In the first summer of Chun Zao’s doctoral studies, the AGI team led by Yuan Ye and his partner, Tu Wenwei, made a stunning debut at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference, demonstrating their first product and future vision.

Starting from their junior year, these two exceptionally talented boys with soaring ambitions, relying on their original high-accuracy image recognition algorithm, caught the attention of numerous domestic and international internet giants, securing their first round of tens of millions in funding.

Needing massive amounts of algorithms, computing power, data, and knowledge support, during their two years at Stanford, they rapidly recruited a team of over thirty cutting-edge engineers, including brilliant and passionate rising stars as well as experienced veteran backbone members, dedicated to the research and development of pre-trained models, and thereby creating chatbot programs suitable for Chinese users. Backed by prestigious universities and internet giants, plus years of intensive research with remarkable results, “Flying Bird Technology” quickly stood out among various AGI-focused companies and teams.

And the person behind the company name—Chun Zao—was in a completely different field and found most of these things impressive but incomprehensible. She only knew that Yuan Ye, whom she could barely see three times a week after returning to China, seemed to be doing something extraordinary.

The week WeTalk officially launched, it exploded across the internet with daily active users growing wildly. Chun Zao heard this familiar term from classmates: “Have you downloaded that amazing WeTalk? Can this thing help me grind out journal papers?”

His finger kept swiping on the screen: “Holy shit, it works. The content looks decent, even better than that foreign one.”

“Really?” Others crowded over.

The supervisor snorted dismissively: “All academic garbage, only good for reference and cutting corners. I think in the future no one will need to think anymore, just let machines replace everyone.”

A classmate searched the encyclopedia: “The founder graduated from our school.”

The supervisor immediately double-standardized: “Is that so? Then I’ll download one to check it out too.”

Chun Zao eavesdropped while smiling as she downloaded one onto her phone. The software’s Chinese name was “Zhi Yan” (Only Words), inspired by her creativity. She thought, since you only needed to speak a sentence to this system to get the desired results and knowledge, why not take the character “shi” from “zhishi” (knowledge) and reverse it, which also confirmed their product’s original intention: “Give only words, return with complete knowledge.”

AI was like humanity’s nurturing of itself.

Flowers, birds, fish, insects, music, chess, calligraphy, painting—everything mixed into a nest like a hodgepodge, then each taking what they needed to nourish their spirit or life.

This was already half a year ago.

She only remembered that night, after the flash of inspiration, Yuan Ye held her face and excitedly kissed her many times, then took her and drove back to the company to share with other team members in person.

Two years of long-distance relationship abroad, and this year of frequent separations, felt like a dream.

Not until this moment, staring at the blue and white refreshing interface, did Chun Zao feel somewhat grounded, with a sense of reality.

She took a light breath and posed a question to this incorporeal “high EQ and IQ child.”

—

When Yuan Ye received Chun Zao’s message, he had just come out of the break room with a cup of coffee. Staff in the hallway greeted him, and he nodded to each one, his gaze occasionally glancing at his phone, lips slightly curved.

The employees didn’t quite understand why their boss, despite holding a high position, still acted like a student, handling trivial matters personally.

Tu Wenwei, the company’s legal representative, was equally puzzled.

He had suggested several times hiring one or two secretaries or assistants for Yuan Ye, but got no response.

The reason was quite unconvincing: invasion of personal space.

Who would believe that?

Besides, his sister-in-law wasn’t the type with a strict upbringing and got jealous easily.

In any case, Yuan Ye, this “social butterfly” who had amazed throughout high school, completely changed after graduation. He was obsessed with secluded cultivation, had no interest in socializing, and treated fine wine and luxurious clothes as nothing. When Tu Wenwei drove his Maybach around town showing off, Yuan Ye merely drove a white X7 throughout the city.

In the early days of entrepreneurship, Tu Wenwei had wanted him to make more use of his good looks, but public appearances were rare. Unless it was a major occasion, 95% of business gatherings were met with refusal. During wine-filled negotiations, when industry bigwigs asked where President Yuan was, Tu Wenwei could only make excuses with an apologetic smile, drinking several cups as penalty in his place.

At this moment, the “missing President Yuan” sat behind his office desk, repeatedly viewing two screenshots sent by his girlfriend, then leaned back in his chair and laughed silently.

Little Bird says Good Morning.

Question: What should I do when my husband never comes home?

