Sun Rain Chapter 31

The meeting lasted until four in the afternoon.

During the second half, Fu Xuanliao was distracted, frequently checking his phone. Finally, after the meeting concluded, the growing sense of foreboding prompted him to dial Shi Meng’s number.

The first call didn’t connect. He waited five minutes and tried again, but it still went unanswered.

Fu Xuanliao assumed Shi Meng was playing some sort of hard-to-get game, so he called home directly. Jiang Rong answered, saying Shi Meng had gone out in the morning and hadn’t returned yet.

“What did he go out for?” Fu Xuanliao asked.

“To get a vaccine. He scratched his hand on a cat,” Jiang Rong said.

Fu Xuanliao frowned. “A cat?”

He ran out last night, got soaked in the rain, just to get scratched by a cat?

Was it the cat named Mumu?

Fu Xuanliao recalled that it was the cat belonging to Shi Meng’s birth mother, entrusted to Shi Meng for a period of care.

And his birth mother…

The only time he remembered meeting that woman surnamed Yang was when he was in elementary school.

Once, the school organized a spring outing to the suburbs. The middle and upper grades were sitting together, and Fu Xuanliao saw Shi Meng run out of the group, calling that woman “Mom.” But the woman ignored him. Instead, she asked him to call Shi Mu, who was in the same class, over, and she lovingly slipped a large bag of snacks into Shi Mu’s hand, smiling kindly.

Mumu, the woman surnamed Yang, misplaced affection—each item seemed unremarkable on its own, but linked together, they felt strange.

But now was not the time to dwell on this. Fu Xuanliao instructed Jiang Rong, “Call me when Shi Meng gets home.”

“What about you? When are you coming back?” Jiang Rong asked.

Glancing up at the clock on the wall, Fu Xuanliao felt resistant to the upcoming social engagement.

“I’ll be back after dinner,” he said. “I’ll be as quick as I can.”

In reality, once he sat down in the private room, the time of his departure was no longer up to him.

Li Bihan hosted a dinner at a high-end hotel in the city center, warmly inviting the friends who had helped her today. Fu Xuanliao still needed to rely on her assistance later, so he had to show face no matter what.

Shi Sihui rushed in before the banquet started, generously toasted herself three times, offered words of thanks, and then specifically poured a full glass of wine for Fu Xuanliao, thanking him for coming to her aid today.

“Thank goodness you were here,” Shi Sihui, who had a low tolerance for alcohol, had flushed cheeks after just two drinks. It was clear she was genuinely happy. “For so many years, the mountain pressing on my heart has finally been leveled today.”

Midway through, he received a call from Shi Huaiyi. After a moment of silence, the voice on the other end did not harshly criticize Fu Xuanliao’s defection today.

“Anyway, even if the shares fall to Sihui, they still belong to my Shi family,” Shi Huaiyi sighed, saying, “Why did you have to pull this stunt to deal with Mengmeng? He has nothing left.”

—He has nothing left.

This sentence echoed in Fu Xuanliao’s mind until the banquet dispersed late that night.

Initially, he thought, with Shi Meng being so strong and capable, what could he possibly not obtain?

Only upon closer reflection did he realize how little Shi Meng actually possessed.

He didn’t have a happy family, or parents who loved him. Outside, he was just the “bastard” people whispered about, unable to secure even a respectable identity.

Not to mention the love he desperately sought, which was like trying to scoop the moon from the water—ending up with nothing, and now, he was still in the dark about the “betrayal.”

With everything settled, a feeling akin to reluctance began to surface in Fu Xuanliao.

On the way back, Jiang Rong messaged that Shi Meng still hadn’t returned. Fu Xuanliao called him several more times, none of which were answered.

The anxiety within him gradually spread. While waiting at a red light, Fu Xuanliao scrolled through his phone contacts again—a long list of names, none of them related to Shi Meng.

In the past, Shi Meng was the one clinging to him, calling incessantly, one after another, and he would only answer when he was in a good mood. Now that the situation was reversed, besides the discomfort, Fu Xuanliao was only surprised by how little he knew about Shi Meng after nearly five years of interaction.

So little that he didn’t even know where Shi Meng might have gone.

After a moment of confusion, he suddenly remembered Shi Meng had a manager and friend named Jiang Xue. Fu Xuanliao quickly dialed Gao Lecheng’s number.

At this time on a weekend, Gao Lecheng was usually out carousing, and his calls were typically answered immediately, with the background often filled with decadent jazz music.

This time, for some reason, it took two tries to connect, and the background was eerily quiet, making Gao Lecheng’s voice sound particularly harsh.

“Old Fu, I was just about to call you.” His breathing was slightly ragged, and clear footsteps suggested he was walking quickly on a smooth surface. “Come to City Third Hospital. Jiang Xue and I just arrived. Your… Young Master Shi’s condition isn’t good.”

Shi Meng didn’t know if he was asleep or awake, or if he was already dead.

Before him was a long, winding road, with scattered lights shining in the distance, guiding the way forward.

The fatigue intensified with the swaying motion. Shi Meng heard someone calling him: “Wake up, don’t sleep, we’ll be there soon.”

He shook his head to clear his mind and looked around, finding himself in a desolate mountain area. The night wind was silent, and the only sound was the rustling of branches and leaves rubbing against each other.

The person carrying him was only a boy. Carrying the weight of another teenager up a rugged mountain path was incredibly difficult, leaving him breathless, his exhales turning white, which somewhat offset the cold temperature.

