CH 31

Although they were both living their lives like a couple, after all, there was still the premise of the trade.

Now, once their relationship was confirmed, Jiang Zhan felt a change in his state of mind. However, he couldn’t precisely tell what was different. His sight unconsciously surrounded Jiang Li, he even followed him to the chicken coop that he initially wasn’t willing to go near to. 

The days staying in the hometown passed quickly, in a blink of an eye a week had passed and both of them returned to City S.

After they returned Jiang Li threw himself into busy schedules once again. He flew to City C the next day to join a reality show and then rushed to the new drama set after recording the show.

Jiang Zhan also had his work which had accumulated in the days that he had accompanied Jiang Li to go back to his hometown. He worked overtime for a few days after he came back. They were both busy with their own work and could only contact each other by video calling every day. They both finally experienced how one day could last as long as three autumns when they couldn’t see each other.

Before the shoot for ‘Long River and Falling Moon’, the company sent a few scripts to Jiang Li, allowing him to choose. There were modern idol dramas, urban work dramas, spy dramas and many more. After studying them a few times, he chose an anti-Japanese war drama called ‘Undercover’.

The scripts sent by the company were invested and created by themselves, so no audition was needed. Jiang Li played the first male lead, a rich young master called Lu Minyu, who was inadvertently involved in an anti-Japanese dispute on the day he returned from studying abroad.

This was a story of a rich young master growing up to be an outstanding soldier to protect the country. When the drama’s Weibo announced Jiang Li’s stage photo of the first male lead, there were both positive and negative comments, of which two-third of them were negative comments booing.

In the eyes of many people, the soldier bore the responsibility of missions given by the country on their shoulders, so they generally have a tough guy image. However, Jiang Li looked too beautiful, so it didn’t fit the image of the soldier in many people’s eyes.

Jiang Li didn’t care about this; he placed all his heart into the shooting. It was useless to say more about it, only the result/achievement could shut the mouth of the public.

Jiang Li had also once acted as a soldier in his previous life.In order to fit the role and reflect the nature of a soldier, he specially pulled some strings and contacted the armed forces to have training for a month. He then spent that month with real soldiers, eating the same food, living in the same house, and training together.

Hence, the shooting this time was not difficult for him. On the first day he entered the drama set, the proficiency of his dismantling and reassembling of the guns and the accuracy rate of his target shooting was so high that the crowd was surprised.

After finishing the shoot that lasted an entire day, Jiang Li returned to the hotel, washed  away the mud he got in the field today while shooting, and video called Jiang Zhan.

When Jiang Zhan received his video call, he was supervising Jiang Nuomi who was exercising.

Jiang Nuomi was at this point eight months old. From the little kid when it was picked up, it had turned into a white, round, ball after tons of feeding. While Jiang Li was filming out of province Jiang Zhan was afraid that it would fall sick easily if it only ate and didn’t move, so he forced it to walk slowly on the treadmill for half an hour. If it didn’t move, he wouldn’t give him small dried fish, forcing Jiang Nuomi to have the intention to die with him.

After the video call was connected, as Jiang Li’s voice came out from the phone, Jiang Nuomi quickly leapt down from the treadmill and pounced on Jiang Zhan’s body, meowing towards Jiang Li who was in the phone, its voice was filled with both anger and grievance.

“What’s wrong with him?” Jiang Li laughed in the video call, “Jiang Zhan, ask Jiang Nuomi to move his face away, his face is too big to fit into my 6-inch phone.”

“Meow!!!!” Jiang Nuomi pulled Jiang Zhan’s hand, which was holding the phone, and made a strong effort to move forward. It was feeling aggrieved but wasn’t able to say it out loud, it could only meow non-stop.

Jiang Zhan was annoyed by its meowing. He directly carried it to the door and looked at it from above, showing a face of displeasure: “Get out, light bulb1.”

After saying this he then closed the door with a bang.

Jiang Nuomi: “…”

Without the stupid cat there, Jiang Zhan finally had peace of mind. As he returned to his chair and sat down, he heard Jiang Li say, “Jiang Zhan, you’re bullying my son again, why are you acting so evil as a grandfather?”

