Quick Transmigration and Childbirth: The Target is Not Human

Zhang Wang said the two of them would drink until they were drunk, but he still let Lu Xize come back early.

They teased him quite a bit at the dinner table, saying, "Brother, I understand! Brother Shao Huai is unconscious, and anyone would treat his wife like a precious gem, afraid of dropping her or melting her in their mouth. I just never expected this—"

He shook his head, making an exaggerated gesture of lament: "Our fearless Young Marshal Lu has finally met his end! What was his name again? Oh right, someone's taken his soul and tied it to his belt!"

Perhaps it was a synesthesia from the black beans, but Lu Xize found it hard to describe the unease in his heart.

This unease intensified as he returned to the foot of Xiangshan Temple, reaching its peak as he strode towards the dark meditation room. He abruptly pushed open the door—

The room was completely dark, with no lights on.

Moonlight streamed through the window, casting pale, dappled patterns on the ground.

The table and the bed were empty except for a snow-white letter, which was weighed down by a paperweight and was dazzlingly white in the moonlight.

Lu Xize's heart sank suddenly, and he almost lunged at the table, grabbing the letter.

That's... a divorce agreement.

She wrote it to her brother.

The familiar address between the words felt like a red-hot branding iron burning into his eyes.

The handwriting at the beginning was remarkably neat, and the format and honorifics were quite particular, revealing the writer's cruel yet polite flattery.

"I, Xia Yangyang, with a sorrowful heart, tearfully inform my husband... Since our marriage, I have never dared to be immoral... But I have heard that you have a new wife, and she is secretly pregnant... This news struck me like a thunderbolt, and my heart is burning with grief... Since you have abandoned our past affections, I dare not further defile our family..."

But gradually, the strokes began to get out of control, the characters became larger and larger, more and more illegible, and the force penetrated the back of the paper.

"...Since you have betrayed me, why should I linger? The vows we made back then still echo in my ears, but now they are nothing but dust!...My heart is dead, my love is severed. I wish you and your new love to grow old together in harmony...From now on, let us part ways peacefully and each find our own happiness!"

The last two characters, "joy," were written with such force that they seemed to tear the paper apart, the ink splashing everywhere and the characters were no longer recognizable.

What struck Lu Xize even more was the dark stains, blurred by tears, covering large areas of handwriting.

She found out anyway.

He still thought he could buy some time and perhaps have a chance to turn things around.

Lu Xize felt the blood rush to his head and then freeze into ice in the next moment.

The sordid atmosphere of the northern mansion contrasts sharply with the purity of the girl praying under the tree. The image of her brother, the unseen Chen Shi, and her sister-in-law's tear stains... all these images collide in her mind.

For the first time, he resented his elder brother's infidelity, resenting that since his brother was already engaged to his sister-in-law, why did he still seek another woman?!

Having already found a beautiful woman, why waste your elder sister-in-law's sincere feelings?

Such an elder brother is not worthy of his elder sister-in-law's love, nor of her sincere affection!

Lu Xize grabbed the paper and ran out, frantically searching the temple. He called her name, making such a racket that he woke up most of the monks at Xiangshan Temple.

A young monk rushed over carrying a lantern. Seeing his distraught appearance, he clasped his hands in prayer and sighed, "Amitabha. Are you looking for the female benefactor who came with you?"

Where is she??

"That female benefactor... about two hours ago, asked this humble monk for a jar of wine," the monk pointed to the path leading to the back mountain, "and went to the back mountain alone."

*

Lu Xize was extremely anxious, his sharp eyes searching everywhere.

Finally, at the edge of a cliff, they saw a little girl sitting there all alone, drinking her sorrows away.

The wind tousled her hair, and her slender neck was tilted back.

He poured bowl after bowl of liquor down his throat.

This scene was heartbreaking for Lu Xize.

The more I knew her fierce spirit, the more I understood her resolute determination and grief at this moment.

He stepped forward, grabbed her shoulder, and pulled her back from the dangerous edge of the cliff.

He then snatched the porcelain bowl from her hand: "Come back with me."

"Go back..." she murmured, her swollen eyes filled with confusion. Then, finding her own agonizing over the question utterly ridiculous, she burst out laughing, turning to Lu Xize. "Go back to where?"

"..."

"I have no home anymore."

The entire Changshi family was massacred, and she could not return to the Changshi family.

A new noblewoman has joined the Lu family mansion, and she is equally humiliated.

Her eyes were glistening with tears, like a peony broken by a storm, its petals scattered and its branches and leaves disheveled.

