Psst! We're moving!
Shen Yihuan had something on her mind.
She didn’t know what was going on with the tattoo on Lu Zhou’s back.
Was it really cherries? Could everyone have seen it wrong?
But with so many people swearing by it, it probably wasn’t false.
Just as the day was almost over, Zhang Tongqi chose that moment to arrive.
Shen Yihuan carried a basin of dirty clothes outside to wash, and Zhang Tongqi also came over, but she was accompanied by an assistant, so naturally, she didn’t have to do the washing herself.
“How come I haven’t seen you all day?” Zhang Tongqi asked, leaning against the sink.
Shen Yihuan was wearing a nightgown, her sleeves rolled up to her elbows, revealing a section of her fair, slender forearm, as she rubbed her clothes.
She replied indifferently: “Busy with work, taking pictures everywhere.”
“I really didn’t expect you to come all the way to this godforsaken place just for Lu Zhou.”
Shen Yihuan wrung out the washed clothes and tossed them into a clean basin nearby.
“What’s wrong with this place? It’s so beautiful. I think it’s great.”
Zhang Tongqi snorted, clearly unconvinced: “You’d be willing to stay here for the rest of your life?”
“You just like Lu Zhou, don’t you?” Shen Yihuan looked at her, “If Lu Zhou stayed here for the rest of his life, could you endure it?”
Zhang Tongqi chuckled scornfully: “Someone as promising as him, already a Lieutenant Colonel, will definitely be transferred back to Beijing later.”
She shrugged, didn’t answer, too lazy to bother with her, and continued washing her clothes.
Zhang Tongqi pointed at her assistant: “Why did you bring these clothes here? Don’t you know they can’t be hand-washed!?”
Her tone was too harsh, and the assistant was a young girl who nodded and bowed in apology, too scared to move.
Finally, Zhang Tongqi waved her hand, rolling her eyes: “Alright! Go put this back for me! You can’t do anything right for me.”
Shen Yihuan lowered her head to wash the items in her hands, not intending to speak up for the little assistant.
The little assistant scurried away quickly, her steps urgent, afraid of being scolded again.
Putting on such airs in a place like this was truly distasteful.
Shen Yihuan curled her lips, feeling a bit like laughing.
“Tomorrow, I have a shoot. You come and photograph me,” Zhang Tongqi said.
“I don’t work for the TV station, and your shoot isn’t my responsibility,” she said.
“Lu Zhou will be at tomorrow’s shoot too.”
Her hand movements paused, and she retorted: “So what?”
“This was specially approved. Do you think this needed Lu Zhou’s personal approval to be arranged?”
Her words were full of showing off and provocation.
To Shen Yihuan’s ears, it was just laughable.
She chuckled nonchalantly.
To Zhang Tongqi’s ears, it became a huge mockery.
...
She particularly disliked Shen Yihuan when they were in school.
She fell in love with Lu Zhou at first sight. Later, she found out he was admitted on recommendation as the top overall student, became class monitor as soon as he joined the class. He was tall and slender, with fair skin, deep-set eyes like carved knives, a somewhat cold but very polite personality.
No girl wouldn’t like a boy like that.
But she soon discovered that Shen Yihuan, sitting next to Lu Zhou, also liked him, and was openly and sensationally pursuing him, which the whole school knew about.
She was too beautiful, so beautiful that it was an aggressive attack on all other girls.
Ever since her pursuit of Lu Zhou became known throughout the school, the number of love letters Lu Zhou received had significantly decreased. Shen Yihuan and Lu Zhou might not have known why.
But Zhang Tongqi couldn’t possibly not know, and neither could other girls who, like her, couldn’t help but feel inferior when facing Shen Yihuan.
They simply didn’t dare to compete with Shen Yihuan.
Yet, they silently waited to see Shen Yihuan make a fool of herself. They initially thought Lu Zhou wouldn’t like her, but then they learned that Lu Zhou and Shen Yihuan were together.
Such a girl, who attracted attention wherever she went and was with the school’s universally recognized male god, was uneducated, had a bunch of bad friends, and would undoubtedly be met with hostility from ordinary girls like them.
