After a burst of rustling from the other end of the line, a little girl's cheerful voice struck straight through the microphone into his heart. It was soft and sweet, and perhaps because her mouth was pressed right against the phone, her breathing sounded heavy.
The next moment, that spoiled tone was accompanied by a grievance that made no attempt at concealment: "I miss you, big brother! When is big brother coming to see Mihua?"
"Big brother misses Mihua, too," Fang Qingze said, sandwiching the phone between his head and shoulder while stuffing his textbooks into his backpack. He kept his voice as gentle as he could. "But big brother hasn't had time lately. However, big brother promises you: as long as Mihua listens to Auntie Wang, eats her meals nicely, and goes to sleep on time, big brother will come back to see you very soon, okay?"
"Yay! Mihua is being super good!" Hearing Fang Qingze's words, Mihua was overjoyed, her soft, sweet voice sounding as if it were right next to his ear.
"Are you really being good?" Fang Qingze asked with a smile.
"Uh-huh, rilly!"
"Then... Auntie Wang told Mihua to go to sleep, so why isn't Mihua sleeping?"
"I—I just wanted to talk to big brother! I really do listen to Mama Wang normally, and I eat all my meals and go to bed on time every day! Big brother has to believe me!"
Fang Qingze chuckled softly. "All right, I believe Mihua. But it's too late now, Mihua needs to go to sleep. Give the phone back to Mama Wang, okay?"
"Ah?" Mihua's tone dropped noticeably. "But I still want to talk to big brother more!"
Auntie Wang rarely called Fang Qingze. On the one hand, she was very busy with too many children in the orphanage to look after; on the other hand, she didn't want to disturb Fang Qingze.
"No, it's already too late. Didn't you just promise big brother that you'd be a good girl?"
"Mm..."
It took Fang Qingze quite a while to comfort Mihua and get her to go to sleep. After saying goodnight to Auntie Wang, he hung up the phone.
He picked up the wooden photo frame from the desk. Inside the colorful photograph were more than ten people—one man and two women, three middle-aged adults sitting on stools, surrounded by a dozen children. This was the group photo Fang Qingze had taken before leaving the orphanage last year.
Fang Qingze was the oldest and tallest among the children. He stood in the back holding Mihua, who was only four and a half years old. Mihua was wearing a white floral little dress and small red leather shoes, with her hair in braids, her arms wrapped around Fang Qingze's neck, and a bright smile on her little face.
The other children ranged in age from six to twelve. Among them, some had physical deformities and awkward postures; others rolled their eyes back with their mouths hanging open uncontrollably, drooling.
As for the two children with normal facial expressions, one little boy had empty, flapping sleeves on his long-sleeved shirt, while the other little girl had her trouser legs tied up below the knees and was sitting on Auntie Wang's lap...
It seemed that among this group of children, Fang Qingze and Mihua were the odd ones out; at least from their appearance, they had no physical defects whatsoever.
Setting down the photo frame, Fang Qingze turned off the light and got into bed. He had lied to Auntie Wang—he had forgotten his birthday today, and he certainly hadn't bought a cake.
In fact, even if he had remembered, he wouldn't have gone to buy one; he didn't want to celebrate his birthday anyway.
He opened the messaging app and received the red packet from Auntie Wang, which was labeled "Happy Birthday." Looking at the numbers that popped up, Fang Qingze drew a sharp breath.
"Two thousand..." This was the maximum amount for a single red packet. Auntie Wang seemed to be expressing her dissatisfaction with Fang Qingze's refusal of those other red packets in this manner.
"Mihua is already asleep, A-ze, you should get to sleep early too." As if she had been waiting for Fang Qingze's message, the very next second after he accepted the red packet, a message came through.
"Okay, goodnight, Auntie Wang."
Rubbing the bridge of his nose, Fang Qingze transferred the two thousand given by Auntie Wang into a bank card he rarely used.
