Chapter 61#

The terrain of Yang City was flat, and snowy days were always windy.

In the whistling wind, the fine snow on the ground was slightly swirled, looking like rolling white sand. The hem of Zhao Rong’s scarf swayed, mirroring his heart at this moment.

He still hadn’t managed to remain calm regarding the past misunderstandings. Hadn’t his earlier loss of composure in front of Qiao Nanqi been precisely because he still harbored resentment?

Zhao Rong’s expression remained unchanged, but his heart was somewhat boiling.

Boiling in this cold.

Those words just now were spoken to Qiao Nanqi, but they were also spoken to himself.

You’ve left, Zhao Rong.

It took you so long to take a step, and now you’ve already walked away.

Zhao Rong, don’t soften your heart.

He told himself this.

Qiao Nanqi, listening to his words, stood there in a daze.

The man looked at him, seemingly gritting his teeth hard to endure something. Out of the corner of his eye, Zhao Rong glimpsed Qiao Nanqi’s clenched fists and looked at the man’s reddened eyes, seemingly understanding something.

Is Qiao Nanqi… holding back from crying out loud?

Perhaps Qiao Nanqi had unintentionally untied a knot in his heart that he didn’t even know existed. After the extreme endurance just now, what remained for Zhao Rong was only some sighs, regrets, and helplessness.

Things have come to this…

Things have come to this.

He said to Qiao Nanqi: “Senior and I just set the wedding date yesterday, it’s in half a month. If you don’t mind, I’ll send you an invitation. Let’s just treat those past things as memories left from an immature time. Actually, there’s no deep-seated hatred between us. If you let go in the future, we can occasionally drop by and chat.”

“If you meet another person who makes your heart move, I will likewise come to your wedding with blessings.”

Qiao Nanqi seemed on the verge of collapse. He opened his mouth, wanting to say many things, but not knowing how to say them.

After struggling, like a drowning person reaching out for help on a surging sea, he asked: “Do you not love me anymore?”

Zhao Rong turned his head away.

This question was truly difficult to answer.

He couldn’t bring himself to tell such a lie face-to-face, but this marriage contract was also an opportunity for him to cut off the past. If he told the truth or turned back at this moment, there would always be a thorn in his heart, because he himself had only just realized he hadn’t thought things through clearly.

He was silent.

His silence, to Qiao Nanqi, seemed like an admission.

Qiao Nanqi thought of those two people who were similar to Lu Xingping in some ways.

Even similar people could make Zhao Rong look at them differently…

Wanting to grasp the last straw, he said word by word: “Then do you love Lu Xingping?”

This was another question Zhao Rong didn’t want to answer.

Zhao Rong lowered his eyes, lifted his foot, and kicked the snow beneath him, turning the smooth snow into a tangled mess.

He said: “You don’t seem to have the standing to ask me this question right now.”

This sentence indeed blocked Qiao Nanqi’s remaining words.

“There are still many things to be busy with for the wedding, I’m going back,” he simply said. “You should go back too, it’s cold outside.”

“I’m not afraid of the cold,” the other party blurted out.

“I am.”

Qiao Nanqi grabbed his hand and led him outward.

“What are you doing!?”

The man didn’t speak.

His strength had always been much greater than Zhao Rong’s, and the snow was so soft it left one with nowhere to gain traction. Caught off guard, Zhao Rong was pulled by him toward the parking area.

He struggled, intending to speak and stop him, but perhaps because the aura Qiao Nanqi was emitting at this moment was too terrifying, as if he might go crazy at any time, he momentarily didn’t know what to say.

Qiao Nanqi pulled him to the car, opened the door with one hand, and pulled Zhao Rong into the back seat with the other.

Zhao Rong remembered what happened the last time he went to Qiao Nanqi’s company. He suddenly began to struggle forcefully to break free from the man’s grip, standing by the car door, unwilling to enter.

“What exactly do you want to do?”

“I just want to have a good talk with you, okay?” Qiao Nanqi’s tone was almost gentle, but his eyes were deep and somber, like a madman’s. “I won’t do anything, I don’t dare to do anything. Believe me, I really don’t dare anymore.”

He had once been so proud, yet now he repeatedly used the phrase “don’t dare.”

“It’s just cold outside, I’m afraid you’ll get chilled.”

The tone of this sentence was very light and slow.

Mad gentleness.

Zhao Rong was stunned.

The space inside the car was small, and in his eyes, only Qiao Nanqi’s figure was reflected at this moment.

Qiao Nanqi had already pulled him to sit down, closed the car door, and turned on the heater.

The warm air slowly spread out. The car window glass met the cold air outside, weaving a layer of hazy mist, as if separating them from everything outside.

Zhao Rong’s hands, which had been somewhat chilled, gradually regained warmth.

He hadn’t expected Qiao Nanqi to be like this, and for a moment, he didn’t get out of the car.

He sat in the back seat with Qiao Nanqi and said in a low voice: “If what you want to say are those words we’ve gone over many times, there’s really no need.”

“I’m getting married,” he said this to Qiao Nanqi for the first time face-to-face, solemnly. “Qiao Nanqi, I’m getting married.”

“In just half a month.”

Zhao Rong paused, suddenly frightened by Qiao Nanqi’s gaze.

The man’s eyes were slightly red, with haggard bloodshot veins appearing. He stared straight at him, not deep like before, but as if he wanted to devour him whole.

But he had to finish speaking.

His Adam’s apple moved slightly, and he emphasized his tone.

