SB Ch161: Happy Homecoming [End]

Chapter 161: I’m back, Wujiu.

Shen An has been feeling very strange lately, and it’s a very subtle kind of strange.

For instance, in his life, which has been steady and filled with materialism for twenty years, words like “haunted” and “monsters” have suddenly popped up.

“Really, I’m not lying to you. They told me the library is haunted; someone saw it with their own eyes.” Steven, his classmate and good friend sitting beside him, raised four fingers and said, “I swear to God.”

Almost instinctively, Shen An lowered one of his fingers and said, “You swear with three fingers.”

After blurting out this sentence, he suddenly felt something was off.

It felt like he had said this to someone before, and even this scene seemed familiar.

“Oh, three fingers, you’re right.” Steven continued to vividly describe the monster tentacles appearing in the building late at night, “…like snakes, Cthulhu, you know.”

“I don’t know.” Shen An told him quite honestly, “I mean, I don’t really know much about those.” The new stop arrived, and he checked the station, coincidentally seeing a pretty girl with a peculiar makeup squeeze in with a backpack. She was wearing a baby blue qipao, her eyeshadow was mint-colored, and she had twin ponytails, one side white and the other black, very eye-catching.

“You don’t even know these things, my God, you’re so outdated.” Steven continued rambling, as if hosting some late-night horror radio show, “…Tom saw it, those tentacles opened the window, squeezing through the gaps in the bookshelves, as if looking for something…”

He noticed Shen An’s gaze was locked on the girl not far away, and he teased him, “No wonder you couldn’t listen to my story, you were checking out a beauty!”

Shen An raised a finger to his lips, signaling him to be quiet, “No, I was listening to you.”

Steven knew him well, so he knew he wasn’t really checking out the beauty, “Just kidding, but seriously, An, you really don’t have anyone you like? It’s not right, you’re so popular.”

Shen An shook his head, “No.”

But as he said this, he felt another strange sensation in his heart, as if he knew he was lying.

It felt like there had always been someone he liked in his heart, and he had liked them for a very long time.

But he didn’t even know who they were, not even a vague outline.

“What are you daydreaming about?” Steven waved a hand in front of his face.

“Almost there, Steven.” Shen An heard the station announcement, snapped back to reality, patted his knee, grabbed his bag, and stood up immediately, “It seems we have to submit our lab reports today.”

“Oh right, right, I almost forgot if you hadn’t mentioned it, let me borrow yours later.” Steven quickly forgot his urban legend, hurrying back to school with Shen An.

When getting off, Shen An was shoved and bumped into the girl standing by the door, but she was also getting off, so a group of young people burst out of the carriage like an exploded can.

Almost at the teaching building, Steven suddenly noticed a magenta keychain hanging from Shen An’s bag, so he patted his shoulder, “What’s this?”

Shen An found it strange too, frowning, and suddenly thought of the girl from earlier, “It seems to be someone else’s, and I took it down by mistake.”

Steven took down the keychain and found it was a mini smart speaker covered with a plush case. He tried to activate it with a voice command, and the speaker responded with a greeting, and announced the owner’s name and class, “If you’ve found my speaker, yes, it’s lost again. Please contact me, I’ll give you a surprise! Thank you very much!”

“An upperclassman, as expected of an upperclassman, so foresighted.” Steven put it back in Shen An’s hand.

“Let’s go to class first.”

After two long specialized classes finally ended, Shen An was about to leave but was stopped by a classmate who asked him to help fill out a questionnaire.

“You’re the best, only you are willing to help me, so please!”

Shen An was always very agreeable and helpful, so he happily filled out the questionnaire and gave some very constructive suggestions, then took his things and went to find the owner of the speaker according to the department and class.

“Cybernetics Manufacturing and Maintenance…” Shen An found the department in the medical school and thought the girl didn’t look like she was studying cybernetics manufacturing.

After some effort, he found the corresponding department and learned they were about to have an elective class.

