Do you really have a hidden ailment?

People streamed through the bustling market, where vendors' cries rang out without cease, and the State Preceptor's ostentatious carriage cut its way through the crowds.

Listening to the lively bustle of the mortal world, Zhang Lanhe's thoughts drifted somewhere unknown as his carriage crossed paths with Li Xu.

"Oh? The Li Family's boy. Why have you just come from the Ninth Prince's place?"

Seated in his carriage, Zhang Lanhe suddenly spotted Li Xu hurrying along in the distance-the younger cousin whom his uncle by marriage, who shared no blood ties with him, often called a good-for-nothing.

He drew back the carriage curtain, looked toward Li Xu, and called him to a stop.

"Xu, where are you rushing off to? My uncle keeps mentioning you lately. He says you need a good beating."

The moment Li Xu heard Zhang Lanhe's deep voice, his entire body went rigid. Like a mouse encountering a cat, he was too frightened even to breathe loudly.

It's over. Has the secret already come out? Have I been caught this quickly?

He could already picture his parents teaming up to beat him and making him kneel in the ancestral hall.

My life is over!

"Get in."

Zhang Lanhe spoke, and with nowhere to escape, Li Xu could only steel himself, furtively hiding the painting he had obtained from Xie Huizhou while signaling a servant to warn the Ninth Prince.

"I just came from the Ninth Prince's place. He's been ill lately. As his good friend, how could I ignore him? So I went to visit him. He's seriously ill, and we wouldn't want you catching it. Let's head away first and talk as we go."

Zhang Lanhe was clearly headed toward the Detached Palace, and Li Xu kept feeling that he must not let him go there.

"Oh? In that case, all the more reason for me to visit him." The perceptive Zhang Lanhe caught Li Xu's sudden nervousness and gave a wicked smile. "Otherwise, with you worrying about your sick friend day and night, I won't be able to eat or sleep in peace."

So nervous. Li Xu, what are you hiding?

Li Xu said, "Cousin, stop teasing me. I'm nobody important. I don't deserve so much attention from you."

Don't get curious. I'm afraid you'll lust after my good friend's looks.

He was not exaggerating: Xie Huizhou was the most beautiful person he had ever seen. The State Preceptor looked respectable enough, but what if he took a fancy to his friend?

Li Xu's repeated attempts to obstruct him piqued Zhang Lanhe's curiosity. The more Li Xu tried to stop him, the more he wanted to get to the bottom of it.

"What sort of person do you think the Ninth Prince is?"

The Ninth Prince, Xie Huizhou, had fallen from favor long ago. These days, only Li Xu and a few other young masters who cared nothing for official careers still spent time with him. These young men could be considered oddities among the Capital City's privileged sons.

What magic did Xie Huizhou possess now to make so many people revolve around him?

The appraisal Zhang Lanhe heard from Li Xu struck him as unbelievable. His praise was so extravagant that it was almost unbearable.

"His Ninth Highness is incredibly beautiful. The so-called greatest beauty in the Capital City isn't even a tenth as beautiful as he is! He's gentle and loyal, too. He's a good friend I grew up with here in the Capital City." Li Xu praised Xie Huizhou to the skies, his eloquence flowing unchecked. "If my poetry weren't complete crap, I'd write a few poems praising him, too."

The greatest beauty?

After turning it over in his mind, Zhang Lanhe soon rejected the idea.

The person from that night was still the most beautiful. He trusted his intuition.

Zhang Lanhe gave a cold snort, paying it no mind. "Nothing special."

Li Xu was deeply shocked.

So even someone as beautiful as Xie Huizhou was nothing special in Zhang Lanhe's eyes. It seemed he need not worry about Xie Huizhou running into a pervert.

Still, was there really nothing wrong with Zhang Lanhe's attitude toward beautiful people?

Recalling the rumors recently circulating through the Capital City, Li Xu could not help repeatedly looking between Zhang Lanhe's legs.

Could it be...