“—Other matters have no meaning anymore.”

“There is! There is meaning,” Qiao Nanqi almost immediately countered him. “We’ve only been broken up for a few months, and you’ve only been familiar with Lu Xingping for such a short time. How could you really have fallen in love with him? Or… or you just haven’t thought things through clearly. I want to explain to you, give me a chance to explain, okay?”

He looked at Zhao Rong with cautious humility, seemingly afraid of missing a single expression of displeasure or unwillingness from Zhao Rong.

Yet he was also like a crouching beast, as if waiting for a prey’s resistance. Once the prey struggled before him, he would suddenly pounce and completely exhaust it.

Zhao Rong felt his heart skip a few panicked beats.

He tightened his coat, lowered his head, and buried his chin in his scarf, wrapping himself in a sense of security on the fairly spacious back seat.

He said: “Fine, speak.”

Perhaps after speaking, the obsession would be gone.

Qiao Nanqi smiled.

This was his first smile of the day, and the slight redness at the corners of his eyes hadn’t even dissipated.

Afraid Zhao Rong would regret it, he said eagerly: “It really isn’t a whim, nor is it driven by a desire to win. Zhao Rong, after you left, I encountered many things and learned many things.”

He wanted to mention the litter of cats first, but since he had added Zhao Rong using the identity of a pet shop employee, he had to suppress that matter for now.

“I saw the letters you sent me in the past; I’ve finished reading every single one. I didn’t intentionally not read them; I just never thought there would be anything there. I only recently pried open the mailbox to look.”

Hearing the word “letters,” Zhao Rong’s eyes trembled slightly.

Since they got together, whenever he had the thought of chatting with Qiao Nanqi, Qiao Nanqi was always indifferent, even directly interrupting him. He had already begun to give up on speaking out.

To the point that now, he thought those things would be buried in the past forever.

He hadn’t expected Qiao Nanqi to see them after all.

At a time when he shouldn’t have seen them.

He said: “Back then… I just wanted to repay you, I didn’t mean anything else.”

“I know,” Qiao Nanqi wanted to say more than just that. “But I also learned a lot more. I know how you lived in the Chen family, and I know how difficult it was for you to sign the marriage agreement with me.”

“I once had a most difficult time, in university. Someone secretly tucked book lists into my books and secretly accompanied me through that period. I always thought that person was Lu Xingping, but only later did I learn…”

Zhao Rong blinked slowly.

—So Qiao Nanqi knew about this too.

So Qiao Nanqi’s extra bit of specialness toward Lu Xingping was because of this.

So by a twist of fate, this line of the “white moonlight” that didn’t belong to the original work was actually added by him, the variable.

“I was once too guarded, but I thought too little. I’ve always loved you. The past was all my fault, I already know I was wrong. I won’t ever fail to cherish you again, and I won’t ever wrong you again.”

“You loved me for so many years, and I love you too. We are in love with each other.”

He finally lowered his head and folded all his pride: “Zhao Rong, we can still continue. I beg you, I’m begging you, I really beg you, don’t get married, okay?”

If pleading and humility could make Zhao Rong change his mind, he would simply thank the heavens for creating those two words.

Unfortunately, Zhao Rong still didn’t react.

Qiao Nanqi just looked at Zhao Rong, listening to the faint sound of the wind outside and the rumbling of the heater in the car.

He watched the person he was pleading with slowly shake his head.

“Yes, you are very vigilant and guarded. If I had told you these things instead of you seeing them yourself, you would only have thought I had ulterior motives.”

“Now that you know everything, you are very moved, so you want me to go back.”

Zhao Rong thought, perhaps he should be thankful for his momentary softening of heart just now that made him sit down and listen to these words.

Amidst the bitterness, he was actually somewhat gratified.

At least it let him know that those years of being like a moth to a flame were not truly meaningless.

It also let him know what kind of misunderstanding those things about Lu Xingping, which he had always been so concerned about, really were.

At least they were just a series of unfortunate twists and turns, just a mismatch, not a case of mutual self-degradation.

But because of precisely that, his softening of heart only flashed for a moment.

Now that Qiao Nanqi knew these things, it only made the man confuse his feelings even more.

Being moved by one person’s goodness toward another is, after all, different from loving someone. Before knowing these things, Qiao Nanqi’s persistence might have more likely come from frustration. After knowing these things, perhaps what Qiao Nanqi didn’t want to give up was Zhao Rong’s devotion.

He was getting married, and for Qiao Nanqi, this event was like an endpoint declaring failure, making it even harder for Qiao Nanqi to distinguish those feelings.

Instead, Zhao Rong increasingly felt that the decision to fulfill the marriage contract with Lu Xingping was right.

No matter what kind of obsession it was, it would eventually disappear after he married Lu Xingping, his lifelong friend.

Distinguishing between love and obsession is both difficult and easy.

Once the target of obsession is gone, if there is still love in the heart, then it is love.

If this man’s stubbornness still hasn’t disappeared…

It likely won’t.

The man before him was on the verge of losing control. He suppressed his emotions as much as possible and said calmly: “Actually, even if I went back with you, I couldn’t be the same as before. But you very likely just love the old me, the one who loved you.”

“Do you know? These few days when I see you, I occasionally wonder—was I also like this back then?”

“Have you ever considered, if I became like the old you in our relationship, would you still be able to love me?”

“I haven’t thought about it, but—”

“Then think about it.” Zhao Rong raised his hand and stopped his words.