The next morning, Zhu Yun woke with a hangover — her head pounding, her eyes bleary, her memory in fragments. Li Xun was already gone. The bed beside hers was neatly made, the pillow placed on top. She was mildly surprised, because as far as she could remember, Li Xun had never been the type to make his bed.

Good habits picked up from prison?

Li Xun was nowhere to be found. Zhu Yun called Zhao Teng, who answered in a daze and hung up after only a few words. He let slip that last night’s mahjong session had gone until dawn — the whole group had only gone to sleep at five in the morning, and they wouldn’t all be properly coherent until at least noon.

After washing up, Zhu Yun went to the restaurant for breakfast. On the way, she texted Li Xun.

“Where are you?”

A few minutes later, Li Xun replied.

“Went out to buy cigarettes.”

Zhu Yun: “Have you eaten?”

Li Xun: “No.”

Zhu Yun walked into the buffet area. She figured Li Xun probably had no interest in coming here to eat, so she asked a staff member, “Is it alright if I take a few rolls of bread with me?”

The staff member smiled warmly. “Of course.”

Zhu Yun decided not to eat here herself either. She grabbed a few rolls, some sausages, and a small container of jam, wrapped it all up, and headed out.

She asked Li Xun for his location. He was in the outdoor hot spring area from the night before. When Zhu Yun arrived, she found him sitting on a rock, cigarette in hand, gazing at the distant mountain ridges.

Zhu Yun dangled the bag of bread in front of his eyes.

“Sausage or jam — which do you want?”

Li Xun stared at the bag hanging in front of him and said after a long moment, “I want pickled vegetables.”

She smacked the bag into his face. Li Xun gave a lazy, lopsided smile and took the sausage roll.

Zhu Yun sat beside him and started eating.

There was a hot spring pool right in front of them, so the air was not unbearably cold. The morning air was crisp and fresh. Zhu Yun gazed at the mist-shrouded mountains in the distance, and a few lines from Su Shi’s poem “Xing Xiang Zi” drifted to mind —

But the distant mountains are long, the clouded mountains scattered, the morning mountains blue-green.

“The place Dong Siyang picked has a certain charm to it,” Zhu Yun said, chewing her bread.

Li Xun made a sound of agreement.

Zhu Yun said, “Tomorrow is New Year’s Eve.”

He made another sound of agreement.

Zhu Yun: “Happy New Year.”

Li Xun: “You too.”

Zhu Yun thought for a moment, then added, “Give it your all next year.”

He seemed to smile.

“You too.”

At two in the afternoon, Dong Siyang was the last to wake up. Zhao Teng came around with notice for everyone to pack up and head back. On the way home, the group chatted and laughed. Zhao Teng sidled up to Li Xun and asked in a low voice how things had gone — and got a firm shove for his trouble.

By the time they got back to the company, evening was drawing in. Zhu Yun was in a hurry to catch her ride and left straight away. As she was heading out, Zhang Fang came running after her and grabbed her hand, gripping it firmly and saying something oddly out of the blue.

“You have to come back to work next year.”

Zhu Yun found this rather puzzling. “Where else would I go if not to work?”

She later learned from Zhao Teng that Zhang Fang had been worried the whole time that Zhu Yun might quit and leave Feiyáng. Apparently he had been going on about it the entire time they were playing mahjong during the company trip. Zhu Yun said with a laugh, “Aren’t you worried about Li Xun leaving? He’s far more capable than I am.”

Zhao Teng shook his head. “Li Xun is brilliant, but he keeps to himself — there’s a distance to him. People like you better. They’re more worried about you leaving.”

Zhu Yun heard this and felt a complicated mixture of emotions — she didn’t know whether to be pleased or troubled.

This year, the New Year celebrations at Zhu Yun’s family home were unusually lively. Her mother was in inexplicably high spirits and had taken it upon herself to organize the entire extended family gathering.

At the get-together, several aunts and uncles probed obliquely into Zhu Yun’s personal life. Her mother said in a tone of mild complaint, “Don’t ask her — what does she know? She just drags her feet.”

One uncle said, “She really ought to be thinking about these things now.”

Her mother: “Exactly. How old is she already?”

Then someone asked where Zhu Yun was working these days. Her mother said, “She’s out on her own. These things need to be handled one at a time — they’re all major matters, and they require careful thought.”

