Xu Xing did not expect Silver Cloud to be such a good cook. The dishes he prepared looked good. She looked at the handsome man. She really could not tell that he was as capable with the chores too.
Silver Cloud was a man of few words and stood out. While he did not look like the man who was high-above and calling the shots, she could never imagine him being such a good help with chores.
She took out her phone and snuck a photo of Silver Cloud’s side profile. Silver Cloud, sensing it, turned around and was about to say something when Xu Xing gently said, “Don’t move!”
She quickly took a photo of his face. Silver Cloud frowned and said, “Delete it.”
“No!” Xu Xing edited and saved the file. “Silver Cloud, you look so good, so no harm taking a few more photos.” She chuckled.
She sounded gentle and clear, and she had a hint of naughtiness on her lips. Silver Cloud had never had a photo of himself taken, and nobody had a photo of him. If he disappeared, it was afraid nobody would remember him.
“How about you take a photo of yourself?”
“If you say I am good-looking, I will be even happier,” Xu Xing replied naughtily.
Silver Cloud silently brought out the last dish as Xu Xing went into the kitchen to take the rice out. He prepared four dishes: a steamed dish, fried seaweed, scallop soup, and fried fish. There was no meat. To Xu Xing, this was indeed a spartan meal.
“It’s really nice!” Xu Xing was not stingy with her praises, effusively praising the food. While home-cooked food vastly differed from the delicacies that chefs prepared, those intricately-prepared dishes did not have a home-cooked ambiance.
Silver Cloud gently acknowledged it without saying much. His lips broke into a slight smile.
“Who taught you how to cook?”
“I learned it myself.”
“You’re so smart! How do you cook so well despite learning it yourself?”
“This has nothing to do with a genius-level intellect. If nobody cooks for you, and you do not want to torture your stomach, you learn along the way,” Silver Cloud plainly said.
Xu Xing bit her lip. “When I return home, I’ll learn from the cooks and cook for you.”
Silver Cloud looked at her before looking down. “I do not want to torture myself.”
“What? Are you looking down on me?” Xu Xing pouted and kicked him underneath the table. “It’s a deal, okay? I will definitely cook for you. Given how beautiful and smart I am, learning to cook is surely not difficult at all.”
Was there any relation between learning to cook and being beautiful? Silver Cloud wondered.
Although Xu Xing was not a glutton, she had been famished for a while and was supportive enough to finish all the dishes save the seaweed soup. Xu Xing, after all the eating, felt bloated.
She felt really bloated.
“Told you not to overeat. Feeling bloated?”
“A little.” Xu Xing had a slightly aggrieved look. “Why’s your food so tasty?”
Silver Cloud once again remained silent.
After washing the dishes, Xu Xing said, “Bring me out for a stroll. We could walk to help with digestion.”
“Sure!”
The scenery on the island was extremely beautiful. The mountains, clear water, and beds of camellias reminded her of the castle in London that had roses of various colors in it. As her cousin loved roses, her husband hence planted roses within the castle. Those who had stayed for long in the castle would carry a lingering rose fragrance.
It was romantic and enviable.
“If only the person I love could do this, that would be so nice!” Xu Xing told Silver Cloud with a smile.
“Can romance fill your stomach?”
“You really don’t understand romantic feelings.”
“When people are dead, everything is for naught,” he coldly replied with a sad look. For a moment, Xu Xing did not understand what he was saying. She only felt terrible walking.
She, in her high heels, had a difficult time walking on the beach. Silver Cloud noticed it and said, “Take off your heels and walk on it. There is nobody on the beach all year long, so the beaches are very clean and you will not hurt your leg.”
Xu Xing thought about it and really took off her heels. Her white tender feet stepped on the shore comfortably.
“What flower do you like?” Silver Cloud suddenly asked.
“Yellow roses.” Xu Xing gently smiled. Silver Cloud grunted in acknowledgment. She smiled and turned her head. “Silver Cloud, do you have anybody you like?”
She had never asked him whether he liked anybody else.
She did not know whether a guy like Silver Cloud would take a liking to anybody. If he did, how would they look? Would they, like him, be cold and expressionless?
He looked at the white camellias on the ground and said, “I used to like this really young girl a very long time ago.”
“Little girl? Xu Xing tucked her lips. “How old was she?”
“Seven.”
“…How old were you then?” Xu Xing asked.
“Twelve.”
“You sure are precocious.” Xu Xing sounded a little nervous. What do children know about feelings?
However, that was not particularly right as she did like Ye Ningyuan since she was very young. It had been so many years. In that case, was she precocious too?
“She saved me once. When I was ten, my master almost walloped me to death. She risked her life to save me. Since then, I swore that I would protect her. It’s not really love, but she just happened to be the person whom I swore to protect. However, she died because of another person,” Silver Cloud flatly said. “If he did not arrive on this island, she did not need to die.”
Xu Xing did not say a word. “Why aren’t you convincing me out of it? I remember that you do not like such things,” he said.
“Why should I convince you out of it?” Xu Xing smiled. “I am not you, and I never experience this eternal separation like you have. Likewise, I do not know the pain you have experienced. To advise you against seeking revenge since it’s a never-ending loop is too duplicitous of me.”
However close one was with another person, and however much they tried to put themselves in another person’s shoes, they could never understand the pain one had experienced. She had never experienced hatred and did not know how terrifying hatred was.
She hence did not want to convince Silver Cloud otherwise.
He was a smart and rational person, but did he really know what he was doing?
She was just his friend, so there was no point in saying more.
But she hoped that there would be no more war and bloodshed so that he would be able to forget all his hatred and become happy.
Silver Cloud looked at her and did not say a word. If she knew that he was talking about her elder sister and that he wanted to kill Ye Ningyuan, would she still say that? It was afraid that it wouldn’t be the case.
“Xing Xing, do you really like Ye Ningyuan that much?” Silver Cloud asked. She did not wish for Xing Xing to be unhappy, and he did not want to do anything to aggrieve her. His desire to avenge Xunuo was what kept him going for so many years.
Back when he saw that unrecognizable Xunuo, his hatred and madness…