Li Fengqi was a martial arts practitioner, and his own fire was strong. He took another medicinal bath that night. The heat of the medicinal herbs radiated from the inside out, turning him into something like a natural fireplace that drew people to get closer. Ye Yunting drowsily followed the warmth and clung to his side, wrapped in a quilt and huddling up to his side like a little silkworm chrysalis. His body was turned sideways to Li Fengqi’s chest, and his forehead ended up against Li Fengqi’s shoulder.
There were only two quilts between them. Li Fengqi could even feel the cool breath exhaled from his nose.
Such an intimate gesture made Li Fengqi, who had always disliked contact with others, subconsciously draw away from him. He tensed his jaw, glanced at Ye Yunting, and used his arms to try to create some distance.
However, his movement created a gap between the quilts. The cold chill penetrated through the gap in the quilt, making the sleeping Ye Yunting shiver from the cold. He frowned, mumbled vaguely, rolled up the quilt and squeezed closer to Li Fengqi. He probably still felt cold after getting closer, so he arched his spine again and stretched his cold hands and feet carelessly into Li Fengqi’s quilt.
Li Fengqi’s quilt was naturally warm. Ye Yunting first extended his hands and feet, and after feeling the warmth, he leaned in until he was completely pressed against the warm body, and only then did he contentedly he fall asleep.
He slept peacefully, and after finding a heat source, he remained in the same position without moving.
Li Fengqi was left alone, his body stiff and tormented.
The body pressed against his was slightly cool, and the skin that occasionally touched his was smooth and warm, like a polished and delicate piece of fine cold jade, cold to the touch. Gradually, as he was held in his arms, his body temperature started to be shared with his.
Li Fengqi took a deep breath, forced himself to close his eyes, and ignored the exquisite and ambiguous illusion.
…
Never before had Ye Yunting had such a good sleep.
He tended to suffer from body cold, and his hands and feet are always cold every winter. In the past, when he was in the Duke’s Mansion, Ji Lian would always warm him two heaters1 and put them under the quilt. He would have one under his feet and one in his arms to have a good sleep.
But ever since he came to the palace, the weather had been getting colder and colder day by day. Not only did he not have heaters, he also deliberately exposed himself to cold in order to carry out his deception. As a result, he hardly had a good night’s sleep in these few days.
Only last night did he manage to sleep soundly, a rarity for him.
Ye Yunting woke up from his sweet dream, sighed contentedly, before he poked his head out of the warm covers to see what time it was. If it was still early, he could sleep a little longer.
But his movement brought him against another warm body.
“!!!”
Ye Yunting was startled, and his scattered thoughts cleared up immediately. His eyes widened and he turned his face sideways in horror, just in time to catch the eye of Li Fengqi who noticed the movement and looked over.
Li Fengqi looked at him for a few moments, his expression indiscernible. “Are you awake?”
“…?” Ye Yunting blinked slowly, his eyelashes trembling like butterfly wings. He looked at Li Fengqi, and then secretly glanced to the left. When he saw the mostly empty bed on the other side and the covers twisted up into a pile, his white ears flushed a hot red.
He curled his toes, he cautiously leaned back, his eyes darted left and right, and smiled awkwardly. “I’m awake.”
Li Fengqi looked at his red ears and his flickering eyes that did not dare to look at him, and all the restlessness that had been lodged in his chest since he had not slept most of the night dissipated. He let out a “mn”, looked at Ye Yunting leisurely, and slowly said, “Then I’d like to trouble you to bring me a set of clean clothes.”
“Why do you need to change clothes?” Ye Yunting asked subconsciously.
Obviously, he had changed into clean clothes after taking a medicated bath last night.
Li Fengqi stared at him with a half-smile. “When two people sleep next to each other, it can get rather hot and sweaty.”
When Ye Yunting snuggled into his bed last night, the coldness of his body felt very comfortable; it was just the right temperature to relieve the heat. But as time passed, Ye Yunting’s body became warmer and warmer. On the other hand, Li Fengqi was affected by the medicine and his body had become very hot. After suffering for half the night, he had sweated all over.
