The living room was so quiet that even the sound of a pin dropping could be heard. Aside from this self and the head of the household sitting opposite, everyone else had nearly the same expression of shock.

Inwardly, they were all thinking in unison—

What are these two doing?

What on earth is Gu Ci saying?

Does he himself even know what he is doing???

And also, what does “you are free, I do not want freedom” mean? What drama are you two acting out?

Compared to Big Black, Little Black, and the group of aunties, the uncle at the side was even more shocked.

This nephew, from childhood till now, had almost never shown the liveliness and impulsiveness that peers ought to have. Gu Ci’s personality then and now was similar—appearing gentle and courteous, even praised by some as warm and refined like jade, but in truth he was more aloof than anyone, or perhaps one should say calm to the extreme.

But now…? Did this have the slightest relation to calmness?

The uncle thought of the currently popular time-travel drama—could it be that Gu Ci had been possessed by someone else’s soul?

……

Even without using her eyes to look, Yan Luqing could still sense, from this environment that was quiet to the extreme, the question marks and exclamation marks radiating from the people around.

But the question marks on her own body were not few either.

Yan Luqing stared fixedly at Gu Ci, thinking of his every action just now—first closing the door she had opened, then speaking those words.

She always felt, could it be that just now it was the original body’s mental illness acting up, so she had a hallucination?

It should not be, right? She had already brainwashed herself thoroughly. Even if she truly could not let go, it should not have reached the point of such an outrageous hallucination.

Her saying “free now” was just a joke.

She had never restricted Gu Ci’s freedom. In the beginning he could not leave, but afterwards? Gu Ci had never said halfway that he wanted to leave this place.

Then why did he follow her words downward to say… that he did not want freedom?

“No, actually, what I meant was not freedom, it’s just…” Yan Luqing was somewhat incoherent, then paused to buffer her emotions, once again adjusting her word order, “I know that actually you being here is also quite free, but the way I said it just now was a joke. This freedom I meant, refers to—”

“Refers to.” Gu Ci cut off her words, his gaze sweeping toward the suitcase at the side. “Packing my luggage, driving me away?”

Yan Luqing refuted in a small voice: “It’s not, I asked Big Black to pack just to help you save time…”

“Oh,” Gu Ci nodded, “so it was saving time, to drive me away faster.”

Yan Luqing: “…???”

No, that’s not right!

It was getting more and more off-track!

Should this really be the point he was focusing on?

When his uncle was abroad, Gu Ci video-called him every day from here to handle company affairs. Now that his uncle had returned, even came here to fetch him, why was he reacting like this again??

And most crucial of all—she clearly did not want it either!

The moment Yan Luqing recalled, she was filled with grievance from the past two days.

What kind of days had she been living? On one hand she had to deal with those people, pretending to be extremely magnanimous, showing that Gu Ci could leave whenever he wished and she would never stop him. Yet after coming home and seeing Gu Ci, she would get tangled up again, thinking: after he leaves, how will the two of them still meet?

He was not someone who took initiative. Would it really become like ordinary friends, contacting once every ten days or half a month, and in the end falling to the point of only being able to meet again at class reunions?

……

Aside from all this, she even had to brainwash herself, comfort herself! Thinking things like, only two months of being a wife, forgetting will be easy.

Easy, my ass! How could someone like Gu Ci be forgotten just like that!

Whenever Yan Luqing had some frustration, she always wanted to complain to Gu Ci first. This matter, however, she could not even bring up. And whenever she wanted to find Makka Pakka, she would hear it over there celebrating Gu Ci finally leaving, rejoicing with glee.

It was really unbearable.

When Yan Luqing had first spoken the words, she had already begun thinking of what to drink tonight with Big Black and Little Black to ease the matter of sending Gu Ci away.

Never did she expect things would develop to this situation now.

Gu Ci was still waiting for her to speak. Yan Luqing looked at him and dryly explained: “I did not mean to drive you away, mainly it’s—”

On impulse, she almost blurted out “mainly because the plot has reached this point,” but fortunately stopped herself in time.

“Mainly because I’ve been hearing these days that your uncle is coming back, and today he even came here, so I thought you definitely…”

Yan Luqing had only spoken halfway.

Gu Ci interrupted her words a second time.

“Why listen to what those people say.”

Yan Luqing was stunned: “…What?”

Gu Ci’s hand had already been taken back from the doorknob, hanging at his side, but now suddenly lifted, resting against the cabinet behind her—strikingly similar to the position when he had been caught last time. She was still standing by the cabinet, only this time he did not press so close, merely placing one hand there, as if casually propping himself.

Yet with this action, it seemed to block the view of everyone else in the living room.

