Chapter 38
Ye Xiyao moved out of Xing Xu’s large office.
This happened just yesterday, the afternoon after everyone returned from visiting Wen Jisheng at the hospital.
As the department leader, Xing Xu, and the new employee, Ye Xiyao, who had only been with the company for a month, both skipped work for almost an entire day without asking for leave, only to suddenly show up when everyone else was getting ready to clock out.
No one knew exactly what had happened between them.
All they saw was Ye Xiyao rushing into the office, and just as Xing Xu was about to enter, Ye Xiyao slammed the door shut.
Xing Xu almost bumped his nose, awkwardly rubbing his forehead before politely knocking on the door.
Everyone who witnessed this was shocked—first of all, the usually mild-mannered Ye Xiyao had shut Xing Xu out. Secondly, the notoriously bad-tempered Xing Xu didn’t kick the door down in response.
Before anyone could make sense of it, Ye Xiyao opened the door again a moment later, apologetically saying to Xing Xu, “Sorry, manager Xing, I forgot you were behind me. Did you want to come in too?”
Xing Xu: “Hmm.”
Ye Xiyao: “Sharing a desk with you has been a bit inconvenient, so starting tomorrow, I’ll return the office to you.”
And with that, Ye Xiyao moved out.
Everyone kept quiet, afraid of getting involved, and silently watched as Ye Xiyao packed up his things and walked out of the office.
Most assumed that the two of them had a disagreement. After all, spending every day in the same office, it’s normal for some friction to arise, whether at work or in life.
But Qiao Linchuan had a deeper understanding of the situation than the others.
He still remembered Ye Xiyao’s shocking comment from a couple of days ago: “He bit my lip.”
This was practically an open admission of a not-so-ordinary relationship between Ye Xiyao and Xing Xu!
So Qiao Linchuan was certain that this wasn’t just a simple argument between coworkers, but rather a lovers’ quarrel.
Lu Kou whispered from the side, “If they’re having a conflict, what if manager Xing gives Xiao Bao a hard time? Should we try to mediate?”
Qiao Linchuan confidently replied, “No need to mediate. Manager Xing wouldn’t bully him.”
Xu Xingyang was confused: “Didn’t you used to hate Xing Xu the most? You always said he’s quick to resort to violence and compared him to a ticking time bomb. You even advised Xiao Bao to stay away from him. Why are you so at ease now?”
Qiao Linchuan chuckled slyly, “Heh, times have changed.”
Lu Kou: “?”
Xu Xingyang: “?”
Qin Zai, who had been silent, suddenly smiled and said, “Oh, I see.”
Lu Kou glanced between them, picking up on their knowing looks, and laughed. “Oh! So that’s it.”
Only Xu Xingyang was left stomping in frustration. “What? What do you mean ‘that’s it’? What exactly is ‘it’? Are you all speaking in code and leaving me out?”
Meanwhile, Ye Xiyao had finished moving all his things out of the office.
Xing Xu, like a ghost, hovered beside him. “Why do you have to move out? My office is so big.”
“I’m afraid I’ll interfere with your work,” Ye Xiyao replied, walking towards the break room with his cup.
Xing Xu: “Be honest.”
Without looking up, Ye Xiyao said, “The truth is, I just don’t want to share an office with an exorcist.”
They both walked into the break room, and Xing Xu was a step ahead. When Ye Xiyao tried to close the door behind him, Xing Xu managed to slip in, pressing his back against the door to keep it open.
Ye Xiyao pursed his lips without saying a word and quietly filled his cup with water.
Xing Xu: “I swear, from the moment I decided to be honest with you, the mission was over. I would never harm you.”
As Ye Xiyao tried to steep a tea bag in the water, it refused to sink, and in his frustration, he poked it with his finger, only to burn himself. He hissed in pain.
Xing Xu reacted quickly, grabbing his hand to inspect it. Fortunately, it wasn’t seriously hurt, but there was a faint red mark on his fingertip.
