Amnesiac General and Infatuated Brothel Keeper 16

Yan Hui lost his patience. After narrowing his eyes to see the newcomer clearly, he frowned and asked, "Who are you?" But just as he finished saying this, his brow suddenly raised, and his eyes swept back and forth between Su Jinzhi and Jun Changwu.

"I... I am Jun Changwu... of Chong, Chongluo..." Jun Changwu's face was as pale as paper. Staring at Su Jinzhi with red eyes, she muttered. However, the young man she was looking at kept his eyes lowered, his expression remaining indifferent, as if he had never seen her before.

Jun Changwu took a few steps forward, wanting to say something to Su Jinzhi, but Yan Hui chuckled and slowly read out loud, "Jun Changwu... the Jun Family of Chongluo Kingdom?" He looked at how the young girl slightly resembled Su Jinzhi, especially the bright red teardrop mole under her right eye, and his eyes were full of interest.

Hearing this, Su Jinzhi raised his eyes and glanced at him, then continued walking towards the iron cage.

"No! Don't go—!" Seeing this, Jun Changwu suddenly ran towards Su Jinzhi, but was then stopped by Yan Hui's guards. "Why! Why must you do this... Do you people... have any humanity left..."

Jun Changwu clung to the subordinate's sleeve, weeping bitterly as she pleaded with Yan Hui, "I beg you... please let him go..."

Yan Hui looked down at Jun Changwu kneeling on the ground, sneered, and cast a sidelong glance at Su Jinzhi. "Am I seeing things right? Miss Jun is actually pleading for a male prostitute?"

Meanwhile, Su Jinzhi remained silent from beginning to end, standing there with lowered eyebrows and downcast eyes, docile and quiet, as if all the clamor in the hall had nothing to do with him. But the more he acted like this, the harder it was for Yan Hui to dissipate his anger. He scolded in a low voice, "What is Young Master Wuyan still waiting for?"

As soon as he finished speaking, Su Jinzhi no longer paused and quickly stepped into that man-eating iron cage.

The sound of the iron lock colliding echoed in the silent hall. Jun Changwu looked at the locked cage door, knelt on the ground in despair, covered her face, and cried softly, constantly muttering "Brother Jinzhi" in her mouth.

But Su Jinzhi, who had entered the iron cage, was actually not as calm as he appeared. He frantically summoned No. 0: "No. 0, No. 0!"

No. 0 quickly responded: "No. 0 is here! What's wrong, Lord Host!"

"Quickly take out my 'Priceless Spring Night' welfare buff and cast it on these three dogs!" Su Jinzhi stared at the three big black dogs, cursing fiercely in his heart, hoping the person holding them would let go a little slower.

No. 0 was startled and said, "Eh? But—"

"No buts!" Su Jinzhi urged No. 0, "Any later and I'll be fucked by dogs!"

"Okay, Lord Host." Hearing Su Jinzhi say this, No. 0 could only follow his instructions and cast the "Priceless Spring Night" welfare buff on the three dogs.

Su Jinzhi watched as the hostility in the blood-red eyes of the three dogs weakened slightly, and slowly breathed a sigh of relief. However, in the next instant, several streaks of silver light flashed before his eyes, and warm blood immediately followed, splashing all over his head and face. Su Jinzhi's eyes widened, and he blankly looked up forward.

He saw Feng Jiuli tightly gripping a longbow, walking towards him with a face full of frost. And the three black dogs from before each had a long arrow pierced into their necks. The fletchings exposed outside their flesh were still trembling slightly, showing just how much strength the person who shot these arrows had used.

He said, "He is waiting for me."

Feng Jiuli sneered, walked straight up to Yan Hui and glared at him, then snapped the longbow in half and smashed it fiercely at Yan Hui's feet.

The wood splinters from the broken bow bounced up from the ground and scratched across Yan Hui's left cheek, leaving a shallow white cut. A few breaths later, red liquid slowly flowed out of it, finally dripping onto the stone floor of the hall.

