After Transmigrating to Become Lady Skylark - Chapter 6

Chapter 6

The sound of washing in the bathroom stopped. Jin Chaoyan pulled open the wooden door and went back to her own room, wrapped in a bathrobe and rubbing her hair dry. She was still trying to figure out how things had taken such a dramatic turn.

She had already been mentally prepared to face her death and had even noticed Hibari’s gaze becoming increasingly dangerous after she had returned his button. But then, his phone suddenly rang, and the call seemed to have diverted the attention of the beast that had just been let out of its cage—

And so, Jin Chaoyan was assigned to this room.

Well, how to put it… it was probably about three or four rooms away from Hibari Kyoya’s residence.

This arrangement of sleeping separately was unexpected but also made perfect sense. It left her unable to figure out if the man had already seen through her act and was just waiting for the right moment to interrogate her, or…

Her arms felt sore, and she put down the towel she was using to dry her hair. She stared at the clean bathrobe she was wearing, which was so wide that it slipped off her shoulders and required her to roll up the sleeves. Even after she had tied the belt tight, it still hung long and low. She thought of how Kusakabe had wanted to give her a brand new, packaged yukata earlier, and a strange expression came over her face.

—If the relationship between the Hibari couple was really that good, the original owner wouldn’t have left no personal belongings at his residence, would she?

Thinking about it calmly, the original owner had already passed away when she transmigrated. The original owner’s husband hadn’t been by her bedside in her final moments. Even during the two days she had spent recovering after the original owner’s last-ditch medical procedure had been successful, she hadn’t received a single message from Hibari.

Jin Chaoyan felt she had been blinded by money. The more she thought about it, the more she felt that the intimate relationship of a wealthy couple had nothing to do with money at all.

Her poverty was truly limiting her imagination.

She swung her arms, her shoulders drooping. She couldn’t be bothered to continue drying her hair. Looking at the sore spot, she found a large red patch on her right arm. She then looked down at her left heel, which had hurt so much when she rinsed it that she could barely stand. The wound was now a bit swollen.

“…”

Her face was expressionless. She felt like she was the one who had been beaten up by a tyrant.

But soon, the sound of a certain unlucky person’s jawbone being shattered echoed in her mind. She belatedly felt her own chin and evaluated the man’s danger level…

I think I can try a little harder to keep up the act, Jin Chaoyan thought from the bottom of her heart.

A few rooms away.

Kusakabe Tetsuya had just gotten the information on the Tokyo underground organizations and confirmed their connection to the Millefiore family. After politely knocking, he opened the door halfway and knelt on a cushion, reporting the situation to Hibari.

The person in the room was standing in front of a wardrobe, wearing a black yukata, as if he had just changed. He only turned slightly to the side to listen. In the end, he didn’t offer any opinion, as if he had already guessed the answer.

Not getting a response for a while, Kusakabe tried to guess what he meant and brought up another matter. “We just got word from Italy that Verde has given a request to Vongola, asking for Vongola’s protection.”

His words were met with silence once more.

This time, Kusakabe couldn’t hold back. “Mr. Kyoya, the Millefiore family’s expansion is becoming more and more obvious. Many Mafia families around the world have to choose between obeying or being destroyed…”

“Let that herbivore decide about Italy.”

Hibari Kyoya’s lips parted slightly. Even at the thought of those enemies, a hint of cold killing intent flashed in his gray-blue eyes, but he remained perfectly still. He then looked at the person at the door. “As for you, Tetsu, you’ve mentioned Vongola quite a bit these past few days. Are you working for me, or—”

Kusakabe heard the displeasure in his tone and realized he had somehow upset him.

He quickly apologized and, showing great perceptiveness, wanted to take away the basket of dirty clothes in the corner that Hibari had just changed out of.

The man in the room watched his movements. When his gaze fell on the suit jacket, that subtle, strange feeling from his waist suddenly returned.

A slight itch, like an electric current.

He let out another “tsk,” and his mood worsened. His fingers had just touched his Tonfa when Kusakabe, holding the laundry basket, turned around to report to him:

“Also, Mr. Kyoya.”