It was just a casual question; he hadn’t expected the answer to be so embarrassing. Even Ye Yunting’s cheeks turned red this time. He jumped off the bed as if frightened, hurriedly put on his shoes and ran out. “I’ll get it for you right now.”
Ji Lian heard the noise and looked up from outside. When he saw him standing in front of the wardrobe in his middle robe2 and rummaging around, he couldn’t help but chime in: “Master, you haven’t recovered from your illness yet, why are you running around without your outer robe?!” “
Ye Yunting didn’t even lift his head: “I know, I know, I’ll wear it right away.”
He used the shelter of the wardrobe to cool down his hot cheeks with his cold hands.
Li Fengqi had kindly given him half of the bed, but in the end, he went too far and buried himself under someone else’s quilt, which was really too much.
When he thought about the nominal relationship between the two of them, he felt even more embarrassed.
Although the large, engraved bed was very comfortable, he’d rather sleep on the luohan bed tonight!
After shuffling back with the middle robe in hand, Ye Yunting handed the middle robe to Li Fengqi, pursed his lips, and explained with lowered eyes, “I didn’t sleep well. Wangye, please don’t worry about what happened last night.”
Li Fengqi took the middle robe and glanced at him. His eyebrows twitched imperceptibly. “It’s cold, and there is no charcoal fire in the house. If you are afraid of the cold, it’s fine for you to squeeze in with me.”
When Ye Yunting heard this, he thought to himself: I didn’t want to squeeze in with you, I just did it unintentionally while I was asleep.
But then he thought of the warm quilt and just had to give in. If he could, he still wanted to squeeze in. After all, it was really warm.
These were just thoughts in his mind, however, and he still said, “I haven’t recovered from the cold yet, so I’d better go outside and squeeze in with Ji Lian tonight, so as not to spread my illness to the Wangye.”
Hearing this, Li Fengqi raised his eyebrows slightly and raised his eyes to look at him, but he didn’t say anything more.
…
After a good night’s sleep, Ye Yunting’s illness was much better.
But to the outside world, he still had to pretend to be sick, drinking bowl after bowl of medicine. Fortunately, he was not the only one to suffer like this. Li Fengqi also had to drink medicine with him–in addition to taking medicinal baths once every three days, he also had to drink decoctions three times a day.
In order to deceive others, Ji Lian mixed the two medicines together and decocted them together, so they drank the medicine together.
Every time Ye Yunting was tortured to the point of nausea by the bitter tonics, he looked at Li Fengqi’s unchanging expression as he drank the bowl of dark decoctions down, and he would feel that it was not so difficult anymore.
After all, Prince Yong’an’s tonic smelled and tasted more bitter than his.
After two days of this, Ye Yunting’s illness was almost healed, but his body was nevertheless still weakened, and his face still appeared pale, bloodless and miserable.
After dinner that day, Ye Yunting was wrapped in a thick cotton robe, holding in his arms a heater that Ji Lian asked a maid to buy, and discussed with Li Fengqi how to transmit the message from the capital to the northern border as soon as possible.
Ye Yunting has been thinking about the dream that he had the day he fell into coma, suspecting that it was something that had really happened in his previous life. As a result, ever since recovering from his illness, he had been thinking about how to avoid this tragedy.
Because Ye Yunting was sick and needed medicine, Ji Lian was allowed to enter and leave the palace once every five days. Now that three days had passed, Ji Lian would be able to leave the house again the day after tomorrow. At that time, he could get in touch with Li Fengqi’s people and ask them to find a way to send the secret message to Northern Xinjiang right away.
The challenge they now faced was that the vigilant Li Zong had secretly cut off all channels for sending letters to Northern Xinjiang. It was likely that Li Fengqi’s people would not be able to find the opportunity to deliver the letter, or that by the time the secret message was sent, it would already be too late.
Ye Yunting always felt that they couldn’t just wait passively. They had to find a way to avoid the emperor’s eyes and ears and send the letter immediately.
