The Cold Queen is My Exclusive Little Snack - Chapter 30

On set, Zuo Xingning settled onto a small stool in a sheltered corner, cupping her face in her hands as she stared blankly ahead.

Today wasn’t particularly busy, but she couldn’t go anywhere either.

The elaborate makeup and hairstyling for historical dramas were time-consuming. Even she herself was too lazy to bother with it, let alone the stylists. At most, she’d remove her wig to let her scalp breathe.

Last night…

The thought of last night made Zuo Xingning’s cheeks flush.

The bed had been thoroughly disheveled, practically unusable for sleeping. In the end, they had to retreat to Zuo Xingning’s hotel.

Chu Shiyin washed up first and rested on the bed. By the time Zuo Xingning finished, Chu Shiyin was already asleep.

Helpless, Zuo Xingning slipped under the covers and waited alone until midnight, whispering “Happy birthday” in her ear.

Before drifting off, she resolved to say it again in person when they woke up. But when she opened her eyes, the warmth beside her had already faded.

An urgent matter at the theater had called Chu Shiyin away before Zuo Xingning woke up.

Zuo Xingning sighed deeply, rose, and returned to her trailer to rest.

It was still too cold outside. Though stuffy, the car was warm.

Lizi followed her in, carrying a box of soup dumplings—her just-arrived takeout, which she considered her after-dinner “dessert.”

Zuo Xingning wasn’t hungry; things were different now. She had “eaten” her fill last night.

No longer needing to suppress her “appetite” with normal food, the little vampire had become picky, refusing to eat this or that.

But the takeout Lizi had ordered came from a time-honored establishment—a small shop tucked away on a side street. Its storefront, unchanged for decades, was said to look exactly as it had twenty or thirty years ago. The taste, too, remained consistently delicious, day after day, year after year.

Zuo Xingning didn’t know any of this, but the aroma wafting through the air told her these were undoubtedly excellent soup dumplings, worthy of their reputation.

Unable to resist, she grabbed a clean pair of chopsticks and asked Lizi for one to try.

As expected, the skin was thin, the filling generous, and the flavor lingered on her palate.

The dumpling was small, gone in just a few bites. Zuo Xingning set down her chopsticks, about to ask Lizi where she had ordered from, when she saw Lizi frantically grab two tissues and press them against her mouth.

A slightly rough tissue wiped her chin, moving from side to side. After wiping, Lizi sighed in relief. “Good thing, good thing! It didn’t stain your clothes.”

The tissue, stained with pale yellow broth, flew into the trash can. Zuo Xingning paused, then thanked her.

In that brief moment, she suddenly felt something was off.

Not with Lizi, but with someone else who had once made a similar gesture toward her… something was wrong.

Zuo Xingning touched her chin, then her nose bridge, before pulling out another tissue and holding it up to her face.

Broth would spill over the lip and trickle down the chin, and bl00d would do the same. If you wanted to wipe it away, you’d never place the tissue at the tip of the nose.

This gesture could only be meant to conceal something.

The night before last, Jiang Shuqing had rushed over the moment she saw Zuo Xingning, untying her silk scarf. Was she trying to hide something?

Was there something on her face?

Recalling Jiang Shuqing’s appearance, Zuo Xingning pressed the tissue against her nose bridge and ran her other hand down the tip of her nose.

Philtrum, upper lip, teeth…

In a flash of insight, Zuo Xingning suddenly understood what Jiang Shuqing had been trying to hide—

Her fangs.

Zuo Xingning was certain that she had only lost control of her fangs for a moment that day, accidentally biting herself. She had quickly retracted them, making it impossible for Jiang Shuqing to have seen.

Therefore, Jiang Shuqing must have known she was a vampire all along.

This explained why Jiang Shuqing’s first words upon entering the room had been:

“Biting people outside? Are you trying to get killed?!”

Only someone who knew she was a vampire would react that way.

That was why Jiang Shuqing had sacrificed her expensive silk scarf to cover Zuo Xingning’s mouth, preventing others from seeing her fangs.

But how had Jiang Shuqing discovered her secret?

Was she just an ordinary human, or…?

Come to think of it, Jiang Shuqing’s drunken ramblings at the banquet had also been odd.

She seemed fixated on the fact that she couldn’t detect any “special scent” on Zhongli Yan, using this as a criterion to determine who she liked.

“When you like someone, you can smell a unique fragrance on them that others can’t detect, right? Don’t you know that?”

If this wasn’t just some made-up trope from romance novels, could it mean that Jiang Shuqing was also…?

Zuo Xingning’s pupils constricted.

At ten in the morning, Zuo Minglan had just arrived at the office. Before she could even spread out her design drafts, her personal phone, lying beside her, began buzzing incessantly.

Only Zuo Xingning could cause such a commotion.

Sighing, she set down her pen and unlocked her phone. Amidst the scattered seven or eight messages and emojis, she sifted through the nonsense until only one sentence remained:

Mom, besides me, are there any other vampires in China around my age?

