Chapter 67 - Heavy Snow

"You can tell how intense the battle is just by the sound of it." Di Xingchen said.

Yan Zhi's throat twitched, calming his excitement at winning the game, and asked, "Do you play games?"

"I'm not very good at playing." Di Xingchen said.

"If you want to play, I can teach you."

"I can't even play Glory of Kings." Di Xingchen says, "This one looks even harder for you."

"The games are basically the same, so once you get through them, you'll know them all." Yan Zhi says.

Di Xingchen smiled and said, "I can't compete with you, you're a gaming genius."

The gaming industry is a youthful one, and there is an age limit for professional gamers, who must be at least 16 years old to make their debut, but after 24 you are considered an old man. Yan Zhi's family is very strict, his father is from a high class family and owns a famous law firm, his mother is one of the top three ophthalmologists in China, his family is either a doctor or a lawyer. He won three championships at the start of his career, and his face was a huge hit on the gaming scene.

Someone shouted over the headset, "Who are you talking to, Six, little brother has such a nice voice."

Yan Zhi picked up his headphones and said, "I'm offline."

"No, it's our sixth wife Zhai ......"

Yan Zhi hung up without waiting for him to finish. After hanging up, he suddenly remembered what he had brought back for Di Xingchen, so he stood up and reached for the box on the windowsill. Di Xingchen saw that he had touched the keyboard and quickly reached out to help him, but he accidentally glanced at Yan Zhi's trousers and froze.

What a high to play a game. Longma is attacking and killing red-eyes.

Yan Zhi took something and sat down, handed it to him and said, "Look what this is."

Di Xingchen took it and found a box of snow, which had mostly melted, and inside was a cluster of ice sculptured flowers, the petals of which had melted so much that they were blurred into a large mass.

"It's a bit melted." Yan Zhi says.

"What is it?"

"We went to Ice City today and there was an ice carving shop inside, the crew let me go inside and have some fun, they can carve a lot of things out of ice, so I learnt to carve this from the master, can you tell what kind of flower it is?"

Di Xingchen said quite honestly, "I can't tell. What flowers?"

Yan Zhi smiled, the lenses of his glasses glowing blue in the lamp, and said, "Who told you to come home so late?"

"You should put it outside, it's too warm in the room."

"We were late enough, but who knew you and Brother Huo would be even later." Yan Zhi said slyly.

It's as if the vinegar had been held in all night and was only brought out at this point.

But his vinegar was not sour, it was restrained and his voice was gentle.

"We wouldn't have been back so late, there was a problem with the car." Di Xingchen said, "Say, what kind of flowers were carved?"

"Next time I'll carve a new one for you." Yan Zhi said, "Leave it here."

Wow, very creative. It's so local to come to North City and get an ice sculpture.

"Want to give it to everyone as a souvenir gift?"

Just as thoughtful as Pei Xu.

He also had to think about what he would make as a gift for everyone, something meaningful and local.

But how could Yan Zhi possibly want to go to the trouble of preparing something so complicated for someone else, and said, "This ice sculpture is so difficult that you may not be able to make one in an afternoon, and I can make one."

"So do you still carve this flower?"

Yan Zhi nodded, "Let's see if you can guess when the time comes. I'm not very skilled."

Di Xingchen glances into the box.

So beautiful and so special.

It's just a pity that ice flowers don't last long, unless they stay in this world of ice and snow.

Di Xingchen suddenly remembered something very important and asked, "By the way, did you see Brother Lin when you came back?"

Yan Zhi shakes his head and says, "No, he and Pei Xu probably didn't have a very good time."

Di Xingchen then sighed.

Yan Zhi says: "It's to be expected. For a guy like Pei Xu, either he has to take the initiative and like whoever he wants, or he has to be unafraid of the hardships and the cold in order to impress him, and Qingning is not the kind of guy who will fall for him."

Yan Zhi was talking about Lin Qingning and Pei Xu, but he found that his mind went off the rails when he saw Di Xingchen's face.

He thought Di Xingchen's lips were so moist and his skin so white.

Why is it so white.

He hadn't even thought that whiteness was much of an alluring thing before, but now he sees that a particularly white person can be particularly pink.

When associated in this way, white becomes a very tempting thing to do.

He sometimes wonders if he is too repressed and morbid, or if it is just a common thing in young boys, that when they are alone with someone they like, especially at night, their thoughts always go astray. He actually wants to control himself and feels as if he likes Di Xingchen simply for the sake of lust.

