╔═══ Author's note ════╗

Edited by Psycho S.

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Feeling his heart twist in frustration, Lu Kai hastily pressed a panicked peck onto her lips, blurting out, "I love you, Bing Shi. Do you love me?"

"I do!" Bing Shi declared, her voice tinged with the determination of a soldier, as she fiercely wiped away her tears. She had an inkling about his secret, even though he hadn't spilled it; his frequent, anxious questions about her love revealed his poor concealment skills.

"How much do you love me?" he pressed, his focus shifting frustratingly from her lips to her neck.

"I love you more than I love myself!" she proclaimed, even louder this time. Her emphatic nodding halted his distracting nibbles at her neck. In a bid to demonstrate her true feelings, she placed her hand on her chest, inadvertently swatting away the hand that dared to stray to her chest.

"Don't handle me as if I'm just another one of your tasks. I'm not one of your patients," he chided, withdrawing his hand from beneath her shirt. She was getting better at taking control of the situation at the cost of her emotions. How much further did she want to go?

He didn't want to wake up one day to realize that she already turned into a little monster. "How much do you love me?" He noticed her shoulders trembling in response, yet she made no attempt to pull away from his eager embrace.

"Why do you keep asking me?! Go and make a measuring scale to evaluate how much I love you! You doubting me so much is getting on my nerves!" Bing Shi inhaled deeply, tears welling up as her voice shook with emotion, revealing her vulnerability to him, "What more do you want from me? What do I do, when you keep provoking me left and right?! Every time you question me, you make me angrier and angrier. Don't test my love!"

Lu Kai opened his lips in protest, but he was silenced by her covering her teary face with her hands, and throwing a barrage of words at him like they were grenades.

"You don't like it when I'm calm, and you don't like it when I'm angry. You don't like it when I'm sad, and you get suspicious when I'm happy! Now, you even think I'm treating you like my mission?! I should be the one asking who loves who! Can't you see I'm hurting? Don't talk to me anymore! I'm not talking to you..."

"I'll keep talking to you. Don't ignore me..." His words broke through her frustration, revealing that he was far from the compliant 'wife-slave' many mistook him for at first glance. "I'll do anything for you," he insisted, "Just don't ignore me."

It was in his nature to do whatever he wanted, including punching himself in the face for treating his wife like an ass. Including hating himself for making his wife upset. He took the hands covering her crying face and kissed each hand on the palm with reverence. He had always promised himself never to hurt her again, yet he always broke that promise when his moods were unstable.

Her tears... How he could treasure, but also hate something to such a degree was beyond his comprehension. Perhaps he loved her tears, only when they were happy, or were a result of her being pleasured beyond her comfort. "Not gonna cry at me to let go of you? If not, I'll keep kissing you."

Refusing to move an inch, Bing Shi stayed rooted on the spot like a statue. He should be the one to scatter like dust before she pulled out her fangs and horns. Well, not really. How could she leave him alone? How could she bear her fangs at this man, at this moment? She couldn't do that unless he decided that she should do just that: wear her horns and bite him with her fangs so that she may feel guilty and he could feel better.

This wasn't the first time they had such a minor fight over her love for him and vice versa, and surely this wouldn't be the last fight. This also wasn't the first time, and she was sure it'd be far from the last, where she couldn't help but worry about his unstable mental state. His mood swings were a tribulation on their own to overcome in their relationship, but it wouldn't be enough for them to simply...give up.

Of course, his mood swings hurt her.

The way his poisonous words dripped into her heart was the cause of her short-lasting tears, but his feelings and tactics of hurting her emotionally weren't enough for Bing Shi to give up on Lu Kai.

Afterward, when he realized that he'd hurt her, he would feel remorseful that he had hurt her. Strangely, however, he was never quite that remorseful that she'd been hurt. He felt bad about his actions but also didn't. It was... confusing.

She couldn't explain it....

Or maybe she could explain it, and she just didn't want to put into words how twisted their relationship was.

The guilt in his heart, after lashing out at her, would be obvious; he'd treat her like she was glass. But do not be mistaken. Even though she was glass to him, still, when angry, he would make her shatter with his words that felt like a punch to the gut.

She would always excuse his behavior and find fault in herself to soothe the guilt that weighed heavy on his shoulders.

(She could partly understand why her mother never left her father when it was apparent to all that he was trash. She could also understand Su Min, who could never bring herself to really forget and move on from Mo Luwei. Men were a trap for women in love.)

This man... wouldn't keep her happy 24/7; she didn't expect that from him. Even to her, making someone happy with their presence alone sounded a bit tiring. It's just... He was doing a pretty good job making her feel relatively 'calm' under his relentless watching.

Despite him being the cause of her tears most of the time when she cried, she wouldn't feel abused under his grasp. It was like she was aware of what he did to her, but she didn't care enough to do something about how he treated her.

Did she feel abused? No, she didn't. As weird as it may sound, instead of feeling as though she was a victim under blatant manipulation, she felt like he had a valid reason to manipulate her...

She felt hurt, yes, but it felt like she deserved the hurt because it seemed as though he was torturing himself on the inside when he hurt her. Was she wearing the same brand of rose-colored glasses Su Min once brought for Mo Luwei? She had no idea. When it came to him, she couldn't think straight like she usually would.

The sight of her vulnerable and malleable body in his arms made Lu Kai feel lightheaded. He breathed in her scent deeply and enjoyed the way her smell washed over his senses. His mouth watered. Combined with the visual sensation she made and the 'seductive' scent she gave off, he couldn't take the temptation that was her in all her natural, unguarded glory anymore.

Shifting back, he smoothly removed his own shirt and watched as she curled inwards so she could absorb the warmth he had left when moving on the couch.

When Bing Shi realized what she had done, she wanted to laugh and cry at the irony.

Lu Kai gave her a curious look, gently lifting and wrapping her in his partially warm shirt.

Bing Shi shrank into the fabric that smelled entirely of his unique scent. He leaned forward to gain access to her space ring, and she watched as he... pulled out a pair of horns and fangs.

To cry or not to cry...?

Wait... Why was she feeling so guilty for the things he'd done to her? Why? This all began with him, so why was she feeling so horrible? She had to deal with what he'd done and...

And...

Lu Kai arranged the horns in between the strands of her hair, and he put the fangs on himself in an attempt to lighten her mood. It was his own way of trying to cheer her up after she had to deal with his lousy mood. He noticed that she balled up like a shrimp and so, he caressed her hair and asked her, genuinely, "Is it hard to be with me?"

╔═══ Author's note ════╗

Xuan Mu's personas are the same at the core, all cut from the same cloth—constantly discovering fresh insecurities to fret over like it's their favorite hobby. ꉂ ('∀｀)ʱªʱªʱª

I hope he will stop soon because it's getting annoying. Nobody wants an insecure man who keeps nagging their partner, right? (｀∀')Ψ

Do you think a love meter device would help Lu Kai to finally calm down?

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