Feng Jiuli cast him a cold glance, then turned and walked towards the iron cage.

Yan Hui sneered, raised his right hand to wipe the blood from his cheek. His subordinates hesitated, wanting to step forward and stop Feng Jiuli, but Yan Hui waved his hand to stop them.

Su Jinzhi blankly watched Feng Jiuli approach him, only blinking lightly when the man pulled him into his embrace.

"I'm sorry," Feng Jiuli murmured softly, placing a gentle kiss on the top of his head.

However, Su Jinzhi didn't pay much attention to the man's words. He only noticed No. 0's slightly puzzled question: "General Feng was clearly about to come and save you... Lord Host, why did you have the dogs use this kind of welfare?"

Su Jinzhi: "..."

No. 0 continued, "Lord Host is so strange..."

After apologizing, Feng Jiuli realized that the young man's tense body in his arms had suddenly relaxed, and then slowly began to slide down. Feng Jiuli hurriedly held him to prevent him from falling to the ground. He brushed aside the blood-soaked hair on the young man's forehead, only to discover a gash that had been smashed open. The flesh there was hideously turned outward, and the blood had mostly coagulated, but half of the young man's clothes were also soaked, and he had fainted.

Su Jinzhi was wearing dark green clothes, which didn't show the red clearly. He had previously thought that all the blood was just from the three vicious dogs he had shot to death, but looking at it now, that wasn't entirely the case.

"I will demand double the payback from Beiyou for today's matter."

Feng Jiuli picked Su Jinzhi up horizontally, dropped this sentence, and left the hall without looking back.

Yan Hui didn't care much. He turned around, sat back in his guest seat, downed the clear sake in his goblet in one gulp, and sneered, "Then I will be waiting."

After the two left, Yun Mengchen finally entered from outside the hall. He helped up the dazed Jun Changwu from the ground and said softly, "Fourth Miss Jun..."

"I protected him... I protected Brother Jinzhi once, right?" Jun Changwu backhandedly grabbed Yun Mengchen's clothes, asking him with red eyes.

Yun Mengchen was silent for a while, then smiled and said, "Yes, it was you who gave us enough time to rush over."

Since the day Su Jinzhi agreed to enter the palace, Xile had secretly started contacting him. After knowing about this matter, he immediately asked Jun Changwu, who was still in Zhuhua, to constantly pay attention to Su Jinzhi's movements. Meanwhile, he whipped his horse and rushed back to Chongluo Kingdom to tell Feng Jiuli about it, asking him to return to Zhuhua quickly.

And after hearing his words, the expression on Jun Changwu's face seemed to be crying yet not crying, smiling yet not smiling, but she didn't shed tears again, softly saying, "That's wonderful... So Brother Jinzhi has always been here... He's still alive..."

Inside the Huaqi Pavilion, Qiu Yi and Xile, with red eyes, continuously brought out basins of bloody water from the room. Yun Mengchen was inside bandaging the wound on Su Jinzhi's forehead. Feng Jiuli leaned against the doorframe with crossed arms, slightly turning his head to look at the potted peony in the corner, facing the equally silent Jun Changwu in silence.

The wooden door opened with a creak. Feng Jiuli and Jun Changwu simultaneously looked inside. Yun Mengchen came out with a smile: "It's done. Don't let it touch water for the next few days, remember to change the dressing and—" But before he could finish his sentence, Feng Jiuli dodged sideways and entered the room.

"Brother Jinzhi... Is he really okay?" Jun Changwu slowly shuffled in front of Yun Mengchen, biting her lower lip and asking quietly.

"Mm, I was also quite surprised... but I didn't expect that Seventh Junior Brother indeed took very good care of him. Even his illness has mostly healed—" Yun Mengchen paused his words. "The two of you were outside the door for so long... did you not say anything at all?"

