Chapter 123 Sight: His most thorough act of seizing a common girl.

Tian Qin was not naive enough to believe his words.

Love Gu could only be dissolved with his heart's blood, she knew.

His sudden offer to dissolve Love Gu, such a huge temptation, was by no means benevolent; its sole purpose was to harm her.

She kept backing away, her plain clothes rubbing against the soil of the field ridges, her body crushing the winter jasmine. Xie Tanwei pressed on step by step, the needle in his hand becoming his deadliest weapon, killing without a trace, wantonly and cruelly toying with a sick blind woman.

"You're lying," Tian Qin said sternly. Being blind, she could only judge how close he was to her by sound.

"Don't come any closer."

"How do you know without trying?" Xie Tanwei said with feigned seriousness, a relaxed expression on his face. "Or are you afraid?"

He laughed, the sound echoing in Tian Qin's ears, trapping her in a chamber of fear, driving her mad.

Judging by the clarity of his voice, he was already very, very close, close enough to touch. Sure enough, the next moment, Xie Tanwei's cold, bony hand gripped her neck, cutting off her breath, forcing her to tilt her head up.

"Are you going to kill me?" Tian Qin's lips lost all color, a few traces of blood seeping out, her voice hoarse and disjointed. The air flowing through her fragile throat had been precisely cut off by his force.

"What do you think?"

Xie Tanwei seemed regretful at such a guess. "Guess whether I would go to the trouble of curing you, only to then kill you."

She became a lamb to the slaughter, his strength increasing.

In an instant, the pale skin on his arm, where his sleeve was rolled up, showed winding blue veins.

Tian Qin's throat hissed a sound, her consciousness barely holding on: "...Let's talk this out properly. I'll agree to anything."

A hint of desolation flickered in Xie Tanwei's eyes. "Sorry, I don't feel like talking properly."

Then, with his other hand, the sharp tip of the long needle aimed at her duck-egg blue veins for the final preparation. Indeed, as she had guessed, the needle was not coated with poison, but with a high-grade anesthetic that would cause unconsciousness for four or five days. Of course, he controlled the dosage to a minute degree so she wouldn't be unconscious for too long. Once he brought her back to their new home, she could wake up and get to know the world again.

His tone was as soft and misty as raindrops, a harmless breeze, continuing the harmless joke from before: "Just one prick. Maybe Love Gu will be dissolved. If not, you can run away then."

"No..." Tian Qin was reliving her fear; when he first gave her Love Gu, he had also gently and harmlessly said it would be quick.

She absolutely could not repeat the same mistake. Her desperate will to survive, hanging by a thread, activated her maximum physical ability. She began to struggle wildly, even with his iron-like hand gripping her throat and the air in her lungs nearly gone. If she was lucky, she could dodge, wasting his malicious potion in the field.

How could Xie Tanwei allow that?

Xie Tanwei easily subdued the blind woman. Then he bent down and kissed her deeply, like spring rain sweeping over green tiles over and over again. At the same time, the icy needle tip pierced her skin, penetrating deeply. The cool liquid inside rapidly diffused into her blood, as fast as ink drops spreading in clear water, irreversible. The poison quickly entwined her heart, suppressing her conscious mind.

His movements were very romantic. From a distance, they looked like nothing more than a pair of star-crossed lovers kissing in the fields.

Tian Qin shuddered, clutching her neck, where a tiny, untraceable needle hole remained. Xie Tanwei gently withdrew the needle tip. The blue liquid had been absorbed, leaving behind a barely noticeable drop of blood.

Very good. He was satisfied.

Before Tian Qin could even utter a curse, the world spun. Paralysis quickly climbed to her head, twisting and fainting. That feeling was absolutely not like falling asleep comfortably; it was like being hit on the back of the head with a blunt object, forcibly stripping away her consciousness.

She lost all usable strength. Her ten fingers, like withered vines in autumn, futilely clutched his clothes, filled with overflowing anger and unwillingness before she passed out.

Xie Tanwei watched quietly. When she was completely limp and about to slide onto the dirty field ridge mud, he in time scooped her up and stuffed her into the carriage he had prepared.

Forcibly abducting a woman—this was the most thorough he had ever done.

...

Nanny Chen, Bo Ge, and Zhaolu waited at home for a long, long time, but Tian Qin and Wan Cui, who had gone out to pick winter jasmine, did not return.

Zhaolu was worried: "We should go out and look for them."

After all, Wan Cui was young and willful, and the young lady was blind and inconvenient.

Nanny Chen agreed. The three of them—Bo Ge, Zhaolu, and Nanny Chen—split up to search. The area of the fields was narrow; in theory, two living people should be easy to find. However, after two hours of searching, Tian Qin and Wan Cui seemed to have vanished into thin air.

Dusk was approaching. It would be very dangerous if Tian Qin got lost in the wilderness.

Nanny Chen blamed herself deeply. She shouldn't have let the young lady and Wan Cui go out alone. Their already shattered home was now facing additional hardship. They asked all the neighbors, but there was no trace of Tian Qin, not even a suspicious set of messy footprints.

Had Tian Qin left on her own?

And what about Wan Cui?

Doubts lingered desolately in the fields, with no answers.

...

Tian Qin tried countless times to struggle awake from the chaotic nightmare, but her eyelids felt glued shut. In the dream, she forgot she was blind; even when she peeled open her eyelids, it was still pitch black.

After what felt like an eternity, her heart finally found its original rhythm again. Her eyelids seemed to have opened. Her whole body was weak, as if she couldn't even bear the weight of a single strand of hair. Paralysis still lingered in her limbs and bones.