Shen An took the elevator to the aerial classroom for the elective, and in the elevator, two junior girls asked for his contact information, saying they wanted to invite him to model. Shen An couldn’t refuse, so he smiled and said thank you.

There was only one aerial classroom, a large spherical public classroom. Shen An stood at the door looking inside, hoping to find the girl directly since she was noticeable. Unexpectedly, just standing there for a while, he attracted attention first.

“Hey handsome, who are you looking for?” A girl sitting in the first row by the wall asked with a smile.

“Ah,” Shen An thought it was just right, so he took out the speaker from his bag and asked, “Excuse me, senior, do you know a senior named Zhong Yirou? She…”

Before he could finish, the girl waved her hand, her gaze moving behind Shen An, “Hey Yirou, there’s a cute junior looking for you!”

Only then did Shen An turn around, coincidentally locking eyes with Zhong Yirou, who had just entered the classroom. She seemed a bit confused, pointing to her face with her elaborately manicured hand, “Me?”

“Yes.” The seated girl teased, “Look at your luck with love!”

Zhong Yirou glanced at the speaker in Shen An’s hand and touched her pink bag on her shoulder, immediately realizing, “Ah, mine, thank you, thank you.”

Seeing her about to bow, Shen An quickly waved his hand and said it wasn’t necessary, handing her the speaker, “Then senior… I’ll take my leave.”

“Thank you so much!” Zhong Yirou saw him off at the door, “You’re an angel!”

Shen An felt a bit embarrassed, smiled back at her, and heard her classmates continue to tease, while Zhong Yirou replied in a slightly scolding tone, “I like girls, stop gossiping.”

For some reason, on his way back from the medical school, Shen An couldn’t shake a lingering sense of familiarity, as if he had seen Zhong Yirou before.

But when he recalled the people he had met before, he couldn’t find anyone so distinctive.

On the way, he ran into Morris, a classmate from the same department, who greeted him warmly and shared a cupcake his mother had made.

“Thank you.” Shen An loved sweets and quickly ate half of it.

“By the way, An, did you know?” Morris licked the cream off her fingers. “I heard that Professor Lin specifically invited a group of ghost experts, and they’ve already gone to the library. You often hang out at the library, do you want to go check it out today?”

Shen An almost choked, “Ghost experts? Are there such experts?”

“Ah, that’s what I heard. They seem to be mystical experts from the East, like…” She suddenly remembered and snapped her fingers, “Right, they are Taoist experts. You know about Taoism, right?”

“I do know about it.” Shen An finished the other half of the cupcake and mumbled, “But are there really ghosts? I don’t quite believe it…”

“Ah! Someone took a photo. I saw it on social media.” Morris eagerly found the photo and showed it to Shen An, zooming in with two fingers. “Look, do you see this? The tentacle.”

The so-called photographic evidence showed a dark corridor with a slender tail resembling a tentacle in the corner.

“Isn’t this just a gecko?” Shen An examined it carefully.

“Where would you find a gecko this big! Don’t be skeptical. They also heard from the cleaning lady at the library that a masked ghost was wandering around…”

Morris continued telling the horror story while scrolling, suddenly seeing another photo posted by a classmate, and she excitedly patted Shen An’s arm. “Hey, the expert who came is a handsome Chinese guy.”

She showed the photo to Shen An, who glanced at it casually. The man in the photo was tall and thin, wearing a gray-blue Taoist robe with a bun, looking kind but somehow unreliable.

Wait, Shen An tilted his head.

Why did he seem a bit familiar too?

It wasn’t unusual for such a feeling to occur occasionally, but it had happened many times to Shen An in one day.

Although he was a staunch materialist, hearing people repeatedly talk about the “haunted library rumor” inevitably planted a seed of doubt in his heart. With no classes in the afternoon, he decided to go to the library to study and finish the professor’s assignment due that day.