"I wanted to apologize to him, but, but he ignored me... If he had told me earlier that Hua Wu—" Jun Changwu twisted the corner of her clothes, her head lowered and her voice tinged with a sob. "Was Brother Jinzhi, I would never have scolded him like that, nor would I have come to cause trouble for Brother Jinzhi... Wu wu wu... The way Brother Jinzhi looked at me then was like looking at a stranger... Has he also forgotten me..."

"No, he has never forgotten you." Yun Mengchen sighed deeply, raised his hand, and patted Jun Changwu's head, recalling the scene where Su Jinzhi met her through the gauze curtain that day. "He was... very happy that day, and he missed you very much. He just didn't know—how to face you, after all, he is now..."

"I know..." Jun Changwu tilted her head up, her eyelashes clumped together by tears. "Once Brother Jinzhi wakes up, I will return to Chongluo."

Yun Mengchen nodded and said softly, "That's for the best..."

Hearing this, Jun Changwu took a reluctant glance inside through the ajar wooden door, wiped her tears, and left. Yun Mengchen watched her figure disappear at the staircase, then also turned to look through the crack in the door—in order to let the young man rest well, only a single candle was lit in the room. The candle flame flickered slightly with the night breeze seeping in through the unclosed gap. In the dim lamplight, he saw Feng Jiuli sitting on the edge of the bed, tightly holding one of the young man's hands; and although the young man had a wound on his forehead, he slept extremely peacefully, unlike those past days where he slept fitfully all night, tossing and muttering in his sleep.

"That's for the best."

Yun Mengchen repeated the words he had just said to Jun Changwu. The voice was exceptionally clear in the silent night, filled with loneliness. Then he smiled and firmly closed the door for the two people inside.

Too many things happened this night, some even outside of Su Jinzhi's expectations, such as Feng Jiuli, and Jun Changwu.

But the result was always good.

So the next day, after Su Jinzhi woke up, he just kept grinning foolishly at the data on his panel—except for Yan Hui, Qiu Yi, and himself, everyone else's Progress Value was full. He had finally added a brick and half a tile towards building a harmonious society.

"Is there something wrong with that Third Prince?" Su Jinzhi asked No. 0. "I humiliated him so much last night, yet his Progress Value increased faster than my own. It's already at 80 points. If I scold him one more time, will it become full?"

"I don't know, Lord Host." No. 0 dutifully reminded him, "But your own Progress Value has only just gone back up to the original value of 75 points, there hasn't been any progress."

Speaking of this, Su Jinzhi was also somewhat puzzled. If his previous drop in Progress Value was due to Jun Changle's inferiority complex, then this inferiority was broken during the confrontation with Yan Hui in the hall last night, so the Progress Value went back up again. Yet it ultimately stopped at 75 points and stagnated. What exactly was Jun Changle still regretting?

"What are you thinking about, so seriously?" Feng Jiuli entered the room carrying the minced meat porridge Ping'an had just cooked, and saw that the young man was already awake, leaning against the head of the bed with a blank expression, not knowing what he was thinking, so he spoke up to ask.

Su Jinzhi looked towards him and said softly, "It's nothing..."

"Really nothing?" Feng Jiuli sat on the edge of the bed, took the young man's hand, and dropped a kiss on the pale, slightly cool fingertips. "You're not going to ask me why I returned to Chongluo?"

The young man smiled forcedly: "Didn't you say it all in the letter?"

"I didn't finish. After I went back, the Emperor disdained me for being old and still having no family, so he bestowed a marriage upon me. The betrothed is the Empress Dowager's own niece." Feng Jiuli raised his eyebrows to look at him, picked up the bowl of minced meat porridge, blowing on it while pretending to speak casually. Seeing the young man's eyes go wide after hearing these words, he felt increasingly amused inside, but didn't show it at all on his face. He scooped a spoonful of porridge, blew it until it was warm, and brought it to the young man's lips. "Open your mouth, ah—"

But the young man pursed his lips tightly, only reluctantly parting them after being looked at again and again: "Then did you agr..."

