6: Chapter 6 Towels and Accidents

In the living room downstairs, the television volume was turned down very low, with only the images flickering silently.

"Um... Huang Mao? Can you hear me?"

The voice drifted down again, slightly clearer this time, but the sense of shame in it almost seemed to flow down the stairs.

Huang Mao's heart unhelpfully skipped a beat.

As a physically and mentally healthy twenty-year-old male, the hidden folder in his brain named 'Study Materials' instantly became a bit restless.

A lone man and woman, late at night, a bathroom, a plea for help.

The combination of these keywords was enough to construct a ten-thousand-word erotic novel plot in the mind of any male college student.

"Huang Mao?"

"Coming!"

Huang Mao snapped back to his senses and shook his head, tossing those impure thoughts out of his mind. He took a deep breath, sprang up from the sofa, and rushed up the stairs two steps at a time.

A faint mist of water vapor permeated the second-floor hallway.

Huang Mao didn't rush straight to the bathroom. Instead, he first ducked into the guest bedroom he had prepared for Leng Qingxuan.

He remembered clearly that when he was tidying the room earlier, he had specifically placed a set of brand-new toiletries in the second drawer of the wardrobe, including a pink cotton bath towel.

He pulled open the drawer, and sure enough, that neatly folded bath towel was lying there quietly.

"This young lady really is a level-nine disaster when it comes to basic life skills."

Huang Mao shook his head helplessly, grabbed the bath towel, and turned to walk to the bathroom door.

The frosted glass door was tightly shut, with a warm yellow light glowing from within. He could vaguely see a blurry silhouette pressed against the door. Those lines... even through a layer of frosted glass, he could see breathtaking curves.

Huang Mao felt his throat go a bit dry. He cleared his throat twice, trying to break the suffocating, flirtatious atmosphere.

"Ahem. Um, Classmate Leng, you forgot to take a bath towel, right? Didn't I tell you earlier? The towels are in your bedroom cabinet."

A deathly silence lasted for two seconds inside the bathroom.

Then, Leng Qingxuan's annoyed and aggrieved voice came through: "I... I know! I remembered just now... but I'm already inside!"

"I'm covered in water. I can't exactly run out soaking wet to get it, can I? I'd get your hallway all wet..."

Hearing this, Huang Mao leaned against the doorframe, unable to resist teasing her: "That's nothing. You'd just have to mop the floor afterward. Besides, technically, you don't even need a towel."

"This bathroom has a heater installed. There's a drying mode on the wall. If you stand there for a few minutes, you'll be dry."

"...Huh?"

The voice inside was clearly stunned. "There's such a thing? Where? I pressed a button just now, and it almost blew cold air onto my head!"

"That's the exhaust fan..." Huang Mao facepalmed. "Forget it. Since I've already brought the towel, open the door."

"O-Open the door?"

Leng Qingxuan's voice instantly jumped an octave, like a cat whose tail had been stepped on. "Don't... don't you come in!"

"What are you thinking?" Huang Mao rolled his eyes. "Just open the door a crack, and I'll hand it in. It's not like you can phase your hand through the wall to grab it."

A rustling sound came from the bathroom—the sound of bare soles scuffing against wet tiles.

The blurry silhouette slowly approached the door.

Leng Qingxuan was clearly standing right against the door. Her voice was just behind the panel, inches away: "Then... then pull the door open just a little bit. Just a tiny bit! You're absolutely not allowed to peek!"

"Don't worry, I'm not interested in flat chests."

"You're the flat one! Your whole family is flat!" Leng Qingxuan instantly bristled, retorting in shame and anger. "I... I'm actually quite well-endowed, okay!"

"Sure, sure, well-endowed, right."

A mischievous smirk curled on Huang Mao's lips. "But then again, Classmate Leng, since you dared to run away from home and stay in a single man's house,"

"Didn't your contingency plan include the scenario of being seen due to some 'accident'? I thought you'd have prepared yourself mentally long ago."

"Who... who would have such a weird contingency plan!"

Behind the door, Leng Qingxuan's face was as red as a ripe tomato. She shielded her chest with her hands. Although she knew there was a door between them, she still instinctively took a defensive posture. "Shut up! Just give it to me!"

