Su Minguan: “…”

He had forgotten!

From her tone, it seemed she had been looking forward to this day all along!

Su Minguan suddenly felt his sincerity was misplaced, casting her a wronged glance.

“A’Mei,” he began lecturing, “it’s hard to go from luxury to frugality. Besides, this was originally my cabin—I haven’t even charged you rent yet.”

He didn’t obediently pack up and leave. Instead, he continued opening his clothing chest, seriously selecting tonight’s sleepwear.

Inviting gods is easy, sending them away is hard. Lin Yuchan watched him warily, feigning concern: “Sleeping curled up all the time causes poor blood circulation—careful you don’t get paralyzed.”

“Getting angry to death by you beforehand would prevent paralysis.” He spread out his bedding matter-of-factly. “Besides, you could sleep closer to me, overlap a bit so it’s not so cramped.”

Lin Yuchan hesitated again, unable to bring herself to ruthlessly drive him away. After all, the weather was cold and harsh, and Wuhan was several degrees colder than the coastal areas. Having a natural heating stove in bed felt quite nice.

Though the crew quarters were vacant, they likely hadn’t been cleaned up—filthy and messy was a certainty. While he had initially volunteered to sleep there, who wouldn’t want to sleep more comfortably? Forcing him to go there would be somewhat against her conscience.

Before she could decide what to do next, her body tilted, and someone captured her center of gravity. Her internal organs gave a sudden jolt as he laid her down on the bed, his hand cupping the back of her head, shielding her from the cold board wall.

“Don’t move from this position, just sleep.” Su Minguan leaned over her, whispering in her ear, “I won’t disturb you.”

Lin Yuchan was flustered by his breathing, grabbing the blanket to wrap herself tightly, tucking the corners firmly under her shoulders, seriously reminding him: “I don’t trust you. Yesterday you…”

“You wanted to warm your hands first,” he turned the tables, righteously arguing back, “you touched me first.”

Her face burned hot. “But But-but I never said I wanted to warm my feet too.”

“You didn’t. You were pretending to sleep.”

“…Because I’ve been sleep-deprived lately! All thanks to you!”

“That’s your problem. I sleep quite well.”

“You call last night sleeping quite well?”

“If you were more obedient, I could sleep even better.”

Su Minguan finished this scheming remark, seeing her about to get up, he preemptively caught her hands, pressing his body forward to pin her down through the blanket so she couldn’t move at all.

She finally felt a bit afraid, turning her head away and warning in a tiny voice: “I’m not yet…”

The last word melted against her lips. It didn’t take him long to taste the lingering foreign wine fragrance on her tongue. It seemed like rose wine, not too strong—he was satisfied. He knew she had good judgment.

But suddenly she struggled a bit, the wine fragrance retreating, slight resistance between lips and teeth.

Su Minguan withdrew accordingly, looking at those moist red lips under the lamplight, soothingly dotting her brow.

“Two months and twenty-three days left.” He gathered the vague curves under the blanket, nuzzling her cheek with his nose tip, saying coaxingly, “You promised to be good to me.”

She hesitated, “But I haven’t…”

“Don’t worry,” his eyes held warmth, like a blazing fire in snowy fields that made people want to approach yet fear its heat, “I have my limits too.”

Whether she understood his meaning or not, her face flushed to her ears as she uneasily pulled her hands out, wanting to pull the blanket up a bit higher.

Su Minguan chuckled softly, helping her pull the blanket to her shoulders while picking off a strand of hair that had been crushed loose.

He wasn’t the rash and reckless young master of Eastern Mountain. He was clear about what he had given up in this lifetime.

Of course, casual affairs seemed not to violate any prohibitions. If he were completely selfish, he could experience all earthly pleasures during these remaining two months and twenty-three days.

But… what about her?

When the spring dream ended, she might grow tired of this drifting, rootless life. If… just if, she belonged to someone else in the future, she would still need to live properly.

He couldn’t let his selfish desires prevent her from having a decent life later.

Even though she was completely under his control. He chose not to be a slave to power.

He chose safe places, kissing her softly and densely, deliberately ignoring his physical sensations, focusing on counting how many eyelashes she had.

Finally, he made her ticklish. She laughed and dodged: “Alright, how long are you going to keep playing?”

