Chapter 9: Do You Like Me?

“Be good. Let me touch it, okay?”

Huo Xianchi had already reined in his earlier ferocity. Now he was crouching beside the sofa like a giant dog begging for affection, his eager eyes fixed on my belly.

Exhausted, I finally gave in and let his large hand rest against it.

Standing nearby, Huo Sui watched the scene and spat in disgust.

“You damn animal. You secretly got a vasectomy ages ago, yet somehow you still managed to get someone pregnant. What a miracle.”

“That’s right. I’m an animal.”

Huo Xianchi wasn’t offended in the slightest. Instead, he gave a smug little snort, got to his feet, and happily headed into the kitchen to warm some milk for me.

Soon, only Huo Sui and I remained in the living room.

Dark circles hung beneath his eyes, and the exhaustion left behind by the family’s endless turmoil was written all over his face. He looked at me and gave a bitter smile.

“Compared to this lunatic, Xianchi’s primary personality is much more obedient and rational. The messy romance rumors in the media have only affected his marriage prospects to some extent. They haven’t really damaged the bigger picture.”

“The Huo family has been quietly searching for top doctors who might be able to cure him for good.”

He sighed, his eyes clouding with fatigue.

“But honestly, I’m grateful that this crazy second personality appeared.”

The Huo family was cold and ruthless. It was like living inside an iron cage.

“My father was an illegitimate child. Our branch may look like a bunch of spoiled playboys who stay out of the power struggles at headquarters, but underneath it all, the rot has already spread to the core.”

“Some people went insane. Others lost their lives.”

“Xianchi is the only legitimate heir of his generation. He never wanted to fight for power, but fate—and the family—forced him into the battle anyway.”

Under the dim light, Huo Sui’s gaze grew distant.

“Actually, when he transferred to that impoverished county to finish high school, it wasn’t arranged by the family at all.”

“He simply wanted to find somewhere quiet…”

“Somewhere he could die in peace, far away from the eyes of the media and the family.”

“Baby, are you hungry? How about a midnight snack?”

Huo Xianchi’s excited voice rang out from the kitchen, cutting through the heavy atmosphere.

He carefully carried over a small plate of pastries and gently coaxed me to eat.

Huo Sui looked at his younger brother, then lowered his voice.

“There’s an anonymous IP address online that’s been quietly pushing Xianchi toward madness. Whoever is behind it has been helping him seize power and fight against the family. They’ve even been deliberately provoking this unstable personality of his, encouraging him to cause trouble for you.”

“The person behind it is incredibly smart. They’ve always managed to stay one step ahead of our security team.”

He looked me straight in the eye.

“Even if we find out who they are, the family will still have ways to force Xianchi back onto the path of becoming the perfect heir.”

“As for you…”

“You should make the right choice for yourself.”

“What are you two whispering about over there?”

Huo Xianchi approached with strawberry cake and a glass of warm milk.

He was barefoot, his sleeves rolled high enough to expose the strong veins along his forearms—and the scars crisscrossing his skin, remnants of the times he had hurt himself in the past.

Most of the time, his primary personality chose silence and restraint.

As the Huo heir, he had always been forced to live by strict rules and rigid expectations. He was never allowed to show his true emotions.

Even when he was desperate enough to end his own life, he could only do it quietly, alone in the dead of night.

Huo Sui stood up and let out a long sigh.

“I’m leaving. Secretary Shen, please take good care of him.”

He paused before adding,

“Xianchi’s primary personality isn’t nearly as naive or easy to manipulate as this one.”

Huo Xianchi let out a careless scoff.

“The ‘real’ Huo Xianchi?”

“He might not even know how to behave or understand people as well as this second personality does.”

He lifted one hand into the air and slowly curled his fingers into a fist, as though he were grabbing hold of something invisible.

Huo Sui frowned.

“What the hell are you doing now?”

Huo Xianchi moved his hand away from his own neck and made a motion as though he were pulling an invisible leash.

Then, with great care, he placed that imaginary “bundle of air” into my palm.

He turned to Huo Sui with a mischievous, almost defiant grin.

“Big brother, see this?”

“It’s a dog leash.”

“As long as she’s willing to hold onto it, everyone in this world will be safe.”

“But if one day she gets tired of it and lets go…”

Huo Xianchi dropped down onto the carpet right beside my feet.

His smile became almost careless, but a dangerous glint flashed through his eyes.

“I’m sick in the head, you know.”

“I’ll run around biting whoever I want. I’ll bite this whole damn world to pieces.”

Huo Sui was so furious he could barely speak.

He muttered a curse under his breath and walked away without another word.

That left only Huo Xianchi and me in the quiet of the night.

We ate pastries together and put on an old movie.

It was the kind of film that demanded a very particular taste. The projector cast a faint, flickering glow over our bodies as we sat close together.