Zhang Tongqi couldn’t describe her feelings when she learned that Shen Yihuan’s father’s company had gone bankrupt and she was forced to drop out of school.
She gloated, like a voyeur, paying attention to all the bad news about Shen Yihuan’s life, feeling that the light she felt had been overshadowed by Shen Yihuan was gradually returning.
She saw Shen Yihuan again.
She had expected to see Shen Yihuan bowing down to her, but she didn’t.
She just wore a seemingly soft facade, but at her core, she was still the same.
And now.
When she triumphantly flaunted Lu Zhou’s regard for her, she merely let out a light, dismissive chuckle.
Disdain.
She didn’t even bother to pay attention.
How could she be so certain that Lu Zhou would like her forever?
How could she be so certain that everyone had to revolve around her?
...
Zhang Tongqi almost lost control of her temper, suddenly raising her hand and forcefully pushing Shen Yihuan.
She lost her footing. The laundry room floor was already slippery, and she was wearing slippers, causing her to fall backward directly.
Her elbow hit the ground with a thud, a sound that made one wince. Shen Yihuan’s entire face crumpled in pain, and she gasped.
Zhang Tongqi hadn’t expected the fall to be so severe and was momentarily stunned.
It wasn’t that she was worried Shen Yihuan would be seriously injured, but rather that bad news might spread.
“You, are you okay?” she hesitantly reached out.
As she knelt down, Shen Yihuan slapped her.
Her head snapped to the side, ears ringing. The slap had been so hard that she saw stars for a while and couldn’t see anything clearly.
Shen Yihuan had never been purely beaten in her life.
During her rebellious middle school period, when she got into fights, they were always group brawls, and she usually didn’t even have to lift a finger. Even if she was hit, she wasn’t afraid; she’d just get back at them harder and more fiercely.
She was proud and arrogant, and after delivering that slap, she felt a surge of satisfaction.
Then, belatedly, she remembered Lu Zhou’s deliberate warning from yesterday—
“Don’t cause trouble.”
And when he said those words, his slightly cold eyes and calm, deep expression.
She was going to make him angry again.
Shen Yihuan thought this in the last moment before her rationality completely drained.
Zhang Tongqi clutched half her face, then suddenly shrieked and lunged at Shen Yihuan.
________________________________________
Lu Zhou had just driven into the military camp.
He had visited several nearby border checkpoints. As soon as he returned, He Min heard the car and rushed over.
“Captain Lu!” he shouted.
Lu Zhou rolled down the car window: “What’s wrong?”
He Min gasped, “Shen, Shen Yihuan and that celebrity got into a fight.” Lu Zhou was stunned, pushed open the car door, got out, and threw out a command: “Help me drive the car into the garage.”
By the time He Min reacted, car keys were already in his hand, and Lu Zhou had long disappeared.
At the entrance of the Commander’s office.
Commander Feng’s furious voice echoed from inside.
“This is a military camp! It’s not a place for you to fight and throw tantrums! If you can’t control yourselves, then get the hell out of here and go back to Beijing!”
Shen Yihuan and Zhang Tongqi stood side by side.
They were as disheveled as could be.
Both had messy hair, their clothes were soaking wet, clinging to their bodies, dripping water.
Zhang Tongqi was shedding tears, her makeup ruined, lipstick smeared across the corners of her mouth, eyeliner smudged, one cheek swollen and red, and several red marks on the back of her hand.
Compared to her, Shen Yihuan looked relatively fine.
Aside from being a bit dirty, her entire face was clean and uninjured, with no tears.
Zhang Tongqi’s little assistant was on the side, speaking tearfully: “As soon as I went in, I, I saw Shen Yihuan grabbing Sister Tongqi’s collar, about to hit her. She, she hit too fiercely, I didn’t even dare to pull her away...”
Shen Yihuan’s gaze was calm. She scanned her face once, then looked away.
Commander Feng: “Is what she said true?!”
Zhang Tongqi nodded, crying, looking as pitiful as possible.
Commander Feng looked at Shen Yihuan: “Do you admit it?”
“I admit it,” she said.
Before her words faded, the door to the Commander’s office opened, and Lu Zhou walked in.
