Alone, Beautifully – Chapter 155

by Little Panda

A Story About Happiness (2)

My heart delights in you.

When she heard that loud “I’m asleep,” Ye Zhen’s eyes showed obvious amusement. She approached from the bathroom, still surrounded by lingering steam, walked to the bedside, bent down and gently pinched Xu Jiao’s nose, saying deliberately:

“Go to sleep.”

“You sleep, I’ll try.”

Xu Jiao: “……”

She slowly opened her eyes, containing a hint of resentment, and after making eye contact with Ye Zhen at the bedside for a few seconds, she asked: “I wonder if you’ve heard a saying?”

Ye Zhen: “What?”

She smiled with her eyes, with water droplets from her hair ends still clinging to her neck, lurking on her fair skin. The only light in the room came from the bathroom door, creating a dim, hazy atmosphere, backlighting her figure so that most of her body was silhouetted in shadow, yet the visible parts of her skin appeared even more fair.

The water temperature when Ye Zhen showered must have been quite warm. Even just being near her brought along that humid warmth. Although Xu Jiao was some distance away from her, she had the illusion of being enveloped by her body heat, causing her body to unconsciously feel warm.

But she was indeed tired.

At this moment, she could only forcefully ignore Ye Zhen’s alluring post-bath beauty scene (a reference to classical Chinese paintings of beautiful women after bathing), and slowly finished what she was saying: “Try and die (a wordplay in Chinese where ‘try’ 试试 and ‘die’ 逝世 sound similar) — I still want to live a few more years, not trying, next please.”

It took Ye Zhen a few seconds to distinguish which homophonic characters were used in her sentence.

Then she laughed out loud.

After turning off the bathroom light, Ye Zhen slowly walked to the bed in the dark, crossed over Xu Jiao to sleep on the inner side, and while doing so, she pulled the person into her embrace and said softly:

“I’ll stop teasing you now, go to sleep.”

Xu Jiao let out a sigh of relief, naturally finding a comfortable position in Ye Zhen’s embrace, closed her eyes to try to brew back the sleepiness (meaning: try getting sleepy again). In the peaceful atmosphere, after an unknown amount of time, she mumbled softly:

“We could try.”

Ye Zhen: “?”

The quiet atmosphere earlier had almost put her to sleep, and now hearing a voice, she drowsily made a sound “Hmm?”

The end of her sound dragged lazily, containing a particular kind of languor, like a fierce beast being awakened from a nap, carrying a dangerous sensuality.

Xu Jiao wanted to say that if they were to try, this time she could be on top, after all they were both girls. However, previously in the book world, she initially had no interest in Ye Zhen, so naturally there was no thought of “counter-attacking”. She neither wanted to top nor be topped, but now it’s different—

She also likes Ye Zhen.

She also wants to control the other’s emotions and desires.

The reason they currently defaulted to their top-bottom relationship was firstly due to their initial habitual roles, and secondly because Xu Jiao couldn’t be bothered to compete with Ye Zhen for position. Before, she was too busy to even touch the ground (an expression meaning extremely busy), and later when she had free time, she discovered being the bottom was quite comfortable……

But now she’s realized that she might not be able to fully satisfy Ye Zhen’s desires, and since being bottom isn’t working, she naturally thought that switching to being the one giving pleasure wouldn’t be a problem.

But it’s too late now.

If she were to wake Ye Zhen up and tell her about this, that certain someone who would hear her idea would definitely go along with it, and this fooling around would probably go on until who knows what time in the middle of the night.

After the person beside her pillow made that “hmm?” sound and received no response for a long while, her sleepy brain entered sleep mode again. Xu Jiao heard Ye Zhen’s breathing become gradually steady and deep. She didn’t speak up to wake her again, but instead slightly lifted her head, kissed Ye Zhen’s chin, and prepared to sleep next to her, pushing this matter to tomorrow.

Unexpectedly, even though Ye Zhen was clearly asleep, she still instinctively sensed her movement, slightly lowered her head, nuzzled left and right near her forehead, and also left a very light kiss on her head.

Xu Jiao silently raised the corners of her lips, entering her dreams with a heart full of comfort and contentment.

She was awakened by a strange presence.

It’s hard to describe what kind of feeling it was.

It was as if someone defenseless, sleeping soundly in a safe environment, was suddenly thrown into a pack of hungry wolves. Although the wolf pack hadn’t made any moves yet, that predatory gaze, the intention to pounce and bite at any moment was concentrated in their eyes, thus triggering the human instinct’s awareness of danger, causing her consciousness to suddenly awaken from the abyss of deep sleep.

When Xu Jiao woke up, she was still somewhat dazed.

Her mind was blank, and her first conscious thought was: What time is it? Why am I still so sleepy?

She instinctively raised her hand to reach for her phone that should be by her pillow or on the bedside table, but as soon as her wrist moved, she felt a heavy force pressing down on it, and with the slight movement, there was a “clink” sound of metal colliding.