“Are you going to leave?” Ye Xiyao didn’t pull his hand away, just looked at him.
Xing Xu: “Where would I go?”
Ye Xiyao asked, “Since the mission is over, why haven’t you left?”
He paused, as if answering his own question, and said, “Oh, is it that you still don’t trust me, so you need to keep monitoring me for a while longer? That would be understandable.”
Before Xing Xu could respond, Ye Xiyao, holding his cup, tried to walk around him to leave.
His emotions were complicated right now. He wasn’t angry because he wasn’t truly upset, but rather because he couldn’t find a clear reason to be.
Was he angry at Xing Xu for approaching him with an agenda? But that was something to be blamed on the Security Bureau, maybe even the entire Alliance, because the mission had been authorized by the government.
Could he be angry at Xing Xu for being an exorcist? But Xing Xu had said he’d been an exorcist for a long time—it wasn’t by choice, and it wasn’t something he became just to kill him.
So, what was he supposed to be angry about?
Maybe it was that Xing Xu hadn’t approached him to be a friend from the start.
Or that all the happy coincidences and fated moments that Ye Xiyao had cherished were actually fake.
Every time he looked at Xing Xu, his chest felt tight, so he didn’t want to see him.
Just as he was about to open the door, Xing Xu reached out a hand and stopped him. Ye Xiyao lowered his eyes and stayed silent.
He guessed that Xing Xu was going to apologize again.
Since yesterday, Xing Xu had tried every possible way to apologize, but Ye Xiyao had already said he understood and forgave him.
But emotions weren’t something that could be controlled.
He didn’t want to hear any more kind words because no matter how reasonable the explanation or how sincere the remorse, they couldn’t repair a bubble that had already been burst.
“I haven’t told you something else.” Xing Xu, surprisingly, didn’t start with another apology.
Ye Xiyao instinctively asked, “What is it?”
Was there still another task from the Security Bureau? Or could it be that even Xing Xu’s current behavior was fake? Was this all just a trick?
Preparing for the worst, Ye Xiyao gathered his courage and listened to Xing Xu.
Xing Xu said, “Actually, there’s a camera inside that leaf-patterned roly-poly toy.”
The air seemed to freeze.
Ye Xiyao’s eyes widened in disbelief as he stared at him. His hand shook, and the cup of hot water he was holding almost fell, but Xing Xu quickly caught it.
“I’ve been watching you every night.” As Xing Xu spoke, he stepped closer, almost pinning Ye Xiyao against the door. In a low voice, he added, “I watched you chat with your toys, heard you talk about the happy and disappointing moments of your day. Sometimes, when you poked the head of the roly-poly toy and your finger brushed the camera, I felt like you were talking directly to me.”
“You… You’ve gone too far!” The anger that Ye Xiyao had been suppressing suddenly surged up. Embarrassed and furious, he kicked Xing Xu, “Even if I was just your mission target, I still have my
privacy! I’ve never harmed anyone or done anything wrong, so what right do you have to monitor me like this?”
Xing Xu didn’t seem to feel any pain from the kick and didn’t back off. Instead, he continued to move closer. “It wasn’t ‘we’—it was just me. Only I could see what you were like at home. I watched you in your thin pajamas, wearing those little white shorts, rolling around on the bed with that silly, clumsy dinosaur plushie.”
Ye Xiyao’s eyes reddened. “You’re despicable!”
“Yes, I’m despicable.” Xing Xu could tell that he was angry but didn’t stop. He went on, “I wasn’t really monitoring you. I knew long ago that you weren’t a threat, that you were a well-behaved little demon. But I still kept watching you. At first, I just thought you were cute at home. But the more I watched, the more I got addicted. I wanted to throw away all your plushies so that from now on, you’d only hold me. Isn’t it strange? I’m an exorcist, yet I never wanted to kill you. From the very beginning, I didn’t want to.”
Finally, Ye Xiyao’s anger found its target. He started kicking and hitting Xing Xu, unleashing his frustration. Eventually, without realizing it, he began to release his demonic energy, and each blow that landed on Xing Xu grew heavier.