Zhu Yun sat at the table eating, saying nothing.

Her mother’s habit was to not air such things publicly. Once all the gatherings were over, she tracked Zhu Yun down and asked her, “Why didn’t you invite that painter Tian over?”

Zhu Yun thought to herself — did you organize all these gatherings just so Tian Xiuzhu would show up at the door?

Her mother asked, “So where do things stand between you two?”

Zhu Yun hedged, “Nothing’s really… happening.”

“Nothing’s happening — what does that mean?”

Zhu Yun suddenly seemed to develop an intense fascination with the cup in her hands, staring at it with total concentration.

Her mother said gravely, “You’re going to be twenty-eight next year. You’re not young anymore. Are you planning to drag this all the way to thirty?”

Zhu Yun looked up, feigning shock. “Good heavens, I’m twenty-eight already?”

Her mother slapped the table. Zhu Yun’s head dropped again.

Throughout the entire conversation, Zhu Yun talked around everything — never agreeing, never pushing back, every answer deliberately noncommittal.

There was nothing else she could do at this stage. She had to keep up this kind of evasive dance with her mother. As long as her mother’s attention remained fixed on her marriage, she wouldn’t focus too much on her work. Because in her mother’s eyes, marriage would always rank above a career.

Her mother still had no idea that she was working at Feiyáng, and even less idea that Li Xun was there too. It was a hidden time bomb, and Zhu Yun knew it was bound to go off sooner or later — but she could delay it as long as possible. She needed to maintain the current status quo, at the very least long enough to get through the early stages.

A person only has so much energy. Just managing the company’s project was already draining her completely. She simply could not take on a confrontation with her parents at the same time.

Zhu Yun carried herself through the New Year with an attitude of willful optimism, determined to enjoy a few days of genuine rest before throwing herself back into the fray. Then, on the fourth day of the New Year, news arrived from the company — the backend of Invincible General had been hacked.

The news came from Zhang Fang, who called her in tears. “Why does this project have to be cursed with so many disasters?!”

Zhu Yun said firmly, “Don’t panic. Tell me exactly what happened.”

Zhang Fang didn’t understand the technical details, so Zhu Yun couldn’t get a clear picture from him. She tried Li Xun next. Li Xun didn’t say much either — just told her to enjoy the rest of her New Year and hung up, and no matter how many times she called back after that, he didn’t pick up.

Dong Siyang’s phone was, as always, perpetually unreachable. Left with no options, Zhu Yun called Fu Yizhuo directly — only to learn, to her surprise, that Fu Yizhuo had been dragged off to America by his father for the holiday.

“You’re not in the country?” Zhu Yun asked.

“No, I’m not.”

Zhu Yun momentarily forgot the entire matter of the hack. “Then who is Li Xun spending the New Year with?”

Fu Yizhuo sounded puzzled. “Ren Di, of course. Why? I asked him to come to America with me before the holiday, but he turned me down. I asked where he was going and he said he was going to Ren Di’s place.”

Zhu Yun: “Ren Di has six performances over the New Year — all across the country. Where would Li Xun go?”

Fu Yizhuo fell silent.

“My dear sister-in-law…”

“Enough,” Zhu Yun said, knowing exactly where Fu Yizhuo was going with that. “I can probably guess where he is. Go enjoy your holiday.”

Zhu Yun hung up and immediately started packing her bags. Her mother watched and asked, “What are you doing?”

Zhu Yun: “I’m going back a few days early.”

“Early? Why?”

Zhu Yun gave a vague answer. “Something’s come up.”

She didn’t explain further. Her mother sat holding her teacup, turning it over in her mind, and concluded that Zhu Yun was heading back early to spend a few days with Tian Xiuzhu over the holiday. She tacitly approved.

“Hold on — I bought some things for that painter. Take them with you.”

Her mother produced gifts she had prepared in advance. Zhu Yun was taken aback. “When did you buy these?”

Her mother scolded her, “You have no manners at all! If I waited for you to prepare anything, it would be too late.”

Zhu Yun took the assortment of bags and packages and quietly made her way out.

Zhu Yun was in a rush to get back, but of course every train ticket for the day was already sold out. She simply drove herself on the highway. With the poor winter road conditions, it took her over five hours to arrive — by which point it was already past midnight.

