Ch3 - Im the one above!

Special thanks to Petra for proofreading

As soon as Xia Wan said those words, silence followed, quiet as a pin drop. Huo Yu looked at him without saying anything. He knew Xia Wan was handsome, but his face was hidden by the dim light inside the car, so none of his good looks were visible. 

Meanwhile, Xia Wan started to regret his words as more time passed. Asking this was too much, especially when Huo Yu had lent him a hand in difficult times. His request was indeed off bounds. After all, in the end, they were strangers who had met for the first time tonight. Even if they were on the same page a while ago, that was when they loathed the same person. Now that they were alone, they were back to being strangers. If it weren’t for his transmigration into this completely strange world, in such a helpless and hopeless situation without any of the memories of the original owner, Xia Wan would not have made such an abrupt request. But now he only had Huo Yu to lean on. He rubbed his fingertips subconsciously inside the windbreaker pocket.

Xia Wan was about to speak when suddenly a cold wind blew in, causing him to sneeze twice in a row. 

Huo Yu watched him sneeze. He looked into those beautiful eyes, soaked in a thin mist of water under the white moonlight, as pure as if he had never committed a single hideous crime. Xia Wan looked like he didn’t have a single skeleton hiding in his closet. He looked like an abandoned wandering puppy……

 “Get in the car.” Huo Yu looked away. Even in his tone, he did not seem upset with Xia Wan’s request. “If you can accept sleeping on the sofa, then you can come with me.”

“Ah?” Xia Wan was surprised by how easily Huo Yu agreed to his request. But after hearing his positive answer, Xia Wan was a bit reluctant. After all, the other party was the villain. When did the villain become so humble as to lend a hand?

Xia Wan hesitated a little. He couldn’t help but rub his fingers underneath his sleeve. 

In his previous life, Xia Wan was always nurtured by everyone. To be precise, it was more appropriate to say that he was constantly under the watch of his family, even more so after his diagnosis. And if someone tried to mess with him, his family would deal with them immediately. He was the apple of their eye. 

Because of this, apart from health issues, Xia Wan hardly encountered anything terrible, and he did not mix with people who were malicious to him. But now, without his beloved family members who loved him to bits, he had to face everything alone. And it was indeed said in the book that Huo Yu was an unstable person and that his methods were ruthless. For the sake of his own family, he would go to great lengths.

Thinking of his own family, Xia Wan became even more emotional. If he had transmigrated here, did that mean that he died in his world? Would they be able to cope with his death? He bet they wouldn’t. His eyes became moist as he remembered each of their faces. Because of his illness, Xia Wan was mentally prepared to be separated from them at any time, but now that the day had come, why was it so uncomfortable?

“Aren’t you going?” Xia Wan was probably silent for a long time, and Huo Yu’s deep voice was impatient.

Xia Wan pursed his lips, trying to forcefully press down the sourness at the tip of his nose, but as soon as he moved, the hot liquid slid down the end of his eyes. He looked even more like an abandoned puppy compelling people to protect him. Huo Yu seemed to be stunned for a moment as he looked at the tears that flowed down from Xia Wan’s eyes. After a while, he tilted his head and softly explained: “Actually, it doesn’t matter if I sleep on the sofa.”

Huo Yu has never bent down in front of anyone in his life. Looking at the figure in front of him, he didn’t know why, but he was inexplicably stabbed in the heart and for the first time in his life he felt a little helpless. Xia Wan smiled at Huo Yu. He raised his face, the tears in his eyes having yet to dry, but the corners of his mouth pulled up.

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

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…….

The night wind was cold, but the car was very warm. The scenery outside the window was familiar because the book was based on the city where Xia Wan used to live. 

But if one looked closely, many details were markedly different from real life. For instance, the Imperial City Hotel where they were just now, although it was a hotel, in reality, the names were different. The one in Xia Wan’s previous life had not been named Imperial City.

Xia Wan looked at the scenery outside as the car was moving, and carefully sorted through the memories of the original owner in his mind. The life that had been lived thus far was not complicated. It was just a matter of time before Xia Wan got the gist of it. From these memories, Xia Wan learned that he (the original owner) had no mother and that his father’s legs were disabled. His father’s name was Xia Chengzhang. Before this, the original owner had not lived in this city but in Xia Chengzhang’s hometown, a poor and desolate region in the southern part of the county.

The original owner was in his first year of high school when they had the opportunity to move to the city, when the original owner’s distant uncle, Xia Chenglin, returned to his hometown. Due to the original owner’s upbringing, although he was extraordinarily beautiful, his personality was rather inferior. He had a feeble disposition, and people often took advantage of him because of it.

Suddenly, Xia Wan saw a very familiar building sign. He was stunned for a moment. He immediately sat up reflexively.

