Chapter 9 - The Window Beyond Reach
Lin Quan was quite satisfied with the Qian residence, but he would be even more satisfied if the guest room he was staying in was a little closer to Qian Gu’s.
God knows what Qian Gu told Auntie Zhang but Lin Quan's room was ridiculously far from Qian Gu's. The fact that they weren't staying in the same room, Lin Quan could still grudgingly tell himself that Qian Gu wanted to take things slow, that their relationship wasn't at the stage where they could move too fast.
However, what's the reason for them not even being willing to give him the room next to Qian Gu's? With this arrangement, Lin Quan completely lost the chance to sneak through the window to Qian Gu’s room in the middle of the night to leech some HP. This cohabiting turned out worse than not cohabiting.
Lin Quan: My dearest Little Temtem, what am I to do? Tell me, what can I do?
System: I warned you not to come on too strong. Now you're paying the price for having negative points for impression.
Lin Quan: That's too stingy of him. I can't even touch him? Not even a teeny little bit? I'm the one who offered to marry him; that's such a big sacrifice on my part. I'm clearly the one at a disadvantage in this marriage, yet he's still unhappy about me?
System: Host, are you sure you're the one at a disadvantage here? With that sickly, weak body of yours, what can you really do?
System: According to Qian Gu’s settings, he doesn't get close to anyone, male or female.
Lin Quan: Tsk tsk, there's a big problem. Don't tell me he's, you know, inadequate in that department, and that's why he's keeping his distance from everyone to hide it?
After repeatedly measuring the distance between his room and Qian Gu's, Lin Quan begrudgingly came to a conclusion— the difficulty of this task was beyond him. There's no way he could climb past several windows and his midnight HP heist was going to be on hold indefinitely.
(lilies: ahaha he really has a thing with windows XD)
He sat by the window, resting his chin on his arms, and gazed at the peaceful and beautiful night view with a sigh. The moon was so lovely, but his HP was anything but. It was the first night of his escape from "prison" yet there weren't any celebrations planned.
Lin Quan: The night's so long and I dare not sleep. Little Temtem, is there anything fun to pass the time?
System: Host, your plan of climbing windows will never succeed. Why not use this time to clean up some rubbish from the past—throw away what needs to go, tidy up what needs tidying. Let's start with tidying up your personal blog, it's sure to wake you right up.
Lin Quan whipped out his phone and quickly encountered his first problem.
Lin Quan: Little Temtem, do you know what's the login password? I didn't inherit the original owner's memories; I'm completely clueless.
System: His password, I doubt you'd want to use it. The username, avatar, and password—you'll want to change them all as fast as possible.
Lin Quan: Don't tell me the password is a chain of numbers related to Childhood Friend No. 7's birthday. Or a special day they spent together, a "memorable" occasion?
Lin Quan: And the username is a confession of love for Childhood Friend No. 7 while the avatar is a photo he secretly took of him?
System: Congrats host, you're so smart, your answer is completely correct.
Lin Quan facepalmed. Upon opening his account, sure enough, he found the rather blatant username "Love Fu Forever". There was no shock there.
He quickly changed the username to his full name, “Lin Quan,” and set a new password to one of his usual numeric combinations. As for the profile picture, Childhood Friend No. 7's photo had to go.
He half-draped himself by the window and flashed a relaxed smile as he took a selfie. Then, he uploaded the photo as his new avatar, marking the beginning of his fresh start.
Lin Quan's Weibo—or rather, the little Young Master Lin's Weibo hadn’t been updated in a very long time. In the past when the little young master of the Lin family was obsessed with Childhood Friend No. 7, every new post would somehow or another be related to No. 7. This wasn't just a one-off phase—it had gone on for years.
Lin Quan couldn't understand what kind of love could last so long. To the point where, no matter what he said now, no one would believe him. It was a love so fanatical that no one would believe Lin Quan would have a change of heart and marry Qian Gu.
Once he logged into the dashboard, Lin Quan found the "delete all" option. Just before pressing on it, he paused for a bit, as if giving the little young master of the Lin family a moment to say goodbye to the past.
