Mann placed Cen Jin on the living room sofa, his lower legs dangling with his toes brushing the cool floorboards.
Mann sat right beside Cen Jin. They maintained a distance of about a fist’s width apart, but a mere lift of a hand or a shift of a shoulder would be enough for them to brush against each other.
Having formed a decent impression of Mann, especially since the other man had thoughtfully carried him out Cen Jin offered a soft, “Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it.”
Cen Jin glanced sideways toward the hallway. Seeing that Weixin hadn’t followed them out, he let out a quiet sigh of relief.
Believing himself safe once more, Cen Jin grew a bit bolder. “You and Talon are both alike too nice to your guests. Is things managed way too strictly at home?”
At the mention of Talon’s name, Mann’s thoughts grew heavy, but he maintained his calm composure as he asked, “Why do you say that?”
“Otherwise, with how wealthy Talon’s family is, why would he be raised since childhood to help guests kneel and change their shoes?”
Mann furrowed his brow, though the shadow across his features quickly dissipated the moment Cen Jin looked over at him.
He carefully weighed his words, hoping to make Cen Jin aware of Talon’s intentions without sounding too direct.
“Tch.” An abrupt sound echoed from the hallway.
Cen Jin looked over to see Weixin leaning against the wall with his arms crossed.
Cen Jin took one quick look and instantly whipped his head back.
“If he pushes his luck any further, it won’t just be about changing shoes.”
“Stupid. He believes whatever anyone tells him.”
Giving the unfiltered Weixin a disapproving look, Mann made a shushing gesture.
Weixin fell silent, his gaze fixed entirely on Cen Jin’s face. Cen Jin kept his expression cold, refusing even to look at him.
He had been all smiles and chatter with Mann just moments ago.
Yet toward him, he couldn’t muster a single pleasant expression.
Weixin knew his previous words had been a bit too harsh, but without a bit of edge, how could Cen Jin ever recognize Talon’s true motives?
His original intention had been to make Cen Jin stay away from Talon, but it seemed he had completely backfired.
Damn it.
The awkward atmosphere didn’t last long before the bathroom door opened.
Talon’s hair was still damp, a towel draped around his neck and neatly concealing the puncture wounds on the side of his throat.
Noticing Weixin’s unexpected presence in the room, Talon paused mid-step.
Recovering quickly, Talon pulled the towel tighter with an air of casual indifference to block the injury on his neck, asking with a feigned, relaxed smile, “Why are you here? Mann is here too?”
Glaring at Talon, who was clad in nothing more than a bath towel, Weixin said with displeasure, “Put some clothes on.”
“Talon’s out?” Before Cen Jin could stand, Mann pressed him back down onto the sofa with one hand.
“Are you planning to go running off to him again?”
Though Mann’s tone was gentle, it gave Cen Jin a mild chill down his spine.
Properly settling back into the cushions, Cen Jin shook his head.
Since Cen Jin hadn’t coordinated his story with Talon yet, he had no idea how Talon felt about his sudden transformation into a vampire.
Pinned down by Mann’s hand, he had no way to go consult with Talon.
He could only pray that Talon wouldn’t accidentally blurt out the fact that he was a vampire.
Weixin utterly despises vampires. Before he discovers your vampire identity, you need to establish a romantic relationship with him and feed on his blood.
This is so difficult.
After what had just transpired, Cen Jin felt even more terrified of approaching Weixin.
If Weixin harbored such intense hatred for vampires, how on earth was he supposed to feed from him? Was he supposed to knock the guy out first?
Once Weixin was knocked unconscious, Cen Jin could ask if he’d like to be his boyfriend, and then manually bob Weixin’s head up and down twice surely that would count, right?
No, that doesn’t count.
Fine.
Four people sat in the living room. Aside from Cen Jin, who kept his head lowered the entire time, the other three eyed one another in mutual awkwardness.
Talon had already changed back into his school uniform. In fact, he had buttoned his shirt all the way up to the very top button anyone unaware of the situation would have thought his personality had undergone a complete overhaul.
Only Talon and Cen Jin understood that this was merely to hide the bite marks on his neck.
“Why are you guys, acting so dead serious?”
Stuck in the bathroom, Talon had missed everything that happened outside, but his intuition told him nothing good had occurred.
