Chapter 8

Zhou Jing pulled the bamboo basket out and laid its contents on the ground.

Inside were three boxes of face masks, a complete set of lipsticks, mascara, eyeliner, two hand creams, and a 120-milliliter tube of face mask.

“What are these things?” Shen Mo asked.

“These are skincare products for women, all worth a lot of money,” Zhou Jing replied, opening the box of lipsticks. Inside were five small tubes, all in colors representative of the current era, none bold or outlandish.

He twisted open a lipstick to show Shen Mo. “This is called lipstick; you might not know it. It’s what you refer to as lip balm. But I can assure you, the lip balm used here can’t compare to this.”

Curiously, Shen Mo watched him as Zhou Jing proceeded to apply a bright red lipstick right in front of him.

“How is it? Looks good, right?”

Shen Mo wore a complicated expression. “Not really. It looks like you drank some blood. Hahaha…” He stood up, adding, “Zhou Jing, how can you, a guy, wear something meant for women and ger? It’s so strange!”

Zhou Jing carefully twisted the lipstick back and set it aside before playfully tackling Shen Mo.

“Who looks like they’ve drank blood?!” He planted loud kisses on Shen Mo’s cheeks, leaving bright red marks that made Shen Mo dodge and laugh.

Both were in the prime of their youth and after some playful antics, things began to heat up. Zhou Jing’s physical reaction was clear to Shen Mo even through their clothes, causing Shen Mo’s face to flush as he lay stiff on the ground.

Feeling embarrassed, Zhou Jing tried to get up but suddenly felt a small tug on his shirt. Shen Mo’s face looked as if it might bleed from embarrassment, his gaze drifting, unable to meet Zhou Jing’s eyes.

“I… We haven’t even consummated yet. Is it because I’m a ger? Is it the reason why you don’t want to touch me?” Shen Mo said—his voice pitiful and filled with a sense of grievance.

Rather than evoking Zhou Jing’s pity, Shen Mo’s expression fueled the intense desire within Zhou Jing, pouring a bucket of oil onto a raging fire, leaving him with nothing but primal urges.

He pressed Shen Mo down, feeling something was off but too blinded by the desire to think clearly.

What man could reason in such a moment?

This night, under the covers where passion surged like waves, Zhou Jing had also become a man with a wife.

It was Zhou Jing’s first experience, and he exhausted Shen Mo until he begged for it to end.

Shen Mo, who was accustomed to waking up early, didn’t wake up until the sun was high.

Instead, it was Zhou Jing who woke first—he gazed at the handsome face of his little wife in his arms, feeling an overwhelming fondness. Unable to resist, he leaned in and kissed him a few times.

Zhou Jing cherished the little wife in his embrace, realizing that he, too, was now a man with a wife—it was his wife who pursued him! It was a beautiful feeling.

Shen Mo still had a few traces of the lipstick Zhou Jing had left on his face last night.

Zhou Jing reached out to wipe them away, and as he did, he finally realized what had felt off since last night.

There were too many inconsistencies. Why hadn’t his little wife asked any questions? Especially about those strange items—why did Shen Mo accept them as if it was completely normal?

Shen Mo was stirred awake by Zhou Jing’s gaze. As he opened his eyes, he met Zhou Jing’s intense gaze. That look instinctively filled Shen Mo with a sense of danger, causing his heart to sink. The previous night’s warmth faded away.

“When did you find out?” Zhou Jing asked abruptly, his tone lacking emotions. The tenderness they had shared felt like a distant dream.

The reality set in, and the day remained overcast.

Shen Mo bit his lip, turning his gaze away and remaining silent.

Zhou Jing pressed, “Do you think it’s funny to treat me like a fool?”

Shen Mo remained silent, biting his lower lip harder until a trickle of blood appeared.

The sight of the blood made Zhou Jing forget everything else. He grabbed Shen Mo’s chin, furious. “You think it’s okay to toy with me? Now that I’ve figured it out, you’re punishing yourself, hoping I can’t bear to let you go?”

