Four Years Ago, Her Husband Cheated on Her Body - Chapter 22

“Since I won the grand prize that only comes once in a lifetime, of course I have to double-check the numbers several times.”

The wedding highlight video came to an abrupt halt there.

Hearing such romantic words, the administrator, despite their age, felt their heart flutter at the sweetness of this newlywed couple, inwardly lamenting: Heavens, what kind of peerless love is this??

Human joys and sorrows are not universally shared; Jia Qiao couldn’t perceive where the “romance” was. He thought expressionlessly: Why didn’t this video include the aftermath?

In fact, Jia Qiao had never bought a lottery ticket, so he naturally didn’t understand Zhu Nanyu’s metaphor.

Winning numbers—as if he were merely a string of randomly appearing digits.

“Then…” Jia Qiao blinked slowly and looked up at the man who was theoretically supposed to spend the rest of his life with him, “What if I answer ‘I’m not willing’ right now?”

As soon as he spoke, the air suddenly froze.

Jia Qiao clearly felt the surrounding temperature drop by several degrees Celsius.

“You’re not willing?” Zhu Nanyu took half a step closer to Jia Qiao. He was still smiling, but the warmth in his eyes slowly turned cold, and his entire being seemed on the verge of turning dark. “That’s fine. I have a few other alternative wedding plans; I was just worrying that I’d only get to marry once and wouldn’t be able to use them all. If you aren’t willing this time, I can marry you a few more times, and then… until you are willing.”

Although these words sounded normal, Jia Qiao felt as though something terrible had been omitted between “and then” and “until.”

Zhu Nanyu put his arm around Jia Qiao’s waist, pulling him into his embrace. He lowered his head to peck at the curve of Jia Qiao’s ear, his warm breath sending a numbing, electric-like tingle through Jia Qiao’s entire body.

Dazed by the kiss, Jia Qiao heard him say in a low voice:

“Wear a wedding dress next time, shall we, Jiao Jiao?”

A… a wedding dress?

That troublesome attire that required waking up at 3:30 AM to change into, needing chest padding and a corset?

The key point was that when Zhu Nanyu first suggested a wedding dress, he specifically pointed out that the larger the skirt, the better. God only knew what he wanted to do under the “bride’s” skirt!

That was the first time in Jia Qiao’s life that he experienced what could be called “indescribable terror.”

If he only said “I’m not willing” now, heaven knew how many more weddings Zhu Nanyu had waiting for him.

“…I am willing.” Jia Qiao almost spat those words out through gritted teeth. He glared at the man and grumbled in a small voice, “You didn’t give me a second option at all!”

Stirred by those terrifying memories, Jia Qiao rejected the administrator’s suggestion to “watch the rest of the wedding videos together” and left the photographer’s studio without looking back.

The time spent watching the videos was more than he had expected; outside, the sky was already pitch black.

This area was within the city limits but far from the center, surrounded by old alleyways.

The old streetlights were dim, and the nearby streets became exceptionally silent once night fell.

Jia Qiao stood there for a while, but there was no sign of Lu Min.

“Lu Min.”

Lu Min was mute; even if he heard, he wouldn’t respond, but he would definitely come skipping toward him.

Jia Qiao listened carefully to the footsteps, but none were coming his way.

Perhaps after getting into the car with the painting, Lu Min had been too lazy to come back and meet him.

Jia Qiao took out his phone and dialed Lu Min’s number. No one answered.

Usually, if there was anything to be done, he always let Lu Min handle the communication, so he hadn’t saved the driver’s contact information.

Because parking was difficult near the photographer’s studio, the driver had circled around a few times when they arrived and parked the car in an underground garage two hundred meters away. Jia Qiao had no choice but to walk there himself.

After a few steps, a streetlight along the road short-circuited, making a “sizzle-sizzle” sound as it flickered.

Moths active at night, influenced by phototaxis, beat their wings forcefully, recklessly crashing into the light.

The moths exhausted the last of their lives and then fell lightly, landing by Jia Qiao’s feet, their wings still twitching neurotically.

Jia Qiao took half a step back and looked down at the moth remains, discovering a small piece of torn and crumpled paper next to them. The grid pattern on it looked familiar, seemingly from Lu Min’s spiral notebook.

After a moment of hesitation, Jia Qiao bent down to pick it up and slowly unfolded the paper.

The handwriting on the paper was familiar—it was left by Lu Min, written crookedly:

RUN

That red color was vivid and viscous; it was the ink unique to the human body—blood.

The scent was very fresh; it should be from arterial bleeding.

Although Jia Qiao had never taken a biology class, he understood the human body very well.

Arteries are blood vessels that come directly from the heart; the bleeding is heavy and the flow is fast.

If the bleeding wasn’t stopped in time…

He would die.

“…” Jia Qiao silently gripped the paper tightly and brought it to his nose, discerning the metallic rust scent unique to human blood.

Then he looked ahead, following the direction where the same scent was growing stronger, and quickened his pace to rush into the underground parking lot.

The old underground parking lot had been unmanaged for years. The only electronic barrier arm had been forcibly snapped, and there were fragments left on the ground where a car had sped through and smashed it.

The further in he went, the more intense the smell of blood became.

Reaching the deepest part, the car that had brought him was gone. On the ground remained shards of window glass and a large, startling pool of blood.

Judging from the volume and the splatter pattern, it wasn’t enough to be fatal in the short term.

He could still be saved.

Jia Qiao reached a conclusion and heard a rustling sound around him. Several people hiding in the darkness slowly began to gather toward him.

The aura they carried was something Jia Qiao used to be very familiar with.

