"Qingzhu, I told you I wanted you to be my woman, to belong to me alone forever. I wasn't joking. I meant it."
Moving Ling Qingzhu's slender hand aside, Ling Feng let his smile fade and looked at her with a slightly solemn expression.
Seeing how serious Ling Feng looked, Ling Qingzhu's beautiful eyes flickered, and her long, pale fingers twisted uneasily. Suddenly, however, she pursed her red lips and said self-mockingly, "My master told me that I'm proud by nature, like a lotus on a lofty mountain. To men like you, I'm like a sacred aphrodisiac. What you men love most is conquest. And you've been thinking about how to conquer me from the very beginning, haven't you?"
In Ling Qingzhu's eyes, Ling Feng wanted to conquer her to satisfy his male vanity, not because he truly loved her.
She knew her own beauty well, and she knew that the burning heat in men's eyes when they saw her was a desire for conquest.
Thus, Ling Qingzhu believed Ling Feng wanted her because he wanted to conquer her. Because they had crossed the bounds of friendship, he wanted to possess her-not offer the pure affection she desired.
Ling Feng stared blankly at Ling Qingzhu, whose eyes had suddenly reddened and whose expression had grown uncertain. There was a vulnerability in her now that he had never seen before. Her cool indifference, which had shielded her like a shell, seemed to have fallen away entirely, and he could sense the emotions suddenly surging in her heart.
Ling Feng remained silent. Then he slowly reached out, wanting to caress her delicate face, only for her to gently evade his hand.
Her expression grew indifferent once more, as though that brief moment had been nothing but an illusion.
"Perhaps you're right. I