Yet, because of its complete collapse, it exudes a breathtaking beauty.

Lu Xize's Adam's apple bobbed, and the words hidden in his heart surged to his lips with the help of alcohol and the night.

Who says you don't have a home?

Wherever I, Lu Xize, am, that's home for you.

I will respect and love you a thousand times better than my brother has ever treated you.

But his five fingers tightened suddenly on her shoulder, and then he restrained himself and loosened them.

"Go back to the Lu family." His voice was low and hoarse, but it severed all possibility of his wishful thinking. "As long as I am here, you will always have a place in the Lu family, elder sister-in-law."

The night wind lifted a corner of his coat, and he saw a fleeting look of despair in her eyes.

She turned her head, picked up the wine jar, and shakily aimed it at her lips, but just as she made the gesture of pouring, he snatched it away with one hand.

"You are the eldest daughter-in-law of the Lu family, and you wrote the divorce papers. It's all your brother's fault. Why should you leave with nothing? The Lu family owes you, and we will repay it all when your brother wakes up. If he doesn't wake up, I will repay it for him."

On the surface, it appears to be a wise and weighty sense of responsibility, but every word sets clear boundaries.

Seeing that she remained silent, Lu Xize squatted down to meet her hazy gaze: "The Xia family are meritorious, and the descendants of meritorious people must not be insulted in front of me."

"From now on, the headquarters will be your support. If you want to live in the Lu family mansion, I will send my personal guards to protect you and give you peace and quiet. If you want to move out, I will arrange everything for you. You don't need to have any trivial worries. As for that Chen mother and son..."

He paused, a ruthless glint flashing in his eyes before disappearing into the darkness: "How can the Lu family genealogy be defiled by such treacherous individuals? While I cannot expel it, I will not allow any of the outer disciples to set foot in the ancestral hall."

Lu Xize felt that this was the most legitimate and substantial protection and explanation he could give her.

But in the half-minute of silence after he finished speaking and waited for her response, his heart beat faster and faster. How light and thin he could be.

The mountain wind howled in the stillness.

She suddenly turned around, her dreamy eyes fixed on him with an unwavering gaze, her beauty beyond compare.

Her voice was soft, tinged with the slurred quality of drunkenness: "Lu Xize, tell me, what do I lack compared to that Chen woman?"

Lu Xize replied firmly, "She's not even worthy of carrying your shoes!"

But she seemed not to hear his angry rebuke, her gaze drifting into the void as she murmured to herself, "I heard... that Chen family member has studied abroad and seen the world. Is it because I've never been abroad... that Shao Huai thinks I'm too feudal and outdated, and can't help him in his career, that we're not on the same path... maybe it really is me—"

Her father held the official position of Chief Secretary, and she was a bright pearl raised in a world of fine silk and ink.

She was originally such a proud and poetic woman.

He was able to stand firm in the deep courtyard of a mansion all by himself, he was able to do his best to avenge his father and brothers when they died, and he was able to escape death in the freezing cold... He was reasonable and open-minded, flexible and unyielding.

Yet they still belittled themselves to the point of comparing themselves to a third party.

Lu Xize felt as if his lungs had been pierced by an awl; every breath was excruciatingly painful.

"Shut up!!"

He couldn't bear to hear her say another word.

Xia Yangyang's shoulders trembled slightly, startled by the unexpected reprimand, her bright eyes staring blankly at him.

Lu Xize gripped her cold face with both hands, his grip a little too tight, forcing her to look directly at him: "Listen to me, the only feudal, stubborn, backward, hateful, and infuriating thing about you is that you deny yourself because of a man's moral depravity!"

"..."

"If you say something like that again, you're not the Xia Yangyang I know!"

She was stunned by his intense reaction. Looking at the corners of his eyes, which were reddened with anger, she suddenly reached out her finger and touched the corners of his eyes like a child.

"Aren't you... the one who hates me the most?"

"Who said I hate you?"

"On the day of our marriage, you blocked the sedan chair, whipped me, threatened me with a gun, and called me shameless."

"That was then, and now is now; they are not the same thing. Back then, I disliked you because I didn't understand you, but now... I respect you."

"Respect..." she murmured repeatedly, her eyes scanning his tense face.

Then, she blinked, her thick eyelashes fluttering like butterfly wings, and asked a naive question that was enough to completely shatter all the defenses Lu Xize had built:

"Do you like me?"

The air freezes.

The wind stopped, and the chirping of insects ceased.

Even the moonlight seemed to linger on her upturned, flushed face, streaked with tears and intoxicated by alcohol.

