It was bright and beautiful, though prickling to his eyes, so when a ray of intense light hit them, he immediately closed them.
He frowned, his handsome brows drawing together into a deep line, showing his exhaustion. He wasn’t quite awake yet, and his body was also heavy and sluggish.
As his hangover passed, the moment he woke up, he couldn’t recall anything that’d happened.
The three unanswered and most difficult questions of the world suddenly gained a strong sense of existence at this moment: Who am I, where am I, what am I doing?
Ai, in this moment, the esteemed General was completely unknowing.
However, he soon adjusted to the light, and the leaden feeling in his head slowly dissipated. With difficulty, he could remember his name and where he was born; the noises from outside also began to filter into his ears.
It was actually quite peaceful outside. Compared to yesterday’s racket of noisy demons, it was almost silent today.
Right, they had really drunk a lot yesterday. He’d momentarily loosened his restraint – it seemed like he had been repressed for too long, so last night must have been quite fun.
But no, as soon as he sat up, he looked out the window and saw a mecha taken apart not very far away – its head had been directly severed and reattached to the tail, the four limbs had been cleanly removed and neatly stacked to the side – this was literally a scene of dismemberment. In one fell swoop, it had evolved from a majestic Snow Lion mech to an incredibly stupid…he didn’t even know what this was.
The scene was extremely miserable.
…Too wanton.
However, he’d let everyone go wild since tomorrow was a public holiday – welcoming the rookie was just an excuse.
Today, a crowd of useless, hungover drunks had all scrambled home. Of course, there was no way they’d actually stay behind and clean up the mess.
Naturally, the esteemed General had his own selfish motives.
When he, this old one, was happy, he’d inevitably want others to be happy as well.
The mech division had always been famous for being strict yet also unrestrained. Who told them to be composed of talented nobles with a few screws loose?
However, after all these years under General Yan’s command, they usually didn’t dare to be unbridled.
He dragged himself up, a few fragments of memory appearing in his mind. Oh…he’d actually gotten drunk last night, and from what he could remember, it had still been quite early.
It didn’t matter, though. He’d always believed staunchly in his own self-control – even if he was drunk, he should be able to maintain an elegant demeanour.
From the fragmented scenes that flashed through his mind, he recalled that after getting drunk, he had gone to the window to enjoy the breeze. There was no way he could’ve done anything strange.
Thinking of this, his mood was quite good.
“Ah, General, you’re awake.”
He heard Laurent’s voice coming from outside the door. He nodded, then went to go out and wash up.
However, he froze in his movements.
Somewhat dazedly, he looked at his own clothes…Hm, he thought that he’d been wearing different clothes last night?
If he wasn’t wrong, this was Shen Zhifan’s outfit.
…Wait a minute!
What was going on?
A few faint memories came back to him. Suffering somewhat, he held his forehead as he tried to remember.
Right, he’d been on the balcony last night, then he faintly saw Shen Zhifan’s face.
There was nothing strange about that, was there?
He hesitantly thought, head still pounding like it was about to split open, yet he was still perplexed.
No no no, but – but if nothing happened, why would he be wearing Shen Zhifan’s clothes?
Laurent poked his head in from the doorway, “Hey, General, what’re you doing?”
Laurent didn’t like going home, so even when everyone was on holiday he’d remain on duty.
Yan Shuo still had a headache, and reached to rub at his temples for a moment. He hesitated, and looked at Laurent somewhat meekly, “Last night…I didn’t do anything strange, did I?”
“Nah.” Laurent was in the middle of playing a game on his phone, and replied simply.
Yan Shuo slowly put his worries to rest.
“You just got up in the middle of the night to tear apart that mech, that’s all.”
Laurent indifferently pointed out the window at the S-rank Snow Lion mech that Yan Shuo had just named a “miserable beast slaughtered as a sacrifice”.
Yan Shuo, “…”
…H-He’d done that?
No way.
“But it doesn’t really matter ah,” Laurent laughed carelessly, “Compared to when you wanted to open the storehouse to launch ‘Raphael’, yelling about wiping out ‘Ferdinand’ at the same time, the Snow Lion thing isn’t much ah.”
Yan Shuo, “…”
Yan Shuo looked at Laurent’s smiling face, his brain completely frozen.
“After all, dismantling a mech isn’t a lot of money to you,” Laurent held his chin as he thought, “And insulting the royal family as well as a homicide charge, hm, usually the sentences for those are pretty severe.”
Yan Shuo’s throat bobbed, and he couldn’t speak.
“Speaking of, we almost couldn’t hold you back ah,” Laurent sighed, “Afterwards, everyone got really drunk, and some of them even yelled about going with you. Luckily, Mr. Shen and I were still mostly sober and he managed to dissuade you just in time.”
Yan Shuo silently looked at the clothes on his body, and struggled to ask, “What happened to my clothes?”
Laurent tilted his head, sinking into thought, “I don’t know about that, when you came outside you were already wearing Mr. Shen’s clothes.”
Although he hadn’t gotten a proper answer, Yan Shuo still let out a breath of relief.
