With a sudden pop, the buzzing hair dryer finally went quiet.

Shi Linchuan casually ran his fingers through the dried, fluffy strands of hair beneath his palm, catching a faint, familiar scent of the same shampoo he used.

Sitting in the chair, Xie Jinghe squinted his eyes from the warm air. Perhaps his nose was itching, because he let out an unexpected sneeze, causing the tips of his hair to quiver. A stray strand of hair hooked onto the man’s hand, refusing to let go.

Just like its owner.

Xie Jinghe received a random glare for no apparent reason. Before he could even ask why, the man’s large palm cupped the back of his head and pressed it downward. The line of sight connecting them was instantly broken, leaving him only able to see his own bare feet gently stepping onto the tops of the man’s feet, overlapping with each other.

The next second.

A dull ache suddenly registered on the top of Shi Linchuan’s foot.

Calling it pain didn’t seem entirely accurate; it felt more like an itch. The sensation hovered somewhere in between, the boundaries blurred. To put it in plain, everyday terms, it was…

Ticklish and irritating.

Shi Linchuan looked down.

He saw Xie Jinghe with his toes splayed out, wielding them like a pair of aggressive “crab claws,” desperately pinching the thin skin on the top of his foot with a sort of powerless clumsiness. During the movement, the top of his foot was tensed tight, the bones and veins sharply defined.

Shi Linchuan clicked his tongue but said nothing.

After a good while.

He banished this guy—who was clearly full and had nothing better to do—back to the bed. Shuffling out in his slippers, he ignored the question of “Where are you going?” trailing behind him and pulled the door shut.

The bedroom door gave a sharp, agonizing creak, separating the inside from the outside.

The hallway was dimly lit, and the wind swept back and forth.

Shi Linchuan’s footsteps paused briefly. Instead of walking forward, he took a step back, leaning his spine against the old wooden door. Then, arching his long neck, the crown of his head braced against the door panel, he cast his gaze toward the cracked plaster of the ceiling, his eyes zoning out slightly.

“…”

About two minutes later.

His expression returned to its usual nonchalance. Stepping forward, he continued down the stairs. Just as he reached the first-floor lobby, he ran into two silhouettes standing outside the courtyard gate. The staff member leading the way immediately waved twice, greeting him.

“Teacher Shi, what a coincidence!”

Shi Linchuan didn’t remember the words that followed.

Separated by a low courtyard gate.

He and the man standing behind the staff member looked at each other from a distance.

Li Huan, Dr. Li.

Outside the gate, Li Huan pushed up his glasses. The transparent lenses reflected the light and shadow, feeding the distant scene back through a complex retinal neural network to form a clear image.

Inside the dusty, gray building.

The man stood tall. Having likely just showered, his hair was slightly messy, and his clothing was casual and warm. On his feet was a pair of cool, gray-blue slippers, making him look exceptionally domestic.

However, this was only “looking like it.”

The man had sharp, handsome features, yet his expression was as cold as frost, and his aura was piercingly sharp.

Strangely enough, it was clearly the guide who had greeted him, yet for some reason, the man’s gaze had locked onto him instantly.

Unerringly precise, like an arrow aiming for the bullseye.

Li Huan felt a subtle, almost imperceptible sense of exclusion and hostility. Well, based on his usual ability to perceive others’ emotions, the probability of this being an illusion was likely not very high.

Following the staff member through the door, Li Huan didn’t wait for the youth to introduce him. He proactively extended a hand and said warmly, “Hello, my name is Li Huan. I’m the accompanying doctor hired by the program crew.”

“…”

Shi Linchuan lowered his eyes, staring at the hand extended in front of him for quite a while before finally raising his palm to briefly shake it, breaking the contact almost instantly.

“Shi Linchuan,” he said.

Compared to the half-hidden, obscured glimpses on camera, the other protagonist of the novel was now right before his eyes. Separated by less than two meters, both of them could see each other much more clearly.

After a few breaths.

Shi Linchuan said, “Looking for Xie Jinghe? He’s upstairs.”

A flash of surprise and confusion crossed Li Huan’s face, but it was quickly masked by a polite, courteous smile. He responded smoothly, “No need, telling Mr. Shi is just the same.”

With that, he pulled a pack of portable iodophor cotton swabs out from the pocket of his sand-colored coat and handed them over. “I suspect Mr. Xie might have some bruising, so he probably needs this… oh, and this.”

From his other pocket, he produced a card. The double fountain pen sketch on it had a corner bent from his fall, and it had picked up some smudges, making it look a bit like a piece of scrap paper.

But the scrap paper had been picked up, and its bent corner had been smoothed out.

At the same time.

Shi Linchuan heard the person in front of him speak slowly, “I asked the chief director, and he said this is a clue card left by a guest for their partner. I assume it must be quite important to you both?”

“Returning it to its rightful owner.”

At the end, he even added a compliment,

“Mr. Shi’s drawing skills are truly excellent. Your portrayal of your partner is very accurate.”

Shi Linchuan reached out to take it. After a long pause, he said, “Thanks.”

Li Huan smiled, then asked, “Have we met before? I feel like Mr. Shi’s attitude toward me isn’t quite that of a stranger. It doesn’t feel like a first-time meeting.”

Shi Linchuan replied concisely and directly, “You’re overthinking it.”

