chapter 1 – zhuang yan returned to china

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After picking up Yan Xi’s phone call, Xie Ning huddled under his covers, dizzy and with a headache, and didn’t clearly hear Yan Xi for a period of time.

 

He pulled an all-nighter to finish a draft, and the client only responded in the morning.
After confirming and finalizing the poster, he fell on his bed and slept like the dead.

 

The phone rang for a long time.
Xie Ning, through his headache, rubbed his head, and when he came to his senses, said “What did you say? Can you say it again?”

 

Of course Yan Xi repeated it again.
“You and Xu Qing broke up?”

 

“Oh,” Xie Ning replied, “We broke up.”

 

Yan Xi started to speak, then stopped.

 

Xie Ning glanced at the clock.
It was 7pm.
He’d slept the whole day away.

 

Yan Xi was silent for a long time.
“How are you now?”

 

Xie Ning responded truthfully.
“My head hurts a little.
This sleep wasn’t very comfortable.”

 

“My stomach is uncomfortable too.” He hadn’t eaten anything all day, so he was hungry.

 

Yan Xi sighed.
“Don’t think about it, and stay at home.
I’ll be over soon.”

 

What is there to think about? Xie Ning randomly said “Then bring me dinner when you come.”

 

Xie Ning regained his senses on the bed for a little and crawled out of bed to change his clothes, wash his face, and brush his teeth.
On the table next to his computer, there were various drawings messily spread around the desk.
He finished cleaning, and went to the kitchen to heat up a cup of milk for himself.

 

His phone screen lit up, and he saw that he had dozens of missed calls.

 

Three from Yan Xi, and the rest were from Xu Qing.

 

Xie Ning took a sip of the hot milk, letting it warm his body up, and without hesitation, blocked Xu Qing.

 

There were also a couple text messages from Xu Qing.

 

[I was wrong.]

[Let’s not break up, okay?]

 

……

 

No.

 

Xie Ning cleared out his message inbox, and blocked Xu Qing on all other messaging platforms.

 

After doing all this, the doorbell rang.

 

Yan Xi indeed rushed like the wind to come, and brought a very light, white porridge.

 

The white porridge was so tasteless that Xie Ning said, “You couldn’t bring anything else, and brought such a bland one?”

 

Yan Xi looked at his expression.
“I was afraid you’d have no appetite.”

 

Xie Ning had an appetite, a great one at that.
He put the spoon down and went to the bedroom to grab a coat.
“Forget it, let’s go out to eat.”

 

Yan Xi said, “I ate dinner already.”

 

“Then stay with me to eat another.
Treat it like a midnight snack.”

 

On the way out, Yan Xi’s phone rang a couple times.
He took it out, glanced at the caller ID, and declined the call.

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“Who is it?” Xie Ning casually asked.

 

Yan Xi said, “A stupid cunt.”

 

Xie Ning said, “Don’t think I didn’t see the caller ID.” He didn’t purposely look at it, but he was all too familiar with the number, and could recognize the string of numbers at a glance.
It was Xu Qing’s number.

 

Yan Xi smiled coldly.
“Is he not a stupid cunt?”

 

Xie Ning thought about it, and couldn’t refute it.

 

Yan Xi was always biased against Xu Qing.
Well, maybe it wasn’t a bias.

 

He sees Xu Qing as a playboy, carefree and a slacker, and isn’t worthy of Xie Ning at all.

 

Everyone around Xie Ning, not just Yan Xi, thought so as well.

 

But the two had been together for four years, and countless people had not been able to separate them, until now…

 

Whenever Yan Xi thought about it, his chest would hurt with anger.
“Xu Qing, this scumbag player, he’s eating from the bowl but keeps looking at the pot! It’s good that you guys broke up; there’s a bunch of people with a crush on you, so there’s no need to hang onto that rotten tree!”

 

Xie Ning, following him, nodded.
“Yes yes yes.”

 

Yan Xi glanced at him and sighed.
“Your personality is just too docile.
If it were me, I’d have kicked him farther than eighteen thousand kilometers.”

 

The personality of this good friend, in nicer words, is “Lets things go easily”, but in harsher words, is “Resigns himself to misfortune”.

 

Whatever you ask him, he would basically respond with “Whatever works”, “Whatever”, “Okay”, and occasionally, “What does it have to do with me?”

 

Yan Xi remembers that in college, Xie Ning had many admirers.
The flower of the Arts Department confessed to him, saying a bunch of heartfelt and sincere things, and in the end, Xie Ning responded with a line: “Thank you for liking me, and you can like who you want, but what does it matter to me?”

 

The flower was so angered that she cried on the spot.

 

Later on, an admirer of the campus flower who was troubled by this event, found Xie Ning to try and reason with him.
After he was done cursing, Xie Ning responded, “Does it have anything to do with you?”

 

If it was only this easy, then it would have been fine.
Later on, when Xie Ning and Xu Qing were dating, and Yan Xi mentioned Xu Qing’s womanizing behavior, Xie Ning would also always have an attitude of “What’s it to me?”

 

When he thought of this, Yan Xi’s heart was troubled.

 

Xie Ning didn’t think he was docile himself; he just didn’t really care.

 

In this cold winter, when it was freezing outside, if it wasn’t for his lack of stock at home, Xie Ning wouldn’t have wanted to go out.

 

Who knew that it would even snow after they finished eating?

 

Christmas is on Friday, and many of the shops on either side of the street already had Christmas lights and decorations up.

 

Xie Ning thought of the draft he just finished drawing; it was a Christmas poster for a mobile game.
He wasn’t the original artist they decided on, but the company wasn’t satisfied with the poster that the outsourced artist had produced.
They floundered for a bit before finding Xie Ning, and gave him double the price for this urgent draft.

 

In the painting, the silver-ornamented Christmas tree and Santa Claus, with the playful game characters, are just like how the streets will be in a few days.

 

It’s rare for him to not have urgent work, so Xie Ning didn’t want to return so early and wanted to wander around some more.
Yan Xi picked up a call that ended up being from his company, and hurriedly went back.

 

Xie Ning is different from him; Yan Xi’s family background is well-off, but his individual capability is also strong.
After graduating, he started his own business and opened a game company, which can be considered a small achievement.

 

The streets were too cold, so Xie Ning walked into a shop instead.
He regretted not wearing a couple more layers when coming out.

 

After wandering a couple laps, he finally stopped in front of a claw machine.

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There was already someone in front of the claw machine, with their slender hands cupping the joystick.
Xie Ning noticed that his sleeve cuffs and watch were not something normal people could afford.

 

He didn’t know how many coins the person had already put in, but he didn’t get it a single time.
Angry, he kicked the claw machine once, complaining, “What is this?”

 

Xie Ning couldn’t help laughing once.

 

Hearing the laughter, he turned and glanced at Xie Ning.
“What are you laughing at?”

 

Xie Ning couldn’t clearly see what he looked like, mainly because half his face was covered with a warm-looking scarf.

 

Xie Ning was a little envious.

 

Seeing that Xie Ning didn’t say anything, he backed up to give him some room.
“You try to get it.”

 

Xie Ning shook his head.
“I don’t have any coins.”

 

He said impatiently, “I do.”

 

Xie Ning was still hesitating, but he pulled Xie Ning to the front of the claw machine.
“If you can’t grab it, I’ll eat the loss.
If you grab a plushie, then it’s yours.
That’s okay, right?”