By the time Wen Shilan woke again, it was noon. Tang Wan had drugged him outside the Federation the night before, and he had remained “unconscious” all night and through the morning.
Not that he’d really been unconscious. Balala had blocked the drug’s effects, and Wen had only pretended. Once Tang brought him here, he’d simply gone to sleep for real.
Honestly, Wen hadn’t expected Tang to go this far. Tang was the favored son of this little world’s fate. His character might have its flaws, but it shouldn’t have deteriorated to this extent.
Tang had drugged him and sat by his bed all night, watching without moving. If he’d shown the slightest urge to climb into bed, Balala would have sent him flying.
But Tang hadn’t tried. He hadn’t laid a hand on Wen. Well, he had done two things: thrown away Wen’s phone and sent Qi Yan a breakup message. At the time, Qi Yan had been flooding Wen’s inbox because he wasn’t getting a reply.
Well rested, Wen sat up at his leisure. Tang Wan really was asking for trouble.
“The Lord God is almost here,” Balala said.
The two planets weren’t far apart, but the journey still took time. At the speed Qi Yan was traveling, he must be pushing his warship hard enough to make it smoke.
“Shilan, you’re awake. Are you hungry?”
Tang’s mental power was strong enough that an entire sleepless night had left no trace of fatigue. Pleasure lit his eyes when Wen woke. He liked being the first person Wen saw upon opening his eyes.
It felt wonderful. He couldn’t yet hold Wen as they woke together, but before long he would. Wen was here with him now. He had made Wen fall for him once, and he could do it again.
He loved Wen Shilan, and Wen would love him too.
They were supposed to be together. There had been a small mistake along the way, but that didn’t matter. The ending mattered, and Wen Shilan was beside him now.
Wen seemed angry. He surveyed the room warily, his voice frighteningly cold. “Tang Wan, what is this supposed to mean?”
The guarded look hurt Tang, but he quickly steadied himself. His methods had been underhanded; of course Wen couldn’t accept them right away. Things would get better. His gaze softened as he sat on the edge of the bed and reached for Wen’s hand. Wen moved aside with effortless ease.
Tang’s smile froze for a moment. He withdrew his hand and spoke softly, as though raising his voice might frighten Wen. “Shilan, Qi Yan has deceived you. That werewolf is cunning. You can’t be with him. You should be with me. I’m the one who loves you most in this world.”
Ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous.
If Wen could send the original story straight into Tang’s mind, his reaction would probably be funnier than Wen could imagine.
It was all so absurd.
How could Tang Wan even bring himself to say he loved Wen Shilan? Was his love the hesitation and abandonment that followed Wen’s loss of mental power?
Was it the accusing look he gave Wen when Wen, without his power, made a wrong call?
Or was it the “You’ve really disappointed me” he said after Wen was captured by the enemy and released?
If that was Tang Wan’s way of loving someone, Wen wanted no part of it.
Tang could still claim to love him now for one reason: even without his mental power, Wen Shilan’s glory as the God of War had not faded.
“Tang Wan, you’ve lost your mind.”
Wen regarded him calmly, with none of the fear one might expect from a captive at someone else’s mercy.
In the original story, an enemy had been meant to abduct him to humiliate the Federation. This time, Tang Wan had taken him instead.
Tang’s smile faded. He instinctively avoided Wen’s gaze. It was too cold, too calm, as though silently condemning the sordid way he’d brought Wen here. Wen hadn’t even raised his voice to accuse him. His eyes seemed to say Tang wasn’t worth even Wen Shilan’s reproach.
Tang Wan flushed with anger. He sprang to his feet and turned back to Wen Shilan, who was sitting on the bed. Even the finger he pointed at Wen trembled. “You’re the one who’s lost his mind, Wen Shilan! You’re Silan’s God of War, and you’ve taken up with a werewolf! I’m trying to make you see sense. I’m the one you love! Me!”
“Love you?”
Wen looked at Tang’s frenzied face without a trace of fear. Amusement even rose in his beautiful eyes, as though Tang had told a particularly ridiculous joke.
“Tang Wan, what I felt for you before wasn’t even love. At most, I liked you. Why are you dreaming with your eyes wide open in the middle of the day?”
Perhaps the original Wen Shilan had loved Tang, but never enough to live or die for him. If Tang had been the only one to lose faith in him, scorn him, and treat him coldly, the original Wen would never have taken his own life. Tang had been, at most, the final straw.
“Shut up! How could you not love me? You do love me! Before you went into battle, you were going to be with me!”
Tang wheeled around, pulled open the bedside drawer, and took out a letter. Two words stood out starkly in black ink on the white envelope: LAST LETTER.
In this interstellar age, paper and pens had become rare. Yet before going into battle, soldiers still insisted on writing their last letters by hand rather than using their communicators or recording devices. They had done so for years, as though forming each letter themselves gave them more reason to return alive.
Tang opened the envelope and held the letter before Wen. At the bottom, Wen Shilan had written a line in small handwriting:
“If I make it back alive, I’ll accept Tang Wan’s courtship. I won’t tell him yet. Anything can happen on the battlefield. If I die, he’ll be heartbroken.”
Wen Shilan’s last letters were unlike anyone else’s. No one knew that the revered God of War wrote them at all. Each one was more like a diary entry, kept under lock and key in his safe. Had he died, the safe would have been sealed according to long-standing custom, and no one would have known what was inside. When Wen wrote this letter, he never imagined anyone else would read it.
But Wen Shilan hadn’t died. He had left the Federation and forgotten to take the safe. Though it wasn’t really the safe he’d forgotten; there was only that one letter inside. He’d forgotten the letter.
