Outside, Dan Shuang and Chi Xue initially felt uneasy, but seeing her fall asleep so quickly, they felt a faint heartache.
The Crown Princess appeared composed and at ease, but actually lived constantly maneuvering and walking on thin ice. Now that she had finally left the imperial capital, on this desolate sea under drooping stars and vast plains with no one in sight, being able to relax and sleep peacefully was a good thing.
The two women stood guard on the left and right at the cabin entrance. The tall man looked displeased and snorted.
Chi Xue ignored him, but Dan Shuang raised an eyebrow: “What are you snorting about?”
“Toothache.”
“I think it’s an itchy mouth.”
“Not really. Just seeing a young master sleeping soundly while having his maids stand guard all night makes my hands itch a bit.”
“Don’t like what you see?” Dan Shuang sneered coldly. “None of your damn business. If you dare make a move, I’ll make sure your head never itches again.”
The tall man wasn’t backing down: “Please, give it a try.”
Chi Xue couldn’t stand listening anymore and pulled Dan Shuang: “Alright, don’t disturb our master’s sleep.”
Over there, the short man also said to the tall one: “Brother, brother, visitors are guests. You can’t offend people like this. When we travel abroad, we can’t be this arrogant. When traveling ten thousand li, one should make friends in all directions…”
The tall man: “…Shut up!”
A moment later, the four faced each other. Chi Xue and the short man nodded at each other with fake smiles, while the tall man and Dan Shuang engaged in a battle of loving and killing with their eyes.
In the cabin, Tie Ci slept peacefully. Next door, Money Brother didn’t fall asleep so quickly and hadn’t expected that someone could actually fall asleep so fast like this. He turned over to face Tie Ci.
The other side was very quiet, even the breathing was shallow. Through the bead curtain, he could vaguely see the curves of her body—her waist and hips were attractively slender, her legs surprisingly long, curled up pitifully with nowhere to rest.
Money Brother closed his eyes but still couldn’t sleep. After thinking for a moment, he pulled out his hairpin, and his full head of black hair cascaded down.
He used the jade hairpin to lift the bead curtain and saw Tie Ci’s profile. The cabin was dark, and the upper half of her face couldn’t be seen clearly. Only a ray of moonlight streamed through the outer reed curtain, falling precisely on her delicate chin. The jawline flowed smoothly like a master calligrapher’s wonderful brushstroke, and her skin was as thin and translucent as crystal.
His gaze slowly moved down, pausing briefly on her flat chest, then withdrew.
The jade hairpin retracted. He snorted and also turned over to sleep.
He had only slept for a short while when Tie Ci woke up.
She had always been a light sleeper and would definitely wake up at least once every hour. On this unfamiliar boat, she naturally woke up even faster, because there was always a strange fragrance lingering, reminding her this wasn’t her Ruixiang Palace.
The fragrance seemed like wood incense, like flower fragrance, with a faint hint of vast and refreshing scent that made one think of white egrets flying over rivers, the egrets disappearing into endless white grass, the white grass stretching endlessly to connect with floating clouds, with someone dancing hazily among the floating clouds. Graceful as a startled swan, yet vigorous as a dragon.
That dragon suddenly flew down from the clouds, opening its mouth toward her, its sharp teeth gleaming with cold, snowy light. Tie Ci startled awake, groggily opened her eyes, but only saw the black boat ceiling, while the sound of oars made this small space seem even more silent.
She turned her head, hearing steady breathing beside her—this person didn’t even snore. Curiosity arose, and she also lifted the bead curtain. Her vision suddenly crashed into a pair of red lips.
Those lips were thin yet soft, with beautiful lines, and what was even rarer was the rounded lip pearls. In this vague darkness, she could only dimly see the other person’s long hair cascading down, covering half his face, with faintly visible snow-white skin like a contrasting backdrop, vividly outlining those red lips into something bright… and seductive.
Like a budding rose with its heart half-hidden, every petal speaking of charm.
Tie Ci was stunned for a moment, feeling somewhat confused. Could this be a woman?
She looked down, but the person was sleeping on his side, and she could only see that the body’s curves were indeed slender and beautiful, but couldn’t really make out any gender characteristics.
Secretly watching someone’s sleeping face in the middle of the night—the Crown Princess felt this wasn’t very honorable. So she lowered the curtain and continued sleeping.
Sleep she did, but her mind kept floating that rose. She sighed inwardly, feeling tears flow from the corner of her mouth, and quickly wiped them away. Closed her eyes.
Since the other person’s sleeping posture was natural, she felt reassured this time and slept more comfortably.
For example, while sleeping, she turned over and propped her pitifully long legs up on some high place.
Her long arms also stretched out, grabbing something slippery and holding it tightly.
After a while, she extended her wolf claws and habitually grabbed for the Pikachu pillow from her bed in Ruixiang Palace.
…
Next door, that person suddenly had a mountain descend in his dreams, pressing on some unspeakable place. With a struggle, he woke up.
Opening his eyes, he saw an extra long leg on his leg.
That long leg in snow-white silk pants was slender and straight, very beautiful, but the place it was positioned wasn’t very appropriate.
He stared at that leg for quite a while, as if planning to stare a hole through it with his gaze, or use his gaze to force this bedfellow who had crossed the boundary line to understand what restraint meant.