“Huo Yu.” Xia Wan didn’t notice that he dared to call the villain’s name directly, nor did he realize that his voice was trembling. “What is that?”

“Where?” Huo Yu thought Xia Wan was cold, so he turned on the heater. The temperature increased a bit.

“Over there,” Xia Wan pointed subconsciously. “That red X building sign.” 

The huge “X” was very far away from them, but it was placed in such a way that even from a distance it was noticeable. Not to mention that the red color of the sign was very eye-catching. Xia Wan was very familiar with it, having seen this image since childhood. How could he mistake it for anything but the logo of his Xia family? The sign represented their dominance. Their company was considered the brightest star in the whole country – the best of the best. 

Xia Wan’s heart almost jumped out. Even from far away, he accurately estimated the location of the building with its flashing sign. It was in the same place as their Xia family. Was there a possibility that their Xia family also existed in this world, and that his parents and relatives were also here? Xia Wan couldn’t help but clench his fists.

Huo Yu’s voice broke his train of thought: “That is the headquarters of the Xue family.”

“The Xue family?” Xia Wan murmured, and in an instant, his whole heart became desolate. The heaviness of his mood was hard to bear.

As soon as he heard the name “Xue,” Xia Wan recalled from the original owner’s memory bits and pieces of information about them. The Xue family was mainly engaged in daily chemicals, skincare, make-up, and accessories. In recent years, the investments they had their hands in had also flourished. The Xue family had powerful influence and appeal in the world, and there was almost no one who would not have heard of them before. 

While Xia Wan was in a trance and his body went numb. He sat stunned for a while before he realized that his phone was vibrating. He slowly took it out, and when he saw the words “Brother Yang” flashing on the screen, he couldn’t help but frown slightly. If Xia Wan was not mistaken, the reason why the original owner got together with Huo Lin in the first place was entire because of Xia Yang. The original owner grew up in a small place and his father was always busy all the time. The father and son didn’t get to spend much time with each other, and due to this lack of parental warmth, he didn’t have anyone to talk to. That resulted in a deterioration of his personality and introversion. The original owner would spend all his days being idle, and when he first came to the city he was unable to understand many things due to his temperament and lack of personal opinions. When others looked down on him, or when they bullied him, he would say nothing and bear it all silently – Including Xia Yang. But this Xia Wan was different. He was born into a wealthy family, and even if he seldom went out he was still aware of what was happening around him. Although Xia Wan rarely had contact with outsiders, and he was often relatively ignorant about small things, that did not mean that he could not see who wished him well and who did not.  

The original owner was very talented in painting since childhood, but Xia Chengzhang could not afford the related expenses until Xia Chenglin returned home and persuaded Xia Chengzhang to live in Beijing for the sake of the original owner’s future. Every word Xia Chenglin said seemed full of goodwill, but it was just a mask of hypocrisy. Once Xia Chenglin saw Xia Wan’s looks and beauty, Xia Chenglin started to have crooked thoughts about him. It didn’t cost much to support one or two people, just like raising a couple of sheep, and if ever he came upon difficult times it would be easy to send them to slaughter. Whether it was the Xia family or Huo Lin, they all saw the original owner as a simple bargaining chip for their own use. From the very start they all wove webs of falsehoods, and in the end, what awaited the original owner was betrayal and his own destruction.

“Hello?” Xia Wan answered the phone and almost immediately held the receiver away from his ear because the voice on the other end was so loud that it almost burst his eardrums.

“Do you know what you have done today? How dare you?” Xia Yang angrily said. His voice carried in the quiet car, and even Huo Yu could hear it.

Huo Yu glanced sideways, but all he saw was Xia Wan’s unblinking expression. His eyes drooped, and his thick lashes covered his lower eyelids like small fans, without even fluttering. It wasn’t until Xia Yang got tired of yelling on the other end of the line that he lowered the tone of his voice. Only then did Xia Wan slowly bring the microphone closer to his lips, which had frozen purple. The blood rushed back to turn them pink and red, and he answered Xia Yang: “What did I do?”

Just this sentence made Xia Yang see red. His rage climbed another level, he started to shoot words like bullets. Xia Wan pulled the phone away again, and vaguely heard the other side asking loudly, “What did you say? What did you do? You offended Huo Lin! Wasn’t Huo Lin your boyfriend? Our family finally got a shot at the project but just because of your silly mistake everything is ruined.”

“Brother,” Xia Wan said, “You probably don’t know what’s going on. It was Huo Lin who gave me a green hat first, and it was Huo Lin who got engaged to someone else while dating me. Tell me how I should handle it. By bottling up? Or maybe becoming a mistress?”

How could Xia Yang not know all of this? He probably knew it better than anyone else. Sure enough, as if overwhelmed, he said angrily: “Who the hell are you? Are you even worthy of being Huo Lin’s cuckold?”

