The leaves branching out on either side of the mountain path were a mix of crimson and gold. Chen Xunfeng, dressed entirely in black, stood out sharply against the colorful backdrop of the forest behind him.
The zipper of his athletic jacket was pulled all the way to the top, with the collar turned up to reveal the distinct silhouette of his chin. He turned his head occasionally to look at Zhou Ai, all while walking casually to keep pace with the rest of the group. The zipper tab swayed gently beneath his chin. Chen Xunfeng carried nothing, and his whole demeanor appeared exceptionally agile.
Having run all the way from the foot of the mountain, Chen Xunfeng was slightly out of breath, but within a few inhalations, he had adjusted. He could still easily walk upward, half-turned to watch Zhou Ai.
There were occasional branches obstructing the path. Chen Xunfeng raised his hand in advance to push aside a twig blocking Zhou Ai’s side. As he withdrew his hand, he lowered his lashes and asked Zhou Ai again, “Aren’t you going to give me any water?”
Zhou Ai finally withdrew his gaze from him and unslung the backpack from his shoulder.
Since they were going up in the morning and returning in the afternoon, Zhou Ai had only brought one unopened bottle of water. He handed this bottle to Chen Xunfeng.
Chen Xunfeng took the water, twisted off the cap, and first held it out toward Zhou Ai’s eyes. Sunlight condensed at the bottom of the bottle; Zhou Ai looked at that speck of golden, fractured light and shook his head slightly.
Chen Xunfeng seemed genuinely thirsty. He tilted his head back, drinking half the bottle in the space of a few steps.
During this process, Chen Xunfeng did not say “thank you” to Zhou Ai. Of course, on the many previous occasions, Zhou Ai had also never expressed gratitude to Chen Xunfeng.
It seemed as if “thank you,” “sorry,” and “you’re welcome” had never existed between them, neither in the past nor in the present.
“This seems to be my first time hiking,” Chen Xunfeng said, walking beside Zhou Ai while holding the half-bottle of water loosely.
The stone steps were a bit uneven in places. Chen Xunfeng lowered his eyes to watch Zhou Ai walk past before continuing: “For the past few years, I spent most of my time abroad with my uncle. He went abroad for university and took me with him.”
Zhou Ai had been looking at the road ahead, but he paused slightly upon hearing this. That night at the bottom of his apartment building, Chen Xunfeng had already mentioned that he had spent most of these past few years abroad.
Chen Xunfeng did not speak quickly, his tone following the slow, leisurely rhythm of the main group climbing the mountain: “He was quite busy. A lot of the time, our meals were completely out of sync with day and night, so we had even less leisure or time to develop hobbies like this.”
At this point, Chen Xunfeng’s topic pivoted abruptly. He suddenly asked Zhou Ai: “Have you been in a bad mood these past few days? What’s wrong?” His tone was such that it sounded as if he had already confirmed Zhou Ai was in a bad mood, merely pressing him for the reason.
Zhou Ai turned his head to look at the boy beside him.
Chen Xunfeng seemed to anticipate the confusion in Zhou Ai’s look. He kept his head lowered, watching the path at his feet to avoid Zhou Ai’s eyes. As he bowed his head, a few strands of hair on his forehead swayed gently in the breeze: “I don’t know how I can tell, but when I see you, I just know you’re in a bad mood.”
Zhou Ai silently withdrew his gaze. He breathed gently, his pace steady.
They kept walking upward. The breeze blowing toward them grew cooler, the view widened, and the sunlight became increasingly blinding. Zhou Ai lowered his eyes to avoid the sun, pondered for a moment, and then opened a new memo on his phone.
He handed the phone to Chen Xunfeng beside him; it contained only a simple sentence: I don’t want to talk about it now.
Chen Xunfeng took a look, nodded, and said: “Alright.”
The main group moved slowly; it was nearly noon by the time they reached the summit. There were hotels and restaurants at the top, but since the students rarely had the opportunity to come out as a whole, the school did not strictly limit their dining arrangements, leaving it to each class to manage.
Zhou Ai’s class had already voted on it: the summit was flat and spacious, making it an excellent spot for a picnic. They had long planned to grill outdoors, and the bags the students carried up contained pre-prepared barbecue grills, seasonings, meat, and vegetables.
There were shops nearby once they reached the summit. Chen Xunfeng went into one and bought two more bottles of water. He walked out and stopped in front of Zhou Ai, twisting open one bottle to hand to him. Before he could speak, an angry roar from a middle-aged man came from behind: “Chen Xunfeng! Get over here right now!”
Zhou Ai, holding the bottle of water without having taken a sip yet, reflexively looked toward the distant sound.