Those bright eyes stared straight at him.

Look into the deepest, most unspeakable corner of his soul.

Time may pass in an instant, or it may pass for a very long time.

"like."

The two words landed like a thunderclap in the wilderness.

Lu Xize heard his own voice; it was dry and hoarse, as if it didn't come from his throat.

Even he was stunned, unable to believe he had just said it.

His hands, which were cupping her face, trembled slightly. Along with the panic came a sense of almost liberating resolve.

The person opposite him blinked again, smiled, and suddenly leaned closer to him, her eyelashes lowered, her gaze falling on his lips.

As his back stiffened, her lips came close and gently touched his.

"I'm drunk, Xize, can you take me home?"

Her breath brushed against his cheek.

The soft, affectionate "Xize" was a name he had never heard before, and a wave of tingling sensation surged through his limbs and bones.

He gave himself no more time to think or react.

In the current position, he lowered his head and kissed her lips fiercely once again.

Something inside my body started burning intensely, fiercely, wildly, and recklessly.

His arms encircled her waist, pressing her closer to him. The cold metal buttons on his coat pressed against her, while his wildly beating heart burned through his skin.

When they parted, she was panting heavily in his arms, her pink lips swollen and red, but she looked extremely happy, behaving boldly in a way that was completely opposite to her usual self.

She slowly traced her fingernails across his neck, and Lu Xize could no longer bear even the slightest touch.

He grabbed her wrist: "Don't touch it."

She chuckled softly, her voice hoarse with a hint of desire, both alluring and pleasant: "How interesting, you have scales on your neck, and your eyes have turned into vertical pupils."

Lu Xize's ears turned bright red; the very thing he loathed most was something she was curious about like a kitten.

She gripped his belt with one hand and gently tugged at his ear with the other: "Are you going to turn into a snake?"

"..."

"If you turn into a little snake, who will keep me company tonight?"

Lu Xize, suppressing his breaking point, covered her lips, leaving her large eyes blinking in confusion, her fluttering eyelashes seeming to scratch at his heart.

He kicked away the wine jar, picked her up and stood up, his voice hoarse: "You're too drunk. I'll take you back to your meditation room to rest."

No matter how much he liked her, he knew he couldn't take advantage of her in her vulnerable state. She was drunk, but he wasn't. If she regretted it when she woke up tomorrow, tonight's indulgence would push their relationship into the abyss.

She curled her fingers, half-covering her lips with her palm, and giggled: "Who said I'm drunk? I'm perfectly sober."

After saying that, she wrapped her arms around his burning neck: "I'm seducing you, seducing Lu Shaohuai's younger brother, my husband's younger brother, hahaha... I know what I'm doing, but I'm so happy and free. Isn't this the kind of happiness people live for?"

Lu Xize frowned, stopped in his tracks, and tightened his grip on her arm: "Don't say that."

"Oh, you think I'm promiscuous?"

"no."

"Hypocritical man, dare you say you're not happy?"

Lu Xize moved his lips, but ultimately couldn't say anything: "..."

She was like a bomb with its countdown timer on, eager to explode, wishing she could blast herself into pieces and be completely destroyed.

"He can cheat on me, but I can't? He has children and mistresses outside, so I have to be a dutiful wife and mother... Why should I?"

Her voice suddenly rose, and the feigned allure shattered instantly, revealing the bloody wound beneath.

"Why... why..." she repeated these words, her voice gradually turning into sobs.

The knuckles of his fingers, gripping his clothes, were blue and white, as if they were the only piece of driftwood.

Lu Xize was really bad at comforting people, so he could only hold her and sit down on the spot, taking off his coat with one hand and wrapping it around her, letting her cry on his chest.

Her sobs grew softer and softer, and after an unknown amount of time, her tears dried, and her passion and sorrow were also carried away by the mountain wind.

The two of them were like children who grew up soaking in a bitter gourd jar, snuggling together and drawing warmth from each other.

She was in a daze, her voice was hoarse from crying, and her words came out long and slow.

"We've always been fine since we were little. When did everything change? Lu Xize, tell me... is this misfortune because I did something wrong, or is this just how life is... is it that everyone will leave me, or that I've never truly had anyone in the first place...?"

Lu Xize gently patted her back, swaying slightly. He leaned against the tree, looking up at the bright but distant moon.

"I don't know either," he said softly.

"I've lost my parents, I just want someone to love me, not the stars in the sky..." She was exhausted, and after saying this, she fell into a deep sleep.