CH 21

Chapter 21 - “I am your… fated person.” (2)

The little girl’s back looked both delicate and dance-like. She jogged over to closed the windows before she doubled back to close the room door.

Luo Xiu looked over at her nonchalantly. His spectacle with thin lens, hooked by his slender finger lazily, was placed casually over his nose. In his sight – which the spectacles made no difference whatsoever - the girl closed the room door, turned around, and let out a sigh of relief.

Gu Nian stood there with her back against the door.

She finally noticed that something was off in the atmosphere after a few seconds of silence.

Her rationality finally struggling free from her “protective mode”, Gu Nian quickly stood up straight and re-opened the door that she had closed, leaving it ajar.

She then turned and explained, “Your hand felt very cold earlier. It is summer time but the temperature can get very low in the mountainous areas. That and you have just come out of a shower. I closed the windows because I didn’t want you to catch a cold…”

“Thank you.”

The man’s voice was low, gentle, and harmless.

Gu Nian was very touched from where she was standing.

Sniffle. Sniffle. Her precious son was such an understanding, kind, and naïve soul. He was almost taken advantage of but he was still so trusting toward her…. Sniffle. Sniffle.

“But, who are you?”

“……?”

All of the old mother’s warm and fuzzy feeling evaporated instantly.

Recollected herself, Gu Nian walked over and lifted up her worker’s badge that had been dangling in front of her and said, feeling a bit awkward, “I forgot to introduce myself. I am Gu Nian, part of the screenwriter team for Demons. I’ve sent you a message before I came over.”

Luo Xiu nodded slightly. “Hi, Ms. Gu.”

Gu Nian, “No, no, no. No need to be so polite. You can refer to me as…”

And Gu Nian stopped herself just in time.

If she had him call her “mom” right away, he just might beat her up. She should tread lightly and get there in baby steps.

As such, Luo Xiu saw the girl looked up after pondering for a little while. She still didn’t have a lot of emotions on her face but her eyes were filled with anticipation. “Sister Gu, Sister Nian, Sister Gu Nian. Any of those will work.”

“?”

Luo Xiu looked up.

Standing up straight from leaning against the tall, his shirt and pants made him seemed especially tall and slender.

Luo Xiu looked down at the girl who barely reached his shoulder. His eyes, away from the light, became less tender. There was a smile that wasn’t a smile in the coldness behind those lens.

“Sister?”

“……”

Gu Nian wasn’t aware that she was standing so close to him until Luo Xiu had stood up straight.

Right now, when she was looking straight ahead, all she could see was just a hint of the outline of his chest under his shirt. She lifted her head up some and saw the man’s long and slender neck through the unbuttoned collar. She had to lift her head up one more time before she could see the man’s eyes and brows.

Gu Nian: ….was that how tall her 186 cm son was?

Sniffle. Sniffle. She wasn’t good enough to be his mother.

Plunged into the sadness from the shock, even Gu Nian’s voice became listless. “’Sister’ will work as well. It’s fine. Sister will be happy as long as you are happy.”

Luo Xiu: “?”

Gu Nian, who was now dispirited, had no idea what she had just said. She had already turned around, put her backpack down, and said, “Why don’t you have a seat first. Let me explain the script and your role to you.”

“……”

Luo Xiu did not move.

He watched the girl who was standing not too far from him rummaging through her backpack. Her back was skinny and she did not appear to be vigilant. It would seem that nothing she had said or done since she had entered the room were deliberate.

But if they weren’t deliberate…

The arranged date with Jiao Xi; the night at the club; the meeting at the production crew; and then there was her overly concern for him since she had showed up tonight.

All the incidents together seemed to be carefully scripted. Showing up in front of him, trying to pique whatever limited interest that he had, and to lure him into a trap that he wasn’t aware of.

Could this be another trap set by Luo Zhan?

If that was the case, then, judging by how each step was well thought out and each of them being so closely tie to the next, Luo Zhan had surely learned a lot from him from the past.

But if that was not the case, then…

“Eh? How come you still haven’t come over yet?” Finished rummaging through her stuff, the girl who stood back up with a tablet and a file turned around and frowned from being worried. “Did you bump into something and hurt yourself earlier?”

“No, I am fine.”

Looking down, Luo Xiu smile nonchalantly and walked over to her.

It didn’t matter even this wasn’t one of Luo Zhan’s trap.

He didn’t care what it was that this girl wanted from him, nor how many current or ex-boyfriends she had that were available to chat with others. She was the one who started this game; all he needed to do was to pretend that he had fallen into the trap.

Coincidentally, he’d be joining the Taoist temple in two months and he had been bored. When it came to playing games of manipulation with others, he had never lost once.

This time wouldn’t be any different either.

___

Translator’s Notes:

“Fated person” in the title doesn’t not necessarily mean “the one” in the romantical sense. It’s a Buddhism concept that when two individuals meet each other, it was fate. Doesn’t not necessarily suggest romance.