At five in the morning, the sky was just beginning to turn pale. The mountain forest remained shrouded in heavy darkness, with only enough light nearby to barely make out outlines.
Xu Qingnan had been back in bed for less than an hour, just starting to drift off, when an alarm suddenly blared by his ear. It was shrill and urgent, instantly causing Huo Zheng in the neighboring bed to sit bolt upright in a stress response, his eyes scanning his surroundings with sharp vigilance.
Yet he had no clue where the sound was actually coming from.
Frowning, Xu Qingnan groped blindly for the wristband on his arm, unclipped it, and hurled it outward. The alarm cut off abruptly.
Outside came the sound of something landing on the ground.
Huo Zheng stood up, padded over on quiet footsteps, and picked up the wristband to inspect it.
He roughly estimated the distance.
Xu Qingnan’s spot was the furthest away from the central peak, and lying down made it awkward to generate much force. Moreover, the alarm apparatus had been fixed outdoors, separated by a layer of tent fabric.
And Xu Qingnan hadn’t even opened his eyes.
To accurately knock down the alarm device under such conditions Huo Zheng felt certain he couldn’t pull it off; he probably wouldn’t even have located the source of the noise yet.
Xu Qingnan simply rolled over, his cold voice laced with exhaustion and thoroughly devoid of courtesy: “Wake me in ten minutes.”
Huo Zheng gave an instinctive assent.
He lifted the tent flap and stepped outside, running straight into Ye Yuyao, who had just finished his night watch shift holding a stuffed plush toy. The three occupants from the neighboring tent had also crawled out, their faces bearing a uniform annoyance at being rudely awakened along with a puzzled confusion as to what had just happened.
Ye Yuyao shook the stuffed toy in his hand, opening his mouth to speak: “This was—”
Huo Zheng signaled for silence with a finger to his lips, turning back to carefully zip the tent flap shut. “He’s still asleep.”
Without naming names, the several individuals present instinctively reined in their expressions and took a couple of steps further away.
“Yeah,” a trace of abnormality flashed across Ye Yuyao’s expression as he curbed his tone and lowered his voice. “When the bell rang, I looked back and saw this thing swinging back and forth up top. Then I heard a muffled thud, and it dropped down.”
Huo Zheng opened his palm to reveal the very wristband belonging to Xu Qingnan. “He knocked it down.”
“…” The four of them stared blankly at the wristband. After a long beat, Cheng Yanzhi asked again, “Didn’t you say he wasn’t awake yet?”
Huo Zheng gave a nod. “Lying in bed, eyes closed, when he hit it.”
Oh, wow.
“Eyes closed?” Deng You glanced back at the height of the tent. “I couldn’t do that.”
Cheng Yanzhi similarly looked back, pondering aloud, “I reckon his spiritual power tier has got to be at least A+.”
The rest of the group nodded in agreement.
Clearly, none of them suspected that Xu Qingnan might actually not be an Alpha.
Ren Xubai, however, thought a layer deeper.
Being able to forge reflexes and sound-localization skills of that caliber likely tied back to those past skirmishes along the way that Xu Qingnan had mentioned earlier.
Yet experiences of that sort which, in Ren Xubai’s view, were traumatic enough to constitute a lifelong shadow were already entirely in the past for Xu Qingnan.
Then just what kind of ordeal had those events “after Silver Frost Star” mentioned by Xu Qingnan actually been?
A dense, prickling ache bloomed across Ren Xubai’s heart.
For someone like Xu Qingnan, just how much trust must he place in a person before he could bring himself to share those painful memories?
Only to be met with a dismissive, “No wonder.”
For the very first time in his life, Ren Xubai felt a surge of revulsion toward someone he had never even laid eyes on.
That person had broken Xu Qingnan’s heart, dragging him down so that even he himself was being pushed away.
Ultimately, Ren Xubai was the first to retreat back inside the tent. He heated up some water, warmed a bottled milk in it, scooped a dollop of butter mixed with honey, and meticulously, evenly brushed it across slices of bread. He rekindled the barbecue grill used the previous night, threaded the bread slices onto skewers, and placed them over the heat.
Within mere minutes, the sweet aroma of toasted bread permeated the entire base camp.
Drawn over by the scent, Ye Yuyao let out an admiring exclamation. “Xubai, you know how to make this, too?”
Ren Xubai retrieved the toasted bread slices, laid them on a plate, and made two diagonal cuts across them. “Just learned it yesterday. Want some?”
As the rest of the group stepped forward, responding to the invitation by taking their seats, they watched Ren Xubai pick up the plate and turn away.
The group: “???”
Ren Xubai lifted his chin slightly. “You’re all up, make your own.”
The direction he gestured toward was precisely the remaining half-loaf of untouched sliced toast.
“I’ll take over then,” Cheng Yanzhi laughed helplessly, volunteering to shoulder the heavy responsibility of feeding the rest of the group. “Do you guys like it sweet or—”
Only to notice that the gazes of the remaining three individuals were all trailing after Ren Xubai’s retreating figure as he slipped into the tent.
Lifting an eyebrow, Cheng Yanzhi leisurely began slicing up the remaining toast.
