Chapter 7: Eat

“I didn’t think about it. It wasn’t me looking.” 

Ying An’s voice of rebuttal was weak and powerless.

Li Jue opened the drawer beside her, took out a document from it, and flipped it open in front of Ying An. 

“Does Xiao An know what this is?”

“It’s…” 

He glanced at the writing on the document. 

“It’s my physical examination report?”

“Correct. It says on it that Xiao An’s body is very healthy. Not a single problem. Your strength might even be greater than mine.” 

Li Jue gently pinched Ying An’s waist, neither light nor heavy, without any pain, only a strange ambiguous sensation.

She leaned close to Ying An’s ear and breathed orchid-scented air. 

“Xiao An, have you ever fantasized about doing bad things?”

“No. I haven’t thought…”

“Really?”

Li Jue exhaled slightly hot breath by his ear, making the base of his ear itchy. 

“Then how do you explain this browsing history? Hasn’t Xiao An hoped for the scenes in the comics, hasn’t he thought about doing all kinds of naughty things? Your face… seems to be getting hotter and hotter.”

“I haven’t. It wasn’t me looking… I didn’t think about anything…”

“Then why is your face so red? Besides Xiao An, who else could use the computer at home? Sister can’t think of any other possibility.”

The boy in her arms gave no response.

He remained silent for a long while.

Li Jue called him in confusion. 

“Xiao An?”

“It wasn’t me… it wasn’t me.” 

Ying An repeated softly twice, his voice carrying a faint crying tone, sounding especially wronged. 

“I only played games. It wasn’t me. I didn’t think of doing anything bad to Sister. Why do you have to say it’s me…”

This made Li Jue a little panicked.

She had not expected to wrong Ying An to the point of tears.

In her memory she had rarely seen Ying An cry.

The little one had always been very strong.

How had he almost cried just because of her distrust?

Did her trust and support hold such a heavy place in his heart…

“Don’t cry. It’s okay, it’s okay. Sister knows it wasn’t you.”

Li Jue set Ying An down from her lap, half-knelt, and wiped the teardrops from the corners of his eyes for him.

The boy lowered his head and kept sobbing, speaking in broken fragments, his appearance especially heartbreaking. 

“Then why did you… why did you say it was me? I clearly didn’t do this kind of thing… why don’t you believe me…”

“Don’t cry, don’t cry. Sister believes you now.” 

Li Jue carefully wrapped her arms around Ying An and lightly patted his back.

Looking at the little one’s crying appearance, she could not help but feel self-reproach.

He already had a pair of proper and good-looking features, a well-behaved and cute face.

On top of that, these past few years she had raised him fair and tender, even with a few traces of feminine softness, extremely endearing.

Even when he cried, he was especially pitiful.

“Then why did you say it was me?”

“Just joking with you. Actually Sister did it herself. I wanted to tease Xiao An a little. I’m sorry. Sister was wrong.”

Knowing the truth, Ying An immediately struggled free from Li Jue’s arms, wiped his tears with his sleeve, then tightly stared at her with those eyes that had turned red from crying. 

“Why would you do this… how could Sister do something like this…”

“Xiao An, I…”

Before Li Jue could finish speaking, Ying An ran straight out.

Fortunately he did not run out of the house, only fled into his own room and then locked the door from the inside.

She thought of apologizing to him again from outside, but the words that had just left her mouth stopped short.

Forget it.

Better to wait for him to calm down a while and slowly let the anger fade.

……

Ying An truly did not leave his room the entire afternoon.

Li Jue moved a chair and sat on the balcony.

From there she could just see the window of Ying An’s room.

He lay on the desk in self-isolation for a long time.

At least he had stopped crying and eased up a little.

Then he stood at the doorway of the room and began to hesitate, but in the end still did not open the door to go out.

When he turned his head, he happened to discover Li Jue secretly watching him from the balcony.

She smiled and waved at the boy.

Ying An, however, angrily pulled the curtains shut.

Only when the sun began to set did Li Jue finish cooking and knock on the door of Ying An’s room. 

“Xiao An, come out to eat. Sister made your favorite cola chicken wings and braised spare ribs.”

No response.

“If you don’t come out, Sister is going to finish them all.”

Still no response.

Li Jue sighed, pressed the door handle, and injected a thread of demon power into it.

The lock immediately opened.

She walked into the room and only then discovered that Ying An was already lying on the bed asleep.

She walked to the bedside and shook Ying An awake.

The boy opened his eyes, looked at her, then stubbornly turned his head away.

Li Jue smiled bitterly in helplessness. 

“Still angry at Sister? Sister made so many dishes you like. Eat them and then forgive Sister, okay?”

“I’m not eating.”

“If Xiao An doesn’t eat, Sister will finish everything by herself.”

“Then you eat. I’m not eating anyway.”

Li Jue sighed, used her tail to wrap around Ying An’s waist and lift him up.

Ignoring his vigorous struggles, she placed him on the chair at the dining table.

Looking at the tempting aroma of the food on the table, Ying An first froze for a second, then turned his head away again, looking as if he would rather die than submit.

“Really not eating? Then just watch Sister finish it all.”

She even helped serve rice for Ying An.

Seeing the boy still refuse to pick up his chopsticks, Li Jue began eating by herself, deliberately making it look extremely delicious.

Sure enough, after a short while she heard the growling of Ying An’s stomach.

“Has Xiao An decided how long he wants to hold a grudge against Sister? Although Sister was the one who teased you, you also secretly played on the computer and lied.” 

Li Jue spoke while eating. 

“Besides, you’re going to eat this meal sooner or later. Eating earlier means you’ll go hungry for less time.”

“Why do I definitely have to eat?”

“Because you’ve never truly gone hungry. In the late years of the Western Jin, the Northern Song, and the Ming Dynasty, there were scenes of people starving to the point of eating their own kind. Some people were sold as food. Some people exchanged children to eat. Hunger… also means despair.”

These were also scenes Li Jue had witnessed with her own eyes.

In those years when the people could not make a living, humanity was completely lost in the face of survival.

Hunger had eroded all benevolence, righteousness, propriety, and wisdom.

The human world was like a blazing hell.

Just like that line… That year there was drought in Jiangnan, and in Quzhou people ate people.

Ying An did not know whether he had been frightened by her words.

He quickly could not hold on and picked up his chopsticks.

Li Jue smiled and picked a piece of spare rib for him. 

“I’ll take this as you forgiving Sister. Sister won’t pursue the matter of secretly playing on the computer either.”

He was still immersed in Li Jue’s words and timidly asked, “Do demons eat people?”

“Of course they do. And the influence of pathogens on demons is very limited. Eating people has almost no physical harm for demons.”

“Then has Sister ever eaten people?”

“That I haven’t. Even in the past when there were famines, Sister still had quite a few ways to fill her stomach. Besides, human flesh doesn’t taste good at all.”

Hearing Li Jue’s words, Ying An felt inexplicably a little more at ease in his heart. 

“Then what you said before about eating me when I grow up was fake, right?”

“This is real. Xiao An’s skin is so fine and tender, so fair and clean. Just looking at you makes you seem delicious. Sister has been craving you for a long time.” 

Li Jue’s smile carried a few traces of chilling coldness.