Jiang Hezhou had never gone as crazy as he did in that moment—not once in his entire life.
Or to put it more precisely, this was the first time since birth that he had resorted to violence and fists to solve a problem. Though he had never been fond of brawling, as the heir of a prominent family, he had received professional combat training as a child. And because he maintained a regular fitness routine to build muscle, his punches were no mere show—each blow landed with full, crushing force.
The first punch sent Zhou Chao staggering back two steps. Blood immediately seeped from the corner of his mouth, and as the coppery, sweet taste spread across his tongue, he glared at Jiang Hezhou with fury.
“The hell is wrong with you?! I haven’t even—”
Jiang Hezhou didn’t give him the chance to finish. At this moment, the man was like a beast whose territory had been invaded. Zhou Chao’s disrespectful approach toward Chu Luyu had awakened every violent instinct and pathological possessiveness buried deep within him. Just thinking about how Zhou Chao had cornered her, how he had touched her arm with those disgusting hands—Jiang Hezhou wished he were dead.
How dare he touch her? How dare he!
Under the dim, yellow light of the club’s corridor, Jiang Hezhou’s face was ice-cold. He grabbed Zhou Chao by the collar and drove punch after punch into his face. His pale, handsome face showed no expression at all—only the dark eyes behind his lenses burned with a terrifying, chilling ferocity.
Zhou Chao’s lackeys rushed forward to intervene, but Zhang Jiting and Ji Chen, who had arrived right behind Jiang Hezhou, stopped them with cold warnings.
“If you’re thinking of joining in, think carefully about how much weight your families carry in Jingzhou—and whether you’re even qualified to get involved.”
Ji Chen finished with a cold glare, and the men hesitated, exchanging uneasy glances. After a long moment, none of them moved.
Zhou Chao was pinned to the ground, his face already covered in blood. But Jiang Hezhou showed no sign of stopping—each punch landed harder than the last.
Zhang Jiting watched closely. After a while, seeing his brother still had no intention of letting up, he began to feel a flicker of concern.
“Jiang Er, that’s enough. Look at this bastard—he can barely keep his eyes open now. You can stop.”
But Jiang Hezhou seemed not to hear him at all. He had no intention of stopping.
Even Chu Luyu, standing nearby, was shocked by his frenzied state.
The system was screaming frantically in her head: [Oh my god! Oh my god! The male lead has completely deviated from his original character! What kind of aloof, restrained, icy male god is this? He’s turned into a complete madman! Aaahhh what do we do now?!]
Chu Luyu felt the same shock. In her impression, the male lead had always been restrained, polite, and calm—a mature man who handled any situation with composure and ease. But now, he had completely shed those traits. It was as if he had transformed into a different person entirely, radiating an obsessive, manic violence.
Ji Chen gradually realized something was wrong as well. He frowned and stepped forward to pull Jiang Hezhou back, but Jiang Hezhou flung his arm away without even looking, growled a low “Get lost,” and swung another punch at Zhou Chao’s face.
The other two had now fully grasped that their brother was acting abnormally. Afraid that Jiang Hezhou would beat Zhou Chao to death if this continued, Zhang Jiting quickly turned to Chu Luyu and said: “Little sis-in-law, you go talk to him! Jiang Er’s not right—I don’t think he’ll listen to anything we say. See if he’ll listen to you!”
Chu Luyu was equally worried. The man on the ground was already a bloody mess, barely clinging to life, yet Jiang Hezhou showed no sign of stopping. She was terrified—terrified—but even more afraid that Jiang Hezhou would actually kill someone for her. So she steeled herself, circled around behind him, and wrapped both arms around his waist.
“That’s enough, Jiang Hezhou. I’m fine—he didn’t actually do anything to me. If you keep going, you’ll really kill him…”
Jiang Hezhou still had Zhou Chao by the collar, his fist covered in crimson, droplets of blood falling one by one from his knuckles to the floor.
His expression was ice-cold. When he looked down at the man on the ground, his gaze was like looking at a dead dog.
“Then so be it. He deserves to die.”
Chu Luyu held him tightly, refusing to let him move an inch.
“He may deserve to die, but he’s not worth getting your hands dirty.” She paused, then bit her lip and hardened her resolve. “Didn’t you say you wanted to be with me for the rest of your life? If you kill him now, what happens to us?”
That sentence, as if flicking a switch in Jiang Hezhou’s body, seemed to bring him back to his senses in an instant.
The man on the ground was now a blur of blood, one side of his face and eye swollen grotesquely, barely breathing in and out.
Jiang Hezhou suppressed the violent urges surging in his chest, took a deep breath, and coldly averted his gaze.
“Call an ambulance. Take him away. I’ll cover the medical expenses.”
The lackeys who had been cowering in the corners scrambled forward at his words, all flustered.
Jiang Hezhou paid them no further attention. He turned, intending to take Chu Luyu’s hand, but stopped short when he saw his own bloodied fingers.
Chu Luyu noticed. She looked up at him, then without a moment’s hesitation, firmly and willingly took his hand in hers.
At that moment, the warmth of their palms melded together. Jiang Hezhou shuddered involuntarily, gazing at her in a daze.
The little girl looked back up at him, her eyes soft. “It’s okay. I don’t mind.”