But he also really loved him and wanted to put him in his heart. As he wandered around the Ice City, he thought about every view he saw and wondered if only Di Xingchen could see it too. He would fantasise about taking Di Xingchen home, taking him to dinner with his friends and family, or simply, just him playing a game while Di Xingchen did his own thing in the same room, those innocent everyday moments, and he would also think that he wanted to love him tenderly, all the tenderness and delicacy he could give him, not even a single tear would fall from his eyes. But sometimes, like when he was playing the game just now, he was so mad that he couldn't eat him up inside his stomach, even if it didn't matter if he cried and begged him, he had to make him cry hard.

Probably not everyone is like that, he thought, just him.

But that's who he is. Other people may not be like that, but that's who Yan Zhi is, and that's who he is when he falls in love.

He is a tsunami of a man with overwhelming power.

Lin Qingning heard the sound of snow breaking branches outside, so he rolled over and turned his head to look out of the window.

The window was a haze of snow, and he could imagine the icy weather outside, so he shivered and wrapped himself in the blanket.

He had mixed emotions.

In fact, Pei Xu didn't say anything, he was in a bad mood and felt cold, so he stayed in bed and didn't go out.

Pei Xu did not say anything explicitly to him, they were both smart people and smart people don't need to say anything explicitly to each other for him to understand what Pei Xu meant.

Pei Xu was not interested in him and there was no way they could have been together.

Pei Xu has this quality, the way he can easily make his suitors realise that their chances of success are zero - I don't know if it's natural, or if it's just the experience of rejecting people over the past decade or so. But compared to that rejection as a teenager, the Pei Xu of today is much more introspective and gentle, unlike the stern face that said, "Don't waste your time on me."

Knowing Pei Xu's character, Lin Qingning himself knew that the chances of success were slim, but in the heat of the moment, he had the courage to lean in, and he was prepared for this outcome.

Rather than being sad, he was now embarrassed.

Lin Qingning regretted the thought that thousands of people, including their friends and family, would see what he had done in the future.

Male sexuality is harmful, impulsiveness is the devil!

How could he forget that the two families have always been close and their friends have crossed paths, and now that he's chasing Pei Xu in the romance roundup, and doing so in such an obvious way, he's bound to get moved over at future gatherings!

He was so embarrassed that his toes scrunched up.

But he can't keep hiding like this and not go out, it's more embarrassing to hide for longer.

Let's pretend nothing happened tomorrow, he shouldn't have sought any true love in the Love Roundup. He would never dare to like anyone in the Love Roundup again.

Pei Xu.

Pei Xu.

When he closes his eyes, he sees Pei Xu as a teenager, peeking out at him in the park, sitting alone by the lake, so lonely and isolated.

He remembers a time when they were in South City, when he, Hu Ying, and Di Xingchen were talking about Pei Xu and Di Xingchen said, "Don't you want to be his only light?"

Both he and Hu Ying must have had their hearts racing back then. It was so tempting to be the only light in the life of a withdrawn and brilliant boy.

Now that Hu Ying has given up, he can't become one either.

I wonder who can be his only light.

Lin Qingning closed his eyes and said goodbye to his youthful crush for good.

It was after eleven o'clock, but they were still chatting in Room 4. Wen Nuo loves Hu Ying so much.

Because Hu Ying was so lively and articulate, and Huo Cheng was also very funny, he and Hu Ying occasionally exchanged barbs with each other, making Wen Nuo laugh under the covers.

"It's half past eleven." Wen Nuo said as he looked at the time.

"Are you sleepy?" Hu Ying asked.

Wen Nuo smiles and says, "It's just emotion, not sleepy at all, it's this late."

"I'm sleepy, I'm going to bed, I have to get up in the morning and go to Xingchen for dance lessons." Huo Cheng was deliberately angry with Hu Ying.

Hu Ying said, "It's amazing that you can sleep with two beautiful men like us."

Huo Cheng said with a smile, "That's very meaningful, isn't it? What, you can't sleep with Pei Xu? You're very dry, Hu Ying."

Hu Ying said, "Please plant me with someone else, Pei Xu, on whom I'm lucky not to be frozen to a popsicle."

Hu Ying laughed and said, "Honestly, when I slept with Pei Xu yesterday, it was a bit awkward at first, because you know, the red and blue guests were in bed together. You didn't see Pei Xu's reaction, I felt like I wasn't even a man in his eyes."