As Talon looked toward Cen Jin, opening his mouth to ask a question, Mann cut in, “What were you doing in the bathroom?”
“Taking a shower.”
“I’m well aware it was a shower.”
“…”
The atmosphere plunged right back into weirdness.
While Weixin refrained from dropping any more wild remarks, sitting quietly on the sofa with an expression that suggested he cared about nothing happening around him, Mann found himself equally at a loss for words.
Though Talon was usually a bit of a beast in daily life, looking at his current attitude, he genuinely seemed innocent.
Accustomed to being loud and uninhibited, Talon wasn’t the coy type. If he truly harbored hidden intentions he wanted to conceal from Mann and Weixin, he wouldn’t have announced back in the classroom that he was going to look for Cen Jin.
Now that Weixin and Mann had calmed down, they realized they had simply overreacted earlier.
They had even managed to scare Cen Jin half to deat.
Just thinking about the things Weixin had said made even Mann, an outsider listening in, feel a bit.
Noticing their silence and sensing that something might have occurred during his “shower,” Talon’s primary worry was that Cen Jin’s identity would be exposed.
If someone like Weixin found out, he wouldn’t spare Cen Jin.
Weixin had climbed to the position of Guild Chief precisely through such cold-blooded and ruthless methods. Having gone on missions with Weixin multiple times, Talon understood those tactics intimately.
And while Mann appeared easygoing on the surface, he was two-faced, often concealing his true internal thoughts beneath a polite facade.
Talon decided that, regarding Cen Jin’s true identity, it was best to keep it entirely a secret. He would figure out a way on his own to track down whoever had turned Cen Jin into a vampire.
Standing up, Talon headed toward the kitchen. “I originally planned to cook something special for Cen Jin, but I accidentally got my clothes dirty. There are only two sets of everyday uniforms to change into, so I had to wash this one to make sure I have something to wear tomorrow, and just took a shower while I was at it.”
“Have you guys eaten? Should I cook?”
Mann cast a skeptical look at the overly confident Talon. “You? Cook?” Since when did Talon know how to cook? Didn’t he always rely on a housekeeper to handle meals?
Talon blinked meaningfully at him.
Instantly grasping the hint, Mann realized Talon simply wanted to show off his culinary skills in front of Cen Jin.
Fearing whether Talon’s skills were actually up to the task of making food edible, Mann decided to pretend he hadn’t caught the hint, standing up and casually pulling Cen Jin to his feet along with him.
“Let’s go eat outside.”
This time, Mann didn’t pick Cen Jin up to help him change his shoes.
Before Mann could even reach out, Cen Jin had already slipped around the other side of the coffee table.
Hooking his index finger into the back of his shoe, he slipped them on, stamped his feet against the floor to settle them, and grabbed the schoolbag he had previously left on the foyer cabinet, trying to open the front door.
After failing to open it on the first few tries, an arm reached past his side, clicked a button, and unlatched the door.
Ah, so it was locked.
The person who opened the door was Weixin. Casting a quick sideways glance at him, Cen Jin darted past Weixin’s outstretched arm and hurried straight out.
Pushing the door wide open, Weixin lowered his gaze to look at the figure strapping on a schoolbag outside.
“…”
Is he afraid of me?
Sensing something amiss, Talon stepped in front of Weixin, blocking the line of sight between the two.
“What do you want to eat?” Talon asked Cen Jin.
Cen Jin shook his head. “I’m heading back to school.”
He had zero desire to linger around these hunters.
If only he could be alone with Talon, they still had so many things left unsaid.
Fearing Talon might miss his hint, Cen Jin blinked pointedly at him.
The corners of Talon’s lips curved upward. “Then I’ll walk you back and buy you some snacks along the way.”
“Hey, the two of us are still right here. Are you even going to ask us?” Mann draped an arm over Talon’s shoulder, putting a sudden halt to their silent eye-communication.
Not asking.
Cen Jin pouted slightly.
“I saw that, you know. Were you secretly cursing us out in your head just now?” Mann stepped forward, cupping the underside of Cen Jin’s chin and speaking in a teasing tone.
Yes.
[You can just say it out of loud. You’re a malicious, fickle little ghost; you don’t need to worry about breaking character.]
No.
[.]