“It seems the Madam wasn’t very fond of the clothes I had someone buy for her on short notice. So I just sent her one of the bathrobes I prepared for you.”

Given Hibari’s personality, he mostly stayed in Nanimori-cho when he was in Japan. It was normal for him not to have any of his usual clothes in Tokyo, and he likely hadn’t worn most of the ones that had been prepared for him.

But with Kusakabe’s words, the atmosphere in the room instantly became strange.

The wind stopped, and the air froze.

A cloud obscured the moonlight, and the mansion, nestled in a quiet part of Tokyo, was utterly silent in the shadow of the clouds.

Even though the environment was perfect for sleeping, Jin Chaoyan didn’t sleep well. Whether it was because she hadn’t dried her hair before bed or because the tatami mats were too thin and transferred the coldness of the ground, she felt cold in her semi-conscious state, and then her head started to hurt.

When her consciousness became blurry and muddled, she was either hot or cold. The blanket seemed to be working against her. When she was cold, it wouldn’t cover her feet, and when she was hot, it would wrap into a ball that she couldn’t kick away.

Even more, her headache was so bad that she was hearing things.

A mechanical voice kept chattering in her mind, even with a hint of mockery: [Congratulations on spending one billion yen and activating the entry requirement for the “One-Billion-Yen Member” of the Money-Is-All-You-Need Mall. Although you didn’t earn this money yourself, transmigration is also a skill. It’s clear that you, a new rich madam with a corporate husband, can be called a Transmigration Empress—]

[Even more fortunately, you’ve watched many hot-blooded animes in your youth. Although they may not have left many traces in your goldfish memory, compared to those unlucky fools who were unprepared and couldn’t even activate the mall to select items when they first transmigrated, you are truly lucky!]

Jin Chaoyan, who was exhausted and desperately wanted to sleep: “…Are you mocking me?”

Who is being so sarcastic in my ear in the middle of the night?

She weakly cursed and, pulling a sliver of attention from her muddled thoughts, typed in her consciousness: “Get out.”

[…]

[Mall is bound. User information has been entered. Your exclusive customer service is being assigned. We sincerely look forward to your visit.]

What kind of scam app is this?

She wanted to curse, but she didn’t have the energy. She decided to deal with it after she woke up. But this sleep was truly painful. In the first half of the night, she wanted to sleep but couldn’t. In the second half, she wanted to wake up but couldn’t.

In a daze, she heard Kusakabe’s voice a few times, sounding at a loss. Later, she heard Chiyana’s voice…

Someone neatly adjusted her blanket, and a cold compress was placed on her forehead. The cold and heat that had been tormenting her subsided. The utterly exhausted Jin Chaoyan watched her chaotic thoughts settle like dust, and her consciousness became peaceful along with them.

Midday. The wind rustled the leaves in the courtyard. By a stone water bowl, a few bamboo pipes, arranged as a shishi-odoshi, filled up with water. They tilted with a “dong” and emptied their clear liquid, startling a few birds perched in the trees.

“Mr. Kyoya—”

A hurried sound of footsteps came from the corridor. Kusakabe Tetsuya didn’t even knock and simply pulled the door open, exclaiming in relief, “Chiyana says the Madam’s fever has finally gone down.”

The person in the hall was sitting at a low wooden table, looking at documents. He didn’t move at the sound, but the little yellow bird that had been napping in his hair suddenly flapped its wings and flew out the door.

Hibari Kyoya looked at his relieved subordinate with a half-smile. “Tetsu, you’ve been overly dramatic these past two days.”

“…”

The person at the door subconsciously raised a hand to cover the spot on his chin where a bandage was stuck.

In the more than ten years he had followed Hibari, Kusakabe thought he had a good handle on his temperament at work and at home. But for some reason, he felt that over the past few days, Mr. Kyoya had regressed to his unpredictable mood swings from his school days.

When he had first discovered the Madam wasn’t feeling well and had brought in a family doctor, Hibari had put down his work and gone over to listen to some of the findings, even ordering him to bring over the person who had originally been taking care of Jin Chaoyan.