“The three states in the capital belong to the Yunrong Governor’s office, and all the checkpoints and post stations are filled with Li Zong’s cronies. There must be many checkpoints on the way to Northern Xinjiang at this time. It will be difficult for my people to avoid his notice.” Li Fengqi traced his finger across Luzhou, Jizhou and Zhongzhou3 on the map. He said in a low tone: “It’s possible to risk sending someone in disguise to divert from Zhongzhou to Fanzhou, and then go to Yuzhou in the west via Jializhou, but it’s a long detour and the travel time will be increased by half.”
“Unexpected things may still happen as time goes by.4” Ye Yunting stared at the map and thought deeply. “Is there no way to hide this from Li Zong’s attention?”
Li Fengqi shook his head; the tiger was bullied by the dog5. If there had been a way, his letter would have been sent out by now.
Ye Yunting held his chin with one hand, frowning in anxiety.
However, Li Fengqi, who was making tea, suddenly inclined an ear. After listening for a while, he said with a strange expression: “There seems to be someone outside calling you.”
The voice was full of energy, penetrated through the eaves, and reached Li Fengqi’s ears.
“Who’s calling me?” Ye Yunting was puzzled.
He poked his head out and called to Ji Lian outside, “Is someone calling for me?”
Ji Lian listened carefully when he heard the words, and it seemed that someone was really calling the young master’s name. He said, “I’ll go out and look,” pushed the door open, and went outside.
Outside the yard, the shouting voice became clearer and clearer, calling out, “Ye Yunting, come out!” and “You really think you’re some bigshot now that you became Wangye, and you didn’t even return home!” and so on.
The more Ji Lian listened, the odder his expression became. That voice… sounded like that of the second son, Ye Wang.
Ye Wang, the second son of the Duke of Guo, had been arrogant and mischievous since he was a child. He was raised pampered in the palm of Madame Yin. Now, at the age of sixteen, he was already well-known as a poseur in the upper capital. Cockfighting, visiting brothels and restaurants–there was nothing he wouldn’t dare to do, and there was no place he wouldn’t dare to go.
The second son Ye Wang and the eldest son Ye Yunting turned into two extremes living in the Duke’s mansion.
Ye Wang6 lived up to his name. He lived recklessly and arrogantly by relying on the power of the Duke’s Mansion and the Yin family; meanwhile, Ye Yunting lived isolated in a corner of the Duke’s Mansion, no one cared for him, and he never even left the Duke’s Mansion’s gates.
But this arrogant and impetuous second young master often liked to cause misfortune onto Ye Yunting ever since he found out that he had an elder brother.
Ye Yunting was good-tempered and didn’t want to cause him trouble or offense. Back when we was living in the mansion, whenever Ye Yunting saw him looking for trouble, Ye Yunting only complied with his wishes. But every time this happened, Ye Wang always became more annoyed. After losing his temper for no reason, he would leave angrily.
He’d come back the next time, and the same thing would happen. Over and over again, without tiring.
Ji Lian thought that after coming to the palace, he could finally escape this demon-lord. He didn’t expect that Second Young Master Ye would be so brazen as to make a scene at the gate of the palace.
===Translator’s Notes===
A new challenger appears! (Well, not a challenger, but you know what I mean.)
Bed-sharing duo is so cute~
- Referring to this thing, which is filled with hot water and placed under quilts, under the feet, etc. for warmth. ↩︎
- My best approximate translation of 中衣, which is the middle-layer (between the inner-robe and outer-robe); see here. ↩︎
- I’m using “state” as the translation for 州 (“zhōu”). So Zhongzhou is “Zhong state” or “state of Zhong”, “Fan zhou” is “Fan state” or “state of Fan”, and so forth. See also chapter 4 ↩︎
- Literally “delay brings about change” (“迟则生变”). ↩︎
- According to here, idiomatic expression which means that when a hero loses power, he is easily bullied by villains ↩︎
- The "Wang"/"妄" in Ye Wang (叶妄) meaning ridiculous or delusional, lol. ↩︎
If you like this story, please consider supporting the author here.
And if you're enjoying this translation, please considering sending a tip via Ko-fi. :D
Can we use this dude?
ReplyDelete