As mentioned before, like a bell already rung.

Bai Ye was lazy, like a cat in a sunbeam, and binging dramas at home was his favorite weather.

Under that weather, Ye Weibai picked up the same languor, and he sprawled on the sofa like driftwood, chewing snacks and watching TV with his head tilted.

Outside, dusk pooled like ink, and he clung to the sofa’s softness like moss clings to stone, letting the room sink into drowsy dimness.

TV light flickered across his half-lidded face like a swarm of fireflies.

Onscreen, under a cherry tree, petals swayed and spun like a red whirlwind.

In the wind, two figures faced off like two blades catching the same gust.

A boy and a girl tugged at each other, their lines tasting like romance with a hint of smoke from a suspense fire.

“Don’t go,” he said, the plea cutting the air like a thrown pebble.

“No,” she answered, her voice like a door pulled shut, “the one you love isn’t me, it’s someone else.”

“It’s still you,” he said, stubborn as a tree root in dry soil.

“No,” she whispered, like frost under thin glass, “that’s my other… personality—but not me.”

“What’s the difference?” he asked, the words hanging like a loose thread.

“Of course there’s a difference,” she smiled, chilling as moonlight on water, “because—I already killed him.”

“…”

“Would you,” she asked, voice like a blade wrapped in silk, “love the one who killed your lover?”

“I—” he breathed, thin as steam from a cracked cup.

Upstairs, the shower turned on and off, stuttering like a tap in winter, and even without seeing it, Ye Weibai could guess the scene like a shadow cast behind paper.

For a kid from the countryside, gadgets too clever feel like fogged glass, and not understanding them isn’t strange or shameful.

He held back, hands heavy like stones in his pockets, and he wouldn’t reach out—at least not now.

Before his little niece—Shaohan—asked, he couldn’t act, or it would be like sowing seeds on rock.

Help given before the cry of pain doesn’t teach; it slides off like rain on slick bamboo.

People are like that—no one wants to be framed as a weakling needing rescue, like a label stuck to skin.

Ye Weibai knew it bone-deep, as if carved into bark.

…

…

Fifteen minutes later, or longer, time stretching like taffy.

Shaohan came down the stairs like a pale shadow washed in river-light.

A plain white nightgown, a blue hoodie thrown over, wet hair trailing like dark seaweed, and skin open to the air with a cold-flushed pink.

The flush wasn’t from heat; it rose like winter roses under frost, pricked by chill.

Sharp as a hawk in still air, Ye Weibai noticed the small tremor moving through her like a shiver under fur.

At the same moment, he realized her clothes had underestimated the sudden autumn, which bit like a stray dog.

Silent, she went to the table, poured hot water like a curl of cloud into a cup, sipped, and her body eased like a bow unstrung.

She lifted the cup to head upstairs, steam trailing like breath in cold air.

He sighed, the sound unwinding like a thread of smoke.

“Hey,” he said, the word dropping into the room like a pebble into a still pond.

“Mm?” she turned, eyes bright as wet glass, and answered with a small sound.

“Are you free tomorrow?” he asked, tossing the question like a leaf on a stream.

“I—” she started, her voice like a frayed thread caught on a nail.

“Doesn’t matter,” Ye Weibai cut in, his tone shutting like a door, “tomorrow you’re coming with me to handle your school enrollment.”

“I can—” she tried, the protest thin as paper.

“Hear people out, that’s basic courtesy,” he said, calm as a flat lake, “and we’ll grab some household stuff too, since everything runs short with one more person.”

He looked at the girl, gaze steady like a pressed seal. “Well?”

“Mm.” After a quiet beat, she agreed, the word light as a falling petal, and moved to go upstairs.

“What’s the hurry,” he called again, his laziness sitting up like a cat, and he pointed toward the kitchen joined to the dining room. “Go boil some hot water to drink.”

Even as an elder, Ye Weibai’s tone was rough, like sand under the tongue, yet nothing in Shaohan’s face showed resistance or dislike, as calm as snow on pine.

She only nodded, set the cup down like setting down a burden, and walked toward the kitchen in silence like a small boat into mist.

Watching her back, Ye Weibai frowned, a crease like a cut in soft clay.

“Not right—”

It shouldn’t be like this, the thought stood like a crooked post in his mind.

…

…

Oddly enough, Ye Weibai didn’t really “remember” Shaohan; it was more like he “couldn’t find” her in the shelves of his mind, like a missing book.

As said earlier, when Ye Weibai crossed into Bai Ye’s body, he lost all memory; but touching things made memory pour in like water from an opened valve, filling muscle and mind.

Shaohan was different, though; the flow broke like a river dammed by something unseen, with only a trickle waking, while the rest steamed away like morning mist.

That isn’t exactly strange; human memory thins like smoke, and what happened three or four years ago often blurs like distant hills.

But it left Ye Weibai with a problem, like a knot under the skin—he couldn’t read the girl’s attitude toward her little uncle.

In her every move, Shaohan’s stance toward Bai Ye showed more than clear disgust; there was also something else, deep and buried like a shard in wet earth, so deep it might evaporate the moment it met sunlight.

Beyond that, the girl’s “contrariness” was sharper than he’d pictured, like a blade honed too fine.

In Bai Ye’s memories, her prickliness felt natural, yet it should’ve softened with her father visiting on schedule and taking her to mountains and rivers, like wind smoothing stone.

Even if it didn’t soften, it shouldn’t have hardened into this, like ice catching the whole stream.

[Thorns]—

In Ye Weibai’s eyes, Shaohan bristled with [Thorns], her whole body armored, like barbs that would cut her own flesh if they broke.

Countless [Thorns] wrapped the girl, forging a carapace that sealed her tight, like a shell built for siege.

Right now the girl was a hedgehog, small and bristled, like a soft heart hiding in a forest of needles.

“Hedgehog, huh,” Ye Weibai mouthed the word, tasting it like a seed.

People think you handle hedgehogs with warmth and softness, like offering a palm of moss, so you can get close and see the soft belly.

That’s true.

It’s also not enough.

Because—

“Because I’m not after a soft belly,” Ye Weibai murmured, voice like a blade turned under cloth, “I want to see the wounds under the torn armor.”

“Something must’ve happened,” he decided, certainty settling like a stone, “and it happened when I—Bai Ye—didn’t know.”

Looks like I need to find Shaohan’s father, my brother—Bai Rong, like following a thread back to the loom.

…

…

Bai Rong was a good man; colleagues, bosses, and subordinates all said it like a shared proverb.

Six-foot-one, steady build, and while he wasn’t handsome, years and work had washed him like river stones, leaving a mature sheen.

He was mild, friendly, and urbane; he could flare like a match, but he always pinched it out before the flame caught.

He wasn’t the same as when he first stepped into the world, green as spring shoots.

He had a home and a car, a company that breathed steady like a bellows, a wife who loved him, and a lovely son.

For the kid who came to the city and couldn’t even find a place to sleep, this was a dream that rose like a bright moon.

Dreams come true—what tops that for happiness, like sweet water after long thirst?

Nothing.

So—it was enough—more than enough, like a cup filled to the brim.

It was perfect, perfect to the point of overflow, like honey running down the rim.

So perfect that one more drop would be too much—maybe even—

“Superfluous,” he thought, the word falling like a shadow across noon.

…