To the northwest of the Wang Consortium’s territory and inside a forest that spanned over a 100 kilometers in the wilderness, Ren Xiaosu was carefully making his way alone across the mountain ridges.
The forest next to him was already full of dead branches. In the harsh winter weather, Ren Xiaosu could see the snow mixed together with rotten leaves.
He washed his face at a stream. The stream was so clear he could see the bottom of it. The cold water made Ren Xiaosu shudder, and he sobered up a lot.
Ren Xiaosu thought, ‘The stream isn’t even frozen in this season, so it’s probably flowing down from a hot spring upstream, right?‘ He had not taken a bath in seven days and seven nights, so he was wondering if he should go up to the hot spring to take a bath there.
During these seven days and nights, he had been chased for more than 700 kilometers. He was really starting to find it a little unbearable!
But before he could think further, a gunshot rang out in the distance. A bullet suddenly hit the stream in front of him, shattering the rocks within and splashing water all over him.
Ren Xiaosu wanted to cry. Why did that girl have such a bad temper? He and Zhou Yingxue were really innocent. He even put on gloves when they entered Stronghold 61 together back then!
But he did not have time to think too much. He turned around and went back into the forest again.
After Ren Xiaosu went away, Yang Xiaojin’s figure slowly appeared from the forest. She walked up to the stream and slowly washed her face. If it weren’t for the fact that it was too cold in this season, she would even liked to have washed her hair.
“What a silly fool,” Yang Xiaojin muttered to herself. All she needed was an apology, but she ended up being made to chase after him for more than 700 kilometers.
To be honest, it was not only Ren Xiaosu who was finding it rather unbearable. Even she could not take it anymore.
However, she absolutely could not admit defeat. Otherwise, if that boy were to take in a few more maidservants in the future, who was she going to reason with, huh?
When Yang Xiaojin was still attending Qinghe University, she had heard about the story of that mysterious young man and his maidservant. Yang Xiaojin really did not expect Ren Xiaosu would actually do something like that when they had only been separated for such a short while!
A decent-looking person like him actually turned out to be such a player?!
With this thought, Yang Xiaojin got up again and decisively walked across the stream. Her footwear were excellent waterproof combat boots. But after seven days of chasing, the soles of her boots were almost worn out.
After entering the forest, Yang Xiaojin calmly examined the ground.
It was past the snowy season, so Ren Xiaosu’s footprints were clearly left on the ground. She was not worried she would lose track of him.
But as she walked on, Yang Xiaojin suddenly stopped, because the footprints on the ground had disappeared!
While she was taken aback by this discovery, a sniper rifle went off in the distance. A bullet was fired and landed straight at her feet. The bullet penetrated the soft, decomposing leaves and soil, leaving the hole in the ground smoking…
Yang Xiaojin’s eyebrows twitched under her cap. You were in the wrong for taking in a maid, yet you still dare to retaliate?!
Thinking this, Yang Xiaojin picked up her sniper rifle and went after Ren Xiaosu in the direction of the mountain.
Gradually, the temperature in the atmosphere seemed to increase by several degrees. The vegetation on the mountainside even started turning green. They had not withered due to winter at all.
At this moment, Ren Xiaosu’s footprints reappeared. Yang Xiaojin sneered and continued her chase up the mountain.
Suddenly, the meandering mountain path stopped, and there was flat land on the mountainside filled with warm pools.
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The pools emitting hot steam in the winter looked like an enchanted land.
And at the edge of a pool, there was a bunch of white flowers.
Yang Xiaojin’s eyebrows twitched again. This sight was really a little unexpected. It had completely caught her off guard. She really did not expect Ren Xiaosu would suddenly have such a trick up his sleeve after chasing him around for seven days.
Besides, Ren Xiaosu did not seem like a person who knew how to send flowers!
“Alright, come on out. I know you’re here,” Yang Xiaojin said.
Ren Xiaosu came out from behind the dense steam. “You’re not angry anymore?”
“Where did you pick the flowers in the middle of winter?” asked Yang Xiaojin nonchalantly, not answering his question.
“The temperature around this hot spring is quite high. Not only are the plants not wilting, they’ve even bloomed.” Ren Xiaosu explained, “I led you here mainly because I felt that both of us must have gotten really dirty after running around in the wilderness for seven days. When I saw that the stream at the foot of the mountain was not frozen, I realized that there had to be a hot spring up here. So I thought that maybe we… maybe you could take a bath here….”
Yang Xiaojin secretly rolled her eyes. Putting all else aside, Ren Xiaosu was still as wishy-washy as ever.
She glanced at Ren Xiaos. “I’ll forgive you this time.”
Actually, girls were very easy to appease most of the time. What they wanted was not a specific outcome but an attitude.
It wasn’t that Yang Xiaojin insisted on hunting down Ren Xiaosu, but it was just that Ren Xiaosu did not seem like he had any intention of apologizing at all. This made her even angrier as she chased after him. It was clearly Ren Xiaosu who had taken in the maidservant, but in the end, it was as though she were the one being unreasonable.
“Step aside, and don’t peek,” Yang Xiaojin said.
“OK, alright,” Ren Xiaosu said as he walked down the slope. He sat on the slope with his back facing the hot spring and said, “Not all hot springs are suitable for bathing in, but I’ve already checked this one. There’s no problem with the water here, so it’s very safe.”
Yang Xiaojin asked nonchalantly, “What’s the name of that maid of yours?”
As she was asking, she kept staring in the direction of Ren Xiaosu to see if he was peeking at her. She waited a long time before finally getting into the water.
“Zhou Yingxue,” Ren Xiaosu replied. “You probably know her too, right?”
“Zhou Yingxue?” Yang Xiaojin was clearly taken aback. “Why is it her? Isn’t she supposed to be in the Southwest?”
“Oh,” Ren Xiaosu said, “after Stronghold 88 was destroyed, she went to the Central Plains. At first, she said that she wanted to make money to treat her mother’s illness. But later on, I realized that she had lied to me when I found out her mother had passed away years ago.”
Yang Xiaojin was silent for a while before saying, “Zhou Yingxue grew up in the Yang Consortium’s orphanage, so how could she have a mother…”
Ren Xiaosu was speechless. Had Zhou Yingxue really never told the truth before? He had thought Zhou Yingxue was being honest with him the second time she confessed, but he did not expect her to still be lying!
That maidservant was way too damn good at putting on an act!
“So tell me, what happened after that?” Yang Xiaojin asked.
When Ren Xiaosu heard the sound of water splashing, his mind went blank.
Noticing Ren Xiaosu did not answer her, Yang Xiaojin asked again, “What did I just ask you?”
“Oh… actually, I didn’t want to accept her as my maid. At the beginning, I only wanted to join the Anjing House through her. Don’t people say that after becoming an official member of the Anjing House, we can get the Anjing House to do something for us? That’s why I wanted to get into the Anjing House: so I could get them to look for all y’all.” Ren Xiaosu blushed when he came back to his senses. “We were only working together at the beginning!”