Can Ci Pin - - - Chapter 142

Chapter 142 – You Still Have to Love Him

The person before him might have been as swift as a mutated predator, but the forces behind every action were rather light. The hand that grabbed onto Lin Jingheng’s shoulder was gentle, almost timid, while the other hand held his back. A thick scent of alcohol quickly consumed Lin Jingheng’s senses.

Lin Jingheng’s senses heightened as he felt a gentle lick against his neck while those hands that grabbed onto him started shifting around on his body.

Being pinned to a door in the dark by a predator was surely a new experience; Lin Jingheng didn’t know whether to laugh or cry as he was put on the spot and could only grab onto those hands that slipped towards his chest and lifted his chin up slightly: “Prime Minister Lu, where’s your shame?”

Lu Bixing gave a muffled response, innocently confused.

Lin Jingheng heard this muffled tone and grabbed onto his collar, then lowered his head slightly to sniff out the scent of alcohol: “Did you drink too much or did your clothes drink too much?”

Lu Bixing’s act was immediately ripped apart: “……now you’re making me feel bad for asking for drunk sex.”

He took in a deep breath and shoved his chin into Lin Jingheng’s shoulder by the door. He could feel the hard metal button and epaulet pressing against his face, carrying the coldness of the planet’s night. A thin layer of mist covered the metal as Lu Bixing’s breath caressed the button like an episode of light rain. He turned his hand and held Lin Jingheng’s hand that grabbed onto him, fingers still cold at the tips. He suddenly felt a tiny bit of awkwardness from his impulsive act.

The meeting at night was real, and he really did have a few drinks at the banquet; spraying wine on his own shirt was also to avoid drinking too much at the banquet.

The people that he received at the hotel were from a faraway planet near the border of the EIghth Galaxy. Winter on that small planet was longer than Beijing-β, and even after installing an artificial ecosystem, it was still much colder than many other places. The climate control broke at one point during the internal war, causing the deaths of thousands on the planet who couldn’t withstand the cold winter. The locals that survived used an extremely high alcohol content wine that Lu Bixing secretly left them. The Engineering Team at the time risked their lives to deliver the wine, and under the cover of the locals, finally repaired the climate system after half a month while under enemy attack. Since then, the survivors of the planet swore their loyalty to the government and assassinated the enemy boss, then swore to forever remain under the rule of the Eighth Galaxy’s Independent Government.

The wine that helped them live through the harsh winter at the time was later named ‘Survivor’ to commemorate the event. Every year after that, the locals would send a collector’s edition of the wine to show their gratitude.

Due to the biochip in his body, Lu Bixing metabolized alcohol in his body at a much faster rate than normal people. Even someone with strong alcohol tolerance like Turan, who could easily down three bottles of wine, would find Survivor burning to the throat. The wine was so strong that even Lu Bixing’s iron self-discipline melted quite a bit after a few drinks, making him feel a bit tipsy for the first time in a while.

If it wasn’t for this, he wouldn’t have mustered up the courage to do such a thing.

This kind of thing…that he was only able to do so without shame a long, long time ago.

He was young and shameless back then; he could openly ask to be spoiled and boldly request lots of love without any pressure.

Lu Bixing cleared his throat: “Uh, I…”

Lin Jingheng’s gaze turned towards the direction of his voice in the darkness.

Lu Bixing could still see clearly in the dark thanks to his chip. He could see that his commander was leaning casually by the door, balancing on one leg as the other rested on the side. The commander’s eyelids draped slightly over his grey eyes, giving off a hint of kindness: “Hm?”

“How did you know it was me?” Lu Bixing suddenly asked, “Aren’t you afraid it might be a trap?”

