Early the next morning, Yan Xiaodao got up and washed as usual in cold water. Afterward, he unpacked the two large boxes of appliances he had brought with him and began installing them around Mrs. Yan’s house.
The four brothers who had accompanied him finally got to enjoy a genuine company-funded countryside outing. They slept until late morning before wandering over from the village entrance with breakfast in hand, grinning. “Boss, something as small as installing appliances still needs you personally? Let us do it!”
“No need.” Yan Xiaodao shot the lot of them a sidelong glance. “Blew all your cigarette money playing online games last night, didn’t you? Tipped it all to those little demon-faced streamers? You’re here begging alms from me now, right?!”
The younger brothers burst out laughing. “No—we’ve got salaries! Don’t need you buying our cigarettes! Boss, save your wages for buying flowers for that certain someone!”
When Yang Xifeng got kicked straight out through the door with one foot and clutched his backside, he hurriedly corrected himself. “No, no, no! I meant buying that certain someone a bouquet!”
Yan Xiaodao took a cigarette from the pack, snapped it in half, and put one half into his mouth to chew. He had begun getting used to “smoking” like this. It did not fill the air with smoke and unpleasant smells that might bother a certain person. He kept his head down and concentrated on the work, connecting wires and repairing circuit boards. This was the sort of work a man of the household ought to know how to do.
There was no one else left in the family, yet Mrs. Yan refused to follow her son into the city and stubbornly remained on this land that held almost no pleasant memories for her. Yan Xiaodao had hired a cook, a worker who came once a week to handle heavier chores, and a gardener to care for the plants in the yard. All were familiar, reliable villagers who could look out for one another. Even so, Mrs. Yan remained accustomed to doing her own cooking and cleaning. The carefully chosen fabric and precise tailoring of the sofa covers, the many embroidered cushions, and the embroidered dust cloth laid over every appliance in the house were enough to show how competent and particular its mistress was.
Mrs. Yan was not old to begin with. Among the surrounding villages, her fine brows, delicate eyes, and oval face had always been considered gentle and pretty. She would never have lacked for marriage prospects if fate had treated her kindly. She kept drifting over to wipe sweat from her son’s face, then came back to feed him water. A short while later she appeared again, this time carrying a plate of corn cakes.
Yan Xiaodao said, “Hands are busy. I’ll eat later.”
Mrs. Yan said, “Open your mouth.”
So Yan Xiaodao opened his mouth and ate an entire cake from his mother’s hand in three or four bites.
Ling He sat beside the dining table, his gaze occasionally drifting past the flowers and plants outside, but all his attention rested on this warm picture of a loving mother and devoted son. There were things inside that picture he had never experienced before. He could not tell whether the feeling in him was melancholy or bitterness. It was as though he had suddenly shrunk backward into an ignorant third-grade child, slowly learning for the first time that a person’s heart could actually become soft.
There were not many opportunities left for him to stumble through lessons like this and learn slowly. Their fate together was too shallow.
Ling He lowered himself to the floor and sat there helping Mrs. Yan trim chives and snap beans. He had never learned to sit cross-legged, so his two long legs stretched out in an exceptionally bold sprawl, practically occupying the entire living room of the rural house. Even picking beans, he somehow managed to look like a young master commanding an estate, as though the room could barely contain his presence. Mrs. Yan was also quietly studying Ling He, particularly those legs, and kept slipping him roasted sweet potatoes and the local sugar-roasted beans. She had already noticed that this handsome boy could really eat!
When Yan Xiaodao stepped outside into the yard, Mrs. Yan immediately seized the opportunity and tentatively asked in a low, vague voice, “Child… you work for those people too? You work at the same company as Xiaodao?”
Ling He nodded naturally. “Yes.”
Mrs. Yan stared at him and pursued the question. “You went away on that business trip with him too? You travel with him often?”
Ling He felt that he was probably supposed to nod. “…Yes, Auntie.”
