Did My Ex-Wife Agree to Remarry Me Today? - Chapter 12

Chapter 12: Protection

Chi Yun paced around the pear tree like a headless fly. The piece of bark in her mouth was a dilemma: she couldn’t swallow it, yet she couldn’t bring herself to spit it out. She retracted her “guilty” teeth and held the fragment delicately between her lips.

Was the priority the bark? No, it was checking if A-Li was hurt.

Chi Yun returned to the “crime scene,” narrowing her eyes to stare at the spot she had bitten. To ensure she hadn’t missed anything, she used her communicator as a flashlight, pressing her eye close for a 360-degree inspection.

Thank goodness. Beneath the missing bark was a layer of fresh, vibrant green skin. The piece in her mouth was more like a bit of dead, non-functional outer bark that happened to come loose.

She pressed a palm to her lips and slowly spat the fragment into her hand, studying it under the light. It was indeed devoid of life brittle and dry. Even the innermost layer showed no vitality; it crumbled when pinched.

But a new question arose: if a tree has dead bark, and she had nibbled on so many different spots over the years, why had she never caught a piece of dead bark before? And why this time, with a single bite?

Chi Yun stood frozen, the lingering, grainy fragrance of the pear tree in her mouth. She swept her tongue across her teeth, swallowing the remaining debris, and licked her canines.

The way to test if today was a fluke was simple: bite somewhere else. But the thought made her flinch. What if the next piece was live tissue? A-Li would be hurt.

Her mind spiraling, she lost her nerve. She clutched the crumbled bark in her fist and headed upstairs.

Chi Yun clutched that bark all through the night, her dreams saturated with images of Li Zhou.

The next morning, Monday, her “demonic” alarm set for the company’s general assembly blared on time. The sky was still dark. Chi Yun sat up abruptly, her oversized pajamas sliding to the left to reveal a patch of pale skin. Her neck was flushed a soft pink an inevitable side effect of the “unspeakable” dreams she’d been having. Whenever her imagination strayed, her body betrayed her.

The bark she had protected all night was gone. She searched the bed and the pillows with sleepy eyes, only to find a few grainy bumps near the corner of her mouth. She licked them into her mouth and tasted them. It was definitely A-Li’s bark.

So… she had eaten it? Well, she thought, that sounds like something I’d do. It was safer in her stomach anyway; now she didn’t have to worry about losing it.

Rubbing her eyes, Chi Yun prepared to get up. Just as her bare toes touched the floor, a dog’s bark from outside the courtyard pulled her focus. It wasn’t far right outside her gate. Was it a stray? Or…

A memory from twenty years ago flashed in her mind. Her sleepiness vanished instantly. She sprinted to the balcony.

A stray spotted dog had wedged half its body through the iron gate. Its eyes gleamed with a predatory, somber light, and it radiated an unsettling aura that made her skin crawl.

The scene of A-Li being bitten by that black dog years ago was still vivid. Standing on the edge of the third-floor balcony, Chi Yun’s eyes turned red with fury. She shouted at the top of her lungs:

“Get away from my wife!”

The spotted dog licked a wound on its leg, restless and agitated. It wasn’t afraid of humans. It barked back at Chi Yun, then stepped boldly into the center of the courtyard.

Chi Yun felt a surge of dread. If you dare bite her, you’re dead. She calculated the distance, wondering if jumping from the third floor would be faster than the attacking dog.

Actually, jumping wasn’t fast enough.

She shifted, transforming into a Phoenix and diving down. She landed squarely in front of the pear tree, blocking the way. Her eyes, neck, wings, and tail feathers shimmered with golden light, and sparks flickered at the edge of her beak. If that dog took one more step, she would turn it into charcoal.

The dog wasn’t afraid of Chi Yun the human, but it was terrified of the blinding radiance of the Phoenix. It whimpered, ducked into the bushes, and bolted out of the yard.

Chi Yun waited until it was far away before shifting back into human form. Thank goodness. She had stopped it in time.

She stood barefoot on the stone path, the morning chill crawling up her soles, but she didn’t care. She stood before A-Li, worried. She had to go to the office in half an hour. What if her “wife” got bitten while she was gone? Her wife wasn’t “bite-proof” right now.

Recalling what the dog feared, Chi Yun turned on every single light in the courtyard. Then, she raided the warehouse. She remembered her mother leaving behind two rolls of heavy-duty protective fencing.

She twisted the fencing into a cylinder, intending to wrap it around A-Li. Looking at the iron mesh, she felt satisfied it was spiked. Standing there, it looked formidable. No one and no thing would get through easily.

She lugged the fencing to the yard, measured the tree, and estimated the construction time. Then, she called her assistant, Pei Pei.

“Something’s come up. Delay the morning meeting by one hour.”

Pei Pei, still half-asleep in bed, mumbled, “Okay, President Chi.”

Since she was doing this, she wanted it to be sturdy—windproof, rainproof, and even mosquito-proof. As she started building, she began drawing a structural diagram. It became complicated. She called Pei Pei again.

“Delay the meeting by another hour.”

“Okay…” Pei Pei heard the sound of clanging and hammering over the phone. Is she breaking into someone’s house? Why is she smashing things so hard? But before the thought could finish, Chi Yun hung up.

Two hours later, the defense system was complete. It had angle irons at the corners, tension cables, and an incredibly fine mesh. Chi Yun stood back, wiping her brow and admiring her handiwork in the morning light.

Suddenly, her smile froze.

She had forgotten herself. If even a mosquito couldn’t get in, how was she supposed to “cuddle” with A-Li when she got home?

A-Li ignoring her was one thing; her being unable to get close was another. The fence had successfully blocked her out, too.

She licked her back teeth. Dammit… I actually really like biting her.

The delayed meeting threw her whole day off. She had planned to finish work by noon and head to Wuzhou to “gain visibility” in front of her ex-wife. Instead, her morning was consumed by meetings, and she didn’t finish her paperwork until 4:00 PM.

By the time she reached Wuzhou, the sun was sinking behind the clouds. Chi Yun felt a bit wilted. She found a crowd of people at Li Zhou’s house so many that she couldn’t even get close to her ex-wife.

These people were strange. Every one of them was carrying a burlap sack filled with… something, and they were all trying to shove them into Li Zhou’s house.

Chi Yun peered closer and realized the sacks were full of white plastic trash.

What are they doing? she wondered. A neighborhood recycling drive?

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