ISMW Chapter 115

Actually, even if Jian Wenxi hadn’t said anything, Yun Xunlan could probably have guessed.

After all, Yu Chen had already started forced landing simulation training. With Yu Chen’s military rank, he would never have had the opportunity to participate without Yun Xunguang’s authorization. And if it weren’t for Yun Xunlan, he wouldn’t have gone to the most dangerous front lines so early, walking into a one-way road that very likely had no return ticket.

“On the day you leave, I won’t come to see you off. There will definitely be many people at that occasion, and I don’t want to go.” Jian Wenxi looked embarrassed, tightly gripping the mask in his hands. After thinking, he still held Yun Xunlan’s hand through his gloves and shook it, saying, “You must come back alive.”

“But you don’t need to worry too much. If you die, I’ll hold a ghost marriage for you two.”

Yun Xunlan was speechless with laughter: “…Wenxi, you’re really thoughtful.”

Jian Wenxi sighed in a tone of “I’ve made a huge sacrifice”: “But I still want to attend your living wedding. No matter how many living people are at your wedding, I’ll go be your best man.”

“I won’t sit with you much longer now.” After saying this, he glanced at his light brain. “I’ll come see you again after your differentiation is complete.”

Jian Wenxi slipped away before Yu Chen returned.

Actually, he didn’t need to leave so urgently, because Yu Chen was intercepted on the way.

The person who intercepted him was Mu Xingyu.

Mu Xingyu hadn’t immediately fled from the hospital back to the palace after learning of Yun Xunlan’s hospitalization as Yun Xunguang had said. But he also didn’t dare to see Yun Xunlan. He waited on the path leading to Yun Xunlan’s ward, and when he saw Yu Chen returning, he maneuvered his wheelchair to block Yu Chen’s path, urgently asking: “How did Lanlan end up hospitalized?”

“Is he injured?”

“He…”

“Second Prince, the Third Prince is not injured.” Yu Chen stopped walking and answered expressionlessly. “He’s preparing to undergo secondary differentiation tomorrow, so he was admitted tonight for related examinations.”

Mu Xingyu was probably preparing to treat his severed limbs in the hospital, so his mechanical leg prosthetics had been removed. The area below his knees was now empty, and his broken forehead was still bandaged, making him look somewhat down and out.

Upon hearing this news, he was stunned for a few seconds, murmuring: “He quit his job and gave his pet to others to board. I thought he was again…”

Yu Chen had originally been too lazy to deal with Mu Xingyu after saying those two sentences, but Mu Xingyu’s half-finished statement made Yu Chen realize there were some past events about Yun Xunlan that he didn’t know about. So he stopped again and asked Mu Xingyu: “Again what?”

But Mu Xingyu refused to say: “Again what?”

Yu Chen’s limited patience was reserved entirely for Yun Xunlan. Upon hearing this, he directly sneered and looked down at Mu Xingyu in the wheelchair: “Always speaking in half-sentences is very uncultured behavior.”

But alphas were mostly similar in nature. Yu Chen couldn’t stand Mu Xingyu, and Mu Xingyu wouldn’t find him particularly pleasing either, immediately retorting: “Oh, then consider me as uncultured as you.”

Yu Chen: “?”

Yu Chen decided not to argue with Mu Xingyu for now, considering he was currently disabled and brain-damaged. But when he was about to leave, Mu Xingyu called out to him again.

“Yu Chen—”

“Can you help me give this to Lanlan?” Mu Xingyu took out a bouquet of evening primroses from the side pocket of his wheelchair.

In the Galactic Empire, if you wanted to send flowers to express blessings without causing misunderstandings, the national flower evening primrose was the best choice.

Mu Xingyu’s intention in wanting to send this bouquet to Yun Xunlan had only one meaning: “I want to apologize to him.”

“What’s the use of telling me?” Yu Chen didn’t take the flowers. “If you did something terrible that requires an apology, go say it yourself. Are your vocal cords disabled too?”