Su Minguan answered quickly, “Until you’re not afraid of me.”

Lin Yuchan tentatively opened her eyes, looking at his smooth profile silhouetted against the dim kerosene lamp’s lively arc of light. His throat moved with his words, and behind each spoken word seemed to hide hundreds of tender, sweet phrases.

That instinctive, primal tension gradually disappeared. After hesitating for a long time, she opened a corner of the blanket.

Warmth enveloped her, sending shivers down her spine.

From this warm void, she grasped at a completely unrelated topic, asking him: “Not leaving tomorrow?”

During the past few days sharing a bed, both had been very careful—either reading or chatting about very proper, boring topics until neither wanted to continue talking and closed their eyes to sleep.

“Tickets aren’t sold out yet.” Su Minguan nestled her little head against his chest, saying casually, “Besides, tomorrow’s weather looks poor—it might snow, making travel impossible. The dock has already agreed, staying three to five more days is no problem.”

Lin Yuchan hummed in agreement, calculating that they shouldn’t be too late returning to Shanghai.

She also planned that when they passed through Anqing on the return journey, if there was time, she could finalize next year’s raw tea supply with Anqing Yixing Tea Company. Currently, Boya’s two subsidiaries—one in Xuhui, one in Anqing—could completely handle every step of the tea production line, from tea trees to export packaging, full process tracking…

Suddenly, she heard low laughter, her cheek pressed against the chest, gently trembling.

“Where do you want to go tomorrow?” Su Minguan asked her, “Don’t spend another day running around docks and markets.”

Seeing her expression, he feigned surprise: “I guessed right.”

Lin Yuchan smiled embarrassedly: “Docks and markets are fun too.”

When people move, they live, when trees move, they die. Always being confined to one area inevitably limits one’s perspective.

When Lin Yuchan first fled from Guangzhou to Shanghai, she suddenly discovered a new world, and her entire life seemed to have unlocked a new map.

Now, deep in the inland along the Yangtze River, she felt she gained something every day.

Not limited to specific achievements like acquiring tea companies, observing steam tea-pressing machines, eavesdropping on foreign firms’ secret agreements, or recording prices in various places. All the new things she saw along the way, every word she heard, every small incident she experienced… all subtly influenced her, becoming absorbed into her cognition and experience, turning into foundation stones in the hall of her life.

This feeling was wonderful. In modern society, supported by extensive communication networks where people could tour the world without leaving home, “traveling ten thousand miles” seemed less important, and people became numb to the impact of unfamiliar things.

But in the Qing Dynasty, where everything was three beats slower than people, having opportunities for such deep travel already put her ahead of ninety-nine percent of the population.

Su Minguan watched her zone out very indulgently. After a while, he poked her arm, laughing: “You’re so hardworking, I’d feel bad going anywhere to play tomorrow.”

Lin Yuchan was entranced by his teasing.

Wuhan, eh. Yellow Crane Tower should be visited, right? What other scenic spots were there?…

But remembering something, she still expressed regret in a small voice: “I have business tomorrow. I… I want to visit the American Consulate in Hankou.”

Su Minguan was somewhat surprised, pulling her head out of his embrace to face each other, with a few inches of air between them carrying their mingled warmth.

The blanket blocked the bean-sized lamplight, making both their faces appear unclear in the dimness. Further down, their clothing-wrapped bodies were also unclear, full of shadowy contours.

Su Minguan swallowed, taking Lin Yuchan’s hand and placing her slender fingers between his teeth, nibbling intermittently.

“What are you going to the American Consulate for?” he asked, then figured it out himself and advised her: “To report that Smith fellow? It’s useless—no evidence, just a waste of time.”

Lin Yuchan tried to withdraw her hand but couldn’t, not knowing where he’d learned this strange habit. She struggled to lift her head, her gaze sweeping over a row of books of various sizes on the shelf, wondering if he’d seen it in some English adult novel.

She could only let him have his way. Her fingertips felt hot, occasionally tingling.

She smiled: “I can’t let go of that five silver dollars bet—alright, I’ll only go for half a day, we’ll go out and play the other half.”

Su Minguan weighed this and found it acceptable.

