Chapter 18 - 1#
Freeing Him - From Today On, He Is No Longer a Servant#
Inside and outside the dream, on and off the couch.
The nightmarish Yanzhi and the clear-headed Xiao Cuan faced each other, quietly in a standoff.
An alarm sound, coming from nowhere, echoed between them.
The sharp, piercing alarm played over and over again like a valley echo.
An alarm light, coming from nowhere, flashed between them.
A dazzling, intense red light reflected on both their faces, highlighting Yanzhi’s reddened eyes and a momentarily incredulous look on Xiao Cuan’s face.
The palace servants and imperial physicians in the hall were in a chaotic mess, busy picking up the candle stands and vessels that had crashed to the floor.
The earth-shaking alarm only moved back and forth between the two of them, flashing and wailing.
In an instant, the world fell silent.
It was as if only the two of them remained in this world.
Amidst the flickering firelight, Xiao Cuan was the first to regain his senses. His expression turned gloomy inch by inch, and the light in his eyes darkened.
He instinctively took a step forward, staring intently at Yanzhi, trying to find even a hint of a clue on his face.
But Yanzhi was already ill and trapped in a nightmare. Because of the agitation, his face was flushed. Illuminated by the red light and covered in tears, his eyes, nose, and cheeks were all red.
He was crying, his entire body trembling.
Except for sadness, Xiao Cuan could see nothing else.
—ALARM! This character’s favorability toward the player has dropped to…
“Error report!”
Xiao Cuan suddenly turned his head and roared sternly, disregarding the others present.
“Error report! Error report! Error report—!”
The alarm sound finally stopped. The imperial physicians and palace servants were all stunned into place by the roar.
In the next instant, they regained their senses and, one after another, fell to their knees with several “thump-thump” sounds.
Though they didn’t understand what His Majesty was saying, they still spoke up to beg for forgiveness.
“May Your Majesty appease your anger!”
Xiao Cuan clenched his fists tightly and took two deep breaths, trying his best to calm his mind.
“Get out.”
“Your Majesty, but Young Master Yanzhi…”
“Get out!” Xiao Cuan repeated, raising his voice.
The group dared not disobey and could only pack their things and bow their way out.
Upon leaving, they also closed the hall doors.
Xiao Cuan calmed his mind and said one last time: “Error report.”
Impossible.
Just now in the purification room, Yanzhi had said “I like Your Majesty” one hundred and eighteen times, and “I like Your Majesty the most in the world” sixty-three times.
Even if one “I like Your Majesty” only represented one point of favorability, Yanzhi’s favorability toward him should be full.
He had already carried Yanzhi out of the purification room, he had already fed Yanzhi milk, and he had already washed Yanzhi clean.
Even regarding the sugar cakes, he and Yanzhi had already cleared things up.
This matter should have passed.
Normally, even if he teased or bullied him severely, the favorability always remained unmoved, forever full.
Even when joking with him about sending him to the purification room, at most it would only drop by 0.01 or 0.02.
Yanzhi had sworn an oath to the heavens to always be loyal to His Majesty, always serve His Majesty, and always like His Majesty.
Yanzhi’s favorability toward him could not possibly drop this much all of a sudden.
It must be that the previous detection error hadn’t been fixed yet.
It had to be.
Thinking this, Xiao Cuan’s heart, which had been pounding wildly, gradually calmed down.
With a cold face, he issued commands one by one—
“Use the highest authority, report directly to the top level, and troubleshoot the error.”
“Turn off the alarm and temporarily hide the favorability panel.”
“Notify me when it’s fixed.”
After he said these words, the red light hanging between the two gradually dissipated.
Xiao Cuan began to walk, step by step, closing in on Yanzhi.
Standing on the couch, Yanzhi retreated inch by inch, instinctively.
After several entanglements and struggles, Yanzhi finally exhausted his last bit of strength.
As he retreated, he was tripped by the quilts on the couch. His legs went weak, his eyes closed, and he collapsed just like that.
He didn’t fall onto the couch, but into Xiao Cuan’s arms.
Xiao Cuan sat down on the couch, holding Yanzhi.
This time, it wasn’t a death-grip using all his strength to crush him into his bones and blood.
This time, Xiao Cuan placed Yanzhi on his lap, only supporting his waist with his hand and letting him lie there.