Feng Jiuli didn't wait for him to finish speaking. Seizing the opportunity, he fed the minced meat porridge into his mouth, gave a light cough to suppress the uncontrollable curve at the corners of his mouth, and then scooped another spoonful of porridge over, pretending to be serious. He said in a deep voice, "Eat quickly. How can you still be like a child when you're this old, needing someone to urge you just to drink porridge?"

The young man was extremely angry, and also due to that trace of petulance common during illness, his brows knitted. He pulled the soft quilt over his head to wrap himself up, rolled over, turned his back to the man, and said in a muffled voice, "I have a headache, I don't want to eat anymore!"

The man didn't speak, and the room was momentarily silent.

Su Jinzhi waited for a while. Thinking the person had really left, he pulled open a corner of the soft quilt to peek outside, only to look into the man's teasing gaze. He shook his head and laughed helplessly: "Truly a child."

"Does your head really hurt?" Feng Jiuli placed the porridge bowl on the table beside him and leaned over to check the wound on Su Jinzhi's forehead.

Su Jinzhi slightly avoided his palm, lowering his eyes in silence.

Feng Jiuli laughed inwardly at how deeply jealous he was. But considering the young man still had a big gash on his head, he didn't dare to continue teasing. Using the posture from just checking the wound, he leaned down and kissed the corner of the young man's lips. Then he sat back on the edge of the bed, picked up the bowl, and continued blowing on the porridge: "Of course I refused the Emperor's good intentions. I told him, this concubine has already married, how would I dare to marry again?"

Hearing this, the young man indeed couldn't help but hook up the corners of his lips, then looked at him worriedly: "Then the Emperor... didn't he make things difficult for you?"

"Men should marry when they come of age, and women should wed. How could he make things difficult for me?" The old Emperor had taken the opportunity to flare up and confiscate his military tally, but of course, Feng Jiuli wouldn't tell Su Jinzhi about this. Anyway, once war broke out at the border, the old Emperor would still have to hand the military tally back to him for the sake of his empire.

After feeding the porridge, Feng Jiuli smilingly took off his outer robe and slipped into Su Jinzhi's blanket. Carefully avoiding the young man's wound, he wrapped his arms around his waist, leaned into the crook of the young man's neck, took a deep breath, and said in a slightly muffled voice, "You don't know, when I rushed into the hall, how much I wanted to yell, 'Who dares to touch my husband'! If any of them dared to force you even half a step further, I would have hacked them into eight pieces. This way, they would all know that I am your person, and no one would dare to bully you again in the future."

Su Jinzhi couldn't help but laugh, saying in a low voice: "What are you talking about..."

"I'm serious." Feng Jiuli raised his head from his neck, his gaze clear, and the depths of his eyes full of determination.

As he said this, he raised a hand to tug at his collar. The man's strength was great, and he easily ripped his robe open, revealing the wheat-colored pectoral muscles underneath. Then, he grabbed Su Jinzhi's hand, reached inside, and pressed it against his own wildly beating chest. In a low voice, staring intently into Su Jinzhi's eyes, he said earnestly, "I know what you've been hiding from."

Upon hearing this, Su Jinzhi's body trembled slightly, his gaze looking at him blankly. The light flashing in his pupils seemed like a plea, yet also seemed like reluctance to part.

Feng Jiuli sighed softly. Lying flat, he pulled the young man on top of himself. He raised his hand and stroked down along the young man's smooth waist. His voice was slightly hoarse, carrying an enticing tone as he gently murmured in Su Jinzhi's ear, "You've waited for me, liked me for a long time. I know all of this; I also like you, have loved you for a long time. If you are afraid, then let me bear it."

