A soft kiss was printed on his cheek. It lingered for only a split second before panicking and leaving, yet it seemed to leave an indelible mark.

The scattered lights of the campsite had gone out. The wind whistled behind him, blowing through his thin shirt and onto his somewhat feverish skin. Xie Lan cupped water from the campsite faucet and splashed it on his face. The cold water swept across his skin, provoking a moment of clarity, but soon, an even more arrogant heat surged back.

Dou Sheng stood not far behind him, watching him finish washing up before crunching over the gravel back to the tent.

After a long day, the boys were all asleep. Inside the tent, it was pitch black, save for two empty sleeping bags near the door.

Xie Lan lifted the flap of one and lay down. A moment later, Dou Sheng came in from outside.

In the darkness, Dou Sheng rustled around the pile of luggage for a while, then walked over to him and dropped something.

It was a tank top—the exact same one Zhao Wenying had bought for both of them.

“Wear this to sleep, it’s more comfortable,” Dou Sheng whispered, taking off his own T-shirt and changing into the other tank top.

Xie Lan gave a hum of acknowledgment, took off his clothes, put on the tank top, and burrowed into the sleeping bag.

The sleeping bags bought hastily at the campsite store were of average quality. They had zippers on both sides; when fully zipped, the sides would curl up, sandwiching the person in the middle.

Xie Lan tossed and turned a few times inside the bag, then silently unzipped the right side.

“Goodnight,” he whispered.

Dou Sheng gave a low hum. “I’m already half asleep.”

All was silent, leaving only the sound of the wind outside.

The campsite was next to a village; with no tall buildings to shield it and no forest behind it, the wind grew increasingly clamorous, howling woo-woo outside.

Xie Lan closed his eyes for a while, but felt cold drafts drilling in through the side seam of the sleeping bag. The little bit of warmth he had just accumulated with his body heat quickly faded.

Beside him was the sound of Dou Sheng’s even breathing. He endured it for a while, getting colder and colder, so he silently reached out to grab the clothes thrown between them and pulled them into his sleeping bag.

Struggling to put the clothes on, Xie Lan breathed a sigh of relief and turned over.

A few seconds later, he opened his eyes again.

Damn it, wrong one.

He shrank into the sleeping bag, feeling a bit suffocated, and pulled the collar up to sniff.

It was the peppermint scent of Dou Sheng’s body wash. The scent was strong, lingering faintly on the T-shirt even after a day of hiking.

He lay in the sleeping bag, silently shutting himself off from the world for a moment, then reached out to find his own shirt. The instant his hand touched the familiar soft fabric, another hand suddenly rested on top of his.

Dou Sheng’s breathing remained even, indistinguishable from when Xie Lan thought he was asleep earlier.

But his palm was very hot. His hand covered Xie Lan’s hand, which was resting between them, and gently squeezed his knuckles.

Xie Lan paused, closed his eyes, flipped his hand upward, and interlaced his fingers with Dou Sheng’s.

Listening to the breathing of his friends around him, he squeezed Dou Sheng’s hand hard. Dou Sheng’s fingers threaded through his, then began to gently trace circles on the back of his hand.

After a while, Xie Lan opened his eyes, blushing, and struggled a bit.

Doing petty actions while friends are sleeping… childish, annoying.

In the darkness, light footsteps suddenly approached. Xie Lan looked in the direction of the sound, only to see a dark shadow that had unknowingly advanced to the space between him and Dou Sheng. Dou Sheng reacted just then, abruptly letting go of his hand. But before he could pull it away completely, a force strong enough to shock Xie Lan for a whole year slammed down onto his hand.

A silent scream erupted in Xie Lan’s chest.

Che Ziming cried out “Ouch!” and muttered in a low voice, “What the fuck did I step on?”

Xie Lan: “…”

Dou Sheng: “…”

Che Ziming turned back in confusion, fumbling for a long time before pulling his phone out of his pocket and flashing the light between the two sleeping bags.

There was nothing on the ground except a balled-up white T-shirt.

He breathed a sigh of relief, turned off the phone, felt for the door flap, lifted it, and went out.

