Lin Wanxing never imagined that she would come to understand Professor He’s past so deeply.

Of course, Professor He couldn’t possibly discuss her love life with middle school students on the lecture stage.

The entire lecture ended at a very appropriate time.

The students left in an orderly fashion, led by their teachers.

They arrived in Sanmin County in the afternoon, and after finishing the lecture, they were arranged to discuss with the school leaders. By the time they were truly “liberated,” it was already evening.

Professor He made an excuse about having dinner with relatives and friends, declining the county leaders’ hospitality, and secretly taking her out to eat something delicious.

The soft sunset spread across the entire county town as Lin Wanxing walked beside Professor He along the stone path by the Cang River.

Smoke rose from houses by the river, still carrying the original scent of firewood.

“How was my performance today?” Professor He asked her.

“More interesting than I imagined,” Lin Wanxing answered honestly.

Professor He chuckled: “Do you also think I used to be rigid?”

When Lin Wanxing heard this question, she felt that Professor He might have heard some comments, so she said: “I don’t. If other students said that about you behind your back, my advice is: fail them.”

Professor He laughed with delight. She continued forward, arriving in front of a row of old residential buildings by the river.

Between the buildings was a small alley that could only accommodate two or three people walking side by side. At the entrance hung a small neon sign that read “Flying in the Sky.”

Once they entered the alley, Lin Wanxing finally understood why the shop was called by this name.

At the end of the alley was a narrow iron staircase attached directly to the exterior wall of the residential building, leading to a household on the fourth floor. Due to the limited space in the alley, the iron staircase went steeply up and down, looking quite intimidating.

Lin Wanxing took out her phone, looked up, and took a photo, which she couldn’t help but send to Wang Fa via WeChat.

Professor He, familiar with the place, took the lead, holding the railing.

The stairs creaked under their feet. Only after climbing up did Lin Wanxing discover that the treads were perforated. Halfway up, standing in mid-air, she wanted to take out her phone again to take another photo to send to Wang Fa, but after her limbs were uncoordinated for a moment, she ultimately gave up.

“It wasn’t students who said it, but my colleague, saying that I’ve changed recently compared to before, feeling that my attitude has become much younger. So I wondered if I was too unapproachable before.”

At the top of the stairs, the shop door, which was originally an exterior window, was where Professor He bent over to enter the shop, turning back to say this.

Lin Wanxing’s phone happened to vibrate. She climbed into the shop almost using both hands and feet, then accidentally spoke her thoughts aloud: “Is your colleague trying to get you to switch shifts?”

Professor He paused and couldn’t help but laugh.

“Flying in the Sky” was a typical hole-in-the-wall restaurant. The dining area was small, the food prices were low, and it was packed with customers during meal times.

Professor, He seemed to be an old acquaintance of the owner. Even though there were still customers waiting for seats, the owner’s wife called out, and the owner immediately rushed out of the kitchen with an iron spatula to greet them, leading them to a two-person table by the window.

Only after sitting down did Lin Wanxing discover that outside the window was the view of the Cang River. Before nightfall, the river water was nearly the same color as the sky.

The owner seemed to be a former patient of Professor He’s. After sitting down, Professor He looked up and asked the owner gently: “How have you been feeling lately?”

“Everything feels good. See, I can even swing this spatula with vigor.” The owner had a loud voice and demonstrated by waving the spatula a few times.

“You still need to be careful and come back for a follow-up in three months,” Professor He reminded him.

“Going to Yongchuan will have to trouble you again,” the owner’s wife immediately responded.

“Just make an appointment with me in advance,” Professor He said.

The couple expressed their gratitude again.

As the conversation stopped, Lin Wanxing was opening the disposable cutlery when she felt a gaze fall on her.

Professor He said: “Old Zhang, bring us a pot of preserved pork ribs, to let my friend who has come from afar taste our Sanmin delicacy.”

Lin Wanxing knew clearly that Professor He was afraid the owner might ask something like “Is this your daughter?” which would embarrass her, so she interrupted in advance.

She rubbed the disposable chopsticks she had just broken apart, feeling somewhat moved. Though they sat together in a relationship they couldn’t easily explain to others, they naturally became “friends” in Professor He’s words.

All of this was because of Professor He’s persistence.

Recalling their only previous meeting, Professor He was the rarely-participating faculty spouse.

Almost at first glance, Lin Wanxing knew she didn’t enjoy socializing, but for some unknown reason, she still came to the event that day.

Lin Wanxing understood “social anxiety” very well—feeling like sitting on pins and needles in crowds—so she pulled Professor He aside to take photos of her alone.

Professor He complimented her on taking good photos, so Lin Wanxing demonstrated tech-enhanced photo editing on the spot.

Because Professor He liked those brightened and refined photos so much, Lin Wanxing thought of making a small booklet as a keepsake for her.

