“Suo Sen, what are you doing? Let him go!”
Yiyi Chen came up with Chongming Yan from a distance, their shadows long as spears on the pavement. Nana Toki had Zhaokang’s arm wrenched behind his back; Chongming’s handsome face darkened like a stormcloud rolling in.
“What am I doing? You blind or just pretending?” Her voice was a blade glinting in sun.
As if she’d let go that easily. She dragged Zhaokang back a few steps like hauling a hooked fish, then snapped her wrist. A playful smile curled like a cat’s tail. “What? Don’t like it? Come hit me.”
System: “...”
Host, could you stop courting hatred like it’s spring rain? You’re cranking this plane’s difficulty up like a madman.
“Let. Him. Go!” Chongming Yan’s words grated like teeth on stone, anger burning like a brazier.
But the effect was a ripple against rock.
“You say ‘let go’ and I just let go? Who even are you?” Her glance was cool as moonlight on ice.
Nana Toki wasn’t about to heed the Protagonist Lord. “And what kind of big deal are you supposed to be? Why should I listen?” Her wrist tightened; Zhaokang howled like a dog stepped on.
Shock flashed across Zhaokang’s face, a lightning fork in a clear sky. He hadn’t expected a sharp-looking girl to move like a coiled snake; he stepped in, and in a heartbeat she had him pinned. It was absurd, like a card trick flipped in his face.
Worse, he hadn’t even seen the move. One blink, and the net was already over him.
Yiyi Chen, though stunned by Nana Toki’s skill, still jabbed forward with words like thrown darts. “Suo Sen! Do you even put Chongming in your eyes anymore?”
“Chongming’s done so much for you. This is how you repay him? And you drag an innocent person into it.” Her meaning was clear as daylight.
But she’d misjudged the wind.
“How I repay him is none of your damn business.” Nana Toki’s tone was cold water on hot iron.
Emotion first—she was bored, an arctic lake—then motion. She shook her head, aloof as a swan gliding past reeds. “As for whether I ‘put Chongming in my eyes’—heh. I don’t even want to look at him.”
“Suo Sen!” Chongming’s face went dark as ink.
“Why are you yelling?” she said, digging a finger in her ear like flicking off dust. “We’re this close—trying to make me deaf?” She didn’t spare the Protagonist Lord a glance, contempt drifting like smoke.
That said, his voice really was loud, like thunder rolling off cliff faces.
System: “... Is that seriously your focus right now?”
“Suo Sen, let Zhaokang go first.” Chongming drew a breath like choking down fire. His smile stayed polite, but veins stood on his forehead like cords, warning everyone he was pacing the cliff-edge of fury.
“I don’t get why you’re all so twitchy. I just put one guy on the ground.” Nana Toki kept Zhaokang’s wrist pinned, brows lifting like a drawn bow. “What, is he a fragile patient who can’t handle a little shock?”
Zhaokang: “...”
Chongming Yan: “...”
“Suo Sen, do you not even recognize Zhaokang anymore?” Chongming’s confusion fluttered like a torn banner. Lately, everything about her—bearing, choices, even clothes—had flipped like seasons changing overnight. It was like she’d become someone else.
He’d thought once Zhaokang got out, the past would line up like footprints in wet sand. In the original memories, Zhaokang met the original host in their first year. Back then, the tightest trio at Tinglan High School was Zhaokang, Chongming Yan, and Suo Sen.
But after Zhaokang went to prison in Mo Yao’s place, the three drifted apart like boats in fog. Chongming had blamed his imprisonment for twisting Nana Toki into what she’d become.
Now that belief cracked like ice.
“Zhaokang, no Zhaokang—who’s got the time to memorize a crowd?” She gave a cold laugh, then shoved the man she’d pinned toward Chongming like tossing back an unwanted catch. She stooped, lifted a white sheet of paper from the ground, and aimed a look at Chongming that cut like wind off a blade. “You’ve got time to worry about others. Maybe worry about the people right beside you.”
“What do you mean?” Chongming frowned, lines carving like knife-cuts.
“What do I mean? Heh.” Nana Toki’s smile at Yiyi Chen was a hooked knife under silk. “Say it out loud and it’s no fun. Figure it out yourself.”
A chill ran up Yiyi Chen’s spine like ants; she tugged Chongming’s sleeve and slipped behind him like a shadow seeking shade.
Heh. Cute.
Nana Toki curled her lip, not bothering to look at the gloom pooling in Yiyi Chen’s eyes. She stepped around the three, leaving like a cloud breaking free of a peak.
“Oh, right.” After a few steps, she paused, hand lifting in a lazy wave, mischief bright as a fox’s grin. “Starting tomorrow, I’m transferring to Diguang. You three—good luck surviving.”
“What?!” Chongming Yan and Yiyi Chen froze, doubt fluttering like startled sparrows.
“Wait, Suo Sen, what do you mean?” Chongming blocked her, stance hard as a door-bar. His aura said: you’re not leaving till it’s clear.
“What, didn’t catch it?” Nana Toki smiled at the man before her like watching rain slide off a lotus. “Tomorrow, I’m a student of Diguang High. From then on, I’ve got nothing to do with you.”
“So you really colluded with Diguang!” The memory of his earlier failure—sold out by her—flared back like a burn touched by salt. Chongming trembled with anger, a bowstring pulled too tight. “Didn’t think you were that kind of person.”
“Think whatever.” She shrugged, careless as a leaf spinning in wind. “Whatever I do, you lot assume it’s dirty. I’m too lazy to explain to an idiot. Waste of breath, waste of time.”
Right now, she only wanted to clear the main quest and get out of this brain-dead plane. The male and female leads’ IQ was painfully low, like lanterns guttering in rain.
Any longer, and she’d go mad.
“So, from here on—good luck.” Her goodbye fell like a pebble in a still pond.
“Stop!” Chongming’s command cracked like a whip. He had no intention of letting her go.
Stop? Heh. Who would stop?
She ignored him. As she swept past Chongming, she didn’t look back, feet light as wind leaving a courtyard. At Tinglan High’s gate, only Yiyi Chen, Chongming Yan, and Zhaokang were left standing like three stones in fading light.