Mu Xingyu smiled bitterly: “I already told him, but I always feel that perhaps written expression would be more sincere.”

Only then did Yu Chen take the bouquet and inspect it. The bouquet had a small card attached with only three words: [I’m sorry.]

The words were very brief, but the handwriting showed solemnity and seriousness, signed with Mu Xingyu’s name.

“In the past, I said many unpleasant things to Lanlan… no, I used to curse him with many harsh and extreme words.” Mu Xingyu hung his head in explanation, thus missing Yu Chen’s stunned look at him. He stared at the reflection on the floor, saying in a daze, “He hates me very much, so I’d better not appear in front of him anymore.”

“…Fine, I’ll help you deliver it.”

Hearing Yu Chen’s agreement, Mu Xingyu raised his hand to cover his eyes: “I hope Lanlan’s secondary differentiation goes smoothly. I wish you two…”

But at this point, Mu Xingyu stopped again. The words after “I wish you two” he could never say.

Yu Chen didn’t need this blessing either and left with the flowers.

Mu Xingyu listened to his gradually receding footsteps, slowly lowered his palm, leaned back in his wheelchair and turned his head to look at the silver moonlight outside the floor-to-ceiling window. He remembered that three years ago, he had also hesitated like this outside Yun Xunlan’s ward, not daring to enter.

And before that, he had never had such hesitation.

He always brazenly intruded into Yun Xunlan’s private space, never considering the privacy of Yun Xunlan, who was still a teenager at the time—after all, they were both alphas, so what did it matter?

Yun Xunlan and Jian Wenxi were the ones who needed to avoid suspicion, right?

So after Jian Wenxi came out of Yun Xunlan’s ward once again, Mu Xingyu also followed in: “If you don’t like Jian Wenxi, why do you always want to see him? Don’t you know how ugly the rumors about you two are spreading outside?”

At that time, Yun Xunlan had just undergone kidney replacement surgery not long ago and his body was still recovering. He was very thin, and the hospital gown that had fit reasonably well before surgery now looked loose and empty when worn. However, the smile on his face from seeing Jian Wenxi hadn’t disappeared yet, and he was even smiling so much that his cheeks had a thin blush, making his complexion look fairly good.

But after seeing Mu Xingyu, the smile at the corners of his lips didn’t diminish, but the joy in his eyes gradually disappeared, and even the thin blush on his cheeks quickly faded. With a pale, sickly face and a very light tone, he explained to Mu Xingyu: “Imperial Brother, I do like Wenxi, but the kind of liking between us is friendship, so I will see him.”

Mu Xingyu was in an irritable mood. He always felt that since Yun Xunlan’s body hadn’t recovered yet, couldn’t he just lie there and rest honestly? He usually said he didn’t want to see people, but he didn’t see him meeting with Jian Wenxi any less often. If they were just friends, couldn’t they wait until his body was better before meeting?

But for some reason, these words that could perhaps barely be considered “concern,” including what he had wanted to tell Yun Xunlan before entering—that he had already obtained qualification to go to the border battlefield, that he would fight on the front lines in the future, that he would work with Yun Qihe to attack the insectoid home planet, recapture every lost human planet, and also save Yun Xunlan—all changed flavor when they reached his lips.

He said: “With such high compatibility between you two, always meeting, wouldn’t love develop? Or is it that you know you deserve to die and will die soon, so you won’t be with him?”

As his words fell, the smile on Yun Xunlan’s face also disappeared.

Mu Xingyu belatedly realized his words were somewhat excessive, but he had been saying such things for so many years and was used to it—no one had ever scolded him for it, not even Yun Xunlan himself had ever blamed him.

Anyway, Yun Xunlan would always tolerate him… so there was no need to apologize, right? At worst, he just wouldn’t say such things in the future. Or when he conquered the insectoid home planet, he could use the Brood Mother’s corpse as an apology gift.

