Little Silly Aemeath

Aemeath stopped there. She seemed to realize that she had accidentally revealed the terrifying, almost pathological possessiveness deep in her heart.

She looked at Lu Yan apprehensively, afraid of seeing even the slightest trace of disgust or withdrawal in his eyes.

But she saw none of it.

In Lu Yan's eyes, there was only acceptance as calm as the deep sea, and love that was nearly overflowing.

Aemeath's words had not frightened him. On the contrary, his heart, which had been unable to find a home for so long, finally settled because of her clumsy, calculating possessiveness.

He lowered his head and pressed his forehead against Aemeath's. Their breaths mingled at that intimate distance.

"It's okay," Lu Yan said earnestly, looking into her eyes.

"I won't let you talk about yourself like that. There's no one in this world who could be better than you."

Lu Yan took her hand, brought it to his lips, and gently kissed it.

"Listen to me."

Lu Yan lowered his voice. "When I was sitting there eating just now, I couldn't actually taste a thing."

"Because all I could think about was how flustered you were in the kitchen, choking on the cooking fumes but still refusing to give up."

"Do you know? In the three years before I met you, I ate all kinds of takeout every day."

"Some of it tasted good. But when I ate it, it only felt like something to fill my stomach."

Lu Yan's gaze grew distant, as if he had returned to that cramped rented room. "I sat alone in front of my computer, staring at the screen and eating cold food. I thought that was all my life would ever be."

"But today, just now..."

Lu Yan's gaze returned to Aemeath's face. "Those ribs and that fish soup were the warmest meal I've had since I grew up."

"Because you made them with love."

"To me, that makes them ten thousand times more precious than anything else I could eat."

Lu Yan smiled faintly and reached out to stroke Aemeath's cheek with his thumb. "So don't blame yourself, and don't be afraid that I'll think less of you."

"You're so smart, Aemeath. You're the best at everything you learn. Something as simple as cooking is bound to get better with practice, right?"

Aemeath froze.

Her heart, once filled with frustration and panic, seemed to be swept away by a warm flood. Wrapped in that indulgent tenderness, her negative emotions quickly dissolved.

Looking into Lu Yan's trusting eyes, Aemeath suddenly realized how unnecessary her so-called strategies for controlling him had been.

She had thought she needed to keep Lu Yan by her side with perfect behavior, attentive care, and even a few little tricks.

But his actions had told her that he had already entered her cage of his own free will, put a deadlock on it himself, and handed her the key.

It turned out that for every bit of clumsy sincerity she gave him, he would return ten times as much acceptance.

"A-Yan~" Aemeath's voice softened completely.

The vulnerability in her eyes gradually faded, replaced by a passion so deep it seemed capable of swallowing someone whole.

"You're really too cunning," Aemeath murmured.

She closed her eyes again, took a deep breath, and buried her face in the crook of Lu Yan's neck.

She greedily breathed in the scent unique to Lu Yan, feeling the steady pulse of the artery in his neck.

"Since you say so, A-Yan..." Aemeath's hands slid slowly up Lu Yan's back until they reached his shoulders, her fingers tangling tightly in his short hair.

Her voice regained its usual sweetness. "Then I'll cook for you every day from now on, A-Yan. I'll memorize every recipe, down to the exact amount of every gram of salt and every drop of oil..."

Aemeath leaned close to Lu Yan's ear. Her warm breath accompanied her whisper, wrapping around him layer upon layer like an airtight net:

"I'll make food that suits your taste buds better than anything else in the world. I'll brand your stomach, your body, every one of your cells as mine alone."

"By then, even if you want to eat someone else's cooking, A-Yan, you'll instinctively find it disgusting. You'll have no choice but to come back to me obediently and eat what I feed you."

"Does that sound good, A-Yan?"

Lu Yan listened to her almost pathological declaration and promise, feeling the lingering ache in his stomach, yet he felt not the slightest disgust or fear.

Instead, he felt an unprecedented satisfaction.

