Alone, Beautifully – Chapter 131
by Little PandaBestowing Upon You the Realm (13)
Settling accounts.
It was certainly impossible to watch a large white cat covered in red paint running around wildly in her study. Xu Jiao looked at the size of the white cat that Yu Ye had transformed into and felt that washing her and drying her immediately with a towel wouldn’t be a problem, especially since the study had underfloor heating, providing excellent warmth.
Yu Ye, after all, wasn’t a real cat. Before she could coordinate the movement of running on all fours, she was caught by Xu Jiao. Come to think of it, if she truly had a cat’s agility, she wouldn’t have been so easily captured by the Korean spy in the palace earlier.
Xu Jiao flipped the cat over to reveal its white belly, looking at the fluffy white fur and the faintly visible pink skin underneath. Initially, she had no ill intentions, but remembering Yu Ye’s earlier house arrest order, suddenly, a mischievous thought arose.
Her sinful palm covered the cat’s soft belly.
After rubbing back and forth, she intentionally sought out the white, fluffy “grass” (euphemism for private parts), her fingertips touching a small protrusion.
“Oh?”
Xu Jiao pretended to know nothing, rubbed the completely frozen cat’s belly under her palm, and deliberately asked, “What’s this?”
Yu Ye’s entire person, no, the entire cat was not okay.
She never imagined Xu Jiao could be so brazen with her, actually groping her up and down. The cat’s body immediately trembled, extremely embarrassed and angry. She promptly bit Xu Jiao’s wrist!
The sharp teeth bit hard, forcing Xu Jiao to loosen her grip due to the pain. She never thought that petting a real cat was risky enough, but a human turned into a cat could be just as dangerous as a wild cat.
She looked at the two small indentations on her wrist, clearly the marks left by the Regent when she was too angry to care about decorum or status. She found it somewhat amusing.
When she tried to reach out and touch again, the white cat raised a front paw, making a gesture to swat at her, even lowering its body. Seeing that the cat was truly annoyed, Xu Jiao innocently raised her hand, turning her palm towards the cat, softening her voice slightly:
“Alright, I won’t touch you randomly anymore, okay?”
“You can’t keep these red paint marks on you forever, right? Let me give you a bath, hmm?”
Yu Ye watched her vigilantly. Although her blue eyes were very beautiful, the wariness in them was also unmistakable, with her pupils shrinking to the size of a needle point.
Seeing her putting on a brave front, only able to resist using a cat’s instincts, Xu Jiao suddenly lost the desire to take revenge on her.
To be fair.
Yu Ye’s life had truly been miserable. Now that she had finally avenged her childhood grudge and had only been in control of the court for a few days, she had been harmed by villains, losing all her martial arts skills for self-protection, reduced to the form of an animal. Anyone with a bit of skill could easily toy with her.
She must be shocked, panicked, and angry now.
Thinking of this, Xu Jiao saw the white cat’s face full of distrust. She didn’t bother to explain further, just sat down nearby to read her book, not forgetting to instruct the palace servants outside to bring in a small basin of hot water.
Even when the steaming water was brought in, Yu Ye maintained a distance of ten steps from Xu Jiao.
Xu Jiao crouched down to test the water temperature. Because a cat’s body temperature is higher than a human’s, the water for washing couldn’t be too cold, otherwise, once the entire body of fur was wet, it would be easy to catch a cold. She had raised a cat herself when she was young, and later, when writing, she became acquainted with writer friends who loved cats, so she was very familiar with these basic facts.
Putting her right hand into the copper basin to test the water temperature, she looked at Yu Ye, who was watching her from behind a tall vase in the distance, and beckoned with her left hand:
“Come quickly, the water will get cold soon.”
The palace maid who had brought the hot water earlier hadn’t left yet. She had been wondering why the Crown Prince wanted hot water at this odd hour, but now seeing the little white cat, her eyes lit up:
“Oh! Where did this cat come from?”
Xu Jiao casually replied, “I don’t know. I saw it jump in from the window earlier, fed it some pastries and snacks, and now it won’t leave, so I thought I’d try keeping it.”
The blue-clothed palace maid smiled and followed Xu Jiao’s lead: “I haven’t heard of any concubines in the nearby palaces keeping cats. It’s probably a stray cat from the palace. Your Highness should be careful, it would be bad if you get hurt.”
Xu Jiao, fearing they might throw the cat out due to their excessive protection because of Yu Ye’s usual authority, quickly intervened: “It won’t. This cat is very clever. If you don’t provoke her, she won’t extend her claws at people.”
