The Cannon Fodder Was Pampered By The Tyrant - Chapter 12

“You are my little assassin.”

A smile tugged at the corner of Si Yan’s lips. Her gaze drifted toward the side of the room. The back palace was vast and empty; there weren’t many places to hide.

Si Yan intentionally raised her voice. “A fool’s dream.”

As expected, the window curtains flickered slightly. Satisfied, Si Yan withdrew her gaze and continued, “Thinking you can dismiss me with just a few scraps of paper? You’ve made it far too easy.”

The curtain fluttered again for a moment, as if protesting, or perhaps feeling wronged.

Si Yan rose slowly, teasingly saying, “I never noticed these curtains were so restless. Could it be..”

Lin Yutian’s body had been stiff with tension, but suddenly, the world brightened. Si Yan’s elegant, beautiful face appeared abruptly in her line of sight.

Si Yan said tonelessly, “A ghost?”

Caught red-handed, Lin Yutian’s face flushed with embarrassment.

Si Yan narrowed her eyes. “So, it’s a ghost that likes to stir up trouble.” She let go of the curtain and turned to leave. In a panic, Lin Yutian forgot everything else and reached out, grabbing Si Yan’s wrist. “Wait!”

The corners of Si Yan’s mouth were already curved upward, but she refused to turn around, her voice intentionally cold. “Let go.”

Afraid she would truly leave, Lin Yutian pleaded, “Can you give me a moment? I want to apologize to you.”

Si Yan’s profile remained haughty. “I fear I lack the fortune to receive it.”

“You have it! You definitely have it!” Seeing an opening, Lin Yutian scrambled to use every good word she knew. “May your fortune be as vast as the Eastern Sea and your life as long as the Southern Mountains… It was I who was sinister, cunning, a lowly person…”

Before she could finish, Si Yan spun around, catching her in her arms and pinning her against the wall. Si Yan’s eyes were brimming with laughter, there wasn’t a hint of anger left. “At least your self-assessment is accurate.”

Lin Yutian wasn’t even angry at the mockery. She didn’t even notice how intimate the position was instead, she looked into Si Yan’s eyes, carefully searching her expression. “Si Yan, are you still mad at me?”

For some reason, Si Yan didn’t like seeing Lin Yutian so cautious. She preferred the way Lin Yutian bickered with her when she had nothing on her mind. This version with red-rimmed eyes and a voice too afraid to speak up was not what Si Yan wanted to see.

“Yes, I am.” Si Yan pressed her forehead against Lin Yutian’s. “Why didn’t you come find me on the first day?”

Lin Yutian felt a pang of grievance. “I thought you would come back.”

“Then why didn’t you come to me?”

Lin Yutian lowered her eyes, refusing to speak. Si Yan pinched her cheek. “Talk.”

Lin Yutian still remained silent. Si Yan finally used her ultimate threat: “If you don’t speak, I’m going to kiss you.”

“I…” Lin Yutian hated dissecting herself like this. To her, it felt like exposing her vulnerabilities to someone else. Her intuition told her this was how one got hurt. But a subconscious thought emerged: Would Si Yan really hurt her?

“I was afraid you wouldn’t let me in,” Lin Yutian finally admitted her worry. After saying it, she didn’t dare look at Si Yan.

To her surprise, Si Yan laughed even more beautifully, as if mocking her silliness. “You certainly have a wild imagination.” She pinched Lin Yutian’s cheek again. “Aren’t you the assassin who has killed countless people? The more I look at you, the less you seem like one.”

Lin Yutian’s face burned. She stubbornly countered, “I just… I just don’t want to show my true strength.”

Si Yan suppressed a laugh. “Mhm, I thought as much. Not only do you not want to kill me, you even apologize. I’ve never seen an assassin like you before.”

Feeling insulted, Lin Yutian blustered, “Don’t get ahead of yourself. I just don’t want to win unfairly. If you keep me around, I’ll still kill you if I find the chance.”

“Alright, I’ll be waiting,” Si Yan replied calmly. “What do you want for lunch?”

