Futile Devices Scans

Mr. Yan came home much later than usual that night. By the time he returned, it was already the hour when all the brothers in the house routinely turned off the lights and went to bed.

Their compound was large. Yan Xiaodao lived in the main villa, with four of his men sleeping in two rooms downstairs. Beside the main villa was an added annex that could accommodate another seven or eight people. Ordinarily, more than a dozen men lived there together.

Yan Xiaodao had deliberately stayed out until dinner and the evening’s entertainment were over, avoiding every unnecessary entanglement. He was mentally tired and did not want to hear irrelevant people teasing and chattering about his relationship with Mr. Ling. For the first time in his life, he thought this bachelor “dormitory” was too crowded.

There seemed to be a figure on the terrace leading to the sitting room, but when he looked more carefully, it was only the shadow of the maple tree, whose leaves scattered everywhere from spring through autumn.

The diligent Kuanzi poked his head out of the downstairs bedroom, his messy hair revealing how sleepy he was. Yan Xiaodao made a shushing gesture and sent him back to bed. In fact, tonight’s background lullaby was extraordinarily high-class—not a record or recording, but a live performance. The villa’s own resident pianist was playing the Steinway. Moonlight flowed like water, spring blossoms lay scattered across the ground, and exquisite piano music drifted through the entire house.

The magnificent grand piano occupied the center of the sitting room. The pianist’s back was quiet and elegant. Seen from behind, the curve from his neck down his spine was flawless, the long, balanced muscles beneath his shirt eventually narrowing into a flexible waist. His elegant bearing and graceful posture looked as though they had descended from the clouds. This was not something of the mortal world….

Master Bear and Third Lady had even become quiet, trained by the music into walking with feline steps. Their four fleshy paws landed lightly, and they appeared to have absorbed the etiquette of Western concerts: absolutely no barking or panting before the end of the piece. Only when the final note faded did they dare run over and rub affectionately against their master.

Yan Xiaodao left his suit jacket on the sofa, walked over, and sat on the empty half of the piano bench.

The place had clearly been reserved for him, waiting specifically for his return.

“Sorry. I’m back late.” Yan Xiaodao placed both hands on the keys and casually struck a few notes. The silence was making him uncomfortable.

Ling He slowly lifted his eyelids, his words carrying another meaning. “As long as you come home to sleep. Otherwise the villa gets haunted.”

Yan Xiaodao asked, “Am I some Door God who wards off evil?”

Ling He mocked him. “You’re much better-looking than a Door God, but the function is similar.”

They had made no arrangement, yet both naturally assumed their positions. On a whim, they launched into another passionate, soaring four-hand duet.

Yan Xiaodao sighed. “Nobody in this house is going to sleep.”

Ling He was completely unreasonable. “Who cares whether they sleep? We’ll play ours!”

Ling He had ordered a pile of sheet music online and had it delivered. They were all beginner and intermediate teaching materials, obviously prepared for a certain elderly novice. Ling He tossed several books at him and indicated with his eyes that it was time for the boss to make his request.

Yan Xiaodao’s mood turned page after page with the score, white pages scattered with leaping notes flowing like spilled mercury. Suddenly he looked into Ling He’s eyes. “I ran into Mai Yunliang at a café this afternoon. Talked with him for a bit.”

There was no surprise whatsoever on Ling He’s face. Every trace of emotion flowed slowly through his narrow phoenix eyes and dark brows before disappearing beneath the hair at his temples. “You can talk to whoever you want. You don’t need to report to me.”

Yan Xiaodao’s deep voice was gentle. “Just reporting it anyway. No reason to hide it from you.”

Ling He gave a cold laugh and cut straight through the substance of the conversation with an invisible blade. “Mr. Yan, there’s something you want to ask me, isn’t there? No need to beat around the bush. Ask.”

That was Ling He’s style: aggressive, leaving neither side any room to maneuver, never concealing the sharp edges of his personality or his ability to read people. He could not even be bothered circling around with polite nonsense.

Yan Xiaodao looked at him. “There’s nothing I need to ask.”

“If Mr. Yan has any doubts, ask whatever you like.” Ling He cut him with a sidelong look. His thin lips barely seemed to move before a string of words came crashing out. “Open attacks, hidden arrows, violent winds, raging waves, demons, monsters, tigers, leopards, pixiu—what haven’t I seen? No question is going to frighten or choke me to death. Go ahead, Mr. Yan. Don’t hold it in.”

