Chapter 49: Technique

The moment Yu Xi made the discovery, it was as if a rabbit had realized a natural predator was crouching right behind it. His fur practically stood on end, and he instantly pushed Lin Shuhuai away with great force.

Lin Shuhuai was caught off guard. His back hit the marble sink countertop, causing him to let out a muffled groan.

Yu Xi instinctively wanted to step forward out of concern, but he quickly stopped himself.

“Xiao Xi.” Lin Shuhuai didn’t blame him, only asking with a gaze full of deep concern, looking exactly like the gentle older brother Yu Xi had always known. “What’s wrong?”

Yu Xi hung his head in silence, biting his lip lightly. His hands clutched the sleeves of his oversized sweater, which covered half his fingertips, and his shoulders shrank in slightly, making his exposed collarbones look exceptionally sharp.

Every time Lin Shuhuai took a small step forward, Yu Xi would take a large step back as if startled.

Lin Shuhuai’s expression froze for a moment, and then he smiled knowingly. “You caught me again.”

Yu Xi’s fingertips trembled, and he averted his eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, I don’t understand…”

“You discovered that I was using my illness as an excuse to get close to you,” Lin Shuhuai said bluntly.

Yu Xi hadn’t expected him to tear away his own disguise, and his pupils shrank.

Immediately after, Lin Shuhuai said something even more unexpected: “That night, you were actually awake too, weren’t you, Xiao Xi?”

“…” This time, Yu Xi remained silent, completely speechless from sheer shock.

Lin Shuhuai maintained a gentle smile. “I actually did it on purpose. I knew you were awake, but I still kissed you.”

The look in Yu Xi’s eyes as he stared at Lin Shuhuai was full of astonishment and bewilderment. He felt as though something inside his heart had shattered once again, causing his heart rate to spiral out of control in a daze of confusion.

Before he could ask why, Lin Shuhuai beat him to it. “Xingkuo was the first to break the ‘rules,’ so the relationships among the few of us are destined to undergo a massive shift.

“This is a tacit competition. Winning or losing originally made no difference to me—even when it came to the piano—but when it involves you, I finally realized that I have a competitive drive after all.”

Lin Shuhuai walked closer and gently grabbed Yu Xi’s wrist.

“Xiao Xi, all the decision-making power is in your hands. Who do you want to win?”

“I…” Yu Xi bit his lip. “I don’t want to choose anyone.”

With that, he violently wrenched his wrist back and strode out.

Flustered, he lost his bearings upon exiting the restroom and took a wrong turn down the other side of the corridor, bumping right into a body at the corner.

The person seemed to have noticed him walking over long ago and was waiting on purpose. Before Yu Xi could bounce back from the impact, the person quickly wrapped an arm around his waist, pinning him against his own chest.

Yu Xi’s head spun slightly from the collision. Before he could even clearly see the person’s face, he first caught the familiar scent of mint and wood.

The next second, a warm palm smoothed down the messy strands of hair near his ear.

“What were you just doing? You look so panicked.”

The moment Yu Xi recognized Gu Chuanzhou, his already unsteady heart rate grew even wilder. Beads of sweat formed on the tip of his nose, and his breathing became shallow and rapid as he hurriedly tried to pull away the hand on his waist. “N-nothing…”

Gu Chuanzhou’s arm was like cast iron, firm and unyielding. His tone was calm as he asked, “Is that so? You didn’t say anything to Lin Shuhuai?”

Yu Xi looked up in surprise. “You…”

“Maybe others can’t tell, but Xixi,” Gu Chuanzhou’s gaze deepened, his pupils reflecting Yu Xi’s beautiful yet panicked face, “I know you very well. Whenever you have a little secret, I can always tell.”

A chill ran down Yu Xi’s spine, and he couldn’t stop shivering. He didn’t dare to meet Gu Chuanzhou’s eyes, feeling as though he could hide nothing under the other man’s scrutiny—a sense of shame as if all his clothes had been stripped away.

The moment he lowered his head, Gu Chuanzhou cradled his jaw. The pressure wasn’t heavy, but his thumb pressed against the corner of Yu Xi’s lips, rubbing back and forth. The calluses on his thumb made the skin of Yu Xi’s lips feel itchy and hot.

“Your mouth is very red.” Gu Chuanzhou’s tone was normal, but his eyes were dark and cold. “Did he kiss you?”

“No!” Yu Xi denied in a raised voice. “He didn’t kiss my mouth, I bit it myself.”

Gu Chuanzhou’s voice suddenly turned deep. “In other words, he has kissed you somewhere else.”

Yu Xi trembled. In his frustration, he habitually wanted to bite his lip again, but forgot that Gu Chuanzhou’s finger was still pressing down on it. His pearly teeth accidentally nipped it, and he immediately snapped back like a startled clam, pushing Gu Chuanzhou’s hand away.

“Where was it?” Gu Chuanzhou asked.

