Jiang Nuan’s heart skipped a beat.
She struggled to keep a casual “just chatting” expression on her face, but her ears were pricked up.
“I think it’s very precious.” Qi Sui’s gaze rested on the ring of moisture left by spilled liquor on the tabletop. “Because the paper and ink are clearly products of this era, yet inside, it records in detail things from the previous era.”
He paused, then looked up at Jiang Nuan. There was a glint of curiosity in those gentle, warm eyes.
“I found it suspicious, so… I’ve already submitted it to the Federal Central Archives for filing and cataloging.”
Jiang Nuan’s fingertips flinched slightly.
“As for the source,” Qi Sui’s voice came steadily, “it was something I came across by chance when I was wandering through the refugee districts practicing medicine in my early years.”
The refugee districts. Paper and ink from this era. Records of the previous era.
Three pieces of information stacked together, detonating in Jiang Nuan’s mind.
She and Bai Siyuan had grown up in the refugee districts.
Paper and ink from this era meant the writer lived after the apocalypse. But the content was about life before the apocalypse.
Who would, after the apocalypse, meticulously record their life before it?
Unless that person had experienced the world before the apocalypse.
Just like she had.
She wasn’t alone.
In this world that devoured people, someone else was living with memories like hers.
The thought spiraled outward in her mind, ring after ring.
The other person was also a college student like her—after all, college students’ lives were roughly the same.
…Probably?
A warmth that was hard to put into words welled up in Jiang Nuan’s chest. The long-standing loneliness faded by more than half in an instant, and an inexplicable sense of belonging to a kindred spirit quietly crept into her heart.
“I see…” She lowered her eyes, concealing the turmoil churning beneath them. “What a shame. I was hoping to see how people lived before the apocalypse.”
She lifted her glass and took a large gulp.
The strong liquor burned as it went down, stinging her eyes, but the burn was just enough to mask the expression she’d lost control of from the shock.
The Federal Central Archives.
What kind of place was that, exactly?
The tracker on her collar wouldn’t even let her leave the base gates freely.
The trail had gone cold—cut off somewhere she could never reach.
“Drink slower.” Qi Sui’s voice sounded in her ear. A cool hand covered the back of hers, pressing it down. “This liquor has a strong kick.”
Jiang Nuan mumbled a vague “Mm.”
But one thought was etched clearly into her mind: she had to see that handwritten journal.
She took two more sips.
Or maybe three. She couldn’t quite remember anymore.
The room began to spin. The lights softened and blurred, and the voices of Qinian and Qi Sui drifted in and out of hearing.
Jiang Nuan braced herself against the table’s edge, trying to stand.
“I… I think I’ve had a bit too much.” Her tongue wouldn’t cooperate, and her words came out slurred. “I should head back first.”
The moment she stood, her legs gave way beneath her.
The floor seemed to tilt all at once. The ceiling and the walls staggered violently in her field of vision.
Her body tipped sideways, out of control.
She didn’t hit the ground.
A scorching-hot arm caught her around the waist from behind.
Qinian’s reflexes were too fast for someone who’d been drinking—his arm was hard, his temperature fierce, the line of his muscle pressing into her side through the thin fabric of his tank top.
He pulled her back in a single motion, and Jiang Nuan’s back collided with his solid, burning chest.
His heartbeat traveled through her spine—strong and steady.
“Where are you going?” Qinian’s low, raspy voice dropped from above her head. “You can’t even walk straight, and you’re still trying to tough it out.”
He pulled her back onto the sofa.
At the same time, Qi Sui reached over and wrapped an arm around her shoulder from the other side.
Qi Sui’s fingers were cool, pressing against her shoulder through her thin clothing.
“If you’re drunk, rest here for a while,” he said, a hint of a smile in his voice. “Go back once you’ve sobered up.”
Jiang Nuan was pressed down onto the couch between the two of them, unable to move.
Her waist was locked firmly in Qinian’s grip—that hand radiated intense heat, five fingers curled around, palm flat against her side, so hot it made her flinch.
“Running off?”
Qinian’s hoarse voice murmured next to her ear, his breath spilling all over the hollow of her neck.
The air brushing over her skin made her heart skip a beat.
His lips nearly grazed her earlobe, his voice carrying amusement, dropped low, low, low.
Then—the next second.
Without any warning, an extremely light kiss landed on the skin of her neck.
Jiang Nuan froze entirely.
That patch of skin burned as if struck by a spark, making every hair on her body stand on end.
Instinctively, she tried to dodge to the other side.
But the other side was Qi Sui.
A long, slender hand—cool to the touch—gently cupped her cheek.
His fingers were chilly and dry against her flushed, liquor-warmed skin, a stark contrast in temperatures.
His thumb slowly traced away the trace of liquor beading at the corner of her lips.
The motion was almost impossibly gentle.
“Don’t run.”
His voice was almost impossibly gentle too.
But his eyes weren’t.
Those eyes that were always curved in a smile, right now, in the warm amber light, were deep and terrifying. Like a pool of water with no visible bottom—calm on the surface, but with undercurrents churning violently below.
Jiang Nuan’s breath caught in her throat.
It had been Qinian who kissed her.
Yet the way Qi Sui was looking at her made it seem like he had felt it too.
Because he had felt it.
The softness and the trembling Qinian had felt when his lips pressed against the skin of her neck were being transmitted, with perfect fidelity, into Qi Sui’s senses at this very moment.
And the temperature and texture Qi Sui felt through his fingertips on her lips—Qinian could feel that as well.
Jiang Nuan’s breathing was completely thrown off now.
“You two…” Her voice trembled. The alcohol had dulled her reactions. “You’ve had too much.”
“We haven’t.” Qinian’s voice was muffled against the side of her neck. “I’m perfectly clear-headed.”
There was a beat of silence.
“Do you know what I was thinking before I died on the White Whale?”
Jiang Nuan shook her head.
“I was thinking,” Qinian’s lips grazed her skin with each word, “that I hadn’t gotten enough of kissing her yet. What a damn loss.”
“…Can you be normal for once?” Her voice came out hoarse and soft, completely lacking any authority.
Qinian laughed. The laughter rumbled through his chest and traveled through her back. “When have I ever been normal?”
Qi Sui’s thumb still lingered at the corner of her mouth.
“Nuannuan,”
he gazed at her with tenderness, leaning in slightly, and placed an extremely light kiss on her forehead.
Cool—a temperature utterly different from Qinian’s.
“If anything happens, you have to tell us.”
A pause.
“Don’t carry it all alone.”
“We survived that desperate situation together. We’re the closest people in each other’s lives now.”
Jiang Nuan’s nose suddenly stung.
She bit her lower lip hard, but the image of Qi Sui charging into the white fog on the White Whale still surged up unbidden, her eyes burning with pre-tears.
She blinked forcefully, pushing the tears back, and spoke in a low, stuffy voice.
“…I know.”
Qinian’s arm around her waist tightened further.
Jiang Nuan closed her eyes.
Alcohol and exhaustion began to blur her consciousness.
Qi Sui’s fingers threaded through her hair, the motion as gentle as stroking a cat.
“Relax,” he whispered near her ear.
The night stretched long, and no one let go.
