Ever since learning that Ah Heng was Si Wan’s younger sister, the girls in class became rather awkward around her. When they met, they would exchange greetings, though their words were hesitant and evasive. Ah Heng, however, felt relieved.

“Why are you grinning like that, miss? What’s got you so happy?” Xin Dayi scratched his black hair.

“Qian Minmin greeted me,” Ah Heng said, her eyebrows curved in delight.

Qian Minmin was the girl who had previously clashed with her.

“You silly thing!” Xin Dayi laughed.

“Hey! Can you two stop chattering about nothing? Help young master me deal with this pile of stuff! Hurry up!” Yan Xi shouted from beside them, waving a stack of workbooks.

“Dear beautiful Yan, weren’t you just wandering back from your second year? Don’t tell me you can’t handle something this simple,” Xin Dayi beamed brightly, finally seizing a chance to mock Yan Xi.

“It’s not that I can’t do it, I just don’t want to write. Hmph, you little potatoes wouldn’t understand me.”

“Who are you calling little potatoes? Yan Xi, don’t get cocky just because you’ve eaten a few more meals than us!”

“Young master here was eating spare ribs when you hadn’t even grown teeth!” Yan Xi yawned, having stayed up late playing games the night before.

Ah Heng flipped through Yan Xi’s workbooks and smiled wryly, getting a headache. She wondered just how long he had been accumulating unfinished homework.

“Dayi, you take physics and chemistry, I’ll do politics and history.” Ah Heng picked up four books from the pile of homework, dividing them and handing two to Xin Dayi.

“Why should we do his homework!”

“Why aren’t you helping me with Chinese, math, and English!”

Both of them jumped up in protest.

“What are you saying? I don’t understand,” Ah Heng smiled, her dark eyes rippling with gentleness.

“Wen Heng, why do you always get stuck at crucial moments?” Xin Dayi grew anxious.

“Hey! I was speaking Earth language just now, how come you don’t understand, Wen Heng!” Yan Xi glanced sideways.

“So you’re saying you can speak languages from other planets?” Xin Dayi found Yan Xi’s way of speaking rather odd.

“Oh, I’m from Planet Tamama, here to investigate your Earth,” Yan Xi flashed a dazzling smile.

“What kind of planet is Mama’s planet? Is it tasty or not!”

Ah Heng quietly suppressed her laughter. See? She knew it wouldn’t take two seconds for these two to go off-topic.

“Class is starting! Xin Dayi, why are you so talkative!” Teacher Guo walked into the classroom, tapping the blackboard eraser.

“Yan Xi was talking too!” Xin Dayi protested unhappily.

Teacher Guo chose selective deafness, pretending not to hear as she began the lesson.

Yan Xi smiled insincerely, forcefully kicking Xin Dayi under the desk with his long legs.

Xin Dayi howled: “If I’d known earlier, I wouldn’t have specially changed seats to sit with you!”

“Young master here doesn’t want to sit with you either, it makes me look like I’m at your level!” Yan Xi’s long, fair fingers tapped his chin lazily.

Ah Heng turned to look at the two of them, tilting her head with a smile that revealed neat, rice-grain-like teeth, beautiful and gentle.

“Watching the show costs money!” Yan Xi smiled, extending his beautiful clean hand with slender fingers as white as jade.

“What are you saying? I don’t understand…” Ah Heng shook her head as she turned around slowly.

“Playing dumb again.” Yan Xi watched Ah Heng’s back and spoke lightly, though his tone carried familiarity and playfulness.

“Are you two close?” Xin Dayi muttered.

Yan Xi merely smiled without speaking.

Not too much, not too little, just right to know.

Not too deep, not too shallow, just acquainted.

When Ah Heng called Si Wan for dinner, she was rushing through homework – looking closer, it was first-year English.

“Yan Xi’s?” Ah Heng frowned.

“Mm. He forced it on me, and wanted me to finish it today.” Si Wan wrote furiously.

But Ah Heng reached out and pulled the workbook from the table.

“No,” she shook her head, her eyes slightly drawn together, the clear landscape clouding over.

“Hm?” Si Wan looked up, not understanding.

“We can’t spoil him like this.”

Si Wan hesitated: “But Yan Xi instructed…”

“Leave it to me.” Ah Heng smiled gently, her voice soft and tender.

After dinner, Ah Heng took the workbook and visited the Yan household.

Grandfather Yan was out at a dinner party. After greeting Officer Li, she went upstairs. When Yan Xi saw her after she knocked, he was surprised.

“Come in.” Yan Xi nodded slightly, moving aside indifferently.