“Who are you calling a grandfather?” Jiang Zhan asked in a dangerous tone as he fixed his phone on a stand which was placed beside him.

Hearing the change of his tone, Jiang Li immediately acted pragmatically and changed his words, “I am the grandfather, you are the father, alright? Hahahahaha.”

“…”

The words sounded like Jiang Li had taken advantage of the situation, he was now a generation older than him.

Jiang Zhan looked at the person who was rolling in bed laughing in the video. He was itching to drag him out and beat him up, so that Jiang Li wouldn’t act naughtily without three days of beatings.

The two were chatting when a knock sounded at the door. Jiang Li told Jiang Zhan to wait for a while, he placed the phone on the bed and got up to open the door.

The person outside the door was Feng Dong. He came in with two bags and said to Jiang Li while walking, “It’s good that you’re not asleep, I bought you supper.”

“Thank you, Brother Feng.”

Jiang Li hadn’t had much appetite for dinner. He had only taken a few bites, but he didn’t expect Feng Dong would notice it. He arrived just in time for Jiang Li to feel hungry after coming out of the bath. He lifted the bag and found that Feng Dong had brought him lean meat porridge and dumplings, as well as two small side dishes. He was touched, “Brother Feng, have you and Xiao Zhou eaten?”

“We also bought supper and I’ve asked Xiao Zhou to bring them back to his room.” Feng Dong said as he took out two bottles of medicine to give to Jiang Li from another plastic bag. “This is the wound medicine I bought for you, first rub the medicine, after drying…”

“What wound medicine?”

A voice interrupted Feng Dong’s words. There were only two people, Jiang Li and Feng Dong, in the room so the sudden voice took Feng Dong by surprise. He reflexively pulled Jiang Li to the side and asked out loud, “Who’s talking?!”

“It’s me, Jiang Zhan.”

“…”

Feng Dong’s hand which was pulling Jiang Li stiffened, he then heard Jiang Zhan said once again, “What injury medicine did you just say? Jiang Li’s injured?”

“Just a little scrape.” Fearing that he would be worried, Jiang Li went over and picked up the phone on the bed, he then said to comfort him, “Don’t worry, it’s not a big deal.”

“Where are you hurt? Let me see.” Jiang Zhan asked.

“It’s really okay…”

“Let me see.”

Jiang Zhan intensified his tone, with the implication of not being able to argue, Jiang Li knew that there was no room for negotiation, so he didn’t argue with him: “Okay, I’ll show you later.”

Feng Dong listened to their conversation anxiously. When he heard what they said he knew that he wouldn’t be able to keep his job if he continued staying there, so he quickly left after greeting Jiang Zhan and telling Jiang Li how to use the wound medicine.

After he left Jiang Li was the only one left in the room.

After placing his phone on the holder to stabilize it, Jiang Li pulled the chair and sat down. He said smilingly to Jiang Zhan who was in the video, “My wound is at a relatively sensitive part, I’m afraid that you won’t be able to sleep alone tonight after seeing it.”

A sensitive part …

Jiang Li roughly guessed where it was. He fell into silence for a while and said firmly, “Let me see.”

They have already done everything that they should and shouldn’t do. Not to mention just looking at the wound, it was also a common thing for them to shower naked. So, Jiang Li also didn’t feel embarrassed. He stood up and took off his pajama pants directly, revealing his white underwear.

In order to not have his wound rubbed he was wearing a brief. The fabric was relatively lesser, and a thin layer of cotton material could barely wrap his round and upright buttocks.

However, Jiang Zhan’s attention at this time wasn’t about this. Instead it was on the obvious scrapes shown by Jiang Li.

Jiang Li’s wound was on the slight bottom of the buttocks; it had been scraped during the afternoon shoot. The wound was about seven or eight centimeters in length. A large piece of skin was scraped off. He could imagine how painful it had been when he was first injured.

