Sitting in front of the haishi qin, he said, “Let me teach Miss Wang Luan to play the instrument?”
Wang Luan sat down beside him and sighed. “I can’t even learn a simple lunzhi qin, let alone something this complex.”
But there was no helping it—her partner pursued an artistic life, so she could only accommodate his hobby.
Yan Qiongyu said, “Then this time, I’ll wait until Miss Wang Luan learns three pieces before I leave.”
For a moment, Wang Luan didn’t even know whether she should work hard at learning.
Yan Qiongyu had outstanding looks; he was naturally suited to being paired with all beautiful things. When he sat before the haishi qin and struck the keys, he seemed to glow. Even though Wang Luan felt she didn’t have much artistic talent, she would still, without noticing, be so captivated by him that she wanted to study seriously.
“Would Miss Wang Luan like to learn an easier piece, or a more difficult one?”
“…A more difficult one.”
Every night, they sat shoulder to shoulder on the piano bench.
Those complex keys could always produce smooth notes under Yan Qiongyu’s leaping fingers, but when it came to Wang Luan, it was basically a live record of a wild haishi qin taming a wild human. Both being wild, they were equally unconvinced by each other.
Under Yan Qiongyu’s patient instruction, Wang Luan developed a kind of pressure that poor students feel when facing a teacher… ah, so this was the kind of romance he wanted from teaching her the haishi qin?
Once again, Wang Luan stumbled and stopped. Yan Qiongyu said to her, “Miss Wang Luan.”
This gentle wife, who had been tormented for many days like someone tutoring a child’s homework, was probably about to comfort her again, Wang Luan thought in shame.
“Miss Wang Luan plays the haishi qin as if the keys are burning hot,” Yan Qiongyu sighed.
Wang Luan: “…………” No longer ashamed! Not only not ashamed, but now she wanted to commit domestic violence!
Ending the part Yan Qiongyu excelled at, the momentum shifted, moving on to what Wang Luan was good at.
A section of the vegetable patch on the second-floor balcony had been cleared. Wang Luan hadn’t yet had time to plant the next round of vegetables there. Yan Qiongyu somehow obtained some flower seeds and said he wanted to plant flowers.
He was only responsible for saying it; the actual execution was left to Wang Luan.
Because Yan Qiongyu was the type who would ruthlessly ruin flowers but didn’t know how to plant them, Wang Luan condemned his behavior of wrecking all kinds of vegetables and blossoms in the garden the moment she wasn’t watching. Only after she promised to let him deal with some of the flowers that didn’t bear fruit did he finally spare those vegetable blossoms that were diligently producing yields.
From soaking the seeds and raising seedlings to transplanting them, Yan Qiongyu watched Wang Luan’s entire process of planting flowers. He couldn’t understand why she could tell which seeds wouldn’t sprout without testing their quality, why she didn’t use instruments to observe the growth stage of the seedlings yet could tell at a glance when they were ready to be planted, why she didn’t consult any materials yet knew the watering and fertilizing frequency, knew what temperature they needed.
“If this were an experiment, Miss Wang Luan, you didn’t use any precise data at all, and relied solely on feeling to arrive at the best and most correct result. What kind of talent is this?” Yan Qiongyu marveled.
“Something this simple still needs instrument assistance?” Wang Luan launched a bloodline-level disdain at him.
Yan Qiongyu: “…………” All right, now it’s my turn to be the poor student.
He sensed the secret smugness Miss Wang Luan was hiding beneath her calm expression.
The flower seeds Yan Qiongyu had insisted on planting bloomed.
Wang Luan had thought that by his aesthetic standards, what grew would be something gorgeous or unusual, but the flowers that bloomed were unexpectedly plain and ordinary.
Brilliant golden-yellow stamens, pure white petals, resembling a kind of daisy—here, they were called jinyun flowers.
When Yan Qiongyu occasionally stood on the balcony watering the vegetables, he would casually pinch the hose and, in an almost charitable manner, give this patch of jinyun flowers a couple of splashes.
When he looked at these flowers, he always seemed to be thinking about things that weren’t particularly easy, his expression light, appearing not to like these flowers very much.
Yet if one were to say he didn’t like them, from the time the flowers bloomed onward, he would frequently pick a handful and place them around the house as decoration.
This kind of flower was common and easy to grow, with strong vitality. Once the flowering season arrived, it was like chives—after one harvest, new buds quickly grew again. So even though Yan Qiongyu ruined them for flower arrangements every few days, this flowerbed still looked dense and crowded.
Just as Yan Qiongyu had said before, he never left, staying by her side and living a fairly regular, ordinary life.
When two people who are too close spend a long time together, it’s inevitable that they’ll discover some troublesome aspects in each other.
When Wang Luan was repairing machinery and felt her hair falling into her eyes, she impatiently picked up scissors and cut her bangs off in one stroke.
When Yan Qiongyu saw her botched bangs, he stared at them several times, then while she was asleep during her midday nap, he fixed her bangs again.
After all, in her previous world Wang Luan had been a girl. Having been a girl for more than twenty years, her concern for her own appearance still exceeded that of most single alphas. Cleanliness and neatness were basic requirements; every quarter she would also buy herself new clothes, and she bought skincare products for wiping her hands and face as well.