Shining the flashlight on his own hand, Shi Meng confirmed through the inch-long scratch on his palm that he had returned to the winter when he was thirteen. Having just entered junior high, he participated in a school winter camp, but accidentally wandered off during free time and got lost deep in the mountains.

The boy carrying him was clearly curious why he was there, not forgetting to ask between heavy breaths, “How did you end up here? Didn’t the teacher send someone to tell everyone to gather?”

Shi Meng heard his thirteen-year-old self reply, “No one told me.”

The boy carrying him was silent for a moment, then said, as if accustomed to it, “Those guys are childish and boring. They just bully the new kids.”

He skirted around the main reason for Shi Meng’s exclusion, deliberately ignoring the ugly rumors like “bastard,” “mongrel,” and “son of a prostitute.” He only taught Shi Meng how to protect himself: “Stay away from them usually, and don’t take the things they say to heart.”

He was referring to the incident before free time, when Shi Meng was cornered by a group of older students in the cafeteria. In his haste to hide, he accidentally knocked his meal tray over himself. Shi Meng felt both ashamed and deeply hurt, but he wasn’t good at expressing himself and didn’t know how to tell him that he had already taken it to heart.

“I wasn’t there during dinner time, I only heard about it later,” the boy carrying him continued. “When we get a chance, I’ll help you dump a meal tray over their heads.”

Shi Meng was stunned at first, then curved his lips, revealing a faint smile in the cold wind.

He asked, “Why are you so good to me?”

“I just happened to find you,” the person carrying him countered. “If it were someone else, would you feel they were good too?”

Shi Meng shook his head, thinking, you are more than just good.

In a place no one knew, you were a sun, illuminating the path ahead while igniting a warm light for a lonely, cold life. No wonder people would scheme to keep you and fight tooth and nail to seize you.

Unfortunately, even the longest road has an end, and the most beautiful mirage is nothing more than an illusion.

Ahead, voices were bustling and lights were bright. The world belonging to the two of them reached its edge.

Shi Meng jumped off his back and took a deep breath. “You should go.”

The boy who had carried him all the way turned around. Above his slightly thin shoulders was a face deeply etched in Shi Meng’s mind.

This face had superior features, and any expression it wore was enough to make Shi Meng infatuated.

Sometimes there was no expression, sometimes anger flickered in his brows, but more often there was a smile—either arrogant, or frivolous, and later, only self-mockery, sarcasm, and cold, emotionless laughter remained.

They originally had a beautiful beginning, no less than anyone else’s, but it ended up like that. Who was more ridiculously wrong no longer mattered.

“You should go,” Shi Meng said. “I’m letting you go.”

Go back to where you belong.

The boy in front of him seemed confused, standing still. “What about you?”

Shi Meng looked back. The road he had traveled was dark and silent, without a single light.

Yet, he was no longer afraid. He blinked, seeing the darkness more clearly.

The lone boat should return to the sea.

“I’m going back to where I belong, too.”

Amidst the deviating memory fragments, occasional chaotic sounds intruded.

First, his body was constantly being moved and handled. A group of people surrounded him, poking and prodding him with cold instruments. Then came strings of footsteps, back and forth, ceaselessly.

Shi Meng heard someone saying “I’m sorry,” saying “It’s all my fault for neglecting you recently.” The crying was sorrowful and heartbreaking.

He wanted to speak, to tell Jiang Xue not to cry, that it wasn’t her fault he ended up like this. Just as he was about to open his mouth, his uninjured hand was grasped by another large palm. The familiar warmth transmitted through the gentle rubbing, yet it made Shi Meng want to retreat, temporarily abandoning the return to reality.

Later, more people arrived. Besides the investigating police officers, there were those who gloated, those who went through the motions, those who should and shouldn’t have appeared. There were also quite a few who genuinely felt sorry for him.

“This child, he still trapped himself,” Shi Meng heard Teacher Ma sigh. “I hope you can find an escape route in your dreams.”

Shi Meng felt justified in wandering in the interlayer between reality and illusion. The moment he opened his eyes and all his senses reconnected with the world, he was still dazed, unable to distinguish whether he was dead or alive.

A single-bed hospital room with four walls, medicine dripping into his body, and a calendar by the bed showing Thursday. A thousand sails had passed in the dream, but only a few days had elapsed in the real world.

Confirming that he was alive, the first thought that came to Shi Meng’s mind was still escape.

Fortunately, no one was in the room when he woke up. Shi Meng propped himself up and got out of bed. He first used his tightly bandaged, difficult-to-move right hand to pull out the needle from the back of his left hand, then leaned against the wall and felt for a suit jacket placed on the sofa.

He could tell whose clothes they were just by the style and size. Shi Meng didn’t want to take it, but he had no choice.

He draped the jacket over himself to cover the hospital gown. After pressing his ear to the door to ascertain the situation outside, he turned the handle, carefully crossed the corridor, and headed toward the stairwell.

To avoid running into anyone, Shi Meng chose to take the stairs.

Perhaps due to tension, he didn’t immediately notice any discomfort.

Walking down from the fourth floor, pretending to be a passerby, he exited the hospital gate, crossed two streets, and sat down on a long bench in front of a commercial plaza. Only then did the pain from his wounds slowly register, draining the color from his face.

Taking several deep breaths provided some psychological relief, allowing Shi Meng to shift some of his attention away from the pain and onto other sensations.

Having finally broken free from the shackles of body and mind, he shouldn’t waste this rare freedom.