CHAPTER 18

Panic was inevitable, because Ha Yue had never seen such an imperious, overbearing Xue Jing.

She had never heard him swear. Even in the most infuriating situations, like when someone spilled oil all over him in the cafeteria, he remained polite and would even soothe the emotions of the person who caused the trouble.

Her first love, her boyfriend, had been like the moon hanging in the night sky, like dew on a lotus leaf, the embodiment of all that was gentle and kind in the world. His nature was pure and transparent.

But now, the person before her, this “transparent” figure, was not just without a trace of warmth. He was like a judge holding vermilion ink, so intensely detailed in his judgment, every stroke seemingly written with the intent to mark her death.

How could this be?

Xue Jing was such a promising young man, living in the glory of realizing his dreams. He had a future full of possibilities in his hands, so much to hold and squander. What was she, at most? A sugar-free sweet drink that had been spilled by accident? How could he still hold a grudge from four years ago?

Her throat was dry, and her voice sounded like an old hinge that hadn’t been oiled in years, “I really do need to apologize… You don’t have to accept it… but...” But she couldn’t allow her apology to be doubted as just a game.

Before she could finish, Xue Jing once again seized the opportunity to interrupt her.

“Don’t try to pin this on me. Of course I can accept your apology, but an apology has to be somewhat sincere. You listen to yourself—are you being sincere? Do I really seem as good, perfect, kind, and talented as you say? Am I such a high-performing stock? How could you bear to break up with me?”

“I’m foolish, I don’t quite understand, could you explain it to me?”

The frequent use of the word “you” didn’t make Ha Yue feel respected. On the contrary, the emotional drawer she had tried to close in the hotpot restaurant had been forcefully yanked open again, unleashing a new storm.

Xue Jing was certainly not foolish, but his intelligence had never been so overtly sharp.

Ha Yue felt a wave of panic, shortness of breath, her heart pounding in her chest from the tension, so loudly that it made her ears ring.

“Oh, you’re not going to say anything now?” Xue Jing straightened up, standing there with no hint of kindness on his face, like a complete bad seed.

His mind was clear, but it was weighed down by a pain that had been suppressed for too long.

People are animals too. When the pain becomes unbearable, it triggers deep-rooted flaws in one’s nature.

Xue Jing knew that as a gentleman, for the sake of decorum, dignity, and the rules of how men and women should interact, he shouldn’t continue, but he did. Like a mad dog, he couldn’t control his urge to use his mastery of words to hurt her. He wanted to repay her for how she had hurt him years ago, double-fold.

No one is really always calm. When he was in school, to win Ha Yue’s favor, didn’t he fake being tired too? Thinking step by step, second-guessing everything, like a professional chess player contemplating every move?

Because he loved her so much, he was willing to be a fool, to abandon all the tricks and deceit he’d learned in life. He gave her his heart, his most precious thing, not for her to trample on it, but to cherish.

“Tch, you spoke so smoothly just now. Now you can’t get the words out? Can’t explain yourself anymore, right?”

Xue Jing nodded, like a patient teacher.

“I’ll help you explain. Yes, I am great, but I’m not the person you were looking for. From the very beginning, right? Of course, you weren’t truly into me. I admit that.”

“You’re not really materialistic either. You just knew all along that I was a short-term plaything in your life, so once I was used up and your pride was hurt, you couldn’t wait to throw me away like trash.”

“Was graduation your personal line for cutting losses?”

“Everyone plays around, right? If you’d made it clear from the start, I wouldn’t have minded. But you shouldn’t have kept up the illusion that you wanted a future with me, right?”

“Stop pretending. Tell me honestly—did you feel sad after we broke up? You only felt relieved, didn’t you? No more lies, no more fear. Even this half-hearted apology is just for the same purpose.”

“You only care about making yourself feel better, right? Did you ever think about me?”

“Ha Yue, an apology is to make up for the other person, not to make yourself feel good. Do you understand?”

Xue Jing didn’t know if Ha Yue understood his outburst, but he knew his words had surely hurt her too. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have been trembling all over while he spoke, staring at him with a mixture of confusion and horror, as though looking at a pervert.

Yes, she should be afraid of him.

This was him, full of thorns, a person who repaid every wrong in kind. She should have been afraid of him long ago—otherwise, how could she have treated him that way?

A broken mirror is still a broken mirror. It’s better to break it even more, shattering it thoroughly.

Stop longing for the past; it was all fake, an illusion. Stop looking toward the future; it’s stagnant water, without hope.

But even with all the harm he had thrown back at her, the pain inside Xue Jing didn’t lessen. After the blood boiled, all that was left was a silence of sorrow, and sorrow, to some extent, really hurts more than a dead heart.

Ha Yue ended his first love, and he ended her lingering feelings.

After this meeting, they had probably been stripped of the right to even think about each other, right?