In Lin Wanxing’s memory, Professor He was lovely and approachable, curious about young people’s new gadgets.

“I never thought you were rigid,” she said to Professor He very seriously.

The restaurant was noisy, with many tables ordering preserved pork rib hotpot. The whole space was somewhat smoky, yet filled with the rich aroma of everyday life.

Professor He was gazing absent-mindedly at the rushing river outside the window. Hearing her words, she suddenly came back to herself, as if not fully awake from her memories: “Is that so? But he always said that about me.”

Her temples were streaked with gray, and her words and expression were both faint.

Almost instantly, Lin Wanxing guessed who that “he” was.

“He had a typical narcissistic personality disorder. Belittling you was in his nature,” Lin Wanxing said.

Perhaps because she was too serious, Professor He quickly came back to her senses.

“It’s okay,” Professor He comforted her in a soft voice. “He’s already dead.”

The hotpot was soon served.

The owner lit the alcohol burner, and the blue flames gently rippled.

Lin Wanxing suddenly realized that Shu Yong’s death was an unsolvable situation for her, but for Professor He, it might have been a complete liberation.

The past of He Youting and Shu Yong was almost a template for marriages of that era.

They were university classmates with several overlapping courses, but it wasn’t a love match.

“His mother was our Marxist Philosophy teacher. She liked me very much. During my senior year, she introduced me to her son,” Professor He explained.

Lin Wanxing looked at her somewhat puzzled. It seemed natural that Professor He continued the story she hadn’t finished in the school auditorium.

“Young people like you nowadays probably can’t understand this kind of marriage, but I was different then. I was a girl from the mountains. Although I had gone to university, I always felt inferior in the big city. The fact that my university professor thought highly of me and introduced her son to me was a genuine sign of respect. I couldn’t refuse.”

Lin Wanxing nodded, almost able to feel the ideological constraints that came with that era and family background, which couldn’t be shaken off.

“It seemed natural that I got married. His family thought I was an honest and virtuous woman, and I thought his parents were both university professors, the elite among the elite, so there was nothing wrong with it.”

The hotpot soup was already boiling, with preserved pork ribs and soft potatoes floating up and down.

“But actually, the hardest thing in this world isn’t making a choice, but knowing that you have options,” Professor He’s voice was filled with loss. Then she raised her hand and asked the owner’s wife for a bottle of osmanthus rice wine.

Although rice wine was almost non-alcoholic, Lin Wanxing was still concerned about her health: “Can you drink?”

“I’m a doctor,” Professor He replied.

The rice wine was quickly brought to the table, and Lin Wanxing poured half a cup for each of them. The sweet rice wine balanced the saltiness of the preserved pork rib hotpot.

“Nothing wrong” also meant “nothing right.”

After marriage, Shu Yong’s family arranged a hospital position for her.

But He Youting knew that it was a position she could have obtained with her abilities.

Professor He’s story was calm and long, but for some reason, the more Lin Wanxing listened, the colder she felt.

She knew Shu Yong’s family had issues—a man who would marry a girl he didn’t love because his mother told him to have problems. She also clearly understood that although Shu Yong treated her with courtesy, deep down he never respected a girl from a pig-farming family.

But the most terrifying thing was always that you could have options but didn’t know it.

So although she had left the mountains and escaped her fate, she fell into a new fate.

“Knowing he had issues when we couldn’t have children, I even felt relieved.”

In her oppressive marriage, the only thing He Youting could do was throw herself completely into work. She left early and returned late, rarely attending to family matters.

This left her confused for a long time after Shu Yong’s suicide.

Then, Lin Wanxing heard the most heartbreaking self-analysis.

“When people are in difficult situations, they can’t realize that their life has problems. I lived like this for decades. It seemed nothing was wrong, but I no longer knew what happiness and joy felt like. Perhaps subconsciously I knew my marriage had issues, so I was always immersed in work. Only when completing major surgeries, bringing patients back from the brink of death, could I feel that I was a living, valuable person.”

Outside the window was the bottomless rushing river. He Youting raised the osmanthus rice wine and took a sip.

Though it had almost no alcohol content, it still made her gaze distant: “Perhaps because of long-term suppression in life, I got cancer, and his death tore open my world. When I first saw his suicide note, I realized that a world-shattering sound. I felt like I was still that little girl sitting in front of the mud pen, with most of the pigs dead from disease, but I needed to pay my school fees. After so many years, I still couldn’t do anything.”

The river breeze was cool at night. Lin Wanxing lowered her head to take a sip of soup, only to find that her bowl had already gone cold.

A salty, bitter taste made her throat choke up.

“Of course, I couldn’t accept this fact at all, but your existence and his suicide made me not completely lose face in front of colleagues,” He Youting’s gaze was both distant and clear. “Compared to my husband being a psychopath who never loved me, the idea that he was bewitched by a young female student seemed more acceptable. Moreover, his suicide was due to guilt towards me, indicating he still loved me. That’s how I deceived myself back then.”

