That day, Sima Qiuyun was exhausted.
Her body was still unable to withstand such massive emotional fluctuations. Lin Shaohua had been right; if they had made the round trip in a single day, Qiuyun likely would have transitioned seamlessly from the bullet train into the back of an ambulance. She fell into a heavy drowse as soon as they returned to the hotel. It wasn't until evening, when Lin Shaohua woke her to feed her some food and a serving of the protein powder he carried with him, that she regained a bit of her strength.
"Shaohua," she called out, watching him busy himself with tasks for her sake.
"Yes?" Lin Shaohua stopped what he was doing.
Qiuyun looked at him and asked, "Why?"
Their previous relationship hadn't reached the level of a deep, inseparable love; their most intimate gesture had been a mere kiss on the cheek. She admitted he had been the more proactive one, but as the saying goes, "Husbands and wives are birds of the same forest, yet they fly their separate ways when disaster strikes." Moreover, he had no legal obligation or responsibility to care for her while she lay bedridden as a vegetable for a year, nor to settle her family's affairs. One had to realize that no one ever knows when—or if—a person in a vegetative state will wake up.
This was an investment with no projected return.
"Why what?" Lin Shaohua asked, seeing that her question lacked context.
Qiuyun remained silent.
The corners of Lin Shaohua’s mouth curled upward. "If it’s the same question as before, I believe I’ve already answered you."
"Alright," he said, coming over to tuck her in. "Don't overthink things. You're too tired today. Get some sleep."
Just as he stood up, Qiuyun caught his hand. "Thank you. Thank you for taking me to see my father today."
"Why are you thanking me again?" Lin Shaohua feigned annoyance.
Qiuyun fell silent.
Lin Shaohua also stayed quiet for a moment before saying, "These past few days, you’ve been very steady—neither sad nor happy. Seeing you so heartbroken in the prison today, I finally realized that you can actually cry."
Qiuyun turned her face toward him.
Lin Shaohua said, almost jokingly, "When will you ever cry like that for me?"
***
By the fourth month of her recovery, Qiuyun was basically able to take care of herself. Occasionally, she would go downstairs to walk in the residential compound's garden and soak up the sun. Lin Shaohua constantly warned her not to go outside the compound gates, and if she did, not to go too far. He worried over her like she was a small child, even making up—or perhaps not—scary stories to frighten her: he told her about a young man who had just recovered from a serious illness and went wandering off, only to have a sudden complication and die because no one was there to give him emergency aid. Qiuyun simply laughed this off, saying, "Don't worry, I worked so hard to wake up; I won't fall back asleep again."
When the six-month mark arrived, Lin Shaohua took her to the hospital for a routine check-up. The results were excellent, and a genuine smile finally appeared on Qiuyun’s face. While she was focused on reading the report, Lin Shaohua suddenly dropped to one knee.
Qiuyun froze.
The surrounding doctors and nurses, however, reacted with lightning speed. Before Lin Shaohua could even open his mouth, they began chanting in unison: "Marry him! Marry him!..."
Lin Shaohua’s face flushed red. He pulled out a ring and tried his best to speak steadily. "Xiaoyun, I am so, so happy—happy for your health. If... I mean, if you could still marry me, this happiness would surely last a lifetime..."
Qiuyun stared at him blankly. In truth, she should have seen this coming; she shouldn't have been so surprised.
There were countless moments when she regretted ever meeting Lin Shaohua. There were countless moments when she would have preferred to remain unconscious in that hospital bed, neglected, despised, or even kicked out by the hospital for lack of funds—even death would have been better than having Lin Shaohua treat her this way.
She didn't want to be indebted to his kindness.
But now that she was awake, she had no way to repay this debt of devotion.
"What are you waiting for?..."
"Hurry up and nod!..."
"What is there to hesitate about with such a good man?"
The bystanders were more anxious than Qiuyun, constantly urging her on.
In an instant, countless memories flashed through Qiuyun’s mind. They laughed, jumped, and shouted, racing toward the distance before finally vanishing.
Once, a man had asked her blankly, *"Oh, you want me to buy a house?... You're asking me to buy a house because...?"*
Later, that same man had said, *"...I've spent a fortune to buy a house for you... You can't run away now..."*
But in the end, she had run away anyway.
The ring was dazzling, its brilliance blurring her vision with tears.
Did she even have a choice?
Life is so incredibly difficult.
Amidst the expectations and cheers of the crowd, Qiuyun finally accepted Lin Shaohua’s proposal. He solemnly slipped the ring onto her ring finger and kissed his future bride.
Once the excitement died down, the crowd dispersed.
Lin Shaohua was a bit agitated from the success of his proposal and said he needed to go to the restroom to pull himself together, asking Qiuyun to wait for him outside.
Qiuyun sat on a long bench as instructed. She didn't know when Lin Shaohua had bought the ring; its luster was bright, and she estimated it was at least one carat. Seeing her sitting alone, two young nurses ran over enviously to chat.
"Congratulations, congratulations!" they said.
"Thank you," Qiuyun replied politely.
"Oh, you probably don't recognize us, but we all know you..." Nurse A said. "We were on duty in this department. we monitored your vitals for a whole year."