She’d also been to the American Consulate in Shanghai. America was a young nation and generally not as arrogant as Britain and France. The American Consulate wasn’t a dragon’s den or tiger’s lair either—at worst, she’d just be thrown out.

He sucked on her fingertip and smiled: “Then we agree…”

Lin Yuchan suddenly protested, complaining: “If you’re hungry, go eat a midnight snack. Don’t nibble on me.”

Su Minguan’s childishness suddenly emerged. He deliberately held her fingertip in his teeth, lowering his voice to ask: “Did you ever hear the story of Tiger Auntie when you were little?”

Without waiting for her answer, he began setting the atmosphere himself, breathing heavily and pressing his voice to tell her: “Once upon a time, there was a tiger spirit who specialized in eating children. Every time late at night, she would transform into an aunt’s appearance and trick children into opening their doors…”

“When the sister woke up in the middle of the night, she suddenly heard crunching sounds of chewing. She asked Tiger Auntie what she was eating, and Tiger Auntie said peanuts, and asked if sister wanted some…”

“When sister received them, she discovered—oh no, those weren’t peanuts, they were little brother’s fingers…”

Su Minguan’s mischief overflowed as he told the story vividly. At key moments, he bit Lin Yuchan’s knuckles and deliberately ground his teeth, making soft sounds.

When he was small, his wet nurse would stop at nothing to get him to sleep. She told the Tiger Auntie story for several months, frightening him out of his wits so he’d clutch his nurse and not let go. Back then, he thought this was the most terrifying story in the world.

When he reached the part about boiling oil, he deliberately gave a soft “wah” cry, waiting for the little girl to turn pale with fright and throw herself into his arms, clinging to him.

But the opposite side remained quietly silent. Only after Tiger Auntie had been killed by the clever sister did he hear a few sounds of lingering laughter.

“That’s it?”

Lin Yuchan withdrew her hand, showing a sly smile in the darkness.

Someone like her, a good young person of the new era who’d been trained by all kinds of horror stories online, would be afraid of Tiger Auntie, this feudal dross?

She couldn’t help reaching out to pinch that disappointed face.

“Good, now it’s my turn to tell one.” She also lowered her voice, “I just heard a fresh foreign ghost story at the reception.”

Su Minguan lightly bit his teeth, domineeringly pulling and rolling her so she was seven-tenths lying on top of him.

“Tell it.”

As if he were afraid.

He relaxed completely, stroking her soft hairline. The childhood shadow from Tiger Auntie quickly dissipated. He had grown up now, taller and more solid than that mischievous boy of years past, a hundred times more mature.

His senses became sharp again, feeling the slender pair of legs beside him, wrapped in loose, empty trouser legs. The waistband was tied loosely. He couldn’t help imagining the lines of those legs, his breathing becoming somewhat uneven.

This won’t do…

Just as he began to restrain himself, Lin Yuchan spoke.

“Once upon a time, there was a married couple who went mountain climbing with a group of good friends and encountered a blizzard… The wife stayed in the tent while the others continued forward…”

Her tone was ethereal, telling one story after another.

“…So that man hid under the bed… but he forgot that when the concubine died, her head was facing down… thud thud thud, she’s coming…”

“…When the photos were developed, he discovered there was a pair of dangling legs behind him that had been touching his neck the whole time…”

“…Oh, so those people had no feet…”

Lin Yuchan told her stories with relish, feeling like a midnight radio broadcaster.

Only now did she realize that the ghost stories circulating online were quite behind the times—at least they didn’t feature high-tech elements like smartphones. Those creepy plots were all very retro, and with slight modifications, they could even make sense in the Qing Dynasty.

The blanket was pitch black, the cabin gently swaying, so quiet it seemed otherworldly. When she reached key points and paused, she too felt the atmosphere was rather eerie.

But she had a countermeasure! As long as she kept the national anthem playing as background music in her mind, she was invincible!

Lin Yuchan vividly delivered her stories. By the third tale, she felt the body beside her stiffen.

The hand that had been stroking her shoulder had stopped at some unknown point.

Human nature was truly strange. Everyone knew humans were scarier than ghosts—he wasn’t afraid of facing soldiers’ guns; hearing about those massacres of tens of thousands only made him angry; opium turning people into lunatics and fools at most disgusted him.