Legs snapped together, he gave a crisp salute: “Report!”
“Come in,” Commander Feng motioned him over, then lit his lighter and walked to the side. “Since you’re back, you handle this. Punish them as deserved. If they don’t obey, then send them all back to Beijing!”
Only a few of them remained in the office.
Lu Zhou leaned against the window, smoking, with the black, invisible night behind him.
He spoke to Zhang Tongqi’s assistant: “You go back first.”
The assistant still wanted to say something, but seeing his dark, hollow eyes, she suddenly dared not say anything. He didn’t explode in anger like Commander Feng, yet he inexplicably exuded an oppressive aura that brooked no defiance.
Zhang Tongqi looked up at him.
She suddenly realized that after the boy had grown into a man, he was even more unrestrained, even more daunting to look at directly.
His fingers were long, gently twirling the cigarette. The blue veins on the back of his hand and forearm were prominent. White smoke rose, shrouding his eyebrows and expression.
His collar was slightly open, his collarbones distinct, his Adam’s apple moving subtly.
Even the wind that blew past him felt hot and dry.
Zhang Tongqi spoke in a soft voice: “Captain Lu, I won’t pursue Shen Yihuan’s responsibility in this matter...”
“Shut up.”
These two words were all he said.
Shen Yihuan and Zhang Tongqi were both stunned simultaneously.
Such words, coming from Lu Zhou, were rare.
Once it sank in, Shen Yihuan couldn’t help but laugh out loud.
Lu Zhou frowned slightly, squinting his eyes, and with a slight lift of his chin, stared at her: “You shut up too.”
“...” Shen Yihuan glared at him, then lowered her head again.
After he finished smoking the entire cigarette, he stubbed the butt into the ashtray and said flatly: “The incident just now, from start to finish, Shen Yihuan, you tell me.”
“She pushed me first. I couldn’t stand it, so I slapped her, and then we started fighting,” she said concisely, her words neither humble nor arrogant, with no intention of playing the victim.
“I didn’t,” Zhang Tongqi said tearfully, “I didn’t push her. She just came up and hit me.”
Lu Zhou listened, then put another cigarette in his mouth.
“Then what about the injury on her elbow? Did she hit herself?”
Shen Yihuan subconsciously raised her arm, only then realizing that she had bruised her elbow when she fell. It was a large, purplish bruise, looking somewhat ghastly.
Zhang Tongqi opened her mouth, but in the end, said no words of defense, and sullenly closed her mouth.
“Both of you run ten laps. Submit a self-reflection report to me tomorrow,” Lu Zhou said coldly, his back straight. “If there’s a next time, both of you will be kicked out of the team.”
They went downstairs.
To the training ground.
Shen Yihuan never imagined that she would one day be punished with running and have to write a self-reflection report.
And the person punishing her was her ex-boyfriend.
She walked behind Zhang Tongqi, with Lu Zhou walking last.
Suddenly, a weight settled on her shoulder, and her vision was largely obscured.
She pulled it off—it was Lu Zhou’s jacket.
“It’s cold, put it on,” he said as he passed her.
________________________________________
He Min stood beside Lu Zhou, watching the two women running one after another on the training ground.
He sighed: “That’s ten laps. They’re both pampered city girls; can they handle it?”
Although they had signed relevant agreements upon entering the military camp, ensuring that during their time there, they would abide by military requirements and that disciplinary action could be taken if they made mistakes.
However, after all, they weren’t actual soldiers who had come up through the ranks step by step. Their physical fitness wasn’t as good, and the punishment shouldn’t have been so severe.
Lu Zhou glanced at him: “Your warm-ups are more than ten laps.”
“How can our physiques compare to theirs? After ten laps, aren’t you afraid your Photographer Shen will faint?” He Min said.
Lu Zhou chuckled upon hearing this, exhaling a puff of smoke.
“That girl doesn’t faint so easily.”
Shen Yihuan didn’t have much else going for her, but her athletic performance was decent. She wasn’t good at sprints, and while she wasn’t first or second in long-distance running, her stamina was indeed good.
In her second year of high school, she even participated in a five-thousand-meter long-distance run once and won a bronze medal.
