A crimson sun leaped from the river surface, with radiant light stretching across the horizon. Golden rays shimmered brilliantly upon everything, making it all seem sacred—this shouldn’t be the mortal world, but celestial palaces above.
Xie Queshan had the illusion that this wasn’t him accidentally glimpsing natural beauty, but divine beings specifically staging a grand performance of piercing darkness for him.
As the rising sun climbed higher, the light softened instead, evenly spreading over mountains and rivers. This swelling illusion finally settled down lightly and steadily.
The girl bathed in sunlight, squinting her crescent moon eyes, looking at him with slight smugness. In a trance, she seemed to see something crystalline in his eyes, and her smile gradually froze with disbelief.
“Xie Queshan, you’re crying.”
Xie Queshan felt as if he was about to be scattered by this sun, dissolved by it. He snapped back to his senses and instinctively denied it.
“No.”
He stubbornly turned to go back to the room.
“Ah ah ah—”
Nanyi suddenly lost her balance, her whole body tilting backward, hands flailing wildly as if about to fall into the river.
“Nanyi!”
In his panic, Xie Queshan quickly turned back and tried to reach out to grab her, but only heard the chains clang. His hand couldn’t reach her—he only grasped at air.
His mind went blank for an instant.
But Nanyi calmly jumped down from the ship’s rail herself, taking the opportunity to grasp Xie Queshan’s hand, a sly smile appearing on her face: “I fooled you.”
The boiling blood that had rushed to his head fell back through his body. Xie Queshan paused in bewilderment—in that moment just now, he really thought he couldn’t catch her.
And just when he was completely off guard, she had already moved close to him, seriously studying his eyes: “You were crying.”
He immediately denied it: “The sunlight was too glaring.”
How could he possibly cry in front of her? Xie Queshan walked sullenly toward the room.
“You’re lying.”
Nanyi followed cheerfully behind, bending down and poking her head out to look at him while he turned his head to avoid her gaze.
“—You didn’t really think I was going to fall, did you?”
“—I was just joking with you, are you angry?”
“—Why won’t you talk to me?”
“—Hey, if you cried, you cried. What’s wrong with admitting it?”
“I told you I didn’t!” He was somewhat exasperated, showing a rare loss of emotional control.
“Then I’m going to cry.”
Xie Queshan: ?
Xie Queshan turned back to see her stubbornly standing in place, huffily glaring at him. She really could cry on command—big tears welled up in her eyes, falling one by one like white pearls.
How did she turn the tables on him?
“Hey… you, don’t act.”
Nanyi had been putting on a bit of a show, but when he said this, she suddenly became genuinely emotional, all her grievances pouring out at once.
Where was she acting? She was clearly worried sick about him, yet he accused her of acting!
Now it was worse—this comment made Nanyi cry even harder. She simply sat down on the ground and began wailing.
Her tear-stained face was all wrinkled and huffing angrily, as if putting on a show for him, sobbing forcefully and dramatically, yet upon closer look, she seemed truly heartbroken.
Xie Queshan didn’t know how to face a crying Nanyi. He was even clear this might be one of her little tricks, but since this trick was for him, he still felt very distressed. Previously in his life, the girl who would cry at the drop of a hat was his sister Xie Xiaoliu, but that seemed different—as children they would always have clear disagreements before Xie Xiaoliu would wail, but now what was Nanyi crying about? He felt somewhat at a loss—he had no experience coaxing girls.
He walked around to face her, crouched beside her, and carefully touched her.
“Don’t cry anymore, okay?”
But Nanyi wasn’t buying it at all and immediately swatted his hand away.
“Not okay.”
“Why?”
“You don’t even talk to me…” Her mouth turned down, and thinking about how Xie Queshan had ignored her these past two days while she kept offering warm face to cold shoulder, she suddenly felt extremely wronged. After just a few words, she started wailing again. “You heartless thing, and I even brought you to see the sunrise… and you were mean to me…”
“I wasn’t.” Xie Queshan felt completely wronged.
“You were!”
At this time, no matter what she said, he absolutely couldn’t argue with her. Xie Queshan didn’t act stubborn either and immediately admitted his mistake with excellent attitude.
“I’m sorry, being mean to you was wrong of me.”
“Then you have to talk to me in the future!”
“Okay, I’ll talk to you every day.”
Mission accomplished!
Getting such a promise, Nanyi felt a bit happy inside. This happiness quickly overcame her grievance, even rising to her lips as an irrepressible curve, but knowing she couldn’t get too carried away or it would seem too deliberate, she quickly suppressed it.
But this small change was still captured by Xie Queshan, who helplessly rubbed her cheeks.