Xia Wan smiled with the corners of his mouth hooked, but he didn’t speak, and his brother seemed to realize that he had made a slip of the tongue and stopped suddenly. Before, they had relied on Xia Wan’s stupidity. Their exploitation of him was always covered in a veneer of goodness and love, but today Xia Wan was behaving quite differently as if he were about to rip apart this entire façade. Seeing that Xia Wan did not speak any further or hang up the phone, Xia Yang’s tone softened a little. “Xia Wan, your brother didn’t mean that.”

“Then what did you mean?” Xia Wan asked, not even bothering to call him “brother.”

“Brother’s saying this for your good,” Xia Yang tried to persuade him. “Just think, Huo Lin has only been engaged, not married. Huo Lin likes you very much, you still have a chance…”

“Why don’t you just say that you want me to cling to the Huo family’s legs?” Xia Wan interrupted him. “I am with Huo Yu now, isn’t it the same? Both are young masters of the Huo family.”

Xia Yang was so furious that he almost threw the phone, but then he thought of how Huo Lin was so irritated when he had called just now, he seemed to still have some lingering affection for Xia Wan. All hope was not lost. There was still a chance to make things right. 

“Can Huo Yu be compared with Huo Lin?” Xia Yang said in a low voice. “The reins of the Huo family are now in Huo Lin and his father’s hands, what do you think Huo Yu will do? After so many years abroad now, he has to be considered an outsider. How will Huo Yu support you, huh?! Xia Wan,” he continued. “Although they are all from the same family, the fact of having real power and not having real power is completely different.”

“Oh.” Xia Wan heard him and lazily said: “So it’s like me and brother. Although all things belong to the Xia family, I have nothing.”

Come on! Xia Yang was so angry that his temples twitched. He didn’t know what medicine Xia Wan had taken tonight so his words were ignorant but more poisonous than usual. They kept repeating in Xia Yang’s head. For the first time, he felt helpless when dealing with Xia Wan. His behavior was drastically different from the usual Xia Wan, who had always been an obedient younger brother. It made him feel uneasy and helpless.

 “Brother didn’t mean that,” Xia Yang continued to explain while holding back his anger.

“Then what do you mean?” Xia Wan asked again.

“Huo Lin likes you very much. If you don’t go to him, who else will treat you as well or regard you as highly?” Xia Wan did not know. He would naturally be tempted by such benefits. “Huo Lin was very generous when he was with you. Just think about it. When you were in trouble, and you and your father did not have enough food or clothes, it was Huo Lin who lent out a hand. Now thanks to him you and your father have enough to eat and wear for the rest of your lives, and of course, you will be getting much more if you choose Huo Lin.” 

All this was just to make him Huo Lin’s lover. Xia Wan sneered silently and asked, “So many benefits?”

“Of course,” Xia Yang’s tone finally became lighter. “Could brother harm you? Has your brother ever lied to you?” 

“Since there are so many benefits,” Xia Wan asked after a moment, “Why doesn’t my brother date Huo Lin himself?”

Fuck! Xia Yang almost insulted his mother, but he immediately reacted and said, “Why, because of course Huo Lin doesn’t like me!”

“Then let Zhang Hao date him. I’m with Huo Yu now, and I’m not as pure as before,” Xia Wan said.

God damn it! This little rascal!!!!! Xia Yang thought. 

The hands that had been firmly resting on the steering wheel tightened subconsciously, and the corner of Huo Yu’s mouth twitched stiffly. The show was not over yet, because Xia Wan continued to say in a very serious tone, “And I analyzed what my brother said. I think Huo Yu is a better match for me than Huo Lin.” Then he kindly suggested, “Why don’t you let Zhang Hao date him?”

Zhang Hao was Xia Yang’s cousin. Xia Yang’s uncle died very early, and his aunt lived in the Xia house with her two children. Zhang Hao was the boy among them. Because of their lack of a father figure, they were even more pampered and as a result became lawless. They even tried to bully Xia Wan many times, but they were blocked by Xia Yang and Xia Chengsen. The original owner was very grateful for this, but Xia Wan knew very well that they stayed in the original owner’s good graces just so that Xia Wan would blindly trust them, and never doubt them.

“Are you saying this on purpose?” Xia Yang finally came to his senses. “It doesn’t matter if Huo Lin sees Zhang Hao, even if he does, Zhang Hao would never be the one below because he is the one who would top.”

“Oh~.” After a long snort, Xia Wan said, “But I’m also the one who likes to be above.” 

A very low and deep cough echoed in the car, and Xia Wan raised his eyelashes to look over. Huo Yu was still staring forward intently, but the corners of his mouth were slightly raised. Even though Xia Wan was busy fighting this battle of wits and courage, he couldn’t help but appreciate the charming smile. So dazzling!