Wei Zhi rushed back to the apartment with her large bag of purchases before lunch. Holding the three boxes felt like holding three-time bombs. She suddenly realized what she had done, wandered around the apartment, sat down, and analyzed the current situation with Jiang Nanfeng.
Jiang Nanfeng kindly offered her several ways to rationalize the situation:
1. Desiring your partner’s body during the honeymoon phase is normal; it’s not just men who have such needs.
2. As adults, splitting costs equally is fair and reasonable. If you buy it this time, he can buy it next time. Someone has to buy it, so why worry about who goes first?
3. Well done! Women should actively protect their health.
4. Wei Zhi, you’re almost 23, not 13. Even if you went to a pharmacy to buy these, the doctor wouldn’t give you a second glance, let alone at a self-checkout.
5. Just admit you’re a pervert.
Wei Zhi wasn’t comforted at all.
Especially when she realized that out of the four long options and one short one, the shortest—option 5—might be the only correct answer. She felt suffocated.
Furiously embarrassed and incredibly pure, she cursed out Jiang Nanfeng over the phone. Just as she could sense her friend’s cold expression (even through the screen) as she typed out a question mark, her boyfriend called, asking where she was and if she remembered their lunch plans.
His voice over the phone was normal—low, magnetic, and cold, with a hint of natural indifference.
This man just couldn’t speak nicely. If he wanted her to come for lunch, he could just say so. Instead, he had to use a rhetorical question, asking if she remembered, making her heart race.
Yet this morning, it was the same person with that icy voice and terrible personality who had called her name with a passion that made his voice hoarse. He had let her pin him down, defenseless, as she kissed him—
She couldn’t think about it anymore.
Swallowing hard, she quickly lifted the pillow and hid the three cigarette box-sized items underneath. Wei Zhi sighed in relief, dusted off her hands, and hurried to the restaurant.
The restaurant was crowded.
Back in Chongli, if nothing else, there were always people. Besides Bei Ci and the others who had followed them to Xinjiang and back, some usually stayed here. A group of people noisily occupied a table, like some Chongli ski gang.
The seat next to Shan Chong was empty. The man was probably waiting for his wife to arrive, leaning against the table, not getting food, his eyes lowered as he looked at his phone.
Wei Zhi decided to get two bowls of rice, some tomato and egg stir-fry, some stir-fried lotus root, and after circling, she picked up a few skewers of grilled meat. Passing by the freezer, she didn’t forget to get a can of cola for her boyfriend.
Carrying the tray, she approached him. He lifted his eyelids and glanced at her—
Wei Zhi leaned in to look and found he was on a video call with someone.
Unlike Bei Ci and the others who would mindlessly scroll through short video apps when they had nothing to do, Shan Chong wasn’t fond of looking at his phone. Unless someone was looking for him, he generally didn’t pay much attention to it.
Lately, quite a few people had been trying to reach him.
Wei Zhi recognized the person he was talking to now—it was the brave soul who had posted the righteous video last night and then scared the subject’s sister to tears—
The owner of the DF Snow Equipment Store.
This guy’s surname was Qiu, with a pure Northeast Chinese man’s appearance, sporting a mohawk and tattoos. However, at the moment, his panicked expression completely clashed with his tough-guy exterior. He was shouting: “Your sister saw the video I posted yesterday! What should I do? I never thought she’d see it!”
Shan Chong was annoyed by people making such a fuss over trivial matters, all of them fretting and worrying, unable to understand that it wasn’t his sister.
“How do you know she saw it?” Shan Chong thought for a moment and asked.
“We follow each other.”
“…” Shan Chong told himself not to think too much about it. “Your video has over 300,000 likes. Anyone following you would see it as the first thing on their feed when they open the app unless the platform is broken. Did you expect her to be blind or stupid enough not to see it?”
His voice was merciless.
The DF Snow Equipment Store owner was speechless: “How could I have known there’d be such a big reaction! Haven’t you seen that my usual ads and promotions only get about a hundred likes—”
Shan Chong: “So it went viral. Congratulations.”
DF Snow Equipment Store owner: “Chong God! I’m not joking! Your sister left a comment with a crying face emoji. What do you think she means?!”
Shan Chong: “Just what a crying face means.”
DF Snow Equipment Store owner: “Huh?”
Shan Chong: “She cried.”
DF Snow Equipment Store owner: “…”
Shan Chong: “You people, when you’re free, just go up the mountain for a couple of runs. If that’s not tiring enough, go drink with some girls afterward. If you have nothing to do, don’t just lie on the hotel bed thinking about what to post—”
“It’s too late to say that now,” the DF Snow Equipment Store owner said, looking distressed. “Your sister has already seen it! Your sister has already cried! Ah!”