Yanzhi’s body had gone completely limp; his legs dangled weakly, his hands hung limply, and his head tilted back softly.
His dark hair was scattered, falling down and swaying beside Xiao Cuan.
Hearing that the hall had gone quiet, a palace servant grew bold and inquired softly from outside.
“Your Majesty, should we ask the imperial physicians to come in and examine Young Master Yanzhi…”
“No need,” Xiao Cuan refused flatly. “Withdraw.”
“Yes.”
A series of light footsteps sounded in the outer hall and soon vanished.
Yanzhi still had a fever. Xiao Cuan, supporting his waist through the fabric of his clothes, could feel waves of heat coming from his body.
He couldn’t go without medicine.
So—
In silence, Xiao Cuan opened his palm.
In the blink of an eye, a box of pills and a bottle of liquid medicine appeared in his hand.
This idiot Yanzhi always loved to dream. This time he was merely having a nightmare, unable to distinguish between dream and reality, and had mistaken him for someone else.
He was already stupid; if the fever continued and fried his brain, he would be even stupider and even less able to distinguish people.
Xiao Cuan was magnanimous; he wouldn’t hold a grudge against an idiot like Yanzhi.
He wouldn’t hold a grudge.
Xiao Cuan propped Yanzhi up, letting him lean in his arms.
Freeing a hand, he opened the medicine box, popped out a white pill, and held it in his hand. He then unscrewed the liquid medicine and poured a capful of the thick, brown syrup.
He haphazardly wiped the tears from Yanzhi’s face with his sleeve, pinched his mouth open, stuffed the pill inside, and poured the liquid medicine in.
Perhaps because the taste was too strange, as soon as the items were stuffed into Yanzhi’s mouth, Yanzhi turned his head away, looking as if he were about to spit them out.
Xiao Cuan tossed the things aside, forcefully covered Yanzhi’s mouth, and pulled him back.
He instinctively barked a stern command: “Swallow it! If you dare spit it out, I’ll…”
The words stopped halfway, coming to an abrupt halt.
Xiao Cuan didn’t say anything more.
In the moment he was dazed, Yanzhi pushed his hand away and, with a “wah,” spat out all the medicine in his mouth.
Because Xiao Cuan was still supporting his head, he spat right onto Xiao Cuan.
“Yan… zhi—”
Xiao Cuan called his name through gritted teeth and picked up the pills and liquid medicine resting to the side again.
“If you don’t take this, I’ll have the imperial physicians come in to treat you. The medicine they prescribe is even more bitter than this.”
Xiao Cuan popped out another pill and poured another capful of liquid medicine, then pinched his mouth open.
“Those imperial physicians are also quacks. You’ve taken their medicine for several days and aren’t getting better; instead, the more you take, the stupider you become.”
“I’ve changed you to good medicine, and yet you don’t know quality when you see it.”
“Eat!”
This time, as soon as he stuffed the things in, Xiao Cuan covered Yanzhi’s mouth, not allowing him to spit them out again.
Yanzhi obediently swallowed the medicine, closed his eyes, and fell into a quiet sleep.
Xiao Cuan sat holding him for a while. Seeing that he was indeed soundly asleep, he placed him on the couch and covered him with the quilt.
Xiao Cuan stood by the bedside and changed out of the inner garment Yanzhi had soiled.
Just as he finished changing and was about to get onto the couch to sleep with Yanzhi for a bit, Yanzhi suddenly turned his head—
“Heugh!”
Yanzhi vomited again, once more aiming perfectly at him.
He didn’t know where Yanzhi had hidden the swallowed pill and liquid medicine, but he had vomited them up quite smoothly.
Enraged, Xiao Cuan instinctively grabbed his collar and yanked him toward himself: “Idiot, are you doing this on purpose?”
But Yanzhi’s eyes remained closed, his face flushed, motionless.
He seemed… to just dislike the taste of these medicines.
He disliked them, and that was all.
Xiao Cuan stared at his face for a long time, eventually admitting defeat.
He changed into clean clothes for the third time and picked Yanzhi up.
A dozen palace servants were waiting in the corridor outside the hall.
Suddenly, the doors of the main hall were opened from the inside.
His Majesty stood within the threshold, holding the unconscious Young Master Yanzhi.
Outside, gloomy clouds obscured the sun. His Majesty stood in the shadows of the hall, his face unreadable.