"As you wish, My Lady."

Huang Mao stopped teasing her. He took a deep breath and reached out to grasp the doorknob.

*Click.*

The lock turned.

He carefully pushed the door open to a very narrow crack, about two fingers wide.

Instantly, a dense, humid, and hot wave of air hit him in the face.

It was a mixture of water vapor, the minty body wash he usually used, and a young girl's unique, indescribable fragrance.

This scent seemed to have a physical form, drilling straight into Huang Mao's nostrils and rushing through his blood to his cerebral cortex.

It was too much.

This was more lethal than any high-end perfume.

Huang Mao held his breath, staring fixedly at the wall across the hallway, and handed the pink bath towel through the crack in the door.

"Here, take it."

A hand reached out from the crack.

The hand was fair and slender, its skin flushed slightly red from the hot water, with crystal-clear droplets clinging to the fingertips. Out of nervousness, the hand was trembling slightly, groping blindly in the air.

Leng Qingxuan didn't dare look out at all; she was flying completely blind.

Her fingertips brushed through the air. Instead of hitting the towel, they landed squarely on the back of Huang Mao's hand.

Cool fingertips, burning back of the hand.

The moment their skin touched, it was as if a faint electric current exploded from the point of contact.

Huang Mao's hand twitched.

Leng Qingxuan, inside the door, recoiled even more violently as if struck by lightning, letting out a tiny whimper: "Ugh..."

With that reaction, someone who didn't know better would have thought Huang Mao had done something terrible to her.

"A little lower. Don't just grope around; that's my hand, not the towel." Huang Mao gritted his teeth, trying his best to make his voice sound like a gentleman's.

"S-Shut up! I can't see!"

Leng Qingxuan was dying of embarrassment. She reached out again, and this time, she finally grabbed the bundle of soft fabric.

"Got it!"

She felt a wave of relief and hurriedly tried to pull her hand back and close the door.

However, Murphy's Law dictates that when a person is in a state of extreme tension, shame, and on a slippery floor, the probability of an accident is one hundred percent.

To reach the towel, Leng Qingxuan had leaned her center of gravity slightly forward. The non-slip mat she was standing on had shifted at some point.

Just as she grabbed the towel and prepared to pull back—

Her foot slipped.

"Ah—!"

A short, terrified scream pierced the silence of the second floor.

Leng Qingxuan's body instantly lost its balance. She had intended to step back, but her foot slipped, causing her entire body to lunge forward uncontrollably instead.

The glass door, which had only been open a crack, was struck by her body and, without a doubt—

*Bam!*

The door was knocked wide open.

At that moment, time seemed to go into slow motion.

Huang Mao stood at the doorway, watching helplessly as the door swung toward him. As a healthy college male who occasionally spent half a day at the gym, his physical reactions were faster than his brain.

Driven by instinct, he took half a step back, narrowly avoiding the fate of having the door slam into his face.

Immediately after, he instinctively reached out, wanting to steady the figure falling out.

But reality is not an idol drama.

In reality, there are no slow-motion replays, no anti-gravity skirts, and certainly no perfectly timed "spinning hugs."

Unless he was a master on the level of The Flash or Quicksilver, trying to catch a fully grown adult who had completely lost control and was falling at that distance and speed was pure fantasy.

And so, with Huang Mao's hands only halfway extended, the tragedy occurred.

*Splat.*

Leng Qingxuan fell face-down, landing solidly on the floor mat outside the bathroom door.

Fortunately, the pink bath towel she was clutching tightly acted as a buffer under her face and chest at the last moment, serving as the only airbag and preventing the campus belle from being disfigured.

But that was all it did.

The air froze.

The entire world seemed to stand still for that one second.

Huang Mao's hands were frozen in mid-air, held in an awkward "tried to help but failed" position.

His gaze fell—honestly, directly, and without any obstruction—onto the scene before him.

Because she had fallen face-down, Leng Qingxuan's entire back was visible at a glance.

What a sight it was.

From her slender neck to her delicate shoulder blades, and down to her tapering waist, it was a breathtaking S-curve.