But those harmless demons and spirits, being formless and substanceless, varied in everyone’s imagination and carried the darkest aspects of human nature that each person found hardest to face.

People’s fear of ghosts was, frankly, fear of themselves.

Lin Yuchan bit her lip, laughing inwardly.

She continued building atmosphere: “Suddenly…”

Suddenly, a harsh scraping sound came to their ears!

Su Minguan’s arms immediately tightened, holding her close, his heartbeat becoming irregular for a moment.

Lin Yuchan was also startled briefly, then realized: “It’s a big fish hitting the anchor rope.”

They’d heard this occasionally before. The sound traveled along the rope and boards, and since it was solid-medium transmission, the audio quality was very true-to-life, ringing right in their ears, quite vivid.

Rustling laughter emerged from the warm blanket.

Su Minguan steadied his breathing, gritting his teeth as he said word by word: “A’Mei. Where did you hear all this?”

The poor young master, wrapped in his little blanket, had endured horror shocks that didn’t belong in this era.

Lin Yuchan couldn’t help laughing, teasing him: “Didn’t you say you don’t believe in gods and Buddhas?”

Her answer was a retaliatory tickle attack. Su Minguan rarely put his hands on her body before, but today he couldn’t bear it anymore. Once he started, he went straight for her softest spot under her ribs.

“Tell more. Keep telling.”

Lin Yuchan shrieked with laughter, dodging left and right like a writhing little fish. He caught her in mid-air, pressed her down, covered her mouth, and forcibly tickled her several times until she was exhausted and defeated, collapsing on the bed unable to get up.

Suddenly, she became aware of heavy breathing right by her ear. The young master who’d been frightened by ghost stories was expressionless, holding the storytelling troublemaker tight and not letting go.

Her whole body was burning hot.

“A’Mei.”

His eyes suddenly became unfocused as he lost control, tugging at her collar. The loose, oversized undergarment was already baggy, instantly exposing half a warm white shoulder and delicate collarbone that rose and fell slightly. Burning kisses fell densely—on her neck and shoulders, by her ear, on her cheek, and finally her lips, like punishment, chaotic bombardment that exploded into bursts of fireworks in the small cabin.

He forgot to maintain distance, so she felt the increasingly obvious changes in the young man’s body beside her, even through two layers of clothing.

Hot-blooded and difficult to suppress. Su Minguan immediately realized this too, hesitating for an instant before hearing a small intake of breath.

His scent was everywhere. She didn’t dare move. After a long while, she said in a tiny voice: “The story from earlier isn’t finished…”

He suddenly bit her shoulder gently, a restrained whimper in his throat.

Why did he have to tell that Tiger Auntie story?

He silently got up, pulled down his hanging cloak to wrap himself tightly, letting the cold air blow against his face to slowly cool himself down.

He’d broken his word to Lin Yuchan multiple times. This time he’d personally promised to “have limits”—he couldn’t take it back again.

She felt somewhat uneasy, wanting to speak but stopping herself, finally quietly self-reflecting: “I’ll sleep properly.”

Su Minguan couldn’t help but smile slightly. What perfect timing for this closing-the-barn-door-after-the-horse-has-bolted moment.

He turned back, giving her forehead a gentle peck.

“You sleep first.” His breathing was short as he said, “I’ll go wash up and come back to keep you company.”

He opened the cabin door. The pitch-black corridor had no lights. Today, the ship was safe with few people on night watch, and outside was as quiet as another world.

Various ghost stories flashed before his eyes. He stepped out resolutely.

Lin Yuchan watched helplessly as the blanket grew cold. She didn’t dare call out to make him stay.

But after playing around with him for a while—though she was being bullied by him, holding her head down—she’d also expended considerable energy and was very tired.

In her half-awake state, she felt someone return to her side, carefully nestling against her shoulder, tender and attached.

The next morning, heavy snow arrived as promised.

After the clouds and mist dispersed, the air was so pure it seemed it could crystallize into ice. All three towns of Wuhan were trimmed with white edges. The Yangtze and Han rivers were like two faded silk ribbons that had absorbed snowflakes and reflected crystalline light.