Wen Nuo and Huo Cheng both laughed at this. Wen Nuo smiled and said, "I can imagine."

"Do you think he is sexually frigid?" Hu Ying said.

Said mind suddenly came back to what he had glimpsed through the door and smiled.

Hahahahahahahahaha, it would be funny if it was neutral.

"Did you both not talk much yesterday and that's why you're talking so much today." Huo Cheng said.

Hu Ying said on his arm, "I wonder who will share a room with him when the house is divided tomorrow."

"It depends on who's lucky." Huo Cheng said jokingly.

Having said that, in reality they are concerned about who they will share a room with and who will share a room with Di Xingchen.

So they fell into a short silence.

Pei Xu sits up from the bed.

It was too hot, just too hot, and he was on fire again, with a sore tongue. He got up and drank several gulps of water, being hot physically and mentally.

The next time you share a house, you can't say anything about sleeping in it again.

He lifted the blanket and looked at the time, it was after 11pm. He opened his mobile phone album, which contained many photos, except for the landscape photos, but only Di Xingchen.

Some he filmed, some he screenshotted from the internet, and after watching them, he went online to search for Di Xingchen's videos.

Di Xingchen's biggest hit on the internet is not the dancing part, but the countless live moments, such as when he was sitting in the audience after a performance and suddenly spotted a smile on the live camera, or the roadshow footage of him coming out of the supermarket.

Of the eight guests on Red and Blue Signals, all but him have Twitter accounts but he does not.

He actually started a Weibo account when he was a kid, but I think he logged off the day the internet started hacking him and Pei Huanong.

He then re-registered for a Weibo account and followed Di Xingchen.

After following Di Xingchen, Weibo gave him a lot of Di Xingchen-related topics, including those about Red and Blue Signals, other guests, and many CP superlatives.

Like an old fart, he doesn't follow this stuff online and didn't even know there was such a thing as CP superlatives.

He saw the names "Star Lake CP", "Meteor CP", "Mars CP", etc. He flipped over with a blank face and saw a CP called He looked over and saw a CP name called "Rising Sun Xingchen".

He didn't even realise at first that it was him and Di Xingchen, after all, his name is Castor, and he didn't understand the meaning of the CP name.

That is, until he clicked in and saw so many photos and short videos of him and Di Xingchen.

In fact, he has always felt that apart from the first phase when he and Di Xingchen were allocated to the same house, he did not have much contact with Di Xingchen, and he did not behave as actively and proactively as Huo Cheng or Hu Ying. But he found that the CP fans were really powerful, even if he looked at Di Xingchen for less than a second through the crowd, the CP fans found out.

The "rising sun" is him, I think, and the "Xingchen" is Di Xingchen.

It's a name he likes.

He then followed the pair's CP super talk and changed his Twitter name to "Rising Sun Xingchen".

It's always right for him to support his CP superlatives.

It turned out that the name was actually registered to him.

He clicked on the Weibo account called "Rising Sun Xingchen".

Then a door called homoeroticism and homoerotic pictures opened to Pei Xu.

An emotional desert and a blank sheet of paper, Pei Xu was disinterested in most things of interest to adolescent boys from his teenage years; mathematics took up almost all of his life, he rarely watched films, and he never read any novels with colour.

The light from his mobile phone screen lit up his brow and he understood all the meanings of the name Rising Sun Xingchen.

In the dimly lit room of the programme team, only two people remain in front of the monitor, Little Zhang and Little Li.

Little Zhang and Little Li are on the night shift today. It's cold here and the guests don't do much after they've slept, so they don't need to watch the monitors all the time.

They were wrapped in blankets and sitting drowsily in chairs when Little Zhang suddenly sat up straight.

"Someone's gone out." He hurriedly tapped Little Li, who was next to him, awake.

"What's wrong?" Little Li rubbed his eyes.

"Someone's gone out." Little Zhang said, "It's Young Master Pei."

A camera was also set up outside Room 3. The camera came out, there were no lights on the road, and in the light of the snow, only his tall, dark back could be seen. He walked slowly against the heavy snow and wind, until he reached a high streetlight, and the sky and the earth were so vast and bitterly cold that they could not quench the fire in his heart.

In the darkness, Yan Zhi, who had been lying on his side with his back to Di Xingchen, jerked around to face the sleeping Di Xingchen across the room, his eyebrows tightening in the darkness without his glasses, his brow furrowed for who knows how long, then abruptly uncurled.

Everything falls silent, except for the snow outside.