Yu Xi remained silent, the tips of his ears gradually turning completely red. He didn’t want to answer, nor did he dare to.

How was he supposed to say that Lin Shuhuai had kissed him in many places besides his lips?

Since he wasn’t speaking, Gu Chuanzhou just kept staring at him, never loosening the arm trapping his waist.

No matter how hard Yu Xi struggled, he couldn’t break free. His cheeks flushed crimson with anxious annoyance, and a bit of a temper was provoked out of him. Panting, he glared back with two shimmering, watery eyes. “Why are you so annoying? Do you absolutely have to have an answer?”

“I am jealous,” Gu Chuanzhou said, counting his grievances one by one with an air of resentment. “From childhood until now, you have always favored them more. You shared a bed with Zhang Xingkuo, you constantly took care of Meng Shen, and you even allowed Lin Shuhuai to kiss you…”

“I didn’t allow it! He sneaked it!” Yu Xi interrupted.

“Is that so?” Gu Chuanzhou said. “But you’re still closer to them than to me. Even with the grass-woven grasshoppers, you gave them to the others, and even Meng Liang got one…”

“Y-you were clearly the one who didn’t want it yourself, you know that!” Yu Xi hadn’t expected Gu Chuanzhou to hold a grudge over this until now. To make up for it back then, he had secretly given Gu Chuanzhou grass-woven items in private… “I don’t want to talk to you anymore, let me go quickly—”

He tried to break away, but Gu Chuanzhou didn’t let go at all, only causing himself to break out into a sweat.

Resting in Gu Chuanzhou’s arms to catch his breath, Yu Xi finished his half-time break and tried pushing against Gu Chuanzhou’s chest with his fingers again. He still couldn’t budge him.

He roughly understood what Gu Chuanzhou wanted to extract from him, but he didn’t want to give it to him. Once certain things started, they would only spiral further out of control.

In his utter helplessness, a sudden stroke of inspiration brought back a phrase Xiao Yang had once said.

—“With someone like you, even if you string them along for a lifetime without ever giving a response, it wouldn’t be a problem at all. Just a casual smile from you and they’ll lose their minds; who would have the heart to force you?”

Would it really work? Yu Xi only knew that Zhang Xingkuo was very easy to coax, but he wasn’t too sure about Gu Chuanzhou.

After hesitating for a long time. Yu Xi’s dark eyes darted around. He took a deep breath, pursed his tense lips, and then tilted his face up. He lifted his long eyelashes, and the corners of his mouth and eyes curved together, revealing a sweet and soft smile.

“I didn’t let Brother Shuhuai kiss me on purpose, and I don’t favor anyone. In my heart, every single one of you is very important, truly. It makes me feel really bad when you question me like this. Don’t make things difficult for me anymore, okay?”

After speaking, Yu Xi kept staring at Gu Chuanzhou. Seeing that he didn’t react at all, his mood plummeted to rock bottom.

Was he too stiff and unnatural?

Why was it completely useless…

Just as Yu Xi lowered his head in awkwardness, he suddenly heard a sentence from above: “Okay.”

Immediately after, the arm around his waist loosened.

Yu Xi froze, raising his head to look at Gu Chuanzhou again.

The aggressive, pressuring aura around Gu Chuanzhou had completely vanished, making him look like a lion whose fur had been smoothed down. He apologized to him in a humble, lowered voice, “I’m sorry, Xixi. I just acted on impulse out of jealousy, I didn’t mean to make things difficult for you.”

Once Yu Xi snapped out of it, he pondered for a moment and tentatively continued using a soft tone, “Then you are not allowed to fuss over this matter anymore, otherwise you are a puppy.”

Gu Chuanzhou nodded. “Okay, I won’t.”

“Then… then let’s go back.”

Just like that, Yu Xi resolved the dilemma. He let out a secret sigh of relief as he turned around.

But before he could even take a single step, he froze again due to the tall figure standing at the end of the corridor.

Meng Shen stood there without making a sound. There was no telling how long he had been watching or how long he had been listening.

“Xiao Xi, who are you going to choose?”

Having his cheek pinched, Yu Xi snapped out of his daze sluggishly and asked blankly, “What?”

“Asking who you want to take you home,” Sheng Yunjuan repeated.

“Oh…” Yu Xi realized that everyone had started arguing over this matter again.

Helplessly, he had actually grown somewhat used to it. He no longer felt distressed because of it and directly gave his answer.

“I’ll take your and Xiao Shu’s car.”

Sheng Yunjuan let out a cheer, hugging Yu Xi to pull him toward the car.

However, a hand cut across and grabbed Yu Xi’s arm.

“Your car still needs to carry Meng Shen. Counting the driver, that’s already five people. What if it crowds him? You’d have to take a detour too. It’s best if Xiao Xi takes my car. I’ve driven him back so many times, he’s long since used to it, it’ll be more comfortable,” Zhang Xingkuo said.

Lin Shuhuai smiled from the side. “Actually, Xiao Xi has ridden in my car plenty of times too, and he was always in a pretty good state.”

