Chapter 68: 55

[Extra] 55 - Ye Lan x Ye Xiao - «Daytime Sleep» 02

After Gui Mao replaced Bing Xu’s bandages, he looked at his deathly pale complexion and haggard appearance, he seemed to have lost a lot of weight in the few days he hadn’t seen him. He asked without thinking: “How many days have you gone without eating?” But he didn’t intend to wait for a reply, and was instead preparing to go out and get something to eat.

The Nightrunner’s daily diet couldn’t be considered great, it consisted of plain rice and light vegetable dishes, since there was the fear of leaving unwanted scents on a shadow guard’s body. Now was precisely the time to make up for it, and Gui Mao was worried for a short time, sighing and muttering to himself: “If I had known about this earlier, last time I shouldn’t have exchanged for sweets, I should have kept exchanging for meat.”

When Bing Xu heard this, he tried very hard to distinguish the meaning for a while, and suddenly struggled to get up, pushing his pillow away and lifting the bedclothes. He groped about the planks under the bed for a moment, digging something out, he moved a small brick aside and took out a small box, then took something out of it and handed it to him.

Gui Mao wanted to throw it away as soon as he received it, that thing was a piece of mouldy sugar that had been left there for who knows how long, and its smell was already very bad.

“What kind of strange hoarding obsession do you have…..” Gui Mao put it aside, and endured a feeling of disgust as he wiped his hand.

Bing Xu pointed at that mouldy piece of sugar and said: “Gui Mao.”

Gui Mao looked at his steady expression, then at where he was pointing, and seriously thought about it, suddenly reacting: “Don’t tell me it’s the piece I gave you last year?!”

Bing Xu nodded.

He even kept expired food as a treasure hidden under his bed, Gui Mao thought to himself that this person’s brain had really not been broken just a few days ago, and he estimated it had been broken for a long time, he could only helplessly say: “If you couldn’t eat it earlier you should have thrown it away, leaving it attracts insects.”

Bing Xu unexpectedly nodded: “Oh.”

Gui Mao expressed gratitude for his understanding.

After getting that lump of sugar out of the way, Gui Mao saw a tattered paper bag hidden away in that small wooden box, from which he could see a few familiar things. Bing Xu saw him looking, and also fished them out and passed it to Gui Mao.

Gui Mao rummaged through it, the bag was filled with small packets of delicate metal tokens, which where engraved with the curved clouds and waning moon pattern that belonged exclusively to the Nightrunner. There were dozens of those tokens, casually stacked together.

Prize tokens? Aren’t these precisely the tokens that are used to exchange for benefits?

This was the first time Gui Mao saw so many prize tokens, and he couldn’t help but be speechless. The other person didn’t seem to think they were valuable, and gave everything to Gui Mao.

Bing Xu….. Gui Mao lifted his head and sized up that sorry-looking fool in front of his eyes, and frowned. The Nightrunner’s codenames for people were given based on how a person was ranked in terms of fighting skills at the time of entrance. The order of the Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches was Jia Zi as first, Yi Chou as second, Bing Yin as third, Ding Mao as fourth, and so on and so forth. However, the Nightrunner arranged it so that that first six ranked on each cycle were given names beginning with “Jia”, the next six had names beginning with “Yi”, the next six after those had names beginning with “Bing”, and so on. This person in front of him had the ranking of ‘Bing’, so it was clear that his strength had been out of the ordinary since the beginning. He himself had a name beginning with ‘Gui’, so he was considered among the bottom of his cycle1 .

He had originally been so strong, but who knew what kind of inhuman cruelties he was met with at the time of the Great Trial, to be reduced to such circumstances…..

“I’ll go get you something to eat, be good and stay.” Gui Mao pulled out a token from the pile and returned the others back into the bag, stuffing it into Bing Xu’s hands, “Take care of them properly, after all, you traded your life for them.”

Bing Xu blankly stared as Gui Mao got up and walked away, then propped himself up and crawled in his direction.

“Hey, I’ll come back right away, do you not understand? Why is it so hard to get you to stay and behave.” Gui Mao had no alternative but to push him down to stay. He looked around everywhere for a while, carefully coming up with a plan, and scooped up a bowl of clear water, then put it next to where Bing Xu was sitting and said, “Look.”

Bing Xu obeyed and turned to look, the round, bright moon was reflected in the middle of the bowl.

Then he heard Gui Mao say: “Can you see it clearly? This beautiful pearl is my treasure, it’s very fragile, so you need to be careful and help me look after it.”

As he spoke, he put the bowl in Bing Xu’s hands. When he came in contact with the bowl, the surface of the water rippled slightly, and the image of the bright moon became slightly scattered.

Gui Mao said: “Hey look, you almost broke it! I told you it was very fragile, hold steady for a bit, don’t move.”

Bing Xu concentrated all of his attention, straining his nerves as he carefully fixed his eyes on the reflection in the middle of the bowl, not even daring to breathe.

Gui Mao laughed inside his heart, thinking he really was a good liar, and took the opportunity to hurry away.


Gui Mao went out into the courtyard and looked for someone to hand over the token to, then ordered a few small dishes and returned to the room. Sure enough, he saw Bing Xu maintaining the position he was in when he left, still nervously holding up the bowl.

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He heard Gui Mao return, but didn’t dare move around, even his voice sounded cautious as he cried: “Gui Mao…..”

“Hey I’m here I’m here, well done.” Gui Mao took the bowl from his hands and poured the water out, returning it to the cupboard.

Once the bowl left his hands, Bing Xu couldn’t stop his whole body from shaking, and he gasped for breath.

