QT: Don't fall in love with the Male Lead

Chapter 176: Don't have the rug pulled from under you

Ji Limei's scowl doesn't become any less hateful just because Xi Zirui orders her to be released.

He waits until she's safely inside his quarters to dismiss the guards, but instructs them to stay nearby.

Considering what he found out about Ji Limei, it pays to be careful regarding what her and his sister might be planning.

"What was miss Ji doing trying to get inside this Emperor's room?" he asks her.

She doesn't say anything, her hands balled into fists at her sides.

"This Emperor asked you a question," Xi Zirui says, wondering if Bai Mi is so confident in her victory that she's convinced Ji Limei that she's as good as crowned the new Empress.

Still, Ji Limei says nothing, all the while looking as if she's ready to pull her own dagger on Xi Zirui.

It's a weird look on her sweet face. It makes Xi Zirui feel antsy and out of his depth. 

He clears his throat and starts pacing around her, his hands clasped firmly behind his back, his own way to wrest back control of the situation.

Whatever Ji Limei is planning, Xi Zirui can always threaten her with the truth.

"How long has my sister known miss Ji's true identity?" Xi Zirui asks.

She goes still, tension gathering at her shoulders and neck. Her eyes drift away from his. "His Majesty will have to be more specific, this lowly servant only understands plain language."

Of course she won't volunteer anything so easily. She wants to know what Xi Zirui knows first.

Bai Mi has her well-trained.

But then again, there's something about the determination in Ji Limei's soft features that makes him wonder if some of it isn't coming from her too.

"This Emperor knows the secret miss Ji and youngest princess are hiding," Xi Zirui says, paying attention to any change in her reactions.

Surprisingly, she relaxes.

"Oh?" she says, an interjection meant to keep him talking.

Isn't she worried Xi Zirui might expose them? Her?

"What would the Empress Dowager think if she found out, this Emperor wanders..."

Even this blatant baiting doesn't get him more than a shrug.

Xi Zirui panics, he wonders if there's something he missed, something he doesn't know.

But that's impossible, he has the letters.

"Miss Ji doesn't think the Empress Dowager would be interested in knowing she's her granddaughter?"

He expects his words to detonate on her like a bomb, to make her foundations shake.

Instead, she fixes him with a cold gaze and says, "I don't care."

She really must not, to talk with the Emperor like that.

This puts Xi Zirui in a difficult position, because he counts on everyone's natural deference and fear of the Emperor to get his way in this world, he has no actual inclination to kill people on a whim.

What is he going to do with Ji Limei?

Whether she knows it or not, she holds all the cards now.

"Is miss Ji sure she can trust my sister with such confidential information?" he asks, trying to at least sow the seeds of discord between Ji Limei and Bai Mi. "Can she be sure my sister won't move against her when it's convenient for her? As she has against me?"

That gets a reaction from Ji Limei, something flashes in her eyes and for a moment Xi Zirui thinks she's going to attack him.

What could the original have possibly done for Ji Limei to hate him this much?

She was better about hiding it when he was in Bai Mi's quarters, but now she's absolutely fuming.

He thinks that Bai Mi is the way to get Ji Limei to crack.

"My sister is fickle, and her loyalties are shifting, I, on the other hand, would be happy to talk with the Empress Dowager in order to have young miss Ji official recognized as a princess, maybe as the daughter of one of late Emperor's bastard children?"

Xi Zirui want her to snap and reveal what she knows and is keeping from him, but nothing could have prepared him for the explosion that bursts forth from Ji Limei's small tense figure.

"I don't give a flying fuck about any of that," she shouts, her face is flushed with rage, her eyes red with indignation. Xi Zirui fears she might pop a vessel. "And neither do you," she says, her accusing eyes fixed on Xi Zirui.

"This Emperor..." Xi Zirui starts, his voice wavering.

Ji Limei's derisive snort makes him come up short.

"Stop that, stop this pointless charade. Why did you have to bring us all along to play house with your pet human?"

Xi Zirui's brain grinds to a screeching halt at the same time it tries frantically to keep up with Ji Limei's words.

What is she implying?

"Do you have your memories back?" Xi Zirui asks, his brain rebooting at the same time his overworked heart does.

Maybe Ji Limei can be the solution to this whole mess. The way she's still glaring at Xi Zirui is slightly concerning but he's sure he can work with that.

"I remember everything," she says, meeting his gaze. "I remember every stupid thing I've had to go through in this demented merry-go-round. I remember having a family with Bai Mi not too long ago," her voice cracks, revealing the real reason behind her anger.

"Oh." It's all Xi Zirui can say in reply to that sentence that hangs suspended between the two of them.

He's very familiar with that kind of pain, but he doesn't understand why Ji Limei feels so much bitterness towards him.

"'Oh', is right." She shortens the distance between them, walking right up to Xi Zirui, her chin tipped back in defiance. "I had a family with her, and now she doesn't remember anything about that, or about the time she was my unscrupulous teacher, or my shitty coworker." She slams a finger against Xi Zirui's chest. "There's all these lives living inside of me now, and it's all your fault."

Now it's Xi Zirui's turn to remain silent while Ji Limei throws accusations at him.

"She doesn't remember any of it," Ji Limei laughs, but there's no humor in it. "For centuries I hated her, while she ignored me, which of course only made me hate her more, and now, because of your little adventure, we had a family together." 

Ji Limei closes her eyes on a shuddering exhale, they're wet when she next opens them. "And I just can't let go of it."

"I'm sorry, I know what you're feeling, but if we can go back..." he starts, trying to reach towards her shoulder, offer some measure of comfort.

She slaps his hand away with another vicious glare. "Go back to what? You think you're going back to the Heavens and everything will be like the little fantasies you played out here?"

Well, no, but he hoped at least...

"Look at you, looking at me like a fish, you don't remember anything about your real life, do you?" she asks, Xi Zirui shakes his head.

She laughs again, guttural and raw. "It shouldn't surprise me, Fate is, and always will be, that bitch."

Xi Zirui has no idea what she's talking about. "I have no idea what you're talking about, but I didn't do any of this... Su Xueyi did, he's the one-"

Ji Limei cuts him off with a single finger raised in front of his lips. "Him? He's just another idiot stuck here because of your whims."

Wait, that can't be. The Shopkeeper told him they suspected the whole thing was Su Xueyi's fault. It's what makes sense!

Why does Ji Limei think it was Xi Zirui's doing?

Xi Zirui shakes his head, adamant that he had nothing to do with everyone being dragged into the Transmigrator 4000. "That makes no sense, why would I do that?"

"Why?" She scoffs. "For the same reason you've done everything since your stupid earthly tribulation."

She points towards the door where Han Yu and Physician Ouyang are, hopefully unable to hear their conversation.

"Because of him," Ji Limei says, spitting out the words with incandescent fury. "Because you can't take no for an answer, because you just had to mess with the balance of the cosmos."

For the first time in his life, Xi Zirui is at a loss for words, unable to make sense of anything Ji Limei is saying.

"That's what I came here to do, to get rid of him," she says, her voice low and threatening. "None of this would be happening if it wasn't for him. Maybe killing him will make it stop, and I can go back to pretending I didn't have children with a woman I vowed to destroy." She chuckles darkly. "Who doesn't even remember it!"

"What does this have to do with Han Yu...I don't..." He feels anxiety climbing up the back of his throat, making it close up on itself. Xi Zirui draws in thirsty breaths, he has a bad feeling about Ji Limei's next words.

"It has everything to do with him." Her eyes meet his. "It's because he's a human and you're not."