Don’t Be a Kept Man

Chapter 151: Exposed

This was a really hard to explain urge, or perhaps it was from the hormones or the dopamine, or perhaps it even came from the terrible situation of this world.
Maybe when there’s no one to depend on, in spirit or physically, he was desperate to try and find any source of comfort to avoid loneliness.

In this compact, tiny space of the car, they kissed and kissed.
The road outside was empty and quiet, with the wind as the only noise, as if they were the only two people that remained in this world.

At this moment, Pei Ran couldn’t care one bit about zombies or orbs.
Holding onto Qu Yan, a pair of lean and long hands lightly patted the other’s back in comfort, creating a gentle sensation that Qu Yan had never experienced.

Qu Yan subconsciously held onto Pei Ran even tighter; even if the other was already too lazy to move another inch, he was still not willing to stop.
He leaned his head down to drop a burning, intimate kiss onto Pei Ran’s throat, like an addicted man, unable to cut away his poisoned drug.

His lips were tainted red, bleeding slightly from their intense kiss just now, and there was a faint bite mark on his shoulder that appeared out of nowhere.
Numerous scars were on Qu Yan’s body, and each wound was a burning mark of hatred.

Yet it was different this time because it was left behind by Pei Ran, so suddenly he cared.

Qu Yan pulled down his shirt and tightly grabbed onto the back of Pei Ran’s head, forcing him to lower his head and kiss that newly created wound on his shoulder.
Pei Ran most likely did not like his forcefulness and bit him again.

It was very light, so light that no trace of it was left behind; it was more warm and ticklish than any kind of pain.

Pei Ran’s simpleton brain will never catch sight of nor understand the dark turmoil in the other’s thoughts.
His tongue was stinging from the pain and numbness, and he himself was so tired he didn’t even want to speak a word.

# First time discovering kissing is also an activity requiring a lot of fitness #

Lazily leaning against the car seat and seeing Qu Yan looking at him, Pei Ran smiled and reached out to pull the other into his embrace.
Making Qu Yan sit face to face with him and pressed up against his body, Pei Ran then pulled the fallen shirt back up from where it had gathered around his waist to cover the other youth’s overly thin body.

“Qu Yan.”

Pei Ran called out his name and then buried his face into his neck, nuzzling it like a large sized dog wanting some affection.
Qu Yan narrowed his eyes slightly and then grabbed the other’s neck, sealing their bodies as close as possible.

Perhaps they had stayed in the car for too long because they attracted two zombies.
Pei Ran rolled down the car window and, like before, threw out two zaps of electricity.
One of the zombies immediately fried up but the other female zombie was unexpectedly level T2 and its reaction speed was quite fast along with its strength.
Agitated, it immediately roared and threw itself forward, almost flipping the car over.

Pei Ran quickly pulled Qu Yan with him to hide and then threw another few zaps over, which finally brought the situation under control.
But the car window was now smudged with stanky blood and flesh.
The rotten face of the female zombie had scrunched into a scowl and was tightly smashed against the window; its body was frozen in its position, not falling onto the floor at all.

Pei Ran’s stomach felt a bit like it was about to hurl.
Lowering his head to look at Qu Yan who was in his embrace, he lightly patted his back, silently comforting the other as he thought about something.
Then he wrapped the other’s hand inside his palm, creating an intimate hold.
Smiling as he considered, 

“Why not…..I wipe the windows, you dig for orbs?”

What a perfectly great plan he has thought up.

Qu Yan let out a sigh by his ear and tightly smiled as he whispered, 

“Then kiss me.
If I’m satisfied by your kiss, I will help you out……”

Pei Ran’s tongue immediately started to throb in pain when he heard Qu Yan.
He felt that their positions seemed to have switched.
For the first time in his life he wasn’t the one being forward and trying to cop a feel and instead the other was trying to get it out of him.

“Your lips are torn, and you still want to kiss?” 

Pei Ran’s fingers lightly rubbed Qu Yan’s lower lip and then he leaned over to press down.
They didn’t kiss very deeply, and after a very long time, they finally separated.
Pei Ran patted the other’s waist and said, 

“Go quick.
Night is about to descend.”

At that, Qu Yan slowly pulled out the knife beneath the car seat.
A knife that was extremely sharp and as cold as ice.
His lips hooked up slightly and he whipped it right in front of Pei Ran’s face, reflecting a cold glimmer against his handsome face.
Qu Yan’s voice was dripping with an ice cold sweetness, as he said in a half threatening and half joking tone, 

“Next time I’ll bite off your tongue hmm……”

Pei Ran was just thinking about whether the orbs found in a T2 and a T1 would have any difference, so he didn’t hear what the other said clearly.
He only turned his head slightly and kissed the other’s scar ridden face, his eyes full of laughter and gentle warmth.

