Thrown out of the house, the wet nurse enters the noble household and becomes a person of high statu

Liu Wenying knelt beside him, her gaze carefully scanning his face, as if to confirm that he was still alive.

She raised her hand, wanting to touch him, but stopped in mid-air and pulled it back.

He's a germaphobe and doesn't like strangers touching him; she remembered that, how could she have almost forgotten?

Pei Zeyu looked at the hand that had retracted and suddenly felt a pang of unease.

"What are you afraid of? Are you disgusted by me?"

Liu Wenying froze, then shook her head: "I didn't..."

"Then why don't you touch me?"

Before she could answer, Pei Zeyu interrupted, "Are you afraid that if I die, you'll be all alone at the bottom of this cliff and won't be able to get back alive?"

"How could that be?!" Liu Wenying hurriedly denied.

"Second Master saved me, so it's only right that I take care of him. What I'm afraid of is that Second Master... will never wake up again."

"Besides, didn't we agree to go back alive together?"

Pei Zeyu was stunned, then took her hands and pressed them against his face.

"You felt it? I'm still alive."

Liu Wenying touched his brow bone with her fingertips, feeling the slight protrusion of the curve.

He looked at her directly, his eyes as calm as a thin mist, showing neither rejection nor eagerness, but rather a kind of indulgence.

Tolerating her transgressions.

Liu Wenying never imagined that one day she would measure such a handsome face with her hands, with his permission.

"I felt it."

With comfort, Liu Wenying was finally able to put her mind at ease.

Flames leaped, turning the cave walls a warm orange hue.

After a moment of silence, Liu Wenying couldn't help but ask, "Second Master?"

"Um?"

"I feel like you're afraid of people being nice to you?"

The other party didn't say anything, so we can continue, right?

Liu Wenying mustered her courage and cautiously probed.

"Like Madam Pei, I can tell that Madam Pei wants to be good to the Second Master, but the Second Master always coldly refuses and cuts off any further talks. After this happened many times, Madam Pei doesn't dare to bring it up again..."

"What do you know?"

Pei Zeyu's voice turned cold, carrying his usual defensive and aloof tone.

"I don't understand, but only when Second Master explains it will others understand, right?"

The cave returned to deathly silence, broken only by the rhythmic, hollow sound of dripping water.

Pei Zeyu's mind was still a little foggy.

The days of being together through life and death, her vulnerability during her illness, and her words "we" all challenged the defenses he had built up over the years.

The wall was high and thick, and he had been trapped inside alone for so long that he had almost forgotten there was light outside.

At that moment, someone gently knocked on the door of my heart in the darkness.

His Adam's apple bobbed, and he managed to squeeze out a low, hoarse sentence.

"Do you... really want to know?"

Liu Wenying was stunned; his question was too serious and dangerous.

The feeling was like he was standing in front of a closed door, holding the key in his hand.

If she nodded, he would push open the door and let her in.

Once you go in, you can never come out or escape.

To be entangled with him for life, to bear his secrets, and to share his pain.

Liu Wenying felt a chill run down her spine, but she didn't want to see him in any danger.

She no longer wanted to spend the long days and nights alone by the fire, listening to his painful murmurs, yet being powerless to do anything about it.

"Second Master, please tell me."

The fire crackled and popped, and Pei Zeyu spoke slowly, his voice tight.

"When I was three years old, I was kidnapped and locked in an abandoned, dilapidated house."

Liu Wenying held her breath.

"The house was always flooded, the rotten vegetable leaves were soaked and smelled bad, and there were mold and insects everywhere."

There was nowhere to sit, let alone lie down; I could only curl up in the mud.

At the age of three, he realized for the first time that people could live like livestock.

"The food they gave me was spoiled leftovers. If I didn't eat it, I would go hungry until my vision went black and my stomach felt like it was being stabbed with knives."

"Later they found out I hated being dirty, so they deliberately tortured me by washing me."

The young master of the Duke of Yu's mansion, born into a life of luxury, actually complains about dirt?

Then let him taste what real filth is.

"They pushed my head into a bucket of sewage."

The water was dirty and smelly; it poured into my mouth and nose and choked me in my lungs.

As I struggled, they pressed down harder until I was almost suffocating before they finally pulled me up.

He took a couple of breaths, then pressed down again... repeating this more than ten times.

Liu Wenying recalled his stubborn refusal to drink water; it turned out that it wasn't affectation, but a fear etched into his bones.

Any unclean water will make him feel physically nauseous.

"They stripped me naked, leaving me with nothing, like livestock waiting to be slaughtered. They surrounded me and laughed, saying that the young master of the Duke of Yu's mansion was no different from a wild dog now."

Liu Wenying's throat felt like it was blocked by a damp cotton ball; just listening to it made her feel suffocated.

"That day, they captured a woman and, in front of me... forcibly defiled her."

There is blood in my memory, lots of blood.

Screams and cries, and the menacing grins of those people.

He was only three years old at the time and didn't understand what they were doing. He just felt nauseous and vomited.

The images and sounds are like a branding iron, etched into my mind, unforgettable for a lifetime.

"They also..."

"Stop talking, Second Master, please stop talking..."

The calmer he became as he recounted those nightmarish past events, the more peacefully he spoke.

Her heart felt like it was being crushed again and again, the pain almost suffocating her.

Now I understand why my godmother only mentioned the fact that my second master was kidnapped when he was a child.

He was missing for a month and was found covered in injuries.

Physical wounds can heal, but those in the heart never will.

Behind those seemingly casual words lies an unspeakable hell he endured alone.

What happened during those days of disappearance cannot be summarized in just a few words.

Every time I recall it, it's like tearing open a wound and getting hurt again.

Liu Wenying dared not imagine how he had endured it.

A three-year-old child, enduring day after day in that kind of place.

I survived until I was rescued, survived until I grew up, and survived until now I can tell those stories without batting an eye.

But did he really pull through?

What was saved was only his body; his soul was forever trapped in that dark, abandoned dilapidated house.

He was so calm it was almost numb, as if he were telling someone else's story, but every word he spoke was chilling.

As Liu Wenying listened, her eyes grew increasingly hot, and the tip of her nose stung with tears.

She bit her lip, trying not to cry.

But the tears just wouldn't stop, falling drop by drop onto the back of his hand and onto his clothes.

For the first time, he opened up the wound that he had buried for so long and placed it in front of her.

Realizing her lapse in composure, Liu Wenying turned her face away and wiped it away roughly with her sleeve.

"Second Master, I understand. I will never touch you without your permission again."

This was the only thing she could think of that she could do for him: respect his boundaries.

Before he could finish speaking, Pei Zeyu retorted hastily, "No, no need."

"Over the years, I've known I've lived like an oddball, and I want to be... a normal person."

What he found even more unacceptable than being touched was being deliberately kept away from by her.

Liu Wenying was completely stunned.

She never imagined that she could help him.

She had initially thought that the unavoidable touches, made out of caregiving, would only disgust him.

…………