Yan Xiaodao said with complete certainty, “I don’t have any questions I need to ask.”

In that brief moment, he confirmed his own judgment and feelings once again. It was not avoidance but release. He believed he had not misjudged this man. This Mr. Ling, wrapped from head to toe in vicious thorns, dazzlingly brilliant, with a temper so foul and hard that nobody could subdue him, was utterly different from Mai Yunliang or Lu Yilun. Every single scale on his body was different to the touch!

Yan Xiaodao struck a piano key and spoke with a hint of ingratiation. “What was the piece you were playing just now? I’ll learn that one.”

Teacher Ling mercilessly rejected his hardworking student. “Moonlight Sonata. Too difficult. You can’t learn it. Three months probably wouldn’t be enough.”

Yan Xiaodao said, “Then I’ll learn it slowly. What’s three months?”

Ling He lowered his thick lashes. “I’ll teach you an easier one. Let’s aim for you to learn it in three days.”

That night, Yan Xiaodao did not quite understand why Ling He refused to teach him something harder. They could take their time with it. What was the hurry? Why did he insist on producing a graduate in three days?

Ling He gave him the books to choose from, and they selected a Bach piece that looked relatively simple. Their efficiency was honestly not very high because somewhere along the way, practicing seemed to turn into the two of them catching each other in verbal sparring. Basically, Xiaodao practiced his fingers while Ling He practiced his mouth, criticizing his student until there was practically nothing left worth praising. Sometimes Xiaodao’s gaze was unconsciously captured by the other man’s eyes, and he would quietly force himself to look away, only to catch Teacher Ling through the corner of his eye staring fixedly at the student’s hands as though he wanted to swallow his fingers.

The right hand and left hand nearest each other occasionally met in the same range of notes. Almost as if they shared one mind, the bones beneath their ring and little fingers pressed together…. Neither spoke. Neither moved away. Their hands stayed stuck together, and the score promptly deteriorated into nonsense.

They played until after midnight. If they kept going any longer, the brats under their roof were liable to rise in rebellion against their masters. They had managed only two pages of the Bach exercise and agreed to continue training the next day.

Yan Xiaodao got Mr. Ling washed up and settled into bed, then walked alone back toward the guest room. His lonely shadow stretched slowly beneath the dim corridor lights, betraying a reluctance he clearly did not want to admit, a tether he could not shake. Once inside the bathroom, he stripped off his shirt and immediately shoved his head beneath the shower, using cold water to brutally force himself awake before facing the mirror.

The cold water mercilessly soaked his hair, chest, and everything else, droplets leaping across his thick black lashes. This forced cooling, like drinking poison to quench thirst, ultimately failed to hide the hard rise beneath the final layer of clothing. Yan Xiaodao suddenly leaned closer to the mirror and, as though he had finally developed some sense, turned his face left and right to study it. A little embarrassed, he lowered his eyes and smiled, letting that sweetness sink inch by inch into deeper places. He had never experienced this kind of heartbeat before….

He had never admired his own appearance this much. He was already past the most recklessly youthful age, yet somehow he had become vain. He shaved his chin clean again and used mouthwash to remove the smell of cigarettes.

Yan Xiaodao was not remotely stupid. He was extremely perceptive. Ling He’s blunt statement after learning that Yan had privately met Mai Yunliang—ask whatever you want to ask—was, from a certain angle, almost an admission that Ling He had indeed known Mai Yunliang before and that Mai had not mistaken him for someone else.

The old events Mai Yunliang had privately revealed about Ling He might truly have happened.

And precisely because of that, Yan Xiaodao felt there was no need to interrogate him. Someone you cherished was supposed to be held close and treated tenderly, not pushed away through narrow-minded questioning about the past. There were some things Yan simply did not care about, while there was one person he already cared about far too much.

…

Yan Xiaodao pressed his forehead against the smooth, icy mirror in one last futile resistance.

A moment later, he lowered his head and removed the black abdominal belt he almost never took off, along with every knife he carried. There was no need for them. He had no defenses against Ling He. Then he pulled the white shirt back over his damp body, his burning fingers brushing skin that felt as though it were on fire.

His elongated shadow reappeared in the corridor. This time he did not linger or hesitate. He strode directly to the master bedroom, opened the door, and went inside.