Yan Luqing looked at him as he opened his mouth, speaking slowly: “Regarding my matters, do not listen to what others say.”

Her eyes suddenly widened.

With his back shielding the sight of the others, Gu Ci placed one hand on the cabinet, while the other reached toward the side of her face, briefly brushing her auricle, tapping twice. “Listening is fine, but you can only believe what I tell you.”

His face did not smile, but in his brows and eyes there was an indescribable gentleness.

“What you want to know…” Gu Ci’s voice was very soft, as if deliberately not wanting others to hear, “I will tell you everything.”

These last six words were as light as a sigh, yet Yan Luqing heard each one with precision, even feeling the lingering tenderness in the ending sound.

Her mind, which had been a muddle these past few days, always filled with wild thoughts, and her heart, which had been beating ceaselessly, was suddenly filled completely with his words.

——What you want to know, I will tell you everything.

She inexplicably thought of that somewhat nervous yet somewhat amusing hypnosis.

At that time she had thought she succeeded, but later, because of another one of Gu Ci’s astonishing operations, she began doubting herself. Yet, since she could not find any motive for Gu Ci to cooperate with her in answering those questions, Yan Luqing still felt there was indeed a possibility that her hypnosis had succeeded.

But after he spoke these words, she suddenly realized.

Could it be…

It really was him deliberately cooperating?

Gu Ci, seeing her remain silent, suddenly gave a slight laugh, the corner of his eye hooking into a beautiful curve: “Remembered?”

Yan Luqing blankly nodded.

“Then,” he pointed at the suitcase to the side, still smiling, “can my luggage be sent back now?”

Yan Luqing nodded again, but halfway through, a voice came from the living room—it was Gu Ci’s uncle.

“Mm—cough.” He heavily cleared his throat. “We’re still here, you’re just treating us like we don’t exist? Is there anything you can’t say in front of us? Hm?”

“……”

Gu Ci casually withdrew the hand propped against the cabinet and also withdrew his smile. He turned around, striding over to stand before his uncle. “Why did you come early?”

“They first notified me that the flight was delayed, but later, I don’t know how, it took off on time again,” the uncle said. “So I came earlier.”

Although Yan Luqing was still in a peculiar state, her brain somewhat sluggish, her eyes still followed Gu Ci, watching the men in the living room from this angle.

Gu Ci and his uncle were nearly the same height; he was just a bit taller than his uncle.

At the side, Big Black and Little Black were tall too, only their appearance, build, and complexion were too different. The four of them standing together formed a sharply divided scene—princess and the princess’s family; and the princess’s servants.

While Yan Luqing was arranging her bodyguards in her mind, Gu Ci was continuously conversing with his uncle.

“Uncle, your coming today was purely unnecessary,” Gu Ci said calmly. “Tomorrow night, you don’t need to come in the door, I’ll go out to find you.”

Then he paused, issuing a dismissal order: “Then now, go to the company and work?”

“……”

“???”

The uncle’s face was utterly bewildered. He turned again to look at the two bodyguards beside him, whose expressions had been filled with grievance when he spoke with Yan Luqing earlier. But now, as they looked at Gu Ci, they were extremely pleased.

Was Gu Ci really treating another family’s home as his own now? And it even seemed he had won people’s hearts?

Most crucial of all, this young miss of the Yan family… seemed to have no objection to it???

The uncle turned to look at Yan Luqing again, only to find her standing at the entrance, gazing at Gu Ci in a daze.

“……”

Alright then, so it was mutual affection.

The uncle sighed with laughter and shook his head, bidding farewell to everyone before heading to the villa’s front door, getting into the car, and leaving.

Yan Luqing had barely spoken the whole time. Somewhat stunned, she watched Gu Ci’s conversation with his uncle, then bid farewell with him. Afterwards, when his uncle seemed to reprimand him for something, Gu Ci, seemingly reluctant, still stepped outside to see him off.

In Yan Luqing’s mind there was a constant sound of static, and Makka Pakka kept trying to contact her. But even though Gu Ci had gone out, he still seemed to be right on the edge of blocking it, so the voice could not get through at all, only the buzzing of electric current.

She slowly drifted back to the sofa and sat down, casually scooping up a pillow into her arms.

This pillow had been drawn by Yan Muliang in these past two days. With emotions pent up and nowhere to vent, she had poured all of it into the drive to paint, and thus—

She produced many items of merchandise related to “bamboo shoot.”

This pillow was a green bamboo shoot, wearing a crown, in a chubby chibi style, just the right size to hug in her arms.

After she sat down, she heard movement at her ear, as if the princess had returned after sending someone off, and Big Black and Little Black, the two maidservants, expressed extreme joy that the princess would not be marrying far away.

