The madam picked up the gold ingot from the table with her eyes shining, grinning from ear to ear, before she heard the girls behind her chattering in complaint.
“What?! So they were a pair!”
“Coming to a pleasure house like this, they must be out of their minds. Why didn’t they go to the Southern Wind House next door?”
“That monk was totally my type, and yet he ended up being wasted on that stinky poker face who looks even more bewitching than us!”
Hearing this, the girls instantly burst into a noisy commotion.
“Exactly, exactly! Bringing his sweetheart here and even glaring at us, how hateful!”
“I thought I was just losing my charm, but it turns out they’re not into women at all.”
After the crowd grumbled and cursed for a good while, the madam agreed with them in her heart, but she finally couldn’t help chiming in out loud:
“Alright, alright! They paid after all. At worst, I’ll buy each of you a new tube of lip rouge!”
As soon as those words were spoken, the girls stopped complaining, cheered, and obediently went back to their original spots.
In the blink of an eye, Yun Qingzhou and Han Yujiu returned to the Demon Palace, but Han Yujiu kept a cold face the entire time. Without saying a single word, he took Yun Qingzhou to the hot spring located behind the Demon Lord’s palace.
This hot spring was surrounded by sparse, layered woods and rolling peaks, with steam billowing and a hazy, scattered mist floating in mid-air.
With a loud splash, both of them plunged into the water. Yun Qingzhou choked on a mouthful, but Han Yujiu quickly grabbed his arm and pulled him back up.
Yun Qingzhou coughed, leaning against the crook of Han Yujiu’s arm. His eye rims were red, and his eyelashes were soaked, his mist-filled eyes looking rather pitiful.
Seeing such a picturesque view, Han Yujiu couldn’t help his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. He lifted Yun Qingzhou’s supporting arm a bit higher, while his other hand firmly pinched Yun Qingzhou’s chin, forcing the young man to lock eyes with him.
“Did you have fun playing today, Xiao Zhou?”
Han Yujiu’s voice was exceptionally low and hoarse, his gaze carrying a raw desire that people dared not meet directly.
Seeing Han Yujiu’s current expression, which looked like he wanted to devour him whole, Yun Qingzhou lost his nerve, so he expressionlessly shook his head.
Han Yujiu: “But you looked like you were having a lot of fun.”
The Demon Lord bent down, his broad palm gripping the Buddhist cultivator’s waist and his fingertips rubbing up and down. Right by Yun Qingzhou’s ear, he said:
“Let me think, how should I punish you?”
Yun Qingzhou’s mind was filled entirely with question marks right now.
No way, he had clearly shown that he wasn’t having fun, so what else was this guy trying to do?!
Before he even had a chance to speak, Han Yujiu’s face moved in close to his, and then a warm, soft object brushed against his lips.
The Buddhist cultivator’s eyes widened slightly, looking thoroughly surprised.
“System, system, System, old buddy?! What the heck is going on here?!”
“Help me!”
Having consistently received no response from the system, Yun Qingzhou finally experienced what it felt like to call out to heaven with no response and pound on the earth with no answer.
“In this broken world, it turns out I’m the only one bravely pressing forward, sigh.”
The Buddhist cultivator’s lips were held and sucked on by the other man, leaving him stunned for a moment. Once he snapped out of it, he made a resolute, split-second decision and pushed him away.
Han Yujiu didn’t dodge and took the Buddhist cultivator’s push square on, staggering back two steps. A pair of emerald-green eyes stared at Yun Qingzhou with a chilling coldness.
Yun Qingzhou: “Layman, please show some self-respect.”
Driven to anger and embarrassment, the Buddhist cultivator wiped his lips, though his outward composure and self-restraint were still well-maintained.
Han Yujiu was so angry he laughed. Gritting his teeth, he asked: “Self-respect?”
“The little monk must have forgotten how you even came to the demon realm, didn’t you?”
The man walked step by step toward the young man in front of him, forcing the youth to back up until his back hit the stone wall of the hot spring pool.
Han Yujiu’s slender arms pressed against the pool walls on either side of Yun Qingzhou, making it look from the side as though he had pulled him into his embrace and enclosed him within his own territory.
Han Yujiu’s expression was concealed by the strands of black hair hanging down, and the faint, flickering light sources within the hot spring were also entirely blocked by his broad shoulders.
The air around Yun Qingzhou seemed to close in oppressively at that moment, causing him to swallow involuntarily.
Han Yujiu’s voice was low and hoarse, giving Yun Qingzhou a slight urge to run away. He said:
“Xiao Zhou, don’t make it hard for me, alright?”
Yun Qingzhou’s brow furrowed slightly. He felt a bit strange inside, yet his voice remained as calm and gentle as a spring breeze:
“Apologies, Layman. This poor monk is not the Xiao Zhou you speak of.”
The youth originally thought the man would let him go after hearing these words, but unexpectedly, the other person only seemed even more obstinate.
Hearing this, Han Yujiu sneered and grabbed his shoulders forcefully, pinching him hard enough to hurt.
The next instant, his collar was roughly torn open by the other man. Han Yujiu buried his face in the side of Yun Qingzhou’s neck, obsessively and lightly sniffing the scent on his body.
Astonishment flashed across the depths of Yun Qingzhou’s eyes. He hurriedly tried to push him away repeatedly, but the man remained completely unmoving, instead effortlessly catching his wrists and lifting them high above his head.
Han Yujiu seemed on the verge of exploding, his voice strained to the absolute limit of endurance as he spoke in a muffled tone:
“How could you not be?”
“Xiao Zhou, don’t hide from me, alright?”
“I’ve missed you so much I’m going crazy. Do you know that?”
“If it’s just a breezy little not you, I will never let you leave my side.”
As Han Yujiu spoke, he grew increasingly aggrieved, yet his lips didn’t forget to linger and kiss the youth’s collarbone.
“No, Big Brother, what on earth are you feeling aggrieved about? Shouldn’t the one feeling aggrieved right now be me?!”
Yun Qingzhou was on the verge of a breakdown. He tilted his head backward to dodge the other man’s kisses, but unfortunately, he was already cornered against the edge with nowhere left to run. He could only frown and endure the unbearable, skin-tingling itch.
Seeing that the male lead’s hands were wandering further and further down, Yun Qingzhou truly panicked and quickly said:
“Layman, you cannot do this!”
As those words fell, Han Yujiu actually lifted his head and asked:
“Why can’t I?”
“As a Buddhist cultivator, you surely have never tasted this ultimate joy of the mortal world. Allow me to instruct you today, how about that?”
With that, Han Yujiu lowered his head, his eyelids half-drooping, and kissed the youth’s lips.
Before Yun Qingzhou could refuse, his teeth were forcefully pried open. A slightly cool tongue slipped into his oral cavity, and he gradually lost his rhythm, completely at the mercy of the other’s control.
With crimson-red corners of his eyes and a lack of oxygen to his brain, he was only temporarily released by the other man, but what followed immediately after was the man’s heavy panting as he nipped at his earlobe and hands wandering wildly across his body.
Seeing that the situation was about to spiral completely out of control, Yun Qingzhou had a sudden flash of inspiration. He closed his eyes and began chanting the Heart Sutra.
Listening to the continuous, murmuring scripture recited by the person in his arms, the raging fires of desire in Han Yujiu vanished by more than half.
The man laughed out of exasperation. He pinched the Buddhist cultivator’s chin and said in a cold voice:
“That really is a fine way to kill the mood.”
“However, I will make you regret this, Xiao Zhou.”