At the gateway that was the mandatory path up the mountain, a new class had arrived. The leading middle-aged man with a crew cut was panting, his jacket draped over his arm, his hands on his hips as he glared at Chen Xunfeng, who stood before Zhou Ai.
It was obvious that the class that had just arrived was Class 21. Zhou Ai swept a look over and saw Jiang Chuan behind the teacher, along with the familiar faces that often appeared around Chen Xunfeng, as well as Zhao Yue, who was looking over from the crowd.
Jiang Chuan and the others wore exaggerated expressions of frustrated disappointment mixed with gloating, while Zhao Yue was peeking at him from behind Chen Xunfeng.
Teacher Wu’s roar hadn’t been quiet; Chen Xunfeng clearly heard it loud and clear. Yet, he was the least reactive of them all he didn’t even turn his head.
“Chen Xunfeng!” Chen Xunfeng didn’t react, so Teacher Wu roared again.
Chen Xunfeng knitted his brows. He handed the bottle cap to Zhou Ai, scanned his face quickly, and said: “I’ll go over for a moment.”
Zhou Ai looked at him, raised his hand, and took the cap. Their hands brushed briefly; Chen Xunfeng quickly squeezed Zhou Ai’s fingertip before letting go and saying, “I’m going.”
His voice melted into the wind, light and faint.
Zhou Ai retracted his hand and clenched his fingers. He kept his gaze flat on the direction of Class 21, watching Chen Xunfeng merge into the distant formation, followed shortly by the sound of boys and girls hooting and Teacher Wu’s reprimands.
The flat ground at the summit had already been claimed by the classes that arrived first, so Class 21 was being led by their homeroom teacher, boisterously pushing and shoving as they headed toward a more distant spot.
Zhou Ai was about to look away, but unexpectedly, the crisp black silhouette in the crowd turned around. Chen Xunfeng turned his head and locked onto Zhou Ai’s gaze, which he hadn’t yet pulled away. The moment their eyes met, Chen Xunfeng moved the corners of his mouth. It wasn’t a smile it was a subtle, restrained facial expression, like something one might do to tease a child.
Zhou Ai turned his head away and stopped looking at him.
During this process, the students of Class 1 were busy organizing the barbecue. Teacher Qin had long since gone to a restaurant in the back with the other teachers of the grade. This task was overseen entirely by the class monitor, Li Meng, who was assigning duties on how to roast the barbecue.
But when it came time to set up the grill, they couldn’t find the most important item: the charcoal. Li Meng flipped through the assignment list in the group chat and asked a girl in Class 1: “Ge Qinqin, didn’t you carry the charcoal?”
Ge Qinqin’s bag only contained two books and bread. She hugged her backpack and stood there awkwardly: “My mom… my mom said I came to school to study and wouldn’t let me do these things. We don’t have… don’t have any charcoal at home.”
As soon as she spoke, the students beside her began to grumble and blame her.
“Then you should have said so earlier! I really can’t deal with this.”
“What do we do now? Eat raw meat? It’s not a big deal for one person, but there are 40 of us in the class!”
“…”
Ge Qinqin was surrounded, bowing her head lower and lower in silence.
Li Meng frowned and stopped the complaints of the students beside her: “Forget it, it’s done. Stop talking. Let’s think if there’s any remedy. Is there any place up here that sells charcoal?”
Li Meng quickly went to ask the shopkeeper nearby. She really did manage to ask successfully people came here to team-build and picnic from time to time, and since there were farmers nearby, the leftover charcoal from the farmers’ firewood was specifically kept for sale.
Li Meng prepared to find a boy to go buy the charcoal with her. When passing the wooden tables and chairs outside the shop for tourists, she saw Zhou Ai sitting there.
Zhou Ai had a bottle of water beside his hand.
He sat there quietly, flipping through a book. The wind lifted his bangs, and his fingers, which were pressing down on the page, were long and clean. Li Meng paused in place, remembering that day in the corridor outside Class 1, when Zhou Ai had reached out his hand over her to bat away the basketball that had been heading toward her.
In that instant, she had actually smelled a faint scent of peppermint brought by the wind.
The clamor of Class 1 was only a few steps away, yet Zhou Ai occupied this patch of silence alone.
The logistics of the picnic had been discussed in the group chat the whole time. Zhou Ai’s social media account was in the group, but that account had never appeared in the chat box. Zhou Ai hadn’t participated in any extracurricular class affairs. Li Meng wanted to help Zhou Ai integrate into Class 1 and also wanted Class 1 to accept Zhou Ai, so she wanted to get him to participate in Class 1’s activities as much as possible.
Previously, it had been her duty as a monitor, but now, she suddenly realized she had a private motive.