"I see," Qiuyun realized. "Thank you for taking care of me."
"Don't thank us..." Nurse B said. "We were just doing our jobs. If you want to thank someone, thank your fiancé. He stayed by your side and cared for you for so long. They say 'there are no filial children before a long-term illness,' and we see families tear each other apart in this hospital all the time, but someone like him is truly a first for us. It's so rare..."
"Exactly," Nurse A chimed in enviously. "You two must have had a wonderful relationship before, right?"
"...Yes." Qiuyun could only nod.
"I'm just dying of envy..." Nurse B added. "Seeing him succeed in his proposal today brought tears to my eyes. Honestly, you've made me believe in love again."
"...Thank you."
Nurse A, who seemed to know a bit more about Qiuyun’s situation, said, "I'm truly happy for you. During that year you were asleep, Brother Lin was the only one who never gave up on you. In the beginning, some friends came to see you. There was one pregnant woman who cried and cried by your bed for ages—I remember her clearly—but she only came that once and we never saw her again. Oh, and there was a man in his thirties—Xiao Liu, you remember him, right? The one who was really handsome and sophisticated..."
"Yes, yes, I remember! Every time he came, we’d fight over the shift to go check your vitals..." Nurse B giggled. "He must have been a good friend of yours, right? Really handsome. He came to see you basically once a month. But he stopped coming later on..."
"Oh..." Qiuyun struggled to control her emotions, pretending to be casual. "He... he was my teacher. When the accident happened, the perpetrator was driving his car."
"I see..." Nurse B and Nurse A exchanged a look. "We... we thought he was a very close friend."
"He wasn't," Qiuyun said flatly.
"Then... do you still have contact with him?" Nurse B asked again.
"No," Qiuyun replied tonelessly.
The two nurses looked at each other again.
"What is it?" Qiuyun asked. The two nurses had suddenly gone from chattering to hesitating.
"He seems to have fallen ill," Nurse A said.
"What illness?" Qiuyun’s heart slowly began to climb into her throat.
"...Leukemia."
***
October 12, 1988. At No. 89 Phoenix Street, Qiu Zhenghong asked Qiuyun in an old, raspy voice: "Now I must ask you my second question. Regarding what I am about to tell you—are you prepared?"
Qiu Zhenghong told her that during his travels back and forth, he had discovered a hidden rule of the game: if a person's total energy is a unit of "1," the soul is X, and the body is Y, then there is an invisible formula: X + Y = 1. Qiu Zhenghong said that Qiu Xiaoyun’s original body had been too weak to cross the time tunnel, so only her soul had gone across. Meanwhile, Qiuyun had been in a car accident, her spirit scattered, and she was displaced by the high-energy Qiu Xiaoyun. This was the cause of their soul swap. However, after Qiuyun moved to 1987, both her soul (X) and her body (Y) were weak. Her X + Y was less than 1. Without a remedy, she would soon die. Qiu Zhenghong asked, "Think carefully. During the first six months after you traveled here, did you experience any sudden bouts of discomfort?"
Qiuyun tried hard to remember. There were no major illnesses, but there were indeed small, puzzling incidents. For example, the first time Liang He invited her for a small glass of red wine at Utopia, she woke up the next day with a splitting headache as if she were severely hungover. Then there was the time she agreed to visit Sima Feng with Wang Chen during the Spring Festival, only to have to rush to a McDonald's mid-journey with diarrhea. And later, after that bad fall when she stayed at Wang Chen’s place, her period hadn't come for several months... But what did that prove? Wasn't she perfectly fine now?
"Yes, you are fine. But what about the people around you?" Qiu Zhenghong asked, staring into her eyes.
Qiuyun’s heart skipped a beat.
"You studied physics in middle school, didn't you? Energy is conserved; it can neither be created nor destroyed. If you know this, you should understand why the brain tumor in Qiu Xiaoyun’s head mysteriously vanished."
Qiuyun slumped into her chair.
"Are you saying that I... absorbed the energy of the people around me?" Qiuyun forced a hideous smile. "You must be joking. I've never heard of a brain tumor curing itself because it sucked energy from others. Even shamans wouldn't dare make up such nonsense."
"And when had you ever heard of drinking well water to travel through time?"
"Grandpa Qiu..." Qiuyun struggled to maintain her smile. "Stop teasing me."
"It's normal that you can't accept it. But I still have a responsibility to tell you the truth. Your soul does not belong to this body. For you and this body to be compatible and coexist harmoniously, you need more energy. You cannot create this energy yourself; it can only come from the people around you. The closer the relationship and the more frequent the contact, the more you absorb. Think back and see if I'm right: Has your best friend suffered a sudden misfortune recently? Has anyone close to you felt unwell?"
Qiuyun could no longer smile. Not even a little.
She swallowed hard, finding it difficult to face the answer.
The answer was, of course: Yes.
Starting in June, their dormitory had been hit by the flu, one person after another, yet she alone remained invincible. After going to Datong, Shanxi, she had shared a room with Wang Chen; on the day they returned, Wang Chen had somehow fallen and broken her leg.