Su Jinzhi spread his legs, kneeling at Feng Jiuli's side. Looking into his eyes, he blinked lightly, and tears smashed onto the man's face. He said with a trembling voice, "But... the current you hasn't even met me for long..."

"Perhaps I fell in love with you at first sight." Feng Jiuli raised his hand to wipe away the tears on his face.

Su Jinzhi choked out a sob, trying hard to put on a smile as he said, "Liar. Later on, you even made me cry."

Mentioning this, Feng Jiuli was also quite annoyed with himself. He had indeed been moved the first time he saw the young man on the painted boat, but at that time, he was with his Third Senior Brother.

He mistakenly thought that he and Yun Mengchen were a pair, and later, due to various reasons, caused so many twists and turns. Helplessly, he sighed, pressed Su Jinzhi's jade-white shoulders down against himself, and said, "Then take your anger out on me, bully me back fiercely."

The young man suddenly broke into a smile, leaning against his shoulder blade, and said in a muffled voice, "I don't want to bully you. I want to be with you..."

At the very moment those words left his mouth, Feng Jiuli felt the young man's warm tears soak his clothes. The heat easily pierced through his skin, burning deep into his heart. He breathed deeply, suppressing the tears welling up in his own reddened eyes—seven years for him was but a fleeting moment, gone in the snap of a finger, but for the young man, it was longer than a lifetime.

"I will be with you, always be with you, and will never ever be separated from you." Feng Jiuli hugged the young man tightly and declared solemnly.

As soon as his voice faded, Su Jinzhi began to tremble slightly.

Together forever.

Jun Changle had waited for him for ten whole years, just for this single sentence?

"Ding—Lord Host, Jun Changle's Progress Value has increased to 90!" No. 0 happily notified Su Jinzhi of this news, and then lowered his voice to quietly remind him, "But your affection index has exceeded the standard. Please be careful to control your emotions, otherwise Brother No. 1 will get angry."

"Heh heh." No. 1 laughed coldly, "I am already angry."

Su Jinzhi was in so much pain that his whole body shuddered, but he still tightly hugged Feng Jiuli's neck, refusing to lift his head from his shoulder. Feng Jiuli also noticed his abnormality, but he thought the young man was just crying and didn't think much of it. He gently patted his back and teased, "Still crying? Do you need me to hold you and coax you before you'll quiet down?"

"I'm not crying." Su Jinzhi carefully swallowed the coppery sweetness surging in his throat, and sat up straight with his back to Feng Jiuli.

When the young man had just sat up, Feng Jiuli caught a glimpse of his slightly red corners of the eyes. Seeing the young man like this, he thought he was feeling shy, so he pulled back the brocade quilt that had been kicked away during their movements and covered them well. Hugging the young man's waist, he closed his eyes and coaxed in a low voice, "Okay, okay, okay, you're not crying. You have an injury on your head, how about I sleep with you for a while longer?"

After Su Jinzhi evened out his breathing, he turned around to look at him, discovering that the man had faint dark circles under his eyes. One look and you could tell it was the exhaustion of not sleeping all night. Therefore, he gently hummed an "mm" and lay down beside him. After pondering for a moment, he even raised his hand to hug his waist, closing his eyes and pretending not to see the hooked corners of the man's lips. Su Jinzhi leaned into his embrace, smelling the scent on the man's body that made him feel secure, and his consciousness also gradually became blurry.

In a daze, he saw some fragmented images. It seemed that a long time ago, he had also been this intimate with someone else.

That person hugged him, saying they wanted to be with him forever.

The two slept in each other's arms, having a good dream that day.

As for the Third Prince Yan Hui, not knowing whether it was because he lost all face in the main hall that day, he returned to Beiyou the next morning. However, no one in Zhuhua dared to gossip about him even a little. Later, he even sent several chests of gold and jewelry to Su Jinzhi as an apology. But no matter how many precious gifts the King of Zhuhua sent, Su Jinzhi only cared about that single, feather-light thin sheet of paper representing the removal of his lowly status, registering him into a proper household from then on—thousands of gold and ten thousand silver could not compare to how precious this piece of paper was.