Xie Lan rubbed his hand, which had been ruthlessly stomped on, inside his sleeping bag. Speechless.

Che Ziming didn’t look that heavy usually, but a solid step from him felt like it could shatter bones. Fortunately, Xie Lan’s hand had been on the bottom; Dou Sheng was the poor soul who took the direct damage.

Neither of them spoke again. Xie Lan took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and calmed his mind to sleep.

A few minutes later, Che Ziming came back from the toilet. Yawning, he walked to the space between them and squatted down.

“You guys are gonna freeze to death.”

He muttered as he felt around Xie Lan’s sleeping bag, found the zipper, and with a zzzt, zipped up the side opening Xie Lan had left open.

Then, squatting in place, he turned around, felt Dou Sheng’s sleeping bag, and skillfully zipped it up with another zzzt.

“That’s better. Papa loves you.”

Che Ziming yawned, still a bit groggy from the alcohol, and stumbled away.

The tent fell silent again. Xie Lan lay speechless, bundled up in his sleeping bag. After a while, he suddenly heard Dou Sheng’s low laughter.

He said coldly, “Stop laughing, it’s noisy.”

“Sorry.”

Dou Sheng apologized, but laughed even more happily. He struggled to turn over, muffling his laughter inside the sleeping bag.

---

When he woke up the next day, Xie Lan hurt all over, as if he had been beaten up. The tour bus was taking them from the campsite to the Three Gorges Dam scenic area, a drive of over an hour. Everyone shared breakfast on the bus, chatting noisily.

Che Ziming knelt on his seat, turning back to scold Xie Lan, “You look just like a spoiled young master. You didn’t even zip your sleeping bag last night; it’s easy to catch a cold, you know?”

Xie Lan looked at him gloomily. “I didn’t know.”

Satisfied, Che Ziming puffed out his chest and reached over to pat his shoulder. “Good thing I zipped it for you. No need to thank me. Oh, I zipped Bean’s too. You two have the same bad habits.”

Beside him, Dou Sheng lowered his head and rubbed the bridge of his nose. His hair hid his expression, making it look like he was waking up, but in reality, he was suppressing his laughter until his hands shook.

Liu Yixuan suddenly shouted, “Hey, that dance video passed the review yesterday afternoon! I forgot to check. I can’t believe an outdated trend like Koi Dance made it to the homepage!”

Yu Fei immediately got up and walked toward her. “Let me see.”

Everyone gathered around. Xie Lan hurt all over and really didn’t want to move. Dou Sheng sat in his original seat, smiling nonchalantly.

“Want to watch together?” Dou Sheng asked in a low voice, lacking sincerity.

Xie Lan paused. “Watch it on your own.”

After confessing their feelings (sort of), a subtle “desire to speak but stopping” atmosphere had grown between them, and the distance seemed even further than before.

Xie Lan instinctively glanced at the crowd. Fortunately, they were all huddled together looking at the phone; no one looked back this way.

Actually, it wouldn’t matter if they did. He and Dou Sheng were sitting properly in their seats, no different from usual.

It was just the person with a guilty conscience scaring himself.

Xie Lan let out a breath, put on his headphones, and refreshed the homepage. After a few tries, sure enough, he saw the video in the top left corner.

[Koi Dance with Classmates on My Birthday | 4 Boys 2 Girls | Campus Otaku Dance]

The warm, joyful melody played as the screen opened. The intro was a montage of everyone’s solo dance shots. Liu Yixuan started, and Xie Lan and Dou Sheng were the last two. The music synced with the hand-swiping-by-face movement; one on the left, one on the right, connecting smoothly.

After the intro, the vocals began, and the scene cut to the group dance in the aerial corridor. Xie Lan was on the far left of the front row, and Dou Sheng was behind him, watching him with a smile. Scenes of different member combinations were interspersed constantly. The bullet comments (danmu) were very friendly, praising almost everyone.

• Dream collaboration!
• Bean and Xie Lan?
• Can’t believe they are in the same class as Croissant-chan!
• Koi Dance, my youth is back.
• Lan-zai’s face says “No” all over it, dying of laughter.
• Bean really knows how to shake it.
• Lan-zai’s waist… slurrrp.
• Those legs are so long, I’m dead.
• Moved by the sight of Lan. The two sisters are also so cute!