Mrs. Yan visibly leaned forward. The gaze fixed on him mixed worry, unease, and dissatisfaction before sliding painfully down toward his disabled legs, as though she had abruptly understood something terribly important. Her expression became unusually distressed, and she hesitated before murmuring, “Such a good child… don’t keep doing that kind of work with him in the future. You’re a university student. There are so many other things you could do. Such a handsome child, and now look at your legs…. Don’t follow him anymore. What’s the point of making that much money?! Being rich, having status—it all makes people different from before. Isn’t living honestly and peacefully without anything happening to you worth more than all of it?…”
Ling He understood what she meant and reassured her calmly. “Auntie, Mr. Yan is a very good boss. He’s smart, capable, efficient, and loyal. You don’t need to worry about him.”
Mrs. Yan’s face remained knotted with conflict and anxiety. This was clearly not some sudden bout of melancholy. The disappointment, exhaustion, and helplessness appeared to have tormented her for years—perhaps ten, perhaps eight.
Maybe the anxiety had begun the very day Qi Baoshan returned and came looking for them, growing worse with every passing year. Mrs. Yan had heard and seen enough over time; she was neither deaf nor blind. Put plainly, those five hundred thousand yuan in cash had effectively “sold” the rest of her son’s life to Master Qi. Somewhere deep in Mrs. Yan’s heart, mother and son had merely exchanged one loan shark for another. The creditor had changed from that black-hearted coal-mine owner to the inscrutable Qi Baoshan, and the debt had changed from a fixed five hundred thousand yuan into an immeasurable debt of gratitude that could never be repaid in a lifetime.
Yan Xiaodao soon returned indoors, and Mrs. Yan immediately stopped talking. She did not dare mention anything in front of Xiaodao that might cause unhappiness between mother and son…. In the end, this son was not hers by blood. Did she dare interfere? Did she even have the right? What if she said too much, he turned against her, and then left? Who would she have left to find?
As lunchtime approached, Mrs. Yan said she had to go to the church to attend a lunch gathering with the brothers and sisters and told the two of them to head back to the city.
Ling He immediately suggested, “Auntie, we’ll go with you.”
As they left, Ling He whispered into Yan Xiaodao’s ear, “It isn’t the weekend. Churches generally don’t hold lunch gatherings today.”
Yan Xiaodao suddenly realized it too. “Oh. Right?”
Ling He said quietly, “Mr. Yan, your mother has something on her mind. She’s worried about you. She’s going to the church because she wants someone to talk to.”
The church on a weekday afternoon was completely different from the bustling marketplace atmosphere of the day before. It had finally returned to the appearance of a dignified white building standing sacred beneath the sunlight. Once every hour, its bells rang in a deep, hoarse voice, recounting more than a century of history.
The amateur choir finished its rehearsal and came down from the platform.
Pastor Qiu, who presided over the church, greeted the parishioners and visitors warmly. He looked refined and cultivated, and his smile carried the pleasant warmth of spring sunlight.
Ling He did not personally believe in any of this either, but he bowed to Pastor Qiu with perfect courtesy. In his heart, he understood completely. A woman like Mrs. Yan, born into humble circumstances and rejected by fate in every possible way, had worked and bled through one disaster after another for most of her life. Now she had only an adopted son and a cluster of graves on the mountain to depend on. Who else could she entrust the last hope and faith of her life to except the Heavenly Father and God? If she gave that faith to anyone else, who would be worthy of carrying it?
The church was quiet. There was indeed no lunch gathering. Sunlight filtered through stained-glass windows, while the exquisite murals high across the ceiling seemed to radiate a light capable of seeing straight into a person’s heart.
On the platform where the choir had rehearsed stood a piano. The instrument looked old around its edges, but it was still usable.
Mrs. Yan, wanting to show off her precious son a little, said, “Xiao Ling, did you know? He can play the piano!”
Yan Xiaodao’s expression changed immediately. He hurriedly protested, “Mom! I can’t. Mom…”
Mrs. Yan looked surprised. “You play very well, son!”
Ling He raised an eyebrow and smiled. “Oh? Really?”
Yan Xiaodao frantically signaled at his mother with his eyes. “Mom, I really don’t know how to play… what I do absolutely does not count as knowing how to play the piano!…”
Mrs. Yan asked Pastor Qiu to go with her into a small room so she could pray and confess, leaving the two men alone in the vast church hall.
In any mother’s eyes, everything her own child did was naturally the best. If he possessed even one little skill, she could not resist pulling it out and showing it off. Especially in a small, rustic place like this, where few people had much exposure to Western classical arts, being able to play several piano pieces was more than enough material for boasting to the villagers.
