Free Web NovelChapter 226: You Chose Wrong
Chenghai had seen Yuche angry. He had seen Yuche annoyed, possessive, amused, and mildly inconvenienced by things that would have sent other men into panic.
This was different, though. This was Yuche deciding how many people in the room could die without splashing blood on Rouxi, without interfering with Luo Xin, and without destroying anything she cared about.
The fact that Chenghai understood the calculation made him feel worse.
Another burst of power cracked across the living room.
Sun Ming threw up a low ridge of earth to stop Tao Jun from reaching Luo Xin, but the force split the hardwood and sent several loose boards lifting under the carpet. Chenghai stared at the damage for one miserable second before grabbing Shen Kaiyang again and driving him back toward the hall.
"The floor!" he snarled. "Stop destroying her house!"
Shen Kaiyang spun around to look at Chenghai, an actual look confusion on his face. "You’re worried about the floor?"
"Of course I am worried about the floor!" Chenghai roared. "Who gives a fuck about you assholes? You are destroying the house! That’s more important."
That seemed to offend the other man, but Chenghai didn’t have the time to coddle the poor fucker’s feelings.
Instead, he shoved him again, harder this time, forcing him away from the main living room and toward the wider entrance hall. If they were going to destroy something, they could at least destroy the part of the house Rouxi used less.
Behind him, Zhenlan had already reached the same conclusion and was using controlled bursts of air to redirect bodies away from the windows, the television, and the open space where Rouxi lay.
It would have been impressive if it wasn’t also infuriating.
They were fighting a defensive battle inside their own home against people who had walked in uninvited, burned the front perimeter, insulted Rouxi, and then acted shocked when someone finally responded appropriately.
A metal blade flashed toward Chenghai’s shoulder.
Wang Junjie caught it before it landed, pulling the weapon sideways with a sharp gesture that sent it burying into the wall instead.
The wall. freёwebnoѵel.com
Again.
Chenghai turned his head slowly toward Wang Junjie.
The private flinched, his shoulders hunching forward as he tried to make himself smaller. "Sorry."
"Stop putting things in the walls. Next time, let it stab me if it isn’t going to hit an organ or anything essential."
"I was trying not to let it go into you," sputtered the other man.
"Don’t."
Wang Junjie looked like he wanted to argue and wisely decided against it.
Across the room, Commander Li had finally forced his soldiers into something resembling formation.
Zhao Rui stayed near the edge of the fight, calling warnings seconds before attacks landed while his brother controlled the fire on their side with enough finesse that Chenghai immediately disliked Huang Zedong more by comparison.
Liu Zhenyu kept water moving in a tight circle near the windows, smothering sparks before they reached curtains or furniture, while Deng Kai looked increasingly overwhelmed but still managed to pull two soldiers away before a burst of power cracked through the space they had just occupied.
They were not the problem.
Meilan’s people were.
That realization settled deeper with every exchange.
Shen Kaiyang fought well, but he fought for her. Tao Jun adapted quickly, but he adapted around her. Lin Cheng never let his body drift too far from her side. Guo Renwang kept checking exits, not for the room, but for Meilan’s escape. Even Huang Zedong, burned and coughing, dragged himself backward until he was between Lingyun and the woman who had sent him to burn the defenses.
Chenghai had respected versions of these men once, but not anymore.
A heavy strike from Shen Kaiyang forced Chenghai back into one of the side tables. The lamp toppled, shattered against the floor, and sent glass skittering under his boots. Chenghai looked down at the broken lamp, then back at Shen Kaiyang.
Rouxi liked that lamp too.
Probably.
Maybe.
It did not matter if she liked it or not. It was hers.
Chenghai hit him hard enough to make the man stagger.
The fight spread again before he could press the advantage. Tao Jun threw another wave of force across the room, and this time Zhenlan redirected most of it upward.
The ceiling cracked in a jagged line from the chandelier toward the front hall.
Dust fell across the living room, and every person who actually belonged in the house looked up at the same time with identical horror.
Lingyun stopped smiling.
Yuche’s head lifted.
Zhenlan’s face went flat.
Chenghai felt his temper snap cleanly into something colder.
"You cracked the ceiling," he said.
Tao Jun blinked as if he had expected a threat and did not understand the accusation.
"You cracked Rouxi’s ceiling," Chenghai repeated.
That, apparently, made more sense to everyone who mattered.
Lingyun’s fire rose immediately. Yuche’s metal shifted with a quiet sound from every hinge, nail, and broken fixture within reach. Even the baby vine lifted its head from Rouxi’s shoulder and opened its mouth, black venom dripping onto the blanket beneath it.
Meilan’s group finally looked uneasy.
Good.
They should.
The room had crossed from fight into damage control, and Chenghai was beginning to understand that protecting the house meant ending the fight faster than he had intended.
Diplomacy had failed. Restraint had failed. Recognition had failed. The only thing that wouldn’t fail was brute strength.
He moved toward Shen Kaiyang again and this time, he did not try to redirect him.
He drove straight through him.
The impact sent both men crashing into the entry hall, away from Rouxi, away from Luo Xin, and away from the cracked ceiling.
Shen Kaiyang struck back hard enough to split Chenghai’s lip, but Chenghai barely felt it. He grabbed the front of the man’s shirt, slammed him into the wall beside the door, and leaned in close enough that only Shen Kaiyang could hear him over the chaos.
"The person you were before all this? He’s dead. The you that you are now would have made him cringe and want to kill himself. When you chose Meilan, you chose wrong. Now you have to die with that choice."
Shen Kaiyang’s eyes narrowed but before he could answer, something shifted behind them.
It wasn’t a new power... there was no fire or air or anything else attacking them.
In fact, the movement was small enough that it should have disappeared beneath the noise of the fight, but Chenghai felt everything around him react before he fully understood why. It was the same feeling you got before lightning struck.
Lingyun’s fire dropped. Yuche turned sharply. Luo Xin made a sound that was too close to a gasp. Even the baby vine poked its head up with excitement.
Chenghai released Shen Kaiyang and turned toward the center of the living room, his breath trapped in his lungs as he tried to figure out what was setting off all his warning bells.
It was Rouxi.
Rouxi was awake.