But Xing Xu’s pace didn’t slow, and his voice carried a barely perceptible smile. “That camera was terrible—its colors were all washed out. But even so, you still looked beautiful on the screen. Your skin so fair, your face so small, and your eyes curved when you smiled.”
“Stop talking!” Ye Xiyao tried to cover Xing Xu’s mouth. “You’re just… too awful.”
Xing Xu playfully kissed his palm and said, “If I’m so awful, don’t you have more insults for me?”
Ye Xiyao gritted his teeth and shouted, “You scumbag!”
Xing Xu shook his head and corrected him, “That’s not harsh enough. You can call me a bastard, a beast, a jerk.”
Ye Xiyao immediately picked up on the suggestion and yelled, “Bastard! Bastard! Bastard!”
He shouted until his face flushed red, nearly out of breath.
The long-delayed fury wasn’t just for the camera but also for all the secrets that Xing Xu had kept from him for so long.
In the small break room, Ye Xiyao’s demonic energy filled the air.
At the same time, the tense expression on Xing Xu’s face finally relaxed as Ye Xiyao continued to hit and scold him.
As long as he was willing to get angry, that was good. What Xing Xu feared most was if Ye Xiyao ignored him completely.
As long as Ye Xiyao was willing to vent his emotions on him, there would come a day when his anger would dissipate.
“…I thought that rabbit was the first gift I ever received, but it was actually just part of your mission.” Ye Xiyao, filled with resentment, bit down on the back of Xing Xu’s hand until it drew blood before releasing him.
“Good job, little one. You bite really hard.” Xing Xu hissed in pain before adding, “But giving you that rabbit wasn’t part of the plan.”
Ye Xiyao, half-believing, half-doubting, asked, “Then why did you give it to me?”
Xing Xu smiled bitterly and said, “When we were eating, you looked at that claw machine at least six times. Every time someone went to play, you’d sneak a glance. You really thought I didn’t notice?”
Ye Xiyao: “…Oh.”
Fine.
He really thought he’d been pretty discreet.
The next moment, Ye Xiyao thought of something else and continued to bite the back of Xing Xu’s other hand. “Our ‘coincidental’ encounters before and after work were all part of your plan, weren’t they? All that talk about fate was just fake.”
“That’s true,” Xing Xu said, letting him bite. “I left home an hour early every day to wait for you by the subway entrance. I even got two parking tickets for it. After work, I’d drop you off before driving home myself. The longest traffic jam I sat in was two hours. It was such a hassle. I’m never doing that again.”
Ye Xiyao: “…”
Xing Xu: “So, I’ve decided to move in with you.”
Ye Xiyao: “?”
Ye Xiyao immediately slapped him on the forehead. “Who agreed to that?”
Xing Xu shrugged. “No one agreed, but I’m going to do it anyway. We scoundrels don’t play by the rules.”
Ye Xiyao was so frustrated he couldn’t speak. He snatched the half-spilled teacup from Xing Xu and stormed out, fuming.
This time, Xing Xu didn’t stop him.
After leaving, Ye Xiyao suddenly glanced back. Xing Xu was still standing there, smiling at him.
Ye Xiyao averted his gaze, thinking that Xing Xu probably knew there was no point in chasing after him anymore, so he had wisely let him go.
Once Ye Xiyao was far away, Xing Xu’s smile faded. He closed the break room door with a blank expression.
The next moment, he spat a mouthful of black blood into the sink.
After a long pause, he clutched the spots where Ye Xiyao had hit him and slowly sat down on the nearby couch, gasping for air.
Ye Xiyao’s demonic energy was no joke. Even though he had held back somewhat, it still did significant damage to Xing Xu.
Provoking Ye Xiyao was like risking his life.
Xing Xu silently admitted to himself that he’d learned a lesson.
—
In the afternoon, Ye Xiyao noticed something odd about Xing Xu.
He wasn’t pestering him anymore—no more sweet-talking, pleading, apologizing, or chasing after him to get him to move back to the office.
