Chapter 75#
Ji Yang was pressed deep into the soft hotel mattress, the back of his head sinking into the pillow.
Nie Xu’s words pulled a thread of rationality out of his hazy state.
Wait—help me?
Since when is he helping me all of a sudden?
The question barely spun once through Ji Yang’s mind, let alone had time to make sense of it, before he suddenly grabbed the pillow and let out a muffled groan.
Ji Yang had said long ago that he had zero real-world experience and was purely a theory man.
Plus, this body had been ravaged by drugs, and for all this time, physical desire had been so faint it was almost negligible.
So the speed of his reaction caught even himself completely off guard.
Maybe it was Nie Xu’s own body temperature—unusually high.
Maybe it was because the hotel room was too dark, and the calluses on Nie Xu’s tiger’s mouth were too distinct.
Or maybe, it was simply because this person was Nie Xu.
Ji Yang’s hand—the one that had been resting on the duvet, pushing against Nie Xu’s forearm—soon gave up, transforming into a tight grip, his knuckles turning white.
Ji Yang had to turn his head to the side, panting in short breaths.
He felt hot. Warmth seemed to seep out from under the duvet, coloring his neck and the edges of his ears a deep red.
Ji Yang didn’t even have the bandwidth to care what he looked like in Nie Xu’s eyes; all he knew was that Nie Xu was staring fixedly at his face. Before long, even that small breathing space was stolen from him.
In his blur, Ji Yang could feel Nie Xu kissing him while simultaneously pulling him upright.
His knee pressed against the small of Ji Yang’s back.
Even with that support, Ji Yang had to reach up and tightly grab the short hair at the back of Nie Xu’s head, just to keep himself from sliding down bonelessly.
The time was both brief and endlessly long—every second magnified.
It wasn’t just him; Ji Yang could hear Nie Xu’s breathing grow heavy and ragged. Every place their skin pressed together, the temperature kept climbing. Ji Yang had broken into a sweat—a thin sheen transferred to the other person, impossible to tell whose it was.
It seemed like a long time had passed, and yet not long at all, when Ji Yang finally broke free from the suffocating kiss. His lips were pressed against the side of Nie Xu’s neck as he gasped open his mouth, letting out two big breaths of hot air. This time he started pushing again, and with no small amount of force.
His voice was trembling and unsteady, hoarse and rushed: “No… let go of me…”
Unfortunately, his pitiful strength was utterly useless.
In the end, he just bit down on Nie Xu’s shoulder with a whimper, all strength leaving his body at once.
Ji Yang couldn’t come back to his senses for a long while.
The two of them remained in that pressed-together position.
Nie Xu didn’t withdraw right away either. The hand behind Ji Yang’s back gently stroked through the hair at the back of his head, and his chin brushed, deliberately or not, against Ji Yang’s forehead.
A bit prickly.
Ji Yang, in a spirit of complete surrender, turned his head and buried his face even deeper, asking: “How long was I out for?”
The moment the question left his mouth, Ji Yang heard a low chuckle.
He’s laughing at me. Without a second thought, Ji Yang bit down on the same spot again.
Nie Xu was unfazed, just nuzzling him and asking: “Do you like it?”
Ji Yang: …Isn’t that a little too blunt?
But he couldn’t very well enjoy it and still be stubborn about it. He released his bite, nodded, and generously admitted: “I do.”
“Like what?” Nie Xu didn’t let it go there, pressing on: “The act just now—or, does it include the person?”
Ji Yang was no longer generous this time.
He lifted his eyelids: “Are you really sure you want to ask that kind of question right now, at this particular moment? You do know that nothing a man says in bed can be trusted, right?”
Nie Xu lowered his head to look at him, massaging the back of his neck in a lazy, unhurried rhythm. “It’s fine. Just tell me the answer you can’t be trusted to give.”
Ji Yang was pushed to the edge.
But why should I always be the one on the defensive?
Physically, yes. But now too?
He grinned at Nie Xu, showing his teeth: “I like that too.”
“Are you sure?” Nie Xu raised an eyebrow.
Ji Yang kept smiling: “See, you wouldn’t believe me even if I said it.” He leaned close to Nie Xu’s ear. “I like you. You’re incredibly impressive, brother. You really seem like you know what you’re doing.”
The moment Ji Yang’s words dropped, he was flipped back onto the pillow in one deft move.
It left him completely dazed.
