“Mom, don’t interrupt them, you’re making those young men feel awkward,” said a middle-aged woman to the patient on the neighbouring bed, her voice gentle.
When Yao Qi looked over, the woman nodded apologetically at him. He smiled back, indicating that it was all right.
“Can you tell me the rest after we go home?” He asked instead of requesting, implying that Liu Lin could refuse if he wanted to.
“You want to know?” The eyes that had dimmed suddenly lit up again, pride colouring his expression and making him look a little smug.
“Yes. If it’s about you, then I want to know about everything,” Yao Qi magnanimously smiled, not shying away from the topic in the slightest.
Shocked by these words, the old woman on the neighbouring bed cautiously peeked at them. Her daughter, on the other hand, had very good etiquette and didn’t show any particular reaction. When Yao Qi spoke, the people from the outermost bed were also talking amongst themselves. Because his voice wasn’t loud and there was a considerable distance between the beds, those people probably didn’t hear what he just said.
After observing the expressions of all the people in this ward, Liu Lin felt even more proud.
Sigh, why was his baby so likeable?
What made him happy wasn’t Yao Qi’s sappy words, but the fact that the man didn’t try to conceal anything even when there were other people inside the room. This proved that in Yao Qi’s heart, the man genuinely viewed him as someone important. It was different from the situation in the corridor earlier—he was the one who draped himself all over Yao Qi, and although his baby acquiesced, he didn’t really respond to him.
What happened just now would be enough to keep him happy for quite some time, Liu Lin thought.
“Alright, then I’ll tell you after we get back home,” just like that, the happy Liu Lin smugly agreed to him.
How silly.
Yao Qi also felt happy, internally thinking that Liu Lin was as silly as a husky. The one who managed to grab hold of him was Yao Qi, but had it been a scumbag who did, this guy would’ve been scammed to the point where not a single strand of his hair could remain intact.
‘This person appears to be a brainless and violent madman, but in fact, his mind should be very clear’—was the diagnosis Yao Qi had made about Liu Lin in the past, but he had seemingly forgotten all about it now.
The two of them continued talking for a while, but it didn’t last very long.
Yao Qi’s work and rest time had always been relatively regular, and tonight’s events had made him stay up later than his usual sleeping time. After some time, he simply fell asleep on Liu Lin’s lap while chatting with the man. Worried that he would catch a cold, Liu Lin took off his jacket and draped it over Yao Qi. Fortunately, the weather hadn’t gotten too cold at this time.
Afterwards, everyone in the ward fell asleep as well.
Liu Lin was bored out of his mind, so took out his phone and started playing games.
Not long after that, at about three in the morning, the girl finally woke up.
At first, she didn’t realise where she was. It took a moment for her to become fully awake, and when the girl discovered that she was lying in the hospital, she almost screamed and jumped out of the bed. But nothing of the sort happened in the end.
Because just as she was about to scream, she heard the low, cold, and extremely dangerous voice of a man telling her, “Quiet.”
The girl was so frightened she instantly swallowed the scream back into her stomach, obeying his order.
This man was none other than Liu Lin.
As the one who had almost killed her, he was the only person whose voice could deter the girl to this extent.
She lay down on the bed as still as a corpse, not daring to move.
But after telling her to be quiet, the man simply ignored her. She began to feel restless, and so, at last, very cautiously, she propped up her body to glance at Liu Lin.
Dressed only in a sleeveless shirt, Liu Lin continued playing with his phone, not even bothering to acknowledge the girl when she looked at him.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Then the girl saw the man lying on Liu Lin’s lap.
Ole Olc’r atlutr delnfgfv j ilaaif, j nfgs riluta wbnfwfca atja kbeivc’a tjnf yffc obecv bea lo la kjrc’a obg atf ulgi’r mbcrajca byrfgnjalbc. Vtf ibbxfv ja Tjb Hl, ktb kjr ygfjatlcu fnfcis, jcv mjwf ab atf mbcmierlbc atja Ole Olc’r ifur tjv wbra ilxfis jigfjvs ubcf cewy.
Pa mbeivc’a ufa jcs yfaafg atjc atlr.
Her eyes gleaming with glee, the little girl groped around her waist, hand reaching out to the place where she usually kept her knife—then she remembered that she had hidden it away before going to find them. Her smile completely disappeared in a split second.