For the past six months, he hadn’t seen her once, and his understanding of her was limited to the medical reports from the sanitarium. He hadn’t thought much of it then, but after their brief interaction that night and hearing the family doctor say that the high fever was likely from a combination of shock and a cold, he understood what “delicate and helpless” meant.

But it was Hibari’s own choice, after all—

He could only do his best to maintain his boss’s family harmony.

And now he was being told he was being dramatic? She had been running a fever for two days, and the Madam had a heart condition! What if the fever had led to organ complications…

Kusakabe Tetsuya was truly at a loss.

He had even forgotten how he had brought himself to make the suggestion with an expressionless face: “Do you want to go see her…”

“Isn’t she still alive?”

Hibari Kyoya, who already knew her fever had broken and that she was likely out of danger, lowered his head to look at the corporate financial reports. The lines of his soft profile became cold because of his indifferent expression, like a high-mountain flower that had never touched mortal dust.

A crisp bird’s chirp sounded by the window ledge.

Jin Chaoyan groggily opened her eyes and saw a little bird bathed in the dappled sunlight filtering through the leaves, tilting its head and looking at her with its little black bean eyes.

She pulled back the blanket and sat up on the futon, revealing an exceptionally gentle smile. Her violet eyes flowed with tenderness, even reflecting the bird’s fine feathers in perfect detail.

“Hello, Hibird.”

The little bird’s appearance was truly unique. In the anime, it had no real-life prototype. Jin Chaoyan herself had once tried to raise a parrot, so she still had some impression of the bird Hibari raised.

Hibird wasn’t afraid of people. Hearing her voice, it hopped along the window ledge, its little black bean eyes constantly watching her. It even followed her out after she changed and washed up.

“Madam, you’re awake.”

As she pulled open the wooden door, Jin Chaoyan saw Chiyana in the courtyard, hanging clothes to dry. She rubbed her eyes and asked with a pleasant surprise, “What are you doing here?”

“The Madam had a high fever. Mr. Kusakabe ordered me to come. How are you feeling now?” Chiyana put down her work and walked to the porch to speak to her.

Jin Chaoyan: “Ah?”

She had no idea. She thought, no wonder I feel so light and refreshed, as if I just had a good night’s sleep.

After a pause, she remembered the original owner’s history of heart disease. Although she hadn’t experienced an attack since transmigrating, she was still a little worried and asked, “I’m okay now, right?”

Chiyana gave a helpless smile. “Yes, the doctor came this morning and, after learning your fever had broken, performed a general checkup. You are fine now. But you’ve been ill, so would you like to eat something to replenish your strength?”

Jin Chaoyan, feeling hungry, proceeded to recite a long list of dishes. “Steamed lamb, steamed bear paw, steamed deer tail, roasted duck, roasted chicken, roasted goose—”

Chiyana interrupted her. “You can only eat bland food right now.”

Jin Chaoyan, whose Chinese stomach was once again not satisfied, instantly deflated. “…Then anything is fine.”

She glanced at Hibird, who had followed her to the porch. “Right, could you ask Mr. Kusakabe what I can feed it?”

Two days later, having eaten only bland food, Jin Chaoyan felt she needed to apologize to Chiyana.

The bland food she had imagined: plain, watery white porridge.

The bland food Chiyana had prepared: a rich, well-balanced, and luxuriously made nutritious meal.

Jin Chaoyan again lamented how nice it was to be rich. But after learning that Chiyana couldn’t stay the night and had to drive back and forth every day, she felt she needed to lighten the burden on her hard-working butler.

And so, on the third day of her recovery, she didn’t have Chiyana come over. Instead, she placed an order for some nearby ingredients, preparing to make something edible in the kitchen herself.

The ingredients were all high-quality and, of course, very expensive. Jin Chaoyan believed that “the most delicious ingredients only need the simplest preparation,” and with her experience of cooking for herself during her working life in her past life, she wasn’t worried about lunch.

She naturally woke up around 9 a.m., and by the time she had finished her entire routine of washing up, changing, applying skincare and sunscreen, putting on makeup, and doing her hair, it was almost 10:30.

