Chapter 78

“Sheng Huaixi, are you listening?”

The air moved silently past, and Jiang Chao’s soft, tentative question rang beside Sheng Huaixi’s ear, jolting her scattered thoughts awake.

Coming back to herself, Sheng Huaixi lowered her head. The mute icon on the screen was still lit; the uncertain murmur she had let slip in a moment of helplessness had only reached her own ears.

What was she supposed to say?

How was she supposed to salvage the words she had just blurted out?

Why would Jiang Chao think that?

One question after another surfaced in Sheng Huaixi’s mind; she stared fixedly at the numbers changing second by second, her thoughts shifting with each passing moment.

“Sheng..."

“I’m listening.”

At last, before Jiang Chao could call out again in confusion, Sheng Huaixi turned off mute and answered her call in a hoarse voice, her fingertips trembling slightly from being held aloft.

Having finally gotten a response, the call fell completely silent.

A silence they had both created spread between them.

“I’m changing my answer,” Sheng Huaixi said, her voice stubborn.

“What...” Jiang Chao seemed to be lost in her own world. Hearing Sheng Huaixi suddenly throw out that thought, her voice was faint with confusion.

Her words were light, like a drifting breeze, making Sheng Huaixi feel as if, if she didn’t reach out and hold on tight, Jiang Chao would turn and disappear.

After the thought rolled once across her tongue, Sheng Huaixi clenched her fist and deepened her gaze; the persistence hidden at the bottom of her eyes turned into a burning obsession.

Across the screen, Sheng Huaixi enunciated each word.

“Even if we’re destined to separate, even if this part of our memory is brutally erased, even if this relationship is painful, I still won’t give up.”

Her tone was firm; the last sentence was practically forced out through clenched teeth.

The scarlet, bloodlike color that had churned in her eyes surged again, then was brutally suppressed as she spoke. That stubborn refusal to turn back even after hitting a wall blazed up like wildfire, burning away every trace of hesitation in Sheng Huaixi.

The fear she had suddenly set down had bound her tightly through every minute and second since she and Jiang Chao met again; Sheng Huaixi had not been able to break free of it until this moment.

But listening to Jiang Chao, Sheng Huaixi suddenly realized——

If pain meant she would never dare take that step, if failure was already certain and she wouldn’t even have the chance to reach out, then stepping out of that shackle suddenly seemed like the easiest thing in the world.

She wanted Jiang Chao; no matter how difficult it was, she had to have Jiang Chao.

“Why does it matter if the world is turned upside down, if memories are reversed? Since I can like you once, why can’t I do it a second time? Once, twice, three times..."

“As long as there’s even a sliver of possibility, I’m not letting go.”

By the end, Sheng Huaixi’s voice had dropped to a husky rasp, and the obsession in every word was laid bare.

The breath she had been holding in her chest poured out completely with her words. Sheng Huaixi’s flushed face deepened in color, and her ragged breathing echoed through the room.

The cloud that had long hung over Sheng Huaixi slowly drifted away, and the thoughts pressing at her chest finally became clear.

Yes; she had never been some obedient, well-behaved person, nor had she ever been the kind of cowardly soul trapped by the past and too afraid to move.

The first time, in the past between her and Jiang Chao, it had been because of her mistake that the light and shadow in her world had fallen; but in the end, she had won, hadn’t she?

Jiang Chao had appeared in her world again, and the person reflected in those eyes had never changed; it had only ever been her.

“But if something you once had ends up being remembered by only you, not the other person, isn’t that cruel?” Jiang Chao asked again.

Unlike her earlier drifting uncertainty, Sheng Huaixi could feel that the Jiang Chao asking this now was completely different from before.

This was Jiang Chao’s true thought.

No, rather, everything Jiang Chao had said since calling her was her true thought.

Sheng Huaixi didn’t know what Jiang Chao had gone back to England to look for. She only knew that after hearing her words, her desire to understand her had reached its peak.

What exactly had happened during the six years Jiang Chao had been away; the six years she had spent in England?

Why had she said she needed to return to England to search for something? Why had she told Yuan Bai that she wanted to find herself in England?

Why had the once open and straightforward Jiang Chao become so hesitant and evasive after coming back?

Sheng Huaixi would not yield to Jiang Chao’s questions. Her gaze turned fierce; her eyes narrowed dangerously at the phone screen as she forcibly dragged Jiang Chao’s thoughts back onto the track she wanted.

“Cruel? But we clearly had something real and beautiful, didn’t we? Besides——”

Sheng Huaixi’s thoughts surged, her fist tightened, and she leaned forward. Her vivid red lips were almost pressed against the screen; the corners of her mouth lifted slightly as she asked back,

“What if my memories get taken away? Even if she doesn’t like me, can’t I just force my way in?”

Memory is in the brain. The brain controls the body. If Jiang Chao really ended up not remembering it at all, then could Sheng Huaixi not be ruthless enough to act first, to make Jiang Chao’s body get used to her before her mind did?

Sheng Huaixi’s drumming against the table slowed, and a flash of excitement crossed her eyes. Her newly awakened thoughts prowled through her heart.

She had played the good girl in front of Jiang Chao for so long that Sheng Huaixi was almost forgetting she could act before Jiang Chao’s resistance ever had the chance to begin.

Jiang Chao said no; Jiang Chao said she refused. But if Jiang Chao kept dragging things out and refusing, if there was no way to get close to her——

What else was Sheng Huaixi supposed to do besides forcing her way in?

Wasn’t this just Jiang Chao being stubborn and refusing to admit it?

Having made sense of it all in her own mind, Sheng Huaixi’s excitement spilled even further over the edge, and she was practically itching to make it happen right this second.