Reply: I’m sorry to hear you’re having this trouble. For this situation, timely communication is key to solving your problem. I have the following suggestions:

Face-to-face communication; you can find an evening or afternoon when both of you are home recently…

Seek marriage counseling or relationship consultation; if communication can’t solve the problem, professional marriage counselors or relationship therapists are another option…

Find other problems in the marriage; there may be other issues between you, such as trust crises, communication gaps, goal differences, marital discord, etc…

Self-regard and self-care. Even when your husband isn’t around, I hope you can put yourself first, focus on your mental health and emotional well-being, seek help and support from other family members or friends…

Yuan Ye took off his glasses, drained his coffee in one gulp, took something from the drawer, packed his black laptop into his bag, and prepared to head home.

Leaving, he bumped into Tu Wenwei, who had just returned to the company. Seeing his off-work posture, Tu Wenwei asked: “Where are you going?”

Yuan Ye: “Home.”

Tu Wenwei looked at the bright glass wall: “Now?” Then checked his watch: “1 PM?”

Yuan Ye: “Mm.”

“Not attending the afternoon meeting?”

“You organize it.”

“Didn’t you say we needed to discuss…”

“I already said you handle it.”

Impatiently dropping this line, the man turned and left.

Tu Wenwei shouted: “Damn you, I think you refuse to hire a secretary just to torture me to death as your little secretary.”

Driving out of the building reflecting gray-cold light, Yuan Ye sped home. Finding no one there, he showered, changed clothes, raised the living room’s hidden projection screen, opened the debug mode, then finally closed the screen, waiting in the living room from the bright afternoon until the sky was burned through by sunset, slowly sinking into a deep blue sea.

When Chun Zao arrived home, she was startled by Yuan Ye sitting alone in the living room.

She clicked on the ceiling light with a “pop,” puzzled: “What are you doing, not turning on lights?”

Then accused: “And not replying to my messages.”

Yuan Ye stood up, walked over, reached past her to turn off that switch, returning the room to dimness.

Chun Zao found it strange, looking up to examine him more closely. The boy wore a white shirt and black pants, with collar and cuffs meticulously arranged. His already sharp facial contours had shed their former innocence, gaining some mature refinement. But when her eyes met his clear, almost unchanged brows and eyes, it always gave her the illusion of still being young.

The soap fragrance on him was the same, too.

Always so light, so pure, unadorned, not touched by worldly concerns.

Their eyes met, Yuan Ye asked: “What are you looking at?”

Chun Zao deliberately said the opposite: “I hardly recognize you.”

Yuan Ye was stunned: “I’ve only been away for two days, haven’t I?”

Chun Zao remained silent, suddenly raising the taro purple paper bag in her hand: “For you. Congratulations on ‘Zhi Yan’ successfully launching, congratulations on ‘Flying Bird Technology’s’ flourishing success.”

Little one…

Yuan Ye smiled.

Only she would endow cold bytes with childlike innocence and life, like a fairy godmother wielding a magic wand, romantic and egalitarian.

Yuan Ye took it: “What is it?”

Chun Zao poked the outer packaging: “Just a small cake.”

Yuan Ye pulled her toward the sofa: “How did you know I’d come home?”

Chun Zao said seriously, “Your program suggested ‘face-to-face communication’ to resolve ‘marital crisis.’ I figured its creator wouldn’t be so lacking in insight.”

Yuan Ye said, “True.”

Then tilted his head, slightly disagreeing: “Marriage? When did we get married?”

Chun Zao raised a few fingers that weren’t being held, counting: “Not counting the two years you were abroad, living together on and off adds up to three years, more or less the same.”

“Three-year itch, seven-year crisis,” she snorted, continuing her puzzlement, looking around the pitch-black living room: “I still want to ask, why aren’t you turning on lights?”

Yuan Ye pressed her shoulders, making her sit down, then picked up the projector remote from the coffee table: “Want to watch a movie?”

Chun Zao was dazed: “Now?”

Yuan Ye nodded: “Mm.”

Chun Zao liked this randomness in ordinary days: “Sure.”

However, no movie played on the screen. There was no classic broadcasting dragon logo, no parade of various production companies, only automatically appearing slides, clumsy yet simple.

Page by page.

Picture by picture.

Unhurried and steady.

They weren’t group photos, nor accompanied by beautiful melodies. The sound effects were just subtle page-turning sounds, tick-tick, rustle-rustle, very pleasant to hear.

Yuan Ye showed her some landscape images of varying clarity and different paper materials—deep valleys, rushing waterfalls, green forests, and golden mountain peaks… Beside each were remarkably similar real landscape photos, along with their locations and text descriptions.

Chun Zao frowned slightly, initially confused, but soon she bloomed with understanding.

All the pictures were familiar, from her former tin box island—that summer before senior year, it had accidentally ended up in Yuan Ye’s hands due to an incident, then returned to its rightful owner the following summer.

But she never expected that Yuan Ye had secretly photographed and preserved every single landscape photo she had once cut and collected during that limited custody period.

And found locations and scenery around the world that closely matched them.

