Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Seeing Cui Ling’s troubled expression, Qin You said, "Draft me a plan by tonight."

Cui Ling: "..."

A plan?

Was this had to be a joke, right…?

Besides, getting Yan Tingshen to like him in just three days?

He couldn’t do it.

This was downright impossible!

Yet, before he could figure out how to refuse, the hospital room door opened.

Yan Tingshen stepped out.

Cui Ling sneaked a look at him and was immediately cowed by that icy, expressionless face.

Then he looked at his own carefree boss, and his stomach twisted with mixed feelings.

Why’d the Prodigal Heir have to fixate on Yan Tingshen, of all people? Powerful, good-looking, but stone-cold ruthless!

Was he trying to make life harder for himself?

"All set?"

Qin You glanced at Yan Tingshen in the wheelchair inside the room. Getting a nod in return, he said, "Let’s go."

Cui Ling followed behind the two, watching their retreating figures, his fingers clenching around his phone again and again.

After much hesitation, recalling Qin You’s warning, he slowly loosened his hold and refrained from informing Qin Hengzhong about the matter.

With Yan Tingshen and the Prodigal Heir recuperating together, security would only be heightened. Besides, very few knew Qin You was staying at Zeshui Bay—discretion was guaranteed.

If worse came to worst, he’d just ramp up security over the next few days.

The chairman had signed off on Qin You recuperating at home. If his 'snitching' made Qin You dig in his heels, it wouldn’t be worth it.

Once he’d thought it over, Cui Ling instructed his subordinates and continued with the arrangements.

Fortunately, the rehab team was on standby.

By the time Qin You’s group arrived at Zeshui Bay, the med techs were setting up equipment and invited Yan Tingshen to test it.

Considering Qin You’s ulterior motives, Cui Ling, guilt gnawing at him, put Yan Tingshen’s bedroom right next to Qin You’s.

Watching Qin You linger in the guest room to look around, Cui Ling suppressed his discomfort and fished a file out of his coat, changing the subject. "Boss Qin, you left this in the office earlier. I brought it back for you. This document is important—try not to lose it this time."

Qin You gave a noncommittal grunt as he took it casually.

Seeing that Cui Ling still hadn’t left, he fidgeted with the folder, scrambling for something to say. "The staff wouldn’t go digging, but now that you’ve brought an outsider here, the consequences of leaving documents lying around could be serious."

Qin You replied dismissively, "Mhm."

The Qin empire was doomed anyway—sooner or later, it made little difference.

If the "outsider" he brought in could deliver the documents directly to Yan Tingshen, it would save him a lot of time.

Just then, a caregiver peeked into the room.

Spotting Qin You, he walked in with a medical kit. "Mr. Qin, Ah, you're here. It's time to change your dressing."

Qin You nodded, set the documents aside, and moved to sit on the nearby sofa, unbuttoning his cuff—

"..." Cui Ling sidestepped the main point and said, "Xiao Qin Zong, this is the guest room."

The comment reminded Qin You of his purpose.

He stood and returned to the desk, scanning the entire suite's layout before telling Cui Ling, "Have someone install support rails here before A Sheng moves in."

Cui Ling followed his gaze to the areas he had briefly indicated—the study and the living area, places Yan Tingshen often used.

Since Yan Tingshen had a spinal injury, which would affect his mobility, having supportive tools in commonly used spaces would indeed make things easier.

Huh, the Prodigal Heir actually cared?

Well.

After all, it was someone he liked. This level of care wasn't something easily faked.

As Cui Ling pondered this, he heard footsteps approach.

Qin You looked around, couldn’t find anything else that needed adjustment, then turned to Cui Ling. "You have experience. Will this actually win me points?"

"..." Cui Ling kept a straight face. "...Solid move."

Qin You asked, "Thoughts?"

"..." Cui Ling was speechless and simply shook his head.

Qin You said, "Get it done."

Cui Ling walked off without another word.