Nie Xu rolled over unhurriedly, straddling the duvet, looking down at him from above.
The sense of oppression hit instantly.
Ji Yang’s heart trembled inwardly, suspecting he’d pushed it too far.
His eyes slipped furtively downward as he stammered: “Well, actually, I can help too…”
“No need.” Nie Xu leaned down, bracing both hands on either side of Ji Yang’s head, one hand trailing across his cheek.
The skin Nie Xu’s hand grazed tingled all over. Ji Yang hesitantly asked: “Are you sure?”
Nie Xu gave a soft hum. “At your full and devoted service, young master. Also—I’m not that experienced.”
“You mean this sort of thing really is self-taught?” Ji Yang was deeply skeptical, completely ignoring the mortifying title of “young master” that he’d just heard.
Nie Xu nodded: “Why not?”
He then got up.
Only now did Ji Yang notice that at some point, Nie Xu had torn off two sheets of tissue and was slowly wiping his hand.
Wiping his hand?
Ji Yang caught on immediately.
His face went bright red.
Because he remembered—Nie Xu had just deliberately used that same hand to brush against his face.
Ji Yang scrubbed fiercely at his own cheek with the back of his hand, gritting his teeth: “Nie Xu!”
It seemed Nie Xu had finally had his fill of teasing.
He smiled, rolled off the bed, and pulled the duvet over Ji Yang.
Then he leaned down and pressed a kiss to his forehead.
“You’re tired. Go to sleep. I’m heading to the restroom.”
Ji Yang wanted to say he was perfectly alert right now.
But as he stared at the ceiling, the seemingly reckless activity had genuinely drained him of all energy. Listening to the faint patter of water in the bathroom, Ji Yang’s mind finally got a brief moment of blankness, and before he knew it, he had drifted off.
He didn’t even spare the thought to reflect on how much leniency he’d been granting Nie Xu’s intimate behavior—how far it had already exceeded the line of safe distance he held in his heart.
When Nie Xu emerged from the bathroom again, Ji Yang was fast asleep.
Nie Xu looked at him, picked up the phone from the low table, glanced at it, grabbed his jacket, and headed out to the room next door.
“I knew you’d come over.” Jiang Lei hadn’t slept at all; he’d been waiting.
Nie Xu tossed his jacket aside and sat down on the suite’s sofa.
“Has the explosion at the dock been traced?” Nie Xu asked.
Jiang Lei nodded. “It was a fuel oil explosion. Zhao Changgen must have stockpiled it well in advance. Looks like he’s been trying to escape Zhao Yuan’s control for a long time—just never found the right opportunity.”
Nie Xu: “Use our own people to search. Zhao Yuan’s been caught and the police have a dragnet in place—he’s definitely still on South Island.”
“Because of Yiyuan’s project this time?” Jiang Lei asked.
Nie Xu didn’t deny it. “The bidding was going badly from the start. Now that Jian Yuan has taken over, I don’t want that kind of mess landing on his head. From the very beginning, all he wanted was to give Yiyuan a more stable footing.”
Jiang Lei studied him for a few seconds. “Why do I feel like ever since you came back from the dock, you’ve been especially concerned about him getting tangled up with things from the past?”
Nie Xu: “I’ve said before—he is just himself.”
“But that’s unavoidable, and you know it,” Jiang Lei said. “Setting aside his identity as the fourth young master of the Ji family—just this case alone, it started in this area, and he already has one foot in the door.”
The phone in Nie Xu’s hand flipped over onto the coffee table, landing with a soft thud.
Nie Xu: “He doesn’t just have one foot in the door.”
He was very likely in it the entire time.
Nie Xu: “Didn’t you say Qi Songqing sent you the investigation results?”
“Oh, right.” Jiang Lei opened his tablet and placed it on the coffee table. “He said you’re looking into Ji Chengyi? That third young master has been pretty low-key ever since the Ji family incident, hasn’t he? Why investigate him?”
Nie Xu picked up the tablet and swiped through a couple of pages.
Jiang Lei: “I’ve already read through everything. Nothing unusual. The annotations are mostly just neighbors praising his good fortune—saying Ji Changshou managed to find his first love thanks to him, because he used a primary school composition assignment to make Ji Changshou discover his existence, which then led to this beautiful love story. Or it’s about middle and high school—classmates reported that Ji Yang would regularly beat Ji Chengyi black and blue, and every single time the teachers and students caught him in the act. As for colleagues, they just said he’s highly capable: since joining the Ji Corporation, every project he’s predicted has been profitable, as if he had a third eye.”
