"He's just grateful," she muttered to herself, trying to rationalize the erratic beating of her heart. "He was a slave. No one treated him nicely, and now that I'm treating him nicely, he's hyper-attached. It's a trauma response. Yes. That's it. It's totally platonic trauma bonding."
She washed her hands in the basin, scrubbing the spot vigorously.
"I am a straight man," she chanted under her breath. "Well, I'm a straight woman pretending to be a straight man. And he is the Villain. Villains don't have romance arcs. They only have revenge arcs."
But as she looked at the reflection in the water, a face that was flushed and eyes that were too bright, a tiny, treacherous voice in the back of her mind whispered:
But he didn't look like he was seeking revenge.
"Gah!" Ji'an splashed water on her face. "Focus! Forty-eight hours of cooking! I need to unlock the Dumpling Skill Tree! No more boys! Only buns!"