Li Meng walked over. It wasn’t until her shadow covered Zhou Ai’s book page that Zhou Ai slowly raised his head to look at her.
Zhou Ai’s lashes were long and always lowered coldly to cover his pupils. With his black lashes and irises overlapping, his gaze appeared extremely dark and extremely cold.
Li Meng looked into Zhou Ai’s eyes, curved her lips slightly, and asked softly: “Zhou Ai, can you do me a favor?”
Zhou Ai looked at her, seemingly uninterested, as if he were about to retract his gaze and return to the page.
Li Meng seized the opportunity and said: “I need to go to that village over there to buy charcoal. It might be a bit heavy, and I need a boy to help. Everyone else in the class has their own assignments… Um… Zhou Ai, are you free? Can you go and help me with a favor?”
…
“Damn! So hot!” Song Mingyi threw the sweet potato he had just roasted onto the grass.
Jiang Chuan laughed from the side: “Are you an idiot? Using your bare hands.”
Chen Xunfeng sat by the extinguished fire, using a wooden stick to stir the embers, evenly roasting the sweet potato he had just put in.
Jiang Chuan laughed and leaned against him; Chen Xunfeng’s knee was nudged aside, and he frowned with a “Tsk”: “Damn you…”
Jiang Chuan looked back, watching Chen Xunfeng’s actions, and squatted down beside him. After a while, he whispered: “Brother Xun, there are so many roasted ones over there, why do you have to roast your own?”
Chen Xunfeng wiped the ash from his hands, his tone somewhat nonchalant: “I feel like it.”
Jiang Chuan raised his hand to tie up his bangs and asked casually: “Are you roasting it for the top student?”
Chen Xunfeng turned to look at him.
Jiang Chuan strategically retreated: “Why are you looking at me? I’m just asking, just asking.”
Unexpectedly, Chen Xunfeng just withdrew his gaze coldly, let out a low “Mm,” and bowed his head to stir the sweet potato, looking seriously at how well it was roasted: “If you’re so idle here, go find me a bag.”
As they were talking, Song Mingyi ran over with his phone, holding the screen up to Chen Xunfeng’s eyes, nudging him with his elbow while giggling: “Damn! You’re famous in the freshman grade again today. It’s hilarious; our Brother Xun walked by the whole grade looking so handsome, and there are even more people in the group now asking about you.”
“That ‘labor camp’ photo you have pinned to the disciplinary board downstairs is going viral,” Song Mingyi laughed uncontrollably. He coughed: “The heavyweight news is that someone asked anonymously in the group if your sexual orientation could be… male? Damn! Look, look, this one… this is a heavyweight explosion!”
Song Mingyi turned to urge Chen Xunfeng to look. Just as he turned and looked up, he met a face staring at him expressionlessly.
There was no shortage of bizarre gossip about Chen Xunfeng; Chen Xunfeng himself didn’t pay much attention to it, and they always listened to it as outrageous jokes. But today’s Chen Xunfeng seemed a bit different. Song Mingyi hesitated under his gaze and asked perplexedly: “What’s wrong?”
Chen Xunfeng’s phone vibrated in his pocket. He took it out, used one hand to poke the sweet potato out from under the embers with a wooden stick, and while fishing out his phone, frowned and asked Song Mingyi: “Who asked?”
“I don’t know, it’s anonymous. Let me try to fish it out for you and see if I can bait this dog…”
Song Mingyi was typing on his phone when he noticed that Chen Xunfeng, who had been sitting lazily, had suddenly stood up and swept past him like a gust of wind. Before Song Mingyi could react, Chen Xunfeng had already quickly moved away from him.
Jiang Chuan was holding a plastic bag in the distance, walking over while joking with a girl from their class. Chen Xunfeng walked past him. Jiang Chuan called out to him, but Chen Xunfeng seemed not to hear at all, showing no intention of stopping or turning back.
Jiang Chuan walked over. Only a lonely, freshly baked sweet potato remained on Chen Xunfeng’s original seat. He nudged Song Mingyi’s shoulder with his knee: “Where is he running off to again? He didn’t even want the sweet potato he spent half the day roasting.”
Song Mingyi turned his head to look; Chen Xunfeng’s back was already about to disappear from their line of sight: “I don’t know. He seemed to have looked at his phone and just left.”
…
The outdoor barbecue for Class 1 was well-prepared, but it hadn’t officially started because the most important charcoal hadn’t been brought back by the class monitor.
They had been slowly organizing the seasonings and vegetables, when suddenly, a black silhouette approached their class’s location. It was Chen Xunfeng. Seeing the newcomer, they reflexively looked for the mute boy in their class first.