Ah Heng was feeling awkward at first, but when she looked down and saw the youth wearing pink pig-head slippers, her nervousness instantly vanished.

She walked in but broke into a cold sweat.

Pink everywhere. Pink walls, pink curtains, pink bookshelves, pink desk, a large full-length mirror, pink clothes strewn all over the floor, walls covered in doodles, and simple Q-version characters – the style was terrifying.

Dizzied by all the pink, Ah Heng rubbed her eyes and handed the workbook to Yan Xi.

Yan Xi raised an eyebrow: “I remember I already gave this to Si Wan to handle.”

“Do it yourself.” Ah Heng smiled.

“No time.” Yan Xi spoke flatly, picking up the controller from the wooden floor and sitting cross-legged to continue playing his game.

“Do it yourself.” Ah Heng repeated, her gentle tone carrying persistence.

“Oh, just put it on the bed, I’ll think about it later.” The youth nodded dismissively, his eyes crystal clear but focused forward. The characters on the TV screen were in an intense battle, but his tone had already turned unpleasant.

“When will you think about it?” Ah Heng continued smiling.

“Don’t know.” Yan Xi’s face had completely cooled.

“Oh.” Ah Heng nodded, quietly sat down nearby, and took out her pen to start writing the politics and history homework she had promised earlier.

The youth’s thumb struck the controller, with subtle sharpness and intensity. He maintained his composure, his gaze not shifting even slightly, treating Ah Heng as if she didn’t exist.

Ah Heng smiled, watching the youth’s back gently.

This youth wore a cotton T-shirt, neat and clean, his black hair soft and fluffy with a strand slightly upturned at the top, swaying with the subtle movements of the air, sensitive and childlike. He tried to treat her as air, tried to treat the subtle undercurrent between them as a form of conquest, and tried to maintain his victory with arrogance and ostentation.

Ah Heng understood it all – this was Yan Xi’s mode of interaction with others. He raised his defenses, preparing to subdue her without a fight.

She thought, at this moment Yan Xi wasn’t viewing her as a lady deserving of gentlemanly courtesy, but as an enemy who had invaded his territory for absurd reasons, regardless of gender, only needing to be expelled.

Yet, this treatment made her feel authentic.

This moment revealed Yan Xi’s true self, not gentle or ingratiating, not mischievous or deliberate, not perfunctory or arrogant, not bland or cold. Those were merely incomplete versions of Yan Xi, shown to specific people in specific situations. But glimpsing just a corner made it all the more fragmentary.

She considered herself fortunate to see the complete Yan Xi at this juncture.

Ah Heng looked at her watch – seven-thirty – and continued solving problems with her head down.

However, on the screen, the character’s death frequency gradually increased.

After quite some time, there was a loud crash.

Ah Heng looked up to see Yan Xi glaring at her coldly, and in the corner lay a black controller with cracks from being thrown.

“How long do you plan to stay?” he asked her, his black eyes smooth and impenetrable like mirrors.

“Have you thought about it?” Ah Heng smiled, extending the Chinese, math, and English workbooks.

The youth’s eyes slanted upward as he glared at her fiercely, filled with anger, for a long while.

Ah Heng’s eyes looked at him gently, clear as mountain waters. She smiled lightly: “Yan Xi, is doing homework really that difficult?”

The youth was stunned, the ice in his expression softening slightly. After a while, he smiled without humor: “Wen Heng, is such a small matter worth all this?”

You’re the angry one, you’re the one sulking, and you’re the one throwing things.

Ah Heng sighed, feeling wronged.

“I get it, I’ll do it. You can go.” Yan Xi lowered his head, leaning against the bed as he spoke flatly.

“Oh.” Ah Heng nodded and stood up, her knees slightly numb.

She closed the door and walked downstairs.

Officer Li had fallen asleep in the rocking chair on the balcony while listening to the radio, his soft snores quite clear in the quiet, spacious living room.

In the sunset’s shadow, the room was completely silent except for the ticking clock.

The Wen household, though not exactly prosperous, was much warmer than here. As Ah Heng thought this, she looked up and saw the photos hanging on the wall. Frame after frame, brilliant and vibrant colors, moments captured in time, overwhelmingly warm.

But while the beauty remained, it had grown cold in the silent air – as much warmth as there was loneliness.

Ah Heng’s heart suddenly felt like it was being clawed by a cat, beginning to ache with each heartbeat.

She remembered the stories Yan Xi had told when he was sick, that weak voice, so mocking and sorrowful.