She heard a blatantly mocking sneer coming from the man.
“Idiot.” Liu Lin gave her a disdainful gaze, his eyes belittling, his lips curved in a lopsided smirk. His whole body language was practically screaming that he was condescendingly looking down at her.
You’re the idiot, you’re a fucking idiot, your whole family are idiots!
Not daring to glare at him, the girl lowered her head and cursed him in her heart, her eyes full of malice.
“Scold me again and I’ll knock you back into the hospital when you’re healed. Wanna try?” snorted Liu Lin without even taking his eyes off his phone screen.
What the fuck??? The girl snapped up her head to look at him in surprise.
“I can guess what you’re thinking, so you’d better behave and stop thinking about all those small tricks.” Sure enough, the times had changed. The generations were different, and her experience wasn’t comparable to him—she was much greener than he had been at her age.
Liu Lin silently analysed in his mind.
After a while, the girl began to look pleased with herself as she quietly sat, pinching and rubbing the sheets with the hand that wasn’t connected to the infusion.
“My Xiao Qi sent you here—but you did it on purpose, right? You knew that Xiao Qi wouldn’t leave you be just like that.”
Liu Lin was annoyed to see the girl pretending to play with the sheets because she didn’t dare to ask him even though she was dying to. No matter what, she was still of the same kind as him, so he was disgusted to see her act so squeamish and cowardly. What a disgrace.
But at this juncture, Liu Lin’s train of thought drifted back to her decision to collapse in front of Yao Qi’s shop, which made him immediately scoff in anger.
The girl started shaking again.
Indeed, she had done it on purpose.
She knew she would really die if she didn’t receive any treatment this time.
She was betting on Yao Qi to send her to the hospital, with her chip being the fact that it was Liu Lin who left her in this state.
She had already planned it thoroughly, deliberately choosing the busiest time to collapse on the street. With so many people passing by, even if Yao Qi ignored her, there would definitely be another person who would take action.
In the worst case scenario, she would be sent to the hospital by the police.
But at least she could still survive.
In fact, the little girl was very lucky. If Liu Lin had already obtained his new ID card, then it was indeed the police who would be in charge of her now.
Yao Qi was not a stupidly naive person who would repay malice with kindness
But the little girl didn’t know about this.
All she knew was that Yao Qi still took care of her.
And thus, she thought, ‘as expected of the ‘ideal brother’ whom I’ve been wanting and persistently chasing for so long.’
The little girl sneakily peeked at Yao Qi who was lying on Liu Lin’s lap.
“He’s mine—he belongs to me, and only me. If you can’t understand my words, then there’s no more use for your ears, got it?” Liu Lin cocked up his eyebrow and raised his chin to stare down at her.
“…He’s yours… I got it… don’t cut my ears…” The girl finally opened her mouth. She was a little tongue tied, and her words were rather incoherent, but she still held the grudge in her heart.
On the inside, she felt hateful to the point her teeth were throbbing.
“You forgot what I told you before? I said you’re not allowed to follow us anymore.”
After a moment of silence, Liu Lin suddenly remembered this scruple—if it wasn’t for this brat, how could Yao Qi have given him the cold treatment?
Had Yao Qi not been sleeping on his lap, he swore that he would have wiped the floor with this brat.
That’s obviously not how it went!
The little girl glared at him, “What you said was ‘If you dare to target Yao Qi again, I’ll crush your skull to pieces’.”
He didn’t say anything about not following them.
And she didn’t follow anyone, did she? She just crashed in front of a flower shop.
Listening to her words, Liu Lin sneered and looked at her with a threatening smile.
“Heh, you mean to say that I was wrong?” At first his tone was flippant, sounding like a provocation, then he lowered his volume, spitting out a menacing command in a deep and sonorous voice, “Stop spouting nonsense.”
“I’m sorry, I was wrong—”
Intimidated, the girl immediately apologised regardless of whether or not it was her fault.
Under the circumstances that her opponent was way stronger, she should have the self awareness to submit when necessary.
“Get your face over here,” Liu Lin sniggered once again, lifting up his hand.
Tremblingly, the girl brought her face forward.
What happened next was as expected.
The man ruthlessly smacked down his palm across her cheek, the momentum sending her tilting sideways. When she turned back around, a trickle of blood seeped out of the corner of her mouth.