Greed, malice, and the preparation to corner a prey.

Jia Qiao stood there calmly, waiting for them to get closer. He reached back with precision to grab the man who was about to attack him from behind, throwing him heavily over his shoulder onto the glass shards.

“Ugh…” The tall man let out a muffled groan.

“Where is Lu Min?” Jia Qiao’s hand now held a sharp piece of broken glass, pressing it coldly against the man’s throat.

“Cough… pui!” The man spat out a mouthful of bloody phlegm. “It’s just like that kid Zhu Ke said—you look soft and weak, but your hands are damn dark!”

Hearing the name “Zhu Ke” come out of his mouth, Jia Qiao remained indifferent.

He had encountered countless top-tier players who had tried to kill him through various means; Zhu Ke really didn’t rank among them.

“Where is Lu Min?” Jia Qiao asked again.

“Do you even need to ask? Of course we caught him!” A companion wearing a headscarf held a knife, pointing it at Jia Qiao from behind. “I’m warning you, don’t move.”

Jia Qiao glanced at the small knife, his gaze somewhat puzzled.

Such a thin little piece of iron wants to kill me?

The man in the headscarf flipped the knife in his hand. The blade was dripping, shedding a few drops of bright red, viscous liquid before Jia Qiao’s eyes.

“See this? This is all the little mute’s blood. I stabbed him once from behind and held the handle to… give it a twist inside.” The man in the headscarf had an excited expression, as if describing a work of art. “Poor mute, his stomach must hurt a lot, right? Too bad he can’t make a sound no matter how much it hurts. He could only cry his eyes red like a rabbit, pushing me away with all his might to escape into the car, using his own blood to desperately, desperately write ‘RUN’.”

“Do you know how many pages that idiot wrote?” Another accomplice walked out from the shadows, fumbled in his pocket, and threw out a thick stack of papers with “RUN” written on them.

“Hunting prey that fights back with everything they have is truly delightful~” A look resembling an orgasm appeared on his face. His breathing was rapid and his eyes were dazed; the more he spoke, the more excited he became. “I smashed the car window wanting to drag him out. He was so badly injured, yet he still intended to drive the car to ram through us and escape.”

“Hahahaha! The poor little rabbit surely didn’t know, right? We already tampered with that car—the fuel tank is empty!”

“Isn’t it despairing? Your loyal butler must have been so desperate, about to be caught by us. Who told him to like drawing rabbits? Nature is about the survival of the fittest; rabbits are born to be prey for predators~”

Jia Qiao: …

A “predator” that could only catch rabbits didn’t seem particularly successful.

The orgasmic man let out a series of eerie laughs and continued to say drunkenly, “Even so, he still worked hard to leave you signals, throwing so many notes back. I was worried you wouldn’t come after seeing them, but this is great—you are the biggest prize tonight~”

While the orgasmic man was confessing the facts of the crime, Jia Qiao had already quickly mapped out the environment of the underground garage and the number of kidnappers across from him.

There were four people in total in the garage: besides the glass-shard man he had shoulder-thrown, the headscarf man pinning him with a knife, and the red-faced orgasmic man, there was one more standing in front of Jia Qiao who hadn’t made a sound.

Jia Qiao’s body shifted. He nimbly performed a side-kick, hitting the headscarf man’s wrist, and the fruit knife fell to the ground.

Just as he picked up the fruit knife, the accomplice in front who had been silent turned around the tablet he had been holding in his arms to face Jia Qiao.

“…” Jia Qiao saw clearly, and his pupils contracted slightly.

The tablet was playing surveillance footage. Lu Min was locked in a small, dark place; his body below the waist was almost soaked red with blood, and he was gasping for breath with difficulty.

The kidnappers obviously didn’t want this “pawn” to stop breathing immediately; they had taken simple measures to stop the bleeding, so there was no immediate danger to his life.

But if he wasn’t treated in time, death was only a matter of time.

The surveillance camera suddenly moved up a few centimeters, revealing a distorted face. The person was also holding a cold, gleaming fruit knife, gesturing it back and forth in front of Lu Min.

“If you move one more time, I will have the man in the video stab him.” The silent man’s voice was muffled. “Of course, you can choose not to care whether he lives or dies and escape from here.”

The man in the headscarf rubbed his wrist, which had almost snapped, his smile becoming even more twisted. “Actually, before you came, we told that mute the same thing.”

“As long as he didn’t care about your life, he could have escaped from here and saved his own hide. Guess what he did?” The orgasmic man’s face turned even redder, and he said drunkenly, “He was so useless, yet he actually wanted to protect you. The result? He ended up in this pathetic state and dragged you down instead. Such a stupid butler—you should replace him sooner.”

“You escape, and we’ll take care of that trouble for you on the way.”

“Whew…” Jia Qiao closed his eyes and let out a long breath.

Lu Min was stupid; he hadn’t just realized that today.

Lu Min used to work for another family, where he was sexually assaulted by the young master because he looked cute.

The little mute couldn’t call for help; having no other way out, he jumped from a second-story window, causing a great commotion.

The owners of that house, however, accused Lu Min of seducing their son. They not only refused to pay his medical bills but also demanded that Lu Min compensate the young master for emotional distress.

The little mute was swindled out of all his money and came limping to Jia Qiao’s house for an interview.

Afraid the new master would dislike him for not being able to speak, Lu Min had written a very long self-introduction.

‘Even though I can’t speak, I write very fast! Communication is no problem at all!’

‘I can cook, sweep, do laundry, take care of the garden, and I will work hard to remember all of Master’s preferences!’

‘Please, please give me this job!’

…

‘I am very loyal.’

—I am very loyal.