In the silence, the characters’ voices and the narrator’s steady monologue drifted through the room.

“To kill the wolf, you must first become a wolf.”

Huo Xianchi suddenly turned toward me.

His voice was low and hoarse.

“Do you like me?”

“Who are you right now?”

I looked into his eyes and asked softly.

“The second personality.”

I smiled, wrapped my arms around his neck, and whispered into his ear,

“Then I like you.”

Something in his eyes froze for a second.

It was as if two souls were engaged in a fierce struggle inside him.

But the hesitation quickly disappeared, replaced by the twisted, feverish hunger of his second personality—the kind that wanted to swallow everything whole.

“Why?”

“Because the second personality would never hurt himself.”

“He’s selfish and vicious. All he wants is to destroy anyone who tries to hurt him.”

I closed my eyes and gave a bitter smile.

“The primary personality failed because he was too obedient.”

“He’s simply too tired from trying to survive.”

“Okay.”

His voice was deep and quiet.

I couldn’t tell whether he was answering me…

Or speaking to the other soul trapped inside his body.

I ran away.

Again.

This time, Huo Sui secretly helped me.

He waited until Huo Xianchi was completely consumed by the bloody power struggle within the Huo family—so deeply involved that he had no way to spare the time to come after me.

I used the money I had managed to save to rent a small, peaceful house in Yun County.

Summer in the countryside was long.

So long that, during countless sweltering afternoons, I found myself dreaming about the years when we were young.

In those dreams, Huo Xianchi was thin and patient, carrying me on his back through the narrow, impoverished streets.

“Shen Tangyuan, what kind of creature are you? Do you seriously have to be carried before you’ll go to sleep?”

“Mm…”

“Next time, don’t go running off on your own. You scared me half to death.”

I murmured softly in my sleep.

Back then, the world had always seemed vast and unbearably cold to me.

No matter where I went or whether I lived or died, no one would have cared.

But now, there was someone who worried about me, scolded me, and would go insane searching for me no matter how far I ran—to the ends of the earth, if necessary.

I buried my head against his solid shoulder.

“Want to come home with me and have some tangyuan?”

He swallowed hard, as if his throat had already tightened in dread at the thought of my disastrous cooking.

“Could we… maybe not eat them?”

“Why not?”

“The tangyuan in your freezer have probably been there forever. I swear they’re about to turn into some kind of ancient fossil straight out of The Classic of Mountains and Seas.”

“But that’s the only thing I know how to cook.”

His body stiffened for a moment.

Then he sighed in surrender.

“All right. Fine. We’ll eat them.”

He muttered with exaggerated annoyance,

“Your parents don’t even bother taking care of you. They’re always yelling at you or hitting you.”

“If I’m not around, there’s no one in this world who’d be willing to eat those awful tangyuan you make.”

“You’d better be grateful to me.”

“Thank you.”

“Thank who?”

“Thank you, Brother Xianchi.”

“Mm. Good girl.”

When I woke from the dream, I stared blankly at the ceiling.

The truth was, even when I was lying on his back, I could barely sleep.

It was just that my mind felt a little more at peace.

A psychologist had once told me that what I experienced was called hyperactive brain syndrome.

Sometimes, an exceptionally high IQ came with a cruel side effect.

My senses were constantly overwhelmed. My thoughts raced at high speed and intensity, making it nearly impossible for my body to fall asleep.

After years of accumulating stress and disorder, I lived in a constant state of exhaustion and agitation, unable to quiet my mind.

Only when I was beside Huo Xianchi would the ten thousand annoying flies buzzing inside my head finally fall silent.

Just looking into his eyes, holding him, feeling his skin against mine—those things were enough to make my body automatically release large amounts of oxytocin and endorphins.

Those chemicals dulled pain and created a profound sense of happiness and safety.

Romantic literature would call it falling in love.

But from the scientific perspective of someone as rational as me, it was nothing more than a drug.

A powerful medication for the illness inside my mind.

Back in Yun County, I began frantically searching for some kind of new drug to replace him.

The enormous fortune I possessed was more than enough to make people forget about the child growing inside me.

One man after another approached me, each swearing the same thing:

“I’ll treat the child like my own.”

But I didn’t need those empty promises.

All I needed was someone who could make my out-of-control mind stop for a little while.

No one could.

The men who approached me only made me more irritated and disgusted.

And once again, I fell into endless nights of insomnia.

One by one, I coldly drove every last one of them out of my life.

Then, the moment I opened the door and stepped into the yard, I froze.

Under the shade of a tree stood a figure I knew all too well.

My best friend, Qu Qu, had called me just yesterday to gossip.

“Shen Tangyuan, Huo Xianchi really has complete control of the Huo family now!”

“It’s the biggest piece of gossip in high society!”

“I heard his father died suddenly in a car accident.”

“Serves that tyrant right. The old bastard was planning to have him locked up and beaten half to death back then…”