Qin You also returned to his bedroom.

After his dressing was changed, he went downstairs to have dinner with the person he was monitoring. When he came back up, a staff member reported to him.

"Mr. Qin, everything’s set up."

"Thanks."

Qin You asked, "Where’s Cui Ling?"

The staff replied, "Mr. Cui gave us the blueprints and then headed back to the office."

Qin You checked his watch. "Call it a day."

"Got it."

When they reached the bedroom, Yan Tingshen couldn’t miss the strategically placed support bars inside.

The setup here is more complete than a hospital's, without restricting movement. Everything's arranged logically, with most equipment clustered in the areas where he rests and works—clearly designed with care.

“What do you think?” Qin You smiled. “If you’re not satisfied, we can still make changes.”

Yan Tingshen came back to himself, avoiding his gaze, and replied softly, “This is good. Thank you.”

Yan Tingshen's face was unreadable, but the system didn’t report any data—clearly no favorability points had been gained.

Qin You wasn’t too surprised by this.

Yan Tingshen was emotionally closed off, rarely showing change. Something this minor should be hard to move his hardened heart.

At least he'd gained one point earlier, and hadn’t dropped since, which meant the general approach was correct.

However, progress in this direction was too slow. A third of the three-day deadline had already passed. As a last resort, a backup plan was still necessary—better safe than sorry.

Qin You glanced at Yan Tingshen beside him, hanging back half a step as he scanned his frame. He asked the system, “When you mentioned physical intimacy, does touching other areas count, or does it have to be a kiss?”

Came the response, “Apologies, Host. The task details do not specify which other body parts count as intimate contact. The examples given only include kissing and intercourse.”

Qin You went quiet.

The system added, “However, it is not recommended for the Host to engage in intercourse with the target, as there is a near 100% probability it will trigger strong rejection, leading to mission failure. Moreover—”

Qin You interrupted, “…Alright. That’s enough.”

The system said, “Understood…”

Qin You changed the subject. “Is there a real-time record of the mission progress?”

The system brought up a display. “Still at zero percent.”

Qin You said, “Later, I’ll attempt physical contact with the target. Monitor the progress in real time.”

The system responded, “Understood!”

Qin You closed the system interface and turned his attention back to Yan Tingshen.

Before long, he gave a soft cough, stepping closer as he raised a hand toward Yan Tingshen’s waist.

Just before his palm made contact, he paused. Only when Yan Tingshen looked over did he let his hand settle.

Giving a gentle pull, he pulled the man into his arms, pretending to glance at the floor as he spoke casually, “Watch your step.”

Yan Tingshen’s eyes narrowed, following the sound downward.

A decorative step at the corner, just an inch or so high—had it not been for Qin You’s action, he wouldn’t have noticed it.

But what stood out more at the moment was the hand at his waist.

Despite having experienced it once before, it still made him uncomfortable to be this close to another person, much less in this posture.

Yan Tingshen’s brow furrowed slightly as he prepared to move away—only to feel the hand at his waist suddenly loosen.

The hand grazed his back almost casually before sliding up to support his arm. Without waiting for a response, warm, strong fingers worked their way into his left hand, clasping it gently yet firmly, guiding him forward a step.

Last night's memories came flooding back.

The same person, the same domineering manner—shielding him, taking a knife for him.

The difference was, this time, after taking that step, Qin You quickly pulled back.

Just a single step, the action wasn’t out of line, and it was well-intentioned—getting worked up over it would be overkill.

Yan Tingshen turned to Qin You, whose face gave nothing away.

His hand fell back to his side, fingers twitching slightly, the lingering warmth in his palm like dying embers, still warm.

Qin You shoved his hand behind his back, curling it into a fist, and smiled at him. "What?"

Yan Tingshen paused briefly before replying, "Nothing. Let’s go."

They continued forward, the room going dead silent.