Shen An arrived at the elevator in the library just as the door opened, and a few people stepped out. One was an old man with a white beard in a Taoist robe, followed by a tall, thin, handsome young man.

Wasn’t this the person from Morris’s photo?

The young man seemed to notice him too, turning to glance at Shen An with a smile in his eyes.

Shen An didn’t understand the look in his eyes and walked into the elevator, staring at the young man’s back.

Suddenly, a bizarre image flashed before his eyes: the young man lying in a pool of blood. The image was fleeting but so real that it startled Shen An.

He instinctively raised the back of his hand to check, but didn’t know what he was looking for.

Everything felt too strange.

Shen An looked at his reflection in the elevator’s metal wall, tilting his head in confusion. Suddenly, the reflected image showed his hair much longer, with white floral patterns along his collarbone to his neck, covered in blood.

Just as Shen An was startled, the elevator door opened.

Those fleeting bizarre images vanished, and the library was bright, with students quietly coming and going.

He thought perhaps he had been staying up too late working on reports, not getting enough rest, which caused hallucinations. He reassured himself, found a seat by the window, and studied all afternoon.

The school’s bell tower chimed the evening bell, and Shen An, immersed in his work, suddenly remembered he had to go home for dinner.

He glanced at the time—it was already six o’clock. If he stayed any later, he would be scolded.

On his way out of the library, he encountered a few classmates joking and teasing each other without a care. One of them, the class clown, walked backward and fell into a flower bed. Everyone helped him up, laughing non-stop, while Shen An took out a band-aid from his bag to cover his scrape.

“An’an has everything!”

“But you shouldn’t walk backward,” Shen An laughed.

They all took the same public aircraft. Shen An was lucky to get a seat, while the little girl next to him was watching a hot-blooded anime. He glanced at it—it was a typical story about a group of chosen people saving a post-apocalyptic world.

Outside the window, the wings left trails of full, white clouds. The sunset filled the sky, the edges of the clouds dyed orange, with a few stars twinkling at the horizon.

Shen An quietly appreciated the simple beauty of everyday life.

A few classmates got off one by one. After waving goodbye to them, Shen An turned his gaze from the window back to the carriage, noticing a boy about sixteen or seventeen standing in front of him. The boy had short hair, wore a high school uniform, and clung to a strap, nodding off while standing.

Is he really that tired?

Shen An tugged his wrist to wake him up and offer his seat.

The boy woke up, confused, hugging the pole and staring blankly at Shen An.

“You can sit and sleep. I’ll switch with you,” Shen An gestured to him.

The boy understood and immediately shook his head, stifling a yawn.

“It’s fine.” Shen An pulled him a bit and stood up first. “I’m almost there.”

“…Thank you.” The boy, a little embarrassed, switched seats but didn’t notice his backpack was open. As he turned, his books fell out, which Shen An picked up.

Accidentally, Shen An saw the name on the boy’s textbook—Wu You.

“Thank you.” Wu You, embarrassed, took the books and put them back in his backpack, hugging it while looking up at Shen An, staring for a long time.

Shen An noticed and smiled, “What’s wrong?”

Wu You shook his head, saying nothing, looking a bit shy.

“What grade are you in?” Shen An asked.

Wu You held up a finger.

“First year of high school…” Shen An thought, so he’s only sixteen.

That’s right, a sixteen-year-old would fall asleep on the bus and forget to zip his backpack.

“Be careful next time. If you lose your books, you won’t find them.” Shen An reminded him.

Sixteen-year-olds shouldn’t worry about big things. Even if the world ends, it wouldn’t be kids who save it.

Of course, Shen An thought, nor would it be an ordinary college student like him.

Saviors must be different people.

At his stop, Shen An walked out of the station and saw a familiar figure—his mother.

“Mom, didn’t you say you didn’t need to pick me up?” Shen An said, but instinctively moved closer to her.

“I just came out of a café with a colleague, so it was on the way.” His mother handed him a muffin and patted his shoulder. “Was school tiring today? I made soup, and your dad’s making pasta. It’ll be ready when we get home.”

