SMMW | Chapter 20

Before long, several more men entered the already crowded room. They wore gauzy robes, their hair loose over their shoulders, their brows and eyes full of flirtation.

Mu Ziyi was clutching his stomach off to the side, laughing so hard that he could barely speak clearly, yet he was still stirring up trouble. “Quick, quick! Hahahahaha, hurry and sit together.”

The men naturally obeyed. Calling out “gege,” they swarmed forward. Two gathered around Yuan Hao, and two gathered around Wen Qing.

Yuan Hao was extremely resistant. But the more he resisted, the more amusing the men found it, and the more they insisted on teasing him.

And Wen Qing? That “fierce” outfit had gone to waste. The moment the men came closer, they could tell he was soft-hearted and easy to talk to. One bolder man directly grabbed his hand and pressed it against his own bare chest, sliding it around.

Wen Qing was so frightened that he went stiff. He could not pull his hand back either, and only sat there dumbly on the stool.

People of the pleasure quarters liked this kind of innocent little novice best. Seeing his reaction, the man pushed his luck further, following that hand upward, his fingers slipping along the sleeve opening and into the clothes…

“Move aside!!!”

The man staggered to the side after being shoved away.

The next second, Wen Qing was hauled up. Pulled by the back of his collar, he stumbled to his feet behind someone, and before his eyes was a broad, straight back.

“Go away! Did you hear me? Don’t come over.” With one hand, Yuan Hao waved the men back to stop them from approaching, while with the other, he half-guarded Wen Qing behind him.

“Aiya~ gege is so no fun~”

“We just wanted to get a little closer to you~”

“I can dance for you, sir. One dance, one piece off~”

The men gathered in groups, refusing to let up, still speaking in teasing, explicit tones.

“Mu Ziyi!” Yuan Hao glared at the culprit and shouted angrily.

“Cough, cough.” Mu Ziyi had laughed so hard that he nearly choked. Wiping away the tears he had laughed out, he said unconcernedly, “It was just a joke. I just wanted to test you two.”

“Test what?!”

“To see whether the two of you are a pair. That’s what people outside are all saying, hahaha…”

“What people outside?”

“You don’t know? It’s all being passed around. They’re saying that Yuan-juren, who placed first twice in a row, and his fellow townsman Wen-juren are lovers, and that the two of you are even living together… Aren’t you living together?”

“We are fellow townsmen, that’s true. Wen Qing’s grandfather just happens to have a home in the capital, so I’m only staying there for a while. There’s nothing else at all.”

“Ah?” Mu Ziyi looked a little disappointed. “Really?”

Yuan Hao stood straight, and his words were hard and firm. “Really. There’s no other messy relationship, and I don’t like men. My brother is the same.”

From behind, he pulled Wen Qing out and nudged his shoulder, signaling for him to hurry up and state his position too.

Wen Qing, however, was in a dazed state. In his mind, the two phrases “there’s no other messy relationship” and “I don’t like men” kept echoing over and over. The tender sprout of feeling had only just broken through the soil, and it was already being trampled flat by a single footstep. His heart hurt so badly he could barely breathe, and his whole body fell into the numbness of self-protection.

Actually, he had never harbored any extravagant hope that Yuan Hao might just happen to like him too, or that the two of them would grow old together. But after all they had been through together, he had still kept one sliver of delusion. He had deceived himself into thinking that as long as he never said it aloud, there would still be a tiny possibility. Now, all of it had been crushed out.

Seeing Wen Qing in that state, Yuan Hao grew even angrier and sternly scolded Mu Ziyi. “What kind of rotten thing did you do? You called in so many people with no manners. Wen Qing is scared silly now!”

Mu Ziyi regretted it a little too. “I only wanted to fool around for a bit. I didn’t think that much.”

Yuan Hao continued glaring at him. Mu Ziyi could not withstand it and drooped his head, apologizing listlessly. Naturally, there was no way they could continue having fun. Less than a quarter of an hour later, the three of them all came out of there looking dispirited.

“You’ve stirred up enough trouble. Don’t come to this kind of place again in the future. After you go home, study properly.” Yuan Hao admonished Mu Ziyi just like a real older brother would.

Mu Ziyi obediently nodded. Then he looked at Wen Qing, who still seemed utterly without spirit, and asked guiltily, “Brother Wen, are you all right?”

“He was just frightened. He’ll go home and rest for a couple of days and see. If he doesn’t get better, I’ll make you pay compensation.” Yuan Hao comforted him while also scolding.

And so the three parted ways there, with no more to say.

As for Wen Qing, ever since he realized his feelings for Yuan Hao, he had not even had time to think about how much of those feelings belonged to the future before they were directly sentenced to death. Naturally, his spirits were poor.

