Demon Consort Runs into the Beijing Crown Prince - Chapter 5

“Haven’t seen you in a few days. You’re working as a male model here?”

The familiar voice sent a shiver down Chu Muyun’s spine, instantly sobering him up halfway.

He looked up to see Lu Hanzhang’s dark expression and tightly furrowed brow, his figure overlapping with a certain figure from his memory.

When the Great King’s face turned cold, his oppressive aura could make his subordinates kneel in terror, trembling and losing control of their bladders. Chu Muyun, pampered by him, was the least afraid of him, but even he felt a flicker of fear.

“N-no, I’m not a male model,” Chu Muyun stammered, shrinking back and lowering his head. He was so docile now, not a trace of his earlier flamboyant confidence remained. “My friend got sick, so I’m covering his shift for one night.”

Lu Hanzhang was indeed like a volcano on the verge of eruption. He couldn’t explain why, but his first reaction to seeing Chu Muyun working as a male model in a nightclub was pure fury—every cell in his body was boiling with rage! Even though Chu Muyun was a stranger to him, someone he hadn’t even exchanged WeChat contacts with.

But when he saw Chu Muyun’s pale face from the pain of his grip on his wrist, and the way he lowered his head in feigned obedience, even knowing it was an act, Lu Hanzhang found himself unable to unleash his anger.

The volcano had been sealed, and the frenzied tiger and leopard had their fangs ripped out.

“…Come with me,” Lu Hanzhang said.

“Okay,” Chu Muyun replied, now as docile as a quail.

Shen Shu watched in terrified disbelief. Is this young model the Crown Prince’s man? If she had known earlier, she would never have dared to provoke him!

Zhou Wei, standing nearby, nearly popped his eyes out of their sockets.

Didn’t this little star fail to hook up with my cousin? What’s going on now? He had assumed Lu Hanzhang was just visiting on a whim, but it seemed he had come to… retrieve his boyfriend?

Am I understanding this correctly?

Impossible, Zhou Wei thought. Could Lu Hanzhang, the perennial bachelor, actually be blooming?

Snapping out of his daze, Zhou Wei furtively reached for his phone, intending to secretly record the scene and share it with his group chat for gossip. But the moment his hand moved, Lu Hanzhang turned his icy gaze on him and extended a hand, his expression unreadable, “Give it here.”

Zhou Wei didn’t dare resist. He surrendered his phone with both hands.

Lu Hanzhang tapped at the screen before returning it. Not only had he deleted the video Zhou Wei had just taken, but he had also purged all of Zhou Wei’s previous social media posts.

Then, with a cold expression, Lu Hanzhang helped Chu Muyun up and left.

Only after they had completely disappeared from the nightclub did Zhou Wei dare to open WeChat. In a group chat where Lu Hanzhang wasn’t present, he frantically typed: [You guys won’t believe it! The Crown Prince has a Crown Princess now!!!]

[Holy shit, is that for real?]

The group chat instantly flooded with over 99+ messages.

Even after they were in the car, Chu Muyun still felt dazed, as if floating in a fog. How had Lu Hanzhang shown up? And how had he caught him in the act?

Hearing the engine start, he asked, “Where are we going?” His mind sluggish, he slowly added, “To my place or yours?”

Lu Hanzhang glanced at him, “Where do you want to go?”

“Let’s go to my place,” Chu Muyun said after a moment’s thought. “My son will get anxious if he doesn’t see me all night.”

The Crown Prince was a rabbit with a dog-like personality—very clingy. He then rattled off the address of his current rental apartment.

Lu Hanzhang’s pupils dilated in shock. A son? When had that happened? He was married with a son and still working as a male model?

Wanting to ask more questions, Chu Muyun leaned against Lu Hanzhang’s shoulder, closed his eyes, and drifted off to sleep.

Dizzy and exhausted, he hadn’t finished his last drink, which might have kept him barely awake. But being near Lu Hanzhang brought such a profound sense of security that Chu Muyun instantly succumbed to sleep.

Lu Hanzhang gazed at him with a complex expression.

Chu Muyun’s upper body was soaked, and the car’s air conditioning was blasting. He instinctively curled up, shivering slightly. Lu Hanzhang removed his suit jacket and draped it over him.

Half an hour later, the car pulled into the residential complex Chu Muyun had mentioned. Lu Hanzhang nudged him, but Chu Muyun remained deeply asleep.

