Chapter 44.3: Temporary Stay at Qingmin (First) [3]
Author: He Feng Yan
Translator: HeXie
Editor: Larkspur
Chapter 44.3: Temporary Stay at Qingmin (First) [3]
After thinking about it for a moment, Qin Wuhua lowered his voice and began telling Wu Ye about some stories from his army days, as well as some ridiculous incidents courtesy of the rookies.
“… Wow, how could there be such a stupid person? If he could get lost even in the base, could he even do missions?” Wu Ye asked in surprise.
“Tiger’s always very lucky. Once when we were at the borders on a mission to catch drug dealers, he got lost in the jungles, but then he wound up running into the dealer who had run away. He apprehended the other alive on the spot and was even awarded a third level prize.” Talking about his once-comrades, Qin Wuhua’s low, rough voice was at once nostalgic and sentimental.
“Then? What happened afterwards?” Wu Ye loved reading fiction, especially the really hot-blooded kind. He found the stories Qin Wuhua was telling more interesting than those stories. After all, everyone knew those stories were fake, but they still got pumped up for it anyway.
But here, Qin Wuhua was sharing real events. Every person in his stories was red-blooded and real, every story he told was vigorous and touching. The more he heard Qin Wuhua retell his past, the smaller the distance Wu Ye felt was between them. And he began to feel admiration, empathy and rapport between them.
“… Then during a mission, he sacrificed himself and took six bullets while trying to protect the target.”
Wu Ye sighed. “What a pity.”
“Yeah.” The target Tiger had died protecting was just a witness to some corruption. The other had done all the bad things that could be done during their lifetime, but because they had helped to successfully convict someone else with the evidence they had provided, they had avoided being sentenced by the law.
The number of fishy things that had gone on in that case was something only the heavens knew. But there was nothing he could do since his hand was tied. Moreover, they were soldiers. As such, they could only obey their order.
Still, whether in the past or the present, that wasn’t the first time Qin Wuhua had felt that those comrades of his had died in vain. He sighed lightly and said, “All right, it’s not early, go to sleep now.”
Wu Ye was just getting into the stories, how could possibly he fall asleep? He pestered Qin Wuhua to tell him more and only after midnight did he finally observe with a sigh, still wondering and unfulfilled, “They’re all heroes, and so are you.”
This was what a real man, a real guy, was like. He really couldn’t even bring himself to envy them.
Qin Wuhua was briefly taken aback, then he said seriously, “If you are willing to, you can be one too.”
The second young master pursed his lips. “I don’t have an ambition as great as saving the world. A person only has a few decades in life, enjoying even one second less is a sin. You see how much good time have I wasted now? I’m sinning greatly. Ay. Sleep, sleep, we still have to wake early tomorrow, night.”
Qin Wuhua, “… night.”
The second young master stretched lazily, then laid down casually, forming a ‘da’ shape[6], his limbs heavily pressing on Qin Wuhua without care. It wasn’t long before his breathing evened out. Qin Wuhua waited, frozen still, for him to fall deep into sleep before carefully moving his errant limbs.
In the dark, he silently counted to a hundred before there was once again a weight on his arms. Then, satisfied, he put his hands carefully on that soft and smooth back, his lips gently touching Wu Ye’s messy hair on top of his head in a light kiss.
In his heart, he laughed bitterly once. Then, after glancing at the photograph on the opposite wall that looked like a wedding photo, he slowly closed his eyes, concealing the complicated emotions in there.
The next morning, the second young master woke up in Qin Wuhua’s embrace. Realising that he had his limbs entangled on the other, he was already feeling a little embarrassed – while Qin Wuhua wasn’t yet awake, he tried to hurriedly separate them.
As he was shifting the arm trapped under Qin Wuhua’s waist, the second young master turned his head slightly and accidentally glimpsed the photo on the opposite wall. His initially pink face reddened even more as a pang of strange guilt welled up in his heart. Coupled with Qin Wuhua’s gentle eyes that he met when he turned his head back, an indescribable, unknown feeling flitted through his heart.
“Morning,” Qin Wuhua said softly, as if not seeing Wu Ye’s struggle.
“Mo- Morning.” After stuttering out the greeting, Wu Ye hurriedly jumped off the bed and pulled on his pants, before dashing into the adjacent toilet like a cat whose tail had been pulled on.
Qin Wuhua stretched out his limbs, the corner of his lips curled up, barely visible to sight.
At the start of a new day, the hunters woke up early and gathered in groups to go search for food downstairs. Their luck was quite good – at the twenty-third floor, they found a 15 kg bag of pearl rice that hadn’t been unsealed yet. Having been vacuum-sealed, although the rice was a little old, it looked and smelt fine.
Other than rice, they also found plenty of dried vermicelli, dried mushrooms, dried fungus, dried chills and some usable spices, three cans of luncheon meat, and two cans of fish. It was a ripe harvest.
After he was done cleaning up, when Wu Ye came out of the bathroom he smelt a really rich scent. Su Jianbang was sitting pitifully in front of two suspended pots, cooking porridge with one hand and vegetables with the other.
“Lao Su, make the fire on the left smaller. You almost make the rice soup too dry. And crank up the fire on the right. There’s too much water there, making the vegetables soup unappetizing.” Yang Li Na ordered while she stirred the pots with a ladle.
Su Jianbang went ‘QAQ’, speechless. He’s a fire ability user, not a voice-controlled electric stove! Little Granny, please let him be!
Author’s notes: Silently light a candle for the second young master.
=[6] the word ‘da’ means big, and looks like this: 大 so you can imagine the head on top, the horizontal line across as the spread arms and the two strokes the legs