Perhaps it started even earlier. That time at the courtyard house, Liang He had mysteriously fainted and run a fever. And now, he was having mysterious nosebleeds.
Even... Qiuyun thought of more. Wang Chen was her biological mother, the person she was closest to. Wang Chen had died shortly after giving birth to her—was it because...?
Qiuyun didn't dare think further; it was simply monstrous.
"You must be joking with me." Qiuyun suddenly had an epiphany; this old man was truly wicked. "Oh! I get it! You're only saying this so your granddaughter can come back, so I'll go back willingly. That must be it!"
Qiu Zhenghong looked at her silently, his expression clearly saying: *No.*
A silent standoff ensued.
Qiuyun felt her psychological defenses crumbling.
Qiu Zhenghong let out a pitying sigh, his voice tinged with heartache and sympathy. "I admit, I do have selfish motives. But my selfishness is merely hitching a ride on your journey. You chose to stay, perhaps because you found something or someone more worthwhile. However, I do not suggest you use them as experiments to prove the truth of my words. Your well water hasn't taken effect yet. This time I returned, I did indeed learn how to precisely control the timing—"
"It's all your fault! All your fault!" Qiuyun suddenly interrupted him violently, jumping up in a rage. She rushed in front of Qiu Zhenghong and shouted, "Who do you think you are?! God? You make me come when you want, and make me leave when you want! What right do you have?! What gives you the authority to do this? Who knows if what you're saying is true? Who knows if you're lying to me? Do you know what my life is like here... do you know how much... how much resolve I had to find... how much I love..."
Qiuyun couldn't go on. She sank to the floor, curling into a ball and hugging her knees, sobbing uncontrollably.
She didn't want to leave. She wanted to stay here.
But why was fate always against her?
When she first arrived, she wanted to go back but couldn't. Now she wanted to stay, but she had become a parasite, forced to return.
Was she simply not allowed to be happy?
A hand with protruding veins rested on the back of her head, attempting to offer comfort.
She knew who it was and angrily shook it off.
The hand returned gently, almost tentatively patting her shaking shoulder.
"You're absolutely right. These are all mistakes I made. I have wronged you. If you don't want to go... a person's will is directly correlated to how fast the well water takes effect. If you want to go, it's fast; if you don't, it's slow... perhaps..."
"On that side," Qiuyun suddenly asked in a muffled voice, "is Qiu Xiaoyun’s soul and my body doing the same thing? Is she also prioritizing the energy of those close to her?"
"Yes. But the 'Sima Qiuyun' on that side is a vegetable lying in a hospital bed; she doesn't need much energy... besides, no one comes to visit you." As he finished the last sentence, even Qiu Zhenghong felt it was a bit cruel.
—Yes, he was telling the truth. On that side, Wang Chen was long gone, and Liang He wouldn't be there. Sima Feng was still in prison, and Chen Liping had likely started a new family. Who else was close to her?
"Everything at the hospital is being handled primarily by a young man named Lin," Qiu Zhenghong added. "But he doesn't seem to be affected. Perhaps it's because the 'intimate relationship' required for energy transfer must be mutual, and this young man..."
"...Lin Shaohua?" After a long silence, Qiuyun looked up.
"That seems to be the name."
And yet, that name didn't seem to stir any ripples in Qiuyun’s heart.
She stared forward with a hollow, vacant gaze, her mind blank—despair and panic filled her brain, and she no longer knew what to do.
"Grandpa Qiu," after a long while, Qiuyun turned her head. Her face was covered in tears as she stared fixedly into Qiu Zhenghong’s eyes, asking with obsession, "You really aren't lying to me? You swear everything you said is true?"
"It is true." Qiu Zhenghong couldn't bear it and brushed the tears from her face. "I swear on my life and the life of my granddaughter, Qiu Xiaoyun, that everything I have said is true."
"If I don't leave, will they die?"
Qiu Zhenghong sighed.
"They won't fall ill because of a specific action of yours, but they will become weak—weak in terms of energy. Your presence is like the HIV virus; it doesn't deliver a fatal blow itself, but it destroys the body's entire immune system. A simple cold or a fall will trigger a chain reaction of complications, and finally... death."
"...Death?"
"Yes. Have you read *Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio*? I'm not comparing you to a fox spirit, but in fact, what she does is also the act of draining a person's energy."
It seemed to take every ounce of Qiuyun’s strength to digest and understand the word "death"—that specific "death," with no other meaning.
Two minutes passed before she mustered her final bit of courage and hope to ask again: "Then... can I ever come back? In a way that won't cause anyone any harm?"
Infinite sorrow was hidden within the folds of Qiu Zhenghong’s sagging eyelids. "In this era, there is no such person as 'Sima Qiuyun.' For you to be here is equivalent to a person appearing out of thin air in this time tunnel. It is no different from defying heaven to change fate."
The light in Qiuyun’s eyes went out completely.
"I returned this time, paying such a heavy price, also wanting to try and defy heaven to change fate for my granddaughter. I don't know if it will succeed. After you go back, if you find Qiu Xiaoyun’s tombstone in the western suburbs cemetery, the dates of birth and death on it will tell you the final result."
***
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