Chapter 12: Teasing Again — “Praise me, and I’ll hold you a little longer”……
Hearing this, Lu Xunye felt around in his pocket, intending to pull out the key and stage a scene of having found it.
But the search came up empty.
He quickly fabricated an excuse and smiled at Shen Yunqian. “I don’t want to trouble you. How about we stop looking? It wasn’t anything important anyway.”
Shen Yunqian disagreed. He didn’t like owing people favors. “Since I promised to help you find it, I have to find it.”
“This…” Lu Xunye’s tone lacked confidence. “Are you trying to settle debts with me again?”
Having his intentions exposed, Shen Yunqian pursed his lips. Instead of answering the question directly, he turned around and walked toward the entrance of the residential complex.
“Hey!” Watching the retreating figure, Lu Xunye glanced at the bushes one last time, pondered for a moment, and finally chased after him. “Wait for me.”
At the corner, Shen Yunqian walked to the parasol tree where the car had been parked that day. Supporting himself against the trunk, he leaned on the tree and scanned the surroundings.
Aside from fallen leaves soaking in puddles and some broken twigs, there was nothing.
Lu Xunye stood to the side, pretending to search as well.
After a while, he walked over and said with regret, “Maybe the rain washed it away, or maybe I remembered wrong. Let’s go back. I’ll look for it again later.”
Saying this, he gestured for the other to return.
Shen Yunqian pressed his forehead against the tree trunk, panting silently, and shook his head slightly. “You go back first. I’m a little hot; I want to catch a breeze.”
Hot after just this little while? Lu Xunye leaned in close, bending down to meet his eyes. “Really?”
His voice carried a hint of a smile at the end. “Mr. Neighbor, your physical fitness isn’t great. Do you want me to take you exercising in the future?”
“No.” Shen Yunqian turned his head to the side.
Perhaps it was because they were back in a similar setting, but Lu Xunye inexplicably thought of how pitiful the young man had looked falling to the ground that day, and that lost, helpless look in his eyes.
He leaned in closer. “I’m serious. I think I’m pretty good at fighting. Can I be your bodyguard? As for the salary… whatever you want to give is fine.”
“I don’t need you.” Shen Yunqian twisted his face to the other side, burying his entire face against the tree bark. With one arm hugging the tree, he stared at the small path within the green belt, leaving Lu Xunye with only the back of his head.
In Lu Xunye’s eyes, this scene was weirdly cute, just like the chibi bear on the other’s profile picture.
The corners of his mouth curved up unconsciously, but the moment he saw the obvious gauze on the side of the other’s neck, the smile vanished instantly without a trace.
It seemed that indirect tactics wouldn’t work. Keeping in mind that the remaining time for the mission was running short…
He poked the fluffy back of the head facing him, choosing to be direct. “Are you hungry? I’m a bit hungry. Let’s grab lunch together, and then have dinner together later?”
At the mention of food, Shen Yunqian’s head moved, but he still didn’t turn around.
Lu Xunye continued to entice him. “They say food is iron and rice is steel; skip a meal and you’ll feel hungry and weak. Look, I didn’t eat breakfast either. Do me the honor?”
“It was you… who didn’t eat.” The voice was as quiet as a mosquito’s buzz, scattered by the wind as soon as it was spoken.
Lu Xunye couldn’t hear it clearly at all. “Didn’t we agree last time? We are friends, and friends should keep each other company. Are you really going to deny your friend this small request?”
playful urge rose in him to scare the other man. “You won’t make any friends acting like this.”
Hearing this, Shen Yunqian pinched his fingers together, his knuckles turning white from the force. “I don’t need friends.”
Lu Xunye was stunned, thinking he had heard wrong. “What?”
At this moment, Shen Yunqian turned around. Releasing his hands, his gaze met Lu Xunye’s. He enunciated every word clearly: “I don’t need them. Everything, anything, including you—I don’t need any of it. Do you understand?”
Since he was fifteen, no one had spoken to Lu Xunye with such harshness and severity.
He couldn’t figure it out—was this Protagonist Shou mentally unstable? What did he expect him to do, kneel and beg?
If the mission failed, it just meant deducting Life Points. Let them deduct it; he wasn’t going to serve this master anymore.
He stepped back one pace at a time, nodding. “Fine. You said it.”
After the man left, Shen Yunqian looked back at the increasingly blurry figure. He blinked, and warm water droplets smashed onto the back of his hand from above.
He was slightly surprised, tilting his head back to look at the tree canopy.
A raindrop fell from the tip of a leaf, smashing onto his face and falling together with the warm droplets.
He slid down against the tree trunk to sit, his hand slipping inside his pant leg to touch the hard, dry cast. His head slowly drooped down to rest on his knees.
The next second, his body suddenly felt light.
Shen Yunqian lifted his head in astonishment and opened his eyes, only to see the person who had long since left appearing right in front of him.
“Handsome, right?” Lu Xunye walked briskly into the wind.
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught the youth’s surprise. Lu Xunye hefted him up slightly with his arms. “Why didn’t you tell me your foot hurt?”
Because of his movement, Shen Yunqian was suspended in mid-air for a split second. His heart stopped abruptly, and he subconsciously clung to the shoulders of the person beneath him, resulting in being held even steadily and tighter.
Before he could recover from the shock of Lu Xunye coming back, Shen Yunqian was so startled that his lips parted slightly, yet not a single word could come out, let alone process what the other person was saying.
His mind was full of: Who am I? Where am I? Why did he come back? Am I dreaming?
After walking only a few steps, Lu Xunye suddenly bent his waist, making a gesture as if to let go.