Her gaze shifted to the screen; Sheng Huaixi felt a little regretful.

Why wasn’t this a video call just now?

“...” Hearing the unmistakably shameless, coercive tone hidden in Sheng Huaixi’s words, Jiang Chao fell silent for a moment.

She had a feeling that what she’d just said had activated something dangerous in Sheng Huaixi; she had dug a pit for herself and jumped straight in.

Thanks to Sheng Huaixi’s completely unreasonable words, Jiang Chao’s emotions briefly detached from the confusion and panic of moments before.

Straightening her back, Jiang Chao wrapped her arms around her knees, her gaze flickering as she asked seriously,

“...A body is only a body. If you force your way in and get the body, don’t you still want the heart?”

Before Sheng Huaixi could answer, Jiang Chao let out a light laugh, purely in understanding. “I don’t think you’re the type who only wants the person and not the heart, Sheng Huaixi.”

If Sheng Huaixi really only wanted a body to play with, then Jiang Chao would not have been so troubled and conflicted from the very beginning, nor would she still be wavering like this now.

Sheng Huaixi asked softly, “How do you know I wouldn’t get her heart?”

The two of them tacitly chose vague references, even though both knew exactly who they were talking about.

And because of that, when Sheng Huaixi openly pointed it out like this, Jiang Chao was left speechless.

If Sheng Huaixi really did such a thing, would she truly not get her heart? Jiang Chao felt that might not necessarily be the case.

“So you agree with what I said?”

Jiang Chao had no answer. Sheng Huaixi waited a few seconds, then spoke almost impatiently, anticipation lighting up in her eyes as she waited for a different answer this time.

“...I don’t agree,” Jiang Chao said, resting her chin on her knee and glancing helplessly at the screen by her leg. “Or rather, agreeing would be impossible.”

That was exactly Sheng Huaixi’s kind of method, the kind of decision she would only make when pushed to the absolute limit; a little madwoman.

Jiang Chao felt that if she were the one with Sheng Huaixi’s mindset, she would have softened long ago the moment Sheng Huaixi showed her goodwill. How could she still be hesitating now?

Sheng Huaixi gave a soft oh, and the disappointment in her tone was impossible to hide. Hearing it, the corners of Jiang Chao’s mouth rose before she could stop them, and she laughed briefly.

The smile was faint and fleeting; it only tugged lightly at her lips. Then Jiang Chao’s mood sank again, and her brows knit together uncomfortably as dark clouds gathered.

“Sheng Huaixi, did you blacklist me?”

The topic shifted so abruptly that Sheng Huaixi instantly found the source of her initial irritation again. Her brows lifted, and the restlessness in her eyes resurfaced.

“I’m not blacklisting you. By tomorrow at the latest, I want to see you.” Sheng Huaixi refused Jiang Chao’s request without the slightest hesitation, her voice decisive.

After thinking it over, Sheng Huaixi leaned forward and said angrily at the screen, “Come back. I don’t want to hear you say that sentence anymore.”

Even if Jiang Chao came back and still didn’t say the words she wanted to hear, Sheng Huaixi still didn’t want to keep talking to her from such a distance, not even on a video call.

In a way, it was practically like being exiled to a frozen wasteland.

Sheng Huaixi’s own imagination annoyed her all over again; her brows drew together into a small mountain. When she spoke again, her tone was even more resolute than before.

“Come back. I don’t want it anymore.”

Jiang Chao really wanted to hold back the corners of her mouth at that moment, but they kept lifting anyway, and the dimple in her cheek sank irresistibly.

The heartbeat that had even been slowing down surged violently the instant Sheng Huaixi’s words landed, shooting straight into the sky.

Her breathing and heartbeat moved together; the thudding was warm and joyful, and a large stretch of Jiang Chao’s heart quietly caved in.

In that very sudden instant, Jiang Chao felt that all the struggles, confusion, sadness, pain, and other emotions of this period poured out in the short moment after Sheng Huaixi said that sentence.

Jiang Chao pressed a finger to her dimple and smiled. “Are you sure you don’t want to hear it?”

Sheng Huaixi’s words were far beyond what she expected. Jiang Chao had thought Sheng Huaixi would miss her during this time away, and she also knew that Sheng Huaixi had been asking Yuan Bai about her all along.

But at this very moment, knowing that Sheng Huaixi’s longing for her had actually surpassed even the desire to hear her say that long-awaited sentence, Jiang Chao’s happiness almost overflowed her chest.

So Sheng Huaixi missed her this much...

“I don’t want to hear it. I’ll book your ticket; you come back.”

Compared with an uncertain answer, what Sheng Huaixi wanted right now was Jiang Chao by her side.

If the person was there, there would always be another way.

But if Jiang Chao kept not coming back, especially since even the tracker she had installed in Jiang Chao’s phone no longer seemed to know where Jiang Chao had thrown it...

Just thinking about Jiang Chao once again being somewhere she didn’t know, in some place where she wasn’t speaking to her—just the thought alone made it feel as if she would suffocate the very next second.

The unplaceable restlessness turned into a feather, scratching over and over at Sheng Huaixi’s heart, making it itchy and unbearable.

She wanted to know where Jiang Chao was; she wanted to know her every move at every moment.

Sheng Huaixi knew her control was too strong, but so what?

She only wanted to control each other with Jiang Chao.

Her lips twisting in conflicted hesitation, her tongue sweeping frantically inside her mouth, Sheng Huaixi waited for a long while before finally choosing to ask Jiang Chao directly.

“Jiang Chao, when did you figure out I installed a tracker?”