Jiang Xun still pushed Ji Yuntian back in his wheelchair.
There were few people in the corridor. Ji Yuntian sat obediently in his wheelchair, looking relaxed, his hands resting loosely on his legs as his fingertips tapped idly against his thighs.
From where Jiang Xun stood, he could see Ji Yuntian's thick, soft black hair, the pale neck beneath its ends, and his slender back under his white shirt.
"Oh, I still don't know your name," Ji Yuntian suddenly asked.
"Jiang Xun."
"Jiang Xun..." Ji Yuntian's rosy lips moved as he softly repeated the name. As though he had remembered something amusing, his eyes suddenly curved into a smile.
"When I was little, I had a puppy that was black all over. It looked a lot like you."
"I'll call you Little Black from now on."
Jiang Xun's mouth twitched violently. He refused.
"We're almost there. Just up ahead."
Jiang Xun pushed Ji Yuntian to a room at the end of the corridor.
Ji Yuntian took a key card from his pocket and handed it to him. "Little Black, sorry for the trouble, but could you open the door for me?"
Jiang Xun's mouth twitched. Resigned, he took the key card, opened the door, then handed it back. "Then I'll head back..."
Before he could finish, a pair of hands suddenly shoved him hard in the back. He cried out, stumbled forward, and fell into the room with a thud.
Immediately afterward, the door slammed shut behind him with a bang.
Ignoring the pain, Jiang Xun hurriedly scrambled up to open the door, only to find that it wouldn't budge.
"Little Black, just stay put in there."
Through the door came Ji Yuntian's languid, lazy voice, tinged with amusement. "If you try to get close to Lin Jian again, you won't get off this lightly."
Jiang Xun: "..."
Fucking hell.
So Ji Yuntian had known who he was all along and had just been playing dumb.
This was the farmer and the snake in real life.
Jiang Xun raised his hand and slapped himself. That's what you get for being an idiot. That's what you get for helping this twisted freak.
"This was originally meant for my eldest brother. Now you get to enjoy it instead."
Jiang Xun heard the malice in Ji Yuntian's voice, and a bad feeling immediately settled in his gut.
This hotel belonged to the Ji Group. As its heir, Ji Yuntian only had to say the word to have something done to this room.
Without a key card, he couldn't turn on the lights either. Jiang Xun took out his phone and switched on its flashlight.
It was a perfectly ordinary room, with decor and furnishings no different from any other hotel.
Before Jiang Xun could breathe a sigh of relief, he suddenly saw something crawling out from under the bed beside him.
The light was dim. He took a closer look, and his pupils instantly trembled.
It was a snake as thick as a child's arm, brownish-black and patterned, slick and slimy. Its soybean-sized eyes stared at the human before it as it hissed and flicked its tongue.
Jiang Xun's blood seemed to flow backward. His hair stood on end, his whole body went rigid, and for a moment his brain stopped working.
Jiang Xun wasn't a coward. He could catch cockroaches with his bare hands, but snakes, centipedes, and other crawling creatures terrified him, whether they were venomous or not.
As a child, he had run into the grass while playing and been bitten by a snake.
One second, two seconds... The man and the snake faced each other in silence.
Suddenly, Jiang Xun let out a bloodcurdling scream that nearly tore through the roof. His heart almost leaped out of his throat as he began pounding frantically on the door.
"Ji Yuntian, open the door! Open it! Hurry up and open it!!"
"I just saved you! You can't repay my kindness like this!"
"Ji Yuntian, I'm begging you! Open the door!!"
Ji Yuntian gave a muffled chuckle, his voice gentle and tender. "Don't be scared. Once you've spent enough time with them, you'll grow to like them."
With that, he ignored the terrified pleas from inside, turned his electric wheelchair around, and left.
The corners of his rosy lips lifted faintly into something not quite a smile.
Yes, he had saved him, but he had also seen him in that humiliating state.
And that was intolerable.
Jiang Xun was on the verge of tears. There wasn't just one snake; two more had crawled out from under the bed. Three snakes were now flicking their tongues right before his eyes.
He screamed and leaped onto the bed, his legs weak and trembling uncontrollably.
Some fears were difficult to overcome.
Ha. Ji Yuntian must have had someone put these snakes here.
Once I get out, I'm going to fucking kill that bastard Ji.
[Old Six, you've really screwed me over! Hurry up and save me! I'll call you Dad!]
Six-Six-Six simply played dead.
Just then, the phone in his hand rang. Keeping an eye on the snakes on the floor, Jiang Xun shakily answered it, his hand trembling like that of someone with advanced Parkinson's.
The moment the call connected, Jiang Huaijin's icy voice came through. "I told you to stay put and not cause trouble, and you ran off again..."
He was cut off halfway through by Jiang Xun's piercing wail.
"There are snakes! So many snakes! They're going to bite me! Brother... Brother, come save me!"
Jiang Xun didn't care who was on the other end. His mind was filled with nothing but fear and the need to cry for help. His voice shook, thick with tears. "I'm going to die! Brother, please, hurry up and save me!"
Jiang Huaijin frowned. His first thought was that Jiang Xun was trying to pull another stunt.
But when he listened carefully, the fear in that voice didn't sound fake.
Jiang Xun was still wailing. Jiang Huaijin impatiently cut him off. "Where are you?"
"On... on the sixteenth floor, room 1623 at the end of the corridor!"
"Brother, hurry! I can't take it anymore! Brother..."
The noise made Jiang Huaijin's ears ache. He hung up with a frown.
Jiang Zixing walked over. Seeing the indescribable look on his brother's face, he asked with concern, "Big brother, what's wrong?"
"Nothing. I have something to take care of. Keep having fun with your friends."
Jiang Zixing nodded obediently. "Okay."
Jiang Huaijin smiled and patted his younger brother's shoulder, then turned and left the banquet hall.
It was quite a while before he arrived at room 1623 with several hotel security guards and raised his hand to knock.
That familiar wailing immediately came from inside.
He'd better not be playing games with me. Jiang Huaijin had no key card and couldn't open the door, so he started kicking it.
The door was sturdy. It took several kicks before he forced it open.
Darkness greeted him, but he could make out several snakes crawling across the floor. One slithered right past Jiang Huaijin's feet and quickly escaped through the open doorway.
The snakes weren't venomous. The security guards behind him used their tools to catch the remaining two.
Only then did Jiang Huaijin step into the room. He saw his younger brother huddled in a corner of the bed, his head buried as he clutched the quilt and trembled.
They were just a few nonvenomous snakes. Did he really need to be this scared?
"All right, the snakes have been caught. Get down."
Only then did Jiang Xun lift his head. Tears clung to the corners of his eyes, which still held traces of terror, and his lips were deathly pale. He looked at Jiang Huaijin as though he were his savior.
"My legs are too weak. I can't walk."