“I’m not tired. So much good food today.”

“Your sister’s on vacation and coming home. Dad’s picking her up.”

On the way home, Shen An told his mother all the strange things he felt today, which made her laugh.

“You seem so calm outside.” An Congnan patted his head. “Why are you still like a child with us?”

Shen An laughed too, “What can I do? I’m still your child.”

They walked home, chatting and laughing under the setting sun. As soon as he opened the door and changed one shoe, his sister ran over and hugged him tightly, “Ge!”

An Congnan teased from behind, “You only have eyes for your brother and not for your mother.”

“Oh, mom, you’re just saying that.” Shen Nan smiled and obediently hugged her. “I only have eyes for mom.”

Shen An changed his shoes and walked toward the kitchen. “Dad, let me help you.”

“No need, no need. Everything is ready. Just wash your hands and eat.”

“Ge!” Shen Nan called him from the living room. “Can you attend my parent-teacher conference next week?”

“Me?” Shen An wiped his wet hands with a kitchen towel and carried a vegetable salad from the counter.

Father Shen served the pasta, looking serious and even a bit sad. “Why don’t you want me to go to the parent-teacher conference? Wouldn’t it be better if I went?”

An Congnan turned on the projector and laughed. “It must be because she did poorly.”

Shen Nan pouted, “No, I ranked fifth in my class. Dad is always busy, and besides, I’ve bragged about my handsome brother to my friends. They don’t believe me, so I have to show you off.”

Shen An smiled helplessly at his sister. “What if they think I’m not as impressive as you said?”

“Who would say that?” Shen Nan said seriously. “Seeing you will exceed their expectations, okay?”

Father Shen’s focus was elsewhere. “Doesn’t Dad look handsome?”

Mom had no choice but to intervene. “You’re all handsome, okay? Now, let’s eat!”

Once the projector was on, it automatically played a TV interview. The interviewee was a young man, and Shen Nan pointed at the screen, saying, “This guy is also quite handsome. His eyes are unique, right, mom?”

“Yes, he has fox-like eyes.”

Shen An glanced over and saw the basic information next to him. He was a product maintenance specialist at Sha Wen, named Zhou Yijue.

“Hey, he works at dad’s company.”

Father Shen took a closer look. “It seems so, but Sha Wen is huge. I don’t know everyone. The young man looks quite fresh.”

Not long after, the interview switched to another person, a young woman in a white coat with silver-rimmed glasses. She was beautiful, but in a smart way.

Her name was Yang Erci.

Shen An frowned, and the feeling of familiarity surged again.

“Wow, this sister is an elite mixed-race lady boss,” Shen Nan said excitedly. “I like her. I totally can with this sister.”

Shen An sighed. “You really only look at people’s faces.”

An Congnan chimed in, “Yes, such a shallow little girl.”

“Isn’t mom also shallow? You married my handsome dad, after all.” Shen Nan leaned on her father’s shoulder, acting spoiled, while Father Shen stared at the young woman on the screen.

“I know her. Isn’t she Lao Yang’s daughter?” Father Shen said. “Recently working on biological firewalls to prevent prosthetic infections. Quite an impressive young woman, even won an award.”

“Really? Yang Ce’s daughter?” An Congnan nodded. “That’s truly impressive, having such an outstanding daughter.”

“Aren’t I impressive?” Shen Nan asked, looking up.

Shen An laughed. “You’d be great as a judge in a beauty pageant, definitely the best.”

This remark made both parents laugh, joining forces to lovingly tease their youngest daughter.

An Congnan also criticized her daughter’s outfit. “You wear too little. Look at your brother. He’s never caught a cold, never made us worry. And you? You get sick every other day.”

“He’s twenty years old. How can I compare?”

“Twenty years without any mishaps. You think it’s that easy?”

It was just a moment.