When Feng Jiuli stepped through the door, he immediately caught sight of the young man staring blankly at a piece of white paper, and couldn't help but ask: "What are you looking at?"

"Nothing." The man's low, deep voice entered beside Su Jinzhi's ear, and then he felt a pair of strong, powerful arms wrap around his waist. Su Jinzhi discreetly tucked that piece of paper into his sleeve pocket to keep it safe, turned his head, and smiled at the man.

Feng Jiuli was more than a head taller than the young man. In the moment he hugged him, he used his peripheral vision to catch a clear glimpse of the handwriting on the thin paper. His eyes darkened, but he didn't say much else. He only used his fingers to gently tidy up the stray hairs by the young man's ear and asked with a smile, "In a few more days, it will be the Mid-Autumn Festival. The night market has been very bustling lately, do you want to go out and have some fun? I'll take you."

Hearing this, Su Jinzhi hesitated before opening his mouth: "The night market... what's so fun about it? I've grown tired of it over the years."

But the truth was not as he said. Because of his identity and his relatives with whom he never reunited, every year's Mid-Autumn Festival and New Year were the most painful and desolate times for Jun Changle. It was a blessing he hadn't fallen ill from depression, so how could he possibly go out to play?

Feng Jiuli understood his temperament and naturally knew he was lying. So he bent down, buried his head in his neck, and while rubbing against him to take full advantage of the young man, he said in a muffled, whining voice like a spoiled child: "There's the moon sacrifice. I'm not returning to Ghost Cloud Valley for Mid-Autumn this year, so you should accompany me to buy offerings and mooncakes."

"Okay, okay, I'll go with you, hurry up and get off." Su Jinzhi chuckled lightly, shaking his head. "I can make mooncakes for you too, why bother going out to buy them?"

"Then we can go buy bamboo strips first, and come back to make lanterns to light." Seeing that he agreed, Feng Jiuli kissed his cheek before standing up straight.

Su Jinzhi's eyes lit up: "Lighting lanterns? You also know how to make lanterns?"

"Yeah." Feng Jiuli smiled. "During those years in the Valley, Master saw that I was bored during Mid-Autumn Festival and asked Eldest Senior Brother to teach me how to make lanterns. I used to always think that even though I lost my memory, being able to admire the bright moon with family members on Mid-Autumn should have been satisfying enough, but for some unknown reason, I always felt that a piece was missing in my heart."

Upon hearing this, the young man instantly fell silent. He had family members he could long for over the years, but Feng Jiuli, whether before or after his amnesia, had no close blood relatives by his side. Furthermore, because he loved him, and he himself loved him deeply in return, he would probably never find a woman to give birth to his own blood relative in this lifetime.

Feng Jiuli had been paying attention to his expression the whole time. Seeing the young man lower his eyes, he hooked his lips again, whispering by his ear, "But now I have met you. You know about that time after I bullied you, when I stood outside the Huaqi Pavilion and secretly looked at you, right?"

Su Jinzhi lightly hummed an "mm" and raised his eyes to look at him.

"I stood outside the building and looked at your window for a long time. Those peach blossoms fell all over my shoulders. Later, you opened the window, and I saw you." Feng Jiuli lowered his head, pressing his forehead against the young man's, laughing and murmuring softly.

"In that instant, I finally understood. I wanted to meet you, wanted to see you, and had been wanting to for a very long time."

Tightly hugged by him, Su Jinzhi suddenly recalled the image of the man standing with crossed arms under a blooming flower tree that day, with moonlight and petals scattered all over his body and shoulders—so he really hadn't seen wrong, it indeed was an old friend returning.

He had crossed thousands of mountains and rivers, traveling day and night, coming from afar.

And so, the flowers fell at this moment, and the moon became full at this time.