Meeting a beauty among the flowers was the standard scene for the male and female leads to meet in many stories.
But those leads were usually handsome men and beautiful women. When they first met, if they weren't gazing at each other with affection, their hearts were at least fluttering like startled deer.
Today, however, when it happened to Xu Xiao, it provoked a shout of alarm:
"How dare you, you savage brute! How did you get into Mantuo Manor?"
It turned out that the Wang family servants working in the camellia grove had spotted Xu Xiao openly barging in.
After that shout,
several tall, sturdy maidservants emerged from the camellia grove, picked up the farm tools beside them or drew the long sabers they carried, and immediately headed toward Xu Xiao.
Hey, wait. I haven't even met the person I came for yet. Why are you lot making trouble?
Xu Xiao also recognized who these maidservants were.
They were no ordinary farm servants working the fields, but flower servants Li Qingluo had specially trained to guard her home.
Because Duan Zhengchun had seduced and abandoned Li Qingluo, she refused to allow men onto the island and had specially trained this group of martial arts-practicing maidservants to serve there.
They usually did the island's menial work, but when outsiders who didn't know whether to live or die came ashore, they served as guards.
Thanks to Li Qingluo, the Wang family possessed martial arts manuals from across the world, brought out of Langhuan Blessed Land, and the maidservants they had trained were already quite skilled.
The maidservants, who had been tending the camellias, immediately attacked when they saw a strange man on the island.
If they caught him, he would make another fine batch of flower fertilizer.
"How annoying. You blind fools really know how to spoil a good mood."
His pleasant search for a beauty among the flowers interrupted, Xu Xiao lost all interest.
He waved a hand. This time he didn't use his iron shards; the power of Telekinesis alone restrained the four maidservants rushing at him.
The next second, the force lifted them into the air and flung them off in all directions.
Since this was his first meeting with Wang Yuyan, Xu Xiao didn't want to leave blood everywhere. For once, he refrained from killing.
As for whether the maidservants he had thrown would survive, that depended on how hard their lives were.
"Who is it? Nanny Zhang, who's there?"
A voice as sweet and clear as a lark's came from the flowers nearby. The sound alone was enough to intoxicate a listener.
Wang Yuyan had evidently heard the commotion and couldn't help calling out to ask.
With a voice like that, she must be Wang Yuyan, the one I've come for. I wonder if she looks exactly like the jade carving!
As the saying went, you could hear her voice and know her beauty. A peerless beauty truly showed perfection in every part of her.
Just imagining Wang Yuyan's beauty made Xu Xiao's heart restless.
Without waiting for the beauty to ask again in her anxiety, Xu Xiao quickened his pace, taking two steps as one. In just a few strides, he reached a dense cluster of camellias.
He casually pushed aside the camellias in his way and saw a young woman in a white ruqun seated in a pavilion, anxiously craning her neck to look in his direction.
Clearly, the young woman had already heard the noise Xu Xiao made as he approached.
"You! Who are you?"
Wang Yuyan was evidently somewhat educated and well-mannered. Seeing Xu Xiao's fierce face, she did not cry out in alarm like the others, but asked timidly instead.
But Xu Xiao, seeing Wang Yuyan for the first time, was plainly captivated by her beauty and forgot to answer for a moment.
Just how beautiful was Wang Yuyan? Heh, she was even prettier than the actress who played her on television, as though she had stepped straight out of a painting.
Xu Xiao stared at her in a daze for a long time, unable to find a single word to describe her.
Only after quite a while did he put away that besotted look and mumble out a sentence:
"To think there's such a beauty in the world! People really do look different from one another."
Hearing this, Wang Yuyan, still a young maiden, blushed with shyness.
The girl knew little of the world and had been raised in the inner chambers from childhood. She could count the men she had met on her fingers, and the one she had seen most was her cousin Murong Fu.
Hearing a strange man suddenly praise her, she immediately grew shy. But then Wang Yuyan asked again:
"Who on earth are you? How did you come to my family's island? And where are Nanny Zhang and the others?"
"Never mind, I won't ask you anymore. Hurry and leave. If they see a man coming onto the island uninvited, they'll beat you and kill you."
As the saying went, a beautiful person had a kind heart. A person's face really could reveal something of their character.
Wang Yuyan was pure and beautiful, like a heavenly immortal, and kindhearted too, unlike her jealous and vicious mother.
Knowing the rules her mother had set, she immediately advised Xu Xiao to leave out of kindness.
But Xu Xiao had come precisely for her. How could he bear to leave?
Not only did he stay, he took several steps forward and walked straight into the pavilion.
Only three or four paces from Wang Yuyan, he could already smell the faint, delicate fragrance coming from her.
"You..." Wang Yuyan was at a loss and could only move a few steps to the side, but Xu Xiao followed close behind.
"Don't come any closer! Men and women must not touch!"
Wang Yuyan grew anxious, parting her cherry lips in an attempt to bind Xu Xiao with that set of moral rules.
But if Xu Xiao had been a moral gentleman, how could he have done such a thing?
On the contrary, the shy, fearful expression on Wang Yuyan's face only made the fire in his heart burn hotter. He excitedly reached out.
He seized her delicate hand and, with a slight tug, pulled Wang Yuyan into his arms.
The beauty was in his embrace, her warm fragrance filling his nose.
Even though Xu Xiao had enjoyed the favors of two great beauties just last night, his heart was still like a restless monkey and his thoughts like a galloping horse.
"Wonderful, wonderful! Wang Yuyan, from this day on, you're mine."
"Let go! Let go of me, you lecher!"
Even Wang Yuyan, a maiden who knew little of the world, knew that the man before her was taking advantage of her.
Although Zhu Xi's Neo-Confucianism had not yet emerged in the world, the strict separation between men and women had existed since ancient times.
A strange man had forcibly pulled her straight into his arms, and the scent of him as a man washed over her, turning her entire pretty face bright red.
Her two little pink fists pounded Xu Xiao's chest as she spoke, seven parts shy and three parts angry:
"Let go of me, let go at once! If my cousin finds out you've treated me so indecently, he won't let you get away with it."
Wang Yuyan had admired her cousin since childhood, so being held in Xu Xiao's arms naturally brought him to mind.
If only it were my cousin holding me.
"You mean Murong Fu, right? Never mind that he isn't here-even if he were, what could he do?"
Xu Xiao's face was full of disdain. He scooped her up from beneath with his other arm, carrying the beauty in his arms like a princess.
"Who dares fight me for a woman I've set my sights on? Never mind a good-for-nothing like Murong Fu, who thinks only of restoring his kingdom-even among everyone under heaven, who would dare oppose me?"
"You... how can you speak of my cousin like that?"
Hearing Xu Xiao speak of her most beloved cousin, Wang Yuyan forgot that she was being held in his arms and opened her mouth to retort.
"All right, save your strength. You'll learn for yourself how your cousin conducts himself in time. Besides, he might not even have taken a fancy to you."
Xu Xiao couldn't be bothered to argue with her. He soared into the air with Wang Yuyan in his arms, just as A Zhu and A Bi came hurrying over.
"You two come up as well. Now that everyone's been found, come with me to the Central Plains martial world first."
Under the influence of Telekinesis, the two women on the ground also rose into the air against their will.
Fortunately, they had already experienced it once and didn't scream.
And so, Xu Xiao took the three beauties straight toward Gusu City.