Heh, Fang Qingze suddenly chuckled. You didn't expect that, did you, Auntie Wang? Why couldn't *I* be the kind-hearted philanthropist in society?
I'll just anonymously transfer it back to you in a couple of days.
After scrolling through some arguments among members of his gaming group, drowsiness washed over him. Fang Qingze long-pressed each chat window and deleted them.
This was a personal habit of his; if there were still chat boxes left before going to sleep, he would feel thoroughly uncomfortable all over.
However, a familiar avatar and an unaccepted red packet made his gesture pause.
A small clock crossed by a diagonal line in the bottom right corner meant that this was someone whose message notifications he had blocked.
Time: October 26th, 0:00.
"Little brother, happy birthday!"
"Actually, big sister knows you blocked big sister, so I sent you a red packet."
"I didn't mean to disturb you, I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday."
"Also, the red packet... can you accept it?"
Scrolling down the chat interface, dozens of messages generated within the past two months all came from the other person, while Fang Qingze had given no reply whatsoever.
"She really is persistent!" Fang Qingze frowned, feeling somewhat annoyed.
"Big sister? Ha, the nerve of her!" With a sneer, Fang Qingze deleted the chat box, turned off his phone, and the room plunged into pitch darkness.
...
Early the next morning, Fang Qingze woke up feeling stifled with heat.
"So hot!"
"That's strange, why is it so hot today? It's almost November, what kind of crazy weather is this?"
He jerked the quilt off, and a wave of heat instantly billowed up. He checked his phone:
10°C, 8–17°C, overcast turning to light rain.
?
Fang Qingze's face was a mask of question marks. How could 10°C feel this hot? Did the Federation's meteorological satellites break down again? What utter trash.
Looking up, the air conditioner wasn't even plugged in; there was completely no way it had been set to heating.
"I can't take this!" Fang Qingze felt as though he had been placed on a grill, his entire body burning up.
Sliping into his slippers, he pattered rapidly into the bathroom. Cold water splashed down over his face and body, and the dry heat was instantly suppressed.
The young man let out a groan, his body shivering slightly as he closed his eyes in relief. Then, a sudden transformation occurred.
The moment he closed his eyes, Fang Qingze felt the ground beneath him suddenly vanish into emptiness. His body lost its weight, followed immediately by a sensation of falling.
Oh no, I'm not going to plunge headfirst into the toilet bowl, am I?
Before fear could spread, his consciousness instantly sank into darkness, and his body became paralyzed.
After "falling" for a few seconds, a bright light suddenly pierced his eyelids. Fang Qingze snapped his eyes open, and everything in his vision was a sea of crimson.
As his focus adjusted, Fang Qingze saw a ball of crimson-colored spherical flames directly in front of him. Suspended right above the flames was a black saber over a meter long, its blade straight and pointing toward the fireball.
Inside the fireball, a wisp of flame spilled out every few seconds. After moving randomly through the air in a circle, it merged into the black saber. The flame instantly swept across every part of the blade before condensing back into a flame and dropping back into the fireball...
Fang Qingze stared at this bizarre sight, his mind completely blank.
Although he didn't understand what was happening, he had no intention of sitting ducks; he prepared to step forward and take a look. In the crimson space, there was no footing; he drifted forward like a swimmer in water. With a gentle kick of his legs, Fang Qingze floated slowly toward the flames and the black saber.
As Fang Qingze drew closer, the black saber suddenly began to vibrate violently, and the flames surged fiercely, as if waiting for an old friend keeping an appointment. The fireball dissolved and wrapped around the blade of the black saber, the tip flipping over to point directly at Fang Qingze.
Amidst Fang Qingze's drastically changing expression, the black saber shot forward like a spring, piercing straight toward the center of his brow.
"Damn it!" Old friend my ass—this thing sees an archenemy and wants me dead!
With zero defense, Fang Qingze was pierced right between the eyebrows by the oncoming black saber at extreme speed.
Fang Qingze, deceased...