He paused for a moment: “Will I be struck by lightning if I go out today?”
Shan Chong fell silent, clearly too lazy to respond.
Wei Zhi had been listening to their back-and-forth the whole time. The snow equipment store owner was still wailing, and Shan Chong, tired of listening but not wanting to hang up abruptly, said: “Dai Duo should have called you yesterday. One cursing, one crying, perfect match.”
The commotion on the other end of the phone suddenly quieted down.
“Dai Duo called you?”
“Mm.”
“What did he say?”
“Same as you. What else could he say?” Shan Chong said. “Making a big fuss over nothing. Isn’t it normal for a young girl to cry?”
“I can tell from your tone that you didn’t say a single kind word. You’re heartless,” the snow equipment store owner whined. “If she cried, it’s because she cares about you as her brother.”
“Thank you for remembering that I’m the actual brother,” Shan Chong said. “Why feel sorry for me? Did I cry yesterday or was I in a bad mood? I just glared at a reporter… These kids just like to push their luck. If I had comforted her, she probably would have cried until dawn this morning—”
As he said “Push their luck,” he glanced at Wei Zhi.
Wei Zhi was very confused—
Which “these” was he referring to?
Just as he was speaking, Dai Duo happened to pass by their table with his tray. Hearing this, he stopped, standing like a small mountain in front of Shan Chong’s table.
Putting down his tray, he stared at Shan Chong with a gloomy expression.
Wei Zhi moved her plate of food aside, fearing he might flip it in anger.
Shan Chong wasn’t blind. Still holding his phone, maintaining his half-sitting, half-leaning position against the dining table without moving, he lazily lifted his eyelids and glanced at Dai Duo, not showing any better expression…
He still held a grudge for the inexplicable phone call last night that had ruined his good mood.
If it weren’t for the follow-up this morning, he might have already thrown the phone at Dai Duo’s face.
He was being merciful by not holding it against him.
Unexpectedly, Dai Duo launched an attack first, saying Shan Chong only thought about himself and didn’t deserve to be anyone’s brother.
That single sentence stunned everyone at the table.
By the time they came to their senses, he had already left with his tray.
Wei Zhi turned to look at Shan Chong. He didn’t have much reaction to Dai Duo’s sudden outburst. He just turned to the snow equipment store owner still on the phone and said: “If you want a sister so badly, why don’t you ask your parents to have another child? You don’t have one, so you’re all lining up to steal mine?”
DF Snow Equipment Store owner: “…”
After hanging up, Shan Chong looked back at Dai Duo, who was sitting alone with his back to them, eating. He thought for a moment and asked, genuinely confused: “What’s wrong with him now?”
He was just muttering to himself, not expecting an answer.
So he missed the young woman sitting next to him, who was originally picking up food, her hand trembling as the egg from the tomato and egg stir-fry fell back into the bowl. She held the bowl, lowered her head, and tried to eat her rice, mumbling, “How would I know?”
…
It was nearly half past one in the afternoon when they finished lunch.
The sun came out in the afternoon, the snow stopped, and the fog cleared.
After such a heavy snowfall in the morning, the snow on the slopes was now as thick as in a small forest.
The ski resort owner had always been praised as the most sentimental owner in the country. So on this bright afternoon, several snow groomers rumbled into action, pushing the fresh snow from the top of the mountain downwards. A wave of fresh, natural corduroy snow (*after the snow groomer’s compression, the tracks left behind look like noodles, hence the name “noodle snow”) was born.
Consequently, a large group of snow enthusiasts followed behind the snow groomers like children, including both snowboarders and skiers. The crowd cheered as they followed, happily ruining the newly groomed corduroy…
The scene was quite spectacular.
Everyone was yelling and happily following the snow groomer down, in what could be described as a large-scale human regression to primitive behavior.
Amidst this scene, someone was shouting, “Those doing carved turns, have some manners! Carvers go last!”
The characteristic of carved turns is that they cut deeply into the snow, easily messing up a nicely groomed slope. At outdoor ski resorts in winter, whenever there are deep, gutter-like tracks on the ground, it’s usually the work of people doing carved turns.
There’s a joke that whether you’re a snowboarder or a skier, those who do carved turns are the common enemy.
Wei Zhi hugged her board, looking at the fixed stance bindings, feeling discriminated against.
Then she looked at the man beside her. He was using his park board today, wearing goggles and a face guard, bundled up tightly. She overheard two people chatting nearby—
“Going to the park?”
“Yeah, I heard Chong God was there this morning.”
“Oh?”
“And he wasn’t cursing anyone. Man, that loving holy light shining on the earth, it seems quite a few people broke through their limits and performed well today.”
“Are you talking about Shan Chong? Loving?”
