Still Secretly In Love With My Enemy Today - Chapter 15

Chapter 15: 

The night was dim. Xie Huaishuang flipped his wrist, and a cluster of blue flame leaped from his fingertips, illuminating half of his profile.

—When he was still the Priest, he was always like this on the sacred altar. With a flick of his finger, the spark would jump into the holy chalice, and in an instant, a massive blaze would erupt.

At such moments, the crowd below would explode with a near-frenzied devotion. I always felt it was some ancestral trick of theirs; I used to stare intently every time, trying to figure out the principle behind it, but I only ever remembered how skillfully his wrist moved—shining like white jade in the sunlight.

Through this flicker of blue flame, Xie Huaishuang’s gaze drifted toward me, a glint of cold light amidst the shadows.

He pinched the flame out, plunging us back into silence. After a long pause, the man with the goatee seemed to want to scream, but though his mouth opened, no sound came out. His eyes bulged until they almost popped.

“Y-you… are… how…”

His lips flapped beneath his beard, which annoyed me. I had no desire to know what nonsense he was sputtering, so I averted my eyes to look at Xie Huaishuang.

Just as I raised my hand to touch his palm, he seemed to know what I wanted to ask: “If he knows, he knows. Now… well, I’m sending him to see his God of Xiling anyway. It does no harm for him to know the truth before he goes.”

As he spoke, he felt for the medallion at the man’s waist, tore it off, and rubbed the engravings between his fingers for a moment. He gave a soft “Mm,” tossed it aside, and turned back to me, extending his hand and blinking slowly.

I understood; he had asked everything he needed to. I wrote the coordinates in his hand and watched him push off his knees to stand. A flash of cold light followed.

He seemed to sway slightly as he rose, but the strike was entirely in his style—one clean cut to the throat.

Earlier, there had been a faint, misty moonlight in the alley, but now the moon was hidden by clouds. Xie Huaishuang stood like a ghost, blending into the darkness.

He tossed the sword back to me. I caught it, but he didn’t turn around; he kept his back to me.

“I didn’t want you to come. Killing them will be troublesome once the Temple finds out,” he said slowly. “You and the Temple… if you stay here, you’ll be dragged into this.”

Why did his reasons for driving me away keep multiplying?

“Was it the Temple… that sent you here?”

“Yes and no.” He gave a short laugh. “They didn’t… intentionally mean for me to enter Linlang Pavilion. I haven’t told you what happened before I arrived here.”

Before I could move, he continued on his own.

“The poison took effect slowly. At first, I had about thirty or forty percent of my inner strength left, and I could still see a little. I was picked up by people… ironworkers beneath the Temple. They lived hard lives. They didn’t recognize me, and they were afraid of bringing trouble upon themselves. Once I could move, I left.”

I listened, only half-understanding. Poison? What exactly had happened between him and the Temple?

“I passed through a village. There were mountain bandits, so I stayed.”

“I killed the bandits, but then the poison peaked. I lost my sight and hearing. Men from the Temple came to collect ‘incense money.’ Many in the village sold their children just to pay it. The woman in the house where I was recovering had looked after me, but while she was out, her husband gave me to the collectors instead. Someone… brought us all to Linlang Pavilion.”

So that was how it happened.

How… how could it be like this?

Xie Huaishuang seemed slightly off; his speech grew faster, and his narrative jumped around, lacking coherence.

Was it because the memories were too painful?

“I came here and realized many people from different places were sold the same way… Someone from the Temple always visits. This place is definitely connected to them. That man entered after you left; when I realized he was from the Temple, I took the opportunity to lead him here… I didn’t want you involved.”

According to his story, the picture was clear.

The Temple’s demands for “incense money” were exorbitant, leaving many families destitute. The Temple would pressure them for money, and Linlang Pavilion would take the opportunity to buy people for the brothels at a low price, splitting the profit.

—But where in the world could you find a greater absurdity? The High Priest of the Temple was sold into a brothel because the people who sold him needed money to give to the Temple.

I looked up at Xie Huaishuang’s back, only to see him sway.

Something was wrong.

“The connection between Linlang Pavilion and the Temple is much deeper than I… originally thought. Now that they’re dead, the Temple will know soon. They’ve been hunting your people; if you stay, it will be very dangerous. You…”

I grabbed his shoulder and forced him to turn around. I saw his brow tightly knit, his gaze unfocused, and his forehead drenched in a cold sweat that matted his hair. From that single tug, he actually stumbled.

Xie Huaishuang was in much worse shape than I realized.

Those shallow wounds shouldn’t have caused this. I frantically pressed my fingers to his wrist and found that his meridians, which had finally stabilized over the last few days, were now in a terrifying state of chaos.

How did it come to this? What had he done?

