Little Pink Starfish

Since he didn’t take that noble rich daddy seriously at all, Gu Bai followed Cecil purely based on his personal principle: if you like a man, you have to stare at him closely. So, just like that, he went along with Cecil. Together, they accompanied Nois, and Nois accompanied Zhu Ning, quickly helping Zhu Ning pack his things and then, without looking back, boarded the magic-powered carriage to leave.

Of course, even though there were two carriages, Zhu Ning felt it was too strange to sit alone with Nois in one, so he pulled Gu Bai onto the same carriage. Cecil had originally wanted to be alone with Gu Bai, but seeing this had no choice but to get in too — and so, that one carriage had four people in it, while the other was left completely empty.

Cecil grew more and more annoyed at Zhu Ning.
—If it weren’t for him, he could’ve spent quality time building a connection with his little Carlo!
At the same time, he felt disappointment toward his own brother Nois.
If that guy were just a little more capable! Why should Zhu Ning be the one taking the lead?
He should know how to assert his alpha status, okay!

【Even though he himself had literally never done so.】

The carriage rocked along the road. Under the protection of guards from both the Nois and Cecil families, they smoothly returned to the imperial capital. At this point, Zhu Ning followed Nois to his estate, while Gu Bai was taken away by Cecil.
Only…

Gu Bai: Did ge forget something?

Far off in Robi City… on the road to the imperial capital.
The house servant, who had been struggling to escape from the crowd surrounding his young master, found him missing and heard he had left with some men — and so hurriedly gave chase…

Ya An cried as he walked: “Ying ying ying… young master walked too fast, ying ying ying… don’t leave Ya An behind, ying ying ying… Ya An’s coming to find you, ying ying ying… young master, wait for Ya An, ying ying ying…”

_{[T/N: Ying is a cute cry.]}

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As the nobles most favored by the Beast Emperor, the Cardinorn and Iman families held irreplaceable positions in the imperial capital. But both families had a lot of children — the lines of inheritance stretched from sixth to seventh to eighth, and there were plenty of illegitimate kids too — aside from the duchess, there were also many mistresses in the rear courts. As long as a child was born, they’d be welcomed in.

Still, one had to admit: both Cecil and Nois were the duchess’s sons and first in line to inherit. On top of that, they were strong and considered the cream of the crop among young beastmen.
But today, after both Nois and Cecil returned from a trip out, they each brought home a private stone-gambling master — that couldn’t help but draw attention.

Cardinorn Estate.
A neat row of servants greeted them at the door. Cecil jumped off the carriage first, then attentively helped the other man out of the carriage.

Pale skin, an average face, nothing particularly remarkable — that could be overlooked. But more importantly!
That was a sub-beastman, okay!

Seriously, were there even any sub-beastman stone-gamblers with strong enough mental power and skill?
Young Master Cecil had always been a flirt, sure, but wasn’t he being too willful this time?

That’s right — everyone thought this was the result of Young Master Cecil’s latest fling… Even though it hadn’t been long since he came of age, everyone figured the only reason there hadn’t been any “scandal” before was due to his age. Now that his first heat was over, the estate would surely get lively.
After all, Cecil’s “tastes” were exactly like those of the duke — everyone knew it!

Maybe… this person had been brought back for that reason?
If that was the case, then it wasn’t surprising that Young Master Cecil had treated him so well.
Although sub-beastmen were hard to impregnate, it didn’t seem like a little young master would pop up anytime soon.

Gu Bai didn’t know how, but he instantly saw through these people’s thoughts.
—Well, it wasn’t that strange, was it? All those sneaky glances, full of suggestive ambiguity, back and forth — it was way too obvious, right?

Gu Bai mentally rolled his eyes for the hundred and first time.
Ge actually kind of wishes the rumor were true, it’s a shame it isn’t, okay.
Your young master’s about to start obsessing over the protagonist shou — torn between old bros and new flames, full of internal drama.
Ge came to save your young master, got it!

Still, Gu Bai kept his expression blank.
His gaze swept over the crowd of servants and finally landed on Cecil.

Whoosh whoosh…
The servants felt a cold wind blow by.
Young Master Cecil’s new plaything was seriously creepy! Like he just crawled out of a grave, okay! That look he gave us chilled us to the core!

As for Cecil, that look left him awkward.
His heart felt uneasy.
The servants’ looks were too obvious — had his little Carlo noticed? If he thought Cecil didn’t respect him because of this, what would he do?
Cecil deeply regretted it.
Was he pursuing someone for their looks? Please, those former flings couldn’t even compare to one of little Carlo’s toes!

In this moment, confronted by his own past scandals,
Cecil really wished he could go back in time and whack that flirty former self over the head! Preferably knock out all that messy, romantic nonsense!
But… thankfully, his body was still pure.