It wasn’t until the group made their way back toward the private room that Zhang Jiting and Ji Chen finally felt themselves slowly coming back to reality.
Ji Chen said, “I never in my life thought I’d see Jiang Er go this crazy. Zhou Chao’s come looking for trouble in front of him plenty of times before, but every time Jiang Er just treated him like a joke—never took the guy seriously. But today, the moment it involves little sis-in-law, he completely lost control.”
Zhang Jiting was silent for a moment after hearing that. “Xiao Yan said before that Jiang Er seems to have a very different kind of possessiveness toward little sis-in-law. Back then I said it was impossible—she was definitely overthinking. But looking at it now, Jiang Er really does seem to lack his usual restraint and calm when it comes to her…”
Mentioning Xiao Yan, Zhang Jiting suddenly realized something and looked around. “Hey, wait—where’s my Xiao Yan?”
…
Xiao Yan didn’t return to the private room until ten minutes later.
Chu Luyu had been disinfecting and bandaging Jiang Hezhou’s hand when she saw her walk in, and immediately remembered she was supposed to have found a server for her earlier. She apologized profusely.
“I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry—I completely forgot! My fault!”
Xiao Yan had been genuinely upset. She hadn’t brought her phone into the restroom and had waited in the stall for ages until another girl came in. She briefly explained her situation, and the girl helped her find a server—Xiao Yan was finally saved.
But on her way back, she had vaguely heard that there had been a fight in the corridor earlier. Now that Chu Luyu had apologized, Zhang Jiting quickly jumped in to defend her.
“You can’t blame little sis-in-law for today—she got held up by someone.” Zhang Jiting’s tone turned angry as he spoke. “Zhou Chao is such a piece of trash. He can’t get to Jiang Er, so when he saw Jiang Er bringing little sis-in-law here, he turned his dirty schemes on her instead!”
After Zhang Jiting recounted the whole incident, Xiao Yan was deeply shaken. She looked at Jiang Hezhou’s injured hand, trying to picture him in a fight—but no matter how hard she tried, she simply couldn’t imagine it.
She whispered to Zhang Jiting, “He really lost it that much?”
“Really lost it. I’ve never seen Jiang Er go that crazy.”
“See! I told you! He’s definitely not ordinary about his girl—he’s got this intense possessiveness and control buried deep inside! Today that guy harassed her and touched her—of course Jiang Er couldn’t hold back…”
While they were talking, Chu Luyu had almost finished bandaging Jiang Hezhou’s hand.
His head had been resting listlessly in the crook of her neck, the faint scent of sweet orange from her skin lingering around his nose. He breathed it in, over and over, and miraculously, the violent impulses churning inside him slowly began to subside.
After a moment, he said in a muffled voice, “Baby, I want to go home.”
Chu Luyu looked a bit troubled and glanced over at the others. “After what just happened, wouldn’t it be a little rude for us to just leave? Don’t we need to be around for any follow-up?”
“No need. Zhang Jiting and Ji Chen will handle it for me.”
“Alright then… let’s go.”
As they stepped out of the club, light snow began to fall. Flurries drifted down, dusting their collars and hair with tiny white specks.
Jiang Hezhou couldn’t drive with his injured hand, so Chu Luyu took his arm and led him to the curb to hail a cab.
But no sooner had they steadied themselves on the steps than he pulled her into his arms.
“I was so scared just now.” His voice was low and heavy, mingling with the winter night breeze. “I was afraid you’d hate me for hitting someone. I was afraid you’d get the idea to run away again because of this.”
He cupped her face under the streetlight, lowering his gaze and murmuring, “Tell me you won’t leave me.”
Chu Luyu hesitated—just for a moment, but she did. Then she followed his lead and replied, “I won’t leave you.”
Even though she knew she was lying, at this moment she didn’t know what else to do, so that was the only answer she could give.
But Jiang Hezhou seemed completely unconvinced. He looked at her with deep, searching eyes and said after a long pause, “You’re lying. You paused before answering. You hesitated.”
His reaction made Chu Luyu feel truly at a loss.
She let out a soft sigh, looked at him, and said, “Jiang Hezhou, I’m really not that great. I’m not worth you liking me this much. You could have a much more perfect, much better life. Maybe in the future you’ll meet a girl a thousand times, ten thousand times better than me—someone perfectly compatible with you.”
The depth in his gaze grew darker. He looked at her and said, “But what does it matter how good others are? They have nothing to do with me. I only want you.”
In this world, there would never be another person who could make him lose all reason, all calm, in an instant. He knew with absolute clarity just how deep and intense his feelings for her were. He wanted to possess her completely. He wanted her to stay by his side forever—unseen by anyone else, never coveted by another.
With that thought, Jiang Hezhou pulled the girl back into his arms, his arms tightening around her gradually, squeezing her so tightly it was as if he wanted to press her into his very bones and blood.
“Baby, when it comes to you, I have no self-control anymore. And I don’t want to be like a madman. So don’t try to leave me anymore. You’ve seen what I’m like now—no matter what happens, I will never let you go.”
Jiang Hezhou paused, his arms tightening another inch as he felt her presence in his embrace. His voice dropped to a low, husky whisper by her ear: “Never in this lifetime.”
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