She remembered Yan Xi’s smile when he handed her the cake, telling her: “Wen Heng, Auntie Yun asked me to buy this for you. She wanted me to say ‘happy birthday’ to you.” That tone is envious to the point of jealousy.

He feared others breaking the loneliness he possessed because loneliness was a powerful armor, and only by bearing such powerful armor could he be the completely powerful Yan Xi.

She had never imagined she would see this youth to such an extent, but this moment of insight truly exceeded her inherent slowness and dullness.

Before, when looking at Yan Xi, in the blur there was vague curiosity and aesthetic appreciation; now, with clarity came fear and pity.

She feared this pity would gradually clarify with time, seeping into her marrow.

But after staring at those photos for a long, long time, she still paused her steps.

Yan Xi saw Ah Heng again just half an hour later when he was finishing his English homework in calligraphy style.

“You didn’t leave?” He was stunned, his slender fingers slowly turning the pen.

“Are you hungry?” Ah Heng asked irrelevantly, holding a steaming bowl of noodles with an appetizing aroma.

“Spare rib noodles?” The youth sniffed and peered forward slightly.

“The kitchen had spare ribs and noodles, just happened to have both. So, I made them.” Ah Heng explained somewhat awkwardly.

So, do you want to eat?

Yan Xi looked thoroughly suspicious, his clear eyes bright but guarded: “Ah, I know, you must have poisoned it!”

“Mm, poisoned it. If you won’t eat it, I’ll feed it to Lu Rou Fan.” Ah Heng smiled, walking to the window.

The little parrot was lazily basking in the moonlight. Seeing her, it fluttered its wings and circled the bowl, its little eyes sparkling, calling out as it flew: “Lu rou, lu rou!”

Yan Xi laughed: “Why so petty, just because I chased you away?” He then flicked the bird’s head. The little creature was spinning too fast and, due to inertia, smacked into the window.

He snatched the bowl from her hands, his hand slightly covering his lips, his dark bright eyes showing a few more degrees of innocent joy. His dark head was buried in the fine porcelain bowl as he ate with relish, reminding Ah Heng of the cute little pig on the youth’s lunchbox.

While Yan Xi was eating, Ah Heng picked up the game controller from the corner, sat cross-legged on the floor, and focused on her work with a screwdriver, tapping and hammering.

“What are you doing?” Yan Xi slurped.

“Oh, this, trying to fix it.” Ah Heng didn’t look up, gently turning the screwdriver.

“Do you know how?” More slurping.

“I’ll give it a try.” Ah Heng chuckled.

“If you break it, will you compensate?” The youth asked righteously.

“It’s already broken.” Ah Heng smiled, reminding him.

“If it weren’t for you, would I have thrown it? This controller, young master had to fight tooth and nail to get it back from my aunt’s house.” The youth proclaimed dramatically.

“It’s already fixed.” Ah Heng smiled, pressed her thin lips together, tightened the screws, and gently handed the controller to the youth.

Yan Xi took it and shook it – no loose rattling sounds. Knowing it was fixed, he remembered something and earnestly held the controller to his ear, listening with intense focus.

“What are you listening to?” Ah Heng was curious.

Yan Xi smiled, narrowing his bright black eyes, sighing for a long while with an old man’s nostalgic yearning: “Long, long ago, really long ago, legend has it that every game controller has a god living inside it. If players chat with them every day, they will lead us to victory in games.”

Ah Heng stared blankly: “Are gods real?”

Suddenly, the cool game controller gently pressed against her forehead. Ah Heng looked up.

“Yes, yes, he just complained to me that you were very rough earlier, he dislikes you.”

Ah Heng sniffled, grabbed the controller pressed to her forehead, and said pitifully: “No, I wasn’t rough.”

“Yes, you were!” Yan Xi glanced sideways, “The god said not only did you hit him, but you also twisted him. He’s going to take revenge on you.”

“How will he take revenge?” She felt guilty.

“Oh, he’ll just send a little ghost to appear by your bedside at night, tell you ghost stories about village corpses, midnight evil spirits, curses, human-skin disguises, man-eating monsters, vampire fights, Chinese and foreign stories spanning ancient and modern times, everything you can imagine…” He gestured wildly, spittle flying.

Ah Heng was half-believing, half-doubting, and asked quietly: “Is the god Chinese or foreign?”

Yan Xi had been stroking his chin with his index finger, but hearing Ah Heng’s words, he burst out laughing while punching his pillow: “I thought you were just pretending to be silly while understanding everything, but it seems the young master here overestimated you.”

He was just a child pretending to be smart while being silly.