Chapter 34: A Natural Progression
Yu Sheng was speechless.
“So, what are you going to do now?”
He couldn’t stay alone for the rest of his life, could he?
How pitiful would that be?
“Did he ask you to come and question me like this?”
The “he” Yu Mian spoke of was none other than his own brother, Yu Lin.
He and Yu Lin were twins.
However, from the moment he was born, Yu Lin had always been much frailer than Yu Mian.
Because of this, the Fish King and his wife paid more attention to their eldest son, Yu Lin.
As for Yu Mian, because he had been healthy since childhood, he was often neglected by his parents.
This quiet balance was shattered the day the two brothers fell in love with the same woman, a girl named Qingyue.
It was because of this woman that Yu Mian, who was never meant to be part of the marriage selection, chose to leave Dongting Lake and agree to this unequal alliance with the Phoenix Clan.
“Of course not!”
Yu Sheng vehemently denied it. “Brother Yu Lin is not that kind of person.”
“Although he and Sister Qingyue feel terrible about what happened, he never had any intention of doing this.”
“I was worried about you, so I came to ask on my own accord.”
From the bottom of his heart, he truly didn’t want to see the brothers, Yu Mian and Yu Lin, turn against each other.
He wanted them to reconcile.
But right now, both of them were still furious.
He wasn’t so tactless as to deliberately bring up Yu Lin in front of Yu Mian and upset him.
“Brother Mian, can you please stop being angry with me?” Yu Sheng finally asked after a few moments of thought.
He knew he was wrong about what happened with Brother Yu Lin and Sister Qingyue.
He shouldn’t have hidden it from Yu Mian.
But wasn’t there a saying? “You can’t force love.”
Although Yu Mian had met Sister Qingyue first, love doesn’t operate on a first-come, first-served basis.
Everything had simply been a natural progression.
In his eyes, Brother Yu Lin and Sister Qingyue were the ones who were truly in love.
Yu Mian’s feelings were more about possession; that wasn’t love.
A cold light flickered in Yu Mian’s eyes.
“You came all this way to the Phoenix Clan just to ask for my forgiveness?”
He raised an eyebrow, passed a cup of tea to Yu Sheng, and continued nonchalantly:
“I forgive you.”
His voice carried an ethereal, hollow quality.
“But let’s not see each other again.”
The hand Yu Sheng used to take the teacup froze.
Although he had expected Yu Mian to tell him to stay away, hearing the words come from his mouth still sent a pang of sorrow through his heart.
“Alright.”
He fought back the sadness and bitterness in his heart, tilted his head up, and gave Yu Mian a smile that looked worse than crying.
Yu Mian paid him no mind. From the day Yu Sheng had decided to hide the truth about Yu Lin and Qingyue from him, the friendship between them had ceased to exist.
He was simply returning things to how they were at the beginning.
At that same time, on the back mountain wreathed in mist and clouds, the arrival of spring had brought a lush greenery, adding much beauty to the Phoenix Clan’s domain.
Layer upon layer of mountain peaks and ancient trees peeked their verdant heads through the shroud of clouds.
The view was vast and breathtaking.
At that moment, in the waters of a mountain hot spring, a pair of fair, delicate arms suddenly rose from the roiling water, clinging to a man’s sturdy ones.
Li Xuanyue was panting heavily. She was about to lose her mind.
Didn’t this Consort Jun say he was bringing her to the hot spring to relieve her fatigue?
Who would have thought that as they soaked, he would start again?
Did this beast even see her as a person?
“Don’t sleep,” the man coaxed, his voice a seductive whisper. His long fingers brushed across her exquisite face.
He could see her exhaustion, but far from holding back, he held her even tighter.
Startled, Li Xuanyue’s eyes snapped open again.
She suspected this beast was doing it on purpose.
Utterly exasperated, she finally lowered her head and bit down hard on his neck.
“Ngh…”
The man’s eyes narrowed as he let out a muffled groan.
As Li Xuanyue gnawed on his neck, his bobbing Adam’s apple showed no signs of surrender. In fact, the sensation seemed to drive him into an even greater frenzy.
His massive serpent tail thrashed in the hot spring, sending water splashing everywhere.
The vibrations shook the nearby peach trees, causing blossoms to rain down into the spring water.
A quarter of an hour later, Jun He finally realized that the woman in his arms had already passed out.
With his slender fingers, he gently lifted the strands of hair plastered to her face by the water and tucked them to one side.
The exquisite, peach-blossom-like face of the woman in his arms was revealed.
She looked incredibly alluring.
The man’s Adam’s apple bobbed once, but he quickly shut his eyes.
Only after the fire within him gradually subsided did he lift her from the hot spring and begin carrying her down the mountain toward Junhe Hall.
“Princess, look! Isn’t that the First Princess and Consort Jun?”
Meanwhile, Li Qinghe, frustrated by the repeated failure of her plans and recent betrayals, had taken her attendant Ruyue’s well-meaning advice to take a walk on the back mountain.
She never expected that as they passed the peach grove, they would witness the scene of Jun He carrying Li Xuanyue down from the hot spring.
Her cold eyes looked as if they had been dipped in poison, dark and deep.
“She really is lucky to be alive!”
To survive all of that and not die!
Li Qinghe couldn’t tell if it was jealousy or resentment she was feeling.
In short, seeing Li Xuanyue so safe and sound made her want to rush forward, eat her flesh, and drink her blood.
Seeing the ferocious, twisted expression on Li Qinghe’s face, Ruyue asked cautiously, “Princess, should we go and greet them?”
Although Consort Jun was still far away, he was striding purposefully, and they would cross paths soon.
Rather than just standing here, Ruyue felt it was better to keep moving forward.
Li Qinghe frowned and shot Ruyue a deep look.
The meaning was clear: she was reprimanding her for speaking out of turn.
Ruyue was so frightened she immediately lowered her head.
The Li Qinghe of today was not the same as before.
Especially after the recent string of failed plans, she had lost all her former calm and composure.
Instead, she had become unusually manic and cold.
It made Ruyue no longer dare to speak carelessly in front of her as she once had.
However, in the short time the mistress and servant were speaking, Jun He had already arrived before them, still carrying Li Xuanyue.
He didn’t seem surprised to see them at all; in fact, his expression was rather cool.
“Princess Qinghe.”
Jun He gave a slight nod to Li Qinghe while holding the unconscious Li Xuanyue, then prepared to walk past.
But Li Qinghe had no intention of letting him go so easily. She stepped forward, craning her neck to look at the woman in his arms, and asked a question to which she already knew the answer:
“Is my sister asleep?”
Although Li Xuanyue’s face was flushed a rosy pink, the exhaustion etched between her brows was impossible to hide.
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