Chapter 84: The Tyrant Star

Mu Si gently lifted Bo Yu from the snow. Suppressing a smile, he brushed the snowflakes from his teacher’s coat.
“Sir, you’re fine.”
Bo Yu was rarely ever so disheveled—he’d taken a harsh fall, his elegant and handsome face now inexplicably serene.
Yet to Mu Si, never had he seemed more alive.
He had stood at the summit for so long. No one dared to defy him, none dared to hurt him.
In the end, it only made his obsessions and gloom deepen.
“Sir.”
Mu Si glanced at the soiled wheelchair, but didn’t set Bo Yu back in it. Instead, he carried him toward the staircase.
“Why aren’t you saying anything? Did you hurt yourself in the fall…”
Bo Yu’s lashes finally fluttered. He spoke his first words since the accident.
“Were you just laughing at me?” His voice rasped, hoarser than ever before.
Mu Si’s nerves tensed.
Bo Yu cared about his legs more than anything.
Lying helpless in the snow, he had tasted a humiliation and rage he hadn’t felt since, as a child, his legs were crushed beneath a car.
Everyone else had laughed; he alone had wept.
He finally opened his amber eyes, which mirrored Mu Si’s face.
“Answer me—were you laughing at me?”
Mu Si lowered his gaze. “No.”
He knew that, explanation or not, his teacher wouldn’t believe him.
“The lawyer’s letter Shen Jixing mentioned—it needs someone to take the fall.”
Bo Yu let himself be held, closing his eyes slowly in Mu Si’s arms. “You’ll go.”
…
In the snowbound town, the snowflakes never melted.
Yet Mu Si thought he heard something fall—a droplet of blood from his own heart, perhaps.
“Alright.”
Mu Si carried Bo Yu out of the set, placed him gently in the back seat of the car. The driver glanced between them, bewildered.
“Mr. Mu, aren’t you getting in?”
Though officially a bodyguard, the driver always addressed him with respect—for Bo Yu had always held him in high esteem.
Mu Si was different from the rest.
He paused by the open door, tall and slender, then bent down to say, “Sir, remember to find a new bodyguard to look after you.”
The driver stared in shock at them in the rearview mirror.
The young master had already left.
Was Mu Si leaving too?
Mu Si unwrapped a lime-flavored lollipop from his pocket.
“Things like going to the bathroom, you can handle yourself. Just a bit lazy, that’s all. Don’t make others do it for you anymore.”
Bo Yu shot him a cold, sharp look.
Mu Si shoved the candy into his mouth and walked off without turning back.
The car door closed slowly, and Bo Yu watched him stride down the long road out of town, hands in his pockets, reaching up to pluck a maple leaf like a spirited youth.
For a moment, he remembered the day he’d found Mu Si.
The filthy little boy was scavenging through trash for food.
“Will you come with me?” Bo Yu, noble in his tailored suit, sat in his wheelchair and gazed down at him with a childish arrogance.
The boy looked up, his dirty face tilting curiously.
“Yes.”
He looked pitiful, but his courage was fierce. Pointing at Bo Yu’s eyes, he said, “Your eyes are beautiful, like that tree.”
A gust of wind swept the street corner, sending a flurry of withered maple leaves into the air.
The boy sat in the pile of leaves, grinning up at him.
“You look like an angel in a painting, big brother.”
Bo Yu could only laugh—angels had legs, after all, but he did not.
One by one, he’d gathered those pitiful children, given them hope for a new life. Now that they’d grown, they rebelled.
Each one would betray him, leave him.
He tasted the lollipop in his mouth.
Sour and bitter.
“Sir, about Mr. Mu—”
“He will not return.”
Bo Yu removed the lollipop, hesitated in silence, but did not throw it out the window.
“Drive.”
…
That night, Shen Jixing received a call from Fu Chen.
“Hope I’m not interrupting anything?”
Shen Jixing glanced at Zhou Yili, who was asleep with his blue hair tousled across the pillow, looking adorably rebellious even in slumber.
“No,” he replied, pausing. “What are you talking about?”
They had only just reconciled—how could Fu Chen know?
Fu Chen chuckled. “Don’t I know you by now?”
Someone like Shen Jixing had never spoken of wanting a world for two.
This ‘accident’ had made him lose his reason.
He couldn’t wait to make that little lion his, to quietly shield him from the world.
“Have you gotten back together?” Fu Chen asked.
