Su Xi’s heart pounded like a drum, her face flushing again—her Zai Zai had been really strange lately! The scary thing was, she had also been strange lately—blushing for no reason! He said he prayed for a fated match, but it wasn’t like he said he prayed for one with her. What was she getting so flustered for? Maybe he prayed for that Liu Ruyan he used to meet secretly by the riverbank?!
Lu Huan looked steadily at her, his thin lips parting as though he wanted to continue. Su Xi was so frightened she jolted, and hurriedly exited the game: “Farewell, I just remembered I haven’t washed my bowl!”
Lu Huan: “……”
Su Xi hid in the bathroom, looking into the mirror with a miserable expression—only to see her face red like a monkey’s butt. She: “……”
On Lu Huan’s side, after offering prayers at Yong’an Temple, everything should now be settled. Next came some military affairs of the Zhenyuan Army waiting for him to handle, and Zhong Ganping also needed to discuss matters with him regarding the over one hundred manor farms throughout Yan. He had just returned after rendering great service; the people were grateful, and the emperor’s favoritism was obvious. Even though the other princes wanted to contend for the throne, they couldn’t make any rash moves for the time being. In other words, for now, nothing major was happening on his side.
What wasn’t good was Su Xi’s side.
She didn’t dare stay home. As long as she stayed home, she would think of how, these past days, Lu Huan had looked at her, the things he said, the tiny subtle gestures he made…
…In the rising white mist, those dark, glistening eyes lingered in her mind, making her heart a tangled mess, unable to calm down, unable to finish any homework.
So she hugged her summer homework, grabbed her phone, and went to Gu Qin’s house to work on assignments.
Lu Huan didn’t know where Gu Qin lived; he probably hadn’t unlocked that location yet.
Gu Qin’s mother prepared watermelon and air-conditioning, letting the two stay home to do homework, while she and Gu Qin’s dad went back to work. So only Gu Qin and Su Xi were left in the house, working a bit, snacking a bit. Su Xi did her best to throw away the inexplicable emotions that had been surfacing these days. She did manage to enjoy watching some dramas with Gu Qin, but after half a day passed, an empty, hollow feeling rose in her chest again, as though she hadn’t seen someone for a long time.
She absentmindedly ate chips, her hand reaching into Gu Qin’s bag.
“What are you doing? You’re totally distracted.” Gu Qin slapped her hand away. “Eat your own.”
Su Xi suddenly sat upright, looking at Gu Qin seriously. “I want to ask you for advice.”
Gu Qin snorted in laughter, glancing at her. “Say it—you’re in puppy love, right?”
“Not that.” Su Xi pushed her a little. “Be serious. It’s like this… I’m playing a game—an ancient-era one. Lately it’s been really strange. I suddenly can’t bear to reach the final stage anymore, and when I realized the game character isn’t as dependent on me now, I felt really sad. Not only that—when I see the game character getting even a little close to other characters, I feel uncomfortable… Obviously it wasn’t like this at the start. In the beginning I was even really excited to pick a consort for him…”
Gu Qin crunched her chips loudly and said, “That’s normal. A lot of people who play games get like that. It means you’ve fallen for a paper man.”
“Fallen? Impossible?!” Su Xi was so startled she almost jumped up. After a moment, she sat back down cross-legged, face red, murmuring, “Then what if… the game world is actually real, and he’s not a paper person…”
“Friends don’t get possessive.” Gu Qin touched her forehead. “Xixi, you’re definitely running a fever.”
She looked at Su Xi with sympathy. “It’s only been a few days since finals ended, and you’re already playing games until you’ve lost your mind?”
Su Xi: “……”
“No way.” Su Xi was still hung up on that word “fallen.” Her heart was beating fast, but as she stared at the empty chip bag, she couldn’t help saying, “At most I just treat him like raising a Zai Zai, like a friend…”
Besides, with the two of them belonging to different worlds, being able to meet through a screen was already something miraculous. Anything beyond that, Su Xi didn’t even dare think about.
Even if she dared think it, what could come of it?
That world had gone from frost disaster and displaced commoners to nationwide celebration, gradually gaining new signs of life. The common people knelt across the northern border, knelt before Yong’an Temple—Su Xi had seen their eyes. The way they looked at Lu Huan held reverence, as though looking at a savior. According to the set main storyline of the game, he would one day become the ruler of a nation. After finally obtaining all of this, what he wanted most should be to fulfill his ideal: allowing his people to live in peace.
Going to another world, with nothing to your name—that was something she had no courage to do, so she had no courage to ask him to do so either.
Of course, these tangled thoughts were only swirling messily in Su Xi’s mind. Gu Qin didn’t understand what she was talking about, and Su Xi had no way to discuss it with her.
She sighed, dejectedly kneading the empty chip bag.
───♡───
On Lu Huan’s side, it was raining heavily. He stood beneath the eaves of the manor, silently watching beads of rain fall in threads. The candlelight in the night wind flickered, nearly extinguishing.
He looked at her expression on the curtain—how she wanted to speak but held back, and at that line of text that popped up: “At most I just treat him like raising a Zai Zai, like a friend…”
He pressed his lips together. Though he tried his best not to feel disappointed, his heart still sank like a stone dropping to the ground.