He whispered softly, "From now on, there is no more love for Childhood Friend No. 7 here. Your grudges, I'll avenge them for you, but your feelings, I won't carry them on. Childhood Friend No. 7 doesn't care about you, he doesn't even take notice of you. He took your family fortune and pushed you into a bottomless abyss. He is not the right choice."
With that, Lin Quan clicked delete and erased everything.
After deleting Weibo, Lin Quan leaned out the window with some effort and stretched his arm as far as he could to take a picture of the villa’s exterior.
The focus of the photo was the distance to Qian Gu's window. Lin Quan's resentment towards the unreachable window ran deep. Adding a caption to the photo, he uploaded his first post: Hello, my new life.
Lin Quan: Little Temtem, do you think Qian Gu will see my Weibo? Will he understand what I mean, that I am expressing my dissatisfaction?
Lin Quan: If he picks up on my desperate hints, maybe he’ll move my room closer to his?
System: Host, you're currently on the fast track to the depths of negative impression points.
Lin Quan: In the first place, he's clearly the one at the advantage in this situation. What’s he got to be dissatisfied about? Once I've replenished sufficient HP, I won't care about him anymore, hmph!
As the heir of the Lin family, every action he makes is closely watched by many. As soon as Lin Quan's new post was up, it was flooded with comments.
The most common responses were long strings of question marks from people who were completely baffled by him. Next, were the same old sneers. The system told Lin Quan that those familiar jabs came from his cousin, who was hiding behind multiple accounts to mock him. It was quite a tedious effort, really.
Lin Quan was now returning back to "normality", but it instead raised suspicions that his "abnormality" was intensifying.
Lin Quan scrolled through the comments and unsurprisingly spotted his older brother's message. His brother's comment was full of praise for him, switching up different ways to compliment him and expressing the affection of an older brother doting on his little brother.
His brother asked: Where are you hanging out? Your new profile picture looks great! It's been a while and you've been getting more handsome since the last time I saw you.
Lin Quan decided not to push the onlookers' fragile nerves too far and replied simply: I'm at a friend's place; the food here is amazing.
Big bro: Eat lots if you like it, you're still too skinny. When I'm done with work next month, I'll come back to keep you company. Oh, and I bought you some local treats. Give me your address, and I'll send them over.
Lin Quan: Sure.
Lin Quan figured it was best to leave things as they were with his blissfully ignorant older brother. Even if he told him his situation, it wouldn't solve his problems. When he was trapped in that sanatorium, this brother of his still thought he was enjoying life. Lin Quan was truly speechless at this.
Lin Quan was about to private message his brother his address when it suddenly occurred to him that he was at Qian Gu's house and didn't know the exact address. And so, he headed out decisively to look for Auntie Zhang.
After getting the address from Auntie Zhang, Lin Quan asked her, "Auntie Zhang, my older brother wants to send me local treats as souvenirs, but I don't know what Qian Gu likes to eat. Can you tell me? I'll ask my brother to buy more."
Hearing Lin Quan's question, Auntie Zhang replied with a smile, "Young master isn't fussy about food."
Lin Quan couldn't help but blink in surprise.
Was that her polite way of saying she couldn't tell him, or was Qian Gu truly not picky? He was just asking about Qian Gu's preferences, yet he was met with wariness. Were they worried he'd accidentally discover some weakness and use it as leverage against Qian Gu?
Lin Quan hit a soft wall, but he wasn't too upset about it. He had plenty of time. Living under the same roof as Qian Gu, he refused to believe he couldn't get anything out of it eventually.
Looking at the bigger picture, he was far more successful than Childhood Friend No. 7. He was already living in Qian Gu's house, seeing him day in and day out. Meanwhile, No. 7 was still stuck wandering outside the gates, unable to step inside the villa.
As soon as Lin Quan left, Auntie Zhang turned and headed for Qian Gu's study. Qian Gu was flipping through some documents when he saw her enter. He asked, "What's he up to again now?"
"Young Master Lin asked for the address, saying his eldest brother wants to send him stuff," Auntie Zhang answered, "After which, he also tried to ask about your preferences, but I didn't tell him."
Qian Gu nodded. "Noted. Get some rest, I'll handle this."