The system’s voice became clearer. "Host, no change in favorability. Emergency protocol task progress remains unchanged."

Seeing the frozen numbers on the panel, Qin You sighed.

Based on his reasoning, in the early stages of the task, what counts as 'intimate contact' couldn’t possibly jump straight to the final step—the target wouldn't go for that. And aside from kissing, holding hands or embracing should also count as forms of intimacy in a relationship.

Unfortunately, his theory didn’t fly under the system’s judgment.

The system said, "Host, stats show human kissing requires bare lips, as does intercourse. So it didn't register as intimate because you touched the target through clothing?"

"...I wasn’t *touching*—never mind," Qin You said. "I held his hand. That has nothing to do with clothing."

Not taking no for an answer, the system pressed on. "Host, then try kissing! The target didn’t reject your hand-holding, meaning he isn’t guarded against you. A surprise kiss would totally work—easy peasy!"

What truly discouraged the system was that the host didn’t take the suggestion.

Qin You was already making his exit from Yan Tingshen.

He had noticed that the other man was now keeping his distance because of his earlier actions, maintaining a step’s distance when they moved forward.

If he stayed any longer, he’d only make him more suspicious, and the favorability likely wouldn’t improve. Worse, if the target read too much into it, the favorability might even drop.

"You’ve been busy for so long—you must be tired. Rest early."

Yan Tingshen replied, "Thanks for everything."

Qin You brushed it off with a wave, turned to leave, then glanced back at him from the doorway. "I’m right next door. The nurse call button is by your bed. If anything comes up, just holler anytime."

Yan Tingshen said, "Understood."

As Qin You’s figure disappeared behind the door and it clicked shut, Yan Tingshen scanned the room, his gaze sharpening.

Qin You had explicitly mentioned cooperation when inviting him earlier, yet after leaving the hospital, he hadn’t brought it up again. Was there some other game afoot, or another arrangement?

Mulling it over, Yan Tingshen’s eyes landed on the coffee table beside the sofa.

A folder was left carelessly at the edge of the table.

Yan Tingshen walked over slowly, picked it up, and cracked it open—and froze.

Confidential Qin Group documents?

Just as he was about to close it, Qin You’s face popped into his head.

Yan Tingshen sat down on the sofa.

How could a confidential document be left here so casually? And of all places, it just happened to appear in the guest room meant for him.

Qin You wasn’t stupid—he knew better than to mishandle sensitive documents.

Cui Ling had access, but he wouldn’t pull a stunt like this.

Which meant only one thing.

So this was Qin You’s idea of 'cooperation.'

Yan Tingshen studied the file, his expression inscrutable.

All Qin Hengzhong wanted was a proposal. With Qin You’s cunning, why bother outsourcing to someone like him?

Incompetence? A test? Maybe both.

Yan Tingshen draped his arm over the chair, drumming his fingers.

After a beat, he put the file aside.

Qin You had stuck his neck out for him today—even pissed off Yan Lihui. If this was a probe, he could cut him some slack.

That stranger’s rigid posture flickered in his memory—

Yan Tingshen closed his eyes.

One favor couldn’t kill him.

—

The next day.

Morning.

Qin You rolled out of bed, cleaned up, and headed downstairs to have breakfast with Yan Tingshen.

Something nagged at him—had he forgotten anything?

The thought kept resurfacing, but it still eluded him.

Right now, only the target’s opinion counted.

Only when he reached the table... did it click—Qin You arched a brow.

He brushed it off at first. He took his seat, accepted the porridge from the maid, then turned to Yan Tingshen. “How’s the food? We can tweak the menu to your liking.”

Yan Tingshen shot him a look. “Don’t bother.”

Qin You dropped it, shoving the file away before grabbing his chopsticks.

Yan Tingshen tracked his every move, eyes locked on Qin You’s face... but Qin You’s poker face gave nothing away.

One thing was clear: Qin You hadn’t even blinked at the file. He couldn’t care less what happened to it.