He finally seemed to compromise, lowering his eyes and commanding in a low voice: “Call the imperial physicians back.”
As things stood, he finally had to admit—
He couldn’t handle Yanzhi.
He, who possessed the system store and claimed to be omnipotent, could not treat Yanzhi now, nor could he control him.
*
The Taiji Hall was brightly lit.
Though autumn had only just begun, the floor heating in the hall was already fired up, and several charcoal braziers were lit, making the hall as warm as spring.
Palace servants rolled up the bedding Yanzhi had soiled, took it away, and replaced it with clean ones.
Xiao Cuan wrapped Yanzhi in a tiger-skin blanket and sat on the couch holding him.
Yanzhi was still in a deep sleep, with only half of his pale face and a small section of his pale wrist showing from the blanket.
Several imperial physicians had been called back.
The most senior imperial physician was kneeling by the couch, feeling Yanzhi’s pulse.
The other physicians, being less senior, waited behind him.
Xiao Cuan lowered his eyes, thinking about who knows what, resting his chin on Yanzhi’s shoulder and pressing his cheek against his through the tiger skin.
Like a tiger with closed eyes feigning sleep, one never knew when he might suddenly pounce.
Fifteen minutes later, the old physician withdrew his hand and tentatively said, “To Your Majesty…”
“Mm.” Xiao Cuan looked up, his gaze as sharp as ever. “How is he?”
The old physician reported cautiously, “Young Master Yanzhi followed the autumn hunt recently. The fatigue of the journey, not being acclimated to the environment, plus the cooling weather and catching a draft, led to this cold.”
Xiao Cuan questioned, “Hasn’t he been drinking bitter medicine for several days already?”
“Yes, Young Master Yanzhi has been taking medicine for several days and should have been nearly recovered. But today…” The old physician hesitated. “Young Master Yanzhi was severely frightened, and…”
“And what?” Xiao Cuan frowned with an impatient expression. “Stop the nonsense.”
The old physician rephrased: “Young Master Yanzhi has just recovered from a major illness; he should not have engaged in such vigorous sexual activity, let alone repeatedly…”
“Nonsense!”
Before he could finish, Xiao Cuan interrupted him.
“I was the one doing all the work on the couch—what does it have to do with him?”
“This…” The old physician was stifled.
Xiao Cuan didn’t want to linger on these matters and only said, “Prescribe some medicine. Something he won’t vomit up after eating.”
“Yes.”
With no other choice, the physicians deliberated and, following a common prescription for colds, added some nourishing medicinal ingredients to prescribe medicine for Yanzhi, and had the palace servants fetch the ingredients to decoct.
They also prepared a bottle of external medicine for reducing swelling and stasis, and presented it to the Emperor, asking him to apply it to Young Master Yanzhi.
Young Master Yanzhi’s wrist had been rubbed raw; other places were likely even more serious.
Before long, a palace servant brought up the decocted medicinal soup on a tray.
“Your Majesty, the medicine is ready. We shall serve Young Master Yanzhi…”
“I’ll do it.”
Xiao Cuan gathered Yanzhi in his arms, reached out to pick up the medicine, and stirred it with a spoon.
Steam rose up, and the scent of bitter medicine spread along with it.
Looking at the pitch-black soup, Xiao Cuan asked coldly, “I told you to decoct several bowls—are they ready?”
“We decocted three extra bowls; they are all warming on the stove.”
“Mm.”
Lowering his eyes, Xiao Cuan personally scooped a spoonful of medicine, blew on it gently, took a sip himself first, and once he felt it wasn’t too hot, brought it to Yanzhi’s lips.
He thought that three bowls might not be enough.
Yanzhi vomited as soon as he took the medicine, over and over. With his way of drinking it like mouthwash, he didn’t know how many bowls would actually be enough.
He was also delicate; he refused good pills and liquid medicine and insisted on drinking a large bowl of bitter decoction.
Xiao Cuan pried Yanzhi’s mouth open with the porcelain spoon and slowly fed the medicine in.
At first, Yanzhi drank it quite smoothly.
But just as one spoonful was about to be finished, Yanzhi choked on the medicine and immediately curled up, coughing.
Xiao Cuan abruptly tossed aside the medicine bowl and patted his back. “Why are you so… it’s just a bit of medicine? Why is it so much trouble?”