing past in an instant.
Her heartbeat accelerated for a moment.
“Yeah, I’m back.” Jiang Li pulled her gaze back, feigning composure as she put down her school bag and went to her room to change clothes.
Xuan He was not completely idle. Over the past few years, the two of them had developed a tacit understanding. Whenever Xuan He wanted to eat something, she would prepare and slice all the corresponding ingredients in advance, leaving them ready for Jiang Li to cook upon her return.
Normally, cooking a meal took only a dozen minutes, yet those were also the most exquisite dozen minutes.
Looking at the neatly arranged and sliced ingredients in the kitchen, Jiang Li couldn’t help curving the corners of her lips.
In the past, she had diligently taught herself how to cook precisely so she wouldn’t be seen as a useless person, fearing that Xuan He might abandon her and throw her out.
They shared no blood relation. The fact that Xuan He had taken her in was already a kindness as vast as the heavens, let alone spending money to hire a tutor so she could learn to read and study.
Now, her state of mind seemed to have shifted. As to what it had shifted into, she couldn’t quite put her finger on it for the moment, but she didn’t reject it at all. Instead, a sense of joy welled up in her heart.
Before long, a savory aroma drifted out from the kitchen.
Xuan He could no longer sit still, shuffling her feet over to the kitchen doorway.
“It’s ready!” Jiang Li said with a smile.
Xuan He skipped over and carried the food to the table.
She really is like a child! Jiang Li thought to herself.
Today, Xuan He wanted to eat steak, so they bought M9 Australian Wagyu.
Jiang Li had never heard of what grade M-whatever steak was, but that didn’t prevent her from looking up instructions on how to prepare it.
Looking at the steak radiating an unbridled aroma, Xuan He impatiently picked up her knife and fork.
As the blade sliced down, one could hear the faint crunch of the caramelized crust shattering. That was the perfect mark left by the Maillard reaction.
The rosy cross-section was exposed, with juices slowly oozing along the grain, gleaming with an amber luster under the warm light.
Xuan He eagerly popped a piece of meat into her mouth.
In that instant, her teeth first broke through the crispy crust, and the warm juices burst across the tip of her tongue.
The texture of the meat was so tender it felt almost unreal, melting into juices that slid down her throat with almost no chewing required.
Jiang Li had also sprinkled a layer of black pepper on top. The pungent fragrance of the black pepper burst between her teeth, while the saltiness of the sea salt supported wave after wave of lingering sweetness, leaving even her breath carrying a hint of milky aftertaste.
It was truly delicious! Xuan He narrowed her eyes in pure delight.
Jiang Li hadn’t tasted the steak herself, but seeing Xuan He’s enthusiastic enjoyment across the table filled her heart with complete satisfaction.
She gently pushed the fruit platter in front of Xuan He. The red cherry tomatoes were crisp and refreshing, the golden mangoes dazzling, the orange cantaloupe fragrant and appetizing, and the green Shine Muscat grapes bursting with sweet flavor.
After eating the savory, milky-rich steak, taking a bite of crisp, sweet fruit relieved the grease, neutralized the saltiness in her mouth, and replenished her vitamins.
After a few bites of fruit, she cut open the fried egg resting beside the steak and forked a piece into her mouth.
The fried egg was cooked to an eight-tenths-done state. When cut open, it revealed an orange-yellow yolk that gleamed with an alluring luster under the light.
The rich aroma of egg burst forth upon entry, the edges crisp and crunchy while the inside remained tender, bouncy, and springy.
Most importantly, the fried egg had absorbed the milky oil flavor from the steak, blending the savory saltiness and the distinctive milky taste of beef, filling the space right beneath her nose.
The soft, tender texture of the egg yolk further amplified the flavor of the beef’s fat, making her entire head spin with dizziness as if she were immersed in an ocean of savory meat and milk flavors.
“Mmph! This is way better than the steak from those chain restaurants!” Xuan He exclaimed with emotion.
The little ball of light watched Xuan He gorge herself and felt intensely envious, yet unable to actually eat a bite, sinking into profound depression.
Forget it, forget it. As a system, I don’t need to eat food from this world in the first place! The little ball of light tried hard to comfort itself.
Too delicious, simply too amazing! A gourmet feast! Why is little Li so talented?! Xuan He continued to sigh inwardly.
The little ball of light thought nothing.
Slurping up a nonexistent stream of drool, it rationally suspected that the Main God was doing this on purpose, deliberately trying to tempt it!
If it couldn’t eat, fine, but stop making it crave it!
Did systems not have human rights?!
Hmph!
Fuming with anger, the little ball of light blocked Xuan He, deciding to unilaterally ignore her for ten minutes.
It would come back out after she finished eating.
After finishing the meal, Xuan He tidied up and washed the dishes while Jiang Li returned to her room to do homework.