Hearing this, Li Huan nodded, leaving it at that.

However, as he nodded, he suddenly noticed a few abnormal red marks blooming across the man’s bare foot. But given the season, mosquito or bug bites were practically out of the question…

Out of professional medical duty, Li Huan pressed further, “Mr. Shi, that looks a bit like the early symptoms of an allergic reaction. Do you feel discomfort anywhere?”

Shi Linchuan followed his gaze down, glancing at it before casually replying, “It’s fine. Just got pinched a few times by a crab. I’m used to it.”

The smile on Li Huan’s face froze for a second.

“?”

The night wind blew past.

Hiss, it was a bit chilly.

The two stood face-to-face in silence. Just as in the beginning, it was Li Huan who broke the silence first. “Well, those are the things I needed to hand over, and it happened to be on my way… If there’s nothing else, I’ll take my leave.”

Before the man could turn around, Shi Linchuan suddenly spoke.

“Wait a moment.”

Back upstairs.

Shi Linchuan opened the door with one hand, his other hand stuffed full of items—the lost clue card, the iodophor cotton swabs, and a bottle of medicine to prevent colds and fevers. Bending down, he placed the items onto the nightstand, only to catch a pair of eyes staring at him from beneath the blanket.

“Come out.”

Shi Linchuan stood up straight, calling out to the bulging blanket.

Xie Jinghe threw back the blanket. Just as he sat up from the bed, he saw the man gesture with his chin toward the items on the nightstand, saying in a flat voice, “Your doctor brought these over. Take the cold medicine first, then apply the ointment.”

Xie Jinghe: “?”

He found it a bit strange. “What do you mean ‘my doctor’? They’re the program crew’s doctor, I barely know them.”

As he spoke, he thrust his gauze-wrapped right hand right in front of Shi Linchuan, pursing his lips in silence while his feet habitually stepped onto the tops of the man’s feet.

Shi Linchuan turned his face away, picked up the bottle of liquid medicine, and twisted it.

Holding the unscrewed cap in one hand, he offered the cold medicine to Xie Jinghe with the other, originally intending for Xie Jinghe to take it and drink it himself. To his surprise, the man directly leaned his mouth forward, pressing it against the rim of the bottle, and simply waited to be fed.

Shi Linchuan: “Drink it yourself.”

Xie Jinghe nudged his injured hand slightly.

Shi Linchuan said testily, “Isn’t your other hand perfectly fine?”

Xie Jinghe went silent again.

Shi Linchuan: “So annoying.”

Once Xie Jinghe finished the medicine, Shi Linchuan covered up the fixed camera in the room. He signaled for him to take off his clothes, quickly applied the medicine for him, and then tossed the blanket back over him, burying him completely as if pulling a prank.

Xie Jinghe rustled around under the blanket to get dressed before sitting back up. He caught sight of the card lying on the nightstand and finally realized he had lost the clue.

After completing the task, he had been entirely preoccupied with waiting for him and hadn’t thought about the card at all.

Xie Jinghe picked up the card, stared at it for a couple of seconds, and then lifted his eyes toward the familiar back of the man who was cleaning up the trash. He suddenly said, “Linchuan, I didn’t even know you could draw.”

Without turning around, Shi Linchuan replied, “There are plenty of things you don’t know.”

Behind him, Xie Jinghe’s voice rang out again. “You drew me so accurately. Have you memorized exactly what I look like in your head?”

Shi Linchuan: “Don’t spread rumors.”

Xie Jinghe pondered for a moment, continuing his critique, “But you seem to have a bit of a misunderstanding about yourself. Your drawing of yourself doesn’t really look like you. I almost couldn’t recognize it…”

Shi Linchuan didn’t want to dwell on the topic, but as he turned back around and leaned his lower back against the chair, he couldn’t help but ask one more question, “Where does it not look like me?”

Xie Jinghe didn’t say a word. He placed the card on the nightstand, then raised his uninjured hand, placing his thumb and index finger on either side of his mouth to yank it downward into a scowl. Maintaining this grumpy face, he answered, “You look like this.”

Shi Linchuan: “…”

The imitation was actually somewhat accurate.

So, it turned out he wasn’t blind after all.

The air fell quiet for a few seconds.

Xie Jinghe slowly lowered his hands, but the corners of his mouth didn’t curl back up. Shi Linchuan noticed moisture gradually pooling in his eyes, yet he still put on a casual front, asking, “Does being with me really make you that unhappy?”

“That’s why you refused to come all day today.”

Shi Linchuan looked at him, suddenly remembering the final scene he had witnessed in the observation room.

The setting sun was dying.

The sky behind Xie Jinghe was burning itself out.

He had turned around repeatedly, met with repeated disappointment, yet he still stood there, his exhaled breath turning into white mist.

He, too, was entirely white.

All of a sudden, Shi Linchuan recalled a book he had read in his youth—Ryūnosuke Akutagawa’s Rashomon. There was a line in it that he particularly detested: Lying is human nature; most of the time, we cannot even be honest with ourselves.

Because it was so accurate, it was deeply irritating.

But today was a special day.

Shi Linchuan decided, for once, to be honest with himself. So, he slowly walked toward Xie Jinghe, who was sitting on the edge of the bed. He lifted him up across his lap, holding him like one would a young child, and whispered softly into his ear:

“Because,”

“I am just too happy.”