When he switched on the bedside lamp, Ling He was not asleep either. He looked up at Yan with hazy eyes. “…Mr. Yan?”

Yan Xiaodao stood at the bedside, his body beneath the white shirt tall and athletic. Water ran from his hair, but before the drops could reach his neck they seemed already heated to scalding temperature.

“…Is something wrong?” Ling He frowned. Alarm suddenly flashed across his face. He jerked his head backward and seemed ready to struggle upright.

Yan Xiaodao did not sit at the edge of the bed and talk with him as usual. His right knee came down on the mattress. His left arm slid in around Ling He’s head and back, and his entire body bowed over him….

The last thing Yan Xiaodao saw clearly was Ling He’s eyes darkening like black jade with shock. In the chaotic light inside those pupils, Yan became the shadow of a large dark feline pressing heavily and relentlessly downward. He pressed his forehead and nose against Ling He’s face, their noses rubbing together with overwhelming tenderness, yet when he was almost close enough to kiss him, his lips trembled with such affection that he hesitated.

The other man’s lips were clearly trembling too.

The look in Ling He’s eyes collapsed instantly into something like intoxicated mental disarray. The moment their bodies met, Yan Xiaodao felt his entire being—body, three souls, seven spirits—explode. His body focused entirely on that point of contact while his mind drifted drunkenly toward a sky filled with auspicious clouds. Heat. Scalding heat. Burning…. The final shell of fragile skin between them was defenseless beneath such sweetness and seemed to turn instantly to ash.

The man beneath him shuddered heavily somewhere deep in his throat and neck. One arm pushed and tugged against him in resistance.

Yan Xiaodao’s arms were trembling. All the experience he had once prided himself on vanished into nothing. He felt like an awkward experimental prototype completely exposed before the other man, tasting for the first time what it meant to cherish and desire one person this deeply. He cradled Ling He’s face as though it were precious, covered his lips, and entered his mouth in a sweetness unlike anything language or previous experience could describe. Their lips and tongues met, sweeping away every breath that had still been wandering uncertainly between them. The instant was devastating, wildfire racing across the plain and flattening everything before it until only the perfect person in his arms remained.

He wanted to confirm that Ling He was truly here in his arms, utterly removed from every filthy and degrading transaction. He was here, real and solid beside him. One embrace. One word of comfort. That was enough.

“Xiaodao… Mr. Yan, let go….” Ling He’s hoarse, suppressed voice was muffled against Yan Xiaodao’s damp chest as though through cotton, but then his palm struck Yan squarely over the heart, and the pain created by that force was very real.

Neither man was weak. They almost started fighting outright on the bed amid the violent turning and grappling.

Yan Xiaodao’s eyes were burning red from desire. From above, he held an overwhelming advantage. During the struggle, his hand slipped through Ling He’s collar and around his back. The house clothes rapidly tore apart under the force of his fingers. Steel bars and metal sheeting could hardly withstand his grip, much less a thin layer of soft fabric.

One hand followed the intoxicating honey-colored skin and thrust abruptly into Ling He’s trousers.

He truly had restrained himself around this man for too long and liked him far too much. All his former resistance and aversion, reserve and pride, seemed ridiculous now, utterly defenseless before Ling He.

…

At some point, Yan Xiaodao finally heard the unbearable struggle and resistance building inside Ling He’s chest. It was as though a living volcano had been buried underneath, suddenly erupting amid the continuous violent movement, lava blotting out the sky and sweeping away all the sweetness from the clouds.

Something also went wrong between the lips and tongues locked in a deep kiss. Ling He tried to bite him, tearing at his tongue before wrenching his mouth free.

Thud.

Hard bone struck hard bone with a dull impact.

An elbow smashed into Yan Xiaodao’s chin, forcing his head backward. Ling He’s right hand reversed and clamped around his throat. The two froze in a rigid standoff, one body overlapping the other, panting beneath the lamp and staring at each other, both holding themselves back.

“Ling He.” Yan Xiaodao still did not want to let him go. Even without touching it, he could feel a swollen red mark rising on his chin. Ling He had driven that elbow down with full force.

The person in his arms had hardened into an inviolable rock. His eyes had never been this bloodshot. He was beyond furious. His body was no longer merely hot; it seemed to be shooting flames at Yan. Ling He’s grip around his throat did not loosen, the muscles taut as iron.