“Do you really care? If you knew everything, would you still want me?” Shen Mo finally spoke, his voice hoarse.

“Don’t I care? If I didn’t, I would’ve long since abandoned you!”

“You could easily abandon me now. After all, you’re not really Zhou Jing! Go ahead and leave! Let them throw me into the pond!”

Women and gers who stray from their roles would face severe consequences, such as being cast into the depths of hell.

Zhou Jing shouted, “Are you trying to stab me in the heart, Shen Mo? Don’t you understand how much I care about you? If I wanted to leave, I would have done so the moment I woke up. I wouldn’t have waited for you to bring me to bed!”

Shen Mo fell silent again.

Zhou Jing felt helpless. He held Shen Mo’s chin and checked him—only after confirming that it was just the corner of his mouth that was injured could he relax a bit.

“Shen Mo, you know how to manipulate me! You get me into bed, and now that I know how good you are, how could I just walk away? Damn it, every time I see you, I can’t move! You’re all I think about!”

“Alright, I admit defeat!” Zhou Jing said. “But you have to explain how I fell into your hands. How could someone like me, from the modern world, be outsmarted by you, a man from ancient times?”

Shen Mo shut his eyes, trying to suppress the waves of despair crashing over him.

“From the day Zhao Da brought me to the mountain, the moment I saw you, I knew you were not Zhou Jing. I had only been married to Zhou Jing for six months, but I would never mistake him for someone!”

“Zhou Jing had a long knife scar, which he got from an attack shortly after we got married, but you don’t have one. Scars don’t just disappear, so I knew you weren’t him!”

“Then why didn’t you say anything? Why did you carry me back? Your family was so poor, yet you still fed me and took care of me? I remember that Old Lady Wang took the last of the wild vegetables from our home. I had only half a bowl left, and you, who was unwilling to eat, insisted on saving it for me, filling your belly with cold water instead. Why did you do that?”

“Why? Because I did it on purpose.” Now that the truth was out, Shen Mo felt dejected. Without that bond, why would he ever choose a ger over a woman?

Not to mention that the man before him, at first glance, was anything but ordinary. Even the previous Zhou Jing had refused to touch him on their wedding night, solely because he was ger and not a woman.

“I did it on purpose. The clothes you wore that day, although tattered and unrecognizable, felt incredibly soft to the touch. They were definitely not the coarse fabric Zhou Jing used to wear. Such material wasn’t even something an ordinary wealthy family could afford. Moreover, that day when you held my hand, your hand was even more delicate than that of a ger. This only further convinced me of your noble background.”

“I was at my wit’s end. If Old Lady Wang found out he was dead, she would never allow me to mourn for him. She would probably sell me off to a wealthy family as a concubine or a servant, which is like a life sentence, I will become a servant—leaving my fate no longer in my own hands. So, I had no choice but to cling to you. I know you come from a noble background. If I save your life today and treat you well, even if you look down on me in the future, you will still owe me your life!”

Zhou Jing asked in a deep voice, “Why are you so certain that the Zhou Jing you speak of is dead?”

“Because I saw it with my own eyes!”

The greatest sorrow was a dead heart. The situation had reached this point, and there was no turning back. Shen Mo decided to spill everything. “That day, after he had humiliated me in front of Old Lady Wang, he went straight to the back mountain. He didn’t return for dinner, so I went to look for him. It had just rained, and the mountain path was muddy, with no one else around, only his footprints were particularly clear. I followed his footprints, I ventured deep into the mountains and suddenly found that they were all over the place, and there were wild boar tracks nearby. At that moment, I heard some rustling in the trees. Fearing it was a wild boar, I climbed up a tree to hide.”