Seeing this, Qu Yan’s hand that was holding onto the knife faltered.
His eyebrows rose up and he didn’t say another word, getting out of the car to grab the orbs out of those zombie heads.

As for Pei Ran, he sat on the car seat without a desire to move.
Evidently, what he had just said about cleaning the window was all a lie.
Through the dirty glass, he watched as Qu Yan dug for the orb and, at the same time, scanned outside to see if any more zombies would show up.

Suddenly the system popped out, its pale blue light flashing as a little ball, lighting up the inside of the car a few degrees: 

[ You’ve already killed the zombies, but you can’t go grab those orbs yourself? ]

Pei Ran didn’t like this system one bit, in any shape or form, so his words were thorny when he sniped back, 

“No.
If you can then you zap me.
Zap me huh.”

[ My dear beloved host, please do not challenge this system’s authority ]

Pei Ran didn’t care, 

“And what if I do.”

[ Are you sure? ]

Pei Ran was sick of bending to the whims of the system these past few days, 

“Yeah zap me to death if you dare!”

The moment his words dropped, he could only hear the flow of electricity and his body immediately became numb all over.
His body locked up and he was stunned, flopping over and down to the ground.

“Fuck you! You actually did dare to zap me!” 

Pei Ran climbed back up, mad and enraged.
He threw a bolt of electricity over as he yelled, 

“I’m going to take you down with me today!”

[ WU —- ! ! ! ! ! ! ]

The system’s voice shrieked from the zap, and the ball was shaking, its blue light flashing.
Faint wisps of electricity were floating around its form.
Seeing this, Pei Ran waved his hand which was still stinging in pain, and coldly snorted, 

“You zapped me so many times.
It isn’t unfair if I zap you once, right?”

The system that was just zapped suddenly quietened down at that and mockingly shook its body: 

[ The galaxy’s highest class of intelligent systems does not experience any interference from outside forces, so please, host, understand the difference between us and respect your superiors ]

In other words, it was just playing with you.

You want to zap me? In your dreams.

Pei Ran had not really counted on really being able to electrocute it, and he had just been trying to test it out.
He dusted off his body and quirked his lips, 

“And I won’t dig for those orbs, just to spite you.”

The tone of the system suddenly became very emotional: 

[ He’s still a high school student and you can endure the fact that he must do such horrifying acts at such a young age.
You aren’t willing to touch anything dirty, but you will let him act as your hands and cover himself in blood? Does your conscience not hurt?!!! ]

Hurt in your mother’s ass.

Pei Ran swatted the system away, thinking that it was being overdramatic.
He subconsciously looked through the window, just catching sight of Qu Yan kneeling on the ground and looking for the orb.
His wafer thin body did somehow randomly make him feel a bit guilty.

What in the flipping fuck.

 

Pei Ran pulled a clean towel out from the stack of items on the car seats and wet it with a bottle of water.
When he opened the door and stepped out of the car, he bumped right into Qu Yan who was just heading back.
He probably knew that Pei Ran was obsessed with cleanliness so the orbs were all wiped clean and held inside a tissue.
One was about the size of a peanut while the other was about the size of a red date1, which probably came from that T2 zombie.

Pei Ran nonchalantly put the orbs into his pockets.
Leaning against the car door, he lowered his head and used a wet tissue to clean his hands, his actions gentle and meticulous.
Qu Yan tilted his head, narrowing his eyes to take in how serious Pei Ran looked and then suddenly burrowed himself in the other’s embrace as if he was boneless.

Pei Ran held onto him and reached out to brush back Qu Yan’s ink black bangs.
Seeing the childish look on his face, he thought that Qu Yan was truly still a child.
He kissed Qu Yan’s face, and then sighed, 

“Were you afraid, when you were digging for the orbs?”

Pei Ran has asked too many questions no one else had ever asked before.
Qu Yan lowered his eyes and kicked at his feet.
His smile was full of wicked interest, before he shrunk back into the other’s embrace, hoarsely saying, 

“……yes.”

And then a period of awkwardness.

Seeing Qu Yan smash and dig into zombie brains with such precision, Pei Ran had thought Qu Yan would say no.
But hearing this, he fell silent and then said, 

“If you’re afraid, then it’s fine.
I’ll do it next time.”

He rarely got so decisive about something.
Seeing the darkening sky, he fixed up the car seats in front of them and said, 

“Let’s make do and sleep in the car tonight.”

Qu Yan was still thinking about what just happened, and his dark eyes shone in the blackened night, as ice cold as a coldblooded animal, 

“You really are planning to do it yourself?”