Was I too impatient? Too rough?

This had already been the gentlest he had ever been.

Yan Xiaodao had always known how coarse his palms were. Being touched by him probably was not comfortable. Yet he himself had enjoyed touching Ling He immensely. The feel of him was indescribable, his body flawless enough to make Yan feel ashamed of his own….

He also did not consider himself someone who liked to drag things out. If there were feelings, there were feelings. If there were none, there were none. If he liked someone, then he liked him. He believed Ling He was equally direct and straightforward; their temperaments matched that perfectly, their minds moved together. Two grown men—did they really need to sit beside a bed and “discuss” and “explain” what they were doing? Did they not understand each other already?

Yan Xiaodao said gently, “Did I hurt you? I’m sorry.”

His Adam’s apple moved beneath the three fingers Ling He had locked around his throat. Yan made no attempt to evade him and simply let him squeeze.

“Mr. Yan, have you gone insane? Get your hands and legs off me and remember who you are. Have you gotten so lazy lately you can’t even be bothered walking out the front door when you want to fuck somebody?” Ling He spat the words through clenched lips and teeth.

Yan Xiaodao answered softly, “No.”

“What are you trying to do?” Ling He had no blade in his hand, but his gaze was one. “Did pretending to be an upright gentleman for too long finally make you snap, or was becoming a beast in human clothing simply too easy and familiar for you to resist? Mr. Yan, my family has fallen, I have no talent or ability, I’m only a cripple taking shelter and eating under your roof. So you think because I’m alone and can’t beat you, you can bully me however you like? How different are you from Jian Mingjue or You Haodong? I’m right here within reach, so why not take what you can?”

Ling He’s abrupt, unpredictable reversal made intense shock and confusion flash through Yan Xiaodao’s eyes. The strength in his hands gradually loosened, and a chill rolled down his back. “Ling He, don’t say that. I’ve never thought that way.”

“Then how do you think, Mr. Yan?” Ling He gave a cold laugh and struck back with equal confusion and anger. “What exactly are you and I? From the moment I stepped through your door, am I a guest you invited to stay or a prisoner you’re confining and watching on behalf of your godfather? Am I here enjoying the fish and moonlight, or am I actually living under another man’s roof waiting to be butchered the moment an order comes? Don’t tell me you don’t understand that the truth is the latter. What is tonight supposed to be? You pull your trousers back on after getting out of my bed, Qi Baoshan tells you to cut off my hands and feet and throw me into the sea for sharks, and then what? Do you obey or not, loyal and honorable Mr. Yan?”

Yan Xiaodao stared in shock for several moments before finally challenging him. “Ling He, would I hurt you? Have I ever hurt you?… Even if Master Qi were standing here today, I would find some way to protect you from anyone who wanted to harm you. You trust me that little?”

Ling He sneered. “How exactly would you protect me? Compared with the godfather whose kindness to you is as deep as the sea and whose favor weighs like a mountain, I’m nothing but some chance acquaintance whose life is worth less than grass. If you still have any face or self-respect left, Mr. Yan, stop acting falsely affectionate and saying things you don’t mean in front of me. Save that strength for declaring your loyalty to your godfather. He’s the only one who’ll believe it!”

…

Yan Xiaodao’s entire body went cold. He stared in disbelief at the beautiful man rigid in his arms, cursing him bloody.

Beautiful enough to topple a city. Ruthless to the extreme.

Every sentence sounded perfectly reasonable at first. Yan could not even find a hard answer to refute him. Every word was like a heavy club smashing him in the face and a blade stabbing into his heart. In that instant, he experienced Ling He’s cruelty firsthand. The tenderness of moments before vanished like smoke, as though it had never existed. As though nothing had ever existed between them.

And yet when Yan’s tongue had entered the depths of the other man’s mouth, he had clearly felt a fierce response from Ling He’s lips and tongue, his body leaning into the embrace. When Yan had held him and touched him in abandon, he had unmistakably felt Ling He trying to respond, trying to hold him…. And in the very masculine way of a man with undeniable strength in his arms, Ling He had wrapped those arms around him, held his back, touched him. That had absolutely not been an illusion. Ling He had touched him…. Those fleeting moments of tangled kissing had carried Yan into the clouds and made him mistakenly believe Ling He wanted this too.