“If Your Highness likes it, keeping it by your side to alleviate boredom is good, but… I wonder if Lord Yu would say Your Highness is distracted by playthings and is neglecting important matters if she sees it,” the palace maid said.
Hearing this, the white cat standing behind the vase widened her eyes to look at her, then carefully examined her own form in the curved reflection of the vase—
Indeed, she was quite beautiful, worth neglecting some important matters for.
Xu Jiao happened to catch a glimpse of Yu Ye admiring herself in the vase, shook her head slightly, and discovered that this Lord Yu was indeed unusually narcissistic. She slowly replied to the maid’s words:
“It doesn’t matter. If she has any objections, she can take the cat back to her mansion to raise.”
But it’s unlikely anyone will ever see such a scene.
The palace maid didn’t try to persuade her further, seeing that Xu Jiao quite liked this little white cat, and went along with her wishes, asking: “Has Your Highness thought of a name for this cat?”
Xu Jiao withdrew her right hand that was testing the water in the basin, flicked off the water droplets from her fingertips, looked at the white cat’s appearance, thought about how in this era there should only be one breed of cat, the domestic shorthair, and remembered the rule that orange cats must be fat. The corners of her lips couldn’t help but spread into a somewhat evil smile:
“Hua Huo.”
The palace maid was stunned for a moment: “What?”
Xu Jiao explained carefully: “Huo as in fire, Hua as in the ‘hua’ from ‘chun hua qiu shi’ (idiom meaning spring blossoms and autumn fruits, symbolizing the passage of seasons).”
The palace maid had a puzzled look: “This name… is so strange.”
Xu Jiao just smiled without speaking: “As long as I like it.”
As she spoke, she looked in the direction of the white cat again—
Suddenly feeling a bit excited to see Yu Ye become as fat as Yu Hua Huo.
It would definitely be a sight to behold.
The current white cat still didn’t know what kind of malicious intent Xu Jiao had towards her. Hearing that strange name, she didn’t think much of it, only assuming that Xu Jiao didn’t like her very much, so even when encountering a cat, she had to maliciously give it a related name to torment.
The palace maid had nothing more to say. Now that Lü Luo, who was closest to Xu Jiao, wasn’t around, they didn’t dare to get too close to this master, fearing that if Yu Ye saw them, they would follow in Lü Luo’s footsteps. Just before leaving, she mentioned:
“This servant will ask the Imperial Workshops if they have any cat toys, and bring them to Your Highness tomorrow.”
Xu Jiao nodded: “Good.”
Half an incense stick’s time later.
Xu Jiao got splashed in the face by the cat’s paw, giving up on the idea of forcibly bathing Yu Ye. She could only use a towel dampened with water to carefully wipe the parts stained with paint. Fortunately, this paint was the type that dissolved in water, so although it was troublesome and required repeated wiping, it could still be cleaned.
Moreover, using just the wiping method could avoid the drawback of not having a hair dryer in this era to quickly dry the cat’s fur.
Throughout the entire process, Yu Ye was very vigilant, not letting Xu Jiao touch her belly again, and almost not even letting her touch her hind paws. Whenever a fingertip touched her, she would try to bite Xu Jiao’s wrist.
Xu Jiao had never served such a delicate cat before. After finishing cleaning up with a face full of water, she couldn’t help but think, why did she think it was a good idea to pick up a cat outside? Facts proved that even if you change the species of a grumpy ancestor, their personality won’t improve much.
Still just as fond of tormenting her.
She let out a deep sigh, releasing the little white cat who was equally exhausted from resisting and being on guard. She immediately saw the cat jump far away, while still vigilantly watching her.
Xu Jiao looked over helplessly:
“Is it necessary to look at me with that expression?”
“Anyone who didn’t know better would think I had forcibly taken advantage of you, a little female cat.”
Yu Ye: “!”
Listen, listen to these extremely coarse and vulgar words!
The color of her blue eyes changed again and again, as if she wanted to rush over and bite Xu Jiao, but in the end, she didn’t move much, just took small steps back to the vase to self-isolate again.
Xu Jiao was also more exhausted than if she had been on a battlefield. After having people clear away the water basin and clean the room, she just sprawled lazily on the chair in the study, reading a book.
However, there was another small incident at dinner time.
Because the little white cat had set her sights on the noodles in her bowl.
And she insisted on eating from this particular bowl.
Xu Jiao didn’t know if the intestines and stomach after turning into a cat were any different from those of ordinary cats, after all, ordinary cats can’t eat too many grains. Their digestive systems are very poor at processing starch and carbohydrates, but Yu Ye’s magical human-turned-cat…
She couldn’t help but hesitate.