Lin Yutian didn’t expect the topic to change so fast. Her thoughts were interrupted, and she forgot what she was just saying. She scratched her cheek. “Roasted duck.”

“I’ll have the imperial kitchen prepare it,” Si Yan arranged. “Go sleep for a while.” She tilted her chin toward a small bed in the hall.

Lin Yutian felt the embarrassment of being seen through. She muttered a lie, “I’m not sleepy…”

But the words weren’t convincing. Lin Yutian had fair skin even a little lost sleep showed. Right now, there were faint dark circles under her almond-shaped eyes, and her lips were slightly parched. Si Yan remembered applying lip balm for her during those nights, the dryness was likely because she hadn’t been drinking enough water. Without Si Yan there, she lived so carelessly.

“I see.”

“?” What do you see?

Si Yan said with a half-smile, “Ayu is inviting me to sleep with her.” It was a statement, not a question.

Lin Yutian: “?” When did I say that?

“I’m not sleepy, I don’t want to sleep. Your Majesty, you sleep first, I’ll just watch from the side.”

Before getting into bed, Lin Yutian resisted in every possible way, as if sleeping with Si Yan were some terrifying beast. However, Si Yan ignored her protests, pulled her onto the bed, and gathered her into her arms. Within minutes, Lin Yutian lost the battle against exhaustion, her eyes closing as her breathing became perfectly steady.

Si Yan wasn’t sleepy yet. She took out the letters Lin Yutian had written to apologize. A smile crept onto her lips. Finally, she took a brush and wrote one bold, sharp character on the last page that asked, “If you’re unwilling, can you authorize Lin Yutian to apologize in person?”

[GRANTED]

From that day on, Si Yan moved back into the bedroom. With Tang Yu’s example fresh in their minds, the palace maids were even more discreet about rumors. Everyone knew the Emperor was keeping a young maid in her quarters, but no one dared speak of it.

Even though Si Yan had been on the throne for three years and had eliminated most of her enemies, some outliers remained. News that the current Emperor “favored women” began to spread through spies to various kingdoms, causing many to shift their secret plans.

Meanwhile, Lin Yutian had no energy to continue her “quest for death.” On the night they reconciled, she discovered her period had started. Her cycle was irregular sometimes coming only once every few months, but lasting nearly three weeks when it did. Back in her senior year of high school, it hadn’t come for half a year. She used to worry she had a terminal illness but feared the hospital was too expensive, planning to save up money from work first. Who would have thought that after transmigrating, this body would still suffer from such agonizing cramps?

Lin Yutian didn’t need to find ways to “die” anymore; she felt like she was dying right now.

Ayu, get up and drink some ginger water.”

Si Yan had stayed by Lin Yutian’s side for the past few days, handling all government affairs in the room. Usually, she could tune out all noise to focus, but a slight turn or a pained groan from Lin Yutian made her restless. Sometimes, when the pain was peak, Lin Yutian would grab Si Yan’s sleeve and beg her to just kill her.

Si Yan had summoned various imperial physicians. They all concluded that it required slow nourishment and that Lin Yutian was burdened by too much suppressed “mental gloom” and overthinking, which worsened the condition. Si Yan could only follow the physicians’ orders, having the maids brew ginger soup with a bit of brown sugar to warm her stomach.

Lin Yutian didn’t even have the strength to speak. No matter how she positioned herself, it hurt. She was drenched in cold sweat, looking completely lifeless. Hearing the voice, she could only feebly shake her head.

“Be good.” Si Yan wiped the sweat from her forehead with a silk cloth, her voice incredibly tender. “Drinking a little might make you feel better.”

Lin Yutian couldn’t respond, she just pressed her lips tight in protest. But she hadn’t eaten well in days, only being fed bits and pieces by Si Yan while in a daze. Seeing no other way, Si Yan lifted Lin Yutian so her head rested on her arm, took a sip of the ginger soup herself, and leaned down to pass it into Lin Yutian’s mouth.