Ling He looked delighted by the prospect of watching someone embarrass himself and regarded Xiaodao with a deep smile. “No need to be modest, Mr. Yan. I genuinely thought you were nothing but a rough brute with clumsy hands and feet who knew only how to hold knives, chop meat, and split firewood. Turns out you’ve been deceiving me. One turn of the head and your true identity as a sensitive young artist comes out.”
“Heh… give it a rest.” Yan Xiaodao knew there was no escape today. He was not stupid. You did not need more than a toe’s worth of thinking to understand how ridiculous it was to boast about “playing the piano” in front of a young master raised in elite schools in Europe and America. It would be showing off axe skills at the carpenter-master’s own door and asking to humiliate yourself.
Yan Xiaodao had grown up poor. Where would a child from a household like his have found the conditions to study piano? Could his family possibly have afforded one?
It was only after he grew older and began accompanying his mother to church each week that he found spare moments to ask Pastor Qiu for guidance. Pastor Qiu was kind and patient and willing to teach him. Yan Xiaodao had started halfway through life and remained a half-baked amateur. He had no foundation in fingering and could not read sheet music at all. But if one was being fair, Yan Xiaodao possessed extraordinary talent for anything that required both technical control and strength in the fingers. His memory was excellent too. Whatever he could play came almost entirely from natural ability and brute memorization.
Ling He refused to let him off. “Play something. I want to hear.”
Yan Xiaodao frowned while suppressing a laugh. “I really don’t play well. An expert like you would definitely laugh at me! Hmph. Forget playing—just laugh now and get it over with!”
Ling He obligingly laughed several times, then asked, “What pieces have you practiced?”
What pieces? Yan Xiaodao honestly confessed, “I only know three and a half!”
Yan Xiaodao placed his left hand on the keys and casually played several smooth passages. Ling He discovered that Xiaodao had been completely truthful: the man really knew only three and a half pieces. He could get through Für Elise, Radetzky March, and Carmen Overture. Anything significantly more difficult by Chopin, Mozart, or Liszt was entirely beyond him. Yan Xiaodao also greatly admired Beethoven, who had composed the Fate Sonata, but that piece was difficult for him too. He knew only the first half of the first movement. After that, everything fell apart.
Yan Xiaodao burst into self-mocking laughter at his own embarrassment. He felt as though ten fingers simply were not enough for all those keys. Under Ling He’s laughter, the second half came out completely scrambled and incomprehensible, bad enough to make Beethoven climb out of his grave in rage.
Almost naturally, Ling He moved over on his crutches and sat beside Yan Xiaodao. Without saying anything, Yan simply shifted aside and gave him half the piano bench.
They did not need to discuss it aloud. Ling He’s right hand flowed through several measures of Carmen Overture before he glanced at Xiaodao. From Mr. Yan’s extremely limited repertoire, this was the only piece suitable for four hands. Mr. Ling would simply have to make do.
Yan Xiaodao liked music like this—joyful, high-spirited, grand, and exhilarating to play. He disliked anything too delicate, artistic, or soft, especially pieces that seemed to drag painfully from one note into another until they left a breath trapped inside your chest. His tastes favored music that was broad, powerful, direct, and satisfying.
Four hands moved rapidly and slowly across the row of keys, full of warmth and energy, striking every note directly into the other person’s heart.
Both men kept their true feelings deeply hidden. Their faces remained restrained and composed, while their chests filled with such delight that the happiness almost hurt. For this one moment they were playing a movement of pure exhilaration, and it was beautiful.
For Ling He, these were nothing more than the final few celebratory measures before the music between him and Yan Xiaodao entered a darker movement. Carmen Overture would drive it to a bright, full-throated climax before the final rest. That was enough…. Because of that, he played with unusual concentration and force, allowing the emotion to pour freely through him without restraint.
Yan Xiaodao had extraordinarily beautiful hands.
Ling He did not need to look at the keyboard to begin with. His gaze openly studied Yan Xiaodao’s hands instead. His Adam’s apple moved, and for one absurd moment he thought it might almost be worth crawling inside the piano and becoming one of those keys himself.
