Recklessly Breaking a Delicate Branch - Chapter 33

Jiang Wanshu whimpered softly at the right moment, but the man caught the underlying sob in her voice.

He knitted his brows and straightened up, only to see the girl’s clear, beautiful eyes brimming with crystalline tears.

She was crying; she was crying because she was unwilling to endure his touch.

Caught in this state of rising yet stifled desire, Zhou Yan grew suddenly irritable. “I haven’t even done anything to you yet. Is it worth shedding pearls over a grievance like this?”

Usually, it was only during moments of frustration in bed that he would refer to himself as “Laozi” (this old man/master) to vent his anger.

“You… you promised me, you would only touch me once every ten days.” The girl’s body wouldn’t stop trembling. Her voice was soft and tender, instantly dousing the fire of rage in the man’s heart.

Helpless, he knelt on the bed and forcefully pinched her chin, lifting it upward. “In the Central Plains, it’s something husbands and wives do every day. How is it that with you, it doesn’t mean a damn thing?”

Zhou Yan was complaining about Jiang Wanshu’s stubbornness, and also resenting that she hadn’t truly accepted him as her Magba (husband).

Once the topic reached this point, Zhou Yan no longer had the heart to continue their previous intimacy; all his attention was focused on this matter.

His shimmering, hawk-like eyes stared intently at the girl before him, his words dominant and greasy. “Speak. What will it take for you to let me have my way with you? If you can say it, I can fulfill it.”

Jiang Wanshu shook her head, refusing to look at his expression, trying to shake his foul words out of her ears and mind.

Tormented by her reaction, Zhou Yan spoke again, “Talk, or I’ll finish you off on this bed right now.”

This “finishing off” was not the literal kind; its true meaning was something only those who were no longer innocent would understand.

Tossed about like this, Jiang Wanshu could no longer spare the energy to cry. With a racing heart and a flushed face, she met the man’s gaze.

As their eyes locked, both were momentarily dazed.

The hand on her jaw loosened slightly. Jiang Wanshu dodged Zhou Yan’s gaze and stopped speaking, staring straight at the white canopy hanging over the soft bed.

From Zhou Yan’s perspective, this gesture was a silent protest.

She would rather look at a bed curtain than look at him.

Zhou Yan stared at the girl before him—noble yet as delicate as an autumn moon—and suddenly burst into laughter.

He wanted to see just how long this little girl could hold out without speaking to him.

The night was long, anyway; they had plenty of time to struggle.

Once his thoughts returned to the present, Zhou Yan looked down at the girl’s exquisite, jade-like body and instantly decided that everything they had just discussed was a mistake.

The clashing of minds was never as pleasurable as the clashing of bodies.

Besides, the “little crybaby” had stopped sobbing. He wanted to hear the lingering, sweet sounds from that elegant little mouth instead.

With that goal in mind, his thin lips began an unexpected invasion of the girl. Jiang Wanshu’s mind was thrown into chaos by his actions. Suddenly, her long legs, stretched out on the bed, began to thrash, her pale toes curling tight.

“Mmh… ah.”

“Zhou Yan, stop it!”

The woman’s voice carried a seductive quality she hadn’t even noticed, sounding like a coy reproach.

Zhou Yan, having found his pleasure, ignored her resistance. One hand moved to cup her other fullness. Just as he couldn’t wait any longer and moved his hand toward her belly, he was suddenly kicked onto the bed by a frantic thrust of her long legs.

In the heat of desire, a person’s defenses are at their weakest.

Jiang Wanshu’s eyes were slightly glazed as she looked at the man. She reached out and grabbed a dagger hidden under the soft pillow where he usually slept. In the blink of an eye, she pressed it half an inch against her own throat.

This time, Zhou Yan stopped completely.

She had a basic understanding of him. She knew that if she held the dagger to his throat, it would be wrestled away in no time.

Her reaction speed might be average, but as long as the dagger was pointed at herself, she believed her own sense of self-preservation would allow her to react quickly to whatever happened next.

Tonight, she would be the ultimate master of this farce.

She wanted Zhou Yan to understand: provoke anyone, but do not provoke her.

But in the next second, her actions made Zhou Yan laugh. He began trying to confuse her.

He sat up on the bed, his arched brows curving. “Wanwan, before you went snooping for the dagger under my pillow, you didn’t bother to ask how many years it’s been rotting there. With how blunt it is, even if you used all your strength, it would be hard to draw blood from that precious neck of yours.”

Jiang Wanshu stared at him deeply, her grip on the dagger tightening as she weighed the truth of his words.

In the past, Shennong tasted hundreds of herbs to know their properties.

Tonight, to avoid further humiliation, she was willing to shed a little blood.

However, blood should only be shed at the most critical moment. If a problem could be solved without it, wouldn’t shedding it be a waste?

She didn’t believe him. A man who could detect her slightest movement when she got up in the middle of the night would never be so careless.

How could a dagger meant to save one’s life in a crisis be left to go blunt over a long period?

Furthermore, Jiang Wanshu understood that with the man’s emotions at this peak, if she didn’t show him she was willing to see blood, he wouldn’t suppress his lust.

Either way, it was a gamble. She might as well choose the path she could control.

“I don’t care if what you say is true or false. Don’t come over!” As she spoke, she pressed the dagger firmly against her neck.

This movement startled Zhou Yan.

