CH 52

Seeing Su Yang’s depressed expression, Gu Feidi moved closer, leaned near Su Yang’s ear and whispered: “You said you would take me to a place to detoxify, but you’re so carefully observing the terrain… Can I surmise that the place you’re looking for is also a forbidden place that you, the Young Saint, also cannot go at will?”

Su Yang knew that Gu Feidi was extremely sharp, but he did not expect that he would be able to make such a close guess in such a short time.

There was no need to conceal this from Gu Feidi, because in any case, breaking into the Devil Sect’s Forbidden Area was something Gu Feidi had to do together with him.

Su Yang gave a light laugh, condensed his voice into a thread and transmitted it over to Gu Feidi: “The place we are going to is beneath Jun Hua Island where Sect Leader resides. There is a cave near the water’s surface, which contains countless ancient books of the Devil Sect. Among them, there should be records on how to resolve the Gu poison.” 

Gu Feidi asked: “Should be?”

Su Yang pursed his lips: “I’m certain there is.”

“Two nights have passed since you’ve brought me here.” Gu Feidi said, “The Sect Leader has never shown himself. I’m guessing… he’s still in seclusion now?”

Su Yang nodded and said, “He seclusions on the top of Jun Hua Island. We are going to the Forbidden Area entrance near the water at the base of the mountain, so don’t worry about alarming the leader. But the flower aides on Jun Hua Island, especially the group guarding the Forbidden Area, must have strong martial arts skills. Even if they aren’t as good as you and me, they can always be equal to Xu Yunzhan and Pu Lingyun.”

Gu Feidi: “So, you’re looking for a way in?”

Su Yang nodded:” Yeah, but these bridges and plank roads are rather dangerous. I’d be fine, but you can’t simply manipulate your inner strength or use light footwork. It’s more difficult having to think of a way that doesn’t alert the guards.”

The two wandered around the headquarters of the Devil Sect for a whole day and did not return to the Young Saint’s Residence on Iris Island until the sunset.

Su Yang asked the Mei Hall Elder for the Devil Sect’s headquarters map and patrol map under the pretext of reviewing the patrol situation of the Sect’s interior.

Unfortunately, these documents were too abstract for him. He almost made no progress despite studying them the whole night and almost couldn’t get out of bed the next morning.

After reconfirming his nature as a ‘mediocre student’, Su Yang thought for a while. That night, he sent away the flower aide and attendant, then brought in Gu Feidi and dragged him over to be his advisor.

Gu Feidi looked at the Sect map and the patrol map in front of him in disbelief: “Do you know the consequences of letting me see these?”

Su Yang smiled and said, “When you lead people to suppress the Devil Sect in the future, remember to avoid irrelevant people and just trouble me and the Sect Leader.” 

The night was dark and the candlelight in the room flickered slightly. It reflected in Su Yang’s smiling eyes and it seemed that there was some brilliant twinkling therein.

Gu Feidi gazed at Su Yang quietly. For a long while, he didn’t say anything. He sat opposite Su Yang across the desk, reached out and took the patrol map of the Devil Sect’s Mei Hall and the patrol arrangement document. He read them silently.

The suspension bridge planks of the Devil Sect’s headquarters were connected with each other according to local conditions. However, there was no three-dimensional technology in this era and even the concept of three views wasn’t sound. All the drawings were casually sketched by craftsmen at a strange oblique angle and there was no accurate perspective or scale. If it wasn’t because the craftsmen had studied from the same line, they might not have understood each other’s drawings.

Fortunately, Gu Feidi used to help in Tengyun Pavilion and he had strolled around the Devil Sect headquarters with Su Yang in the past two days, he somehow managed to form some impressions in his mind.

He compared the Sect map with the patrol map, found the Devil Sect’s patrol routes from the document and discovered that its alterations actually coincided with the four seasons, which changed once a year.

“Tomorrow is a new cycle and the defense route will be changed.” Gu Feidi said in a low voice, “If what I’ve deduced is correct, there will be a flaw in the patrol route in the next ten days at the beginning of the Chou period*. We—”

(*TN : Chou period = between 1am to 3am)

After discussing halfway, Gu Feidi raised his eyes to look at Su Yang, only to find that he had fallen asleep on the couch.

It was past midnight and the candles on the lamp stand were already half burned.