As her smile deepened, tears also rapidly rose in her eyes.

Chun Zao’s vision blurred, tears glittering, pointing incredulously at a hand-drawn image of a country cottage surrounded by hydrangeas on the screen: “This is a watercolor painting, right? You could even find something similar to this?”

Yuan Ye’s tone was flat: “Mm, not difficult.”

—If this planet didn’t have it, then he would create it. Two years ago in America, he purchased a permanent cottage on an idle farm and personally planted a courtyard full of pink-purple endless summer hydrangeas, hiring gardeners for regular care. Just so that one day he could bring her here during the flowering season, letting every one of her dreams have a destination, grow, and eventually bloom magnificently.

After the last image finished playing, Chun Zao had already used several wet tissues.

After the crackling snow dots, black text on white background appeared, completely without flashy effects, only the most simple, sincere, and direct content, even the font was centered and bold Microsoft YaHei.

One image contained one sentence, also forming a love poem, a vow:

“This is a proposal that 18-year-old Yuan Ye started preparing.”

“In eight years,”

“he never considered any other future besides this.”

“If possible,”

“Student Chun Zao,”

“Please give him this one and only, lifelong opportunity and time.”

“to let him accompany you to see all the scenery you wanted to see before age eighteen.”

“Okay?”

The moment those last two words froze on screen, Yuan Ye knelt on one knee, “producing” a navy blue ring box he’d prepared somehow, opening it to both sides.

Chun Zao’s tears flowed like springs—how could she see the style of the diamond ring in his hands?

She only knew it was substantial and brilliant enough, but far less than the eyes of the young man before her—perhaps he shouldn’t be called a “young man” anymore, but those sparkling times she’d experienced, that fearless heart forged drop by drop despite all setbacks, was more dazzling, more brilliant, and more moving than any crystal diamond.

Chun Zao kept brushing away the continuous warm trickles on her face, her throat choked, unable to speak.

Yuan Ye gazed up at her from below, his eyes slightly red: “You just said three-year itch, seven-year crisis, but we’ve been together over eight years, and I still love you very much. Going forward, the only change will be that I love you more, day by day, year by year, more than before. I finished this PPT when I was 22, wanted to propose the day I reached legal marriage age, didn’t want to wait even a second longer. But there was no choice—that ‘eight years’ number kept changing, from four years to eight years, increasing every year. In the early entrepreneurial years, the risk was too great. If anything went wrong, I couldn’t let you bear it with me. This year, today, the team’s research results have withstood scrutiny and testing, and I finally dare to speak to you.”

Finally, no longer needing to suppress and hide, he was joyful, liberated, and as always loved teasing her: “Rather than calling me husband for nothing these past few years, why not make this title official starting today?”

Chun Zao broke into laughter through tears, lightly kicking his knee: “Acting like you haven’t been calling me wife for nothing these past few years.”

“Then we’re even.”

Yuan Ye smiled and sniffed, grasping her right hand, slipping the ring onto her ring finger. The size was perfect, like a star forged to measure, crossing time seas and cosmic dust, picked with sincerity, measured in lifetimes, witnessed by the entire universe.

His gaze moved from the diamond ring back to her face, solemnly: “May the knight rise to embrace the princess now?”

Chun Zao immediately opened her arms.

Yuan Ye unhesitatingly lifted her by the waist, and the projector’s blue light beam penetrated past them. On the screen, overlapping male and female silhouettes spun several circles, skirts flying, joyful and exuberant—the final illustration from a fairy tale book given dynamic magic. Between heaven and earth, a couple danced, each step touching ground, rippling with laughter and musical notes. Happiness was slightly intoxicating, dizzying—they would ultimately glide toward a perfect ending.

Being too happy, too absorbed, Yuan Ye accidentally bumped the coffee table corner. In pain, both of them fell back onto the sofa, looked at each other, and laughed, then kissed tenderly for a while. Chun Zao suddenly remembered something, pinching Yuan Ye’s nose: “I haven’t answered yet.”

“Answered what?” Yuan Ye caught the hand wearing the diamond ring, brought it to her eyes, deliberately making a stern face: “What, going to back out on the spot?”

“No.” Chun Zao pushed him away with both hands, sat up, tidied her hair, pulled over the paper bag from the coffee table, and carefully lifted out the four-inch cake inside.

In the completely transparent gift box was a light pink heart-shaped cream cake with blue edges, simple, cute, and very warm.

Chun Zao said, “I made this myself at the baking studio this afternoon. I’d never done it before, so it’s a bit ugly, but the taste is good. And what a coincidence—I wrote the answer on top in advance.”

Yuan Ye looked over with her.

On the cake’s surface were two lines of crooked, berry-red cream English words:

—together

—forever