I only know how to build machines; I only learned enough martial arts to cause trouble for the Temple. I didn’t understand this well, nor did I know how his meridians could suddenly collapse like this. But even I knew that at this stage, he shouldn’t even be able to stand, let alone interrogate someone or lift a sword. How long had he been forcing himself to endure?

“What’s wrong with you?”

Xie Huaishuang shook his head, finally losing his balance. As I caught him, I heard his voice in my ear, as faint as a snowflake about to melt.

“Don’t stay here… if the Temple finds you, you’ll be in trouble.”

Sometimes, I really hate him.

…

Xie Huaishuang woke up in the middle of the night. I was in the middle of launching a third mechanical bird; a flash of metallic light as it caught the air currents and vanished into the night.

Based on their speed, they would reach their destinations by dawn at the latest.

Hearing a movement, I immediately shut the window, turned, and strode over to pull back the bed curtains. I saw Xie Huaishuang propping himself up, half-sitting, his eyes filled with a trace of daze.

“How do you feel?”

I pressed him back into the pillows. He didn’t answer, his gaze drifting for a long time before finally landing on me. “Zhu Pingsheng?”

Thank heavens. I should thank him for managing to remember who I was.

I felt his forehead, then checked his wrist. I breathed a small sigh of relief and sat down beside him.

In Iron Cloud City—whether we are engineers, craftsmen, or miners, men or women—we are all strong and healthy. I have rarely seen someone like Xie Huaishuang.

He was so light when I held him. His long hair fell in cascades; when he tilted his head, his neck formed a slender, fragile curve—yet his features remained sharp as a blade, his spine clearly defined.

Throughout this night, from the moment I left to the moment I returned, I had been so afraid.

His pulse was much steadier now, nearly back to where it was before. I adjusted the pillow behind him and poked his palm.

“What do you want? Water? Or something else?”

Xie Huaishuang shook his head, his brow suddenly furrowing. “Didn’t I say… why are you still here?”

I had so many things I wanted to ask him, and I had intended to speak with him calmly, but I didn’t expect his first thought upon waking to be this again. Every stroke I wrote in his hand carried my involuntary anger: “Why shouldn’t I be here? I traveled six hundred miles to find you.”

Six hundred miles that can be spoken of; how many more miles that cannot? Why was he always making decisions for me? Why would he never look at me properly or care about my thoughts?

I always hate him, yet I can never quite say what it is I hate. Do I hate that he always destroys my weapons? That he always bests me by a hair? That he played at gods and ghosts with the Temple?

But he clearly isn’t with the Temple anymore, so why do I still hate him?

What exactly do I hate about him?

Muddled and unable to understand, my writing became increasingly messy: “You’re always driving me away. Have you ever asked what I think?”

“We had a deal. How could you go take such a risk without telling me? And this state you’re in—what is it? What is this poison you mentioned?”

He was like this on the first night at Linlang Pavilion too—drenched in cold sweat, his consciousness slipping. He was hiding so much from me. I had thought that given a little more time, he would be willing to speak, but he was far more stubborn and loathsome than I imagined.

Xie Huaishuang remained silent. I continued writing rapidly: “I’ve already sent for someone who might be able to cure you. If you won’t say anything, I’ll just tie you up and take you there.”

I had intended to wait a couple of days to discuss this with him, but clearly, there was no need to wait. Ye Jingwei has a bizarre temper, but her skill is peerless. I don’t know where she’s hiding and grinding her herbs right now, but including the three birds I just sent, every one of her possible hideouts will be harrassed by my mechanical messengers.

Xie Huaishuang didn’t snap “You can try” at me like he did the first night. He just remained silent for a moment and looked away.

“I know you want to beat me. But for that alone, are you going to throw yourself into this mess?”

After a pause, his voice grew even lower: “You and I… it shouldn’t be like this. It shouldn’t be like it has been these past few days.”

—Like these past few days. What did that mean?

And why shouldn’t it be? In his eyes, what should our relationship look like?

I didn’t speak. He waited for a long time, his fingertips tentatively touching my glove, hooking slightly onto my cuff and giving it a tiny shake. He called out: “Are you listening?”

I wasn’t listening.

I curtly flicked his fingers away and pushed his hand back, but he stubbornly reached out again, spreading his palm to show he wanted me to talk to him.

“Zhu Pingsheng?”

I didn’t want to talk to him either. Nothing he said was what I wanted to hear.

I pushed his hand back again, tucking it under the covers, but it emerged once more, groping until it spread out before me.

What did he want me to say? No matter what I said now, he would just repeat those same few phrases: tell me to leave, tell me not to get into trouble. That was all he ever said.

What was the point?

I resolved not to acknowledge him until he told me the truth, so I pushed his hand back a third time, quite firmly. This time, he didn’t reach out immediately. I looked up, only to see him with his brows drooping, staring at me blankly.

His deep green eyes wavered, filled with a look of utter disbelief.

…I froze. Had I been a bit too harsh with him just now?