One second, Shen An was immersed in the happy, blissful family atmosphere, and the next, he suddenly heard a voice from deep within.

[Wujiu.]

He tilted his head, searching for the source of the voice.

“What’s wrong?” Shen Nan noticed her brother’s odd behavior.

Shen An shook his head.

Wujiu.

Why did he instinctively turn around when he heard that name?

Whose voice was it? Why did it feel so familiar?

As he wondered, the voice appeared again, gently, coaxing, calling out a name that didn’t belong to him.

[Wujiu.]

The voice repeated itself many times, like a mysterious incantation echoing in his mind.

Chopsticks fell to the ground.

Shen Nan looked up to see a tear sliding down Shen An’s face. She couldn’t believe it; she had never seen her brother cry.

“Ge?”

He didn’t answer her.

Shen An grabbed the jacket from the back of his chair and said quickly, “I’ll be back soon.” Then he left.

From the moment he was born until now, over 7,400 days and 160,000 hours, in every happy or sad moment, he has always felt a sense of incompleteness. Like a giant jigsaw puzzle, he had been piecing together, always missing one piece.

Until now, when he was almost used to this feeling of missing something, that lost piece seemed to be seeking him out.

[Wujiu.]

The voice repeated itself, calling him, making Shen An’s eyes sting. He didn’t even know why he was crying. Despite being a staunch materialist, he was now searching for an elusive voice.

Soaking in the cool night breeze, he ran down a dark street, the pavement wet from rain, neon lights replacing the stars, flickering.

The voice grew closer, as if it were coming from within his heart.

Where was it?

Shen An turned around, panting, as the crowd jostled him. Everyone wore filter masks, and the projections overlapped with real people. The surreal mix of reality and illusion in the bizarre city was dizzying. He stood in the city center, feeling as small as a grain of sand in a colorful ocean.

[Wujiu.]

The voice was unprecedentedly close!

Shen An spun around quickly and saw a tall man in black among the bustling crowd, wearing a mechanical Guanyin mask.

For some reason, Shen An instantly knew this was the person.

The man approached and stopped in front of him, tilting his head slightly.

Shen An’s heart felt as if it was being squeezed by an invisible hand, rendering him speechless for a moment.

Before he could speak, the man opened his arms.

“Hug me.”

This sense of familiarity broke through the confines of memory. Images appeared before Shen An’s eyes: life-and-death games, opponents on the dueling stage, the long knife in his hand.

But the man hugged him, warm and real.

With a real voice, he softly called his name in Shen An’s ear.

“Wujiu, have you been happy back home?”

Through the embrace, their chests pressed tightly together, two incomplete hearts piecing together and echoing in unison.

In his arms, Shen An remembered everything that had happened.

The cruel times of fighting side by side, the life-and-death challenges, the comrades who sacrificed themselves for him, the repeated pain.

And…

“Shen Ti, Shen Ti, Shen Ti…”

He kept repeating Shen Ti’s name, over and over, as if trying to make up for all that had been missing in the past twenty years.

“Mm, I’m back, Wujiu.”

Shen Ti took off his mask, holding it in his hand, stepped back a little, and pressed his forehead against An Wujiu’s.

Through the memories Shen Ti conveyed, An Wujiu saw himself at the end of the loop, leaving in his arms. He also saw Shen Ti transferring half of his heart, using the power of the Lord of Time, and turning the gears to rewind all time to the beginning before everything happened.

The now-extinct Lasasmus no longer meddled with their timeline, and without threats, Shen Ti returned to that lonely universe, guarding An Wujiu’s birth and growth, from his first day of school to his first time volunteering, from late-night studying to leaving home for college. At every moment, Shen Ti watched alone through the barriers of time.

Sometimes he would laugh, laughing along with An Wujiu’s family. Sometimes he would get angry when An Wujiu was wronged, but knowing he couldn’t intervene, he would hide and sulk to avoid causing a disaster in another universe.