At one point, Xing Xu received a delivery, which looked like a same-day purchase, but Ye Xiyao didn’t know what it was. After getting the package, Xing Xu closed the office door and didn’t come out again.
At first, Ye Xiyao thought Xing Xu was reporting something related to him to the Security Bureau, which was why he shut the door.
Thinking of this made Ye Xiyao nervous because he didn’t know what stance the human government would take regarding his special existence. What if they still didn’t trust him? What if they wanted to detain him for interrogation?
Though it didn’t make much sense, Ye Xiyao somehow believed that Xing Xu would stand on his side. So he kept waiting for Xing Xu to give him an answer.
But…
From 3 PM to 6 PM, Xing Xu didn’t come out of the office once.
Even if he was reporting to the Security Bureau, wasn’t that too long?
Was explaining that “Ye Xiyao is a succubus” really that complicated?
Ye Xiyao grew increasingly curious, pacing outside the office several times.
Then again, maybe it was just his imagination.
After all, a lot had happened between them in the past couple of days, so it wasn’t surprising that Ye Xiyao might overthink things.
Maybe Xing Xu was just sleeping inside.
But later on, even Qiao Linchuan started to think something was off with Xing Xu.
Right before the end of the workday, Qiao Linchuan pulled Ye Xiyao aside and hid with him in a blind spot near Xing Xu’s office.
Ye Xiyao asked him, “Brother Qiao, what are we doing?”
Qiao Linchuan replied, “We’re waiting for Xing Xu to come out. Once he does, we’ll go in and see what he’s up to.”
Ye Xiyao actually wanted to do that too but felt it was impolite. “It doesn’t seem right to barge in without telling him, does it?”
Qiao Linchuan leaned in, lowered his voice, and whispered into Ye Xiyao’s ear, “Little one, I’m giving you a heads-up, so keep your cool. I suspect…”
Ye Xiyao asked, “Huh?”
Qiao Linchuan said, “I think he’s in there… watching some videos.”
Ye Xiyao: “Videos?”
Ye Xiyao didn’t quite catch on to what kind of “videos” Qiao Linchuan meant. Thinking that he didn’t believe him, Qiao Linchuan explained, “I helped sign for the delivery earlier when the runner came, and I accidentally glanced at the package. It had some titles like ‘Imprisonment,’ ‘Abuse,’ and ‘NTR’—basically a bunch of inappropriate stuff!”
“…What is that?” Ye Xiyao genuinely didn’t understand, but from Xing Xu’s perspective, he thought about it for a moment and said, “If it’s ‘inappropriate,’ then we really shouldn’t be looking.”
Qiao Linchuan said, “I don’t need to look, but you have to! What if he tries something on you that he saw in those videos? The guy’s up to no good.”
A few minutes later, Xing Xu really did come out, closing his office door behind him and heading toward the meeting room.
Ye Xiyao was about to comment on the timing when Qiao Linchuan grinned and said, “I had Lu Kou and the others keep him busy with a work report! Let’s go!”
Ye Xiyao was dragged into the office.
To be honest, Ye Xiyao really didn’t want to do something so impolite. Even though he was curious about what Xing Xu was doing alone in his office, he wasn’t comfortable with invading someone else’s privacy.
But when he remembered how Xing Xu had secretly watched him so many times through the wobbling toy’s camera, a bit of courage welled up inside him.
This could be considered…
Payback! Hmph!
So, with Qiao Linchuan’s encouragement and a little self-persuasion, Ye Xiyao quickly ran over to the desk and glanced at the computer.
“It’s not even on,” Ye Xiyao said, feeling a bit confused.
The next moment, he caught a glimpse of an open comic book on the desk out of the corner of his eye.
The content flashed before him, and he thought he had seen wrong. Carefully, he pinched the pages and closed the book.
On the cover, written in outrageously bold, neon pink letters, were the words:
[Innocent Succubus Scorching Hot / 21+ / Imprisonment Edition”]