Cecil had never been so grateful for the fact that beastmen had heat cycles — though his used to be barely noticeable.
Now, all he had left to offer was his pure body…
But would little Carlo still give him a chance?

With that mindset, Cecil treated Gu Bai even more cautiously.
He carefully maintained a polite distance, planning to close the gap slowly over time. He made every effort to show respect.
Then he led Gu Bai personally, past the servants, and arranged for him to stay… right next to his own bedroom.

Gu Bai followed.
Sure enough, after saying goodbye to Zhu Ning, this second male lead started keeping his distance from ge. Dammit, ge’s road to secret love is seriously rough. Should ge head out tomorrow and grab some high-level strange stones? If he can’t flirt for now, he can at least build up presence!

—That was what he thought.
But Gu Bai hadn’t expected… the trouble he had to face was far from simple.

The next morning.
Gu Bai stared dead-eyed at the flamboyant group of… men who had almost wrapped him in layers from the outside in, and felt the world go dark.

“You’re the new fling Lord Cecil brought back? Not much to look at!”
“With a face like yours, stay away from our Cecil-ge!”
“I’m telling you, with your looks, you’re totally not his type. Better leave now, or you’ll be kicked out later and lose all face!”
“Some hick from who-knows-where dares to compete with me for him? Get lost already!”

Gu Bai: “……”
So many words, boiled down to just two.
Fuck off.

Ge did remember that his secret crush had a flirty past, but ge forgot that the flings hadn’t been cleaned up yet! In the original novel, the second male lead turned over a new leaf for the protagonist shou and cut all ties with past lovers. But now with ge around, they didn’t care and didn’t remember at all—
This unpleasant feeling…

Cold energy practically radiated from around Gu Bai.
He had just woken up this morning, about to tell the butler he wanted to go out, and hadn’t even finished packing when he was told a bunch of people were here to visit.
Next thing he knew—
He was surrounded!
Surrounded!!
AHH!

This whole group, whether female or sub-beastman, were all delicate and beautiful. And all of them, despite being men, had orchid fingers, flowery outfits, red blush on their cheeks—it was unbearable!
What the hell was that second male lead’s taste before?!

Gu Bai felt his patience wearing thin.
He held it in… and held it in… and after one minute of tolerance—
Released his mental power.

Gu Bai: Heh.
He didn’t know why, but he just instinctively knew what to do.

And so, the next moment—
All those “flower-like” people’s eyes turned hazy, then they all fell silent, turned around, and left the scene as if nothing had happened.

Gu Bai let out a breath.
Damn, a group of catty divas mixed with flirt demons is worse than a flock of ducks. If you wanna be drama queens, at least have some class!
Learn from ge! Ge is stylish! Ge is elegant!

Gu Bai turned to the bathroom and took a grapefruit-scented bath.
Then he stepped out, casually greeted the butler, and headed toward one of the imperial capital’s famous mining fields.
—Of course, he didn’t forget to bring the crystal card with yesterday’s pre-paid salary from the second male lead.

---

Cecil was summoned early in the morning by Nois for advice. He had wanted to bring little Carlo along, but on one hand, he couldn’t bear to wake him early, and on the other, he didn’t want little Carlo to spend more time with Zhu Ning. So after hesitating a bit, he went alone.

He was glad he went—because sure enough, he ran into Zhu Ning.
But when he got back… he realized he’d made a huge mistake.
He never expected that the people he had flirted with in the past would come harass his little Carlo!

Cecil’s face darkened.
What the hell were the gate guards doing?! Why was everyone allowed inside?!

And then began the umpteenth round of regret.
He should have dealt with those flings long ago, but he forgot… probably because none of them ever left an impression on him. And after meeting little Carlo, he hadn’t thought of them at all.
He always felt like those past events had nothing to do with him anymore… so he just neglected to handle it.

Now that little Carlo had been insulted for no reason, he was definitely feeling more negatively about him.
And the fact that he had left in a hurry—was it because of this?
To little Carlo, this was an unjust disaster…
Thankfully, they had signed the contract early on. No matter how angry little Carlo was, he wouldn’t completely leave…

Frustrated, Cecil called the butler and asked where little Carlo had gone.
When he found out that he’d gone to the biggest mining site in the capital, he became even more certain that Carlo had gone there to clear his mind.
This was all his fault…
If only he hadn’t been so careless…

Without saying another word, Cecil grabbed all his crystal cards and ran out of the estate.
He had to get to the mining site ASAP and make up for the mistake he made today!
Even if little Carlo wanted to buy every single raw stone there, he’d go bankrupt to fulfill it!

As long as—
As long as he wasn’t angry anymore…