Painter Wen’s face alternated between pale and green. The look he cast toward Yao Shujing was filled with bizarre complexity, and whatever he wanted to say was forcefully swallowed back down.
Seeing the accusing gazes fixed on him by the crowd, he turned and wanted to bolt.
However, a pair of overwhelmingly strong hands firmly seized his arm.
Ming Siling hollered, “You’re not going anywhere! What do you mean by trying to get fresh with my sister-in-law just now? You even tried to splash dirty water on her and almost ruined her reputation—you have to give my sister-in-law an explanation!”
“I—no, I…” Painter Wen wanted to leave, but couldn’t. Ming Siling’s grip on his arm was like an iron chain; he couldn’t break free at all. How could a young lady have such terrifying strength?!
In his anxious panic, Painter Wen pointed straight at Mo Guiyi and shouted, “It was her! She seduced me, and these letters are all the proof! If she didn’t harbor romantic feelings for me, why would she write to me? A married woman corresponding with another man—isn’t that textbook seduction?”
“Go spew your dog-shit lies!” Ming Siling cursed out loud.
“Then tell me why she wrote letters to me for no reason at all?” Painter Wen challenged.
Ming Siling wasn’t great with her words and couldn’t win an argument against him. Just as she was panicking, she spotted a familiar figure from the corner of her eye past the crowd. Instantly feeling like she had found a lifeline, she strained her voice and yelled, “Brother! Come quick, someone is splashing dirty water on Sister-in-law! Come back me up and support my sister-in-law right now!”
Mo Guiyi’s heart skipped a beat as she looked over toward Ming Xianbai.
The man’s handsome yet sharp face was set in a tight line, his lips pressed firmly together. His expression shifted unpredictably, making it impossible to tell whether he believed it or not.
Mo Guiyi blinked nervously twice. This time, she thought, I didn’t rendezvous with Painter Wen, I even brought Ming Siling along specifically to avoid suspicion, and I didn’t let Painter Wen and Yao Shujing’s scheme succeed. This time… he should believe me, right?
Ming Siling rattled off the situation in a few concise sentences, pointing furiously at Painter Wen. “He’s splashing dirty water on my sister-in-law! He even had the nerve to claim she seduced him. Look at him—a spineless, fragile soft-shell of a man, lacking both looks and masculinity. Why on earth would my sister-in-law ever look twice at him!”
That remark felt like it delivered heavy, resounding slaps to the faces of several people at once.
Painter Wen’s expression turned intensely ugly. Mo Guiyi’s face flushed slightly red as well. The scolding was right on the money; she must have been truly blind back then.
Mo Guiyi took a few quick steps to Ming Xianbai’s side, her fingers gripping the fabric of his sleeve. Her eyes reddened with a sense of grievance, and she gently tugged at him, whispering softly, “He bullied me.”
Ming Xianbai’s body instantly stiffened.
His fingers clenched tightly into fists, trembling with force as they hung at his sides. His deep gaze locked onto Mo Guiyi’s face, as if he wanted to pierce straight through her deceitful facade and see right into her heart.
After a long moment, Ming Xianbai finally pulled his gaze away, his sharp, piercing stare snapping directly onto Painter Wen.
So it was this man. If it weren’t for him dangling temptations in front of her, how could she have ever committed those foolish acts? Clearly knowing she had a soft spot for romance and affection, this man had still flaunted those very things right in front of her eyes—how could that not make her heart waver? She was a married woman, yet he had maintained an ambiguous, flirtatious relationship with her. The fault lay entirely with him.
Painter Wen felt a deep chill run through his entire body under that gaze. The man’s eyes were terrifying, resembling those of a wolf; being stared at by him gave him the chilling sensation that the blood vessels in his throat were about to be bitten open.