Nie Xu stared at the contents on the data page.
He let out a scoff: “Third eye?”
“Pretty boring, right?” Jiang Lei shrugged. “Most of these evaluations are just people unwilling to admit that the Ji family’s illegitimate third young master does have a certain… capability.”
Nie Xu set the tablet down. “If opportunism and trickery count as capability, then yes—he’s truly outstanding in that regard.”
The undisguised sarcasm caught Jiang Lei off guard.
“What’s going on?” Jiang Lei said. “You never wanted to say much about it before. We always assumed that after the kidnapping case, you two had at least a bit of a rapport.”
Nie Xu looked at him. “What if even the kidnapping was voluntary?”
Jiang Lei’s expression turned serious: “What do you mean?”
Nie Xu handed the tablet back. “Analyze it yourself. I’m leaving.”
With that, he stood, grabbed his jacket, and walked out.
Jiang Lei was left brimming with unanswered questions.
“Hey, don’t go—explain! …Can’t you just stay with me tonight?”
Nie Xu didn’t say a single word and left without looking back.
Jiang Lei: …………
He pulled out his phone, incredulous: “There’s no way you actually call your young master ‘baby’ in private, right?!!!”
NX: “?”
Jiang Lei sent a screen recording in retaliation.
Ji Yang’s words—“I like gentle, considerate people who call me baby”—were right there in the clip.
Jiang Lei waited five minutes after sending it. The screen froze at one point, but he received no response whatsoever.
Jiang Lei pressed his hand to his forehead: “?”
Nie Xu: “Why did you screen-record that?”
Jiang Lei: ………… “Curiosity?”
Nie Xu: “Delete it.”
Jiang Lei: “Yes, sir.”
Jiang Lei: “Sir, even though I don’t know whether you call him ‘baby’ in private, I do know you wouldn’t tolerate anyone having even a single video of him on their phone. Is dating really this terrifying?”
The person who supposedly wasn’t dating anyone worked on his laptop for the second half of the night, right there in bed.
When Ji Yang woke up, he didn’t even know Nie Xu had left the room at some point during the night.
Ji Yang blinked awake groggily, leaning over to squint at the screen, reading aloud: “A Detailed Analysis of Malignant Narcissistic Personality and Paranoid Thinking. What is this?”
He’d just woken up; his vision was still blurry.
He was practically glued to the laptop.
Nie Xu: “Nothing. Just reading a few papers.”
Nie Xu’s hand shielded his eyes from the screen’s light, a gentle warning: “It’s harsh on your eyes.”
Ji Yang leaned back a bit but didn’t fully sit up. He scratched at his tousled hair and heard Nie Xu ask: “Last time you said Ji Chengyi was a master of the script, didn’t you?”
Ji Yang said carelessly: “Mhm.”
Nie Xu: “Including being prophetic?”
Ji Yang thought Ji Chengyi must be up to something again and frowned: “I suppose so.”
Being prophetic could almost count as his foundation.
“Like what?” Nie Xu asked.
Ji Yang gave him a sidelong glance: “Like how he predicted you’d take over the Ji family sooner or later, so he’s been persistently pursuing you. Why? Did he come looking for you?”
The sourness in those words—Ji Yang didn’t even notice it himself.
Nie Xu remained composed: “No. When you first thought of getting in touch with Jian Yuan—was that prophetic too?”
As the question floated past Ji Yang’s mind, he didn’t feel anything was off about it. Nie Xu had asked so naturally, so casually. He even automatically translated the question in his head—as if Nie Xu already knew Ji Chengyi had been reborn, and was now asking about his own situation.
He overlooked the fact that, as part of their training, guiding a conversation was merely foundational for people like Nie Xu. Not to mention that Nie Xu was among the very best.
Ji Yang was still staring at the screen. “No, I transmigrated into a book. Impressive, right? God’s-eye view.”
After saying it, he noticed Nie Xu’s hand on the keyboard hadn’t moved. Only then did Ji Yang realize what had happened—and froze completely.
Slowly turning his head, he saw Nie Xu fall silent for two seconds. It was as though a great many things suddenly had their explanation in this single moment.
Absurd, and yet not enough for him to feel it was unbelievable.
If anything, what Nie Xu felt was more like a helpless, incredulous laugh: “You think you’re a book transmigrator?”