The large and small boats moored by the riverside all wore fluffy white caps. Pedestrians hurried past with umbrellas and rain cloaks, cutting through the fine snowflakes and leaving muddy footprints.

Those impressive steamships at the dock were now covered with a thin layer of down, their decks blindingly reflective. The steel frames draped in plain clothes looked like ship models. Even the cannon barrels on the sides were washed clean by the snow, giving off a sense of beating swords into plowshares.

Only the towering smokestacks remained bare, the moist steel exhaling hot air, artificially creating small heat islands in the overwhelming cold.

Several clever water birds gathered around the smokestacks for warmth and water.

Suddenly, nearby voices laughed and played. The startled birds fluttered away.

A snow doll bundled up thick ran out from the cabin, practically bouncing as if ready to take flight. She stepped onto the thin layer of snow on deck, delightedly looking back at her footprints, then reaching out to catch snowflakes.

“Ah ah ah it’s snowing! Just in the time it took to eat, it started snowing! We can have snowball fights!”

Embarrassingly, Guangdong girl Lin Yuchan had lived two lifetimes without seeing snow.

Though this thin layer on the ground was vastly different from the snow-country spectacle she’d seen in photos, where snow could bury cars and block doors, it was still genuine snow that could be gathered and formed into balls. It could be built into little people!

Unfortunately, the snow along the Yangtze was rather meager. Lin Yuchan estimated that sweeping the entire deck might produce a snowman about Lin Feilun’s size.

…Never mind.

But this didn’t prevent her from exploring properly. She put on knitted gloves, then thought again and ran to the engine room to add waterproof rubber gloves over them, then returned to the ship’s railing to carefully sweep out clean white snow powder.

Su Minguan followed her out, also wearing a felt hat and thick cloak, carrying two hand warmers and stuffing one to her.

“Hah, how provincial.” He mocked mercilessly, his mouth corners lifting in a beautiful arc, “You call this snow? At most, it’s ice factory scraps.”

Before he finished speaking, something flashed before his eyes as a poorly formed snowball smashed down. He nimbly dodged, the snowball grazing his hat and immediately disintegrating, its fragments falling into the air without even making a sound.

Lin Yuchan protested: “You’ve seen heavy snow?”

Su Minguan smiled without answering, his gaze roaming over her shoulders and waist.

He wasn’t interested in heavy snow. Last night’s play had crossed the line. Even through three layers of clothing, he still remembered the locations and feel of her ticklish spots.

Lin Yuchan felt flustered under his gaze, removing her rubber gloves and jumping down the gangplank: “Hmph, you haven’t seen it either.”

Su Minguan said leisurely, “When I was little, I went to the capital.”

Lin Yuchan: “…”

Again with “when I was little.”

Why did she only remember homework and reading supplementary books in her childhood, with the farthest spring outing being to Mount Luofu?

Su Minguan looked at this unworldly girl with pity, probably feeling it was an unfair victory, and added: “The whole trip was taken care of by others, traveling by carriage—I only saw it, never touched it.”

Lin Yuchan understood afterward. It was probably arranged by his family for a marriage alliance.

She didn’t ask more, thinking he probably had no chance for sightseeing anyway.

Su Minguan smiled, seeing that snowflakes had fallen on her head, creating a black and white pattern that was quite amusing.

Just as he was about to brush them off for her, a group of third wheels filed past.

“Boss,” Jiang Gaosheng led a group of subordinates, enthusiastically inviting, “We found out there’s a bathhouse in Wuchang City that’s cheap and good—let’s go together!”

Su Minguan: “…”

Last night, Luna had “unloaded cargo,” the refugees had their great escape, and the sword hanging over their heads was finally gently lowered. The crew brothers all breathed easier, everyone having slept soundly and peacefully.

Today was a rest day to properly reward themselves, which was appropriate and justified.

Jiang Gaosheng urged: “Hurry up! I heard the bath attendants are extremely skilled!”

Fortunately, someone nearby was tactful, poking Jiang Gaosheng and pointing to Miss Lin across from them, winking to make him shut up.

“Why are you poking me?” Jiang Gaosheng didn’t understand: “…Oh, Miss Lin, Miss Lin can’t go to the bathhouse—it only serves male customers. But you could stroll around Hubu Lane, there’s lots of food there…”

Someone dragged him away.