Standing in the dimly lit hallway, Shen Jixing leaned his slender back against the wall, lips curving in a cool, delicate smile.
“Yes. He’s mine now.”
Only in front of Fu Chen would Shen Jixing let such emotion slip.
Fu Chen pressed his hand to his forehead, amused. “I always thought the day you gave up everything for him, you’d have him in your grasp.”
For someone like Shen Jixing, pursuing a person was simple—especially someone like Zhou Yili, who seemed of little value at first glance.
“No.”
Shen Jixing’s lashes cast down in a pretty arc. “Back then, I wasn’t sure if he still wanted me.”
It had all been a test from the start.
But the little lion was so fierce—he never could be sure what Zhou Yili felt.
Fu Chen laughed softly, saying nothing.
An onlooker sees clearly; but in the thick of things, aren’t we all just timid cowards?
“Don’t tell him about that,” Shen Jixing said quietly.
Fu Chen was sharp enough to know without asking—after all, Shen Jixing had given up everything for him.
He only asked, “Why not?”
If Zhou Yili loved him deeply, learning of it would only deepen that love.
If he still harbored old resentments, this would surely dissolve them.
Shen Jixing’s expression was calm. “That was my choice, not his burden.”
Whether they reconciled or not, it did not change the decision he’d made that day.
‘Giving up everything for him’—those words were too heavy.
Shen Jixing gazed through the glass in the hospital room door, watching the blue-haired lion sleep peacefully on the bed.
“He couldn’t bear it.”
Nor should he have to.
Afterward, Fu Chen relayed the outcome to Shen Jixing.
“Mu Si?” Shen Jixing was surprised by the news. He couldn’t believe Bo Yu would send Mu Si away, let alone straight to prison.
How ruthless he was.
“Keep him there for now, look for the one who took the money and acted, and let him out in a few days.”
When the call ended, Shen Jixing put away his phone and returned to the hospital room.
There was only one bed inside, but it was large.
He considered sleeping on the sofa, letting Zhou Yili recover in peace.
“Where did you go?”
Shen Jixing had just lowered his eyes to check if the gauze needed changing when Zhou Yili woke.
“Just took a call. Why are you awake?”
Still half-asleep, Zhou Yili’s voice was lazy. “The pillow’s too hard. Hard to sleep on my stomach.”
He lifted his long, dark eyes and stared at Shen Jixing without moving.
Shen Jixing: “?”
He replied coolly, “Don’t even think about it.”
Zhou Yili: (乂｀д´)
Weren’t they dating?
Hadn’t they just reconciled?
Didn’t Shen Jixing love him to death?
And yet he wouldn’t even let him snuggle a little?
Zhou Yili snorted, childish and annoyed. “Your love is so cheap—”
Shen Jixing cut him off. “You’re too heavy.”
He eyed Zhou Yili’s tall, athletic frame, thinking if he spent the night crushed like that, he’d need a hospital number of his own.
Zhou Yili’s gaze roamed Shen Jixing’s form, then he suddenly grinned.
“Alright, I know you’re delicate.”
Through the moonlight, Zhou Yili looked at him, slowly absorbing the fact they were together again.
After a few seconds, the young master crooked a finger imperiously. “Come here. I want a kiss.”
Shen Jixing: “…”
He summoned him like a kitten or a puppy.
Even after getting back together, Shen Jixing was still that proud, unapproachable idol.
He tugged gently at the blue hair at the nape of Zhou Yili’s neck. “Try being cheeky again?”
Zhou Yili narrowed his long eyes, looked up to retort—then was silenced.
He let his eyes droop lazily, savoring the cool kiss Shen Jixing pressed on his lips.
But Shen Jixing was too restrained, brushing his lips lightly before breaking away.
Zhou Yili felt a little frustrated at his own lack of strength—otherwise, he’d have had him whimpering.
“Shen Jixing, I saw your hexagram today.”
On his waist.
Pure white and pitch black, clashing in a forbidden, seductive contrast.
He was bold, indeed.
Shen Jixing only murmured an acknowledgment, then left something cool around Zhou Yili’s neck.
“What’s this?” Zhou Yili squinted in the darkness—a familiar silver chain.
“A hexagram.”
Shen Jixing didn’t tell him what it was made of.
He declared calmly, “Whoever’s encircled by this will belong to me, for life.”
Zhou Yili let him leave his marks, played with his fingers, his heart turning to mush in the night.
“Tyrant Star.”