The two girls who won gold and silver medals were pale after the race and almost had to be sent to the hospital. Only she was cheerfully bouncing to the podium to receive that bronze medal.
And she even ran to him to show off.
In the end, Shen Yihuan finished two laps ahead of Zhang Tongqi.
Zhang Tongqi couldn’t run at all in the last two laps and ended up just walking.
Lu Zhou didn’t soften. When she finished walking, she almost lost her balance and stumbled as she approached.
He grabbed her arm and said flatly: “Can you walk?”
Zhang Tongqi nodded.
He released her hand: “He Min, take her to the military medical station to rest for a bit.”
After speaking, he left without looking back.
________________________________________
Shen Yihuan went back to the laundry room, finished washing her clothes, and hung them to dry.
She carried two empty basins back to her room.
It was already lights-out. The corridor was dark. Qin Zheng had just messaged her asking if she was okay; everyone already knew about her fight with Zhang Tongqi.
She thought about the words that had come out of Zhang Tongqi’s mouth during their fight.
“Without your dad, without Lu Zhou, what do you think you are?” “You’re truly pitiful.”
“Is living under someone else’s roof so easy?”
“Do you still think that your awful temper can still attract Lu Zhou like before?! He’s utterly fed up with you!”
...
“Don’t cause trouble.”
...
Shen Yihuan closed her eyes.
Suddenly, someone grabbed her shoulder.
The surroundings were pitch black. She had just finished running and was still in a slightly hypoglycemic state. With a sudden pull, her vision went black, and she couldn’t see the person.
Her back hit the wall, and a force pressed against her, her shoulder bumping against it.
She smelled a familiar scent.
Her vision slowly cleared, and she saw Lu Zhou’s approaching face.
“What are you doing?” She didn’t struggle, asking calmly.
“Did I ever tell you not to cause trouble?” He stared intently into her eyes.
“I’m sorry.”
In the dark corridor, only the crisp sound of the young girl’s voice remained.
Such a straightforward apology was unexpected. Lu Zhou raised an eyebrow slightly: “Is apologizing enough?”
“You’ve already punished me, what else do you want?” Shen Yihuan frowned. @Jingjiang Literature City
He took a step forward, trapping her further in the narrow space. He leaned down slightly, sniffing her scent, and suddenly laughed.
His low laughter echoed.
His warm breath enveloped her neck.
Shen Yihuan recoiled, but there was a wall.
“Yes, I did punish you.”
His jawline was somewhat tense. The hand pressing on her shoulder moved, his index finger lifting the soft collar of her nightgown, revealing a thin section of her collarbone.
He moved very slowly, approaching bit by bit, then extended the tip of his tongue.
He lightly licked the hollow of her collarbone.
“...”
Damn it.
Shen Yihuan wondered if this Lu Zhou was possessed by some demon.
It was too f***ing sensual.
She raised her hand to swing at him but he caught her wrist firmly, pulled it, held it tight, and pinned it above her head, the back of her hand against the cold wall.
He released her mouth.
But his head remained there.
“That was her punishment.”
Shen Yihuan didn’t understand, bewildered.
“Now, it’s your punishment.”
He finished speaking.
And opened his mouth again.
Feeling his teeth knock against her collarbone, grinding and gently biting, she let out a soft “hiss.”
Before she could curse in pain, his teeth receded completely, leaving only the soft tip of his tongue, licking her. The sound was sticky and faint, mingling in the dark night and the pitch-black corridor, forming a lewd sound that made one’s ears flush and heart pound.
His fingers pulled open her neckline.
His eyes were deep.
She heard a snapping sound.
It was the snapping of nerves, and also the breaking of chains.
He took a piece of delicate flesh in his mouth, sucking hard, saliva moistening her skin, slick and glistening.
Shen Yihuan’s legs went soft. He hugged her waist tightly, and she barely remained standing.
“F***... what are you doing?”
He finally released her mouth.
His dark eyes observed the “masterpiece” he had left on the young girl’s body.
His finger gently traced the red mark on her shoulder.
He lowered his head, resting his forehead on her shoulder, and let out a long sigh.
“This is your punishment.”