On the day of filming, Liu Yixuan had used the phrase “a thousand faces,” and the video truly reflected that.

Without deliberate expression management, everyone retained their own characteristics. Liu Yixuan had a sweet smile, executing every move to standard. Dong Shuijing was gentle with a hint of reserve. Dai You’s movements weren’t very practiced, but his gentle and refined temperament masked the awkwardness. Yu Fei had his usual drooping face but looked very serious; someone trained in Sanda (fighting) handled a few dance moves easily, showing a beauty of strength and gentleness combined. Dou Sheng, meanwhile, was flirting with the camera the whole time, his “business smile” forming a sharp contrast with the expressionless tool-man Xie Lan in front of him.

They danced together in the school’s glass corridor, walked slowly down the outdoor stairs, and left footprints on the long, phoenix tree-lined avenue.

During the duet section, the few seconds featuring Xie Lan and Dou Sheng were exploded by comments.

• LMAO, Lan-zai looks like he wants to kill someone.
• Lan-zai, blink if you’ve been kidnapped.
• Every time Bean turns back with overflowing enthusiasm, he gets killed by that glare.
• Bean: Gradually doubting life.
• Bean: Smile gradually disappearing.
• Lan-zai: Damn it, so annoying.
• Lan-zai: Where am I, what am I doing, who is this hippie-smiling person!

Xie Lan watched the comments mocking his coldness, feeling an indescribable guilt.

Because of reasons a certain handsome guy found hard to admit, he had indeed worn a face like someone owed him money during the duet that day. Dou Sheng, with his long arms and legs flailing like noodles in the air, seemed to constantly want to poke him, only to be dissuaded by his cold face.

Xie Lan glanced at Dou Sheng. Dou Sheng’s screen had just reached this part too. He paused it, leaned over, and whispered, “The CP vibes are too strong.”

Xie Lan was startled. “What?”

“CP vibes mean looking like a couple,” Dou Sheng whispered in his ear. “I didn’t feel it much watching the raw footage, but the final cut makes it a bit obvious. Just with this, if I were a fan, I could brainstorm a 10,000-word fanfic.”

Xie Lan felt that heat rising in his heart again. He shifted uneasily to the side, leaning against the cold car window. “That’s because you have a guilty conscience.”

“If you don’t believe me, just wait.” Dou Sheng chuckled. “The video has been out for almost a day now. Given my fans’ powerful ability to stir things up…”

Xie Lan ignored him. Waiting until Dou Sheng shrank back to his own seat, he couldn’t help but pick up his phone again.

He tilted the phone towards himself, found the hand-drawn animation video from the “Thousand Layers of Tricks” series in his cache, clicked in, refreshed, and actually found Part 2.

[Love Circulation | dmem’s ‘Don’t Stare’]

Description: 0502 Late night adrenaline update. Supplementing the interaction between the two in the latest class dance. BGM “Renai Circulation”.

Sure enough.

Xie Lan had secretly followed this account for a long time. They were on the front lines of producing fan content for him and Dou Sheng, very dedicated.

He glanced at Dou Sheng, leaned back against the window expressionlessly, and clicked play.

The video simply and crudely looped the sixteen-second duet of him and Dou Sheng from the dance video. Through editing, the movements synced perfectly with the beat of the new music. The original vocal track was used, but the subtitles displayed rewritten lyrics.

「Se~no!

Don’t stare at me anymore

I’ve said don’t stare again

At the very least, don’t shout Lan-Lan, Lan-Lan at the same time」

「I’ve dodged expressionlessly at least ten thousand times

Every time you peek, I catch you

Peeking at my eyes? Peeking at my cheeks?

But, strange, something seems wrong」

「Saying that, even though we are both boys

If you stare for ten thousand years

Can you become your boyfriend?

Then let me try my best!

Look and look, look and look

Seeing his cold eye-roll

Just one eye-roll can grant me more power

Look and look, look and look

If occasionally he could return a smile

I would immediately be happy enough to fly to the sky~」

“What are you watching?” Dou Sheng suddenly leaned in.