Seeing the determination in her eyes, he immediately pointed toward the dagger. “Put it down!”

He tried to talk her down while looking for a flaw, hoping to snatch the threatening weapon away.

Now, he finally admitted it—seeing Jiang Wanshu hold a dagger to her own throat had terrified him. Not only that, but his heart was racing faster than it ever had in over twenty years.

Seeing this, Jiang Wanshu knew she hadn’t gambled wrong. She looked at him with a hint of triumph. “I knew you were lying to me again!”

It was true for the ten-day promise, and it was true for this trick.

The man’s body shifted slightly forward. Sensing what he was about to do, Jiang Wanshu raised her voice.

“Zhou Yan, let me tell you: if you don’t keep your promise of the ten-day period in the future, I will use every means possible to threaten you.”

“I know you want me to accept you from the bottom of my heart. If you force me again, I will slit my throat and make sure you never see me again!”

Her words were so harsh and absolute that they made Zhou Yan’s scalp tingle.

The sharp dagger was pressed recklessly harder into her neck. In the dim darkness, Jiang Wanshu’s left hand, hanging by her waist, wouldn’t stop shaking. She quietly made up her mind.

This move wouldn’t make Zhou Yan remember unless he saw blood. She was no longer satisfied with just tonight’s freedom; she began to bet bigger.

Her heart dropped. She controlled her strength, closed her eyes, and steeled her resolve, sliding the dagger across her throat.

She did it with great precision, only drawing enough blood to let it trickle from where the blade pressed.

Seeing the girl so maddened, Zhou Yan abandoned his methods of gentle persuasion. He used his usual brutal strength to slap the dagger out of her hand and off the bed.

The wound on her neck was bloody, with droplets tracing paths down her collarbone toward her cream-colored chest. Since she wasn’t wearing clothes, everything was laid bare before him.

Zhou Yan looked at her. Her red, tear-filled eyes only added a sense of tragic vulnerability to the scene.

The dagger hit the floor. The disheveled girl leaned back, her wrists supporting her, radiating a sort of stubborn beauty.

But Zhou Yan was in no mood to admire the view. “You are a damn madwoman!” he cursed bitterly.

To his surprise, Jiang Wanshu laughed. “It’s not the first day you’ve known my temper. Even a cornered dog will jump a wall. If you regret it now, send me back to the Central Plains. We can call what we had a passing fling.”

The more she spoke, the more emboldened she felt. Eventually, ignoring the pain in her neck, she knelt before him.

Zhou Yan stared at her as she spoke of having no connection to him, nearly exploding with rage.

He never imagined that his sudden impulse to break the ten-day rule tonight would provoke such a violent reaction.

His eyes remained fixed on her bleeding wound. He finally admitted defeat. “Say what you want. I’m not letting you go.”

With that, Zhou Yan ignored her mood, flipped out of bed, and walked quickly toward the cabinet while she watched in a daze.

A cool breeze blew through the window into the tent. Jiang Wanshu felt a chill and finally realized her nakedness. Blushing, she immediately grabbed the quilt to cover herself.

She feared the cold. Ignoring the wound on her neck, she curled up under the covers.

It wasn’t until Zhou Yan returned with a medicine bottle that she realized the blood from her neck had stained the brocade quilt.

Seeing her looking as pitiful as a stray dog, all of Zhou Yan’s internal frustration vanished.

He sat on a corner of the bed, opened the bottle, poured the medicine onto his hand, and gently pulled back the quilt covering her neck.

The girl felt uncomfortable and shook her head, but in the next second, she was held fast by his large palm.

“Wanwan, I’m warning you. If you move again, don’t blame me for truly breaking my promise.”

He had conceded. If he couldn’t break the rule, he wouldn’t break it. He didn’t want to provoke that deep-seated defiance in her again.

These words were very effective on Jiang Wanshu.

Soon, she cooperated and sat up straight, letting him apply the black medicinal powder to her wound.

During the process, Zhou Yan accidentally poked her wound. Jiang Wanshu couldn’t help but groan in pain.

Instead of showing pity, he pressed harder. “Letting you use self-harm to protest whenever you’re unhappy… if I press a little harder, you’ll remember the pain and won’t dare do it again.”

Seeing her pained expression, his touch softened anyway.

He lowered his eyes, using his right hand to take the powder from his left palm, pressing it bit by bit onto her wound.

“That’s because you did something I didn’t like first,” Jiang Wanshu puffed out her cheeks as if lodging a complaint.

Zhou Yan’s lips curled into a smile. “Husband and wife for a day, sharing a pillow for ten thousand. I just wanted to be with you. You admitted I was your Magba today, so why were you unhappy when I tried to do it?”

This sentence left Jiang Wanshu speechless. She could only turn her head away and refuse to look at him, fuming.

Dark clouds hung over the wilderness. A few hours later, the sky grew bright, and a lively girl entered the large tent.

At this moment, Jiang Wanshu was still catching up on her sleep. Magulaji walked unceremoniously to her bedside, looking at her with a beaming smile. “Wanwan, get up! If you sleep any longer, you’ll turn into a pig.”

Jiang Wanshu was startled awake. She opened her eyes and sat up.

As she moved, the brocade quilt slid to one side, naturally drawing Magulaji’s gaze.

When she saw the bloodstain on the quilt, her eyes widened in shock.

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