Xu Qingnan hadn’t slept well during the first half of the night, followed immediately by his night watch shift, leaving his energy depleted. When someone stepped inside, he initially assumed it was Huo Zheng coming to wake him up, so he lazily piped up to acknowledge them before any words could be spoken: “I’m awake.”
No reply came, save for the sound of approaching footsteps carrying the sweet, toasted aroma of warm food.
Xu Qingnan snapped upright in bed.
It was Ren Xubai.
Catching sight of him, Ren Xubai offered a casual wave by way of greeting.
With considerable vigor, he hauled the small table from the center of the tent right over to the edge of Xu Qingnan’s cot.
Still cloaked in sleepiness, Xu Qingnan’s flamboyant wine-red hair was slightly disheveled. His eyes half-open as he peered toward this side, coupled with the instant spike of alertness triggered by sensing someone approaching, the resulting aura was genuinely formidable.
Upon recognizing Ren Xubai, his aura smoothed back out. Staring across at him, Xu Qingnan slowly knitted his brows and tilted his head in a silent question.
Ren Xubai felt an involuntary urge to reach out and poke Xu Qingnan’s cheek.
Unsurprisingly, his hand was batted away to the side.
Xu Qingnan lowered his gaze to the table Ren Xubai had hauled over to his bed.
Sitting atop it were two plates of toasted bread and two bottles of warm milk.
The portion set before him was plated exquisitely, complete with a pale white flower no idea where Ren Xubai had plucked it from tucked beside it.
That other plate—
Looked rather like the scraps trimmed off the edges of his own plate.
Though none of that mattered.
What mattered was that Xu Qingnan felt he had laid the law down brutally enough the previous night. Logically speaking, someone whose background involved escaping hired assassins ought to feel their pride severely wounded or even harbor deep resentment toward him.
Under no circumstances should the second day feature a breakfast delivered with such industrious, housewife-like devotion.
Fine, suppose none of that mattered either.
Ren Xubai, a certified chatterbox, was currently sitting there completely uncharacteristically mute.
“Why aren’t you talking?” Xu Qingnan half-lifted his eyelids lazily, his voice still thick with lingering sleepiness. “Spun too many lies and met your karma?”
Still refusing to speak, Ren Xubai simply squatted down opposite Xu Qingnan, burying his head as he began eating the plate of scrap edges. “Eat.”
Food delivered right to the mouth—there was no reason not to eat.
Especially since Xu Qingnan was currently ravenous.
Ren Xubai kept his head bowed, yet clearly perceived the exact moment Xu Qingnan took his first bite, immediately chiming in to demand, “How is it? Tastes good?”
“Not bad,” Ren Xubai probably genuinely possessed a talent for cooking, or perhaps because toasting sliced bread had a low barrier to entry. Xu Qingnan offered an objective assessment. “Crispy on the outside, tender on the inside.”
The corners of Ren Xubai’s mouth ticked upward in secret as he delivered an ultra-casual, seemingly offhand prompt: “Does he make breakfast for you, too? Who cooks better, him or me?”
The food supply successfully replenished, Xu Qingnan cleared the fog from his mind. “Him?”
“The person you mentioned who’s so similar to me,” Ren Xubai raised his head to look at Xu Qingnan. “Did he cook for you, too?”
“…” Xu Qingnan hadn’t expected Ren Xubai to actively bring this up. Pausing for a beat, he replied, “He couldn’t cook. He’d occasionally get a sudden burst of inspiration, but he lacked your talent.”
Ren Xubai let out a hum, suppressing the edges of his mouth with a hint of quiet smugness. “Xu Qingnan.”
This was the first time Ren Xubai had addressed him by his full name, dropping the honorific.
Xu Qingnan lifted his eyes to look at him.
“Remember—this is the first way in which I’m different from him.”
It came out of left field.
Xu Qingnan failed to process it in time. “What?”
“And I’m going to talk a lot less from now on, too,” Ren Xubai continued. “I won’t give you a reason to think of him just by hearing the sound of my voice.”
Though Ren Xubai spoke so lightly, his eyes remained unblinking, tracking Xu Qingnan’s reaction.
Xu Qingnan paused for a moment. “That’ll be tough.”
The mental fortifications Ren Xubai had spent hours constructing dissolved in a single instant as he bolted straight to his feet. “He treated you like that, why on earth do you keep thinking about him?!”
Xu Qingnan unhurriedly swallowed the food in his mouth, raising his eyes to look up at Ren Xubai from his seated position. Despite occupying the physically lower vantage point, it failed to impart a single shred of a subordinate feel.
“You won’t ever talk less.”
Ren Xubai was taken aback.
Ah. So he meant that.
Wait.
Ren Xubai moved to argue instinctively, “I—”
The very next second, he clamped his mouth shut, mimicked the gesture of zipping a zipper across his lips, and used his index and middle fingers to point first at Xu Qingnan’s eyes, then at his own—signaling for Xu Qingnan to watch closely.
And then viciously tossed the two empty plates and sets of chopsticks away after finishing their meal.
Watching his performance, Xu Qingnan didn’t speak until the other person reached the tent flap. “Ren Xubai.”
Ren Xubai glanced back over his shoulder at him.
Crooking a finger, Xu Qingnan tapped the table twice. “Carry your table back.”