To keep himself from intervening, Shen Ti folded An Wujiu’s timeline. While waiting, he found a plant very similar to a peony, patiently tending to it and waiting for it to bloom.

But when it bloomed, it was far from the peonies on An Wujiu. Shen Ti was disappointed.

The more disappointed he was, the more he missed him.

Missing him, Shen Ti could only slightly open An Wujiu’s timeline to secretly watch.

He couldn’t bear to ruin An Wujiu’s happy family; after all, he had worked so hard just to give him a chance to go home.

Thus, unable to endure being away from An Wujiu, Shen Ti learned to be patient, to put aside his childishness and selfishness, becoming a mature and reliable guardian god.

“Thank you,” An Wujiu hugged him. “These past twenty years have been great, I didn’t even catch a cold.”

“Of course,” Shen Ti held him, pointing to the sky. “I was watching over you.”

He cupped An Wujiu’s face, carefully examining him, kissing his lips, then cherishingly kissing his forehead, brow, nose, cheeks, and chin, as if confirming and marking his territory.

“Twenty years were too hard, An Wujiu,” Shen Ti sighed deeply, lowering his eyes. “I nearly went crazy.”

An Wujiu laughed, “You’re still like a child.” He raised his hand, brushing aside Shen Ti’s hair, accidentally meeting his gaze.

In Shen Ti’s green pupils, the neon lights and stars reflected, along with An Wujiu’s face.

“I love you,” An Wujiu said softly.

Shen Ti looked at An Wujiu’s lips, thinking of the peony he had carefully tended, its trembling pink petals.

He wanted a long, sweet kiss with An Wujiu, to caress his entire body, to fall asleep in each other’s arms, listening to him recount all the interesting things that happened in those twenty years, even if he had seen them all already.

“I love you too, very much.”

No apocalypse, no disaster, no turmoil. They embraced on the street like the most ordinary lovers, surrounded by the city’s coldness and romance.

“Oh, by the way, I have a gift.” Shen Ti remembered, raising an eyebrow at An Wujiu. “Before coming here, I went to all the other places.”

An Wujiu didn’t understand, “All the places? Where?”

Shen Ti shrugged, turning around and spreading one arm, showing him.

An Wujiu squinted slightly, first seeing Zhong Yirou waving at him, then Wu You in a school uniform, Nan Shan with a peach wood sword, Yang Erci and Zhou Yijue in work uniforms, and even Gabriel, Toudou Sakura, and Matsubara Mori.

A large group of people walked towards him.

An Wujiu first laughed, then lowered his head, holding back the sting in his eyes.

Zhong Yirou grabbed his arm, chattering like a long-lost friend, “Wujiu, you gave me a speaker today, isn’t that amazing? If Shen Ti hadn’t found me, I wouldn’t have remembered you. Oh, I heard your mom’s cooking is great! Can I come over for a meal?”

“I want curry,” Wu You suddenly suggested.

“I want sushi! Any sushi will do!” Toudou Sakura raised her hand high.

Gabriel said disdainfully, “What’s so good about sushi? It’s just rice and fish. I’d rather have a burrito…”

Nan Shan, hands folded, smiled, “I’m not picky, plain noodles will do, just add a bit more sesame oil.”

Zhou Yijue snorted, “Did anyone say they would treat you?”

“Yeah,” Matsubara Mori nodded, “That’s too much trouble for Auntie.”

“It’s no trouble; Auntie will definitely like us!”

Everyone started arguing, each saying their own thing, not giving way. Shen Ti, annoyed by the noise, put his arm around An Wujiu’s shoulder, whispering, “Let’s ignore them, let’s go.”

“Hey, wait for us!” Zhong Yirou was the first to notice.

“No,” Shen Ti waved behind his back, “We’re going to get a room.”

“Who’s getting a room with you?” An Wujiu elbowed him.

Shen Ti frowned, and behind him came the mocking imitations of his friends.

“Who’s getting a room with you? Hahaha!”

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