Jiang Zhan’s eyebrows frowned deeply, “Is this still a little scrape?”

“It just looked serious at first, my flesh wasn’t hurt. It’ll be fine after the skin grows back.” Jiang Li said as if he didn’t mind it at all.

In his previous life as an actor he had suffered many injuries. The most serious one was when the wire broke while he was shooting a martial arts scene, where he later fell to the bottom of the cliff. The good thing was that there was a tree branch blocking his fall so he only broke his leg and one of his ribs, otherwise he would have lost his life.

Jiang Zhan listened to his unconcerned words and pursed his lips: “Apply the medicine first.”

“Wait, I haven’t eaten anything yet. I’ll apply it after eating.” Jiang Li said as he took out his supper. He was too lazy to put his pants back on, since he would still need to apply medicine later. So, he sat on the chair with only underwear and started eating.

It was already a little past 10 pm. When Jiang Zhan heard him say that he hadn’t eaten his tone of voice became unhappy, “Did the crew not order lunch boxes?”

“Yes, they did.” Jiang Li ate two dumplings. He looked at him and joked, “Maybe because you aren’t around so I don’t have much appetite. But, looking at you now I have a really good appetite. Just like the saying ‘a feast for the eyes’.”

Jiang Zhan: “…”

Ever since the two had established a relationship Jiang Li’s flirty talk went overboard as if he had hacks.2 If it weren’t for the fact that Jiang Zhan knew Jiang Li hadn’t been in love before Jiang Zhan would simply assume that he was a love tutor, since he was really shameless.

After eating, again under the supervision of Jiang Zhan, Jiang Li applied the medicine on the wound.

It was difficult to apply the medicine by himself, but the place of the wound was sensitive so he couldn’t ask others for help. Jiang Li applied the medicine as he said to Jiang Zhan, “Don’t stare at me, it’s like your eyes are filled with flames and are burning me through the screen.”

“…” Jiang Zhan averted his gaze and cursed lightly, “Nonsense.”

“How is it nonsense?” Jiang Li got closer to the screen, “You dare say that you’re not staring at my ass? You’re not imagining something naughty?”

“… No.” Jiang Zhan’s mind was seen through; his tone drifted a little.

“It’s like that ah…” Jiang Li stretched his voice, inclined his head and smiled at him, “but I did.”

“…”

“Jiang Zhan.” Jiang Li lightened his voice with a hint of seduction, “We haven’t done it for almost half a month. Aren’t you having a hard time?”

“…”

“Every night when I sleep alone, I miss you a lot.”

“…”

–The other party hung up the video call.

Jiang Li paused for two seconds. He then laid on the table as he burst out laughing, and after laughing long enough he sent a voice message to Jiang Zhan.

On the other hand, Jiang Zhan looked at the part of him that had obviously reacted. He  cursed Jiang Li ‘son of a bitch’ countless times in his heart. He took two deep breaths before clicking on the voice message he had sent.

“Rest early, love you.”

The edges of Jiang Zhan’s lips lifted slightly as he repeated the voice message several times. He sent a good night to him, and then called Ji Shu to book a flight to Jiang City tomorrow.

The next morning, Jiang Zhan and Ji Shu flew to Jiang City together while Jiang Nuomi was entrusted to Ji Shu’s girlfriend.

The two of them went directly to the filming location of ‘Undercover’ and went into the set after explaining their identities to the staff.

It was an escape scene; Jiang Li was playing as Lu Minyu who had his undercover identity discovered and was escaping with Zhao Kui who was there to meet him. Jiang Li almost got shot in the process, while Zhao Kui dashed towards him and pounced on him, knocking him to the ground.

Jiang Zhan came and just happened to catch this scene. Looking from his direction, Zhao Kui’s lips were seen slamming onto Jiang Li’s face and both of his hands were tightly wrapped around Jiang Li’s waist.

Jiang Zhan: “…”

… Damn, not even once have I had a happy visit.

Light bulb here means third wheel.

Hack in this case comes from the phrase hacking games, this means that he has cheats or tips.