Xie Lan lost his grip on the phone, tossed it up, caught it in a flurry, and locked the screen with a cold face.

The song was still repeating in his earphones. Amidst the sweet BGM, he said coldly, “Don’t disturb my studying.”

Dou Sheng paused. “Studying while out having fun? Online class?”

Xie Lan gave a hum, turned sideways to block the phone with his back, and lit up the screen again.

Facing the screen overflowing with hearts, he said calmly, “Appreciation of Su Dongpo’s poetry.”

“…” Dou Sheng wrinkled his face for a moment. “Appreciate it for me too?”

Xie Lan immediately pulled the phone back, snapping, “Go away, I’m going to fail Chinese.”

Dou Sheng was silent for a moment. “Have you ever passed?”

Xie Lan didn’t answer. He stared at the two dancing figures on the screen with a solemn expression of serious study. Only when Dou Sheng turned away with a baffled look did he curl his lips.

This video was really good to watch, even better than Liu Yixuan’s official cut.

It was a pity each account could only contribute one “Like-Coin-Favorite” combo.

---

According to the plan, Xie Lan was to film a performance segment at the hydropower station as well. It was early morning when they entered the scenic area. Taking advantage of the lack of people, Dou Sheng took out the drone to fly.

The drone followed behind Xie Lan, seemingly from Dou Sheng’s “boyfriend perspective.” This realization made Xie Lan feel a bit awkward standing in the sunlight. He was still wearing Dou Sheng’s T-shirt from yesterday by mistake, and subconsciously hugged his violin very tightly.

In the bright morning of the Three Gorges, the aerial view pulled back to reveal a vast, spectacular long shot, then returned to the end of the dam, giving a glittering close-up of the boy in white playing the violin under the sun.

…

After returning from Yichang, Xie Lan clearly felt that he was getting more and more popular on Bilibili. The dance video seemed to serve as a warm-up; catching the holiday traffic and hanging on the homepage, all three main creators gained a massive wave of followers.

Immediately following that, on the second to last day of the holiday, he and Dou Sheng edited the footage from this trip, rushing to submit it before the deadline for the #HeartPoundingMusic# event.

[OP Rearrangement – At the Peak of Red Flame | Yangtze Three Gorges Performance | Xie Lan Focus]

Dou Sheng’s editing skills and camera language were becoming increasingly masterful. With the addition of aerial shots, a simple outdoor performance was passionately crafted into an artistic blockbuster of humanities and geography.

The lens soared freely in the canyon; eagles struck the sky, streams gurgled, and mountain forests rustled in the wind. The music built up progressively; the scenery of the Yangtze gorges and the figure of the boy playing alone in the mountains were interwoven with the rhythm of the music.

The segments of the Three Gorges Dam and Baima Canyon were seamlessly spliced, incorporating documentary footage of flood discharge. The turbulent waves crashed against the shore, washing away the silence with a thunderous roar. Amidst the sound of the water, the whimper of the violin smoothed out. The boy played quietly in a corner of the screen; the audio track of the violin overlaid all other sounds, echoing in the collision of canyon and forest, and carried further away by the wind.

The ending faded out with the backs of the group leaving the valley. The people in front were talking and laughing, gradually becoming small black dots in the distance. Xie Lan was alone in the foreground, carrying his violin on his back. Walking to the exit of the valley, he looked back. The wind danced lightly with the boy’s black hair in the air. Those black eyes held a point of light and a faint smile, coming to an abrupt halt with the last note of the music.

…

This piece, At the Peak of Red Flame, was polished meticulously by Xie Lan. The melodic variations and the structure of the movements were full of ingenuity. Having been questioned about his technique before, he simply increased the difficulty by a billion points in the rhythm interludes and bowing. The piece lived up to expectations; not long after the video was released, it exploded. Covers and challenges flooded the music section, the momentum even stronger than HBlood on YouTube back in the day. The video was frantically reposted across various platforms for a while, and with the help of a certain Youth League committee, the view count rose at a speed far exceeding the follower count of the two of them. In Dou Sheng’s words, this was called “breaking the circle” (going mainstream).