The woman before her was extremely sad. Her life had been dignified and busy; although she was excellent enough, she had missed too much.

“That day you stood at my door, I knew that deep inside there was a voice telling me that I should open the door and hear what you were so persistent about, that it was important to me, but I didn’t dare to do so. I’m sorry to you, and I’m sorry to myself.”

Lin Wanxing shook her head vigorously. She wanted to speak, but Professor He gently stopped her with a look.

“But people gradually become clear-headed. Whether one is deceiving oneself or not, only oneself knows best,” He Youting’s voice became increasingly gentle and soft. “My world shattered, but light also came through. I felt an unprecedented lightness and freedom, and I deeply regretted my past marriage choice. So regarding your matter, I don’t want to regret it again. I want to see what the truth is. I want to know the answer.”

Her tone was firm and clear.

Lin Wanxing understood clearly how much effort Professor He had made to maintain rationality amid pain and confusion.

Although they had never relied on each other, they had somehow supported each other through this long journey.

Lin Wanxing drained the rice wine in her cup and told Professor He: “I’ve thought about it countless times, repeatedly wondering if I had unconsciously seduced him or given him the wrong signals, but my answer has always been no.”

“I believe you,” she said.

“So, Professor He, you did nothing wrong in this marriage either,” Lin Wanxing said with equal firmness. “People easily attribute problems from failed choices to themselves. But his fault is his fault. He was despicable and cowardly, you were upright and honorable. You did nothing wrong.”

He Youting lowered her eyes. The ingredients in the pork rib hotpot are gently rolled.

Some customers had left the restaurant, and finally, a few tables became vacant.

The river bank’s lights were hazy. She raised her head and nodded slightly.

But Lin Wanxing knew that everyone understood those principles, but to move on still required a long time.

Fortunately, he was already dead.

The preserved pork rib soup in the pot had cooked until it was soft enough. Lin Wanxing took two new bowls.

She told Professor He that although Shu Yong appeared extremely pathological, he was always a weak person.

The Neo-Darwinian paradigm holds that nature is ruthless, and moral standards are fabricated by competing interest groups for reproduction. However, in recent years, advances in psychology and neuroscience research have challenged this theoretical system that Shu Yong firmly believed in.

He had always disguised himself well, and few people knew about it. It was only later, through constant recollection, that she gradually realized it.

With his research setbacks, Shu Yong perhaps saw himself as a martyr for truth and wanted her to see the true nature of humanity, severely shaking her.

But no matter how adequate his self-proclaimed theories were, he was ultimately a weak person in the battle of beliefs who dared not look further.

They ate and talked, discussing Shu Yong without taboo, talking about the past and future, and also about Fu Xinshu’s final choices.

“Perhaps I can’t prove that my teacher was wrong, but my student can,” Lin Wanxing finally said.

Professor He smiled with satisfaction.

The alcohol burner at the bottom of the pot had gone out, and in the restaurant, only the owner and his wife remained, cleaning up.

According to the plan, after today’s visit to Sanmin Middle School, she was to go to Han Ling to receive her regular weekly psychological therapy.

As for Professor He, being from Sanmin, she would stay at her old home for one night before leaving.

That is to say, the moment of parting had arrived.

Lin Wanxing lit up her phone. Wang Fa had sent her the latest photo, an aerial view of a section of the river bank.

“Has he come to pick you up?” Professor He asked.

Lin Wanxing nodded.

Professor He smiled, telling her to take her phone and backpack, and walked her to the small shop’s doorway.

Wang Fa stood at the entrance of the alley with his hands in his pockets, having arrived who knows how long ago.

“You have good taste,” Professor He patted the back of her hand, smiling gently. “Go back now, and remember to edit the photos from this trip nicely and send them to me.”

“What about you?”

Professor He looked back at the owner and his wife inside the shop: “I still want to chat with old friends for a while.”

Standing on the iron platform four floors high, Lin Wanxing wore her backpack, somewhat reluctant to leave.

As if seeing what she was thinking, Professor He said: “Let’s play a little game. We each ask the other a question, as an ending.”

Lin Wanxing nodded.

“What is the flower language of the bouquet you gave me today?” Professor He asked.

“I’m very happy to be by your side,” Lin Wanxing answered.

“I’ve learned something new from you young people again.”

Professor He nodded with satisfaction, then looked at her. The piercing river wind disheveled her hair.

Lin Wanxing knew it was now her turn to ask a question.

“What was the poem your mother heard outside the middle school?” Lin Wanxing asked.

“It was ‘The Ballad of Mulan,'” Professor He said with a smile.

It was almost a predictable answer.

At that moment, looking at her serene face, recalling the path she had walked, Lin Wanxing finally cried.