Qin You noticed his gaze: "What's up?"

Yan Tingshen asked bluntly, "You’re not worried someone might misuse it?"

Qin You smiled. "You’ll keep it safer than I would."

Yan Tingshen narrowed his eyes.

Just as he thought.

His guess was correct.

Qin You said, "Don’t dwell on it. Let’s eat."

Yan Tingshen looked at him and unlocked his phone. "Your contact."

The system buzzed excitedly. "Host! The target just added you first!"

Qin You blinked in surprise.

He pulled out his phone and swapped contacts. The second the request went through, a notification flashed.

It was a file.

Qin You tapped it open—then froze.

"A business plan?" He looked at Yan Tingshen. "You put this together overnight?"

He’d left the file in the guest room yesterday afternoon. Seeing it now, he’d figured the target was being decent by not sharing the information with Yan Tingshen. He never imagined the other party had prepared an entire plan for him.

"Yeah," Yan Tingshen replied.

Qin You skimmed through it briefly before turning his gaze back to Yan Tingshen. After a moment, a real smile lit up his eyes behind his glasses. "I truly didn’t expect this."

Didn’t expect?

Yan Tingshen said coolly, "You think this took long?"

However long it took, I appreciate it," Qin You chuckled.

Yan Tingshen looked up, meeting his gaze, and paused slightly.

Something about that smile felt deeper than usual.

Qin You had already averted his gaze.

He went through the file again carefully.

Unlike his own style, the target’s approach was uncompromising, even more ruthless and precise. No question—this was top-tier work. Commercially speaking, it outclassed even his own drafts. No slapdash job, this.

For someone like the target, crafting such a proposal would indeed be effortless.

However.

Injured as he was, the target hadn’t rested properly.

One day’s rest for a spinal injury? Nowhere near enough to sustain even ordinary daily activities, much less hours of focus.

He brought the person home without truly caring about their injury, originally just planning to take advantage of the proximity to improve their opinion of him. Unexpectedly, the other party went above and beyond first, putting in who knows how much effort to create this plan for him.

The system was touched: "Host, I told you! An initial favorability of 10% is rare. Look, the target is even helping you on their own initiative—they must be grateful for what you did for them!"

Favorability.

Qin You set down his phone.

Had he underestimated the value of favorability, he thought?

If 10% could make the target go this far, then gaining a single point from yesterday’s assistance was actually pretty good after all.

But with this, another increase in the short term wasn't happening.

If he couldn’t unlock the favorability mission—

Qin You picked up his chopsticks again, putting it out of his mind.

After the meal, he initially wanted to accompany the target for rehabilitation training to say thanks, but the target turned him down flat, citing work as the reason.

Qin You had assumed it was just an excuse, only to find the target actually stayed in their room all day, even having meals inside. The servants crept in and out quietly.

As night fell once more, the system was freaking out: "Host, two days have passed! The task deadline is down to the last day—aren’t you going to kiss the target yet?!"

Qin You said, "Don’t rush."

The system: "..."

It was about to blow a fuse!

Qin You absentmindedly swiped at the blocks on his screen.

Compared to the target, his day had been a breeze.

The task assigned by Qin Hengzhong was completed early.

Attending a few meetings online—that was pretty much all a day’s work for the general manager of Qin Corporation.

Speaking of Qin Hengzhong’s task...

Qin You glanced at the folder on the nightstand.

Despite being so busy, the target still found time to make a plan for him. He had to admit—he’d misjudged them before. His target had a tough exterior but soft inside.

"Even if you don’t kiss them, host, have you forgotten about raising favorability too?" The system tried to push its host to make progress. "You could at least do that!"

Qin You said, "You really think that'll raise favorability and not lower it if I disturb their work?"

"..." After a long silence, the system tried again, "Then... a kiss?"

That was even less likely.

Qin You thought for a moment, closed the game, and opened the texting app.