The most obvious feeling “breaking the circle” brought to Xie Lan was that the speed of gaining followers was almost impossible to measure. Within a day, the follower count jumped by hundreds of thousands. Business inquiries flooded his DMs. The “night owls” of Class 4 were even happier than he and Dou Sheng, discussing thousands of messages in the class group with great fervor.

The day before school started, students returned to school for evening self-study as usual. Xie Lan had just packed his things at his desk when Liu Yixuan ran over laughing. “Congratulations, treasure of the station!”

Xie Lan looked up in surprise. “What?”

Liu Yixuan waved her phone. “You’ve been included in the ‘Must-Watch for New Users.’ Check your DMs; they say there should be a notification from operations.”

The video had only broken 10 million views that afternoon. By now, the operations notification was quietly lying in his inbox. Xie Lan followed the homepage trending topics to the [Must-Watch] section. It was a golden page, and his and Dou Sheng’s video was placed in the “New Treasures” column, right about in the middle.

The video cover was a close-up of him standing on the mountain peak, bowing with lowered eyes. The platform had stamped a line of golden achievement notes above the cover for him—”A masterpiece blending natural scenery and humanistic music, fitting for youthful passion, triggering a wave of covers across the whole site.”

Dou Sheng came in from outside carrying two cups of milk tea, placing one on Xie Lan’s desk.

“Impressive, Second Cat.” He tutted. “How many Top 100 uploaders can’t even get the glory of ‘Must-Watch.’ Keep this momentum, and you’ll definitely secure a spot in this year’s Top 100 in the music section.”

Xie Lan raised an eyebrow at this. “Depressed?”

Dou Sheng smiled. “Of course I’m not depressed. I edited this video, after all.”

As he spoke, he leaned in close to Xie Lan’s ear. His breath brushed against Xie Lan’s earlobe as he whispered, “But Boyfriend needs to reward me.”

People were coming and going in the classroom; class representatives were urging for homework, and Che Ziming and Wang Gou were performing their daily comedy routine nearby.

The evening breeze was clearly cool, and Xie Lan was sitting right by the window, yet he felt heat spreading down from the roots of his ears.

Actually, in the few days since they returned, he hadn’t had much close contact with Dou Sheng. They even spoke less than before.

A subtle string seemed to be pulled tight between them; every time they got close, there was immense tension.

Dou Sheng sat back up straight, resting his hand on the desk and spinning his pen round and round, looking at Xie Lan with a smile.

After a long time, Xie Lan said flatly, “What reward do you want?”

“You hit a million followers, Xie Lan Xiao-pengyou (Little Friend).” Dou Sheng extended the pen, gently poking Xie Lan’s wrist with one end. “Do you know what the custom is for Bilibili UPs with a million followers?”

“Hmm?”

Xie Lan, distracted by the pen, focused back on him. Looking at Dou Sheng, he suddenly had a familiar bad premonition.

Sure enough, Dou Sheng glanced at the back door, tapped his phone twice, pushed it over, and winked at him.

A Taobao order page.

It was the same shop that made the custom JK uniforms. Dou Sheng had ordered a male high school DK uniform: dark charcoal grey uniform trousers paired with a light grey shirt, and a creamy white tie in the same color scheme as the previous JK uniform.

Xie Lan’s pupils quaked. “What is the meaning of this?”

“I’m almost at two million followers.” Dou Sheng lay lazily on Xie Lan’s shoulder, whispering, “Gaining followers too fast is really annoying. It hasn’t been long since the cross-dressing video, and I’m being rushed again. Good thing I have company this time.”

Xie Lan felt a wave of suffocation. “…The person you’re talking about better not be me.”

“It is you, who else but you?” Dou Sheng mumbled, pressing onto his shoulder. “Isn’t it enough that I’m letting you wear the DK outfit? I’ll wear the JK one. I’ve already thought of the plot: Private time between School Beauty Bean and School Hunk Xie Lan. Our goal is to blow up Bilibili.”

Xie Lan: “…………”

Is it okay to hit people?

The Tragic Time of School Beauty Bean Being Beaten Up by School Hunk Xie Lan.

Let’s just perish, together.