Because she did it slowly, Lin Yutian didn’t choke. Her mind was foggy, unable to distinguish what was happening. After swallowing the soup, her first words were a weak, aggrieved accusation: “I’m already like this… and you still want to kiss me.”

“…”

Si Yan helplessly continued. Lin Yutian had no strength to resist and let her be.

After the bowl of ginger soup was finished, Lin Yutian drifted back into a deep sleep.

She had a dream. In the dream, she was thirteen, and her period had just started for the first time. Her stomach hurt so much she could barely walk, but even so, she had to do chores for her parents. She vividly remembered the grease in the kitchen and the ice-cold water. She felt like vomiting from the pain, but she obediently finished everything.

“Your brother’s clothes can’t go in the washing machine. Hot water won’t get those stains out. Don’t be lazy, use cold water and scrub them clean.” Her mother was holding her brother, playing games, ordering her around as if it were only natural.

Lin Yutian, face pale, looked at her father who was laughing at videos on his phone, and silently accepted her fate. She sat on a stool alone, washing clothes until past 11:00 PM. She had to wake up at 5:30 AM for school. The water was so cold. She had thought about using hot water secretly, her mother probably wouldn’t find out but after weighing the consequences, she didn’t dare.

She didn’t have her own room. When she finished hanging the clothes and tried to go to her “bed” a small cot made of wooden planks in a corner, her mother stopped her again. “Go out and buy some drawing pens for your brother. He needs them for school tomorrow.”

Lin Yutian was at her limit; her legs were shaking. She whispered, “My stomach hurts.”

“Stomach hurts?” The woman frowned. “Why would it hurt?”

Lin Yutian gripped her pants. “My… period came.”

“You’re only thirteen and you started?” Her mother looked surprised and annoyed. “I told you to eat less junk food and stop drinking cold water, but you never listen. Now look, you’re precocious; you won’t grow tall now.”

Lin Yutian pursed her lips. She had no allowance, she had never even eaten “junk food.”

“Go buy them now,” her father said, looking up from his phone with an air of authority. “We raised you this big, and you hesitate over buying some pens? What’s the use of you? When your mother gave birth to you, we should have thrown you in the trash to fend for yourself. Other people don’t hurt, why do you? So dramatic.”

Lin Yutian’s brow furrowed, and her breathing became ragged.

Si Yan, sitting beside her, gently patted her cheek. “A-Yu, wake up.”

When Lin Yutian opened her eyes, they were bloodshot and her breath was short. The first thing she saw was Si Yan sitting by her side, looking at her with a deep frown. Si Yan touched her head softly. “Did you have a nightmare?”

Lin Yutian didn’t want to speak. Si Yan set aside the scrolls she was reading and said with focused intensity, “It’s alright. I am here. No one will hurt you.”

Lin Yutian’s vision slowly focused on Si Yan’s face. She subconsciously grabbed Si Yan’s sleeve. “My hands are cold.”

Si Yan caught Lin Yutian’s palm. She found it was actually quite warm, but she silently wrapped her own hand around it to warm it further. Lin Yutian was startled by the heat of Si Yan’s palm, it brought her back to reality. She realized what she had just said.

But what she didn’t expect was that Si Yan actually did it. Why? Lin Yutian didn’t understand. Even her own family wasn’t willing to go this far for her.

While warming her hand, Si Yan asked, “Does your stomach still hurt badly?”

Lin Yutian blinked slowly. She wanted to nod, but then slowly shook her head.

“I knew it,” Si Yan said knowingly. “Even if I ask, you’ll only be stubborn.”

Lin Yutian looked dazed again. “You…” The words were on the tip of her tongue, but she couldn’t help asking, “Why are you taking care of me?”

Si Yan blinked, intentionally teasing her to lift her spirits. “You are my person. If I don’t take care of you, who will?”

Lin Yutian’s eyes flickered, and her cheeks flushed pink. “I’m not your person…”

“Fine,” Si Yan corrected herself playfully. “You are my little assassin.”