He drifted about in a haze, muddle-headed and absent-minded, feeling as if he had no strength to do anything.

When his grandparents came to see him, he secretly hated himself for being so useless. His mother was still waiting for him to bring her back. His grandparents still needed to be supported. The family business still needed watching over. How had he come to feel so disheartened?

But when Yuan Hao came to see him, it was another frame of mind entirely. He did not want to see Yuan Hao. Seeing him only made him sad. He even hated him a little, hated how unrestrained his actions had been, making him give rise to such foolish longing.

Yet when Yuan Hao really came, Wen Qing could not bear to drive him out, because he had realized one plain fact, they did not have much time left together.

Whether Yuan Hao relied on true talent or on magic, he would definitely earn a rank. At that point, with all the glorious stories of high office and generous salary, of bridegrooms being seized beneath the榜单, of talented men and beautiful women, he would soon have his own residence, his own wife, his own children.

For the sake of their old friendship, perhaps they might occasionally meet once in a while, but that would be all. Their intersections would become fewer and fewer, shallower and shallower. This Yuan Hao who was now caring so much about him, he would never see him again.

“Still feeling bad?” Yuan Hao asked softly. He was wearing a dirty escort outfit, clearly having just come back from the escort agency. He had not even changed clothes before coming to see him.

Wen Qing nodded. He only felt his body was heavy, and he could not speak.

“The medicine is still very hot, so you can leave it for a bit first. Then… why don’t you sleep for a while?”

Wen Qing was like a drunkard greedy for one more cup. Being sick only made him even less self-controlled. Willfully, he shook his head and refused to sleep. He only looked at Yuan Hao without saying a word.

They looked at each other like that for quite a while. Wen Qing recovered a little of his senses and remembered the things he had always wanted to say but had never found a chance to say.

“Yuan Hao.”

“Mm?”

“There are many strange and extraordinary people in the capital. Your learning is already good enough. You can place highly on your own. When you get into the exam hall… don’t use magic.”

After hearing this, Yuan Hao had no reaction at all. He was completely calm.

“I’ve known for a long time already that you’re a monster.”

Yuan Hao still had no reaction. He even reached out and poked Wen Qing’s face with a finger.

Wen Qing slapped his hand away and said angrily, “Stop playing dumb. Did you hear what I said or not?!”

Yuan Hao looked around left and right, seeming rather bored, as though he really had not heard anything.

Could it be… he really could not hear?

Wen Qing grabbed Yuan Hao by the shoulders and forced him to look at him, shouting loudly, “I said, I know you’re a monster!”

Yuan Hao poked Wen Qing’s cheek a second time.

Wen Qing’s hands trembled slightly. He let go of Yuan Hao and looked at him in disbelief.

He really can’t hear. As long as I expose him, he can’t hear it. Last time was the same. He wasn’t pretending to be stupid, he truly couldn’t hear it. And also, also…

Wen Qing tried hard to suppress the trembling in his voice. Even though he knew this sentence too might not be heard, he still said it. “Yuan Hao, change your clothes. This escort outfit looks very dirty.”

Wen Qing clenched his fists, waiting for Yuan Hao’s reaction.

This time, Yuan Hao had none of that earlier strangeness. Instead, he gave a completely normal answer. “Okay.”

Just as Wen Qing had expected, Yuan Hao immediately began taking off his clothes. Then, from who knew where, he produced a patched blue robe and changed into it. It happened very quickly, in the blink of an eye.

More importantly, after he changed, the original escort outfit had vanished without a trace.

Wen Qing looked around, front and back and all over, but could not find it anywhere. Yuan Hao had not left the room, so where could the clothes have gone?

“Where are the clothes you took off? Why did they disappear!?”

Yuan Hao did not answer. He could not hear him again.

Wen Qing felt as if he had fallen into an ice cellar. He called for a pageboy. This was a pageboy who had grown up together with him, a household-born servant whose family had served the Wen household for three generations and had signed lifetime indenture contracts.

“Young Master, you called for me.”

“I’ll ask you something. Before this, did you ever see Yuan-juren changing clothes in the courtyard?”

“Th-this… no, I haven’t.”

“All right. Just stand here and keep your eyes on Yuan-juren.”

Wen Qing pounded the bed hard, steadying his breathing, then said to Yuan Hao, “This one doesn’t look good. Change into another one.”

“Ah? Don’t fuss around anymore.”

“No! Change into another one.”

“…All right.”

Yuan Hao agreed rather helplessly. He swiftly took off the blue robe he was wearing, pulled out a dark green outfit from who knew where, and changed into it in the blink of an eye. Just like the escort outfit, the blue robe vanished too.

