Chapter 3205: Saving Zero Egg Bai Ze's Love Story 06

Midnight, the third watch.

Yiqi sat up with a swish, his golden-brown eyes wide open in the dark.

No, what's wrong with that cheap older brother?

Saying this in the middle of the night, who are you threatening?! He had clearly hidden Bai Ze properly, so how…

Wait.

He couldn't have already found out, could he?

Yiqi grew angrier the more he thought, lay down, turned over, pulled the covers over his head, and let out a muffled hum.

At the same time, Jin Chen in the next room also sat up with a swish, finally receiving the message sent back by the subordinate dispatched to investigate the Ninth Area.

: Jin Consultant, the preliminary sweep of the core area and surrounding regions of the Ninth Area has been completed; the designated target was not found. Should we expand the search scope?

Not having found the person he was looking for, Jin Chen stared at that message, slowly furrowing his brow.

He sent his subordinates to the Ninth Area to look for Chenshu. According to the original plotline, after Bai Ze was expelled from the Huaxia Empire with nowhere to go, he entered the Ninth Area, where he met Chenshu, and together they built a new force. Jin Chen's original plan was to have someone first lock onto Chenshu's coordinates, then, after he sorted things out with Yiqi and Bai Ze here, he would go over to meet his wife.

But there wasn't a single piece of news.

Jin Chen reopened the story generator in the system terminal, reread the section about the Ninth Area, then suddenly snapped the terminal onto the bedside table, lay face-up on the pillow, and stared at the ceiling.

No way……

Could it be that Bai Ze must follow the original plotline, only meeting Chenshu after entering the Ninth Area?

In other words, his wife and he have entered different timelines?

That would be terrible. If he and Chenshu ended up in different timelines, it would mean that after he finishes everything here, he'd still have to go to another time point to find his wife. Although the Quick Transmigration Bureau's transfer array is precise, cross-timeline operations are far more complicated and also involve worldline stability issues.

Jin Chen absolutely did not want to believe that possibility.

He replied to his subordinates, telling them to keep searching, expand the scope, and not miss any clue. At the same time, he hoped Chenshu would soon find a way to come directly to the Huaxia Empire to find him.

After sending the message, Jin Chen rolled over in annoyance and pulled the covers tight.

The first day without his wife, he missed her.

——

Next morning.

Bai Ze was brought out of the basement by the guards of Jin Manor.

After a night passed, his complexion remained pale, but his spirits were somewhat better than last night; wrapped in the coat the guards had handed him, he covered the mottled bloodstains on his shirt.

A carriage was already waiting at the main gate.

This meant they were sending him away.

Bai Ze stood at the gate, the morning breeze moving his hair; he turned his head toward the direction of the upper floor of the main courtyard, his eyes showing a hint of sadness, as if gazing far off at someone.

Too bad, as long as Yiqi didn't want to, he would never let Bai Ze see him.

The guard beside him softly urged, "Please."

Bai Ze withdrew his gaze, bent to sit in the carriage, and the carriage slowly drove out of Jin Manor's main gate.

At the same time, in the small garden on the upper level of the main courtyard.

The youth wore loungewear, his hair messy as if he'd just crawled out of bed, his golden-brown eyes fixed straight on the direction of the garden exit.

Jin Chen rose, took a few steps, came up behind Yiqi, followed his gaze outward, and just saw that carriage drive out of the main gate, disappearing around the street corner.

"You're so reluctant," Jin Chen drawled teasingly.

Yiqi abruptly turned, glaring up at Jin Chen, his emotions not yet settled, his eye sockets slightly red, "You knew all along?"

Jin Chen flicked his forehead, "With just that little ability, you still wanted to hide it from me?"

Yiqi jerked back from the flick, raised a hand to his forehead, pursed his lips, and visibly slumped. He crouched, head bowed, fingers tugging at the stems of fallen leaves under the flower rack, pulling them over and over without lifting his head.

Jin Chen couldn't bear to see him so dejected; he bent down, hauled him up from the ground, brought him to the wicker chair in the small garden, and sat him down, saying, "Have something to eat first, then stretch out your hand so I can take a look."

Yiqi took the snack, chewed a couple of bites, made an indistinct sound, reluctantly rolled up his left sleeve, and exposed the wound on his forearm.