Yan Xiaodao wanted to tear out his heart and lay it open. There were things he could not say plainly, so he could only weave his tenderness into a dense, restrained whisper. “I hurt for you. I want to protect you. Whatever you’ve had no choice about, whatever you’ve been forced to say or do against your will, tell me. I can share it. I’ll carry it for you.”

Ling He rejected him without hesitation. “Thank you for the kindness, Mr. Yan. There’s no need. There are things you simply cannot carry, and I don’t need anyone’s pity. I’m not Mai Yunliang, someone who willingly degraded himself and then hid in self-pity when nobody was watching while wagging his tail and begging when people were. I speak directly and I never say things against my own will. If Mr. Yan has this much tenderness to spare, go pity Mr. Mai.”

Yan Xiaodao was deeply disappointed. He murmured, “…You don’t want this?”

Ling He released his throat. “I don’t.”

…

I don’t.

I don’t.

…

Yan Xiaodao slowly and painfully moved off Ling He. It was barely a foot of distance and should have been an effortless movement, yet the bone-deep chill and disappointment had already thrown him far away from the person before him, all the way to the horizon.

Perhaps Ling He reflected on his own ruthlessness. His thick lashes concealed the true light in his eyes. “Mr. Yan, I’m truly sorry. Perhaps something I did caused you to misunderstand. Your preferences and mine happen to run in opposite directions. I’m ‘not into men.’ I don’t like doing that sort of thing between men…. You’re still the same handsome, charming, irresistible Mr. Yan. You simply chose the wrong person.”

Yan Xiaodao looked at him quietly. “Neither am I. I don’t like that sort of thing between men either. I’ve never done it.”

But I like you.

Yan Xiaodao believed that between the two of them, those words amounted to the deepest possible confession. There was no need for cloying, affected nonsense beyond it. I don’t have a taste for men either. I’ve never touched another man. It’s because you’re you, Ling He.

Ling He obviously understood the instant he heard it. He forced his gaze away as though fighting to the death, but a tremor in his throat escaped his control and swept through the vast wilderness between them.

Yan Xiaodao got off the bed, turned, and walked out without looking back. He suppressed the pain under a sensation like needles piercing him and left.

Ling He had said he did not want it.

Yan Xiaodao would never force him. What happened between two people in bed had to be mutually desired. What he wanted was the intimacy of two people who cherished each other in the same moment. He had never forced anyone in his life, much less someone he genuinely cared for and wanted to treasure. He could not do it…. Even though the difference in their physical strength was so obvious that pinning Ling He’s legs down and brute-forcing the act would have been ridiculously easy.

Late that night, Yan Xiaodao crouched on a rock in a corner of the backyard smoking and letting the cold wind wash over him. One of the brothers living in the annex spotted him, stuck his face out, and asked, “Boss, you’re still awake?”

“Craving hit me. Came outside for a cigarette,” Yan Xiaodao answered.

“Heh-heh. Boss really knows how to spoil someone….” The man went back inside.

There was nothing particularly defeated, embarrassed, or devastated on Yan Xiaodao’s face. He was hurting inside, but he had never shown pain in front of other people, not since childhood. He could withstand any blow life threw at him. What did this amount to?

Yan Xiaodao had no chance to see what happened after he turned his back, closed the bedroom door, and left. Ling He turned off the bedside lamp himself and concealed every impulse to laugh, cry, or lose his mind entirely within silence and darkness.

Ling He lay motionless on his back, staring at the handsome, upright shadow his mind projected onto the ceiling. His nose had finally brushed the nose he had dreamed of, rubbed against it for a long time while he was passively kissed almost breathless, even grazing that extremely sexy little black mole.

He touched his own lips, tracing the countless fine lines while remembering how that beautiful mouth had kissed him. He had absolutely no experience of anything like this. He remembered the faint smell of tobacco circling his excited nerves, strangely mixed with the sweet mint of mouthwash. Even that could not hide Xiaodao’s particular warm, biting tobacco scent. He remembered the slightly rough deep kiss that had burned directly into his heart—a wholehearted, masculine kiss that could only exist between two men.

Ling He slipped a finger between his own lips and tongue, futilely trying to recover the ecstasy of their tongues entangling, the burning, the sensation of entering an endless paradise together.

…

I don’t like it.

I don’t want it.

Doing that sort of thing between men makes me sick. It disgusts me.

But… it was Xiaodao.

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