The world in front of him was bright.
Lin Jue realized that he was standing in the corridor of his dormitory, like he had been when the first game began. Only instead of endless darkness outside the window, there was bright sunshine.
This warm light, this fresh air, this familiar everything… Like an animal waking from hibernation, his frozen blood flowing through his body as his heartbeat grew faster, he felt overjoyed by this long-overdue spring.
He was really back?!
The sound of girlish laughter came from behind the door, followed by the creak of an opening door. Lin Jue turned around, right into the shocked face of a girl in pyjamas. “AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
With this scream, half the doors in the corridor opened. Girls all poked out their heads one after the other and gave disgusted looks at Lin Jue standing in the corridor of the girls’ dormitory.
“Which class are you from? This is the girls’ dorms!”
“Boys aren’t allowed in the girls’ dorms.”
“Where is the housekeeping auntie? A boy got in!”
Their chirping voices scared Lin Jue into a sprint, making him look even more like a pervert caught in action. But Lin Jue had no time to deal with it- all he could do was keep running despite the terrified faces of the girls in the stairwell.
Lin Jue sprinted that way all the way to the ground floor, and was about to rush out of the building without looking back when a figure clad in a white shirt standing outside the dorm doors made him slow his footsteps.
That morning sun, that light breeze, the way others turned to look at him, they all easily brought tears to his eyes.
The long and cruel nightmare finally ended at that moment. He finally returned from the cold night to a world under the light of the sun.
This excited, elated feeling made Lin Jue’s eyes shine. He couldn’t wait and called out “Xuezhang!” and threw himself onto Song Hanzhang, wanting to wrap all of his limbs around him. The warmth of life and the breath on the back of his neck settled Lin Jue’s heart back into his chest. No, or maybe this heart had been left with Song Hanzhang long ago.
It had once been sealed in hell with Song Hanzhang’s death and had once started beating after he came back to life.
The two holding tightly onto each other caused some expected side-eyes from the passing girls, especially since they couldn’t understand why the two gays were hugging each other outside the girls’ dormitories.
When Lin Jue calmed down a little and remembered that he was in public; he let go with embarrassment. The plans that had been worked out long ago came back to his mind; he looked down at his shoes and was as restless as a young boy asking his crush out for the first time. “Xuezhang? Do you want to go watch a movie?”
“…Which one?” Song Hanzhang’s gaze moved from Lin Jue’s face to the posters on the walls, then stayed a little longer on the times on the posters.
“The one that was really popular recently, it should be still showing.” Lin Jue still remembered that the day he entered the game, he had already purchased the tickets online and was prepared to go watch it the next day with his roommates, but his plans had been delayed for a week.
Song Hanzhang knew Lin Jue still hadn’t figured it out yet…
So he stared intently at Lin Jue, not wanting to miss out on the surprise that was sure to come. Calmly, he said, “The movie you’re talking about has stopped showing for ten years.”
“Ah? Ah?? Ah?! Ten years? Ah, oh, ohhhhh, yes, it’s 2022 now, 2022.” Lin Jue finally understood why the dormitory he lived in before was now the girl’s dorms, and why everything looked familiar yet a little strange. It turned out while they were trapped in the game, ten years of time had quietly slipped by. When he finally got it through his head, he panicked again. “Ah, it’s 2022! My degree!!! I tried so hard to get into this school!!!”
“Let’s walk as we talk.” Song Hanzhang had enjoyed enough of Lin Jue’s expression transitioning from confusion to horror, and decided to take the terrified rabbit away to comfort him.
Lin Jue followed him obediently, the morning sun warming up his body. Suddenly realizing the jump from 2012 to 2022, he felt a little anxious, staring nervously at the students around him, fearing that something major had changed in the past ten years that would capture this confused time traveler on the spot.
Looking at Lin Jue’s tense and nervous face, Song Hanzhang called his name and was immediately gazed upon by those dark eyes.
“There’s no need to stress, it’s all in the past,” Song Hanzhang said and reached his right hand to Lin Jue.
Lin Jue looked down at his hand. Song Hanzhang’s fingers were slender and defined, but his palm was empty. He didn’t quite understand what he was meant to be looking at.
Song Hanzhang’s eyes softened into a rare smile. He simply took Lin Jue’s hand and led him forwards along the road flanked by balsam fir trees.
Held by Song Hanzhang, somehow, Lin Jue’s anxiety slowly calmed down. That sensitivity and aggression that was honed in the dark jungle slowly returned to the dark parts of his soul under the sunlight, and the slumbering humanity that belonged to him quickly revived. The hustle around him no longer unnerved Lin Jue, but rather made him feel cheerful. He even gathered courage and dug his fingers into Song Hanzhang’s, and interlocked their fingers.
They passed the busy canteen, their tightly held hands making the passing girls look back frequently. Lin Jue glared back without any chivalry, yet the girls only giggled and whispered to each other, not afraid of him at all.
Lin Jue was a little put out. The “Lin Jue” from a few hours ago that could kill his way through anything was already like a dream. He didn’t even know if he could still calmly spear through a living human if he was given a weapon.
“Do you have any plans for the future?” Song Hanzhang suddenly asked.
Still immersed in the bloody fights from not long ago, Lin Jue shook his head violently, an even deeper sense of frustration rising up. He had disappeared for ten years, wouldn’t it be terrifying if he suddenly appeared in front of his relatives and friends? He didn’t even know how to tell his parents about this – they probably thought something had happened to him.
Song Hanzhang saw through his worries. “It’s best to not be in contact with those that you knew before, but you should go home. At least let your parents know that you’re alive. They love you, they will help hide it for you, but you can’t live with them anymore.”
Lin Jue also understood this reasoning, but his heart still felt heavy at facing this reality. He started to worry about Song Hanzhang; his stepfather died a long time ago, and he didn’t have any relatives left and probably didn’t have many friends… it was as if he was alone in a strange world…
Lin Jue felt his heart ache. “Then what about you? What are you going to do?”
“I plan to go overseas,” Song Hanzhang said, that ability of his to look forward, plan, and make his plan reality in full display. “I don’t have any relatives or friends that would have declared my death, so my personal assets should still be available. The issues of census registration and academic qualifications can all be solved. Compared to being tied down here, it would be best to leave and start a new life.”
Lin Jue let out an ‘ah’, a pang of sourness and reluctance hitting his heart. “Can’t you stay here?”
They had lived through so many hardships, even life and death, and after finally making it out of that death game and returning to reality, they would have to part ways… Just thinking about it made Lin Jue suffocate.
He didn’t want to be away from Song Hanzhang for even a second.
Song Hanzhang shook his head. “In terms of the future, it’s best if we go overseas.”
Lin Jue repeated in a daze, “We?”
Song Hanzhang fell silent and looked at him meaningfully. “You don’t want to go with me?”
That well-hidden flash of danger was ignored completely by Lin Jue in his ecstasy. He was immersed in an uncontrollable excitement and skipped in front of Song Hanzhang, holding his other hand tightly as well, a brilliant smile on his face. “Go, go, go, of course I’ll go with you! Wherever you go, I’ll go!”
Song Hanzhang smiled, the expression decorating his overly cold temperament, gilding him with a vivid layer of humanity. Lin Jue couldn’t look away. The joy that overflowed their hearts quietly illuminated a maple-sweet future for the both of them like this ubiquitous sun.
Vera & Luci Translations 