Looking at the bowl of vegetarian noodles in front of her, Xu Jiao waved her hand, called for a servant, and asked them to bring up a bowl of longevity noodles with both meat and vegetables, while also instructing to add an egg.
The palace servant looked at the little cat that had jumped onto the table, whose demeanor seemed somewhat arrogant no matter how you looked at it, then looked at the Crown Prince who had given this order.
“Your Highness, this…”
Xu Jiao pressed her chopsticks against the edge of her bowl: “It’s fine. If it wants to eat the same as me, let it eat. Such a big cat should be responsible for its own choices. If it gets a stomachache, just have the imperial physician come to examine it.”
Yu Ye, of course, knew what “examine” meant. Hearing the increasingly outrageous words coming out of Xu Jiao’s mouth, seeing the clear teasing in Xu Jiao’s eyes, she narrowed her eyes, unexpectedly not reacting impulsively and rashly as before. It was unclear whether she had adapted to her identity or was plotting to take revenge later.
Xu Jiao, seeing her unusually calm, only thought she was reminiscing while looking at the noodles in her bowl—
After all.
If not for this cat transformation drama, today should have been Yu Ye’s birthday. After finishing official business, she could have had a good birthday celebration in her mansion.
But now she could only torment each other with Xu Jiao.
It’s quite pitiful.
So making longevity noodles for the cat wasn’t a big deal.
After the palace servants left, the cat stared at Xu Jiao, who had ordered longevity noodles to be made for her, as if trying to discern something from her face. Xu Jiao, of course, couldn’t let a cat read her emotions, so she just pinched the little cat’s ear:
“Today is the day we met, so let’s consider it your birthday from now on.”
“You have to finish the longevity noodles later, so you can grow up safely and healthily in the future, okay?”
Yu Ye was stunned for a moment, and because of this, she didn’t dodge Xu Jiao’s action.
Her pupils contracted slightly.
Vaguely, she remembered that when she was young and celebrating her birthday, she often heard her mother murmur such things in her ear. But later, no one celebrated her birthday anymore, so she also stopped caring about this day.
Unexpectedly, she could hear it from this Crown Prince…
After the noodles were served, Yu Ye crouched nearby waiting for the food in the bowl to cool down, as cat tongues can’t withstand heat. She looked deeply at Xu Jiao having dinner at this small table in the study, and for a moment regretted confining her to this place and not letting her go out.
After all… she didn’t know when she would recover now, and the order she had given earlier naturally couldn’t be rescinded.
If she were to continue living in this cat form for three to five years, what would become of this Crown Prince?
As the night deepened, the wind somehow picked up outside, and snowflakes mixed with the wind were blown into the room. Xu Jiao protected her inner bowl, as if not wanting the food inside to be cooled down. The palace maid serving her meal saw her movement and carefully went to the window, closing it until only a small gap was left for ventilation.
The snow-white cat sat on the dark wooden table, its shadow elongated by the candlelight, its large blue eyes filled with the image of the person eating attentively in front of her.
At this moment, Yu Ye thought, she should be nicer to this little Crown Prince.
Because… this Xu Jiao didn’t seem to have done anything cruel or inhumane. She would even rescue a stray cat she encountered on the road, yet she wasn’t so kind as to be without principles like an emperor who would be manipulated by ministers. After all, when she saw an enemy spy harboring ulterior motives, she would kill them without hesitation.
Gradually, this little Crown Prince seemed to have grown into the image of an emperor that she had imagined.
Yu Ye’s good intentions only lasted for four hours.
“Jingle jingle…”
Early the next morning.
The palace maid Lan Yan, who had promised Xu Jiao yesterday to find toys for her, was now holding a large wooden tray filled with various small toys. There were sewn little mice, fish, colorful shuttlecocks made of wild pheasant feathers, and several bells suitable for hanging around the neck, indicating ownership.
At this moment, Xu Jiao was shaking a small golden bell in her hand, while also using her gaze to lock onto Yu Ye’s location.
From Xu Jiao’s eyes, Yu Ye could see that she very much wanted to hang this exquisite golden bell around her neck.
Especially when Lan Yan was still reasonably analyzing to Xu Jiao: “If she accidentally runs to other palaces, it will be convenient for us to have the servants find her, after all, we can hear the sound wherever she runs, don’t you think that makes sense, Your Highness?”
Xu Jiao understood the maid’s reasoning, she just found it amusing.
Yu Ye’s various wary and running away expressions were very entertaining.
