Still Secretly In Love With My Enemy Today - Chapter 9

Chapter 9: 

I knew those few words from that “Ugly Creature” would give me nightmares.

—And I was right!

In fact, at the time, I didn’t realize I was dreaming. In Tieyun City, during festivals, people would also blow horns, beat drums, and hang lanterns and colored banners. The reflections of the lights would flow across various metals, and the perennial damp mist would look a bit thinner under the illumination.

Except, I vaguely remembered that there hadn’t been any solar terms or holidays lately. I was trying to calculate what day it was when suddenly, someone pushed me.

Only then did I realize I wasn’t wearing my usual simple, black, tight-sleeved robe. Instead, I was wearing a deep red, gold-embroidered outer robe with wide sleeves. I wasn’t even wearing gloves.

When had I ever worn such clothes?

“Lift the veil! Lift the veil, quickly!”

A crowd of people with blurred faces gathered around a very familiar figure, clamoring and pushing forward. I saw the bridal veil adorned with fine tassels, swaying back and forth.

It certainly wasn’t my own intention to lift it, but for some reason, my hand reached out, grasped a corner of the veil, and flipped it upward.

The crimson veil was lifted, revealing a face like fine white porcelain. Xie Huaishuang’s long brows had originally been lowered; now, his eyelashes trembled slightly as he raised his eyes to look at me. The deep green pools of his eyes reflected my stunned image.

Someone nearby shouted “A hundred years of harmony,” and instantly, tens of thousands of voices echoed “A hundred years of harmony” from all directions. Startled, I hurried to cover Xie Huaishuang’s ears, only to see that he was holding amber-colored goldfish—sugar-coated ones—wagging their syrup tails on both sides.

I couldn’t hear Xie Huaishuang’s voice clearly; I only saw his lips moving.

“Your face is so red.”

—On my second night staying at the Linlang Pavilion, I jolted awake in the middle of the night once again.

The clamor receded instantly like a tide. The room was clearly quiet; only a sliver of moonlight filtered through the window paper, dimly illuminating the room. Occasionally, the sound of a Kite-Mech sliced through the distant night sky. In the silence of the room, the sound of my own breathing was exceptionally loud.

How could I have such a terrifying dream?!

With a lingering fear, I glanced to the side. Through a landscape screen, I saw no movement behind the bed curtains. Good, Xie Huaishuang was still sleeping obediently. He wouldn’t stare at me like he did just now, much less suddenly come over to marry me…

…Wait, he moved!!

Clutching the quilt, I instinctively shrank back, watching the corner of the bed curtain lift behind the screen with absolute vigilance. A blurry figure was elongated by the moonlight.

I shrank back further. Just being touched by his shadow felt like being burned.

“What’s wrong?”

His voice was slightly softer and raspier than during the day, carrying the tone of someone who had just woken up. The scene from my dream—the red veil lifting and Xie Huaishuang raising his eyes to look at me—flashed before my eyes. Just looking at him now made the back of my ears feel hot; I couldn’t help but avert my gaze.

Problem was, Xie Huaishuang currently couldn’t see or hear. To speak to him, I had to touch his palm. From experience, if I ignored him for three sentences, he wouldn’t be able to sit still.

“Are you… are you awake?”

Sure enough, before he could say a third sentence, he propped himself up on the edge of the bed and prepared to grope his way over without even putting on shoes or socks. Gritting my teeth, I pushed aside the quilt, circled the screen, pressed him back down as fast as possible, and immediately let go.

Pushed back to the edge of the bed, Xie Huaishuang froze for a moment. He tilted his head up and looked at me with great confusion, waiting for an explanation.

“Can’t sleep,” I wrote quickly. “Just getting up to walk around.”

Xie Huaishuang tilted his head and let out an “Oh”: “Can you still not sleep now?”

My mind was a mess. I tapped randomly in his palm twice.

After a dream like that, I’d be too terrified to sleep for the rest of the night—what if I fell asleep and dreamed of marrying Xie Huaishuang again? What if…

My sleeve was tugged. I looked down and saw Xie Huaishuang speak: “Are there stars outside?”

Why ask that? What did he take me for, his eyes?

Dream on.

I pushed the window open slightly and saw a crescent moon and scattered stars. I closed the window, went back, and told him: “Yes.”

Xie Huaishuang propped his hands on the edge of the bed, his gaze wandering aimlessly for a moment before landing on me—his “aim” was getting very accurate now.

“When I can’t sleep, I count stars,” he said, looking up. “I find it very effective.”

Effective?

Maybe his stars are quiet. But in the middle of my starry sky, his sword shadows are everywhere. The more I look, the more I can’t sleep.

—Damn it. Why aren’t I in his stars?

Feeling indignant, I wrote in his hand: “Doesn’t work for me.”

Doesn’t work at all. It only makes me want to stay up all night to build a better weapon.

The emerald green flickered as he drew back into the shadows of the curtains. “Alright.” He paused for a moment before leaning back out: “I’ve also heard… that talking to someone is more useful than just lying there alone. I’ve never tried it. Have you?”

“Never.”

“Then let’s try it.” Xie Huaishuang smiled—though it was only a very light smile. “Maybe it will work.”

When this man smiled, he actually didn’t seem so loathsome; like a magnolia unfolding its petals by half an inch. I tucked him back into the quilt, leaving only his left hand out.