Sure enough, Chen Xunfeng walked up to their class expressionlessly, his first action being to scan the area in search of someone.
The summit was a vast platform with sparse trees; a quick glance would reveal the whole scene. Thus, none of them could find a trace of Zhou Ai nearby.
Chen Xunfeng stood at the edge without a word. They all thought he would leave since he hadn’t found Zhou Ai, but unexpectedly, Chen Xunfeng walked directly up to the barbecue grill they had just set up and reached out, grabbing Hu Cheng by the collar.
The barbecue grill was nudged; the boys and girls nearby instinctively retreated with gasps. Chen Xunfeng’s strength was immense; he dragged Hu Cheng to the ground with one hand.
Hu Cheng landed on his back, not even realizing what had happened. He was dragged two steps along the ground by Chen Xunfeng before he struggled to resist: “What… what do you want!”
Chen Xunfeng was still dressed in the same outfit from the morning: black athletic set, zipper pulled to the top. The solid color accentuated the clarity and fluidity of his facial lines. When they saw Chen Xunfeng walking beside Zhou Ai in the morning, their first reaction was to think Chen Xunfeng was pleasingly handsome. But now, as Chen Xunfeng looked down with a cold face, dragging Hu Cheng on the ground, they only found him incredibly terrifying.
“Where is Zhou Ai?” Chen Xunfeng’s voice was icy as he asked Hu Cheng, who was on the ground.
Chen Xunfeng’s question instantly ignited Hu Cheng’s rage. He resisted and struggled frantically: “Dead mute! Of course, he went to die! Go to… die!”
Chen Xunfeng stared straight down at him without a single change in expression, though his brow twitched reflexively. He threw his hand down heavily, flipping Hu Cheng over. Hu Cheng was nearly 180 centimeters tall, but his struggle under Chen Xunfeng’s hand was negligible. As Hu Cheng was flipped, he kicked up a layer of dust from the ground.
Once flipped over, Hu Cheng was forced to touch his face against the rough stone surface, while Chen Xunfeng’s knee pressed heavily into the small of his back, causing him such excruciating pain that he had no strength left to struggle.
Chen Xunfeng pressed down on the back of Hu Cheng’s head. He swallowed before speaking: “You got people to stalk Zhou Ai.”
Chen Xunfeng used a declarative tone, his voice sounding even calm. At his words, Hu Cheng, who was under his hand, stiffened abruptly.
Chen Zhen had been away on business recently and only had time to address Chen Xunfeng’s request two days ago, which was why Chen Xunfeng had only just received the news. That was how he knew Hu Cheng was a cousin to that punk leader from the vocational school.
Chen Xunfeng never believed in coincidences without reason; with just this one fact, he had locked onto Hu Cheng in that very instant.
The hand pressing on the back of his head exerted tremendous force. Hu Cheng’s mouth was forced open, the rough sand and stone grinding against his face and being forced into his mouth. He didn’t even have the opportunity to deny or defend himself.
“What exactly did he do to you? You’re all such damn bastards! You all have to mess with him!” Chen Xunfeng was always cold or indifferent when appearing before others. The weary coldness in his voice was usually quite evident. But now, before the students of Class 1, the anger he couldn’t suppress in that sentence was even more apparent an anger everyone present could hear.
“Can you all just leave him alone! Damn it!”
Chen Xunfeng increased the force of his hand. Hu Cheng’s nose and mouth were gradually filled with the sand and stone on the ground. His waist and limbs were completely powerless to move; his fingers went into spasms. His struggles had already ceased, and then he was suddenly flipped over by Chen Xunfeng. Having gained a momentary respite for breath, before he could even take a deep breath, a fierce fist wind came hurtling toward his face.
Hu Cheng instinctively closed his eyes and turned his head, but the expected fist did not crash down.
Before he could strike, Chen Xunfeng’s arm was suddenly grabbed from behind. His body’s reaction was to shake it off, but he realized even faster whose hand it was.
Chen Xunfeng slowly turned his head. Sure enough, Zhou Ai was standing behind him, in the direction of the backlight. Chen Xunfeng could only clearly see his slightly knitted brows.
The two stood back-to-back with the sunlight, looking at each other.
The strength Zhou Ai used to grip his arm did not loosen. Chen Xunfeng steadied his breathing, followed his lead to slowly release Hu Cheng, and then followed his lead to stand up.
Zhou Ai finally let go. He glanced at Chen Xunfeng, with something in his gaze that only Chen Xunfeng could understand. Then, he turned and walked away first.
Chen Xunfeng paused, gave Hu Cheng on the ground a cold scan, and then stepped forward to follow.