Vampires had always been few in number. With each generation, some individuals failed to awaken their vampiric bloodline, remaining ordinary humans. Zuo Minglan had once suspected Xingning would be one of them. In short, the vampire population dwindled with each generation. By Xingning’s generation, even counting infants still nursing, they couldn’t fill two mahjong tables.

What were the odds of another vampire of similar age existing?

Yet, as Zuo Minglan sat pondering, she actually recalled one.

What about Aunt Qin’s son, who took the college entrance exam a year before you? He’s only a year or two older, right?

The moment the message was sent, Zuo Xingning replied:

Not a boy, a girl—a beautiful girl.

Her surname is Jiang, and her name is Jiang Shuqing. Her father’s surname is probably Han. They’re in business, and her family is quite well-off.

Image

Mom, does she look familiar?

Zuo Minglan tapped to open the image. It was a candid shot, her body blurred except for her face, which was sharp and clear.

The girl in the photo wore ancient Chinese attire, her brows furrowed in a cold, piercing gaze.

Zuo Minglan had watched the Escape to Freedom livestream and immediately recognized her: Jiang Shuqing.

During the broadcast, Jiang Shuqing had sported golden hair, making her seem vaguely familiar. But now, with a black wig, her features gradually aligned with someone from Zuo Minglan’s memories.

Zuo Minglan sighed and typed a reply:

She looks familiar. I think I know her mother.

Is Jiang Shuqing her stage name? I remember her being called Jiang Qingnuan.

The feud between Zuo Minglan and Jiang Shuqing’s mother was, in essence, a mirror image of the conflict between Jiang Shuqing and Zuo Xingning.

However, Zuo Minglan had been fiercely competitive in her youth, making their rivalry even more intense.

They were classmates for seven years, from high school through university, during which they barely exchanged a few civil words. After graduation, Zuo Minglan left for overseas studies, and the two never saw each other again.

Years later, after returning from abroad, Zuo Minglan learned from mutual friends that Jiang Shuqing’s mother had married a wealthy heir and given birth to a daughter named Qing Nuan.

For vampires, the name “Qing Nuan” (Clear Warmth) was hardly auspicious.

Had it not been for this, the name wouldn’t have left such a deep impression on Zuo Minglan.

As Zuo Xingning scrolled through Ms. Zuo Minglan’s messages, she felt overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information. After a moment to process it, she typed:

We have family gatherings every two or three years, right? Why have I never met her?

The explanation was complex, so Ms. Zuo Minglan sent several voice messages.

“Their branch isn’t aligned with ours. The Jiang girl’s great-grandfather… or was it her great-great-grandfather? Anyway, someone older than your grandmother—I can’t remember if it was a man or a woman—killed several people for sustenance and was caught and executed.”

“The child he left behind was secretly cared for by his kin until adulthood. After that, they abandoned him, fearing he would follow in his father’s footsteps and implicate them in his crimes.”

“This happened before your grandmother was even born—ancient history. If she hadn’t met Jiang Shuqing’s grandfather at the senior year pep rally, I might never have known…”

“……”

Zuo Xingning rubbed her temples, the fog in her mind lifting. Long-overlooked details suddenly resurfaced.

She remembered how, during their freshman year of college, she and Jiang Shuqing had actually gotten along quite well. They must have exchanged WeChat contacts around that time.

But after military training and the National Day holiday trip home, Jiang Shuqing’s attitude toward her had completely changed.

Military training… After finishing military training, they took a group photo.

Jiang Shuqing must have shown the photo to her mother, perpetuating the “family tradition” of a sudden, drastic shift in attitude.

Ah—my head hurts so much.

Zuo Xingning listlessly picked up her phone and sent a final voice message: “Mommy, do you have any extra silk scarves left from the limited edition released this autumn? The coffee and beige color-blocked one?”

“I stained Jiang Shuqing’s and need to replace it.”

The night before last had been chaotic. Zuo Xingning had only just remembered that the silk scarf she’d stained looked familiar. A quick online search confirmed it was a Ms. Lan design—none other than her own mother, Ms. Zuo Minglan.

With the apology issue resolved smoothly, Zuo Xingning found herself feeling awkward around Jiang Shuqing for the rest of the day.

Even more awkward than their inexplicable “friendship.”

This persistent itch, like having lice she couldn’t scratch, finally eased by evening—

Leaving only anxiety.

The night’s filming didn’t go smoothly. After a grueling day, the lead actress was visibly exhausted. By the time they wrapped the final scene—a confrontation with Zuo Xingning—the clock was nearing eleven.

Chu Shiyin’s birthday was almost over.

And Zuo Xingning hadn’t even had a chance to wish her a proper “Happy Birthday” in person.

Without bothering to remove her makeup, Zuo Xingning hastily removed her wig, changed clothes, and rushed to pick up the cake.

The film set was remote, but the cake shop and Chu Shiyin’s hotel were in the same direction. If all went smoothly, she could reach the hotel in under forty minutes.

If all went smoothly.

Zuo Xingning got stuck in traffic.