But when Yan Qiongyu lived with her, he cared about everything concerning her even more than she herself did.
When her hair grew a bit longer and became somewhat messy, he would urge her to get it trimmed; he would also help her cut her nails, each nail needing to be rounded and polished smooth.
As for her clothes, in the two months Yan Qiongyu stayed here, she gained four more wardrobes. He bought her all kinds of dresses, pants, and matching accessories, though he seemed to favor a certain uniform style and bought many of those for her.
Indeed, the cut was very flattering, and they looked good when worn… it was just that Yan Qiongyu wasn’t even this particular about himself.
Wang Luan had a strange feeling: Yan Qiongyu seemed more to be treating her as a Bluestar woman, rather than as an alpha.
She asked him about it, and Yan Qiongyu replied, “You’re already demanding yourself to be a normal alpha, but I have no demands of you at all. It’s just that whatever you like, I’ll prepare it for you.”
For a moment, Wang Luan felt a bit dazed.
The environment’s power to shape a person really was strong. Back on Bluestar, even if she didn’t want to put on makeup, when her colleagues all did, she would go along with the flow and make herself conform more to the standard. In this world, alphas pursued strength and didn’t value adornment, so without realizing it, she had also moved closer to that rule.
There was only Yan Qiongyu—he was the one who noticed that she wanted to wear a wedding dress at the wedding and made one for her. He could perceive certain hidden cares that even she herself hadn’t noticed, and took care of everything that an alpha shouldn’t concern herself with.
“Miss Wang Luan, have you been happy lately?”
“Happy.”
Happy to the point that the subtle fear in her heart grew a little every day, afraid that such peaceful, joyful days were overdrawing the time yet to come.
ততততততততততত
Wang Luan was always working at the spaceport. With so many ships coming and going, it brought in plenty of news from outside. Recently, the various ships involved in transport and smuggling people had been talking most about sightings of star bandits and legions on nearby routes, saying that the imperial legions were conducting anti-bandit operations here.
But this was already a chaotic zone. Fighting breaking out nearby would only make it even more chaotic, and everyone was used to it.
Wang Luan didn’t take it to heart. One day, after finishing work and heading back, she ran into a few alphas committing robbery on the way. When she got home, she even told Yan Qiongyu about it as something novel.
“I haven’t run into a robbery for a while. These few should be new—fresh faces. I heard somewhere nearby started fighting, a lot of businesses got affected, and people who can’t do business anymore just switch to robbery. A traditional skill of the chaotic zone,” Wang Luan said, then reminded Yan Qiongyu, “Aren’t you feeling unwell these past couple of days? If you go out, remember to call me.”
She felt it was just a small matter—after all, it wasn’t the first time she’d encountered a robbery—but after hearing it, Yan Qiongyu’s expression immediately darkened.
Wang Luan hesitated. “Why do you look like I was the one who got beaten up? I was the one who beat up the robbers.”
Yan Qiongyu quickly returned to a smiling expression. “That’s true. Miss Wang Luan is very formidable now.”
After praising her, he added as if casually, “If things have gotten more chaotic lately, Miss Wang Luan should be even more careful. It’s not just robberies here—there are also lots of scams and pickpockets, right? I’m not worried about alphas, but you’re far too friendly toward omega women and beta women…”
He didn’t finish, but gave her a look that said, you understand what I’m worried about, right?
Wang Luan: “…………” Was he reminding her to stay away from “the opposite sex”? But this expression didn’t look like jealousy either.
Because of Yan Qiongyu’s reminder, Wang Luan didn’t go out for several days. This day, she went to the cargo ships at the spaceport to receive goods—some parts she had ordered had arrived.
Who knew that just after getting the items, she ran into two omegas hiding in a cargo hold. The moment they came face to face, the two of them lit up and rushed straight at her.
Wang Luan caught the scent of pheromones coming off them and took off running. No joke—Yan Qiongyu’s nose was that sensitive. How could she dare get close? Getting even a trace of that scent on her would be over! The marriage would have problems!
She ran, the two omegas chased. Wang Luan had seen brazen alpha robbers before, but she had never seen omegas this brazen—daring to chase an alpha.
Glancing back, she saw that one of the omegas was actually coughing up blood while running, clearly injured.
Wang Luan was speechless. She couldn’t turn around and knock them flying with a punch each—that would easily cause deaths. With a headache, she fished out some loose money from her bag and scattered it toward them. “Stop chasing! The money’s here—take it and go!”
She carried a large box of parts and ran home. Yan Qiongyu took one look at her and asked, “What happened?”
How did he know just from one look?
Wang Luan had no choice but to tell him honestly. “I ran into two omegas who wanted to rob me. I attacked them.”
Yan Qiongyu said, “How did you attack them? Did anyone die?”
Wang Luan said, “Probably not. I attacked them with money.”
Yan Qiongyu: “…………”
Wang Luan didn’t understand what these “robberies” were really about, but Yan Qiongyu did. These were all people from the Utopia. Under Fu Qi and his directives, the Li family legions had already cleared out most of Yan Mu’s remaining forces, and the battle lines were still seesawing back and forth.
