When Mu let her go, she gasped for breath and tears silently flowed down her face. ‘Mu, I… I was wrong. You won’t leave me, will you?’ Mu Xiaotian embraced her, letting her feel his warmth and comfort in his arms. ‘Xiaoyu, I guessed this would happen. I should probably thank you, because you’ve made Yueqing come back to life. Ever since that incident, Yueqing has kept his distance from everyone, even me. He rejects everyone with his cold face, and no woman can hug him. He has frozen himself up. In fact, when I saw the resolute expression on his face the day he committed suicide, I thought to myself, I’ve lost him, the Yue Qing who used to smile. ‘Mu Xiaotian helped her dry her tears, ’I remember that day when we were with Situ, he came over but left immediately. Later, I found that he seemed to reject you, and he hated the sight of you the whole way. I even scolded him a little, but soon I realised that it was just his disguise.‘
’Disguise? You mean Yue Qing didn’t hate me at that time?’ ’I don’t remember him ever saying that he hated you! After you drank all my water that day, whose water did you drink? It was Yue Qing’s. And when we reached the next town, he bought you another big water bag, and asked me to give it to you. Usually when we went to bed at night, he never allowed anyone to sleep next to you, and always made sure that I was the only one. From that night on, I knew that he knew who you were, and that he had been taking care of you in his own way. How did someone else describe it: the sun rises in the east and it rains in the west, it’s said to be cloudy but it’s actually sunny.
‘That day when you played the flute, I saw the look in his eyes, and I knew then how he felt about you. He wanted to hold you in his arms just like I did at that moment. That’s why he gave me his handkerchief and asked me to wipe away your tears. The considerate man you mentioned was not me, it was Yue Qing! I knew when we went out that he would eat you up, I just didn’t expect him to say that you ate him up!’ ’You don’t mind? You will look down on me, and think of me as a frivolous woman?’
‘It would be a lie to say I don’t mind. But Situ told me that you are different from other women. If we look at you and love you in the same way, we will only end up losing you. He didn’t want that, so he taught you how to help me relieve my emotions. I didn’t want that either, so I accepted the fact that you love him too. Now, it’s the same with Yue Qing. In fact, I feel that the one with a knot in his heart is him, not me.’ Tang Ziyu leaned into his arms, ‘I know I should only love one person, you or Situ, because you two have really been very good to me. But I don’t know why I was attracted to Yue Qing. He made me feel warm very easily. That day I took the aphrodisiac, and he said it was an aphrodisiac. I was actually a little happy at that time, and I really hoped that he would come to give me the antidote. But when he brought out the antidote, I was a little disappointed. That’s when I realized that I had fallen for him.’
‘I know, he told me. He said he had wanted to take advantage of the situation and eat you, but his inferiority complex made him afraid to touch you, for fear you would find him dirty. So he gave you the antidote, and you had a good night’s sleep, while he took a cold shower. Later, when you went to see him, he said he really wanted to back out, but you had easily captured his heart. Sometimes I also wonder, you’re not some stunning beauty, so why were the three of us attracted to you?’ What did you say?’ Tang Ziyu grabbed him by the collar, “How dare you say I’m not beautiful?!” ’In fact, I should say, I don’t want you to be beautiful! Otherwise, I really don’t know how many more people will compete with me!’