Yan Xiaodao was distracted too, Heaven knew by what…. When they played the piece a second time, he began missing notes, his fingers drifting into the wrong positions and producing uneven, broken passages. Ling He frowned and glanced at him. The moment he did, Yan Xiaodao himself could not hold it together and started laughing apologetically as he played. Ling He seized an opening and used a single “One Yang Finger” to fill in one of his missing notes. Yan Xiaodao felt this was nothing less than an open humiliation of a beginner!
Elio’s Notes: “One Yang Finger” is the name of a famous finger-based martial-arts technique in wuxia fiction. Here Ling He is jokingly reduced to using one finger to rescue Yan Xiaodao’s missing piano note.
Later, Ling He showed off with Turkish March by himself and instantly reduced Mr. Yan to rubble.
The only problem with playing alone was that no one could help Ling He position his leg. He had to use both hands to lift his right leg and place his right foot on the sustain pedal. With his legs inconvenient, he simply abandoned the other two pedals entirely.
Yan Xiaodao could also hear that Mr. Ling must have received strict musical training from childhood and then practiced diligently for well over ten years. Whether or not he had ever taken formal grades, his playing would easily qualify at a high level. If not for being held back by this old church piano, Ling He could have sounded even better. His ten long, elegant fingers were astonishingly agile, as though charms had been pasted to them and immortal water brushed across them. The Mozart piece came alive beneath his hands, lively and graceful yet carrying an unmistakably Eastern sensibility, the music filled with an almost innocent childlike purity….
The two men secretly played the piano behind his mother’s back for a while. Half an hour later, Mrs. Yan emerged from the small room with slightly reddened eyes. Prayer and confession had inevitably touched old wounds.
Ling He handed Mrs. Yan the plate of pastries from which he had already eaten one and asked her to sit for a while. “Pastor Qiu, may I go in and confess as well? If you’ll forgive my presumption and accept my sincerity before the Lord, there are several things I would like to share with you.”
Yan Xiaodao raised an eyebrow in surprise. This had not been arranged beforehand.
Pastor Qiu’s full name was Qiu Wenlan. He was one of the very few respected, educated figures in the small town. Though no longer young, his face carried few wrinkles. Perhaps possessing faith and maintaining an open, benevolent heart truly did allow a person to escape some of the erosion of time. Pastor Qiu smiled, nodded, and gestured in invitation. Ling He seemed to have prepared for this long ago. He turned back toward Xiaodao. “Mr. Yan, can you come with me?”
*
The church did not practice a formal, enclosed ritual of confession. It was more a matter of parishioners speaking openly in prayer. Yan Xiaodao suddenly realized that Ling He might be using this opportunity to tell him something.
Inside the pastor’s sitting room, Ling He met Qiu Wenlan’s kind gaze and customary opening words of welcome. He remained perfectly calm as he began speaking at length. “Merciful Lord, Pastor Qiu—perhaps this cannot even be called confession. I simply carry too much guilt and darkness in my heart. I’m tired and want to put down the burden. What I say today may be nothing but hypocritical, empty excuses. No matter what I say, it will not change the life I intend to live afterward.
“Before the Lord, I am merely a small and ugly sinner. For more than ten years I have carried certain evil thoughts, lived in bitterness, and been unable either to release or escape them. There is a wildfire of rage hidden in my heart, narrow desires, and raging ambition. I want revenge…. Sometimes these thoughts torment me. At other times they make me restless with anticipation, hoping I can finally have what I’ve wanted.”
Yan Xiaodao’s Adam’s apple moved. Perhaps there truly was some kind of connection between their minds, because he could already guess what Ling He intended to say.
Pastor Qiu appeared surprised, but his broad, warm hand still settled gently over Ling He’s. “Child, the Lord will be glad that you are willing to speak these things aloud. Your desires and thoughts may gradually lessen through confession and prayer.”
“You’re wrong, Pastor Qiu.” Ling He smiled and shook his head. In that instant his eyes changed sharply, and his words suddenly became cutting. Even before the Heavenly Father himself, he had no fear of speaking plainly. “My anger and hatred cannot be released until I have successfully carried every thought into action, because they are all I have left! My family was destroyed. The road of my life was broken apart and people died along it. My father was murdered through the schemes of treacherous men and died unjustly. Our family name and wealth became nothing but an empty dream. His death forced me into more than ten years of displacement, concealment, and a life twisted out of shape. Even now, I still have to live beneath someone else’s roof, looking upward at the pitying eyes of my enemies and accepting whatever charity they occasionally decide to hand down. Everything beautiful that should once have belonged to me vanished long ago with the past and the wind. That scene from years ago, the one I desperately want to forget, remains torn into my mind forever. The life I want back will never return.”