Jiang Li was smart and hardworking. Usually, she would still be studying diligently in her room at this hour, but today she pulled a book out of her school bag instead.
It was a comic book.
At school, several close female classmates had been passing around comic books to read. Jiang Li knew about them, but she had never read one.
That was until her deskmate mysteriously handed Jiang Li a comic book, smiling in a rather strange way.
A small knot formed between Jiang Li’s brows as she narrowed her eyes, curling her lips in slight disdain.
Her deskmate had smiled far too lecherously when handing her the book, making her very much want to refuse.
However, thinking of how Xuan He had casually suggested she make more friends at school, Jiang Li swallowed the refusal hovering on her lips and ultimately kept quiet.
The girls in her class had all been reading them lately. If she read it too, she would probably have common topics to talk about with them.
“The plot is super good, hehehehe!” her deskmate had said when handing her the book.
Since her homework was finished and both review and preview were done, Jiang Li opened the comic book just to take a break.
The story followed a protagonist who went looking for a job, only to arrive and discover that his boss was a former acquaintance with a terribly gloomy expression. Still, he endured it and stayed to work there.
Next, the protagonist and the boss worked together, interacted, bickered, and amid all the bickering, they kissed.
Jiang Li thought, “?”
Thinking she must have read it wrong, she incredulously flipped back to the first page to check the character introductions. If her memory served her right, the protagonist was a male, and the boss was also a male.
With a blank expression, she flipped back to where she had left off.
The protagonist first frowned and refused, but the boss was extremely domineering and kissed him once again.
Consequently, as they kissed, the protagonist and the boss began to indulge in it, even reaching the point of baring their souls to one another.
The comic panels were filled entirely with words like mmh, ah, and oh.
In a flash, Jiang Li’s face flushed bright red, and she slammed the book shut.
No matter how mature her usual personality or how staid her behavior, she was still a sixteen- or seventeen-year-old kid who would inevitably feel curious about things she had never encountered before.
Taking a few deep breaths to calm her pounding heart, she couldn’t resist her curiosity and opened the comic book once more.
Her worldview felt completely reshaped.
The next day, with faint dark circles under her eyes, a dazed Jiang Li arrived at school and returned the comic book to her deskmate.
Her deskmate smiled brightly. “Well, well? Good, right?! I’ve got parts two and three here, plus others. I’ll bring them for you tomorrow.”
Jiang Li was filled with hesitation, wanting to speak but stopping herself. After a moment of hesitation, she finally asked.
“This comic… are those two guys…”
“Yep, yep!” her deskmate replied excitedly, her eyes shining brightly.
“But, two guys…” Jiang Li asked hesitatingly.
Her deskmate didn’t mind at all. “What’s wrong with that? Two guys, two girls—that’s true love!”
Jiang Li was surprised. “Two girls are fine too?”
For some reason, Xuan He’s face flashed through her mind.
Seeing that Jiang Li didn’t show any signs of repulsion, her deskmate boldly began pitching it. “You might not know this, but same-sex love is true love, whereas opposite-sex relationships are just for carrying on the family line!”
Her deskmate’s nonstop chatter lost its focus in her ears, drifting further and further away as Jiang Li repeatedly replayed that single sentence in her mind.
Same-sex love is true love, opposite-sex relationships are just for carrying on the family line.
Indeed. Her father had bought a woman with money purely to carry on the family line, and those people in the village bought women just to bear children to carry on the family line.
In her world, she had only ever seen men and women together, and she had assumed that when she grew up, she would probably be casually sold off by Guo Da to some family as a bride, wasting away her entire life like that.
Never had she expected to meet Xuan He, who had pulled her out of that remote, backward little village.
Xuan He was as beautiful as a celestial fairy from the heavens, pulling her out of a sea of suffering, buying her clothes, teaching her to read and study, and treating her genuinely well.
“Girls and girls…” Jiang Li savored the words softly. At that moment, her entire world seemed to open up with startling clarity.
Immediately following that came an endless wave of desolation, sorrow, and intense self-loathing.
Having finished talking, her deskmate stared at the newly handed-out test papers and wailed in hatred of studying.
On this day, the usually diligent and hardworking Jiang Li zoned out during class for the very first time.
During the noon lunch break, Jiang Li had an unusual dream.
In the dream, the two protagonists in the comic book suddenly turned into her and Xuan He.
They bickered, arguing until their faces turned red and their necks strained, but right in the middle of their argument, they kissed.
Their tight embrace made the air feel scorched, red tongues sliding across the gaps between their lips as glistening fluid dripped from the corners of their mouths.
She slowly moved, kissing Xuan He’s cheek, her rosy lips brushing against the skin as they slid toward her earlobe, gently capturing and sucking on it.
Xuan He closed her eyes tightly, frowning in breathless endurance as muffled groans escaped her.