I knew that it was you who did it, but why do you say it in such a tone?! Chi Yan fumed, and finally, he vented by biting Ye Yingzhi on the neck.
Hu Xing coughed, and Chi Yan looked back only to see that all the people at the table were looking at him and Ye Yingzhi.
Even though he was no longer a youth with a thin face, all the friends who were present were well acquainted with him. He could not help blushing immediately.
Why did he always lose his rationality when it comes to Ye Yingzhi? As expected, he really was an homme fatale.
Hu Xing was still comforting him with a friendly smile. “Xiao Chi, it’s fine. We all are used to it since years ago.”
Chi Yan wasn’t comforted at all.
Ye Yingzhi even whispered at the side, “Look, Ah Yan, everyone knows that you’ve been bullying me.”
Old Yuan’s response was slower by a beat, so he directly said, “That’s not right. Ruler told me that in those years when he didn’t know you, you went to his bedroom to frighten him while it was dark with your face covered.”
Xiao An was surprised to hear this. “How could it be? Brother Ye actually did such a thing?”
Ye Yingzhi immediately understood what Old Yuan was referring to, and a sweet smile appeared on his face. “En, although I’ve wronged Ah Yan, even if I thought back to it now, it is still one of my happiest memories. Happier still is that I met Ah Yan at that time.”
Chi Yan knew the inside story, so when he heard such a shameless statement, he was so angry that he wanted to bite him again. He turned around and saw Ye Yingzhi smiling at him. His black eyes were deep, just like the first time he’d seen them.
At that time, when graduate students were starting school, he was panting as he carried his suitcase and pushed the bedroom door open. When he saw that there was already someone inside, that person was looking out of the window with his back to him.
When the man heard the sound, he turned around and quickly helped him with his suitcase. Then he handed a towel to him and said with a smile, “My name is Ye Yingzhi.” A pair of black and bottomless eyes stared at him.
He undoubtedly looked aloof, but he was unexpectedly gentle.
At that time, Chi Yan thought that Ye Yingzhi was really a beautiful name. The most beautiful name he could think of.
His resentment suddenly turned into a feeling of tenderness warming up his belly. Chi Yan couldn’t help watching him as the corner of his lips raised. So, it turned out that they had actually been together for so many years.
Ye Yingzhi had said that he would prove that he’d never hurt him. Now Chi Yan wanted him to prove this for all his life, not because he didn’t believe or because he was fearful, but because he wanted to be with him for a lifetime.
In the evening, they went home, and before falling asleep, Ye Yingzhi touched the tooth marks on his neck and complained softly, “When did you have a habit of biting people? You bite when you are both angry and happy.” This tooth mark wasn’t the one he left in the restaurant, but a new one.
“This won’t do. You always bite me, making me look as if I’m not good enough. I want to get even.”
Chi Yan was too tired to open his eyes and just gave him a silent look.
Ye Yingzhi immediately changed his words. “I will take revenge in the next life.”
Chi Yan also saw the tooth mark on his neck and was instantly somewhat ashamed. “…Ye Yingzhi, you hurry erase that mark. What if your colleagues see it tomorrow?”
Ye Yingzhi was a demon that congealed his own body. It was easy for him to remove a bite mark.
But Ye Yingzhi didn’t comply with him. He touched the bite mark happily and closed his eyes with the intention to sleep. “I don’t want to. I want to keep it.”
Chi Yan bit him because he was dissatisfied. He actually received a bite from him, but he was very happy about it, touching it dearly and refused to remove it.
Chi Yan nudged him twice, but Ye Yingzhi pretended to be asleep as he laid motionless.
Chi Yan was helpless against his shameless behavior, so he could only pull the blanket up and slept in silence. At this moment, Ye Yingzhi moved. He stretched out his arms to hold his lover in his embrace.
————————
Three years after graduation, Chi Yan and Ye Yingzhi purchased their new home and moved away from the “rented” house.
Like the most common couple in the world, they woke each other up every day, find clothes and tied ties for each other. They went out to work, and then returned to the same home after a busy day to eat, wash, and sleep.
They would also try their best to fit their annual leave together, and find a place they had been or hadn’t been to travel together.
If Ye Yingzhi wanted, he could easily obtain all kinds of things that ordinary people dreamed of by using his ability, but he would rather pretend to be an ordinary human, struggle for their lives with Chi Yan on the ground, repay their house loan together, and share a cup of hot black tea together in the winter night. Everything he gave to his lover was earned honestly by him.
After a long time, even Chi Yan would occasionally forget the fact that his lover was actually not a human being, even if he remembered, he would not care about it.
When he first saw a white hair on Ye Yingzhi’s head, he was surprised. He held the hair in his fingers and said, “Yingzhi, will you grow old too?”
Ye Yingzhi lowered his head a little and let him pull out the hair. He smiled casually. “Of course. Don’t believe in those myths and stories. They’re all made up to deceive people and violate the laws of science.”
What he didn’t say was that when he woke up three days ago, he saw a white hair on Chi Yan’s head, so he secretly pulled it out while his lover was still sleeping.
If I could, I want to age a little faster than you, so that you would always be my baby, so that you could always play around in front of me. So that you will be willful toward me, act coquettish toward me, and do whatever you want. Evil entities would never grow old or die, but I would grow old with you, I would accompany you to the end of this lifetime. Otherwise wouldn’t I suffer a great loss if you were to be snatched away by other demons, monsters, or humans in your next life when I have already spoiled you so badly?
After that, he went out to buy groceries with Chi Yan as usual, but he would never say something like this to his lover. Just like he had some love hidden deep in his heart, but wasn’t willing to take it out.