He stood beneath the eaves for a long while. His sleeves had become slightly damp before he slowly returned to himself. Lowering his eyes, pretending he wasn’t that sad, he put away the curtain and returned inside.
───♡───
Because her heart was in turmoil, Su Xi didn’t go online for two days. After dinner that day, she finally logged in.
Once she logged in, she noticed that the lantern she had given her Zai Zai had been hung inside his new manor’s bedchamber, and even the boxes she used to store rouge and other trinkets had been moved over as well. Wherever her Zai Zai went, he moved them too… She suddenly felt strangely guilty.
This time Lu Huan had already finished court and changed out of his court robes. Wearing ordinary attire, he was seated behind the desk in the study handling affairs.
Su Xi wasn’t sure whether he had opened the curtain and could see her, so she sneaked in quietly and watched him for a while. She didn’t know why, but after just two days offline, he seemed much thinner. Could it be that even after becoming a prince, he still had this much official business? Su Xi immediately felt injustice on his behalf. He had only just regained his identity as a prince, why was the emperor dumping so much work on him?
She watched for a bit, planning to slip away unnoticed, when Lu Huan suddenly lifted his head on the screen and said, “You’re here.”
Su Xi jumped in fright and quickly greeted him. “Uh—yeah! I’m here. I saw you were busy, so I didn’t disturb you.”
She was terrified he would say something like those previous times—stuff that made her brain freeze—but unexpectedly, today her Zai Zai said nothing of that sort. He only looked at her gently and said, “You didn’t come these two days. Were you rushing to finish your summer homework?”
Su Xi immediately said, “Yes! There’s so much homework!”
Lu Huan smiled and said, “Shall I help you write it?”
Su Xi was amused by him, and her tense mood instantly eased a lot. “Zai Zai, you go handle your own military affairs first.”
Hearing the “Zai Zai” that slipped out of her mouth, Lu Huan’s slender fingers holding the long brush paused. He fell silent, lowering his brows. Though he tried hard not to show it, there was still a faint bit of desolation in his expression.
Su Xi’s heart tightened. She wanted to slap herself twice on the spot.
After a moment of silence, she forced her tone to sound light and cheerful as she said to him, “I’ll go continue my homework. I’ll come find you tomorrow.”
Lu Huan looked at her, wanting to speak but stopping.
Su Xi’s throat tightened, thinking he would say something again, but he only pressed his lips together before raising his brows slightly and smiling: “It has already been five days since I last saw you. Could you not wait until tomorrow? If you have nothing to do tonight, could you also come visit me?”
Su Xi let out a breath of relief and quickly agreed. “Okay, no problem.”
She picked up her bowl and chopsticks and walked toward the kitchen to wash them. At the same time, she switched the interface out of her Zai Zai’s study and was about to log off. But then she suddenly noticed two lines of eunuchs from the imperial palace entering through the manor’s garden, carrying an imperial decree. The head eunuch was saying something to the Yulin Guards stationed at the Ninth Prince’s manor—
Judging from this, had something major happened in the capital, and the emperor was sending her Zai Zai to handle it?
Feeling uneasy, Su Xi turned on the faucet with her left hand and switched her interface with her right.
And then she heard the head eunuch saying to the Yulin Guard: “Yesterday, Her Majesty the Empress raised the matter to His Majesty that the Ninth Prince is already seventeen years old, yet he does not even have a concubine to manage the household. Everything is handled by the steward, and he has no one close to him—this is improper. Therefore, today, I was sent with portraits of several noble ladies for His Highness to choose from.”
The Empress?
Su Xi instantly remembered that the Empress belonged to the Crown Prince’s faction. Right now, both the Crown Prince and the Fifth Prince were targeting her Zai Zai; they simply could not act rashly for the moment. Sending noble ladies to the Zai Zai’s side was the easiest method to carry out at present.
Which meant—holy crap! The consort-selection scene she used to hem and haw about was finally here…?
But why did her fingertips suddenly feel cold?
Su Xi stared blankly as the Yulin Guard stepped aside after hearing the eunuch’s words. The head eunuch then led the others toward the inner hall to find Lu Huan.
“……”
In the past, she had always thought this scene would make her extremely excited—with so many beauties, her Zai Zai would surely be dazzled choosing among them.
But when it actually happened, she stood before the sink washing dishes, her limbs frozen stiff, her mind going blank, ears ringing, unable to even hear the running water.
And when she finally snapped back—
Plop—
Her phone fell straight into the sink.
Su Xi’s soul nearly flew out of her body. She scrambled to pick up the phone and hurriedly wiped the water off with absorbent paper.
But the screen was already black, and no matter how she pressed it, it wouldn’t turn on.
At the same time, Lu Huan frowned, as if sensing something was wrong.
He stopped his writing hand, lifted his head, and looked toward the curtain that had never been closed.
Suddenly, the curtain flickered—
And then disappeared.
Just like that—disappeared?
Lu Huan’s face went pale as paper. He immediately stood up, reaching toward the air as though wanting to grab the curtain.
But there was no trace of it remaining.
In panic, he took large steps toward where the curtain used to be.
The movement caused the desk before him to shake violently, crashing to the ground and breaking into pieces.
Yet he remained standing alone, left behind in his hall—