Gu Feidi put down the papers, rested his chin on his hand and looked at Su Yang’s extremely peaceful sleeping face. He watched the flickering candlelight cast shadows of eyelashes under his eyes, watched his shortened hair quietly fall on the corners of his lips, watched his shoulders rise and fall almost indistinctly with his breath…

Su Yang felt the intensity of Gu Feidi’s stare, his eyelashes trembled slightly and he woke up.

The colour of Gu Feidi’s eyes were deep and he said, “If you are weary then go and sleep.”

Su Yang groaned, slid off the higher part of the couch, hugged a thin blanket and curled up on the narrow couch seat muttering to himself: “Lazy to move……I’ll just sleep here…”

“It’ll be cold at night.” Gu Feidi couldn’t help laughing lightly. He got up and came to Su Yang’s side and pulled him, “Come on, go to the bedroom to sleep, I’ll keep you company.”

Su Yang was unclear and unwilling to be pulled up by Gu Feidi. He followed behind him and turned into the bedroom. After taking off his clothes in a daze, he climbed onto the bed and fell asleep almost instantly while holding the pillow.

Gu Feidi laughed in spite of himself, leaned over to help cover Su Yang with the quilt and turned around to blow out the two lamps in the bedroom.

Just as he was about to leave, he suddenly heard Su Yang calling out something in his dream.

Gu Feidi leaned near to Su Yang’s lips, thought for a moment and asked, “What did you say?” 

Su Yang did not talk to him in a dream like before*, but mumbled a string of meaningless syllables in a low voice before falling asleep again.

(*TN : when they were on the small shore in the underground river after falling off the Wasteland cliff)

In the dim light, Gu Feidi stared at Su Yang’s slightly pouted lips pressed by the pillow, his throat moved slightly, he couldn’t help licking his lips, leaning forward and moving closer.

Su Yang breathed calmly, his breaths caressing the tip of Gu Feidi’s nose. Gu Feidi’s lips trembled slightly and his breathing became a little quick, but he seemed to be afraid of something and he controlled it very, very lightly.

He moved forward, both their lips were almost within reach and Gu Feidi slowly closed his eyes.

However, he finally retreated back and sighed silently.

Raising his hand, he gently stroked the hair beside Su Yang’s face, Gu Feidi whispered: “If tomorrow doesn’t come, it would be wonderful if this night was everlasting.”

After a long time, Gu Feidi got up and went to the outer room to tidy up the papers spread on the couch. Then he quietly returned to the bedroom and lay down beside Su Yang to sleep.

Neither of them went out the next day, so they immersed themselves in studying topographic maps on Iris Island.

Although it was already autumn, the temperature still showed no downward trend during the day when the sun was shining. Both of them only wore inner shirts, used hair clasps to simply pull up their hair and lay on the couch to write and draw.

Su Yang looked at Gu Feidi’s rare languid appearance and smiled: “You really look like you have been loved and indulged all night. You give the impression that your whole body and bones are soft.”

Gu Feidi raised his eyebrows: “Been loved and indulged?” 

“Ah, been loved and indulged.” Su Yang smiled wickedly, “This Young Saint prefers men. You’ve been staying overnight here with me like this for so many nights, they are undoubtedly saying in private that every night you’re being…… *cough cough*, consummately loved and indulged from head to toe, na!”

Gu Feidi said, “You said you prefer men but I didn’t see you calling for a bedwarmer. Previously, weren’t there rumours that you’d released all the beauties that you’d kidnapped a few years ago?”

Su Yang licked his lips, narrowed his eyes and looked Gu Feidi up and down and said with an affected tone: “With you here, how can I look at others. Why doesn’t Young Hero Gu come and serve me?” 

Gu Feidi’s expression changed slightly.

Su Yang thought he was going to be angry and had already prepared to change the subject, but when he saw Gu Feidi put down the brush and paper in his hand, he leaned over, staring and smiled, “That’s fine.” 

After that, he stretched out his hand, pinched Su Yang’s lower jaw and was about to tug him over.

Su Yang hurriedly retreated behind: “I was joking!”

Gu Feidi retracted his hand and asked, “Joking?”

Su Yang touched the bridge of his nose awkwardly, not knowing how to answer.

Gu Feidi asked again: “You… have no affection for me?”