Unable to ignore Li Xu's fixed stare, Zhang Lanhe asked, "What are you looking at?"

Li Xu asked sincerely, "Cousin, do you really have a hidden ailment?"

Originally, he had only listened idly to such absurd rumors, but after hearing them enough times, he had begun to believe them a little.

No wonder he's never interested in beautiful people. So that's why.

Zhang Lanhe said, "..."

His uncle was right. Li Xu really did need a beating. He had no understanding that a loose tongue invited trouble.

"Stop spouting nonsense." Zhang Lanhe frowned, his emerald eyes sinister. "Your cousin-in-law knows perfectly well whether I have a hidden ailment."

"What? I actually get to have a cousin-in-law? Cousin, I thought you were going to become a monk and spend your whole life before a Buddha statue by lamplight." A thirst for gossip blazed in Li Xu's eyes. "A man or a woman? Which family does the poor unfort-no, that came out wrong. When are you planning to marry?"

The words "poor unfortunate soul" had nearly slipped out of Li Xu's mouth.

As it turned out, there was a reason Li Xu and Xie Huizhou got along. Beneath his obedient exterior lay a restless heart bent on stirring up trouble, and his mouth was just as aggravating.

Li Xu suffered the misery of being hauled home by guards to kneel in the ancestral hall and receive a joint beating from his parents. His screams echoed through the Li Residence.

Another nasty rumor about State Preceptor Zhang Lanhe was added to the list.

The State Preceptor continued toward the Detached Palace.

In the Detached Palace, a handsome youth was writing and drawing.

Xie Huizhou had entered pleasure-seeking mode.

He was admiring his own paintings at the table in the Hall of Mental Cultivation, feeling thoroughly pleased with himself.

"My painting skills are improving by leaps and bounds. I'm better suited to being a free, unfettered painter than living here in fear."

Old Master Zhang, the court painter responsible for teaching him, was astounded by Xie Huizhou's gift for grasping things with the slightest guidance and regretted not meeting him sooner. He kept lamenting that, had Xie Huizhou become his pupil earlier, he would sooner or later have become a renowned figure.

Xie Huizhou found this praise very gratifying. Once he ran away, he could make a living selling paintings.

If that failed, he would keep drawing vulgar erotic pictures. That, too, was a way to earn a living in the Great Xia Dynasty, though scholars and men of refinement had long despised it as utterly devoid of scholarly integrity and truly shameful.

But people had to eat.

Xie Huizhou himself had collected quite a few erotic pictures and kept them in a secret chamber for reference, not daring to let anyone see them.

The pattern at Xie Huizhou's waist suddenly grew hot, as though something were approaching him. A shivering sensation crawled from the snake pattern up his spine.

"Huh? What the hell? Again?"

This behavior, like marking him, displeased him. Flushed to the ears, he frantically drew pictures casting Zhang Lanhe in all sorts of scenarios.

"You make me suffer, so I'm going to make things up about you! I'll make you the most famous star of Phoenix Paintings!"

The snake pattern grew increasingly strange, and from time to time, he could hear Zhang Lanhe calling to him.

[Where are you? Answer me. Come to my side, quickly.]

[Who exactly are you?]

It was always those same few lines, over and over.

Zhang Lanhe's beguiling voice kept tempting Xie Huizhou to seek him out. Anyone else would have fallen for that deep, magnetic voice and might well have delivered themselves to his door in a daze.

But was Xie Huizhou an ordinary person?

He had loved countless fictional characters. All kinds of gorgeous faces had cleansed his eyes, and all kinds of voice acting had delighted his ears. Xie Huizhou was not about to pin all his hopes on a single person.

By now, Xie Huizhou was immune to everything.

Beauty, wonderful as you are, I'm not coming over to offer myself up-not when my life is at stake!

A palace attendant suddenly rushed inside, looking panicked. "Your Highness!! This is bad! The State Preceptor is coming! He's almost at the entrance!"