Crisp, melodious, yet concealing an inexplicable danger.

Xu Jiao stayed blankly still for a moment, then tried to open her eyelids to see what tricks Ye Zhen was playing again, but her eyelids were blocked by something. After much effort, she still couldn’t make out where she was. She futilely turned her head, but everything in front of her remained pitch black, unable to see anything.

She could only vaguely determine through the angle of her head turns that there should be a light source in one direction.

She was stunned for two seconds, and a danmu (弹幕, referring to scrolling comments popular in Chinese video platforms) rolled through her mind:

Why does this feeling seem so familiar?

Where had she experienced this before?

While trying to remember, she assessed her current state, feeling an inexplicable heaviness in her dantian (丹田, an important energy center in Chinese medicine, located in the lower abdomen), but when she tried to examine it more carefully, there was an emptiness that even her consciousness couldn’t grasp, as if something should have been there.

Her restrained fingers explored at her side, gradually discovering that what she was lying on wasn’t the very soft spring mattress from her home, but instead……

Hard, cold, and with a smooth surface, like jade.

Xu Jiao’s head was full of question marks, wanting to ask who was so extravagantly wealthy to carve a bed from jade, isn’t that just burning money for no reason? However, in the next second, some fragments flashed unexpectedly through her mind.

Imprisonment, jade bed, the presence of being watched by demon creatures.

Several keywords correspondingly popped up in her mind:

Demon Realm Abyss.

《The Heavenly Lord Doesn’t Need Emotions》. (LP: Heavenly Lord/Immortal/Celestial… I’m too lazy to revise previous chapters hehe~)

Junior Sister Xia.

Xu Jiao: “……”

She tried calling out in her mind: “System?”

There was no response.

Xu Jiao fell silent again.

She secretly pinched her thigh, using considerable force, and in that sharp pain, she thought expressionlessly, great, she’s transmigrated again.

And she’s transmigrated right at the point of the BE.

Things like caring with love seem to have no effect anymore. If she remembered correctly, Xia Jingzhe’s blackening level should be at 99 now.

Thinking about how later Xia Jingzhe, as the Lord of the Demon Realm, would challenge the current Heavenly Lord, resulting in both perishing together, and then Xu Jiao being elevated to that supreme and cold position of Heavenly Lord, she couldn’t help but take a deep breath.

Before she could exhale that breath, there was a “creaking” sound near her ear.

It was the sound of a wooden door being pushed open nearby.

A strong smell of blood wafted into the room.

Xu Jiao: “!”

She almost choked on her breath, instinctively held it, and then sensed the approaching person’s presence drawing near. Then, a very light, cold temperature touched her cheek, like a snake’s tongue flicking past.

Following that, cool fingers traced up from her jaw, causing her skin to shiver, and the fingertips slowly moved to near her eyes, touching the cloth that blocked her vision. After a rustling sound—

Xu Jiao tightly closed and reopened her eyes, adjusting to the light in front of her.

After slowly opening her eyes, she saw the person leaning over her, one hand propped against the side of the jade bed.

Their eyes met.

On Xia Jingzhe’s beautiful face, her phoenix eyes were as dark as ink, pitch-black and bottomless. Though this person was smiling, she gave off a terrifying aura as if she could drag someone to their doom and fall into hell together at any moment.

Xu Jiao’s heart skipped a beat.

She was both captivated by the presence of the person before her and somewhat haunted by her appearance, feeling altogether unsettled.

“Senior Sister.”

Noticing her lack of surprise and even slight absent-mindedness, the other person softly called out to her.

Xu Jiao came back to her senses, looked into Xia Jingzhe’s eyes, with a thought growing stronger in her heart. Finally, she took an inconspicuous breath and said:

“Junior Sister Xia.”

Xia Jingzhe smiled and said: “What instructions does Senior Sister have?”

Xu Jiao steadied herself, lowered her eyes and said: “Since being brought into the Demon Realm, day and night I’ve only thought about one thing, fearing that before my wish could be fulfilled, I would fall victim to the Demon Realm’s deadly hands. Now seeing you, I think if I don’t say certain words now, there might never be another chance—”

Xia Jingzhe paused upon hearing this, her smile deepening at the corners of her lips, and following Xu Jiao’s words, said: “Oh? What does Senior Sister want to say?”

Xu Jiao suddenly raised her head, with burning eyes said: “I have admired Junior Sister Xia for a long time!”

The statement was delivered with resounding clarity, like the sound of metal and stone (a Chinese expression meaning words spoken with great conviction).

The words even seemed to linger in the small wooden cabin.

Xia Jingzhe was clearly somewhat dazed.

Taking advantage of her not yet having recovered her senses, Xu Jiao continued earnestly and persistently, expressing all of her deep feelings:

“Give me a chance, let me prove it to you, okay?”