Su Yang: …

Could it be that Gu Feidi was still addicted to acting?

Was it because he stayed with him for too long and had emulated his traits, he had been influenced with the obsession to casually harass others?

Su Yang let out a hiccup and gave Gu Feidi a disdainful look with an eye-roll. He snorted with a smile: “What ‘affection’? I’m good to you because we have a classmate-relationship from Lesser Jade House! I definitely don’t treat you as a male concubine…When we’ve found out how to get into the Forbidden Area and you’ve been detoxified, I’ll let you go back.”

As he spoke, he reached out to take a few blueprints and pretended to look at them.

For a long while, Su Yang didn’t hear Gu Feidi speak or move, so he raised his head to glance over.

Gu Feidi was staring unblinkingly at him, the emotions in his gaze were difficult to distinguish.

Su Yang’s heart trembled and subconsciously asked, “What’s up with you?”

Gu Feidi lowered his eyelashes, raised his brush and dipped it into the ink again, “No matter.” 

Su Yang was a little anxious for some reason and felt restless. After a while he said: “The dried fruit sticks that I ordered the kitchen to make should be ready. I’ll go and see.”

Earlier, he’d used the excuse of bringing Gu Feidi to admire the scenery and had ordered a lot of honey, milk and dried fruits at the stores on the cliff side. This was to make an ‘energy bar’ that was easy to carry, full and high in calories which he intended to bring along into the Devil Sect’s Forbidden Area to eat while detoxifying Gu Feidi there.

According to the script, Gu Feidi and Pu Lingyun were trapped in the Forbidden Area for several days. Su Yang didn’t count the number of days specifically, but judging from the later storyline of his pursuit of the two, it should have been during winter.

It was now the mid autumn and the storyline had advanced a lot; not to mention that the advanced timeline had also included the one-month time limit for the Gu poison in Gu Feidi’s body.

After putting on his coat and arriving at the kitchen, he saw that the Lian Hall attendants in charge of food had already allocated staff to make dried fruit sticks for him.

There was no oven here, so Su Yang proposed an idea and let the attendants there figure it out for themselves. Unexpectedly, with only simple iron pots and fire pits, these attendants actually concocted some decent energy bars.

Su Yang snapped it off a piece to eat. The taste was really the same. Rewarding the attendant who took the lead in making the energy bars, he picked up a few, put them on a plate and took them back for Gu Feidi to taste.

Lian Jiu observed their Young Saint who had come to check on his progress and had just left. He gave a chuckle and turned to stop Mei Shisan who was about to leave.

He smiled and asked, “You followed Young Saint out some time ago, but do you know if the current rumours are true or false?”

Mei Shisan raised his eyebrows: “What rumours?” 

Lian Jiu lowered his voice: “That Young Saint actually dismissed the children in the Juan Dan Palace of Mei Hall for the sake of Young Hero Gu?” 

Mei Shisan said: “Young Saint and Young Hero Gu have a classmate relationship. What does that have to do with Juan Dan Palace?”

“That, you’re not aware of.” Lian Jiu smiled mysteriously and leaned close to Mei Shisan’s ear, “Now the Young Saint and Young Hero Gu are together all the time and he even allows him to spend the night in his room. Moreover, my subordinates say that they’re both sleeping together in the same bed. Doesn’t this prove anything?”

Mei Shisan’s expression remained unchanged and said, “Young Saint is willing to be close to Young Hero Gu, that is his own business. Young Saint has his own means of subduing Young Hero Gu, so I don’t have to worry too much.”

Lian Jiu smiled and said yes and then said: “Young Saint has been much easier to serve since he left Lesser Jade House. He hasn’t ordered the death of any attendant in the past two months. We made a mistake in the bathroom the previous day but he did not get angry. I feel that my life may not be in danger as it was previously. I don’t have to worry about being killed by Young Saint himself one day if my attention lapses.”

Hearing this, Mei Shisan brows furrowed slightly before quickly relaxing and he smiled: “Isn’t it better when he’s like this?”

Lian Jiu nodded: “Yes, I hope Young Saint will always be like this, but I don’t know how long his good mood and temper will last.”

Mei Shisan said: “He… could always remain like this, if…”

Lian Jiu: “If?”

Mei Shisan smiled: “It’s nothing.”