A sense of weightlessness wrapped around Shen Yunqian’s entire body. Perhaps his body sensed the danger first; his other hand wrapped around Lu Xunye’s neck, uncontrolled by his brain.
“Like me holding you that much?” Lu Xunye teased close to his ear. “Why don’t you praise me, and I’ll hold you a little longer?”
Seeing the tips of Shen Yunqian’s ears turn red instantly, he pressed on, “Did you cry? Were you afraid I would leave?”
The exhaled breath sprayed against the ear, ticklish.
Shen Yunqian snapped back to reality, letting go as if holding a hot potato. He turned his head straight, reflexively wiping his face with the back of his hand, his voice devoid of any emotion. “You’re overthinking it. Put me down.”
Lu Xunye sighed helplessly and put him down.
Shen Yunqian was still in a state of shock and uncertainty. Just as he was about to stand up, the ground actually moved.
“Careful,” Lu Xunye called out hurriedly.
After steadying himself, Shen Yunqian saw that what was beneath him was a… pushcart painted sky blue?
“This is a cart I borrowed from the courier station. The surface area is quite large; pushing you won’t be a problem,” Lu Xunye explained.
“Although there’s plenty of space, it’s safer if you sit steadily.” Lu Xunye paused, then picked up his pace. “Otherwise, if you fall, I won’t be responsible.”
Is that really the issue here?
Shen Yunqian looked at the eyes of the sporadic pedestrians on the roadside turning toward them. It was a bit embarrassing. Just then, the wheels rolled over a stone, causing the cart to bump. Flustered, he grabbed onto the push handle in front of his eyes.
“Are you sitting tight? I’m going to speed up.”
The voice came from behind. Shen Yunqian quickly adjusted his sitting posture. After realizing he was actually listening to the other’s instructions, his face flushed red. “Let me down.”
Lu Xunye chuckled softly. “Can you walk by yourself if you get down?”
“Or…”
He deliberately paused for a few seconds. Shen Yunqian held his breath, only to hear the person behind him continue in an unserious tone, “Or do you want me to hold you, or piggyback you?”
Shen Yunqian: “…”
Lu Xunye pushed the cart directly out of the residential complex gates.
Shen Yunqian looked back. The complex entrance was getting farther and farther away in his eyes. The string in his heart tightened, and his voice took on a slight tremor. “Where are you taking me?”
“Relax, I won’t sell you,” Lu Xunye said.
As they walked, the number of pedestrians went from scarce to many.
They passed an empty plaza not far outside the complex. Amidst a crowd consisting mostly of middle-aged men and women, a handsome and dashing young man was pushing a blue cart meant for express packages.
Sitting on it was another handsome youth. Such an eye-catching yet bizarre scene was truly conspicuous… if one ignored the bruise on the pushing youth’s face.
Both of them were extremely good-looking. Some people thought they were influencers filming a skit; some whispered amongst themselves, while others took out their phones to record this spectacle.
Lu Xunye was completely at ease with this, as if he were born to be in the spotlight.
He smiled at the people around him who greeted him with good intentions, never stopping his pace.
Surrounded by the loud hawking of nearby vendors’ loudspeakers, he had to raise his voice, leaning slightly toward Shen Yunqian to say, “Look, they’re saying you’re good-looking. I think they’re right.”
How could Shen Yunqian dare to turn his head to answer him? The flashes nearby flickered incessantly. His heart beat like a drum, and he immediately lowered his head, covering his face with both hands.
Who knew which platform the video would be uploaded to? He didn’t want to accompany Lu Xunye in humiliating themselves at all.
Seeing his small movements, Lu Xunye smiled. He stopped the cart and shouted loudly, “Everyone, please stop filming! We aren’t influencers. My friend is shy; he’s injured, and I’m taking him to the hospital.”
An old man looked around and indeed saw no filming equipment, laughing heartily as he started teasing.
“Hey! Young man, if you and your friend became influencers, you’d definitely be a hit. You’re better looking than those stars and internet celebrities. Isn’t that right, everyone?!”
Some of the onlookers shouted, “Right!”
Lu Xunye replied politely, “Alright then, if I become an influencer, everyone has to come support me and send gifts.”
Another round of cheering: “For sure!”
Just as Lu Xunye was about to speak, he felt his pant leg being tugged.
He looked down to see Shen Yunqian covering his face with one hand, his head lowered like a groundhog trying to bury itself in the earth, while his other hand reached through the gap in the push handle to pull at his pants.
“I know.” Lu Xunye looked down and comforted him softly. Then he looked up and shouted, “Alright everyone, see you around.”
“Hey, handsome guy, there’s a traffic jam on the road to the hospital’s East Gate. Switch directions to be faster,” a girl called out to stop Lu Xunye.
The hospital was only a few hundred meters away. She had just come from there and knew about the traffic, so seeing Lu Xunye heading toward the congested area, she reminded him.
Lu Xunye looked back and saw the girl. She was very pretty, holding a bag of sugar-roasted chestnuts in her hand.
His gaze withdrew from the medicine bag hooked on the girl’s finger. “Thank you. I wish you a speedy recovery.”
Halfway there, Shen Yunqian insisted on getting off with a firm attitude. Lu Xunye couldn’t sway him, so he had to push the empty cart and walk beside him.
After parking the cart in a parking spot, Lu Xunye knew he was in the wrong, so he followed closely behind Shen Yunqian until they reached the entrance of the hospital lobby.
Shen Yunqian sighed, turning to stare silently at the person who kept his head down, avoiding his gaze.
Wasn’t he talking nonsense so boldly in front of all those people just now?
He calmed himself, said nothing, pushed open the door, and entered the hospital, leaving the person behind.
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