The Emperor’s Runaway Lover

TW: gore

“What’s that fucking haircut? It’s killing me, hahahaha-”

“Fuck, and I had bet fifty coins too!”

“Don’t worry, the competition hasn’t officially started yet. It’s not strange that Boss He might underestimate his opponent at first.”

“But his hair, hahahaha!”

It was impossible to stop their laughter, even though there were about a dozen thugs cursing them out. The group of people in the bar kept laughing out loud, completely forgetting the fear they usually felt towards He Lei.

“Fu Yucheng, you-” He Lei was so pissed off that, for a moment, he was speechless.

He discreetly glanced to the side, only to see Xu Nana’s dumbfounded expression. Feeling that he’d even lost face in front of his crush, he could barely wait to tear Fu Yucheng to pieces.

Seeing that He Lei’s eyes were red with anger, Fu Yucheng quickly comforted him, “Boss He, don’t worry. I know a great hairdresser with good skills. Have him shave the hair on the right side and trim it all a bit, and it’s a regular undercut. The other day, the proprietress told me that it’s her favorite hairstyle because it’s very manly. Boss He, you don’t even know her tastes after chasing her for so long? No wonder it’s been such a failure so far!”

He Lei glared at Fu Yucheng, his chest rising and falling violently.

After a long while, he took a deep breath, forced himself to calm down, and carefully looked at his opponent.

A moment ago, Fu Yucheng’s blade had flown by like a ghost, leaving no trace. He hadn’t sensed it at all. A move like that not only requires a lightning fast blade, but also absolutely terrifying skills.

He Lei realized that he had seriously underestimated the enemy.

He stared at Fu Yucheng and slowly raised the scimitar in his hand, paying his respects to the opponent.

Fu Yucheng raised his eyebrows slightly, and lifted his own blue scimitar to match.

Two scimitars, one a faint blue, the other bright as snow, their tips barely touching.

Seen from above, they formed a silhouette similar to a capital S, matching traditional Taoist aesthetics.1

The bar fell silent.

In this extreme silence, the bright scimitar gradually turned red. Within a few seconds, the entire blade looked like a red hot soldering iron, exuding heat.

“Fu Yucheng, I didn’t intend to use my psionic power,” He Lei said solemnly, “but you are a worthy opponent, and you deserve to be treated as such.”

“That’s not fair.” Bai Mo’s tone resembled drifting ice flakes.

Fu Yucheng smiled at him calmly. “Little Mo, don’t worry, it’s okay.”

He looked at the red hot scimitar. “He Lei, so it turns out you’re a heat manipulator. Up until just now I thought you were a force manipulator, silly me. It’s just that you seem like the type that only knows how to use brute force.”

The so-called psionic manipulators were divided into ten levels, starting from third class level I all the way up to S-class, depending on factors such as the size of their psionic field or the type of skills they could use.

In addition, depending on the type of interference with the laws of physics, they were divided into six major systems. Namely, strength, heat, light, electrical, special, and hybrid system. Most manipulators belonged to a single system, and special and hybrid system manipulators were very uncommon.

He Lei was a simple heat manipulator.

Without answering Fu Yucheng’s taunts, he simply sneered and slashed with his blade straight at him.

On the surface of the magnificent scimitar blade, a layer of scarlet flames ignited instantly, twisting around like a billowing fire dragon, roaring towards Fu Yucheng.

Moving like a flash of light, Fu Yucheng jerked backwards, only to feel a sharp pain on his face.

The fierce fire dragon almost singed the tip of his nose, sweeping straight past.

He didn’t even have time to get up and could only roll over and over in order to skillfully avoid the violent flames.2

He Lei was a tall man and he swung his sword fiercely. Seeing the other rolling and dodging, he burst into action, violently slashing at him with the scimitar.

For a moment, people could barely see what was going on inside the small dance floor. The only thing visible was a red fire dragon flying up and down, its flames overwhelming.

From time to time, the tail made of flame swept over the audience, leaving sparks in its wake, immediately producing a burst of yells and cries.

Bai Mo pressed his lips tightly and intently stared at the scenario. He was always calm, but at this point he was so anxious that he couldn’t stop himself from clenching his fists.

Without anyone noticing, a layer of frost silently spread over his fingers. The thin layer disappeared in a flash, and even Bai Mo was none the wiser.

" "

‘Psss’

Fu Yucheng didn’t manage to dodge. The fire dragon brushed past his left arm with just a soft sound, but large bright red blisters appeared immediately on his skin.

He clutched his left arm, staggering from the pain, and leaned weakly against a steel pipe by the dance floor, slowly sliding down.

“Fu Yucheng, you’ve lost!” He Lei sneered. “Now I will take your two eyes with my own hands!”

With a thought, the flames condensed into a thin, red hot blade that flew straight towards Fu Yucheng’s eyes.

The crowd cried out.

“He Lei, stop!” The proprietress screamed and covered her eyes, not daring to look anymore.

Upon seeing the situation, Bai Mo, immediately ran towards the dance floor.

At the very last moment, Fu Yucheng held onto the steel pipe at his back and swung his whole body in the air, using the centrifugal force to kick He Lei’s wrist at full strength.

He Lei was caught off guard and his hand let the scimitar go.

Fu Yucheng’s big leap in the air ended with him landing at He Lei’s back. He kicked his opponent’s knee, forcing He Lei to kneel down. He Lei felt a slightly cold sensation at his neck. The blue blade was quietly resting against his skin.

The bar fell so silent, one could have heard a pin drop.

He Lei knelt in the middle of the dance floor, with his entire body trembling, and, for a while, his mind was completely blank.