The startup park was empty and deserted over the holiday. Zhu Yun got out of the car, her shoulders stiff from the drive. She looked up. Of the entire building, only one company on the twelfth floor had its lights on.

Zhu Yun stood there for a moment, breathing out puffs of white vapor into the cold air.

She stared at that lit window and took out her phone to call Li Xun.

No answer, as expected.

Zhu Yun clicked her tongue.

She found a place to park and picked up her bags to head upstairs — at which point she discovered a serious problem. The startup park’s main gate was locked. Because IT companies were known for their long hours, the park normally stayed open around the clock on weekdays. But this was a holiday, and the gate had been locked at half past nine.

Zhu Yun circled the perimeter several times, found no opening to squeeze through, and ended up back at the main entrance. The gate was not a modern electric sliding gate — it was the old-fashioned kind, a large iron gate, roughly three meters tall.

After five hours of driving, Zhu Yun had developed a delusion that she was some kind of indestructible iron woman. She stood at the gate for a moment, flung her bags of luggage over the top, cracked her knuckles, and started to climb.

With enormous effort, Zhu Yun made it to the top of the iron gate — and then she discovered that the gap between fantasy and reality was vast. Climbing up was one thing; looking down to climb down was another matter entirely. The height became terrifying.

And on the inside there was nothing to grab onto, except for what appeared to be some kind of handle in the middle. Zhu Yun inched along the top of the gate like a caterpillar, and when she finally got there, she found the handle was too far away to reach. She tried several times and couldn’t touch it at all.

She rallied herself internally.

If only I could borrow Li Xun’s legs…

Then immediately reconsidered.

No. Too much leg hair.

Amid these peculiar mental deliberations, Zhu Yun unhappily realized she was now thoroughly stuck — no way forward, no way back.

She had no choice. She clamped the gate between her knees and pulled out her phone again to call Li Xun.

Still no answer.

She sent a text.

No reply.

Sent an email.

Still nothing.

Zhu Yun was out of options and past the point of caring about dignity. She tilted her head back and bellowed upward, “LI XUN—!”

Her voice echoed.

“Li Xun! Are you in there?! Li Xun—!”

She called for half a minute. No response. Zhu Yun gave up entirely and prepared to call the police.

She had dialed “1” and “1” — one digit short of completing the emergency call — when the building finally stirred. A faint light appeared in the stairwell, and then a figure emerged from the building.

Like rain after a long drought. Zhu Yun was overjoyed at the sight of a familiar face.

“Li Xun!”

Li Xun came out of the building in thin clothing, both hands in his pockets, and walked up to the iron gate. He looked up at her.

The two of them regarded each other for a moment. Li Xun spoke with perfect calm.

“Performance art?”

He still had the presence of mind for dry humor. “No! Help me! Get me down!” Zhu Yun was well aware that her current position was anything but elegant, but she was past caring — she had been hanging there for nearly half an hour. “Please help me! I’m freezing to death!”

Li Xun pulled his hands from his pockets and raised them high above his head.

“Jump.”

“What?”

“Jump down.”

Zhu Yun looked at the drop. “Will that work?”

“It’ll work.”

Zhu Yun: “If you miss, someone could die.”

Li Xun said dryly, “Then they’d be crushed to death, not fallen to death.”

Zhu Yun’s body might have been stiff, but her mind was clear. She shot back indignantly, “I’m not that heavy!”

Li Xun: “Jump or don’t — if you’re not jumping, I’m leaving.”

Zhu Yun: “Jumping, jumping, I’m jumping!”

Li Xun curled his fingers in a beckoning gesture. Zhu Yun gritted her teeth, squeezed her eyes shut, and leapt — and he caught her squarely. She rolled her stiff arms a few times and said politely, “Thank you.”

Li Xun lowered his arms and looked down at her.

Zhu Yun met his gaze. “What?”

Li Xun said evenly, “You’ve got yourself stuck hanging off a gate in the middle of the night — and you’re asking me what?“

“…” Zhu Yun pressed her lips together. “I came to check on things.”

Li Xun said nothing. Zhu Yun had two questions weighing on her. After a moment’s hesitation, she went with the safer one.

“Has the project situation been resolved?”

Li Xun looked at her quietly for a moment, then bent down to pick up the bags she’d thrown over, turned, and walked back toward the building.

“Come up. We’ll talk inside.”