“I can smell it.” Lin Jingheng raised an arm and pulled Lu Bixing’s hand to his face. He sniffed the tips of Lu Bixing’s fingers lightly, perhaps even touching the skin with the tip of his nose. Lu Bixing couldn’t tell, as he felt his entire arm numbed from his elbow to the tip of his fingers. “I forgot to tell you, but if you don’t stop him, Zhanlu will only buy eucalyptus-scented detergent. This is one of his unfortunate functions; did nobody tell you all these years that you smell like a walking camphor tree? Not even the smell of alcohol can cover it up.”

Lu Bixing felt his throat roll gently.

“Besides, no matter how scared you are of danger, it’ll come at you when you least expect it.” Lin Jingheng paused a little before he continued with a strangely suggestive tone, “You need to grow used to it and learn to overcome it. You can’t spend too much time worrying over it because fear will ruin you.”

“Fear is…a type of self-defense mechanism that can destroy a whole army but also break you down from the inside.” Lu Bixing felt that he was finally falling into the influence of the damned wine. The more he wanted to keep quiet, the more his mouth spat out words uncontrollably. “Someone who’s been quartered in life could even feel pain as a ghost. He knows that if it happens again, even his soul might shatter; that’s why he’s scared, fearful…I…”

The alcohol in his veins suddenly rushed through his blood like a string of wild horses as he spoke, forcefully raising his body temperature and consuming his conscience. The hand that was holding onto Lin Jingheng gently suddenly tightened to the point where Lin Jingheng could feel the pain in his flesh. Yet Lin Jingheng didn’t speak, as if he didn’t notice the tightened grip.

Lin Jingheng felt like he was kneeling down by a small hole, frantically trying to make the little snake inside peek out. The moment a small silhouette could be seen, he would hold in his breath anxiously in fear that he would scare the little snake back into its hole.

Lu Bixing stuttered a few times and repeated “I” at least three times until he met the gaze of the other man in the darkness.

“I’m that lonely ghost that’s hurt all over, I’m that person that was too scared to move. Lin…I…I’m afraid that I can no longer patch up a lot of things anymore, I can’t give you back the person that once kind of liked…”

Lin Jingheng suddenly leaned in closer and interrupted him: “You don’t believe in me anymore?”

Lu Bixing was stunned.

“When Monoeyed Hawk kept shit-talking me behind my back to coerce you stay away from me, you purposely talked back to him and believed in me. When the Cayley pirates surrounded the space station and I had to carry that foolish bunch that barely learned how to pilot a mech to their deathbeds, you also seemed to believe in me. I never promised that I was going to protect that run-down station, nor did I ever introduce myself as a good person to you; you were the one that blindly believed in me.” Lin Jingheng said, “I’ve only ever promised you one thing: I said ‘I will come back for as long as you’re still here,’ and you didn’t believe in me anymore…is it because I let you down?”

Lu Bixing’s lips trembled; he couldn’t answer.

Lin Jingheng gently caressed his face with the back of his hand: “Then…can you give me one more chance?”

Lu Bixing stared at him dumbly.

Lin Jingheng leaned back against the door and said: “To be honest, I did love someone once over these years.”

The blood that boiled inside Lu Bixing quickly cooled down as his whole body was dragged back to the ground, his heartbeat almost stopped as well.

“He was a shameless young man.” Lin Jingheng didn’t notice the change in Lu Bixing’s expression and continued, “He would barge into my room in the middle of the night and flirt with me; he wasn’t very experienced, but was rather good-looking, so I didn’t really mind…”

Lu Bixing could hear the sound of his teeth grinding inside as his muscles cooled down into packs of ice. Soon after, he tasted blood in his mouth.

Lin Jingheng: “….because he told me, ‘If you want to kiss me, why hold back?’”

Lu Bixing’s soul dropped to the ground while his heart wavered slightly, only to discover that he was still standing on air. He then pulled Lin Jingheng over in frustration.

A flood of emotions flowed through his alcohol-filled veins, igniting the fire within Lu Bixing’s heart that had been cold these last few years.

