Let me teach you to read

She knew Lu Mi all too well. He responded to kindness, not force, and was easily moved. Treat him well, and he would repay you a hundredfold.

So what if he had seen her shove He Shengguang? She was only an ordinary person. With a bleeding heart like Lu Mi, she could convince him.

At that thought, she added fuel to the fire. "I really want to go home, but clearing instances is just too dangerous. I can only try my best to earn some money to exchange for points while I'm in the rest area. Lu Mi, with you by my side, I won't be scared anymore. Don't you want to go home?"

Another icy voice came from behind the door. "Set foot on this floor again, and I'll kill... Why won't you let me finish?"

"Don't go around threatening people. Watch out for the guards," Lu Mi said. "Jin Bi, leave. I don't want to see you."

Jin Bi hadn't expected Roman to be there, much less that Lu Mi would be so difficult to manipulate.

"Isn't this just because I shoved He Shengguang?" She clenched her fists and gritted her teeth. "How noble do you think you are? In that situation, if you'd been the unlucky one, you would've run even faster than I did!"

Lu Mi didn't answer her. He simply pulled Roman away from the door to keep him from charging out and causing a scene that would bring the guards running.

Roman looked as though his scheme had succeeded. "I have a natural urge to stand up against injustice. But for you, I'm willing to suppress my impulses-how will you reward me?"

"..." This guy really never forgets what he's after, Lu Mi thought. "Tell me. What do you want?"

"Will you give me anything I want?"

"Of course not. I'll weigh it up myself. Go ahead."

Roman lowered his eyes, seemingly struggling to choose from a wealth of options. Finally, he said, "Come sleep in my room tonight."

Lu Mi was drinking water and choked. Before he could turn him down, the guy was already adding conditions.

"No, sleep in my room for the next few days," Roman said with righteous conviction. "Look at that woman outside. She seems like the dangerous sort who'd cling to your door in the middle of the night and keep knocking."

Lu Mi said, "But your room is right across from mine. We'd still hear her knocking, wouldn't we?"

Roman offered a reason he couldn't refuse. "Only by keeping an eye on me can you make sure I don't rush out and kill her."

Outside the door, Jin Bi was still going. "Just you wait, Lu Mi. One day, you'll bear sins far worse than mine!"

Lu Mi sighed. "All right."

After all, throughout their days in the instance, Roman hadn't gotten handsy once he turned into a cat at night.

Was it because he'd snapped at him in the first instance?

What a good kid, correcting his mistakes once he knows he's wrong, Lu Mi thought, handing him the fried chicken. "Hurry back and eat it before it goes bad."

That evening, Roman shuttled excitedly between the two rooms.

One moment, he was asking for a reward for finishing half the fried chicken; the next, he wanted to borrow a broom to clean his own room. In the end, Lu Mi shooed him back.

So he sat quietly by the door in his room, waiting motionlessly for an hour.

At long last, half past nine arrived. Two knocks sounded at the door. He sprang up and opened it within a second, swiftly reporting:

"I've already drawn your bath. It's at the most comfortable temperature, thirty-seven degrees! The bed's made too, with a soft down comforter. I brought it out of the instance. I didn't waste any money!"

"Thanks, but I've already showered." Lu Mi didn't dare add, "I brought my own comforter too," because the look in Roman's eyes instantly dimmed.

"Do you really like me that much?" Lu Mi couldn't help smiling as he asked casually on his way inside.

The walls of Roman's room were all the same concrete, with a few electrical outlets, but the furnishings seemed like something from an old wooden house years ago.

The table, the floor-everything was spotless. It was clear he'd put real effort into cleaning.

Holding his comforter, Lu Mi looked around, then realized Roman hadn't said a word.

He turned back and found Roman watching him quietly.

That gaze was so intense that he immediately looked away. "Ahem, it's not like your efforts went to waste. You can use the bathwater and comforter yourself."

Roman was silent for a moment, then slowly said two words:

"I do."

Roman went to bathe, and Lu Mi spread his own comforter on the floor.

The room wasn't large, and there was only a small patch beside the bed where he could sleep. Though he did have his suspicions that Roman had deliberately piled all the miscellaneous clutter everywhere else.

"He's just like a puppy."

Before bathing, Roman had taken off his cloak and draped it over a chair. When he came out, he was still wearing his mask.

Lu Mi got up from his bedding on the floor. Seeing that Roman still seemed unhappy, he tried saying a few things to coax him.

But this time, whether because he'd grown spoiled by all the affection or because his careful preparations hadn't brought the results he'd hoped for, Roman's replies were all brief.

In the end, he gave Lu Mi a gentle push. "You take the bed."

"Huh?"

"Don't worry. I'll sleep on the floor."

Lu Mi couldn't help laughing. "That's not what I meant. Roman, you're so considerate even when you're angry. It's too funny."

Roman took off his slippers, stepped onto the bedding on the floor, and sat down far from Lu Mi. "No laughing."

"Don't be upset." Lu Mi reached out and ruffled his wet black hair. "I'll dry your hair for you, all right?"

He'd noticed before that the place Roman had lived was probably not very economically developed. He couldn't read, and he didn't have the habit of blow-drying his hair after washing it, either.

Buying a new hair dryer was out of the question. So Lu Mi went back to his room in his pajamas and slippers to fetch his own.

Actually, Jin Bi had left long ago, and most likely wouldn't come to harass him in the middle of the night.

Roman sat on a small wooden chair, his back rising well above its backrest.

Lu Mi stood behind him, running one hand through his wet hair. Every so often, lifting his hair revealed the nape of his neck.

The hair dryer was loud. Both of them remained quiet, tacitly avoiding any mention of the matter.

One major benefit of leaving the instance was being able to go to bed early at night with peace of mind.

In the end, Lu Mi couldn't bear to make the room's owner sleep on the floor, so he let Roman join him on the bed.

Roman's eyes went wide. "Really?"

Lu Mi nodded and teased him. "Not angry anymore?"

The bed wasn't big, and the two of them could barely squeeze in. With the comforter Lu Mi had brought spread over it, it was unbelievably soft.

Roman had already claimed Lu Mi's pillow, leaving him to use the one on the bed. But he felt something digging into his head, something hard.

He pulled it out for a look.

"A book?"

Didn't Roman not know how to read?

He shifted aside to let the room's light fall on it, then made out the title on the cover: A guide to bonding with cats: the tabby cat edition.

Lu Mi pressed his lips tightly together.

He opened the book to the contents and found a proper-looking list: one, understanding the characteristics of tabby cats; two, providing a comfortable living environment; three, building trust...

Roman lay at the other end of the bed, idly swiping through his own panel, and hadn't noticed what Lu Mi was doing.

There were no notes in the main text, but the pages showed signs of frequent handling.

He probably really wanted to be able to read it.

Without giving anything away, Lu Mi put the book back where it had been, then snatched his own pillow back from Roman.

"!?" Roman sat up and stared at him like a deeply aggrieved large dog.

"Roman," Lu Mi said, pretending to straighten his loose pajamas casually, "let me teach you to read."