The driver stared as if he’d seen a ghost as his boss ordered him to stay behind, then scooped Chu Muyun into his arms and carried him upstairs.

At the door, Lu Hanzhang lifted Chu Muyun’s limp hand and tested each fingerprint. Click. The door unlocked.

Frowning, he carried Chu Muyun inside.

Throughout the drive, Lu Hanzhang had wrestled with the “son” issue, mentally preparing himself for the possibility of encountering Chu Muyun’s “wife and children” and deciding how to react.

As soon as Lu Hanzhang entered, he scanned the room by the dim light of the streetlamp filtering through the living room window. The shoe cabinet held only men’s shoes, and there was only one pair of slippers. There were no signs of children living here, nor any indication of a live-in girlfriend.

Lu Hanzhang unconsciously let out a sigh of relief.

He carried Chu Muyun into the bedroom, removed his outer clothes, changed him into light pajamas, and covered his stomach with a blanket. Once finished, Lu Hanzhang stood up to leave.

Looking at Chu Muyun’s unguarded sleeping face, he felt a sudden heat in his lower abdomen, a primal urge to… turn into a beast.

He desperately wanted to lean down and taste those slightly parted, full lips, to sink his fingers into that slender waist that seemed fragile enough to snap with the slightest pressure, and then—

He couldn’t allow himself to indulge. He could only retreat in disarray. Chu Muyun seemed destined to be his undoing, constantly pushing him to the brink of losing control.

Thump! A sudden noise came from the closet. Lu Hanzhang strode over, half-expecting to catch an adulterer or Chu Muyun’s “son,” and yanked the door open. Inside, he found only a large, plump rabbit. If its ears hadn’t twitched, he would have mistaken it for a stuffed toy.

Lu Hanzhang, “……”

He turned and left, remembering to close the door behind him.

Chu Muyun, having drunk too much, slept restlessly with a slight frown between his brows.

In the dead of night, he had a bizarre dream. In it, the Great King strode in from outside, his figure silhouetted against the light, his features obscured by the harsh contrast of light and shadow. Leaning against the doorframe, the Great King declared, “I am the Martial King. The Restoration requires another one hundred billion. Succeed, and I will make you my Imperial Consort.”

“B-but I don’t have that kind of money,” Chu Muyun stammered, watching the Great King abandon him.

He understood.

To earn one hundred billion, he worked as a bartender in a nightclub, needing to sell 56,818,182 bottles of Ace of Spades or 2,500,000 servings of the Grand Trio. He toiled day and night, stuffing his earnings into a piggy bank, only to return home and wash the Great King’s underwear.

Yet he still failed to reach one hundred billion. He and the Great King were arrested for their delusional plot to overthrow the government. The former Tyrant and Demon Consort now operated sewing machines to produce umbrellas in prison, attending ideological classes where they learned that “socialist society belongs to the people”…

Absurd, yet strangely logical.

That same night, Lu Hanzhang also had a dream. His was far simpler and more brutal. He pinned someone beneath him, the beauty’s face flushed with desire, their fingers weakly clutching his waist, eyelashes trembling as they cried out his name, though he couldn’t make out what they were saying.

Chu Muyun woke up the next morning with a throbbing headache from his hangover.

He rubbed his temples, thinking, No wonder Zhang Chen suddenly fell ill, living like this every day.

Several WeChat messages from Zhang Chen asked how he was doing. Chu Muyun replied, reassuring him but keeping the big deal they’d closed the night before a surprise.

Knock, knock. Just as he was lazing in bed playing on his phone, a knock came from the door (the doorbell had been broken for ages). Chu Muyun sprang up, slipped into his slippers, and hurried out of the bedroom to answer it.

“Ah. Great King, you’re here?”

The person at the door made Chu Muyun freeze.

A tall figure stood silhouetted against the morning light, his eyes dark and profound. For a fleeting moment, Chu Muyun hallucinated the “Great King who needed another hundred billion for Restoration” from his dream.

But the illusion vanished in an instant.

Neat short hair, a bespoke suit, and a luxury watch, the man exuded the aura of a polished business executive. At least he seems mentally sound, Chu Muyun thought. Thank goodness the Great King isn’t planning a rebellion. I quite like my current life.

“What did you call me?” The man looked bewildered. “…Great King?”

“C-Crown Prince, good morning,” Chu Muyun stammered, slowly piecing together the events of the previous night.

Wait a minute… Lu Hanzhang had come across as if he was going to scold me, but not only did he take me home, he actually came to check on me the next day?