"Water..." she murmured weakly, the faint sound sealed in her throat, too soft for human hearing. However, a pair of hands lifted the back of her neck, and cool, clear water with a faint perilla scent flowed into her throat.

She drank greedily, annoyed that the person was feeding her too slowly, trying to grab the cup and gulp it down. But the person remained still, always maintaining a rhythm to avoid letting her take in too much water at once and choking her lungs.

After that, she was fed some food.

She couldn't tell what the food was. It melted in her mouth, creamy and salty, tasting very good—much better than the wild vegetable balls Nanny Chen made... She didn't want to be picky, but the hard vegetable balls were hard to swallow and would cause stomach aches. Sometimes she couldn't sleep all night, overwhelmed by pessimistic emotions, wishing she had never been born... She cried for a while.

After a long time, the tears stopped.

With the replenishment of water and food, her floating soul gradually returned to her body, and she slowly regained some energy. She tried to open her eyes again, only to find them covered with thick gauze, allowing not a single ray of light through. The eyes themselves felt a dull, stuffy pain.

"Don't cry. Crying will cause suppuration and inflammation."

Xie Tanwei's cold voice came, seeming extremely indifferent, as if drifting from the sky.

His movements were as gentle and silent as spring silkworms eating leaves, a complex blend of cold and warmth, impossible to fathom.

The heavy stone hanging in Tian Qin's heart crashed to the ground.

Sure enough, he had kidnapped her.

"Let me go."

She lay passively on the bed, self-destructively saying, "I don't want anything anymore. I'll disappear from your sight."

Tears flowed again, dripping onto the back of his hand as he held her face. Xie Tanwei felt a long-lost tremor, quietly shaking his head in denial: "You cannot disappear from my sight."

A deadly silence fell. That silence could be interpreted as firm resolve, meaning he would never change his mind.

Suddenly, Xie Tanwei released her. Tian Qin lost her balance and flopped weakly into the sunken bedding. A familiar, terrifying coldness touched her neck. He pulled back the needle, and another dose of the blue anesthetic liquid dragged her barely clear consciousness back into a dark hell, sending her into a coma for another day and night.

"Sleep some more," he said. "You'll be fine when you wake up."

After saying this, he left her, looking sharp, unhurriedly smoothing the wrinkles she'd grabbed into his clothes.

Tian Qin couldn't fight back; her heavy eyelids fell shut, and the intense numbness rendered her unable to feel pain.

When she woke up the next day, Xie Tanwei still held a long needle in his hand, its icy-blue tip as venomous as a scorpion's sting. Tian Qin sensed the biting cold, fear kicking in instinctively, her expression frozen as she failed to understand what meaning his repeated torment held for her, shrinking and trembling.

"Come here," he said softly.

She nearly screamed, "Don't touch me!"

And hurled everything she could get her hands on at him.

Her hysterics wore out his patience; a chill finer than wind flickered in his eyes. Ruthlessly, he seized the blind girl, pinned her to the pillow, and forced her to drink and eat, just as before, regardless of her willingness.

"Don't cry," he warned with a pointed finger, cutting off her sobs.

Contempt stuck in Tian Qin's throat. Pinned to the bed, her tone was defiant and hostile: "I'm begging you, show a little decency—if you're gonna kill me, just do it."

Only two layers of gauze covered her eyes, letting light in; she could see better than she ever had. Having been blind for so long, her sight seemed on the verge of returning, and the light gave her a newfound backbone.

Xie Tanwei ruthlessly stuck the needle into her vein again; she could not alter his plan. The more she resisted, the more he seemed to enjoy the thrill of overpowering her all by himself.

The pain was temporary; soon, the care and goodwill he'd put into it would dawn on her. She would have an epiphany, thank him, and come to believe that only he in this world was willing and able to protect her.

For the third time, that icy liquid invaded Tian Qin's bloodstream.

For the third time, her consciousness was seized, and she plunged into solitude and darkness. This time, Xie Tanwei did not leave; he gently but firmly held her close, his hold firm enough to make the sleeping girl feel safe, but not trapped.

He pressed a cold kiss to her forehead. "Sleep."

The drug had locked her spirit and will; he had locked her body.

In an instant, Tian Qin slumped dejectedly into a familiar sleep.

Right before she passed out, she thought about how much she hated that numb feeling. If there were a next time, perhaps she should beg him nicely, do anything to avoid getting stuck again. She had to keep her will clear if she was to have any hope of redemption.

...

When she finally opened her eyes again, Tian Qin's eyes felt light, like a huge weight had been taken off. Though ghostly remnants of numbness lingered in her nerves, as she raised her eyelids, she could dimly make out the outlines of the room's furnishings, which gradually came into focus, sharp and clear. A torrent of sunlight poured in like raging waves, and she stared blankly at her own palm—she had regained her sight.

She hissed in pain, like her head was splitting open.

The pain was very brief, like the dying embers of a match after it went out. She owed it to that sliver of numbness, which had acted like a shield against pain humans just weren't meant to bear.

She had never cherished light so much, staring blankly for a long time, even at the fine patterns on the quilt.

Her mind was still foggy; she did not know where she was or what had happened. The moment she tried to remember, the painful memory of Xie Tanwei jabbing her with that needle came flooding back, and she realized that the seemingly harmonious atmosphere before her hid danger.

Danger had already arrived.

Xie Tanwei rose, his handsome features bearing the weariness of several sleepless nights, his hair slightly disheveled. So he had been sleeping slumped by her bed all along. Now, a sleepy smile spread across his face like a light breeze:

"You can see?"