Chapter 129
Chapter 129
The Ghosts outside the door stood perfectly still, and there were no crew “members” in sight. For a moment, the three of them had no idea where to go.
Qiao Yu was constitutionally incapable of sitting still. He shook Shang Yan’s hand, but failed to break free, and scowled. “Let go. I’m going to look around.”
“Together.”
“…I’m just taking a walk.”
“We’ll take a walk together.”
Current Charm: 49%
“No, I want to go alone. Can you stop clinging to me all the time?”
Shang Yan raised one eyebrow and abruptly leaned closer. Instead of answering, he asked, “Why does your face smell like cosmetic powder?”
Confused, Qiao Yu thought back and finally realized the scent must have come from the Opera Ghost sweeping her sleeve across his face.
Shang Yan gave an urging hum. “Who were you fooling around with just now?”
Qiao Yu was speechless.
He really had fooled around with a ghost for a while.
“I have to stay close so you don’t go fooling around again.”
This was… absolutely ridiculous!
Luo Yunmeng watched the two grown men walk away like conjoined twins, worry creasing her brow.
As her gaze lowered, she saw four crescent-shaped marks in her snow-white palm. She had dug them there herself.
Boss Qiao’s face was growing more and more beautiful, yet what rose inside her was not admiration or infatuation. It was… a sick urge to possess him entirely.
This was wrong. Terribly wrong!
Qiao Yu led Shang Yan forward by the hand. Only three halls in the entire area were accessible. Roughly a hundred meters out, an invisible barrier enclosed them. It felt like a thin sheet of tempered glass beneath his palm.
Qiao Yu tried punching it. Other than turning his knuckles red, the blow did not damage the barrier at all.
Apparently, brute force would not break this thing.
After some thought, he pulled Shang Yan back the way they had come.
Throughout the walk, Shang Yan’s gaze remained glued to him. He barely blinked, as though unwilling to miss even an instant.
Finally unable to stand it, Qiao Yu turned and glared. “That’s enough! How are you even more ridiculous than those Ghosts? Keep staring and I’ll gouge out your eyes and shoot marbles with them.”
Shang Yan shrugged carelessly. “Go ahead, if you can bear to.”
Qiao Yu fell silent.
He truly could not.
“Can you stop looking? When is this damned Charm going to disappear?”
“Probably after we leave the Instance.” Shang Yan continued his close surveillance. “I’m not looking because your Charm increased. Your Charm has always been at one hundred percent to me.”
Qiao Yu… Qiao Yu lost his mind!
In the end, he let Shang Yan do as he pleased. He could still punch other people a few times, but he genuinely could not strike that face.
He sighed and pushed open the doors of the hall beside the Hall of Eternal Light.
Kunning Palace, the empress’s residence.
The interior was just as extravagant. Phoenixes coiled around the red pillars, complementing the twelve golden dragons in an apparent match made in heaven… like hell they did.
In the original plot, the empress had to be a substitute for the Prince of Lanling. No wonder the emperor refused to let the prince marry Tao Zhuyue. Apparently, whether Tao Zhuyue was a famous opera performer or not, the Prince of Lanling was never going to get a wife.
As he thought, Qiao Yu rummaged through the hall one-handed. At last, behind the bed, he found a memorial to the throne and a Review Card.
He hurriedly tucked the Review Card away, treasuring the thing for the first time.
In his eyes, this was no Review Card. It was no NG Card either. It was a fucking monument to his chastity!
Only after safely storing the card did he turn his attention to the memorial. He opened it to find a wall of classical prose that made his head buzz. He promptly handed it to Shang Yan. “Quick, translate this.”
Shang Yan reluctantly shifted his gaze to the memorial. A few seconds later, he quickly raised his head again and read while staring at Qiao Yu’s lovely profile. “It’s a memorial from the chancellor impeaching the empress. It says she’s jealous and refuses to let the emperor fill his harem. As a result, His Majesty has only one prince, and if this continues, the realm will fall into turmoil and the state will become unstable. At the end, the emperor wrote in vermilion: The matter of filling the harem is not to be raised again.”
