Chapter 177: Surprisingly Jovial…lucky little…
After getting the hell out of the Corrada Family territory, including a close shave involving Telana Corrada outside what he hoped was a makeup shop, that mixes rattlesnake venom into their lip stain, the two of them had successfully made it to neutral territory.
“Phew! Now the Corradas have significantly less justification to beat the shit out of us… probably,” Zhen Liu said while dusting off of his clothes.
“I’ve been meaning to ask this, but why haven’t you nor the other three powers wiped each other out yet? Because it seems like that all of you are on the brink of all out street violence.”
“Yeah…I honestly have no idea myself. I can tell you what I think as a whole while we’re talking and walking. Still up for that meal?”
“Honestly? Very much so.”
“Excellent. It’s this way…”
Zhen Liu and Bellona then proceeded to have a lovely late lunch of…some type of stir fried noodle dish that had a weird name, but it translated to “yakisoba” in Zhen Liu’s head…a lot more questionabley sourced meat though…namely giant locust steaks…tasted good still.
After that, the two of them walked and talked some more, figured out a way to get the dust and dirt off their clothes, and eventually parted ways after Zhen Liu dropped Bellona off at the inn she and her father were staying at.
“Well, other than almost getting killed and some emotional venting, I do hope you enjoyed our date.”
“It was… surprisingly more fun than I had anticipated. Though, I do hope your kaijin weren’t too bored with us just walking and talking about.”
[Of course not, milady.]
[It’s…fine…]
[Oh no no, romcom drama is just the best, ya know?]
[Me was bored. Wanted to slice.]
“I think they’re fine,” Zhen Liu confirmed.
With their goodbyes exchanged, Zhen Liu turned to leave for home, but Bellona had just one more thing for him to take before he did.
“Zhen Liu.”
“Yes?”
*Smooch*
[Oh my.]
[Romance…]
[First base, bitches!]
[Huh? What attack was that?]
With no prompting and exactly zero mental prep time, Bellona proceeded to kiss Zhen Liu on the cheek. Perhaps she wanted to kiss him on the lips instead, feeling how very close she was to them, but settled for the cheek instead. It was still considered inappropriate for a lady to initiate such an intimate kiss in public…at least that’s what she was taught.
“Consider this my thanks for everything today,” Bellona said with a smile after pulling herself back from the kiss, “I think this is the first time I’ve seen anyone mentally speechless before. I’ll see you around.” The deed now done, Bellona went back into the inn and left a beet red Zhen Liu standing there, flustered and confused.
This sounds weird, given that Zhen Liu has Jin Fang, but keep in mind that this was technically the first kiss he had received from someone other than her, and that this was technically the first time “Thomas” had received a kiss from someone completely unrelated to Zhen Liu in any prior capacity.
Achievement unlocked, as it were.
Keeping the above interaction in mind, imagine how his cousins would react seeing someone actually going on a successful date with a girl that emotionally damaged two of them in a heartbeat.
________________________________________________
Zhen Yue, Zhen Hai and Zhen Guo looked at Zhen Liu with shock as their cousin came into the courtyard and proceeded to not lie facedown on the ground like a dying trout, instead walking in like he was on cloud nine. It didn’t help that he had a lipstain mark pretty fucking obviously placed upon his cheek.
It took a few moments for it to register in Zhen Liu’s head that his cousins had come to see him again, but he proceeded to wave when it did.
“Hey guys! What’s going-whoa!”
“Holy shit she actually kissed you.”
In a split moment, barely before he could get out a greeting, Zhen Guo had rushed up to Zhen Liu and grabbed his face in order to the kiss marked cheek towards himself. Studying it in a second, he noted that it was indeed the same lipstain that Bellona used on their excursion just a day prior. He didn’t know whether to have been jealous about his cousin’s successful date, pissed that he waited for nothing or proud that someone managed to get back emotionally in one piece. Regardless, it all boiled down to one question anyways.
“How the fuck did you pull that off?,” Zhen Guo and Zhen Hai both asked in almost complete unison. It was apparently that shocking to the two of them that this had occured.
Zhen Yue, not so much.
“Zhen Guo, please let go of his face.”
“Oh. Right.”
“Now Zhen Liu…how?,” Zhen Yue asked. She was just as confused as the other two, but was a bit more polite about it. Plus she had assumed that Bellona and Zhen Liu had chemistry, judging how long it’s been at this point.
“Well…,” Zhen Liu started, trying to find the right words to say and what details to keep out, “for starters, we almost got killed.”
“What?!”
“Why do I feel like this might be a running trend for you?”
Zhen Liu proceeded to tell his cousins about his and Bellona’s encounter with Boss Must, and how they soundly kicked his ass in, and then the significantly more harrowing encounter with the Bloodliner known as leech. Zhen Liu also made sure to leave out the detail about the heart to heart he had with Bellona, respect a person’s secrets and all that jazz.
Zhen Hai and Zhen Guo looked impressed of the back to back harrowing encounters Zhen Liu had in the span of a single afternoon, Zhen Yue on the other hand looked…perturbed.
“Hang on, Zhen Liu, can you repeat where you and Bellona met this Boss Must and Leech character?”
“At one of the exit tunnels near the Natural Treasures Under Park.”
“And you said that Leech…”
“Drained the aether out of Boss Must and used his abilities to try and kill me and her, yes.”
“Huh…so you’re the reason why there’s a vampire rumor floating around.”
“Vampire rumor?”
Zhen Yue went off that question to tell Zhen Liu what was floating around the city. Apparently, during the interim of Zhen Liu and Bellona going on the less deadly portion of their date, Boss Must and his men were found laying unconscious in the same tunnel that Zhen Liu had mentioned.
In a weird combination of testimonies from some rattled henchmen, their boss was initially being beaten by a young man with lighting aether abilities and then drained dry by sudden interloping vampiric warrior. Rumors fly fast, get distorted, and now people think that Stone Claw might have a fucking vampire problem.
Zhen Hai and Zhen Guo couldn’t help but stifle their laughter that the reason for this rumor was none other than their cousin going on a date.
“While I’m pretty sure nothing will come from this since no one could tell it was you, I still think it’s best if…what’s with that look?”
Zhen Liu was like this “._.” right now, because he was pretty sure his cousin was about to jinx his ass.
‘Can…can you not foreshadow me right now? I just got back from a date…’
