Chapter 178
Chapter 178
“Absorbed it?”
Weiqing Song watched the phoenix’s afterimage rush into Fusheng Duan’s brow. Fusheng swayed several times, then quickly recovered.
“Mm.” Supporting himself on the throne’s armrest, Fusheng held his forehead and rested for a moment.
Shengsheng Zhou ran over and was about to call his name when crimson light suddenly blazed from Fusheng’s body, followed by a bizarre transformation.
He became a bird. Unsteady at first, he nearly fell from the air, but his wings quickly adapted and kept him aloft.
The bird was covered in tender yellow feathers and looked fluffy and soft.
Its true texture had indeed felt exactly as one might imagine.
At least no one knew that better than Shengsheng.
All the blood in her body seemed to turn cold, as though someone had poured a bucket of freezing water over her head.
“All right. Hurry and change back. If Shengsheng Zhou sees you, it will be difficult to explain.”
The bird’s form immediately lengthened. In the blink of an eye, a man in red stood in its place.
He calmly extended one hand and examined his palm, then curved his lips in a pleased smile and waved it at Weiqing. “It worked.”
The two turned. “Then we–”
The remaining words lodged in their throats. A short distance away stood a girl whose face seemed drained of every trace of blood.
No one knew how long she had stood there.
Or how much she had seen.
Shengsheng tried blinking and slowly felt for her limbs.
Perhaps it was simply too absurd. She could not shed a single tear.
Would some kind soul help her remember everything she had ever done?
She had confided far too much to that bird that could not speak.
Things she could tell no one, things she had nowhere to release, things she could not reconcile within herself.
Far, far too many things.
Including every opinion and suspicion she held about Fusheng.
Like an arrogant fool, she had analyzed Fusheng’s feelings for her to that bird, treating him like a rubbish bin and pouring out the love she had hidden for so long–love that seemed dug from the earth after rotting into stinking mud.
What had Fusheng thought at the time?
He must have mocked her inwardly, trampling her beneath his feet while watching coldly.
She had been stupid. She was a fucking idiot.
Dense pain pierced her heart needle by needle, finally bringing her back to herself.
At some point, the man in red had appeared before her, undisguised panic covering his face.
“Shengsheng…” he called hoarsely, his voice extremely low.
Shengsheng drew a deep breath and said without expression, “Do you want to explain? I’ll give you the chance.”
At those words, Fusheng opened his mouth, but for a moment he could not produce half a syllable.
“I…”
“You are Pecky.” Shengsheng interrupted the single word. Her black-and-white eyes studied him as though searching for some trace.
“Yes,” Fusheng answered softly.
Shengsheng nodded. “I understand.”
“Fusheng Duan, I am extremely angry right now, but I’m not angry with you. I’m angry at my own stupidity. Therefore, I am formally breaking up with you.”
“Because whenever I see you now, I remember every word I said and everything I did.”
“Even if my fingers were ground down to bloody white bone, I would still want to claw open a crack in the earth, throw myself inside, and bury my regret and humiliation.”
“So, to ensure that both of us leave this place unharmed, we’re resolving the problem immediately.”
“We’re completely finished.”
Fusheng’s pupils contracted.
Before he could even understand her meaning, he had been sentenced to an unforgivable death.
“Brother, let’s go.” Shengsheng Zhou spoke calmly to Weiqing Song, who stood not far away.
Weiqing glanced at Fusheng Duan, who looked as though his soul had left his body, then walked over to Shengsheng. “I…”
“I know. You called me Shengsheng Zhou just now,” she said without looking aside.
Weiqing pressed his lips together and lifted a hand as if to explain, but in the end, he said nothing.
The two of them were just about to leave the great hall.
Then a chill wind suddenly swept in from behind.
“Weiqing.” Fusheng’s voice rang out.
Weiqing jolted and looked back at him.
That single glance made every hair on his body stand on end.
Fusheng Duan, can you even still be considered human right now?
His already pitch-black eyes had grown so deep that not a shred of light seemed able to enter them, while the corners were stained scarlet. Though he had called Weiqing’s name, his gaze was fixed unwaveringly on Shengsheng.
His black hair spilled loose down his back. That mad, sickly, ruined beauty made him look like a ravenous ghost desperate to devour flesh and blood to nourish its soul. It sent a chill through the heart.
“Let me speak with her alone for a while,” the ghost said.
Weiqing lowered his head and looked at the unmoved Shengsheng. “Do you want to?”
She shook her head decisively. “I want to leave.”
“She doesn’t–”
Unfortunately, before Weiqing could finish, Fusheng shoved him straight out and closed the door.
As the gap was about to seal, he tossed both birds out along with him.
Outside, Weiqing pounded furiously on the door. “Fusheng Duan! Have you lost your damn mind?”
Fusheng wrapped an arm around Shengsheng’s waist and brought her to the throne.
She sat while he lowered himself onto one knee.
Her eyes flickered.
This was the first time he had ever humbled himself so completely before her.
“I told you I would never let you go again,” Fusheng said.
“No. What you said then was that if I wanted to leave, I had to take you with me.” She might be heartbroken and furious right now, but that did not mean she had turned into an idiot.
“That was a lie,” Fusheng said, enunciating every word.
Shengsheng frowned.
“Even when that isn’t what you truly think, you never speak honestly. Shengsheng Zhou, you could tell Pecky. You could dissect your own heart for a bird that cannot speak and isn’t even human. Do you have any idea how jealous that made me?”
Watching the corners of Fusheng’s eyes grow redder and redder, Shengsheng pressed her lips together.
She had no rebuttal.
“I am not emotionally perceptive. I do not know how to love someone, nor am I good at listening or offering comfort. That led you to decide I would never be a good person to confide in.”
“I didn’t tell you because I knew you would react exactly as you are now.”
He lowered his eyes and let out the faintest sigh. The bitterness within it dispersed almost at once, as though it had existed for only an instant.
“We are not over, Shengsheng Zhou.”
“As long as I refuse, you will never leave me.”
“I’m sorry I deceived you.”
He rose and stepped in front of her. His voice was clearly gentle, but the obsession and ruthlessness threaded through it were impossible to ignore.
“Your only choice is to accept me. I will not allow you to leave.”
He took her hand and pressed a pale, featherlight kiss upon it. In his lowered eyes, there seemed to be room for no reflection but hers.
Fusheng had never demanded that Shengsheng stay beside him at every moment. It was enough that, if something happened to her, she remained within a distance he could cross in time to protect her.
Even after losing her once, the way they lived with each other would not change.
His restraint over his possessiveness was extraordinary.
Yet this seeming sense of distance did not mean his love was any less fierce or fervent.