With the vicissitudes of events, years passed by quickly. It would only feel ephemeral when one looked back at the decades of time long past.
When he was old, he liked to read books on the small glass table on the balcony of his home, holding his lover’s hand in silence and wearing his presbyopic glasses. It was hard for him to concentrate when he was old. He always thought that it was good to meet Ye Yingzhi, otherwise, he couldn’t imagine falling in love with someone else, and would probably stay alone for his whole life.
In the following days, he would sit on the balcony for a while before Ye Yingzhi would pull him back to his room to rest.
Ye Yingzhi was aware of the coming of his time more than Chi Yan himself. There was not much sadness in his heart. Anyway, no matter what happened after his death, he would accompany him.
At last, Chi Yan had no more strength to speak, he just looked at him all the time with a soft expression gracing his face. His right hand struggled and trembled slowly until he managed to touch Ye Yingzhi’s fingers.
Then he looked at his lover and closed his eyes.
——————————
…
Chi Yan could feel himself falling from a high altitude, he seemed to be falling toward a broad and boundless twinkling milky way.
His heart was suddenly filled with great sadness as if he was reluctant to part with something. In a trance, he felt familiar with this scene, but he couldn’t remember just when he’d seen it before.
Suddenly, a hand caught him.
Then the owner of the hand gave a soft sigh and held him tightly. “…I caught you. I should have caught you earlier…”
“Ye Yingzhi…” Subconsciously, the name appeared in his mind, followed by a great joy that almost made him cry.
His lover looked at him as they fell. He embraced him, and his black eyes were deep like they held the whole universe. He gradually smiled at him.
In the next moment, both of them fell into the river of stars.
Arc 3: Blood Clan
In another world,
Year 201X, Kingsford Smith Airport.
As soon as he got off the plane, a surge of heatwave pounded onto him. It was biting cold in the north of his home country, but here, it was actually midsummer. Chi Yan hurried into the bathroom with his left hand carrying the jacket he had taken off, while his right hand was pulling the luggage. He put on his summer jacket before he let out a sigh of relief.
He’ll have to wait for another three hours before he could fly directly from here to Sophus, his destination.
The entirety of the waiting hall was very empty. At a glance, there were less than ten people here. The flight to Sophus depart every two hours, and the whole journey was less than an hour. However, the person who’d helped him book the ticket had clearly reserved ample time for him to deal with emergencies. At this time, he could only take out his tablet and put on his headphones to watch downloaded films.
The airport wireless network signal was intermittent, all his chat groups on his phone kept on popping up new year’s greetings because today was the first day of the lunar new year.
A girl sitting opposite him looked at him for a long time, and finally dared to greet him, “Hello, how are you?”
Chi Yan took off his earphones, smiled and nodded at the other party. He also replied with a “Hello”.
The girl’s courage began to grow. “Are you alone too? Are you here for school? Are you an undergraduate or graduate student?”
“I am an exchange student. I will only be staying here for one semester. What about you?”
His school had a lot of exchange programs, third-year students were given the option to go overseas for their exchange programs. Most people still preferred to go to North America, while some students who had chosen to go to Europe usually intended to travel all around the continent. In comparison, Australia was a minority choice. For Chi Yan, he had originally applied for a North American school, but somehow, he was arranged to come here in the end.
It wasn’t that bad here. At least the air here was good, the sky was blue enough, and as an English speaking country, the accent wasn’t as strange as Singaporeans.
“I’m here for graduate school.” The girl had introduced herself as Bai Qiu and she wasn’t that awkward anymore. She began to chat with Chi Yan. Although she and Chi Yan were going to Sophus, they weren’t in the same school.
Time passed a lot faster when they began chatting, and soon it was time for them to board the plane.
This was Chi Yan first time taking such a small plane. There were only four seats in each row and he could feel every turbulence happening in the air. He had no other choice but to grasp tightly on the armrest of the seat and close his eyes to resist the dizziness and weightlessness sensation that came so suddenly upon him each time. But fortunately, the flight time was very short. From the porthole, he could see the coastline and the lush trees in the distance.
When the plane took off, the only blonde stewardess auntie gave each of them a small bread and drink. The stewardess took away the garbage when the plane was about to land— it was a really short flight. As soon as Chi Yan got used to the turbulence of the small plane, he was already about to get off the plane.
“Welcome to Sophus.” This was the last sentence he heard on the plane.
Bai Qiu’s school had sent a car to pick up the students at the airport, but Chi Yan had missed the date on when the school would send a car to pick them up, so he had to take a taxi to the dormitory.
The airport wasn’t big, but almost no one could be seen here. Chi Yan dragged his luggage for almost ten minutes before he saw a person.
“Hello, sorry to bother you. I’d like to ask where I can wait for a taxi,” He asked the person.
The person raised his head when he heard his voice. He looked thirty or forty years old. His face was covered with dirt, his full beard seemed to have not been taken care of for a long time, he was wearing a black short-sleeved vest, and shorts of the same color with a pair of black sandals on his feet.
He looked up at Chi Yan and muttered something. Chi Yan tried to discern his words but he still couldn’t understand what he was saying.
But he could tell that he was asking the wrong person.
Turning around, he happened to see a blue sign with a taxi logo.
“Sorry to bother you,” He said hurriedly, then he took the luggage and went to the taxi waiting point.
The man looked at his back and kept on chanting,
“…Be careful of the claws and teeth in the dark, they will tear you apart, bite you to pieces, and devour your blood…
“…Innocent and ignorant stranger, be careful or you might lose your life here…”