"Okay," Lu Yan answered without hesitation.

He turned his head slightly and pressed a light kiss to Aemeath's soft cheek.

"I'll wait for you. For the rest of my life, I'll only eat food you make."

When Aemeath heard Lu Yan say "okay," the tears that had finally receded almost welled up in her eyes again.

She was about to say something more, to bind this man firmly within her territory with even more intimate words, when Lu Yan suddenly chuckled.

His laugh was quiet, tinged with resignation.

His broad palm stroked Aemeath's back. "Aemeath, haven't you forgotten something important?"

"Huh?" Aemeath paused and tilted her head up slightly from his embrace, a trace of confusion flashing through her watery eyes. "Forgotten what?"

Lu Yan lowered his head and gently brushed the tip of her nose with his finger. "Have you forgotten that I know most things about you?"

Aemeath's eyes widened at once.

"In the first few days after you found me, didn't you already look up everything about that game?"

Lu Yan's smile deepened as he looked at Aemeath's adorably dazed expression. "Even though the information about you was gone, I still remember most things about you."

At those words, Aemeath's brain seemed to shut down for a moment.

Then, as if all her tension had suddenly been drained away, her cheeks flushed bright red, the color spreading to the tips of her ears.

"Ah..." Aemeath covered her face. The commanding air she had carried just moments ago shattered instantly.

She buried her head in the crook of Lu Yan's neck again in frustration, like an ostrich sticking its head in the sand. Her muffled voice carried a hint of embarrassed indignation:

"I... I was too scared just now! All I could think about was that you'd dislike me for ruining the meal and think I was unreasonable. I actually forgot something so important this whole time."

She was clearly very smart, but faced with the fear that Lu Yan might leave her, her brilliant brain had temporarily short-circuited.

Thinking of how frightened and uneasy she had been, Aemeath couldn't help laughing.

Tears still clung to her eyelashes, but the corners of her mouth had already lifted high. She was truly smiling through her tears.

Lu Yan took the opportunity to hold her tighter, resting his chin on top of her head. His voice grew infinitely gentle. "So, you see, it's not like I don't know what you're like."

"I also know how deeply possessive you are beneath that cheerful exterior."

Lu Yan took a deep breath and honestly spoke the words he had kept buried in his heart these past few days. "It's precisely because I know all of you, because I know how obsessively you'd give up everything for me, that I'm even more grateful I'm the one you treasure so much."

Aemeath grew quiet in his arms, leaving only the sound of her soft breathing.

After a long while, she finally raised her head again. This time, there was no panic in her eyes, nor any of the urgency born of unease. Only pure attachment remained.

"A-Yan is a big idiot." Aemeath gave him a coquettish glare, her finger tracing small circles on his chest.

Aemeath looked him in the eyes with utmost seriousness and declared her boundaries. "I won't imprison you, and I won't break your wings."

"A-Yan is free. You can draw whatever you want and see whatever you want of the world. I wouldn't stoop to physically locking you up."

She lifted her chin proudly, absolute confidence shining in her eyes:

"What I'm going to do is make you discover, after a whole day of flying through this vast world, that there's nowhere you can sleep peacefully except by my side."

"I'll make you fly back to me every day, entirely of your own free will."

"Mm, I know." Lu Yan smiled and nodded.

"But..."

Aemeath suddenly changed the subject. Her gaze fell on Lu Yan's stomach, and her brows knitted slightly as concern returned to her face. "As touching as that is, my cooking really was awful. Your stomach must feel terrible right now, doesn't it?"

Before Lu Yan could force himself to say he was fine, Aemeath had already pulled him out of the kitchen.

"Go lie down on the couch! Don't move!" Aemeath ordered firmly.

"I saw some digestive tablets in the medicine box earlier. I'll get you some warm water right now!"

Lu Yan watched her bustle around the living room like a gust of wind. Leaning against the soft back of the couch, he felt the tension in his stomach miraculously ease quite a bit.