GBT Chapter 71

Cage…cage…cage…

Cage???

Cage!

Jiao Bai’s mind exploded with a barrage of melodramatic tropes, overwhelming his senses and leaving him dumbfounded.

The head of the Qi family brought a cage, and I caught him.

Can I survive relying on being “possessed”?

Jiao Bai’s whole body stiffened, his hand still on the cage, all five fingers numb. He unconsciously looked at the white cat, wanting to know what it was doing.

His eyes were met with a vast expanse of red.

The white cat was vomiting blood, incessantly, as if trying to expel every last drop from its body. It would die as a shriveled husk, without leaving a single bead of blood.

It’s over, it’s over, he’s been angered to the point of vomiting blood. My life is over.

As soon as Jiao Bai removed his hand, a cold, hard sensation pressed against the back of his neck. A hand clasped his neck from behind, the web of the thumb and forefinger locking onto the protruding, trembling bones of his throat, dragging him backward.

In the early summer night, there was still a hint of coolness in the mountain breeze, not biting, but refreshingly crisp. But now, the wind carried the sound of a heavy object being dragged.

Like the last prey in a slaughterhouse, the hunter hurrying to finish before resting, his movements swift and frantic.

His superior officer in the graveyard was already kneeling and prostrate before the tombstone, hands clutching it, disheveled short hair occasionally brushing across.

The subordinate was acting on her orders.

And the superior officer’s head was pressed against the tombstone, banging against it rapidly, “thump, thump, thump,” like a prayer, yet also like a mad defiance.

Jiao Bai was constantly being dragged backward, the graveyard was in front of him, but he couldn’t spare the attention to look.

Because the person dragging him from behind hadn’t made a single sound, his actions exuding a terrifying silence. This caused Jiao Bai to dare not let his mind wander at all.

To reduce the strain on his neck, Jiao Bai tried to use his hands to push against the grass, to keep his body in rhythm with the dragging, but the person dragging him was too fast, faster and faster. The moment his hand touched the grass, it was dragged away.

His fingertips drew out scarlet gashes, warm liquid flowing out. Staining the emerald green grass blades.

The bones at the back of his neck felt waves of intense pain during the dragging, the flesh and skin seeming to endure the terrifying sensation of being torn apart.

The path of the dragging was filled with an ominous and bloody atmosphere.

Jiao Bai had experienced the feeling of being near death before, when Shen Ji stepped on his neck, when Qi Zi Zhi covered his mouth and nose, and when he was stabbed in the stomach and lay on the deck, feeling the ship constantly sinking, as well as the system’s punishments.

But this kind of infinitely prolonged death, Jiao Bai was experiencing for the first time. He dared not cry out in pain the entire time, dared not struggle. The graveyard in his eyes gradually blurred, until it was completely obscured by the bushes.

He was dragged all the way into the ancient castle, to the second basement floor, and thrown into a study with black walls and white furniture.

The door slammed shut.

Jiao Bai was dragged to the deep black wall.

The hand that had been clasping his neck was like a wrench, clamping him up, then suddenly pressing down with force, slamming him hard against the wall.

Jiao Bai’s eyelids twitched, unable to close. His eyes were wide open, the wall in his pupils rapidly enlarging, but just before he was brutally smashed into his eyeballs, a section of arm suddenly stretched out from behind.

Jiao Bai slammed into the back of a hand, emitting a dull sound that made one’s teeth ache. His forehead didn’t shatter, only that patch of flesh was burning red.

That hand that was horizontally between him and the wall was cold and hard, turning green, veins bulging one by one.

There was a clicking sound behind him, of teeth being clenched too tightly. It was a signal that the restrained force was precariously close to collapsing.

A trapped beast struggling in a cage, arching, breathing hot, blood rushing through its body, roaring ferociously.

Unable to endure any longer.

“Re…strain…”

Jiao Bai’s ears caught the sound of rapid swallowing of saliva, along with the old man’s unclear, panting words. The back of the hand in front of him was reddened by his impact, the blood vessels even more bulging, as if about to burst through the skin, pierce into his eyes, squeeze into his mouth, wrap around his neck. He sucked in a breath with difficulty, grateful for the gentlemanly demeanor in the Qi family’s bones.

The next second, the back of his neck was in pain.

Pale white teeth embedded themselves into the thin, tender flesh, and blood instantly oozed out.

The blood quickly gathered into a small pool of blood.

“Glug.”

It was swallowed.

“Ah–” Jiao Bai, emerging from his dazed state, cried out in pain, “Damn, that hurts!”

The pain in the back of his neck was still intensifying.

Jiao Bai was pressed tightly against the wall, unable to move. His head was against the back of the hand of the person biting him, his whole body trembling with pain. “Third Brother, it’s Jiao Bai, wake up, wake up…”

The white cat was constantly hissing, screaming, the sound like a jagged saw forcefully sawing wood, so piercing that it made one’s scalp tingle.

“Stop yelling…” Jiao Bai shouted unconsciously.

More blood was being sucked out.

The sound of swallowing was even louder, like a beast feeding, horrifying.

Jiao Bai was going to die. He struggled with all his might, leaning backward a little, and bit down on Qi Yi Liao’s hand, which was still horizontally against the wall, and mumbled vaguely, “I’m about to take the college entrance exam, I can’t get hurt at this time, please, I beg you, bite me after I finish the exam.”

The gnawing stopped.

“Restrain,” Qi Yi Liao’s blood-red, eerie eyes drooped slightly. His thick shoulders and back, rising and falling greatly with excitement, were arched. His face, covered with a grim expression, was buried in the young man’s feverish and clean back collar, trembling eyelashes brushing against the other’s cold sweat-soaked nape with each blink.