Kusakabe Tetsuya announced through the room door that the ingredients had arrived. She happily opened the door. “Thank you so much. Mr. Kusakabe, will you be staying for lunch? I bought a lot of ingredients; I can make plenty.”

Kusakabe, who had just been assigned a task and was about to leave, regretfully declined.

Jin Chaoyan nodded, wished him well at work, and began walking down the long corridor with its slanting shadows. After only a few steps, she saw Hibird fly down from a branch and land on her shoulder. From a distance, one could hear her speaking to the bird.

Seeing her lively demeanor even when she was alone, Kusakabe let out a sigh of relief. A moment later, remembering his work, he hurried away.

Half an hour later, at the kitchen counter.

Jin Chaoyan was looking at her phone. She saw Hibird hopping around a beautifully packaged gift box from the auction and casually tore the packaging open. She took out a grape, washed it, and put it in her mouth.

“It’s so sweet. Hibird, can you eat a sweet fruit like this?”

“Eat~ eat~”

The little yellow bird answered her with simple words.

Jin Chaoyan was so charmed that she felt her heart melt. She didn’t even notice the new, undownloadable shopping app icon on her phone’s screen. She immediately picked another grape from the box of “Earth Water” grapes, holding the rose-scented fruit out to Hibird.

“Don’t lie to me, okay? How about you just take one bite?”

Hibird was so smart it was like a spirit. In the past two days of being with Jin Chaoyan, it could interact with her by flapping its wings and even behaved well when choosing food, never peeking at the human’s plates.

Now, when Jin Chaoyan said “one bite,” it truly only took one bite, then obediently tilted its head to look at her.

“Wow, you’re so cute! How can there be such a cute little bird in this world? Mommy loves you so much…”

Not far away, a man who had just returned from outside heard the noise and looked over. He then strode toward the kitchen.

The kitchen door was not closed. As he got closer, he could see a person in a color-block brand-name dress, with perfect makeup, standing with her back to him at the counter, spouting exaggerated praise to a fluffy little bird perched obediently on the surface.

A bag of open “Earth Water” grapes, priced at 100,000 yen, sat on the counter, and one could faintly see a mark left by a bird’s beak on a grape.

Hibari Kyoya: “…”

He wondered why he hadn’t seen Hibird in the past two days. It turned out it had found someone to provide it with good food and drink.

“Hibari~ Hibari~”

The small bird, which had been sitting quietly, suddenly spread its wings and hopped to the side, calling Hibari’s name twice.

Jin Chaoyan, who was used to the bird showing off its impressive language skills, didn’t pay any attention. Instead, she smiled, glancing at the grape beside her, feeling a little bad about its price. She then turned her eyes to Hibird and negotiated:

“Sweetheart, we can’t waste food. How about you take this grape and give it to Hibari?”

Hibari, who just happened to hear her ridiculous idea, let out a scoff from behind her.

Startled by the sound, the person who had been so engrossed in her interaction with Hibird abruptly turned sideways, facing the tall man standing by the kitchen door. She noticed that his well-tailored black suit seemed to have been made of a different fabric—smoother and lighter.

But that wasn’t the point.

What was more awkward than trying to lure someone else’s little bird away?

It was getting caught in the act of teaching the little bird to be bad by its owner.

Jin Chaoyan felt like she could dig out another courtyard with her toes.

Her neck felt like it was on fire, but she also strangely didn’t want to lose in the face of his mockery. So she pretended that nothing had happened. As long as she wasn’t awkward, the awkwardness would be someone else’s!

“I’m just making lunch. Do you want to eat?”

Her calm and gentle voice fell into his ears.

Hibari Kyoya stared at this person, who a family doctor had said had recovered after a two-day fever from “extreme shock and a cold.” His gaze swept over the overwhelming despair and awkwardness she was radiating, but he couldn’t find a single hint of fear or dread for him, which should have been there after that night.

Somehow, he was suddenly intrigued again.

“Okay.”

“Mhm, it’s okay, you…” Mid-sentence, Jin Chaoyan suddenly realized that he hadn’t refused. He had agreed to her invitation. The rest of her words were caught in her throat.

—Surely he didn’t really think I was being sincere, did he?

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