Mu Xingyu thought this way.

In his line of sight, he saw Yun Xunlan move his body, as if wanting to get out of bed, but lacking strength.

Mu Xingyu immediately went to support him, while also seeming to finally find a reasonable excuse to criticize him: “Look, your body is already so deteriorated that you can barely get out of bed, and you still want to go to the border battlefield? Can’t you…”

“Imperial Brother.” The silver-haired youth pushed him away with gentle but firm force, raised his face and calmly asked him, “Do you really want me to die?”

The youth’s eyes gazing at him were beautiful and brilliant, like golden stars with enormous gravitational pull. Mu Xingyu looked back at them, unable to tell if he was speechless from this gaze or from the youth’s words.

…No.

He said this in his heart, but his mouth remained silent.

After leaving Yun Xunlan’s ward, Mu Xingyu’s heart inexplicably beat very fast, making him somewhat uneasy.

And this unease reached its peak when he received a rare message from Yun Xunlan that evening—one where Yun Xunlan had taken the initiative to contact him.

In the message, Yun Xunlan said he wanted to see him and Yun Xunguang that evening because he had some things he wanted to discuss with them both.

Not long after receiving this message, an inquiry message from Yun Xunguang also arrived—clearly, she had received the same message from Yun Xunlan.

At nine o’clock in the evening, Yun Xunguang finished her day’s governmental work and came to the hospital to meet with him.

While waiting for the elevator, Yun Xunguang asked him: “Did Lanlan mention to you what he wanted to talk to us about?”

“…No.” Mu Xingyu said.

But Mu Xingyu guessed that Yun Xunlan might finally be going to complain to Yun Xunguang about him. If he complained, so be it. This matter was his fault, and he would admit his mistake.

But Yun Xunguang pinched her brow and speculated: “If he’s still going to bring up wanting to go to the border battlefield, I really want to curse. He’s not even an adult yet—what’s he trying to get involved in?”

Hearing this, Mu Xingyu was possessed by some impulse and said: “Don’t scold him anymore.”

“I’m just saying.” Yun Xunguang glanced at him with amusement. “You don’t think I’d actually scold him, do you?”

Mu Xingyu clenched his hands hanging at his sides into fists and came to Yun Xunlan’s designated meeting place with Yun Xunguang with a grave expression—a very ordinary rest area in the hospital.

Yun Xunlan sat on a soft cream-colored sofa, raising his eyes to look at them. That touch of pale yellow and Yun Xunlan’s eyes were the only warm colors in this room.

Seeing this, Mu Xingyu’s nerves became even more tense. Yun Xunguang took a deep breath before entering, forcibly dispelling the fatigue from a busy day, and put on a gentle smile to ask Yun Xunlan: “What’s wrong, Lanlan?”

She sat down on the sofa across from Yun Xunlan: “What do you want to talk to me and your Imperial Brother about?”

Mu Xingyu sat on the third sofa.

Between them was a black glass coffee table. Through the table’s reflection, Mu Xingyu noticed his expression was particularly grave. Normally, Yun Xunguang might have noticed his emotional state much earlier.

But Yun Xunguang had been too tired recently.

He Chubai had reached the end of his rope, the point of exhaustion. All his organs had reached the limit of replacement frequency—almost as soon as a transplant was completed, it would immediately be eroded and fail due to insect venom. Yun Qihe had also temporarily withdrawn from the front battlefield, wanting to accompany He Chubai through his final days.

So during this time, all national affairs were pressed on Yun Xunguang’s shoulders, and Mu Xingyu also had to be ready to go to the front lines at any moment.

Yun Xunguang had no choice but to be tired.

But she still tried to speak to Yun Xunlan with sufficient patience: “If you still want to talk about going to the border battlefield, I’m telling you, it’s impossible.”

**

 (advanced chapters available on kofi)