“What do you want to say?” I told him reluctantly, “I can stay and chat for a few words—only a few.”

Xie Huaishuang blinked: “Wasn’t it you who couldn’t sleep? How did it become ‘chatting for a few words’ with me?”

If he didn’t speak, no one would take him for a mute.

“What do you want to say? If you won’t talk, I’m leaving.”

Xie Huaishuang thought for a moment and asked me: “I’ll ask you a question, and you ask me one. Is that okay?”

I tapped his hand twice. I heard him say: “How much money did you spend to be here?”

…He picked exactly what I didn’t want to talk about right off the bat.

“None of your business.”

He made an “Oh” and nodded. “Your turn to ask.”

What should I ask him? If it were that arrogant Priest of the West Wing Temple, I’d have a thousand, ten thousand questions. But when it came to this quiet Xie Huaishuang with his long hair flowing, I couldn’t ask a single one. After thinking for a long time, I finally wrote the first stroke in his palm.

“Do you hate me?”

Xie Huaishuang raised his eyes and looked at me quietly. After a long silence, he slowly spoke: “Not exactly.”

What does “not exactly” mean?

I chewed over those words back and forth, then heard him say: “Do you hate me, then?”

So I immediately told him: “Not exactly.”

Go ahead and guess. If I can’t figure it out, he shouldn’t be able to either.

Grudges must be repaid on the spot!

Xie Huaishuang didn’t get angry; he actually laughed—was he not fully awake? He had laughed two or three times in this short period. Had he ever smiled at me once in the past ten years?

Could it be that he hates me so much that he smiles at everyone, even passersby, but just won’t smile at me?

Of course, I don’t care. Not a bit.

Xie Huaishuang’s lips were still pursed, leaving only a hint of a smile at the corners. “It’s your turn.”

Actually, there was a question that had been hovering in my heart for a long time. I thought it over and wrote on his hand: “Can I ask a question that isn’t very pleasant?”

Xie Huaishuang was silent for a moment and nodded. “Yes.”

I deliberated over the wording several times. My fingertips touched his palm, lifted, dropped again, and lifted again.

“Were you also tricked into coming here?”

Xie Huaishuang didn’t have much of a reaction. He gave a hum: “In a way.”

It was his turn to ask. This time he also hesitated before speaking: “What did you originally come here to do?”

…If you want to ask if I came to visit a brothel, just say it.

Actually, we hadn’t agreed that we had to tell the absolute truth, but I felt he had been telling the truth so far, so I didn’t want to lie to him.

He had already been tricked into this place; how could I lie to him too?

“To find you.”

“To find me?”

Under the heavy curtains and the pale moon, the light was dim, and my brain felt foggy from the low-voiced conversation. This question made me realize suddenly how suspicious that sounded.

—If it were a stranger, how could they specifically come to a place like this to find him?

I stared at Xie Huaishuang nervously—there was no way he wouldn’t notice. If he asked for my identity…

“Your turn to ask.”

He didn’t follow up with a single question, brushing the issue aside lightly.

Maybe he really wasn’t fully awake?

I was half-suspicious, observing his expression. I asked him again: “Your injuries are very severe. Were you harmed by someone?”

This was a very important matter. I had been thinking about it since last night and still had no clue. Ordinary people couldn’t get near him. The Temple relied on him for prestige; they had no reason to harm him. Tieyun City certainly wanted to take him out, but even I couldn’t do it, let alone anyone else.

Who could it be?

Xie Huaishuang let out a soft “Ah” and shook his head. “Not entirely.”

…Why can’t this man speak plainly? It’s like a riddle. Just now it was “Not exactly,” and now it’s “Not entirely.”

A swordsman whose meridians are ruined, and who knows if he was poisoned to the point of losing his sight and hearing… if it wasn’t someone else’s doing, could he have done it to himself?

I can’t rely on this “Riddle Man.” I’ll investigate it myself.

In any case, whoever caused him to fall into this state, don’t think you can get away with it.

It was Xie Huaishuang’s turn to ask again. His eyelashes lowered, the shadows trembling a few times, then raised again. Two deep green pools gazed at me.

“Do you truly ‘not exactly’ hate me?”

I hate you most of all. I hate you most of all.

My hand has been very disobedient lately—both in and out of dreams. What I wrote in his palm was the complete opposite of what I was thinking.

“Truly.”

Xie Huaishuang’s eyes narrowed slightly. He tilted his head and asked me: “Then do you still want to know what my Senior Sister said to me that day?”

Why bring that up?

Answering immediately would make me seem too eager. I restrained myself for a while before writing quite reservedly on his hand: “If you want to tell me, I can listen.”

Xie Huaishuang’s left hand closed slightly. His fingertips touched mine, brushing against each other for only a moment.

“She said,” Xie Huaishuang seemed to have made a decision, speaking slowly, “In the future, would I be willing to leave with you.”

After all that guessing, it turned out to be this. Haven’t I asked that hundreds of times too—

Wait. I stared at him. I remembered that day clearly; he hadn’t shaken his head. His eyes had flicked toward me very quickly.

Before I could feel happy, he spoke again softly.

“Once the matters of the Linlang Pavilion are settled, assuming my luck is good enough.” He said softly, “But I still don’t know where you intend to take me…”

He spoke a few more words. His voice was very soft, but in an instant, it felt like a thunderclap exploding in my ears.

One word at a time, he spoke my name: “Zhu Pingsheng?”