“People can change,” the snow enthusiast said. “Maybe he’s getting older and doesn’t have the energy to curse anymore.”
These two were chatting happily, completely unaware that the subject of their conversation was standing right next to them, dressed in all-black snow gear, tall and slender, not even turning his head.
Shan Chong only then realized that his loving guidance of a bunch of disciples had spread, and everyone knew that Chong God was very loving today. So the park at the top of the mountain was even busier in the afternoon than in the morning.
Shan Chong put on his board and rode down the afternoon slope, critically observing Wei Zhi’s awkward fixed stance style. Passing by the park, he glanced inside and saw it was packed with people.
Without hesitation, he pulled his head back.
“Let’s go to Yunding next time,” he turned to his girlfriend, who was freshly fallen and sprawled on the ground, and said, “Too crowded here.”
After speaking, he picked her up, patted the snow off her body, and passed by the park entrance without looking back.
These people still somewhat misunderstood the extent of their Chong God’s love.
…
The snow was good today. There weren’t many people on Yunding, to begin with, and now they were all scattered on the slopes enjoying their runs. There were hardly any ghosts on the terrain features.
Oh.
There was Dai Duo.
And his coach.
Wei Zhi had left her board at the top of the slope where boards were stored. Now, empty-handed, she accompanied her boyfriend here. As they climbed towards the jump platform, they could hear the middle-aged coach shouting from afar: “I want to chop off your back legs!”
The young woman shrank her neck at the sound.
She turned to look at Shan Chong, who didn’t even blink, as if long accustomed to this scene. He went up to the starting platform, ignoring the sudden silence and stares from the two people there, and stood aside to warm up.
Wang Xin looked over. Faced with Shan Chong’s sudden appearance next to the big jump, he hesitated, clearly having seen the interview from the other day—
Old Qiu’s video had over 300,000 likes, and almost everyone in the snow circle, known or unknown, had appeared in the comments section, unanimously condemning that media outlet…
That video had probably been seen by everyone in the entire snow circle, and everyone had liked it.
Now, when the former coach looked at Shan Chong again, he was suddenly reminded of his silence in that video, and now seeing him secretly come to practice on the big jump, his mind filled with assumptions. His heart, liver, spleen, lungs, and kidneys all ached—
The kind of pain a father feels for his son.
How could he not understand what Shan Chong was thinking?
He understood the reasoning and even sympathized, but he was angry that Shan Chong had made this choice. So every time he saw him, he couldn’t help but want to scold him a bit.
But seeing him like this now, having been scolded by others, he couldn’t bring himself to scold him anymore.
That fierce temperament had also softened, completely different from his attitude towards Dai Duo. Unable to scold, he closed his mouth and just stared at Shan Chong longingly.
Shan Chong had no idea what was wrong with these people.
He didn’t even want to make eye contact with his former coach’s starry-eyed, almost tearful gaze.
He bent down to put on his board.
Under the watchful eyes of Dai Duo and his former coach, before setting off, he just turned back to look at Wei Zhi, beckoning her with his finger to watch carefully. Then he set off stylishly—
Straight board, jump, a fakie crippler 720 (switch external rotation) plus a backflip, combined into a Haakon flip. He didn’t stick the landing, leaning forward to steady himself, the nose of the board lifting and sliding forward a bit. Amidst the snow dust, he cleanly and neatly knelt.
It was just a small warm-up.
A minor mistake wasn’t a big deal.
Wei Zhi calmly put down her phone, with a composed face trimmed off that little landing error—at least the aerial moves were still done well—
Beside them, Dai Duo also set off.
This kid was interesting today. He performed the same moves, but on the external rotation, he forcefully added an extra 360 to make it a 1080. After the backflip, his snowboard landed solidly with a “thud”. He didn’t stick his butt out, didn’t bend over as if looking for money, and his back leg didn’t kick out randomly.
Beside them, the coach let out an “Aiya,” feeling like he had witnessed a miracle.
The man in the black snowsuit stood at the bottom of the platform, having just taken off his board. He naturally saw this performance as full of provocative intent. He held his board in one hand, standing at the edge of the slope without moving.
He watched as Dai Duo bent down arrogantly to take off his board, then straightened up. He stepped on the long snowboard with his foot, half-bent to pick it up, and using the binding as an axis, swung it around his arm. Those effeminate eyes looked over from behind the goggles.
The two stared at each other for a few seconds.
Shan Chong suspected this person might be ill.
After a long pause, he finally spoke: “Shan Shan told me the other day—”
Dai Duo pulled down his snow goggles.
Shan Chong said, “Boss Qiu is pretty handsome.”
Shan Chong added, “But you’re not.”
Dai Duo: “?”
Shan Chong continued, “No chance.”
Dai Duo: “…”