After Auntie Zhang left, Qian Gu took out his phone and looked at Lin Quan's newest Weibo post. The photo was clearly taken from Lin Quan's room, aimed directly at Qian Gu's room.
It was a post about Lin Quan's new life yet the photo was of Qian Gu's room. This was a post meant for Qian Gu, the message couldn't be any clearer—Lin Quan wanted to move into Qian Gu's room, to take their relationship to a more intimate level. The Lin family's young master, who should be head-over-heels for Fu Yunteng, seemed to have developed an excessive interest in Qian Gu lately.
Lin Quan's blog had been wiped clean of all its old content, and even his new profile picture was one taken at Qian Gu's house.
In the photo, with the gentle darkness of the night outside the window as his backdrop, the exquisite little young master of the Lin family looked effortlessly laid-back. He lounged lazily, his head propped on one arm, showing off that long, graceful neck while a small smile played on his lips.
This Lin Quan carried a sense of liveliness that was absent in the Lin Quan who was at the sanatorium. Freed from suffocating oppression, he seemed to be embracing a fresh start—just like his latest post suggested.
Qian Gu set his phone down. The little Young Master Lin seemed to spend every day filling his head with random nonsense, his thoughts leaping unpredictably from one thing to the next.
Instead of reaching out to Fu Yunteng upon waking, Lin Quan went straight to Qian Gu, stubbornly insisting on marriage. Every time he saw Qian Gu, he couldn't resist clinging to him, hugging him at every opportunity as if it was his new favourite pastime.
The heirs of the Lin family were plagued by strange illnesses, yet the family itself continues to flourish. But when it came to Lin Quan, Qian Gu couldn't help but wonder—was he simply muddled from his illness, or had he adopted a new strategy of playing hard to get?
Just then, two new messages came in on Qian Gu's phone.
Fu Yunteng: Lin Quan is at your place?
Fu Yunteng: The benefits of a marriage alliance with the Fu family far outweigh those of the Lin family. Are you really going to ignore the crisis the Qian family is facing?
Qian Gu sipped his coffee and ignored the messages, returning to his documents instead.
That night, Lin Quan didn't know how many people lost sleep. Either way, he didn't plan on sleeping.
Having napped in the car during the day, he wasn't in a rush to rest now. Activating his night owl mode, he spent the night chatting idly with the system while tidying up all the information the little Young Master Lin had shared with the public. He logged into account after account, deleting every elaborate declaration of love to Childhood Friend No. 7.
That night the people tasked with monitoring Lin Quan's every move had a miserable time. Instead of sleeping at night, the little young master of the Lin family was wide awake fiddling around, deleting things left and right non-stop, never giving them a moment's peace.
Unable to stop him, all they could do was try to keep up with his pace. They meticulously logged every piece of deleted content and timestamped it, to use it to analyse what was going on in Lin Quan's mind.
Soon, they reached a chilling conclusion: a storm was brewing and the young master was about to pull something big.
Maybe Lin Quan was rethinking his approach to chasing Fu Yunteng, or perhaps something massive was about to happen. Either way, Lin Quan's abnormal behaviour was a clear warning that the coming days would be anything but peaceful.
Some even boldly speculated that the Lin family was working to rebrand their heir—steering away from his negative image as Fu Yunteng's clingy pursuer and onto the path of a sharp and capable heir.
Lin Quan simply shrugged at that. All he was doing was clearing out emotional clutter; just sweeping every trace of Childhood Friend No. 7 out of his life.
Lin Quan: Little Temtem, you were right! Throw, throw, throw is such a great stress reliever. Ditching Childhood Friend No. 7 feels so refreshing.
System: Go rest for a bit, the sun's almost up. I'll wake you in an hour so you can join Qian Gu for breakfast.
Lin Quan: Okay.
A/N:
Lin Quan: Did you receive my crazy, not-at-all subtle hints?
Qian Gu: No.
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Thank yous!! (˶‾᷄ ⁻̫ ‾᷅˵)
I hope you enjoyed this chapter and have a great day!!
You can support me by sending some love in the comments or through the button below
peace lilies~