Originally, she hadn’t planned to put this bell on, but now seeing Yu Ye’s reaction, Xu Jiao put the golden bell aside and picked up a wooden rod with a little mouse and feathers at the end from the tray. She swung it left and right, feeling that this was more exquisite than the modern toys that cost one or two yuan, and the materials used were also safer.
Her intention was just to play with it herself, but unexpectedly, Yu Ye, who had been hiding in a high place, involuntarily moved her gaze along with the swinging object.
Yu Ye: “!”
This damned animal instinct!
She stared at the stick Xu Jiao was swinging back and forth, her round head also swaying left and right. After realizing this, she forcibly averted her gaze, but after a while, it turned back again.
Xu Jiao tried hard to suppress the smile on her face, swung the toy mouse onto the white cat’s body, then slowly dragged it back, then gently swung it in front of her again, and then…
She couldn’t drag it back.
Because the little mouse was pinned down by a cat’s paw.
Next, Yu Ye uncontrollably cooperated with Xu Jiao in pouncing on the little mouse for half an incense stick’s time, and nearly disemboweled the mouse toy with her sharp claws.
To rescue the toy from her mouth and paws, Xu Jiao had to casually pick up a green feather, tickle the cat’s chin, and poke her waist. Seeing the white cat extend her paws to scratch the feather, she mischievously brushed the feather over the white cat’s body.
Head, pink paw pads, fluffy white belly…
The white cat angrily opened her mouth and bit the feather.
Xu Jiao, seeing her lying down posture, pressed the cat down in one swift move, and decisively hung the golden bell around the cat’s neck. Yu Ye was stunned for a moment, and when she struggled to sit up, she heard that damned “jingle” sound from her body.
She shook her head.
“Ding-ling.”
The sound came from the position of her chest.
The white cat had a look of disbelief, as if she hadn’t reacted yet. She lowered her head to look at the golden “extreme humiliation” on her chest, then raised her head to look at Xu Jiao with round blue eyes.
Xu Jiao fell back on the bed laughing, holding her stomach, and coaxed her insincerely:
“Half an incense stick’s time, wear it for half an incense stick’s time and I’ll take it off for you, hahaha…”
Yu Ye: “!!”
This audacious Crown Prince!
Half a “xun” (ancient Chinese unit of time, about 10 days) later.
The news of the Regent’s unexplained disappearance spread throughout the palace. The ministers who had been restless in recent days constantly heard news from their subordinates, confirming that Yu Ye had suddenly disappeared in the palace. Various conspiracy theories began to float around the palace.
The number of assassins coming to the Eastern Palace to seek death began to increase significantly again.
One night.
Xu Jiao was sleeping when the window was pried open a crack. Two imperial guards outside looked at each other, quietly climbing in through the window. Seeing a figure curled up on the bed, they were about to approach when someone poked them from behind.
One of them hunched his back, signaling the other not to move.
The other person turned his head innocently to look at him.
The two looked at each other for a moment—
When they turned their heads back, they saw Xu Jiao had lit the fire stick in her hand and was smiling at them: “Why aren’t the great Lords Li and Liu from the Northern Suppression Division sleeping in the dead of night, but coming to the Eastern Palace to enjoy the scenery?”
A little white cat sat next to the candlestick, its fluffy tail drooping, also gazing at them quietly.
Yu Ye recognized that these were her own men. Now that she had disappeared, her subordinates would certainly come looking for her. Knowing that she had last disappeared on the road out of the Eastern Palace, they would naturally follow the trail to investigate the Crown Prince. However, they had misunderstood, thinking that Xu Jiao had murdered her, so they could only come to the Eastern Palace in the middle of the night to look for clues.
Yu Ye was now neither alive nor dead, and they had already searched every brick outside the Eastern Palace. Now, having no other choice, they came to try their luck in the palace, after all, such a big person couldn’t just disappear without a trace. If there was a corpse, it must be hidden in the room.
Xu Jiao also knew what they were thinking, but she couldn’t tell them, “Please look back, your Lord Yu is right behind you watching you.”
So she just smiled and exchanged some pleasantries with them, and then suddenly changed the subject, smiling and saying:
“There have been quite a few assassins coming to the Eastern Palace recently, are you two gentlemen also following the trend?”
This was tantamount to accusing them of attempting to assassinate the Crown Prince.
The two imperial guards quickly knelt down, stating that they were just investigating and had no intention of offending the Eastern Palace. Xu Jiao waved her hand, not wanting to hear this. As the words came to her lips, she suddenly looked at the cat on the table that had been staring at these two imperial guards.
A couple of days ago, she had asked the system if there was any way to solve the curse on Yu Ye.
