The “Noodle Emperor” couldn’t handle anyone, but Yin Wuzhi clearly didn’t dare to provoke him.
With a mix of longing and caution, he said softly, “Let me kiss you, Your Majesty, let me kiss you.”
Jiang Wu didn’t want to refuse.
He enjoyed being kissed by Yin Wuzhi—not in a way that he desperately needed it, nor did he feel uncomfortable without it—but if Yin Wuzhi was willing to kiss him, rejecting it felt like missing something important.
“Yes.” As soon as he agreed, gentle kisses began raining down on him like a sudden downpour.
It was only a kiss, nothing more.
Yin Wuzhi’s fingers intertwined with Jiang Wu’s hair as he kissed him, earnestly and devotedly, with teardrops falling on Jiang Wu’s face like raindrops.
Jiang Wu opened his arms to hold him, and Yin Wuzhi buried his face in Jiang Wu’s shoulder, only calming down after a while.
Jiang Wu recalled a conversation with Qi Hanmiao.
He had asked Qi why Yin Wuzhi wasn’t in the palace, and he had hesitated, clearly struggling to answer.
So Jiang Wu coaxed him, “Qi Hanmiao, Qi Hanmiao, Qi Hanmiao.”
Perhaps he couldn’t resist his persistence or felt sympathy for Yin Wuzhi, but eventually, he spilled everything.
Yin Wuzhi had been expelled from the palace by the Great Empress Dowager.
On the day Jiang Wu lost consciousness, Yin Wuzhi, disregarding everything, insisted on dragging Zhao’s people down with him. His wild declarations that Jiang Wu’s death meant they’d accompany him to the grave shocked the Great Empress Dowager and others deeply.
Qi Hanmiao told Jiang Wu, “We all knew the Shizi was likely affected by the trauma. So, the Great Empress Dowager forbade him from approaching His Majesty, and King Dingnan confined him to the mansion.”
“Yin Wuzhi, are you feeling deeply wronged?” Jiang Wu gently stroked his head. “What are you thinking? Could you share it with me?”
“Although I may not be your emperor…”
“You are.” Yin Wuzhi held him tightly. “You are.”
Yin Wuzhi knew he had terrified the Great Empress Dowager, Empress Dowager Wen, and even his own parents, who locked him in the Dingnan mansion.
He understood that he must appear desperate.
When he saw Yao Ji’s blood staining the ground, memories overwhelmed him instantly. For a long time, he was unable to discern which lifetime he was in—whether he was the Yin Wuzhi who had already lost Jiang Wu and ascended alone, seeking immortality, or the Yin Wuzhi who had lost all memory, with his love standing so close, yet he couldn’t bridge the distance.
So, despite his longing for Jiang Wu, he allowed himself to be confined, refraining from seeking him out.
He needed time to sort himself out, to become once again the version of Yin Wuzhi that Jiang Wu had cherished.
Lost in his room, his parents’ worried faces would appear before him, sometimes blending with other, older faces. Reality seemed to dissolve into mirages. He feared sleeping, as waking would jolt him into panic, prompting him to ask his parents what year and month it was.
Before Jiang Wu awoke, the Great Empress Dowager had sent someone to see him. Seeing his state, she gently refused his request to enter the palace and see Jiang Wu.
But he adjusted quickly; within two weeks, he had realigned himself.
He couldn’t identify what seemed off about his behavior, but those around him sensed an unnaturalness, to the point that King Dingnan worried he was possessed and sought an exorcist.
He kept evaluating himself, hoping to appear a little more “normal.”
But he was aware that, like Qiu Wuchen, no matter his actions, he would be seen as a madman.
Other people’s judgments, however, held little importance for him.
If Jiang Wu were gone, nothing else would matter.
But Jiang Wu was still alive, and he might wake up at any moment, so Yin Wuzhi wanted to seem just a bit more “normal,” less difficult to accept.
He avoided eating Jiang Wu’s leftovers as he had in the past, fearing it looked too clingy. He worried that opening his heart would reveal his secrets, so he tried to keep conversations minimal.
But he couldn’t resist his instinct to be close to Jiang Wu.
He longed for him so deeply that physical closeness was the only way he felt he truly possessed him.
Even just holding him like this, he feared Jiang Wu would vanish at any moment.
Jiang Wu didn’t correct him. Instead, he said, “The Great Empress Dowager didn’t want you near me because she thought you didn’t care if I lived or died. Yin Wuzhi, can you tell me what’s on your mind?”
It wasn’t that he didn’t care about Jiang Wu’s life.
If he could, he would want Jiang Wu alive, always by his side.
“You said you wanted to die,” Yin Wuzhi replied. “You said you were a wandering soul, that you didn’t want to be alive.”
It was for the Pessimist’s sake, not the original body’s.
Jiang Wu smiled a little. “Aren’t you afraid that if I die, you’ll never see me again?”
“It doesn’t matter…it doesn’t matter.” Yin Wuzhi’s voice was soft. “I’m used to it. Anyway, I’ll find you again. If I found you once, I’ll find you a second time, a third time…it doesn’t matter; I’ll always find you.”
“This world doesn’t deserve you. It doesn’t deserve you, so you’re free to dislike it, and you can dislike the version of me that exists here…I’ll find a cleaner world someday, and I’ll take you there.”
It wasn’t that he didn’t care if Jiang Wu lived; it was that he respected Jiang Wu’s desire to escape a world he despised.
He was accustomed to seeing no future, holding onto the faintest hope in a seemingly endless cycle of searching.
It wasn’t indifference; he was simply always prepared to lose him.
After all, Jiang Wu had longed for death and would always blame this world.
Everything was always someone else’s fault.
“I don’t dislike this world, and I don’t dislike you either.”
Yin Wuzhi’s fingers wove through Jiang Wu’s hair.
“Whatever you want to do, I’ll support you.”
“Yin Wuzhi, would you be willing to die with me?”
“I would.”
He replied softly, without hesitation and without haste, as though Jiang Wu had merely asked him if he wanted to eat, and he answered, “I do.”
It felt natural.
For the first time, the Pessimist began to doubt the allure of death. “You… would?”
“I would.”
“I’m not Jiang Wu.”
“Nor am I Yin Wuzhi.” Yin Wuzhi propped himself up, looking at him. “I liked you even before I had memories; my feelings have nothing to do with that Jiang Wu. There’s no reason for it—I just like you. You have no right to say I’m in love with him, and you don’t get to say you’re not Jiang Wu to resist or deny my feelings.”
The Pessimist yanked his hair, and Yin Wuzhi leaned down a bit.
“If we’re dead, you won’t be able to touch me anymore.”
“Just seeing you is enough. Knowing you exist is enough.”
“Have you ever thought about disappearing? About… not existing at all?”
Yin Wuzhi’s face twitched. “No.”
“I can’t bear the thought… of forgetting you.”
Jiang Wu pursed his lips. “You’re still thinking about your emperor.”
Yin Wuzhi frowned.
“I haven’t died yet; how can you be sure you wouldn’t want to forget me? The one you don’t want to forget… is your emperor.”
Slowly, the Pessimist’s deadpan face showed a hint of resentment.
Yin Wuzhi couldn’t help but kiss him, releasing him only after a moment.
“You are my emperor.”