However, the bedfellow was obviously rather confused and not only didn’t withdraw, but after a while, spread out her hand and casually grabbed his hair.
He slowly turned his head to look at his hair. Before he could decide whether to chop off the claw or the fingers, the fellow next door turned over and bear-hugged him.
Money Brother: “…”
I thought propping feet and grabbing hair was the limit, but apparently my morals limited my imagination.
His fingertips reached out.
Just as he was about to deliver this lecher to his throat, he suddenly paused, his nose twitched, sniffed once, then sniffed again.
A moment later, he lowered his head, preparing to burrow into Tie Ci’s chest to sniff carefully.
But at this moment, Tie Ci suddenly opened her eyes and immediately saw a dark head approaching her chest, very lewdly about to press against her already bound-flat chest.
She raised her hand like lightning, one arm blocking across her chest, the other hand’s five fingers like iron, fiercely grabbing the other person’s shoulder and slamming outward—
The other person’s reaction was no slower than hers. The moment she raised her hand, without lifting his head, his snow-white fingers had already reached out, instantly grasping her throat with icy coldness, extending his arm and forcefully shoving her backward!
After a “whoosh” sound came two cracking sounds. The cabin walls on both Tie Ci’s side and that person’s side simultaneously broke through!
The two men and two women on deck looked up in shock and saw two white figures burst through the cabin walls, still entangled together in mid-air. Both simultaneously lifted their legs, wanting to kick the other away, then with a bang their knees collided. A faint creaking sound arose, and the four people on deck looking up all felt their knees go weak.
But those two seemed to be cast from iron, not making a sound, and once again simultaneously changed position, lifting their legs. Crack crack crack crack—rapid successive sounds as they kicked at each other countless times in that instant of aerial confrontation, practically kicking out afterimages. The continuous crisp cracking sounds made people’s whole bodies go numb. Suddenly Chi Xue screamed: “Master, stop quickly—”
But it was already too late.
The next instant, with a splash, water splashed up half a zhang high.
The two fighting people fell into the water simultaneously.
The moment they hit water, the two separated. Tie Ci surfaced with a splash, wiped her face, and smiled at the person opposite.
That person’s black hair was soaked and sticky, clinging to his face and draped over his shoulders, only vaguely revealing half a snow-white face. Though completely drenched and should have looked disheveled, under the full moon and shimmering light on the vast sea, he still looked like an unstained lotus flower amid the sound of waves and disappearing clouds.
He floated in the water, staring at Tie Ci. Tie Ci’s hair bun was also disheveled, and though she was in the boat’s shadow, she didn’t look disheveled either, glowing hazily like a bright moon.
The two looked at each other for an instant. Tie Ci smiled and struck with her elbow.
Crack—the boat hull was forcibly struck with a hole.
The person opposite: “…”
Having smashed his boat right in front of the owner, Tie Ci felt no guilt and absolutely wouldn’t stop. She grabbed the edge of the hole and wrenched hard. With another crack, she tore off a large piece of planking. With a swing of her arm, the heavy plank floated lightly several zhang away, skipping beautifully on the sea surface.
Tie Ci shouted: “Dan Shuang! Chi Xue!”
On deck, Dan Shuang grabbed Chi Xue and leaped, landing on that plank.
By this time, Tie Ci had already broken off the second plank, dismantling half the hull. She cracked off two more long strips, and with a push of her arms, the planks were shoved several zhang away. She slapped the ship’s rail, grabbed those two long strips and flipped upside down in mid-air. The next instant she had landed on the plank. Loosening her arms, the long strips fell down, perfectly positioned as left and right oars.
Her series of movements were swift and efficient. Before the tall and short men on deck could react, she had already completed sinking the ship, dismantling the boat, arranging for her maids, and so on. With a stroke of both oars, she was already ten-odd zhang away from the broken ship in the blink of an eye.
The tall and short men felt dazzled.
They’d seen people with quick reactions, but never anyone this quick.
“Splash”—another sound as the white figure emerged from water. In mid-air, his sleeves swept and struck the ship’s side. Immediately the remaining half of the ship also fell apart. The tall and short men hurriedly found suitable planks to stand on. The white figure flashed and the man landed. The tall man stared at his face, couldn’t read the young master’s emotions, and tentatively asked: “Chase?”
Although the ship was destroyed, if the young master really wanted to catch up, there would definitely be countless ways.
But the man didn’t answer. He picked up something in his hand and held it up to the moonlight.
It was an extremely small seal made of Shoushan Tianhuang stone. Its fine and pure texture need not be mentioned. The seal had no characters, and the pattern was also very peculiar—one couldn’t understand what it was at first glance.
He looked carefully for quite a while, then turned to look into the distance. Tie Ci was rowing the plank away into the moonlight. Seeing him look over, she raised her hand with fingers to her lips, then flicked her hand.
He naturally didn’t understand this was a flirtatious blown kiss. But this didn’t prevent him from understanding the ill intent within. So he also smiled and nodded, while steering his plank in another direction and making a motion of tossing the seal up and catching it.
Seeing this from afar, Tie Ci was momentarily puzzled, then suddenly remembered something and quickly felt her waist sash, then froze.
When she turned back, the sea surface was misty and hazy—where was that fellow’s figure?
Tie Ci planted one foot on the head of the plank and let out an angry roar that startled countless gulls and egrets.
“Little thief!”