Late into the night, the sound of the slap rang inside the ward, rousing up all the people who were staying to keep watch over the patients. Yao Qi was also awakened, but his eyes were still very hazy, dazedly looking up at Liu Lin from his lap. He looked so piteous that Liu Lin almost got hard, but his arousal lost to a feeling of self blame over waking the man due to his momentary slip of anger.
“It’s okay, you continue to sleep,” Liu Lin stroked Yao Qi’s head, and then began to lightly pat his back, coaxing him back to sleep with a soft voice. Only after Yao Qi closed his eyes did Liu Lin raise his head to glance at the others who were woken up by him. When those people saw that whatever happened had nothing to do with them, they also went back to sleep.
He continued to leave comforting pats on Yao Qi’s back before looking back at the girl.
“Do you know why I hit you?” Liu Lin’s voice was close to a whisper.
“Yes,” The girl nodded.
By playing technicalities with his words, she was poking at Liu Lin’s dignity, because for people like them, language was a boundary. Both of them clearly understood the meaning of Liu Lin’s previous warning, but in order to save her life, she made use of the gap between his words to justify herself, which was equivalent to stepping on Liu Lin’s territory. In comparison to her mistake, getting hit by a single slap was actually a very benevolent punishment.
But of course, she fully believed that if it wasn’t for the man sleeping on his lap, Liu Lin’s retaliation wouldn’t have stopped at a mere slap, and her skull truly wouldn’t have escaped unscathed.
She silently contemplated that this current situation was really one of the best outcomes for her.
The only way it could be improved was if her ‘brother’ was awake.
“If you dare to appear in front of me after this, I’ll beat you until you wake up in the hospital again.” Liu Lin had his left eye closed and his head tilted, staring at her with his right eye.
“…” The girl pursed her lips, saying nothing.
To be honest, she didn’t want to give up on Yao Qi.
Yao Qi was her ‘ideal brother’. She had been obsessing over him for so long, and for such a long amount of time, it was this obsession that enabled her to survive and persist to this day, deeply taking its roots inside her bones. She didn’t want to give up, but she was extremely afraid of the man in front of her.
“Speak up.”
“I heard you.”
But that doesn’t mean I agree, the girl remarked in her mind, bowing down her head.
Liu Lin would never be fooled by her petty tricks. When he looked upon her again, it was with murderous intent in his eyes.
“Don’t keep thinking about doing stupid things, or else I’ll kill you.”
His barely audible voice pierced through the girl’s eardrums. Her body began to shake, her fists subsequently clenching, but even the pain of fingernails digging into her palms couldn’t pull back her fraying thoughts.
AAAHH!!!
You’re obviously the same kind as me, equally tainted, and equally unwanted, but why are you so much stronger than me?!
How can you find someone who loves you?!!
Why do you have a home?!!!
How can you live such a good life?!!!
Why, why, why—!!!!
You don’t want me to make trouble, right? You want to kick me while I’m down? But all I want is to go! against! you!!
Small Theatre
Xiao Qi: *sleepy-eyed* What’s wrong?
Ah-Lin: *staring at the sleepy Xiao Qi and wanting to kiss him, then feeling extremely sad because he can’t reach his lips with this current posture* It’s okay, you go to sleep
Little girl: Why can you live better than me? (ノ=Д=)ノ┻━┻ *going crazy*
Ah-Lin: Because I’m the one who gets [beeped] by Xiao Qi~♥️ *smug*
Little girl: …Like hell it is! It’s obviously because this is a danmei novel!
Ah-Lin: Since you already knew, then why do you still ask?
Little girl: *choking* My chest feels so tight, I don’t think I can breathe anymore.
Ahhhhh, thanks for the chapter. I wonder what this girl gonna do, and xiao qi should tell her to fuck off next time 😆
Thanks for reading! Next chapter we’ll get to know about her past, but it’ll be quite a hard read 🥲
Thank You for the new chapter ♡⃛ヾ(๑❛ ▿ ◠๑ )
Thank you for reading 😊💝
I feel like she’s going to cause some problems that will cause Ah Lin’s superiors or something to come and take him away, and then Xiao Qi will get her help to find Ah Yi or know more about him so he can bring him back.
That’s an interesting conjecture 😆 we’ll see if it’s true later on hehehe thank you for reading 😊
This bitch better die😤