“Restrain, restrain…”

“Restrain…”

In the large black and white room, besides the heavy and disordered breathing, there was only the repeated murmuring.

Jiao Bai was completely in a state of mental blankness, the passage of time blurred and slow. When the back of his neck regained its freedom, he reflexively shrunk his neck, his mouth opening slightly, only to realize that he was still biting Qi Yi Liao’s hand.

“…”

Jiao Bai quickly let go.

The hand that had been stained with his wet, hot breath was finally withdrawn, leaving a faint watermark pressed against the wall. That was the mark of sweat.

Jiao Bai covered his bitten nape, and after a few moments, there was no movement behind him. Even the breathing seemed to have disappeared. He turned his head back.

He saw a stiff, pale, handsome face, paired with a tall figure, deep and distinct contours, blood-stained lips, and a surrounding atmosphere of gloomy and dangerous air, like a blood clan member with a noble and pure bloodline.

“…Third Brother?” Jiao Bai swallowed.

Qi Yi Liao lowered his eyes, his gaze not knowing where it landed. After a long time, he let out an unspeakable low pant from his throat.

Before Jiao Bai could figure out Qi Yi Liao’s inner thoughts, he saw him stride to the desk, pull open several drawers at once, and search through them like a storm.

“Where’s the knife?” Qi Yi Liao tilted his head, first speaking as if to the void, then turning his face, facing Jiao Bai’s direction, his eyes still half-lowered, his voice turbid and hoarse, “Kid, help Uncle find a knife, okay?”

Jiao Bai’s advancing footsteps abruptly stopped, and he retreated a little. Old pervert, you want me to help you find a knife to cut my neck? You really dare to think!

That’s not right.

Killing him wouldn’t require a knife, he could just strangle him to death.

So,

Qi Yi Liao was looking for a knife to carve words.

Jiao Bai’s tightly wound nerve endings relaxed, and he raised his head, “Okay, I’ll help you find it.”

Qi Yi Liao kept his eyes lowered. But Jiao Bai could sense that he was staring at him. With that kind of gloomy, sticky gaze.

The knife was found on the shelf, the size of a palm. The scabbard was unexpectedly tattered and old, as if it had been used for many, many years, passed down through generations.

Qi Yi Liao drew the knife out and held it in his hand, the rolling, pitted blade exposed in the pale light.

The sound of the wooden desk being scratched seeped out from under the knife.

One horizontal stroke, one vertical stroke…

Restrain.

Every time Qi Yi Liao carved one, Jiao Bai would silently repeat it once.

Jiao Bai watched as Qi Yi Liao filled the last small space on the desk with carvings, the knife still raised in mid-air.

This was a bit panicky.

He wasn’t going to come at me with it, was he?

“Tonight…” The person holding the knife sat down in the chair.

Jiao Bai quickly seized the opportunity to explain, “Third Brother, I was possessed, I didn’t know…”

His voice paused, and a drop of cold sweat rolled down from his forehead. No, he couldn’t say that he didn’t know anything.

He was facing an old pervert, he couldn’t use normal methods to deal with him.

“I was originally sleeping in my room, I don’t know how I walked to the backyard, and when I woke up,” Jiao Bai looked at the white cat. It wasn’t roaring anymore, nor was it vomiting blood. It was just still trembling nervously.

“The graveyard…” Jiao Bai hinted at the topic, his expression awkward with just the right amount of incomprehension, “I didn’t expect Dean Qi to be there.”

The person in front of the desk was slashing with the knife, the carved characters being scratched, ruined.

Jiao Bai listened to the sound, feeling goosebumps all over his body. The back of his neck itched a little, the blood from the wound flowing down, trickling into his collar. He was about to reach out to wipe the bloodstains when a hoarse laugh echoed in the study.

“Did I scare you?”

Jiao Bai didn’t manage his expression well for a moment, his face reading the words “What do you think?”, filled with a non-aggressive resentment.

Qi Yi Liao’s smile deepened, and he beckoned, “Come here to Uncle.”

Jiao Bai paid attention to the white cat as it walked toward its master.

Qi Yi Liao neither looked at the bite wound on Jiao Bai’s neck, nor showed concern for the red marks on his neck from being constricted, or the abrasions on his hands from being dragged. Instead, he lifted his right hand.

His index finger bent slightly, touching the palm of his hand, tracing a few red marks of varying depths.

Jiao Bai rolled his eyes upward. Those were marks from being pressed against the cage. It was evident how tightly he was gripping it at the time in his confusion, even tighter than he imagined.

Truly sinful.

Jiao Bai had seen a lot and was no longer shocked, replaced by complex emotions.

He was very embarrassed to say that this was one of his fetish points.

“Dean Qi has been doing a study for many years without any results, the pressure is too great, and his mind is not clear,” Qi Yi Liao stroked the young man’s soft, moist palm.

Jiao Bai understood the hint. “Third Brother, don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone.” After finishing, he added another sentence, “Not even if I die.”

“Good boy.” Qi Yi Liao placed the knife in his hand.

Jiao Bai didn’t speculate much about Qi Yi Liao’s intentions, and put the knife back in its sheath and placed it back on the shelf. After completing this action, he returned to Qi Yi Liao’s side.

He was afraid that if he was any later, Qi Yi Liao would ask him to carve a hundred or a thousand “Restrains”, and if he didn’t carve them well, he would get a lesson.

“Having talked about the graveyard, let’s talk about the second thing,” Qi Yi Liao slowly lifted his eyelids.

Jiao Bai held his breath. In that instant, Qi Yi Liao in his eyes overlapped with the white cat, merging into a monster.

Their eyes were the same color red. As if flowing with blood.

The decay on the white cat was tangible, while Qi Yi Liao’s was intangible.

——Both were waiting to die, and also waiting to live.