He gritted his teeth, then suddenly roared, curving his fingers and reaching for his own eyes.

Xu Nana screamed. “He Lei, no!”

Faster than it could be described, Fu Yucheng switched the grip on his scimitar and, using skill rather than force, he knocked the back of He Lei’s hands.

He Lei’s hands got deflected.

He Lei was dumbfounded. Abruptly, he turned his head around to glare at Fu Yucheng.”I, He Lei, am willing to make a bet and lose. I will give you these eyes, what else do you want?!”

Fu Yucheng retired his blade with one smooth movement, and shrugged. “What do I want your eyes for, to make wine? Tsk, gross.”

For a moment, He Lei was taken aback. “Then what do you mean? I don’t want you to pretend to be doing me favors.”

Fu Yucheng smiled. “This favor is not for you.”

With his chin, he pointed  at the proprietress who stood by the dance floor. “It’s for the proprietress.”

He Lei followed his gaze faintly, only to see Xu Nana by the dance floor, her pretty face  bloodless. She had a small tear in her eye. “He Lei, you big idiot.”

He Lei blinked and for a while, he did not react. After a long moment, he murmured, “She’s worried about me…? Wasn’t, wasn’t she hoping I’d die?”

Fu Yucheng rolled his eyes so hard that they almost reached the ceiling. “Boss He, you are really stupid.”

He Lei was frozen for a long time before he vaguely seemed to understand something. Stiffly, he stood up and looked at Xu Nana with a dumbfounded expression.

This unrepentant bully had suddenly turned into a dumb boy who didn’t even know where to put his hands and feet.

“You-” He opened his mouth, but he didn’t know what to say.

He felt choked and ended up asking directly, “Do you, do you like me too?”

The entire bar was filled with loud whistles.

“Answer him!”

“Good luck, Boss He!”

“Move in together!”3

“Get out of here!” Xu Nana stomped her feet and, with a red face, turned around and started to walk away.

He Lei, confused again, didn’t know what it meant.

He looked at his thugs for help.

The baldie, Aaron, mouthed: “Boss, come on!” while Mr. Wei glared at He Lei, dissatisfied with him for not rising up to the occasion.4

He Lei’s mind suddenly cleared up. He stepped forward and pulled Xu Nana back, following with a ferocious and passionate kiss. The proprietress struggled weakly and then put her arms around his neck.

The whistles and cheers in the bar came close to blowing up the ceiling, and everyone yelled out at once, “Hooray!”5

Fu Yucheng looked at the two of them kissing, smiled and shook his head. “Love really turns people into fools.”

He smoothly stroked a section of Bai Mo’s hair. “Brat, you should pay attention. In a couple years you’ll be chasing girls too.”

Bai Mo frowned, not understanding. “Why would I chase a girl?”

Fu Yucheng paused, unsure on how to respond. “You’ll know when the time comes.”

He Lei and Xu Nana kissed for a long time before parting reluctantly.

He Lei still felt dizzy and like he couldn’t believe it. “Nana, for real?”

The proprietress couldn’t avoid laughing, and stretched out her hand to push against his forehead. “You fool, if you hadn’t been so arrogant and unreasonable, maybe we would have gotten together ages ago! Let me be clear, you can’t be doing this sort of thing in the future.”

Before she could finish speaking, a cold light flashed before her eyes.

Some unknown warm liquid with a strange smell splashed against the delicate makeup on her face.

" "

He Lei’s body fell limp, and a large amount of blood spewed out like a fountain from the hole in his neck, splashing all the way to the ceiling.

A gentle voice rang out. “Everyone is having such a good time, yet no one invited me, Mo Ziwei? I’m wounded.”

Once this soft and pleasant voice was heard, a thin young man slowly walked into the bar.

His height was average, and he was wearing a black Tang suit6 with dark gold piping, a green ghost mask covering the upper half of his face. The only thing visible was a delicate white chin with a pair of smiling lips.

A slender chain was wrapped around the young man’s left arm, and a sharp hook hung from one of its ends. The whole blade glowed with a faint blue light, resembling a luminescent mutant viper.

At the moment, there was something round stuck on the tip of the hook.

It was He Lei’s detached head.

Author’s comment:

Mo Ziwei, this guy is a degenerate, but he also has a backstory. I will talk about it later.

I liked He Lei T_T so sad…

Special thanks in this chapter to Toon and Wintery ^^

If you want to support the translation, get me a coffee, I need to replenish the liquid I’ve lost crying~

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Footnotes

The raws call it ‘a Tai Chi divider like a capital S’, it seems to refer to the S line in the middle of the yin and yang symbol. Regarding 道家美学 Taoist aesthetics, according to Baidu it’s one of the classic Chinese schools that correlate beauty with elements such as simplicity and nature. 游龙出海 ‘Like a dragon flying out to the sea’ apparently was the title of a painting and is now used to describe something done smoothly/skillfully.This one actually says 入赘入赘 meaning matrilocal marriage, which refers to marrying into the wife’s household as opposed to the usual case of the wife joining the husband’s household. I imagine a similar concept would be telling him to take her surname in countries where wives usually take husbands’ names, though neither are a thing where I’m from, and neither of them make good cheers in English! My proofreader suggested ‘peg him’ but I’m not so shameless ¬¬;;;恨铁不成钢 literally ‘wishing iron could turn into steel at once’.”请客请客” which refers to the host providing proper entertainment for the guests at a party. Once again, it doesn’t quite roll off the tongue in English.A Tangzhuan is a kind of Chinese jacket with a straight collar. It is an updated form of the Qing magua, which itself is a more fashionable adaptation of the riding jacket once worn by Manchu horsemen. Source.