Her freshly showered skin was glowing white, with un-dried water droplets glistening under the light with an enticing sheen.

And the most lethal part was the area that was higher than the rest, even more moist and full.

It was the Creator's most perfect masterpiece, a roundness and perkiness that any 2D artist would find difficult to replicate.

Huang Mao's brain completely crashed.

Although he had watched countless videos and prided himself on his rich theoretical knowledge, when a visual impact of this level actually happened before his eyes, any logic seemed pale and weak.

About five or six seconds passed—seconds that felt a century long to both of them.

Lying on the floor, Leng Qingxuan finally recovered from the dizziness of the fall.

She felt the chill on her back.

She also felt that tangible, burning gaze.

"Aaaaaaaahhhhhhh—!!!"

A high-decibel scream loud enough to shatter glass erupted.

Leng Qingxuan was like a rabbit whose tail had been stepped on, or a startled cat, springing up from the floor with a speed that defied human mechanics.

She didn't care about the pain, or even about standing steadily. She haphazardly wrapped her body in the life-saving towel and then, with all her strength—

*SLAM!!!*

The bathroom door was slammed shut violently.

The wind from the door even blew the bangs on Huang Mao's forehead.

*Click-click-click!*

The sound of the door being frantically locked came from inside. From the noise, it sounded like she wanted to weld the door shut.

Huang Mao stumbled back two steps, leaning against the hallway wall, panting heavily.

His heart was racing wildly, as if it were about to jump out of his throat.

That humid fragrance still lingered at the tip of his nose, and the snowy-white image from that brief glimpse still remained on his retina.

Too stimulating.

Who could possibly withstand this?

Huang Mao raised his hand and touched his nose. Fortunately, no nosebleed.

He glanced at the closed bathroom door. Vague sounds of whimpering and frustrated wall-thumping came from inside. Clearly, a certain campus belle was currently in the darkest moment of social death in her life.

"Cough."

Huang Mao cleared his throat and shouted toward the door: "Um... I didn't see anything just now. Really. I'm actually very nearsighted. I usually wear contacts, but I wasn't wearing them just now."

He didn't even believe his own nonsense.

There was no response from inside, only the sounds of whimpering grew louder.

"You... be careful, don't fall again. I'm going down first."

After saying this, Huang Mao didn't dare stay any longer. He was afraid if he stayed, the person inside would really commit harakiri out of shame.

He turned and walked toward the stairs, his steps a bit unsteady.

As he walked, he couldn't help but replay the scene in his mind.

That curve...

That sheen...

That elasticity...

Although he felt a bit sorry for Leng Qingxuan, this turn of events...

"So supple."

Huang Mao murmured softly to himself, his lips curling up as his face turned red.

This wasn't just letting someone stay over; this was clearly an endurance test for his heart.

This girl was practically a walking fan-service machine.

Back in the living room, Huang Mao sat back down on the sofa and took a deep breath to calm his emotions.

"Calm down, Huang Mao. It's not like you haven't seen better on your phone or computer."

"You are a gentleman, a good youth of the new era."

"But... it really was supple. White and supple."

...

Inside the second-floor bathroom.

Leng Qingxuan was slumped on the floor with her back against the door, wrapped in the pink towel like a silkworm cocoon.

Her face was so red it looked like it might drip blood, and tears were welling in her eyes.

"Waaaah..."

"I'll never be able to get married..."

"I don't want to live anymore..."

The image of that moment played on an infinite loop in her mind. She had been sprawled on the floor like a frog, defenselessly showing everything from behind to that man.

And... and he definitely stared!

When she stood up just now, that guy's gaze hadn't even had time to shift. He was definitely looking at her... her...

"Pervert! Perverted wolf!"

Leng Qingxuan buried her head in her knees and let out a desperate wail.

But strangely.

After the extreme shame, a strange emotion actually welled up deep in her heart.

It wasn't the disgust she had imagined.

Instead, there was a... sort of inexplicable heat.

"Is this... what it feels like to be seen completely?"

She bit her lip, her fingers gripping the edge of the towel tightly, her heart beating so fast it was a blur.

In this unfamiliar house, in this man's territory...

...

She felt like her body wasn't even that wet anymore...