Wen Qing immediately turned back to look at the pageboy. The pageboy looked back at him with an entirely ordinary expression and had no reaction at all.

“You saw it, didn’t you?”

“Saw what, Young Master?”

“Yuan Hao just changed clothes right here. You saw it, didn’t you?”

“Young Master, y-you’re confused from illness. Yuan-juren was just sitting there properly. He never changed clothes.”

How unbelievable.

The shock was too great. Wen Qing laughed once. “What color was Yuan-juren wearing at the very beginning?”

“Dark green. Old Madam even had that outfit made for him.”

“Dark green… hahaha… dark green.”

“Young Master, what’s wrong? Why are you crying for no reason?” As he spoke, the pageboy started to come closer.

“Get out. Get out!”

“Young Master…”

“I said get out!”

The pageboy did not dare disobey. He hesitated as if he wanted to speak, but in the end he still left.

Wen Qing laughed and cried at once. Looking at Yuan Hao too only made him feel unbearably obstructed, so he started pushing at him too, telling him to get out as well. “You get out too, you deaf, stinking monster. Get out!”

Wen Qing was sick, while Yuan Hao had been training in martial arts all this time. He could not push him at all. Yuan Hao only showed a trace of surprise and sat steadily on the bed without moving. Seeing that only made Wen Qing angrier.

“You still can’t hear, right? Nobody else can tell. I’m the only one who knows, but I can’t say it aloud. I could say a hundred times, ten thousand times, that you’re a monster, and it would still be useless. No one can hear it, not even you. Then tell me, the strange one, is it you, or is it me?”

Wen Qing sat weakly on the bed. After venting for a while, his expression wilted, but tears still flowed endlessly from his eyes down to his chin, gathering into a large drop before falling and soaking into the quilt.

“Sometimes, I really feel that all of this is fake. Time passes so quickly. I open my eyes, and I’m already twenty years old. Studying, eating, studying, sleeping, every day exactly the same. The county exam, the prefectural exam, the academy exam, the provincial exam, the metropolitan exam, the palace exam. Becoming an official. Marrying. Having children. Supporting my mother. Everything is predictable. So if I open my eyes again, will I already be sixty?”

A rough, broad palm, with no sense of timing at all, interrupted his outpouring and wiped the tears from half his face.

It was Yuan Hao.

Looking at those calm, unmoving eyes, Wen Qing knew at once that none of his crazy words had been heard. Sometimes Yuan Hao was like this, his gaze too calm, with no emotion in it at all, like a newborn baby, making one wonder whether there was truly any soul inside that skin.

A second hand came up, and the tears on the other half of his face were wiped away too.

“Stinking monster.” Wen Qing cursed him, yet he still cried without pause.

Yuan Hao still looked as if he had not heard a thing, wholly unaffected, and continued wiping away Wen Qing’s tears.

“Stinking monster, you’ve left so many flaws, and you don’t hide any of them. You even use magic to eat snacks. Do you have that much magic?”

Yuan Hao paused a little, seeming troubled, as though he were thinking about why these tears simply would not wipe clean.

“In the capital, you still don’t know how to restrain yourself. Be careful a daoist catches you and refines you into a pill. Then even if you cry, you still won’t be able to escape.”

“Ever since I met you, accidents keep happening. Could it be that you’re about to undergo a tribulation?”

“You’re already undergoing a tribulation, yet you still have so many desires. Greedy for food, greedy for money, greedy for lust. What gives you the right not to like men? You’re already a monster, so what are you even being picky about!”

Yuan Hao stood up, as though he had been annoyed by these tears that refused to dry no matter what.

Wen Qing looked at him nervously, thinking, didn’t you say he couldn’t hear? Could it be that what I said later can be heard after all? If that were true, then I really would want to go die for a while.

Tears were still blurring his eyes, making it impossible to see Yuan Hao’s expression clearly. Wen Qing quickly wiped them away with his sleeve.

“Still feeling bad?” Yuan Hao asked softly.

Uneasily, Wen Qing shook his head.

“The medicine is still very hot, so you can leave it for a bit first. Then… why don’t you sleep for a while?”

The medicine, still hot? After all this commotion, it should have gone cold long ago. How could it possibly still be hot?

Wen Qing turned his head to look at the medicine bowl on the small side table. Steam was rising from it in great wafting curls, as if it had only just been poured out of the medicine pot.

Then he looked back at Yuan Hao. He was wearing a gray scholar’s robe, the exact same one the academy had issued back when they studied at the Jinping Prefecture school. Why was he wearing this one now?

Ah!

Wen Qing understood. Yuan Hao had used magic again, making time rewind so that he could change clothes all over again.

He thought I kept crying and kept making him change clothes because I disliked how his clothes looked?

This stupid monster!