After finishing dinner, the four split the cost of tonight's meal, and Xie Bei took Lu Yinghan back to the small mud house.
“Yingying, you're amazing! Tonight's dinner was so delicious!”
“As long as you enjoyed it.”
After returning to the mud house, the two brought in hot water in wooden tubs and took a nice, comfortable bath.
Then, the two lay down on the single bed.
Instantly, Lu Yinghan was no longer sleepy...
She stood fidgeting by the edge of the bed, rubbing her hands together, feeling completely lost.
“What's wrong? You can go to sleep now. It's already past nine.”
Xie Bei wiped his face with a towel, walked over to the bed, and looked quizzically at Lu Yinghan, who still hadn't gotten in.
“Mm, okay.”
Lu Yinghan pursed her lips, held her breath, and climbed up.
Seeing her get in, Xie Bei climbed onto the bed as well and lay down beside her.
The day's itinerary had left everyone exhausted. The moment Lu Yinghan lay down, the heaviness of her eyelids left her no time to dwell on the embarrassment of sleeping beside Xie Bei.
She adjusted herself into a comfortable sleeping position, and her breathing soon grew steady.
Xie Bei, on the other hand, couldn't quite fall asleep, even though he was very tired.
It was his first time experiencing an environment like this, and physical fatigue didn't bring immediate sleep to his eyes.
The crew had also gone to their designated resting spots, and the cameras inside the house had switched to standby mode, waiting to resume work early the next morning.
By the moonlight filtering in from outside, he turned to face Lu Yinghan and carefully studied her small face.
Unable to resist, he reached out a finger to poke her cheek, closed the distance between them, and finally closed his eyes, drifting off into a deep sleep.
While Lu Yinghan was sound asleep, news about her was exploding across the internet, shooting up the trending topics.
‘The Eldest Young Miss of the Lu Family Can Cook’
‘This Is a Seven-Year-Old's Social Conduct and Emotional Intelligence’
‘What Could You Do When You Were Seven?’
‘The Lu Family's Miss, Lu Yinghan’
Various live stream clips of Lu Yinghan spread like wildfire across the web.
The news that Lu Yinghan was the young miss of the Lu family quickly spread through the elite school.
When the children in her class went home that evening, their parents pulled out their phones to show them, telling them to make sure they knew what the Lu family's young miss looked like.
When the kids saw that familiar face, their expressions turned pale with shock.
Their eyes widened in disbelief as they stared at Lu Yinghan on their screens.
As if by tacit agreement, not a single one told their parents that Lu Yinghan was their classmate.
Zhu Xiyue's little face was pale, and her limbs felt cold. Her mother had suddenly shown her this live stream.
Her mother said the Lu family's young miss was in it, so she had paid close attention—until Lu Yinghan's face came into view.
Fear instantly seized Zhu Xiyue.
Lu Yinghan hadn't been coming to school recently. Everyone in class had been saying she was being targeted and bullied so badly she couldn't attend school.
Who could have guessed she had been preparing to join a variety show...
Would she remember the times Zhu Xiyue had bullied her in class?
She didn't dare tell her family; otherwise, they would definitely scold her.
This was one of the reasons why nobody in class dared to tell the truth.
In contrast to the unease of her classmates...
The group chat of the curly-haired girl's little clique was buzzing all night long.
“What do we do?! How can she be the Lu family's young miss?”
“Maybe it's just a joke? Could the production crew have said that just for clout?”
“What are you thinking? Would the Lu family allow an outsider to pose as their child? This variety show has been promoting this for ages, saying a daughter of the Lu family would be on it. If they had an issue with it, they would've forced the show off the air long ago.”
“Then what do we do?! We beat her up so badly!”
The curly-haired girl sat on the edge of her bed, her heart pounding relentlessly in her chest.
She nervously bit her fingernails.
Her leg bounced rapidly like a motor.
She had observed Lu Yinghan for so long—how had she suddenly turned out to be the Lu family's young miss?
Then after she went home, were all the injuries on her body discovered?
There were no signs of trouble at home yet.
Her father's job was still running smoothly.
The doubts in the curly-haired girl's mind grew rapidly.
It had been so long, yet there was still no retaliation against her family?
Had Lu Yinghan kept it hidden?
She stared at her phone screen, watching the video from that morning's live stream, her brow furrowing deeper and deeper.
She exited the video and opened the WeChat group.
“Don't any of you speak a word of this. So many days have passed without anything happening, which means she hasn't told anyone yet. If someone exposes us, we'll immediately use the video we recorded earlier and leak the clip of her holding the knife.”
It had to be said that once the curly-haired girl calmed down, her logic was surprisingly sound.
The girls in the group relaxed slightly as well.
The video was their trump card.
“Alright, let's leave it at that. No more talking about this.”
After the curly-haired girl sent that message, no one else in the group said another word.
They all discussed it in private instead.
A few of the followers were cautious enough to take screenshots of the group chat.
That night, not a single person in that group slept peacefully...
Jiang Yibai stared at the video, unable to fall asleep for a long time.
Learning that Lu Yinghan was the young miss of the Lu family brought immense pressure upon Jiang Yibai, like a heavy boulder weighing on his heart.
He had always thought Lu Yinghan was a child from an ordinary family...
Who would have expected such a twist?
Even if he grew much stronger...
Could he truly protect her properly?
For once, Jiang Yibai suffered a sleepless night...
Meanwhile, at the Xie house, Xie Chengsheng raised an eyebrow.
He scrolled through the videos one by one.
He watched her maxed-out cooking skills and how she handled things.
A peculiar feeling arose in his heart.
He reflected on the young ladies he knew from other families.
Not a single one was like Lu Yinghan...
Setting his homework aside, his finger repeatedly tapped replay on one particular video.
It was the clip of Lu Yinghan being picked up by his cousin Xie Bei, quietly wrapping her arms around his neck...
Xie Chengsheng knitted his brows.
Watching Lu Yinghan rely on Xie Bei, Xie Chengsheng felt a faint wave of irritation in his chest...
It was three or four o'clock early the next morning.
The cameras in each room began operating.
On the bed in the small mud house, Xie Bei held Lu Yinghan in his arms as the two huddled together for warmth.
Around midnight, drafty spots had indeed let cold air in.
On an early autumn night, a single quilt was far from enough to keep warm.
Half-awake and half-asleep, Lu Yinghan curled herself into a ball.
Her body trembled slightly.
After a moment, a source of heat enveloped her.
Feeling the warmth, Lu Yinghan immediately snuggled closer and fell into a peaceful sleep.
In the middle of the night, Xie Bei felt a little bundle squirm into his arms.
Startled, he woke up immediately to see what it was.
Seeing Lu Yinghan with all four limbs curled up tight from the cold, he didn't hesitate to grab his coat, lay it over the quilt, and carefully wrap his arms around her.
Only after feeling her stop shivering and watching her body temperature slowly recover did Xie Bei rest easy and go back to sleep.
Rate on N.U.
