Flaying
The night gradually deepened.
The pitch-black sky was like a giant beast of the abyss, crawling high above the city where the lights were waning.
Creak——
【Zong Wen】 pushed open the door. There was no light in the dim room, and the obscure starlight projected his shadow on the expensive carpet as he slowly walked into the room...
He didn't turn on the electric lights, but instead lit a wisp of candle fire, igniting the glass candles placed on the table and by the bed. The orange firelight blurred the dark room, carrying a trace of a romantic atmosphere in the haziness, just like a faintly discernible light veil draped over a young girl's bare body.
【Zong Wen】 casually picked up a glass-like cup and popped open the cork of a bottle of red wine. The scarlet, intoxicating wine poured out in the candle light, rolling and flowing into his hand.
Draped in a red sleeping robe and holding the red wine, he stood by the dim window, overlooking this brilliantly lit city...
His eyes narrowed slightly, intoxicated as if he were a king standing amidst the 【Red Dust】.
A light knock sounded on the door.
"Come in," he said indifferently.
As the door pushed open, a black dress slowly walked into the room. Facing 【Zong Wen】's direction, her hands naturally closed the door behind her.
【Zong Wen】 turned sideways in front of the window. On his slightly drunk cheeks, a pair of eyes overflowing with greed and obscenity stared at 【Liu Qingyan】, as if using his gaze to peel open a perfect piece of art.
He walked towards 【Liu Qingyan】 step by step. His red sleeping robe swayed slightly in the dim yellow candle fire, and he slowly raised the remaining red wine in his hand that he had just drunk.
"Have a drink?" He tried to make his voice as gentle as possible, like a kindly old father.
【Liu Qingyan】 stood there calmly. In the flickering candle light, her appearance was increasingly enticing, like a chilly angel fallen to the mortal realm, making people unable to resist wanting to ravage her.
"I don't want to drink this."
"Don't want to drink? It doesn't matter..."
【Zong Wen】 shrugged and put the wine glass back on the table. He raised a hand and began to tease 【Liu Qingyan】's pitch-black hair, a smile emerging on his slightly drunk old face.
"You know? You are truly very beautiful... Not that kind of artificial cuteness, nor coquettish allure. You have a temperament that belongs only to you... The first time I saw you, I knew you couldn't be compared to those ordinary women.
Your posture, your appearance, your dancing... you are a born superstar. If you rotted in that 【Willow Town】, it would truly be too much of a pity... As long as you are given an opportunity to let everyone see you, I believe that one day, you will stand above all others and become the goddess everyone dreams of!"
As 【Zong Wen】 spoke, his completely red face grew increasingly excited. Both of his hands fiercely grabbed 【Liu Qingyan】's thin and weak shoulders, and his entire person leaned in almost to her ear:
"I want to personally send you to that position, the position that originally belongs to you! To let you become the goddess that draws everyone's attention!
But the premise is, you must belong to me... and can only belong to me."
【Zong Wen】 smiled and added a sentence,
"Just like a loyal dog."
【Liu Qingyan】 calmly looked at that old face, which was so close at hand and still reeking of alcohol, and slowly closed her eyes... Her long, slender eyelashes closed together in the candle light. She stood there like a chilly, absolutely beautiful black-dressed cloth doll.
Seeing this scene, the evil fire in 【Zong Wen】's heart burned even fiercer, as if the young girl had completely given up resisting. He grinned hideously and pounced directly at 【Liu Qingyan】's body, wanting to push her right onto the sofa!
But the next moment, his body seemed to have been electrocuted, suddenly stiffening in place!
【Zong Wen】's pupils unconsciously widened. He looked down in astonishment and discovered a slender palm had, at some unknown time, pressed against his chest... That was 【Liu Qingyan】's hand.
For some unknown reason, 【Zong Wen】 felt as if an electric current was flowing through his entire body. His four limbs didn't feel like his own, and his whole person froze in place like a sculpture.
At the same time... 【Liu Qingyan】's eyes slowly opened.
When those black, glass-like pupils were exposed to the air, the temperature in the room dropped suddenly. 【Liu Qingyan】's entire temperament changed, and an indescribable feeling of ice-cold and trembling bloomed outward from the hem of her black dress...
The dim yellow candle fire swayed silently, but there was not a trace of ambiguous romance left. At this moment, in 【Zong Wen】's eyes, that originally absolutely beautiful girl's face seemed to come from the netherworld, making him unable to stop his heart from trembling.
"You... you unexpectedly..." 【Zong Wen】 seemed to have thought of something, looking at 【Liu Qingyan】 in disbelief, as if seeing a ghost.
But under 【Liu Qingyan】's palm, even his vocal cords seemed to be suppressed. 【Zong Wen】 exhausted all his strength, but could only intermittently spit out a few words.
He absolutely never expected that 【Liu Qingyan】, who was so thin and weak that it seemed a gust of wind could blow her over, was unexpectedly a 【Divine Path Possessor】!
He didn't understand, and couldn't understand, if 【Liu Qingyan】 was truly a 【Divine Path Possessor】, why she would participate in 【Willow Town】's selection, why she struggled in this big mud pit of the 【Flower Capital Consortium】, and why, under his hundred kinds of harassment, she remained silent from beginning to end...
"Have I unexpectedly grown thorns?" 【Liu Qingyan】 spoke softly, ethereal like a whisper from amidst a hazy misty rain.
"Not all flowers can be ravaged by others... Since you have no way to control your own desires, you must be prepared to have your skin and flesh scratched and broken by thorns."
【Liu Qingyan】 closed her hand, leaving only her index finger. From the position of his chest, she traced downwards, lightly sliding across 【Zong Wen】's skin.
However, as 【Liu Qingyan】's fingertip slid across, 【Zong Wen】's skin and flesh were sliced open just like a zipper. Scarlet fresh blood flowed down the girl's fingertip onto the ground, and dripping wet blood and flesh were exposed to the air!
Unprecedented pain assaulted 【Zong Wen】's nerves. He opened his mouth wide in agony, wanting to howl out loud, but could only let out bursts of helpless whimpering sounds!
The blue veins on his neck bulged one by one. In this severe pain, his bloodshot eyes widened, and he personally watched 【Liu Qingyan】's finger trace downwards... disemboweling him.
He was personally witnessing the entire process of his own "flaying."
"You all covet my skin," 【Liu Qingyan】 said softly. "But what meaning is there in this? Beautiful or ugly, what lies beneath this skin is the true 'us'...
Do you want to see your truest appearance?"
【Liu Qingyan】's fingertip traced down to 【Zong Wen】's lower abdomen, then slowly released. At this time, a sinister and terrifying cut had appeared on 【Zong Wen】's torso, just as if the "zipper" of his skin had been pulled down. All his muscles, blood vessels, and organs were exposed to the air!
"No... no!!" 【Zong Wen】 struggled in pain. His facial features were already twisted from the severe pain. Under this silent flaying punishment, both his mind and physical body were tortured to the extreme!
【Liu Qingyan】 raised her hand, pinched the collar of the red sleeping robe, and unhurriedly stripped it from 【Zong Wen】's body... 【Zong Wen】's elderly skin was revealed in front of 【Liu Qingyan】, like a lamb waiting to be peeled open.
【Liu Qingyan】 looked at the blood-stained red sleeping robe on the ground and suddenly smiled:
"Are you worthy of wearing red clothes?"