No. More accurately, he had chosen to forget it.
Wen Shilan had thought it would take Tang Wan much longer to find the letter. Out of respect, Tang should have sent his predecessor’s safe back to him. Instead, Tang found it and kept it. He didn’t open it until the day Wen was injured fighting the insectoids and Qi Yan carried him away, one day before Tang learned that the two of them were together.
A general’s clearance could open almost any safe. Wen’s, with his fingerprints and iris scan removed from its access settings, was no exception.
Tang found the letter, and it gave him tremendous confidence. That was why he went to Wen’s house the next day and waited for him. He wanted to tell Wen that they loved each other and, in the end, belonged together.
He never imagined that being a single step late would let Qi Yan get there first. Still, every time Tang looked at the “last letter,” his heart raced.
Lately, it had become the foundation of all his hope. He was certain Wen loved him above anyone else, just as he loved Wen.
Wen Shilan had feelings for him. How could he be with someone else?
Tang held the letter out, desperate for Wen to see it. Wen had written those words himself, one by one. He couldn’t forget them. He couldn’t pretend they had never existed. He couldn’t!
Wen’s long, porcelain-white fingers closed around the letter. Just as Tang wanted, he picked it up and read it carefully. There wasn’t much to read; a glance would almost have been enough. Wen nodded. “And?”
And what? Tang froze. While he stood there, Wen spoke at his usual leisurely pace. “Tang Wan, you’re going backward. That’s in the past. Don’t you find it ridiculous to cling to an old letter now?”
“Even setting aside how you behaved after I lost my mental power, the way you’re acting right now makes me wonder if I was blind when I wrote those words and wasted space on them in my last letter.”
“I’ve told you I used to like you. I’ve never hidden my feelings. At first, I truly didn’t want to be with you. Later, you won me over, and I intended to accept you if I came back victorious. That was true too. But it was all in the past. After everything you did when I lost my mental power, what little affection I had left disappeared.”
“As far as I’m concerned, that chapter closed long ago. You’re the one still stuck there, doing something like this.”
“Tang Wan, you’ve really disappointed me.”
Tang Wan, you’ve really disappointed me…
The words struck Tang like an explosion beside his ear. A fierce ringing filled his head, and he could barely keep his balance.
Disappointed…
Wen Shilan was disappointed in him?
How could Wen be disappointed in him?
Apart from Wen, no one had stronger mental power. Wen had praised him countless times.
Even after losing his own power, Wen had recommended Tang as the next general. Once Tang took the post, Wen had said he believed Tang would become the next God of War.
How could Wen be disappointed in him now?
“Disappointed…”
Tang staggered backward. Wen Shilan had no mental power left. How could he still hurt Tang badly enough to make him lose his footing?
Wen watched him with a contemptuous curl of his lips. This was exactly what Tang deserved. He ought to learn how much damage a few words could do.
Wen had returned the words Tang had once said to the original Wen Shilan, without changing a single one.
It felt wonderful.
He watched Tang as though enjoying an interesting performance, his bright eyes cool and mocking.
Under that gaze, Tang felt Wen was looking at him like a piece of trash.
In an instant, pain tore through his heart. He knew he would never win Wen Shilan’s heart now.
If he couldn’t have Wen’s heart, having Wen himself would be enough… wouldn’t it?
He couldn’t live without Wen Shilan. He loved him too much. He couldn’t accept Wen being with anyone else!
The look in Tang Wan’s eyes changed, darkening into something obsessive. He gave a sudden, quiet laugh, but it did nothing to lift the gloom around him. If anything, it made his smile frightening. He advanced on Wen Shilan one step at a time, his voice low and hoarse. “Shilan, I didn’t want us to be intimate so soon. Why did you have to make me angry?”
Wen watched him calmly. He didn’t retreat or even move from his place on the bed.
Tang stopped before him and tipped his chin up. Wen’s skin was smooth beneath his fingertips, like fine white jade. Tang could scarcely bear to let go.
“Why aren’t you fighting me, Shilan? Do you know it won’t do any good?”
Wen’s stillness pleased him. Tang lowered his head to kiss him.
“Because in a moment, you won’t even have the strength to stand.”
Wen spoke when they were only inches apart.
Before Tang could grasp his meaning, a tremendous crash sounded behind him. A burst of pain struck his arm, and the next instant a powerful blow sent him flying into the wall. He slid to the floor.
Qi Yan’s eyes were bloodshot. Silver energy still swirled in his palm. Tang had barely coughed up a mouthful of blood when Qi Yan struck him again. “Tang Wan! You have a death wish!”
Tang took both blows full on. He could barely get up now, and blood kept spilling from his mouth. It felt as though his organs had been knocked out of place. The pain left him unable to speak; all he could do was glare at Qi Yan.
He’d been so close!
A moment more, and Wen Shilan would have been his!
Hadn’t this werewolf gone home?
Wasn’t he on the Werewolf Planet?
Frustration, fury, and jealousy tangled together. Tang spat another mouthful of blood.
From the moment Wen saw Qi Yan, he never looked at Tang again. He didn’t spare him even a mocking or contemptuous glance.
“Come help me up. My legs have gone weak.”
The sedative had contained a muscle relaxant with a lasting effect. Now that Balala’s protection against the drug had worn off, what remained in Wen’s system was taking effect again.
“Wait a moment. I’m going to kill him first.”
Qi Yan had used only one hand before. Now he raised both, drawing his energy together. The silver light grew brighter and brighter, almost painful to look at.
He was determined to take Tang Wan’s life.
Wen sighed, his voice soft. “Qi Yan, he can’t die. I missed you. Take me home.”
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