Rong Qian went into Lin Jie’s room.

There were very few belongings of his left behind — just a backpack and a few books on the desk. Rong Qian walked over and took a look.

On top was a sketchbook. Rong Qian casually opened it, and was shocked by the drawing on the first page.

The drawing was a skull, scrawled in black gel pen. The entire picture gave off a suffocating, dark feeling, like a bottomless pit.

Rong Qian flipped further through, and found that every single page had a different skull design drawn on it.

At this point, Rong Qian could be one hundred percent certain — the man in the skull mask was Lin Jie!

Rong Qian’s breath caught for a moment. That kid had really gone hard on her!

Rong Qian picked up the sketchbook and set it aside, and a small green booklet fell out. She picked it up and looked it over — based on the English on it, it seemed to be something like a semester teacher’s evaluation booklet, containing the teacher’s recommendations about the student, meant for the parents to read.

Rong Qian opened it and looked through. She saw a few English phrases that shocked her: “capable of violence” [violent tendencies] and “antisocial personality” [antisocial personality].

Although the booklet noted these as “suspected,” Lin Jie must have shown behavior suggestive of these traits for the teacher to recommend taking the student in for an evaluation.

“A’Qian.”

Hearing someone call her name, Rong Qian looked up and saw Shen Yi standing at the door. He’d noticed the booklet in her hand.

Rong Qian asked him, “You already knew about this?”

“Not exactly early, but I found out a bit late.” Shen Yi walked in, took the booklet from her hand, and casually flipped through it.

Rong Qian looked at him. As if she’d made up her mind about something, her gaze grew resolute, and she said to Shen Yi, “Shen Yi, I—”

“It’s getting late. Get some sleep.”

But before she could finish, Shen Yi cut her off. It was as if he’d guessed what she was about to say, but he didn’t dare listen to it.

“Goodnight.” With that, he set the booklet down, patted Rong Qian on the shoulder, gave her a faint smile, and turned to leave the room first.

Rong Qian sighed. She really wanted to tell him that running from this was pointless, but on second thought, she decided against it — she’d tell him tomorrow instead.

The moment Shen Yi entered his room and closed the door, it was as if all the strength had been instantly drained out of him. He slumped down against the door, his head bowed, the strands of hair over his forehead hiding his eyes so no one could read his expression.

The room’s lights were off; only the moonlight outside the window streamed in through the glass, casting a faint glow into the dark room — just enough light to illuminate him.

The man’s thin lips were pressed tightly together, and his hands were clenched. As if he’d gone through a painful inner struggle, in the end, he finally let his hands relax.

As though he were letting go of something he’d been gripping tightly, unwilling to release.

That was the person he loved, her name was Rong Qian.

Rong Qian had decided to go back.

Lying on the bed, with her hands pillowed behind her head, Rong Qian gazed at the ceiling, letting her thoughts wander. Unlike Shen Yi’s room, which sat in darkness, Rong Qian’s room had its bright lights on, the whole room bathed in light.

The contrast between the two highlighted the difference in their states of mind and circumstances.

She was in the light, he was in the dark.

Rong Qian didn’t know what would happen to Lin Jie over the following decades, that would lead him down an irreversible road of fleeing as a fugitive, but hearing that he’d been cooperating with Thomas left a bitter taste in her heart.

If he knew that, all these years, he’d been working for the very person who’d gotten his brother killed — how would he feel?

Regardless of how he’d feel, and regardless of whether he knew about this, Rong Qian decided that once she saw him, she’d tell him — let him know what foolish things he’d been doing all these years!

That night, Rong Qian tossed and turned, thinking about many things, until well past midnight, when she finally grew so drowsy she kept yawning, and at last fell asleep.

Only Shen Yi sat there the whole night, unable to sleep at all.

Before six in the morning, the first rays of dawn light streamed in through the gap in the curtains. Shen Yi walked over and pulled the curtains open, and a wide swath of light spilled over him.

The sudden light was a bit dazzling, and Shen Yi raised a hand to shield his eyes. Just then, he heard Rong Qian’s voice from downstairs: “Good little baby, come here to big sister~”

Shen Yi lowered the hand shielding his eyes. Below was the garden, and he opened the window to look down, only to see Rong Qian sticking her bottom up in the air, lying on the ground, one hand reaching under a bench, fumbling around for something.

“Where did you go and hide?”

Rong Qian’s hand came out covered in small pebbles. She craned her head to look underneath, and could make out a small white shape huddled in the corner. “Found you!”

She reached out toward it, but as the saying goes — when you need them most, your arms always seem too short. She groped around for a long while but just couldn’t reach it.

“What are you doing?”

A voice came from behind her. Rong Qian turned around and saw it was Shen Yi, so she told him, “There’s a little kitten hiding under here, it seems like it’s been hungry for a while.”

Rong Qian had woken up early and thought she’d come to the garden for some fresh air, when she heard a kitten’s weak meowing. She’d searched for a long time before finally finding it under the bench.

But the bench was fixed in place and she couldn’t move it, so all she could do was try to coax the kitten out.

Shen Yi nodded to show he understood, and said, “I have an idea. Wait here a moment.”

“Okay!”

Rong Qian waited there, and before long, Shen Yi came back carrying a small dish and a bottle of milk. He poured the milk onto the dish, set it down under the bench, and called out softly — the kitten came running out to lap up the milk.

The kitten was very small, probably only a few months old, with very white fur that looked soft to the touch, and blue eyes. Rong Qian didn’t know much about cat breeds and had no idea what kind of cat it was.

“A blue-eyed white cat — its ancestors were Angora cats and Persian cats, originating in the 1880s.” Shen Yi explained to her.

Rong Qian blinked. “How do you know about everything?”

“I suppose I’ve read a fairly wide range of books, so I know a little bit about all kinds of things.” Shen Yi said modestly.

Rong Qian gave him a look of admiration, and the two of them crouched there together, watching the kitten eagerly stick out its little pink tongue to lap up the milk.

Rong Qian reached out and stroked the kitten’s little head, saying gently, “Little Cottony, slow down, no one’s going to steal it from you.”

“Little Cottony? You’re naming it that?” Shen Yi looked at her, smiling.

Rong Qian had never named an animal before, and thought the name might not be good, so she said a bit embarrassedly, “Does it not sound nice? She’s just this little fuzzy ball, like a bit of cotton, so I just called her that.”

“No, it’s a lovely name. Let’s call her that from now on.” Shen Yi rubbed Little Cottony’s chin. The kitten’s eyes were very big, and it stared at Shen Yi, then stuck out its little pink tongue, licked his palm, and affectionately nuzzled against him.

Seeing this, Rong Qian decided on the spot, “Then from now on, Little Cottony is yours to take care of. You’d better raise her up nice and plump.”

“Single-parent households can have a certain negative impact on a child’s future development.” Shen Yi suddenly said this.

Rong Qian didn’t catch on for a moment. “Hm?”

“This kitten can’t be without a mother.”

Shen Yi held the kitten in his arms, and at that moment both man and cat were staring at her, with that certain someone’s gaze carrying a touch of sadness too, giving Rong Qian an inexplicable sense of déjà vu — as if she were about to abandon her husband and child and run away from home!

Rong Qian found it somewhat funny, but found that she couldn’t bring herself to laugh at all.

Rong Qian’s eyes darkened. Could she not leave?

If she could help it, she wouldn’t want to leave either, but she knew that wasn’t possible…