Yan Xiaodao could no longer bear it after hearing that. His face changed completely, black brows stark against suddenly pale skin. He wanted to cover Ling He’s mouth. Every trace of tenderness and harmony from moments earlier vanished.
He desperately wanted to tell Ling He: If this is what you wanted to say, why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you say it to me privately? For you, I could at least consider anything you wanted me to do….
Suddenly he felt that he knew far too little about Ling He—or perhaps knew far too little about Master Qi as well. There were many things from which he had probably been excluded from the very beginning. Perhaps he had never truly understood the life he was living. Some of what lay before him had already gone far beyond his knowledge and ability to control.
Pastor Qiu, who had lived long enough to witness many things, was shaken too. His lips moved as he tried to comfort Ling He, whose emotional intensity had begun rising. “Poor child, the Lord will forgive your confusion and wandering. Let me ask you on the Lord’s behalf: is there another way your suffering might be resolved?”
Ling He shook his head again. His posture remained dignified, while a powerful, confident smile spread through his brows and eyes. He had suppressed this for far too long and could no longer hide the excitement. “I will resolve it in my own way. I will watch those small, ugly souls carry the sins of this lifetime on their backs and walk one by one toward destruction, driven miserably from this world in whatever way they deserve.”
“Ling He!” Yan Xiaodao called in a restrained voice, finding it almost unbearable to hear. He shot to his feet.
He regretted entering this room. He regretted bringing Ling He to this church.
There were some words that, once heard, could never be treated as though they had never been spoken. Whatever ambiguous intimacy and tenderness had existed between the two men dissolved in an instant as the bloody flesh beneath the skin of their real world began showing through. Only minutes earlier, they had sat side by side at the piano, able to understand each other through nothing more than a row of keys.
“And those demons who deliberately hurt me before, who humiliated and abused me—I will let every one of them destroy themselves and become ash in a wildfire.” As Ling He spoke, he turned intentionally or unintentionally toward Yan Xiaodao. A poisonous smile capable of chilling the heart rested in his eyes. “Mr. Yan, those are all little ghosts you know personally. At the gambling table they fought to curse and jeer, surrounded me with mocking, contemptuous faces while bidding on me, stepped on my body, and tore apart my dignity as though it belonged to them. I have not forgotten. I will never forgive them. Their bodies will rot away bit by bit together with their corrupted souls until not a single foul-smelling scrap remains.”
Two rivers of ice seemed to flow through Ling He’s pupils, cold and elegant. His voice remained melodious, no fangs visibly bared, yet every sentence sent a chill down the spine.
“…Ling He,” Yan Xiaodao said hoarsely, “I didn’t realize what happened aboard the ship had hurt you this deeply. I failed to protect you properly. I’m genuinely sorry. Can we talk alone?”
Ling He stared at him with such oppressive force that Yan Xiaodao suddenly felt as though he himself ought to be the one holding the pastor’s hand and confessing his sins.
“The Heavenly Father holds the greatest mercy and compassion for every living thing. The Lord will forgive you, child…. I sincerely hope, on the Lord’s behalf, that you can someday find release….” Pastor Qiu’s voice trembled faintly. He too kept glancing at Yan Xiaodao, unable to tell whether he was hearing mad talk or some private conflict between these two young men. Combined with the worries Mrs. Yan had shared with him earlier, all of this became even more unsettling. But the ethics of his position prevented Pastor Qiu from revealing one person’s confidence to another.
Ling He delivered his final statement with elegant composure. “Pastor Qiu, I have far too many wicked thoughts. These are merely the tip of the iceberg. Every time I look up at the Lord bearing the cross for ordinary sinners like us, I feel immeasurable shame. I should be the one nailed to that cross, paying the debt for the ugly souls of this world and for my own sins. My blood will be the most devout offering I can someday give the Lord.