After that, the sofa beside her sank down—it was Gu Ci who had come to sit.

The instant Gu Ci saw the suitcase, what first flashed through his mind was this very day in his previous life.

Thinking carefully, the people he saw across both lives were the same, except that her son Little Black and the wolf were new additions. Most of the faces in this house were vaguely familiar.

That day, with the help of his uncle, he escaped, battered and exhausted.

And this time, it had become a whole family packing up his belongings to send him away.

The same people, yet an entirely different scene.

Pushing the door open and seeing it suddenly, there was a sense of—indeed, this was exactly the sort of thing she would do.

Although Yan Luqing explained that it was because his uncle had returned to the country, and that it was news given to her by the Yan family.

But on his birthday night, Big Black and Little Black had already cried with him. They had long since heard from her that he was leaving.

——So, she knew of this day.

It was as if she were Doraemon, knowing so many things.

Although much of it was still unclear, yet when Gu Ci hypnotized her at that time, he had never once thought to take the opportunity to ask out the answers.

Not because he had already guessed the general outline.

But because, if she did not voluntarily say it, then any answer asked out held no meaning.

……

From the corner of her eye, Yan Luqing saw Gu Ci sit down. A few seconds later, he picked up the remote control, turned on the television, tuned it to her favorite channel, the entire series of motions as fluid as if done ten thousand times, then asked: “Before I came back, what did he say to you?”

He meant his uncle.

Yan Luqing answered truthfully: “We hadn’t talked for long before you came back. He asked my name, family members, age, my relationship with you, what school I attend, what major I study…”

Before, she had always felt that chatting with his uncle was strange. But as she was recounting it to Gu Ci, she suddenly realized what exactly was wrong with this conversation—

This was especially like the scene when a young couple first meets the parents!

“……”

Yan Luqing was made somewhat speechless by her own thought, and her face grew a little hot.

What “meeting the parents”! What nonsense!

“He asked your relationship with me?” Gu Ci seemed only interested in this one point, picking it out deliberately, then asked with what looked like great interest, “What did you say?”

“I just said… high school classmates, and then…” Yan Luqing herself didn’t know what was wrong, her voice inexplicably grew softer and softer as she answered, “friends.”

As if she herself had no confidence in it.

Hearing this, Gu Ci paused just the right amount of seconds, then let out a long “oh,” sounding somewhat disappointed.

“……”

At once the atmosphere changed because of that long, magnetic syllable.

What had been plain and calm suddenly grew alive, every one of his movements became clearer, even the colors of the surrounding furniture seemed to grow more vivid.

Yan Luqing, clutching the soft bamboo shoot in her hands, had not yet reacted at all, when immediately after, Gu Ci launched the next volley.

“Head of the Household, a little hurt.” Gu Ci looked at her, his eyes slightly lowered, and beneath the long lashes his gaze appeared especially aggrieved. The corner of his lips tugged, “To think you listened to what others said, and wanted to drive me away.”

“…!”

Yan Luqing’s hair practically stood on end.

This was acting spoiled, wasn’t it! Again? Addicted to acting spoiled, is that it?!

Yan Luqing had absolutely no way of dealing with him like this. Clearly she had a bellyful of words she wanted to say, but at this moment all of them were swallowed back, and she weakly defended, “It really wasn’t…” At the same time helpless, at the same time like a husband who had done wrong promising his wife, she said, “I won’t listen anymore in the future, is that not okay?”

“……”

Gu Ci smiled faintly: “Okay.”

Yan Luqing let out a breath of relief, as if the husband who had promised had gained his wife’s approval.

After a pause, realizing the content she was imagining in her head, she suddenly gave the bamboo shoot a hard squeeze—

Stop imagining these absurd domestic dramas!!!

Gu Ci, seeing the strength in her hands grow greater and greater, spoke with a smile: “If you squeeze it again, it will deform.”

Yan Luqing snapped back, following his gaze to the chubby bamboo shoot pillow in her hands.

What? This is your true form, and you even feel distressed seeing it?

After this inner ridicule, still, Yan Luqing had to admit she was indeed squeezing too hard. It was about to be crushed into a skinny bamboo shoot, so she released her fingers.

Yet she still wanted to shake off that ridiculous little play in her brain, so she deliberately searched for a topic, asking Gu Ci: “Why did you come back at noon? Are you not going to school in the afternoon?”

Gu Ci did not answer her first question, only said: “Mm, not going.”

“Oh,” Yan Luqing responded, and subconsciously asked, “Why?”

“Today looks rather dangerous.” Gu Ci turned his head, lips curving as he said, “If I go to school again and come back, won’t I be unable to even get through the door?”

“……”