He had grown used to the chip inside his body after a decade and wouldn’t lose control of his force by accident anymore. Lin Jingheng took a few steps forward to find himself being pressed onto the bed by the man before him. He couldn’t see clearly in the dark but felt like there was a clever and oddly cute beast hidden there; it was clenching its teeth waiting to rip him apart and swallow him up, its sharp fangs were already resting on his neck. Yet the beast was hesitant and refused to take the first bite down.

Lin Jingheng could smell the wine from his breath mixed in with the scent of eucalyptus. He wasn’t used to being in the passive role in a situation where he couldn’t see; even though he didn’t voice a complaint, he stiffened up his back instinctively in defense like an archer’s bow ready to strike. Then, he finally felt the other man’s passionate but careful movements.

Lin Jingheng let out a sigh and, like cracking open a clam shell, forced himself to relax his body: “Why don’t you try calling me your big brother for once?”

A bowl of boiling oil poured onto a controlled fire inside a cage.

The metal button on his shirt fell to the ground and bounced a few times before it crashed into the cleaning robot, creating a small trill that echoed in the empty room.

“How did this happen?” The tips of Lu Bixing’s fingers glossed over that long scar on his lower abdomen. “Didn’t you say you weren’t hurt?”

Lin Jingheng’s neck drew a sharp line as he lifted his chin; he didn’t know how to respond and could only grab onto Lu Bixing’s hand.

The flowing rivers on Qiming were pulled by the surrounding satellites; the evening tides rose to a menacing height and dropped abruptly into the depths of memories. The rippling waves caused by the violent tides turned feebly to the past, then flowed forward and peeked at the future.

“You liar.”

The receding tides exposed the reef beneath the water, filled with carvings of words by a certain individual.

A young man had once written countless naive and unrealistic dreams there. He wanted to do many things with a certain someone; so many that he felt even if they were given 500 years to live, life was still too short.

Now, the same man returned to the same place to look at his own writing with mixed feelings. He couldn’t laugh or cry, and could only wish to melt his soul together with that person before him.

He no longer believed in fate, no longer wished to be a bard that walked down the trails of history as a bystander without getting involved in conflict. His delusions and past dreams flowed down the river, believing that he would be blessed with better scenery in the future.

He began to realize that blind hope was not enough, that fooling the younger generation with lies that he no longer believed in was a shameful act. But he also didn’t dare to crush the statue in the central plaza, he was scared to extinguish the fire that took him so long to reignite. Therefore, he could only bury himself in the mud, carry the mountains and the sea on his shoulders, and become the person that digs up the dark nights of the galaxy.

“I’ll keep you here myself.”

“I don’t want to give you a second chance, I will personally sentence you to life imprisonment.”

The capital planet rotated quietly until the light of the Eighth Galaxy Star swept through the city’s morning and the serene plaza, quickly engulfing the grounds.

Lu Bixing’s silent personal device was instantly filled with dozens of unread messages and triggered a special kind of notification. A small wave of electricity zapped through his skin and woke the man up within seconds.

It hadn’t been long since Lu Bixing passed out on the bed before he was suddenly zapped awake. He jumped out of bed with his eyes still closed as a flood of bad news rushed through his mind–rebel forces? Are the military supplies hitting its limits? Or did the casualty rate in the frontlines pass the safety threshold…no, the internal warfare ended already…then what happened?

He first scared himself a whole bucket’s worth of cold sweat before he finally opened his eyes from his hangover. He discovered that it wasn’t any issues with the wormhole area, nor were there any factory explosions that affected the civilians–it was that the infamous workaholic Prime Minister Lu who gained a reputation over the last decade was already 30 minutes late to work.

Lin Jingheng: “……I don’t care if you zap yourself with that thing, but can you not zap me too?”

Lu Bixing only now realized that the alarm had also zapped Lin Jingheng because he was holding the commander’s wrist and quickly let go. He saw that the commander’s forearm was covered in visible bruises from his grip; after a whole night, the blood underneath began to surface up like a horror movie.