The wound was on the inner side of the arm, its edge tinged with an abnormal dark red, the surface refusing to close, the edges slightly swollen; through the skin one could see the unhealthy discoloration underneath.

Jin Chen glanced at it a few times, his brow slightly furrowed.

He summoned Butler Weisen to bring the medical team that had been treating Yiqi all this time. The doctors arrived quickly; three people in white coats surrounded the young master's arm, examining, photographing, and taking samples, fussing for nearly twenty minutes. The lead doctor removed his stethoscope, his expression not good.

"Still the old problem," the doctor said, choosing his words carefully. "We've tried several conventional anti-infection regimens and wound-healing promoters, but the results are poor. The wound remains…… in a suppressed-like state, preventing the body's normal healing mechanism from functioning."

Jin Chen furrowed his brows, glanced at Yiqi; although the boy tried to act indifferent, a flash of sadness and pain still crossed his eyes.

Jin Chen ruffled his hair and asked the doctor, "What's the cause?"

"Possibly a special agent from the Thirteenth Area," the doctor said. "We've taken samples for testing, but there's no result yet."

Jin Chen nodded, signaling them to retreat.

He lifted his teacup, took a sip, and began rummaging through the mall; Zero Egg had followed him across worlds, gathering many good things, so the system mall should have plenty in stock.

After a while, he actually found something useful.

Jin Chen reached into his pocket, and when he pulled his hand out, his palm held a pill the size of a sugar bean.

"Eat it." He handed the pill to Yiqi.

Yiqi eyed the sugar-bean-sized pill dubiously, also glanced at Jin Chen, sniffed it with his nose—no medicinal smell, just a faint sweet fragrance.

He hesitated a moment, then took it and placed it in his mouth.

The next second, he stared wide-eyed in disbelief.

"I'm like this, and you give me a sugar bean?" Yiqi mumbled around the bean, protesting indistinctly, "Are you just fooling me…"

Before he could finish speaking, he suddenly froze; the faintly aching wound on his left arm no longer hurt, the burning pain vanishing completely.

Yiqi lowered his gaze to his arm; only the purplish traces were fading at a visible speed, and the edges of the wound were gradually returning to normal color.

The inexperienced Yiqi was stunned.

He lifted his head, blankly looking at Jin Chen, "What is this?"

Jin Chen calmly drank his tea, his expression unchanged, and said, "Poison."

Yiqi didn't believe it.

It must be the good stuff Dage secretly kept for his own benefit!

His hand didn't hurt anymore, his mood improved considerably, and even looking at Jin Chen became much more pleasing.

Their kindness, their fine virtues, all the qualities of being a good person—all returned in that moment when their arm stopped hurting.

Yiqi's gloom between the brows vanished, their expression became lively, and they took a big bite of the pastry.

"Come on, tell me," Jin Chen said, setting down his tea cup with a serious expression, "what exactly happened?"

Yiqi's chewing slowed down.

Yiqi set down the pastry in their hand, fell silent for a moment, and said, "That day I was out on business when I was suddenly ambushed by assassins. They were many, and I couldn't break free right away, so I sent a distress signal to Bai Ze."

"Bai Ze came quickly, but after arriving, they didn't help me capture the assassins; instead, they let all those assassins go."

Yiqi's tone was filled with resentment and unwillingness: "I asked them why, but they wouldn't say. I asked who sent those assassins, but they wouldn't say either."

"They wouldn't say anything."

Yiqi's voice lowered: "These past few months they've been acting strange, never taking the initiative to come see me, always busy, and still cold toward me. They weren't like this before."

"They definitely have someone else outside, definitely!" Yiqi said, letting out a petty hum, stuffed the crushed pastry into their mouth, and their cheeks puffed up.

"Have you carefully investigated the reason behind that pursuit?" Jin Chen asked.

Yiqi fell silent for a moment, took another two bites of the pastry, and firmly replied, "No."

"Why?"

"Why won't they tell me voluntarily!" Yiqi declared righteously, "This shows I'm not important at all!"

As they spoke, they got worked up, and before they knew it, they had made themselves angry.

Jin Chen: "……"

Quite simplistic, a black-and-white view of right and wrong, good and evil—no wonder they've turned love into this.

Jin Chen tapped the table twice, pulling Yiqi's attention back, and said, "Sit properly, listen to me."