The system said that there were experts in Yu Ye’s mansion, and there might be other methods.
After all, there are always more solutions than difficulties, but the premise was that Yu Ye couldn’t be kept in the Eastern Palace by Xu Jiao every day. So Xu Jiao’s words of accusation turned around in her mouth, and she swallowed them, only waving her hand at the two imperial guards, indicating that they should leave directly.
If she remembered correctly, these two were Yu Ye’s subordinates.
If she let them go directly, Yu Ye might follow them and have her own way of solving the problem.
Sure enough—
After the two left, there was another small movement in the window gap.
When Xu Jiao raised her head from under the quilt to look, there was no longer that quietly crouching figure on the table. She yawned, gathered her quilt, and drowsily wanted to go back to sleep.
But thinking about the cat’s safety, afraid that the system might issue a “female protagonist in critical condition” notice when she wasn’t around, after a while, Xu Jiao still painfully separated from her warm quilt. She yawned, opened the window, and slipped out, following not too far behind.
She followed Yu Ye all the way out of the palace to the vicinity of the Wang mansion.
Seeing the cat skillfully climb up a tree and over the wall, Xu Jiao, bathed in moonlight, sat on the eaves and asked the system: “She’s back at her own home, there shouldn’t be any danger, right?”
The system responded: “Don’t know.”
Xu Jiao: “This you can know.”
System: “This really don’t know.”
Xu Jiao deflated, sitting cross-legged on the eaves of a commoner’s house, rubbing her arms. She just looked in the direction of Yu Ye’s mansion like this, until she fell asleep, almost rolling down with the tiles of someone’s house. It wasn’t until the sky was just beginning to lighten that she really couldn’t stand the night’s dew chill, and sleeping on the eaves had made her back and neck ache. Seeing that it was almost dawn and Yu Ye had been back for so long, probably nothing would happen now, so she headed back towards the palace.
She didn’t have martial arts to support her, so climbing walls relied purely on arm strength. If she hadn’t figured out the patrol routes and shift changes, she would have almost been caught.
By the time she finally made it back to the Eastern Palace, her whole person was in a daze. She happened to see the maid coming to change her clothes and notify her to study in the morning.
Xu Jiao raised her arms, letting her do so.
Lü Luo was gone, and today it was Lan Yan who came to serve her. The palace maid touched her arm and said softly, “Why are Your Highness’s hands so cold?”
Xu Jiao responded listlessly, “Maybe I caught a chill last night.”
Lan Yan was startled and dared to touch her forehead: “Oh my! Your Highness is running a fever! I must quickly go and request the imperial physician!”
Xu Jiao couldn’t hear very clearly. She stood for a while but couldn’t stand steady, falling straight backwards.
When she woke up, she heard the familiar voice of Imperial Physician Fang by her ear.
He was saying that she had caught a chill, if she continued to catch cold like this, no amount of nourishment would help. After all, she would always deplete herself again after being nourished a bit. She was still a bit dizzy, sniffling with her eyes closed, saying:
“I know—”
Halfway through her words, another cold voice by the bed picked up where she left off:
“I will watch over her.”
Xu Jiao was stunned for a moment, struggling to open her eyes to see that figure dressed in a dark python robe. Who else could it be but Yu Ye?
She opened her eyes wide, and Yu Ye, noticing she was awake, had originally been facing sideways to her, now turned her head, her cold eyes meeting hers. Xu Jiao instinctively said, “How did you so quickly…” transform back.
Yu Ye: “Hmm?”
Xu Jiao, thinking quickly in the emergency, changed her words: “Wasn’t Lord Yu missing? How did you reappear so quickly?”
Yu Ye looked at her with a half-smile: “Your Highness seems very unhappy about my return.”
Hearing this familiar opening for mutual banter, Xu Jiao immediately lost interest and moved her gaze away, too lazy to argue or explain herself, looking as if she was tacitly agreeing.
However, today’s Yu Ye was different from usual. Seeing her not speak, she tucked in the corners of her quilt for her and said in a low voice: “If Your Highness is still unwell, sleep a bit more.”
Gentle to an unbelievable degree.
Xu Jiao stared at her for a while, and actually closed her eyes and fell asleep.
She didn’t even notice that she had already returned from the study to the inner chamber. Now, smelling the calming incense burning in the chamber, she unconsciously fell into a deep sleep. Only in her hazy state, she didn’t know if it was a dream or reality, she heard a sentence by her ear:
“Get well soon—”
“So I can settle accounts with you.”
The person in deep sleep instinctively shuddered.
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