That’s fine. Ha Yue had started to loathe him too, just like how, over the past four years, he had frowned every time he thought of her. Now, she probably thought even responding to him was unnecessary, so she had stopped talking?

There was no need for it. It was utterly pointless. How many years had it been since their breakup?

They were adults, and still, the encounter was this ugly. What was the difference between people and dogs?

Xue Jing stopped looking at her. He didn’t want to look anymore. If he kept looking, he might end up doing something worse, something morally reprehensible. So he turned around to find an empty cab for Ha Yue.

At the end of the street, a green light suddenly flashed. He quickly raised his tense right hand.

A blue-and-yellow taxi turned in the middle of the road, and just when Xue Jing thought their miserable relationship had finally reached its end, Ha Yue, standing behind him, suddenly asked in a delicate voice, “Then tell me, how should I make up for it to be sincere?”

It was hard to tell if it was pure revenge, or if she truly couldn’t let go despite reaching a dead end, or maybe both emotions stemmed from the same reason.

The taxi had already stopped beside them, but in the next moment, Xue Jing turned back and casually took Ha Yue’s hand.

As their fingers intertwined, his fingertips brushed against the thin calluses on her palm. The touch of her skin and bones was so familiar that an electric current shot straight to his soul.

Ha Yue had become thinner.

She had always been slim in her early twenties, with a bit of baby fat, but now, her hands were like thin layers of skin, almost like a bird’s beak, and holding them made him feel a sharp sensation.

His heart softened, and his whole body grew anxious.

He was in a hurry, afraid that if he didn’t act tonight, he would regret it. Without giving Ha Yue a moment to hesitate, he held her with his left hand and, with his right, wrapped it around her shoulder.

Ha Yue’s body was soft, tender, and warm, allowing him to hold her, embrace her, press her close without any resistance in the cold wind.

A kiss would heat up, and her body quickly became hot, including the most important parts.

After being alone for so long, emotions had overflowed, and Xue Jing had dreamed of such moments over the years. But in his dreams, Ha Yue always acted like a hedgehog with all her weapons raised, fighting him off desperately.

She wouldn’t smile at him. She wouldn’t give him a pleasant response. She would just avoid him, screaming and using her sharp teeth to curse at him, cursing until it was unbearably filthy, and then biting his flesh.

In his dreams, it was hard for him to release without hurting her.

But this time, it wasn’t a dream. Ha Yue was already past twenty, no makeup, her brows lowered, lips pressed together, looking calm and obedient. The aura around her had a strange composure, no longer as fragile as before.

This heavy and resolute composure annoyed him. He wanted to tear it apart and scatter it everywhere.

So, with no hesitation, he walked toward the hotel, his tone still deliberately cold and indifferent, “Alright, you want to come up? You know, after dinner, exes always need to do something, right? Otherwise, why would you ask me out?”

“You don’t understand how to make up for me, do you? Let me teach you.”

Carpets, spotlights, and the golden decorative paintings flashing in his peripheral vision.

The old-fashioned furnishings in the hotel formed a bizarre kaleidoscope of colors and shapes.

From the moment Ha Yue saw Xue Jing’s hand when he hailed the cab, she began to feel unsteady, and now that scarred wrist was just a few inches from her eyes, swaying lightly with each step he took. It was like a magician’s watch used to hypnotize the audience, pulling her back to that sweat-soaked and restless graduation season.

The uneven scar on Xue Jing’s wrist was not naturally formed, nor was it caused by any accident. It was an ugly tooth mark she had left.

After suggesting the breakup, Ha Yue, aside from moving out, quickly blocked all of Xue Jing’s contact information, fleeing in the dead of night to avoid his questions and entanglements, even changing her job.

Xue Jing didn’t slander her; he was the first to admit that after the breakup, she did feel a sense of relief.

Ha Yue herself didn’t realize just how ruthless she could be when making a decision. The bone-cutting knife swung fast—though emotions had entangled her like a cocoon, cutting him also inevitably tore at herself. Yet the feeling of losing Xue Jing seemed to form a grand, sweeping emptiness.

Only the numbness of excessive blood loss, without any pain.

Perhaps this was what Xue Jing meant: from the very beginning, she had put a time limit on their first love, and when disaster struck, she was wearing a life vest she had never taken off.

Moreover, she was familiar with the numbness of losing someone she loved. As a child, she had loved Ha Jian Guo, someone she had attached herself to before even understanding love. But after her father passed away, she had endured the same numbness. She hadn’t long held onto anything precious, so the loss of unattainable desires couldn’t be called a pain that made one wish for death.

Sadness is a private hell designed for good men and women by heaven.

She was neither good nor believing.

So, was she truly heartbroken over the breakup?

If tears and blood were the measures of mourning...

She indeed never shed a single tear for Xue Jing after their breakup.

Unlike Xue Jing, who not only shed tears but also spilled blood everywhere.