Gui Mao hypocritically pacified him: “You did really well, thank you.” He stroked his coarse and dishevelled hair, and felt that his pitiful and sluggish appearance was unexpectedly somewhat cute.

Bing Xu’s complexion became a bit flushed, and clenched his fists as he dumbly stared at him.

When the simple food was delivered, Gui Mao helped him up and fed him some. At first, he had to tell him to open his mouth and chew every time, but afterwards he seemed to finally understand, and it gradually became a lot smoother.

Gui Mao thought to himself: He’s actually not too stupid, maybe he can still go back to being a normal person after recuperating for a bit.

After putting away the tableware, Gui Mao looked at his filthy and greasy appearance, which was truly irksome, and fetched some warm water so he could wash his hair. His long hair was knotted into balls, so he couldn’t begin to comb it, and also didn’t know how take care of it, he just knew how to pull open a hole from the messy hair to expose his eyes and look at things, which was really amusing. Gui Mao acted of his own initiative and used a pair of scissors to cut at the tangle.

“It is said that the body, hair, and skin are received from our parents, and damaging them is unfilial2 . Luckily for you and I, we don’t have a mother or father, so we don’t have to worry about this.” Gui Mao held him in his arms to prevent him from moving, cutting as he spoke. He had no experience, so naturally his craftsmanship was not good, and the cut looked jagged and uneven, just as if a dog had bitten the hair off. He stopped and pushed him away, looking him up and down, “Hey, it’s really ugly hahahahaha.”

When he finished cutting, he returned to wash the hair and then wiped it dry. Contrary to expectations, it had improved a lot, so he went back to wipe down his whole body. Bing Xu was young like him, but he was half a head taller and his muscles were also more firm and sturdy, when Gui Mao held them he could feel an explosive power in his body that was much stronger than his own.

It really was a pity.

His Teacher said that the Nightrunner was a place where the strong survived but, for the firs time, Gui Mao felt that these words were just nonsense.

Bing Xu had been tidied up by him for the night, and it could even be said he had changed considerably after eating and drinking his fill. Gui Mao looked him up and down, pleased, his eyes and brows were like lacquer, dark and bright, and his short hair made him appear neater, although he still carried a sickly look, at most he seemed a little taciturn now, no longer being that fool that caused people to feel irritated just by glancing at him.

Gui Mao stuffed him inside the bedclothes and sent him to sleep, but Bing Xu lay down quietly, eyes closely glued onto him, without any intention of resting. Gui Mao waited for a short time, becoming impatient, and touched his sleeping acupoint, then he went back to his own room.


The next day, Gui Mao woke up very early as usual, the bring moon still suspended high up in the sky outside the window. As he sat up, he remembered that there were no training arrangements for these few days, so he laid back down.

The beginning of the new year was the coldest time. Outside the window, there was the slight sound of rustling as snowflakes floated down. Every person at the Nightrunner had excellent endurance since they were all used to being exposed to the elements, so naturally they weren’t afraid of the bitter cold. Gui Mao quietly looked at the falling snow, sitting with one leg over the other, and suddenly remembered that fool next door.

When he washed him yesterday, his jade-like, smooth skin3 felt cold to the touch. This kind of weather wouldn’t be an issue for normal people, but it could maybe be very bad for him.

Gui Mao turned over, getting down from the bed and heading next door, Bing Xu was still fast asleep, it seemed that he had been really tired. Bing Xu’s other room mates disliked the strong smell of medicine, and were unwilling to look at this annoying fool, so they had long since moved to the opposite side, leaving Bing Xu alone in the middle of this deserted, cold and miserable room.

Gui Mao sat on the bunk with one leg crossed, he lifted a hand to feel his temperature, and found that he was indeed ice-cold. In his sleep, Bing Xu sensed this source of warmth and couldn’t help but lean against it.

Gui Mao couldn’t help but laugh as he pushed him away, then he pulled out the prize tokens from underneath the edge of his pillow, muttering to himself: “If you can’t endure these few days, keeping these won’t be of any use, so I’ll advocate for you in your stead.”

He exchanged them for a basin of charcoal and a few quilts, he ignited the charcoal next to Bing Xu’s feet, and the room gradually became warmer.

“Nice and warm.” Gui Mao had also not basked in the warmth of a fire for a long time, so he crouched by the side of the bed, excitedly staring at the sparks, and found that he was somewhat reluctant to part from the heat. He couldn’t help but feel slightly lost in thought as he muttered: “It’s just a little warm, that’s all, how is it so comfortable? I thought I had already gotten used to it…..”

Bing Xu had still not woken up, so he went up to him again.

Gui Mao looked at him, pressed under several layers of thick quilts, and his heart was itching to try it, so he simply got in. Bing Xu’s body temperature, which had clearly still been ice-cold just a short time ago, quickly warmed up in his arms. Gui Mao hugged him and accidentally fell asleep against this rare warmth.

 

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1 According to the rankings, out of the sixty people at the beginning of a cycle, the strongest six are given the name ‘Jia’, and so on and so forth, until the weakest six are named ‘Gui’. All the name rankings are: Jia (1), Yi (2), Bing (3), Ding (4), Wu (5), Ji (6), Geng (7), Xin (8), Ren (9), Gui (10). Top.

2 Comes from a Confucian teaching. In ancient times, it was believed that your body was given to you by your parents, so in order to honour your parents you had to take care of your body. This included things like not cutting your hair, which was considered a way of damaging the body and therefore unfilial. Top.

3 冰肌玉骨 lit ice muscle jade bone. Used to describe clear and smooth skin by comparing it to clear cold jade, also gives allusions to something pure and unsullied. Top.

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