Pei Ran thought, how bad could it get, just taking off a skull, the more he did it the more familiar he would be with it.
Counting the orbs in his hand, he said without even lifting up his head,

“Hmm, I’ll do it.”

And then pulled Qu Yan up with him, reaching out to close the car door and separating them from the growing cloud of poisonous mosquitoes.

Seeing him count the orbs with such focus, Qu Yan asked, 

“Weren’t you going to use it to level up? Why aren’t you doing so now?”

Pei Ran thought, he wasn’t in a rush to cultivate, as it was more urgent to exchange orbs for a dimensional space right now, so he randomly pulled out an excuse, 

“Gotta save up a little more first.
Are you hungry? Eat something and then go to bed.
It’s quite late.”

The space inside the car wasn’t very big, and Qu Yan seemed to really like to stick to Pei Ran.
He soundlessly burrowed into the other’s embrace and quietly asked, 

“How should we sleep?”

Pei Ran gave a demonstration, lying on his back in the backseat and then pulled Qu Yan on top of his body.
He playfully raised up an eyebrow and said, 

“However you want to lie down.
The car seat, in my embrace, anywhere you want.”  

Qu Yan’s mother was a prostitute, and so there were a few things that he understood way earlier than others.
He used his fingers to undo a button on Pei Ran’s shirt, and then began to lightly draw circles on his chest.
He lowered his eyes and leaned over to try and kiss him, but he was instead pulled up by Pei Ran and pressed into his embrace.

“Don’t overthink,” 

Pei Ran’s voice was gentle and husky, as, in the end, he did care about the other, 

“just lie in my embrace and sleep.”

Qu Yan touched that uneven scar full of ridges on his face.
He opened his mouth and lightly bit down on Pei Ran’s shoulder through his shirt.
There was a bit of a twisted look in his eyes as he said, 

“Are you disgusted with me……”

Pei Ran yawned and thought that the other must be in his low self esteem phase again.
He elongated his syllables as he said,

“No I’m not, never have.
I like you so much that I can’t wait for it.
But let’s wait until you’ve fattened up a bit as you are too skinny.
Not a single ounce of fat on you.”

Pei Ran then circled an arm around Qu Yan’s overly thin waist and said, 

“Look, this tiny.
Just one snap and it’ll be broken, as if you have never eaten a full meal before.”

Qu Yan lay on top of the other’s chest, silently listening to that heartbeat, before saying, 

“I’ve never been full.”

Pei Ran cocked up his eyebrow, shocked, 

“Truly never?”

Qu Yan’s voice was a bit hazy in this night, 

“Mhmm.”

Hearing this, Pei Ran reached out to pull out a bag full of bread and then passed it over to Qu Yan and hesitantly asked, 

“Why don’t……you eat some now?”

Qu Yan hooked up his lips, as if to smile, but then pressed his head down.
He said with some humor in his voice, 

“I’m not hungry right now.”

Pei Ran pulled back his hand and embraced the other again, 

“Then sleep.”

The moon was slowly rising, hanging in the background of this silent night.
Not a single star was in sight either.
Pei Ran had used his ability quite a lot today, so before long, he was asleep.
Qu Yan was a bit uncomfortable, being stabbed by the orbs in the other’s pockets.
He poked out his head, slowly and carefully taking in all the details of Pei Ran’s sleeping face and then reached over, lightly nibbling on the other’s lips.

A blue spark flashed across his eyes, and he couldn’t hold back his light nibbling, as if he wanted, just a little bit, to swallow the person in front of him whole.
But then in the end, he stomped that urge down and silently got out of the car.

His mental ability was slowly reaching out farther and farther, forcing some unknown beings to come.
Their slow footsteps dragged on the ground, the only sound in this lonely night, and underneath the cold rays of the moon, one of them revealed a terrifying, corroded face.

Qu Yan closed his eyes slightly, the blue in his eyes growing even stronger.
Whatever he did next, those zombies began to tear each other apart, their low growls and roars followed by the chomping sounds of chewing on flesh and bone, a sound that was too horrifying to describe.

One of the zombies that had eaten its brethren dropped its head onto the ground and it rolled in a circle.
Qu Yan stepped forward, his eyes calm and unbothered, and used his knife to chop off the top of the skull, grabbing the colorful orb inside, much like an executioner, silently and emotionlessly taking people’s heads with a guillotine.

Pei Ran had been woken up by his hunger, and when he discovered that Qu Yan was missing, he subconsciously looked out the car window and who would have known that he would stumble right across this scene.

Pei Ran: ……

 

Notes:

*1 red date- for reference, a red date/jujube is this (approximately 1 to 2 inches (2.5cm to 5cm)):