“Just as I settled in, I saw him being chased by a large wild boar. He wasn’t running fast; he must have been seriously injured, his clothes were soaked in blood, and he had one hand pressed against a bloody wound. The boar quickly caught up with him, tossing him far away. He struggled a few times before going still. The wild boar didn’t relent and kept pushing him farther until I could no longer see him. I don’t know how long I crouched in that tree, but when everything went silent, I finally dared to climb down and ran back home in the direction I had come.”

Shen Mo concluded, “With such heavy injuries, he definitely wouldn’t survive.”

Zhou Jing asked, “So your kindness towards me, even being willing to sleep with me, is because he is dead, and you fear being sold by Old Lady Wang? You deliberately set this up, didn’t you?”

“Yes!” Shen Mo replied crisply. At that point, he seemed to believe that denying it would be less effective than simply admitting the truth.

Zhou Jing gritted his teeth in anger. Leaning close to Shen Mo’s ear, he said, “I’ve never lacked for people around me—beautiful women of all shapes and sizes. I can see their ulterior motives at a glance; I’ve spent a lifetime guarding against them. Yet here I am, outsmarted by you, an ancient person, completely toyed with!”

It felt as if, after a lifetime of hunting geese, he had been pecked in the eye by one.

Zhou Jing bit down hard on Shen Mo’s slender neck.

“You can deceive me or pretend to care; it doesn’t matter if you have no feelings for me! But let me tell you this: now that you’ve slept with me, you belong to me! If you dare to trick me, be prepared to keep deceiving me for the rest of your life! You’ll never escape from me!”

“What?” Shen Mo’s eyes widened. Zhou Jing didn’t want to abandon him! Instead, he wanted to keep him by his side.

He was just a ger; nobody liked gers!

They all said gers should not exist in this world, even his own father disliked him and his younger brother.

And he was so wicked, so cruel!

To his husband, who, although they had not yet consummated their marriage, was still his husband in the eyes of the law, he could watch him die without lifting a finger! How could Zhou Jing still want him?

Zhou Jing didn’t give him a chance to dwell on these thoughts; he quickly captured Shen Mo’s lips, and they became entangled in a passionate kiss.

—o—o—o—

Shen Lin had arrived later than usual today because Wang Chunhua had woken up early and mysteriously started looking for trouble with him.

His elder brother had advised him to endure it; otherwise, his already tarnished reputation would worsen. If that happened, he would have to endure a lifetime of Wang Chunhua’s disdain if he can’t be married off.

After finally escaping Wang Chunhua, he arrived at his elder brother’s house, only to find the door firmly shut. The courtyard was quiet as if no one had yet risen.

But it was absolutely impossible; his elder brother was a diligent person and wouldn’t still be asleep at this hour unless something unexpected had happened.

Thinking of this, Shen Lin’s heart suddenly flipped. Could it be that Zhou Jing had gone too far and had beaten his elder brother to the point he couldn’t get out of bed?

The more he thought about it, the more he felt this was likely. Shen Lin was so scared that he hurriedly pushed open the grass door and rushed into the house. As soon as he stepped inside, he heard his brother’s muffled groan.

This Zhou Jing had indeed hurt his brother!

With no time to think, as he poked his head in and took a quick glance at the bed, he was so frightened that Shen Lin felt like a thief and rushed back out.

Shen Lin ran out to the grass door and squatted down, feeling as if his heart might leap out of his throat!

Heavens, his brother… actually with Zhou Jing… engaging in such acts in broad daylight was too… they are shameless!

Shen Lin covered his face, his cheeks burning with embarrassment.

However, hadn’t his brother looked down on Zhou Jing in the past?

He would do everything he could to avoid him. If he couldn’t escape, he would find excuses to work late into the night, waiting until Zhou Jing was deeply asleep before going to bed himself, and then getting up early while Zhou Jing was still sleeping.

Back then, Zhou Jing hadn’t seemed to care much for his brother either; marrying him was simply a way to avoid being burdened with work. With someone around to help with the hard labor!

How had they ended up entangled like this in just one night? Moreover, his brother, who was so aware of shame, had actually…

It was too shameless!