“How come you didn’t say anything about this!” Lu Bixing’s heart stung in pain as he quickly pulled off the blankets to check if there were any other injuries on the commander.

Lin Jingheng didn’t mind and let him stare at his body while he reached out into the pocket of the jacket beside the bed, pulled out a cigarette and lit it up with one hand. He then turned back and lightly flicked Lu Bixing’s forehead: “I thought that was the episode where the criminal sentenced for life was being interrogated. I didn’t even get to act out my part in pretending to fight for my life when someone was already crying his heart out.”

Lu Bixing’s mind was still warming up and didn’t catch the joke. He subconsciously lifted his hand and wiped the corner of his eyes: “….I’m not crying.”

“Then what’s that wet thing, your nose blood or drool?”

Lu Bixing: “……”

Lin Jingheng couldn’t maintain a straight face for once and turned to spit out a cloud of white smoke from laughter.

The scar on his neck and waist were like a set. Normally, only wounds that weren’t treated properly and didn’t receive anti-scarring treatment would leave those kinds of scars, but it was simply because the commander was too lazy to deal with them properly. As long as they could be covered up by clothes, Lin Jingheng didn’t mind leaving scars on his model-like body. A galactic soldier, unless they were naturally born with darker skin or purposely tanned themselves, was paler than the average human. The bite marks near his waist and shoulders on this snow-white skin thus struck an even more visible contrast on his body.

Lu Bixing’s gaze glossed over the commander and he stood up abruptly without a word as he walked into the bathroom–thankfully, he was quick enough to get up before his nosebleed stained the bed sheets.

Lin Jingheng: “…..”

He felt like his jinxes were entering the level of an ancient doomsayer.

“Do you need me to call in sick for you?” Lin Jingheng put on some clothing and walked towards the bathroom door in a slightly awkward manner. “Uh…..excessive blood-loss? Will they think the Prime Minister got stabbed?”

Lu Bixing flung some fresh water all over him and extinguished the fire on the cigarette.

The undesirable dry summer of Qiming arrived at a bad time.

A secretary in the Milky Way City Command Post received a sudden change of schedule from the Prime Minister and the staff completely lost their minds. When they sent another message out to contact the Prime Minister, they discovered that their signals had been temporarily blocked off. Only the old secretary that once followed the former Prime Minister casually poured himself a cup of tea and ignored his confused and panicked colleagues.

Lu Bixing’s hotel from last night was only five minutes away from the central plaza by foot. Past the corner of the street, one could see that stone statue…and the Pledge of Freedom beneath his foot.

Lin Jingheng stood before the statue for a few moments as he stared at Lu Xin’s familiar face calmly. The small bar across the street was thriving in business; he remembered that he once shared a drink with that angry old cat over a decade ago at the same bar.

When he looked over, he could almost feel Monoeyed Hawk’s provocative gaze standing beside Lu Xin, picking bones with him over decades of times and complaining to Lu Xin: “Look at that, what kind of shit did you raise? He hooked up with and took away your precious son that you’ve never met.”

When fifteen-year-old Lin Jingheng was informed of Madam Lu’s pregnancy, he was consumed by very mixed feelings. He was already a second year in the Black Orchid Academy, so of course he was too embarrassed to admit that he was afraid that an unborn child would take Lu Xin’s love and attention away from him.

But even a big child was still a child. No matter how embarrassed he was to admit it, it was still a fact that this feeling lingered in his heart.

Teenage Lin Jingheng carried his childish worry in his heart and wasn’t able to read the worries of the adults at the time. He couldn’t understand why people were worried that the child came at a bad time when Madam Lu insisted on bearing the child from her own body, and only managed to tell Lu Xin with a difficult face: “Don’t bear a child that’s annoying like you.”

Lu Xin, who now only lived as this stone statue, smiled without a word and gave him a teasing expression.

I did bear a son that’s annoying like me, what can you do?

You still have to love him regardless.

Stay mad.

Book 6 – Heart of the Rose