Ultimately, due to Cen Jin’s insistence, they returned to school.
Having consumed so much blood by midday, he wasn’t actually hungry, but Talon and Mann still bought him an entire mountain of snacks. Claiming the items were too heavy for Cen Jin to carry alone, they personally escorted him all the way to his classroom.
Weixin remained silent the entire time, trailing right behind Talon and the others while occasionally shooting enigmatic glances at Cen Jin.
Cen Jin found the presence trailing behind them rather eerie.
Since the hour was still early, the classroom was completely empty.
Luckily, no one had witnessed Cen Jin walking back alongside Weixin and the others, otherwise the class group chat would undoubtedly explode with wild rumors again.
“You guys should take some of these back. I can’t possibly eat all of this,” Cen Jin protested.
“Just leave them in the classroom to snack on whenever you get a craving.”
“Can I share them with other people?”
“Sure,” Mann replied.
Instantly, Talon chimed in, “Only a little bit, though.”
Ah, well. Cen Jin’s secret little scheme to distribute all the snacks away had been spotted.
Ultimately, it took quite a bit of effort on Cen Jin’s part before he finally managed to shoo them away.
The sheer volume of items bought by Talon and his companions was so massive that it wouldn’t even fit inside his desk drawer, piling up right beside his seat and causing an obstruction in the aisle.
Taking advantage of the empty classroom, Cen Jin quickly distributed the surplus snacks.
Before long, every desk around him had a little mountain of treats piled on top, leaving only a small portion for himself.
During the break, Talon came to look for him.
That was when Cen Jin realized Talon’s earlier gesture of buying snacks and escorting him upstairs had simply been a pretext to figure out which classroom he was in.
He followed Talon up to the rooftop.
While the school rooftop was technically a restricted area, Talon happened to possess a key to the door.
Holding up his phone’s flashlight app, Cen Jin illuminated the lock so Talon could see to open it.
For some reason, the whole process felt like they were up to something shady and clandestine.
“Still not open?” Cen Jin poked his head forward to ask.
Talon looked equally puzzled; despite the lock turning successfully, the door refused to budge, as if someone were physically blocking it from the outside.
“Huh? That’s strange”
In a sudden rush, the rooftop door was yanked open by a powerful force. A blinding flood of light poured through the threshold, causing Cen Jin to instinctively squint and turn his face away to shield his eyes from the abrupt glare.
Remembering Cen Jin’s current identity, Talon quickly pulled him back behind his own body to block the harsh light.
In truth, modern vampires had long since developed full immunity to sunlight; it was simply a case of overprotective panic on Talon’s part causing him to forget.
Once his vision adjusted to the illumination, Cen Jin opened his eyes and looked up, spotting a tall, slender figure standing at the top of the stairwell.
Shielded behind Talon and facing the backlight, Cen Jin couldn’t clearly make out the man’s features.
Without saying a word, the stranger stared down at the figures of Talon and Cen Jin, before abruptly curving his lips into a smirk and letting out a low whistle.
As he walked down the stairs, he paused briefly when passing right by Cen Jin.
Cen Jin looked up at the man who had inexplicably smiled at him, momentarily stunned and unsure how to react.
Talon gently pulled on Cen Jin’s hand, prompting Cen Jin to snap out of it and follow Talon onto the rooftop.
When Cen Jin glanced back over his shoulder a moment later, the man had already vanished from sight.
Yet lingering precisely where the man had walked was a faint, elusive trace of fragrance.
“Xiao Jin.”
“Hm?”
“Those guys didn’t give you a hard time when you were at my place at noon, did they?” Talon still felt a lingering sense that something was off.
“……No.” Cen Jin simply couldn’t bring himself to voice the truth.
“Alright, then.”
With a series of rustling sounds, Talon began undoing his buttons.
Staring in astonishment at the action, Cen Jin asked, “W-What are you doing?”
“Do you want another drink?”
Cen Jin had never encountered anyone who so eagerly volunteered themselves to be fed upon by a vampire, especially since Talon was a hunter.
Watching the fabric part to reveal more skin, Cen Jin hurriedly reached out to pull his collar back together, blurting out:
“No need!”
Upon hearing that, a flicker of genuine disappointment crossed Talon’s face. “Oh. Okay.”