Qiao Yu tried to ignore Shang Yan’s scorching gaze and rubbed his chin as he muttered, “How tragic. He became a substitute and still had to take the blame. Tsk, tsk~”
Luo Yunmeng was worrying so intensely over Boss Qiao that her hair might as well have turned white. Just then, the half-closed door opened again. Zuo Qingquan emerged supporting Bian Feibai, alongside another male streamer in an equally sorry state.
“What happened to him?”
She moved to help, but Zuo Qingquan took a step back. “He fell and twisted his ankle. I can manage.”
His voice was gentle yet distant.
Luo Yunmeng’s brow furrowed so deeply it formed a crease. Her gaze traveled between the two men before she awkwardly withdrew her hand.
Fuck! Had spring arrived or something?
Why was everyone feeding her public displays of affection?!
Before she could voice her outrage, the hall door opened once more. Another three streamers came out, each looking badly shaken. They had clearly suffered a serious fright.
Then the familiar white mist rose. When everyone recovered, they had already returned to the Prince of Lanling’s Residence.
Night had fallen deeply by then.
“All right. Everyone will rest for the night. Filming resumes at seven tomorrow morning.”
Behind the glaring set lights, the Ghost Matchmaker waved her handkerchief and called out her instructions.
Before anyone could answer, the lights snapped off. The cameras and Ghosts retreated into the bamboo grove like a receding tide, vanishing without a trace.
Leaning against Zuo Qingquan, Bian Feibai counted the people present. Only then did he realize that of the twenty-four streamers, just nine remained after a single day. His entire expression collapsed.
“The death rate in this Instance is way too high!”
Qiao Yu rubbed his eyes and lazily asked, “Where are you all sleeping tonight?”
His voice drew everyone’s attention. Bian Feibai looked over, and his gaze abruptly froze on Qiao Yu.
The young man stood bathed in moonlight, his complexion cool and pale. Rubbing his eyes had left their corners faintly red. His lazy voice was as clear as ever, yet somehow carried a soft, indolent allure that made the tips of Bian Feibai’s ears instantly burn.
He hurriedly looked away and pointed toward the row of servants’ quarters behind them. Stumbling over his words, he said, “The extras… the extras sleep over there. The front courtyard is… is needed for filming, so we can’t go there.”
His voice grew quieter and quieter, while his toes shifted involuntarily toward Qiao Yu from time to time.
He wanted to get closer…
Current Charm: 53%
Qiao Yu hummed in acknowledgment. Ignoring the many burning gazes around him, he dragged the jealousy-swamped Shang Yan swiftly out of the courtyard. Then he bent his elbow and slammed the door shut.
Only when the view was blocked did everyone recover. Luo Yunmeng looked at the fresh marks dug into her palm, her worry deepening…
The instant Qiao Yu closed the door, a powerful force pinned him against it. Long fingers moved upward and slowly clasped the back of his neck as Shang Yan pressed their foreheads together.
Staring at Qiao Yu’s trembling lashes, Shang Yan squeezed his eyes shut. “Qiao Yu, I’m about to lose my mind.”
I’m the one about to lose my mind!
Qiao Yu was too frightened to move. Wasn’t he the one suffering from all this?
Why did Shang Yan look like the wronged party?
Fuck that cursed title. He would never use it again, even if it killed him.
It was too damned sinister!
Much later, the moon reached the middle of the sky.
Only then did the servants’ quarters fall silent.
After the streamers drifted to sleep one by one, the leaves in the bamboo grove rustled, exposing the hem of a red robe.
Hidden in their blind spot, the female ghost slowly raised her head. Moonlight turned her face a terrifying bluish white. Drops of blood clung to her crimson lips, while several black threads crossed between them, stitching her mouth tightly shut…
Her gaze was colder than the night itself.