Trembling uncontrollably, Painter Wen grew a mix of defensive and furious, pointing at Mo Guiyi as he yelled, “She’s the one who seduced—”
Before the final syllable could leave his mouth, Ming Xianbai strode heavily up to the man. With a pair of powerful, vice-like hands, he grabbed the man by the collar, jerked him right up close with the speed of a rushing wind, drew back his fist, and smashed it viciously into the center of the man’s face. With a single blow, he snapped Painter Wen’s nasal bridge. Bright red blood gushed out instantly, and half of the man’s face swelled up in an instant.
Ming Xianbai’s voice was chillingly terrifying. “Care to repeat that garbage one more time? Go ahead, try it.”
“Are you saying my wife would leave me behind just to go seduce you?” Ming Xianbai sneered with biting mockery.
He snatched up the letters from the ground, tore them to shreds in a fraction of a second, and scattered the pieces right across Painter Wen’s face. “You expect to rely on these letters? I knew all about the letters she wrote to you, and I’ve read every single one of them. Do you really think she’d have to be blind to fall for someone like you? When things go south, dumping the dirty water onto a woman—scum like you is utterly despicable.”
Painter Wen’s face turned ashen white. That single punch had left him collapsed on the ground, completely unable to crawl back up. The pain on his face was excruciating, and his nose felt utterly broken. Staring at his blood-covered hands, Painter Wen shook like a sieve, letting out miserable, agonizing wails.
He… he was bleeding. This man was terrifying. Clutching his head, Painter Wen shook uncontrollably without stopping.
Suddenly, a pungent smell of urine drifted through the air. As the surrounding neighbors glanced down toward his lower body, they realized the ground beneath him had turned wet in a large patch.
He had actually pissed himself out of sheer fright. How could there be such a spineless coward of a man?
Mo Guiyi couldn’t bear to look any longer. She increasingly felt as though her past self must have had her eyes covered by something; otherwise, how could she have ever fallen for such a spineless weakling? Even if he had an education, back then there were plenty of educated men pursuing her—which one of them wasn’t vastly superior to this trash? In the past, she would never have given a soft-shell like him a second glance. Yet in her previous life, she had actually been willing to elope with a coward like this. It was as if she hadn’t been herself at all.
Thinking back on it now, Mo Guiyi found it completely incomprehensible.
Looking over at Ming Xianbai instead, Mo Guiyi thought to herself: What good is an educated intellectual? A man who can step up and protect you when it actually matters is the only kind that’s truly useful.
Catching sight of the abrasions and oozing blood on the back of Ming Xianbai’s hand, Mo Guiyi reached out and took hold of it.
Ming Xianbai’s body stiffened, his gaze darkening deeply. Was she feeling heartache for him?
Just as Ming Xianbai’s heart was about to sink heavily back down, Mo Guiyi brushed her fingers over the bruised knuckles, lowered her head, blew gently on the spot, and asked once more, “Does it hurt?”
After pausing for a moment, Mo Guiyi added, “I’ll help you dab some medicine on it when we get back.”
Ming Xianbai stood there in a daze, staring at her blankly. For a split second, he hadn’t processed it. She was asking about him? Not that spineless weakling on the ground?
Mo Guiyi let go of Ming Xianbai’s hand, and at that instant, a trace of loss flashed through the depths of Ming Xianbai’s heart, his hand suddenly feeling completely empty. He hadn’t even noticed how his own heart was once again being led entirely by the nose by Mo Guiyi.
Turning her attention back to the man on the ground and recalling the events of her past life, Mo Guiyi couldn’t help but give him a kick, saying in a cold tone: “When things go wrong, you try to splash dirty water on a woman. Luckily I brought my sister-in-law along with me today, otherwise my reputation would have been completely ruined by you. I wrote those letters simply because I appreciated your art and thought you were a man of high moral character. I never imagined you were this kind of trash—consider my past self completely blind for ever misjudging you.”
Mo Guiyi needed to completely distance herself and clear her name. Otherwise, if this incident became gossip fodder for everyone in the neighborhood later on, it would leave behind gossip handles for others to use against her. She detested the existence of such unpredictable variables.