He had already cleaned up all the random messages in his account, leaving only one chat window in the entire list showing the system's generic icon, whose name was just a dot.

Opening it, the last message was the file sent that morning.

After thinking for a second, Qin You started typing and sent it.

Qin: Still busy?

The reply came quickly, brief and direct.

.: What's up?

Qin: Don’t forget to take breaks. You should rest.

This time, the message went unanswered.

The system noted, "So the target really is busy..."

Qin You checked the time.

8:40 PM—he’d been working nearly all day.

Looks like after taking the target home to recover, the target had simply turned the place into an office.

The doctor had stressed rest as the top priority after discharge. With the target pushing himself this hard, there was no guarantee the injury wouldn’t worsen.

Before, Qin You would’ve ignored it.

Your body is your own, and health is a personal choice. If the target didn’t care, why bother?

But now, even if the proposal wasn’t crucial for Qin You, it was a significant boost for "Qin You" to make an impact in the Qin Corporation.

He got the kindness behind it.

Now that he’d accepted the favor, he couldn’t just sit back.

Helping the target heal would be his way of returning the favor.

Qin You got up from the couch, stepped out, and walked to the neighboring door, raising his hand to knock lightly.

—

"Boss Yan, Li Jianhang still won’t talk. He’s sticking to his story—taking the blame, saying it’s personal..."

Listening to the report, Yan Tingshen’s gaze remained fixed on the chat window on his screen.

Normally, he wouldn’t bother with this nonsense, but this guy kept rubbing in his injury, his weakness.

Yan Tingshen moved the cursor to close the chat, but as he clicked, his finger twitched.

He froze, his face hardening as his hand tightened.

The random nerve pain, just like Qin You’s bad timing, flared up again.

The company and the Yan family still didn’t know about the crash, and its cause remained unknown.

This stuff wouldn’t have worn him out before. Now, it was draining him.

Yan Tingshen closed his eyes.

He had to admit—Qin You’s nagging had actually looked out for him more than once.

"..."

The caller had gone quiet at some point. Only when the typing started again did they hesitantly ask, "...Boss?"

He wasn't sure why his inquiry hadn't received a response from his boss yet. Just as he hesitated whether to repeat it for the third time, he heard faint knocking.

It must be Mr. Yan's side, so he remained silent.

Soon enough, he finally heard his boss speak.

"Let's stop here for now."

"Got it."

After ending the call, Yan Tingshen turned to Qin You at the door: "Mr. Qin?"

Qin You stepped closer. "I heard you missed your rehab sessions from yesterday till today?"

Yan Tingshen glanced at him.

Was Qin You here this late just to remind him of such a trivial matter?

"Let's go," Qin You said. "It's not too late to start now."

Yan Tingshen replied, "Don't worry about it."

Qin You smiled at him. "No more putting it off. You must do them today."

The past two days had proven that leaving it to his own initiative, he wouldn't rest on his own.

Yan Tingshen frowned slightly.

Qin You circled the desk and stood beside him, noticing the chat window on the screen.

In the reply box, half-finished pinyin characters remained.

Was that meant for me?

Qin You raised an eyebrow, then turned back to Yan Tingshen, his smile growing.

Noticing his gaze, Yan Tingshen closed the laptop and said calmly, "I'll go. You can go now, Mr. Qin."

Qin You chuckled, seeing right through this stall.

He reached out and grasped Yan Tingshen's still extended left hand, intending to pull him away from the desk directly.

Taken by surprise, Yan Tingshen lurched sideways as he stood, unable to steady himself.

Seeing this, Qin You grabbed his shoulder and stepped forward, pulling him close. Just as he was about to speak, Yan Tingshen glared up—

Their noses nearly touched. Qin You froze and instinctively leaned back.

Yan Tingshen's anger momentarily forgotten.

Only the System complained in frustration: "HOST, what are you doing?! If you hadn't moved just now, the mission would be done!"