Chapter 68: Freedom
This was the top floor, the twenty-sixth floor. Jumping from here meant there was absolutely no chance of survival; he wouldn’t even leave behind a whole corpse. The final result would be nothing more than a pile of mangled flesh.
Fu Xingjianâs hands, hanging at his sides, clenched into fists uncontrollably, his nails digging deep into his palms. His lips were pressed into a sharp, straight line.
“Fine. I won’t step forward. Just come down.”
Wen Yuhuaiâs body leaned further outward. At this height, the wind was fierce, blowing him until he seemed to teeter on the edge. He was like a kite with a broken stringâone never knew when the wind would sweep him away, never to return.
“A-Yu, come downâ”
Fu Xingjianâs heart was in his throat, as if someone were squeezing it tight. Even his heartbeat was no longer under his control; every breath he took brought a lung-deep, piercing pain.
Wen Yuhuai remained standing there with an air of indifference. The hem of his coat fluttered in the wind, revealing a glimpse of his slender waist tucked into his shirt. “Take your people and get out. Get out of my sight. I don’t want to see you again.”
Fu Xingjianâs face turned ashen and gray in an instant.
His lips moved a few times, but no sound came out.
Gu Yanxiu, who was outside the door, seemed to have heard the noise. He broke free from the two bodyguards’ restraint and rushed inside regardless of the consequences. The moment he saw the scene, his pupils constricted sharply, and his voice trembled. “A-Yu, be good. Listen to me, come down…”
Wen Yuhuai impatiently let go of the hand gripping the edge of the window. Just then, a gust of wind blew by, causing his frame to sway uncontrollably. He nearly tumbled out.
Both menâs faces turned stark white for a moment. They instinctively reached out as if to catch him, yet they remembered his words and dared not take a single step forward, fearing that any movement would agitate him further.
Wen Yuhuai spared them a cold glance, his tone as biting as a natural-born villain. “Both of you, get lost together. Get as far away as possible. I don’t want to see either of you ever again.”
Fu Xingjian closed his eyes, unable to take it. A stiff, pale smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, and his voice was incredibly raspy, as if he had lost all strength. He turned around dejectedly and walked toward the exit. “Fine. Iâll go. Iâm leaving right now. Just don’t do anything reckless…”
Wen Yuhuai turned his gaze silently toward Gu Yanxiu.
Gu Yanxiu opened his mouth, his dark eyes filled with panic. “A-Yu, didn’t we agree? I was going to send you away. I was going to take you out of here. We can start ovâ”
Wen Yuhuai interrupted him expressionlessly, his voice very soft. Most of it was swept away by the wind, yet it still landed clearly in their ears. “I lied to you. My only goal was to get away from you.”
“Our relationship is just like that bowl you broke today. No matter how you piece it back together, it can never return to how it was before.”
Gu Yanxiuâs lips quivered. His face was so pale it was almost transparent. “It can be pieced back together. A-Yu, just give me timeâ”
Wen Yuhuai made a move as if to lean out again, his tone growing more impatient. “Iâll count to three. If you don’t leave, I will.”
“Threeâtwoâ”
Gu Yanxiu turned around with a deathly pale face. He lifted his legs stiffly and walked toward the door, his voice agonizingly strained. “Iâm leaving…”
The door opened and closed before his eyes. Finally, Wen Yuhuai was the only one left in the empty room.
He climbed down from the bay window with stiff limbs, his palms drenched in cold sweat. He had been chilled to the bone by the late autumn wind. The moment he stepped down, he stumbled uncontrollably, nearly face-planting onto the floor.
Of course, he wasn’t stupid enough to actually commit suicide just to get revenge on those two idiots. His life was more precious than anything. He wouldn’t be willing to die, much less die because of them.
They didn’t deserve it.
The door remained closed. He couldn’t see the scene outside, nor did he know if those two had actually left or if they were just feinting, waiting to catch him again.
He simply flopped down onto the bed and wrapped himself in the quilt. He was freezing to death.
After warming up for a good while, Wen Yuhuai felt enough time had passed. If those two had really left, they should be far away by now. If they hadn’t, he would just repeat the trick and climb the window again.
With this thought in mind, Wen Yuhuai cautiously pulled the door open a crack. The outside was silent; there wasn’t a sound.
He peeked out again and saw nothing. Only then did his heart, which had been dangling in mid-air, finally settle back down.
Thank god. Thank god they finally left.
Still carrying nothing, he hurriedly moved to leave, only to remember halfway through that he had no phone and was penniless.
Even if he went to the station, he wouldn’t be able to buy a ticket.
That was indeed a major problem.
Wen Yuhuai doubled back and searched the apartment. He actually managed to find several stacks of cash, more than enough to take him anywhere he wanted to go.
Stowing the cash close to his body, Wen Yuhuai wrapped his coat tight and pushed open the front door.
Outside, it was still peaceful. The farce from earlier felt like a nightmare he had just woken up from.
He took the elevator down, exited the residential complex, and hailed a taxi on the side of the road. Wen Yuhuai still felt a sense of unreality.
It wasn’t until the taxi left the city center and drove steadily toward its destination that his heart finally eased bit by bit.
However, he didn’t notice that after the vehicle made a turn, two cars quietly followed from the depths of the night. They maintained a perfect distanceânot so close as to arouse suspicion from the person in the front car, but not so far as to lose them. They trailed the taxi from a distance.
“Weâre here.”
Wen Yuhuai pulled out a bill to pay the fare and hopped out of the car almost impatiently, heading straight for the station.
Despite it being night, the station was still incredibly crowded. Wen Yuhuai didn’t care where the destination was; he randomly bought the earliest high-speed rail ticket available and boarded the train without stopping.
In the shadows, two pairs of eyes that had been silently watching all of this finally saw the train depart with obscure gazes, carrying the person they longed for to an unknown location.
No rush. They still couldn’t push him too hard. Since he would rather die for freedom, they would give him freedom for now.
After all, a lifetime is very long. They had plenty of time.
Wen Yuhuai didn’t ride to the final stop. He randomly picked a station in the middle and got off. He didn’t rush to buy another ticket; instead, he left the station and hailed a long-distance bus that took cash. This saved him the step of revealing his information to buy a ticket.
He didn’t know how long the bumpy ride lasted, but he finally stopped in a beautiful small county in the south.
The sky was already beginning to brighten. Wen Yuhuai rubbed his head, which was groggy from sleeping on the bus, followed the crowd out of the station, and hailed a car to the local’s largest shopping mall.
The priority was to buy a phone. In this high-speed, modern society, it was almost impossible to move an inch without one.
It was too early, and the mall hadn’t opened yet. Wen Yuhuai stood at the main entrance for a while before turning into a nearby breakfast shop.
The second after he turned into the shop, a group of people in suits strode past the spot where he had just been standing.
“President Lin, regarding our resort project…”
Wen Yuhuaiâs ears were sharp. Hearing the surname “Lin,” he reflexively turned his head to look outside. For some reason, he thought of Lin Shiyu.
With people coming and going outside, he couldn’t see the person’s face clearly. He turned back to wait for his breakfast, naturally unaware that the person surrounded by the crowd like a star among moons paused in his tracks, his gaze lingering hesitantly on Wen Yuhuaiâs back for a moment.
“President Lin?”
Lin Shiyu retracted his gaze and continued walking forward. “Where was I?”
Translator’s Note:Â
Terms in this chapter:
- Kite with a broken string (ćäşçşżçéŁç): A common idiom for someone who has lost their connections or is drifting away uncontrollably.
- Two-hundred-and-fifty (äşçžäş): A Chinese slang term meaning “idiot” or “foolish person.”
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