Zhang Xingkuo raised an eyebrow and sneered, “Ridden plenty of times? How come I don’t remember?”

Lin Shuhuai: “Xiao Xi and I have met up in private quite a few times, it’s just that you guys didn’t know about it.”

Zhang Xingkuo’s face instantly turned ashen.

At this time, Gu Chuanzhou’s voice came from another direction: “Xixi, you only ate half of the dried fruits I bought for you on the way here.”

Looking at the three men who refused to back down, the corner of Sheng Yunjuan’s mouth twitched violently. “You guys—”

Before she could curse them out, her hand was lightly patted twice by Yu Xi.

Yu Xi curled his lips into a soft smile and said gently, “It’s very late now, I want to go home early to sleep. Let’s not argue anymore, okay?”

After watching the midnight fireworks, Yu Xi was indeed truly sleepy. He had yawned several times already. His long eyelashes drooped listlessly, and the corners of his eyes had been rubbed red. His speech carried a slightly raspy, nasal quality from his extreme exhaustion, yet he still forced himself to muster up the energy to deal with everyone. This state made it impossible for anyone to have the heart to make things difficult for him again.

After successfully getting everyone to quiet down, Yu Xi sat into the back seat and waved at the young man standing quietly outside. “Ah Shen, come over quickly.”

Meng Shen walked closer but stopped before the car door, looking at Zhang Xingkuo, who was standing there like a door guardian.

Yu Xi leaned out slightly, smiling at Zhang Xingkuo. “Xingxing, you’re blocking him.”

“Oh, right…” Zhang Xingkuo quickly stepped aside.

It wasn’t until Meng Shen and the two Sheng sisters had all gotten into the car, the door was closed, and the vehicle had driven a certain distance away that Zhang Xingkuo suddenly woke up as if from a dream, slapping his own head.

“Damn, I wasn’t even blocking the car door. There was such a huge space, yet he still couldn’t get in? Was he looking for trouble on purpose?”

Whether it was on purpose or not, there was no one left to settle the score with.

At this moment, Meng Shen was sitting next to Yu Xi.

Because of his large build, he usually sat alone in the passenger seat, but since Yu Xi had waved at him, he had climbed into the narrowest middle position of the back seat, consciously pulling in his limbs so as not to crowd the person beside him.

Sheng Yunjuan originally wanted to talk to Yu Xi, but with such a big guy like Meng Shen separating them, even trying to look at him was a struggle. Her neck felt strained from stretching, so she lost interest and leaned back to doze off.

Meanwhile, Yu Xi, who was even sleepier, didn’t sleep but was observing Meng Shen instead.

Among the four men, Meng Shen was the one who gave him the least worry.

Once he realized that Yu Xi didn’t want to bring things to light, he never again committed any overstepping behavior like he did at the very beginning. Although he was a bit more clingy than before, he always stayed within the boundaries of the rules.

If Yu Xi didn’t want it, he wouldn’t pester him at all. He would only be like he was during childhood—shrinking into a corner, or standing behind him, waiting for Yu Xi to turn his head and look over, ready to catch his hand at any moment.

Even if he saw Yu Xi being repeatedly intimate with other people, he would choose to suppress all his emotions or thoughts deep in his heart and digest them alone, absolutely refusing to cause Yu Xi any distress.

Meng Shen was the only one among them who didn’t need to be coaxed and wouldn’t cause Yu Xi any grief.

Yet it was precisely this kind of Meng Shen that made Yu Xi’s heart soften more easily.

After returning to the dining room from the restroom, Yu Xi had been paying attention to Meng Shen’s condition. Meng Shen didn’t ask anything and didn’t say anything, looking as if nothing had happened at all. But Yu Xi knew him well; he could tell that Meng Shen’s calmness and silence were somewhat different from usual, and he could feel that his mood was sinking.

Yu Xi could certainly let this matter pass without mentioning a single word, but…

“Ah Shen.” Yu Xi called out to Meng Shen in a very, very small voice. Once Meng Shen turned his head over, Yu Xi extended an index finger and lightly stroked the back of Meng Shen’s hand twice.

The ticklish sensation traveled all the way to the depths of his heart. Meng Shen’s quiet dark eyes were like a peaceful deep well broken by a fallen stone, producing ripples that surged back and forth, gradually escalating into tempestuous waves.

Meanwhile, Yu Xi, who had caused a chaotic upheaval in someone’s heart with just a tiny gesture, remained completely unaware of his own effect. He followed up softly, saying, “Don’t be unhappy.”

It took a long time before Yu Xi heard Meng Shen’s response.

“…Mm.”

There were no other words, but Yu Xi could already vaguely feel a change in the aura Meng Shen was radiating. It was no longer gloomy and oppressive; it had taken a turn for the better.

Yu Xi couldn’t help but secretly curl up the corners of his mouth.

It turned out everyone was equally easy to coax.

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