…Because he faintly felt that he didn’t really want to know what had actually happened.
“I…cough,” Yan Shuo strove to find an explanation for himself, but was inexplicably diffident. He could only clear his throat and speak a little louder, “I should – wouldn’t have done those kinds of things – you didn’t get drunk and remember wrongly?”
Laurent seemed not to hear the fragile little bit of anticipation in his esteemed General’s voice.
“No way ah,” He continued with his clean-cut replies, “Everyone’s already used to you tearing up mechs every year when you get drunk – oh, Yan Dao didn’t want me telling you cause he was afraid you’d get angry. Ai, so what if I tell you, it’s not even important. After all these years, everyone’s used to it ah.”
Yan Shuo, “…”
Pitter-patter, the esteemed General’s anticipation has shattered.
He struggled and repeated, “…After all these years, everyone’s already used to it?”
Laurent was delighted, “Right, right! So what if you tear up mechs? Whenever you get drunk and happy you like to take them apart ah. I always want to join you, but usually don’t get the chance. Ai, it’s always Yan Dao and the others that don’t let me…General, your expression looks a bit off?”
Of course, Laurent wouldn’t know that at this moment, the General had sunk into questioning his own life.
In his…twenty-nine years of existence, he had never questioned his alcohol tolerance, especially compared to Shen Zhifan’s from not long ago.
Now, he felt that he’d been drinking fake wine.
“I…aside from taking apart the mech and wanting to start up Raphael,” He repeated the words with difficulty, still disbelieving, “I didn’t do any other strange things, right? Such as…towards Mr. Shen?”
These things were just a little…a little display of what he wanted to do normally but didn’t – these weren’t important.
“No, ah.”
Laurent kept that delighted smile, his hands fiddling with his game.
The General let out another breath, picking up the hangover soup and taking a sip.
“It’s just that afterwards when you wanted to launch Raphael, Mr. Shen came to hold you back, “ Laurent paused, chin in hand again as he recalled, “Then, you hugged Mr. Shen and kissed him for a while – after that, you said that you wanted to marry him in front of us. Hm, other than that, I don’t think there was anything else.”
The esteemed General’s throat trembled; he almost spat the hangover soup right out.
“It’s fine, we’re already used to…wait, no,” Laurent frowned, “We’re not quite used to this – you’ve never said that you wanted to marry one of us before ah.”
Listening to this, the esteemed General – famous for his fighting prowess, who chose his words carefully and had great self-discipline – was about to go insane.
“General, your complexion looks really bad ah, you can’t be worried about these things, right?” Laurent glanced at him curiously, “Hahahahahaha it’s fine ah! In any case, everyone already knows how bad your alcohol tolerance is ah.”
——In any case. Everyone. Already knows. How bad. Your alcohol tolerance is. Ah.
Very well.
There was another burst of pitter-pattering.
The esteemed General’s self-confidence of many years had been smashed in one fell swoop.
“Bang.”
He silently looked at the pitiful cup of hangover soup that had been crushed in his hand. His fingers were extremely stiff, and his brain had basically crashed after being overwhelmed.
“You didn’t know about it before?” Laurent really didn’t know the meaning of ‘pouring oil onto the fire’, “No way – oh, speaking of, everyone always says not to tell you, and also have people clean up everytime. But they were all drunk yesterday, and there’s still a bunch of people who aren’t awake – I think it was only Yan Dao that had something happen at home so he went back early.”
The esteemed General reached out and leaned his hands on both sides of the table, his brain still in the middle of crashing.
He didn’t know if it was because of the hangover soup, or because Laurent’s description was too realistic – he actually recalled a few images of him taking the mech apart.
Those scenes were extremely…unbearable to look at.
The heavens knew that he’d always thought these memories were just. Dreams. And. Nothing. More.
Laurent beamed as he levelled up. He stretched and continued raining blows unto the esteemed General, “Wow, this mech is pretty handsome ah. Oh, by the way, why did you want to wipe out Ferdinand last night?”
Of course, he didn’t know that in the General’s heart, His Highness Ferdinand had always hovered between ‘damned’ and ‘extremely damned’. Most of the time, the latter was more common. There were two reasons:
<ol>Selling out his country to enemies (Olivia had said this, so it was basically a confirmation. Currently still collecting evidence.) Love rival (the possibility was always there.)</ol>
And considering Laurent’s IQ sometimes, there was naturally no way Yan Shuo would share his suspicions. Even if he was drunk, he wouldn’t.
“So, did His Highness Ferdinand really snatch away your sweetheart, like you said?” Without an ounce of tact, Laurent shattered the last of his esteemed General’s self-respect, “You sounded so aggrieved, and insisted that Mr. Shen hug you before you were willing to come back here and sleep.”
…Very well.
The General’s hands on the table almost couldn’t hold him up anymore.
However, this still wasn’t the last blow.
“Oh, Mr. Shen woke up. Afternoon!” Laurent waved to someone outside, “Our General is up too, come over here! It seems like he can’t remember last night hahaha, how about you tell him about what happened?”
The General raised his head slightly to look at Laurent.