“The only thing troubling me now is that I cannot hold in my arms the person I respect and look up to. Spiritual harmony, physical attraction, and two hearts shadowing one another step for step will ultimately turn out to be nothing more than flowers in a mirror and the moon reflected in water. I sincerely confess before the Lord and hope that when the person I truly respect eventually understands everything, he will still be able to accept and forgive me…. Amen.”
Pastor Qiu was nothing more than a piece of furniture in the room. Every word Ling He spoke had been meant for Yan Xiaodao.
*
When their group emerged from the church, Yan Xiaodao remained completely silent. Both hands stayed clenched until they hurt, and he felt as though he were walking through cloud and fog.
Several times he tried to reach from behind and quietly catch Ling He by the elbow, wanting to pull him aside and talk. Each time Ling He slipped away from his grip without leaving a trace and even turned back to offer a politely innocent smile. That restrained courtesy created an immense distance between them. Compared with the soft closeness they had shared on the piano bench, it was the difference between inches and miles.
Ling He’s expression remained calm as he continued chatting and laughing with Mrs. Yan as though nothing whatsoever had happened in the pastor’s room. They stepped out of the solemn, mysterious church and returned beneath the early-spring sunlight, as though crossing in a single step back into the ordinary human world. All around them, life unfolded layer after layer, revealing a vibrant face. The mortal world was astonishingly beautiful.
Yan Xiaodao wanted to speak with Ling He again, to have an honest conversation, but no longer knew where to begin. Ling He had already switched effortlessly into his harmless domestic mode and offered him no opportunity to return to the subject. The man possessed two faces and two separate shells, each living in a parallel world. His joy, anger, love, and hatred shifted unpredictably. No one could ever fully grasp him.
Yan Xiaodao had lost his ability to judge which Ling He existed inside the body he thought he was holding…. Perhaps this man had never truly been held inside his palm at all.
Several younger brothers had parked the cars outside the church. They leaned against them smoking, looking exactly like a pack of idle tomcats lounging around their boss.
The moment Yang Xifeng saw Yan Xiaodao, he hurried over. “Boss, your phone was off? Everyone looking for you started calling me instead.”
Yan Xiaodao remembered that he had silenced his phone out of respect when entering the church. The screen now displayed several missed calls and unread messages.
Liang Youhui had written: 【Xiaodao, my dad sent me over here on a business trip. Perfect excuse to come find you and play for a few days too! You’d better entertain your buddy properly.】
Jian Mingjue had written: 【Mr. Yan, last time we parted on the ship, you ran off without even saying goodbye. Your brother’s been thinking about you ever since. How about golf sometime? I’ve got some excellent “imported clubs” and “golf balls” I can lend Mr. Yan to use however he likes!】
Liang Youhui’s father was Liang Tong, nominally the richest man in Yandu on the Forbes rankings. Naturally, the truly enormous fortunes belonged to families with deeper political and military connections whose real assets ranking companies could never dig out. But Liang Tong appearing publicly on the list was still enough for everyone in the right circles to know his family was enormously wealthy.
As for Jian Mingjue, either he was short of money or short of business again. The man was certainly working hard. He had apparently stopped throwing playing cards at people and moved on to using golf balls to advertise the abundance of his resources and assets.
Watanabe Yangshan’s liaison secretary had also been harassing him nonstop with calls and messages for two straight days: 【Mr. Yan, when will the commercial agreement you promised our chairman last time be honored? Perhaps Chairman Qi could join us and everyone can meet to discuss the details in person.】 Naturally, this was not something a secretary had decided independently. One glance told Yan it was that old bastard’s greed speaking through someone else. Even with only one breath left, the man still refused to give up.
To Yan Xiaodao’s surprise, he had also received a secret message from Bureau Chief Bao, asking without any context whatsoever: 【It isn’t only the number of people anymore. Can you identify what kind of blades they used?】
Yan Xiaodao very much wanted to blacklist Lord Bao—Judge Bao himself—on the spot. He could not afford to offend this incorruptible magistrate, yet the man always managed to ask exactly the question Yan least wanted to hear.
Elio’s Notes: “Judge Bao” refers to Bao Qingtian, the legendary image of the historical official Bao Zheng as an incorruptible, stern judge. The joke works especially well here because Bao Zhengwei shares the surname Bao.
They all looked like trivial people with trivial matters. Yet one thing after another was beginning to arrive without pause.