The end of the year was approaching, and it was a winter full of trouble. This New Year season was remarkably eventful, with unexpected things occurring one after another.
Zhuang Xiao attended the Golden Horse Awards in Taipei, once again appearing alone on the red carpet and leaving Mr. Pei at home to watch the livestream with his father-in-law.
The two gossiped by text throughout the broadcast. Pei Yan kept teasing him. “You look so handsome in that checked suit! I’ve never seen you wear one before. The moment you cross the strait, you start showing off! Hey, your hair’s long again. Are you cutting it this time or not?”
Zhuang Xiao replied: [What do you think? Cut it or not? How do you want me to look?]
Pei Yan really wanted to tell him he looked beautiful with any hairstyle, long or short. He was always particularly attractive.
Instead, he wrote: [I want to see you bend over and let me take you. Will you let me?]
The moment he sent it, he knew he was dead meat again.
Zhuang Xiao sent him a single letter: “C.”
Brother Xiao seldom swore. On the rare occasions he granted Pei Yan that letter, it meant the male lion was bristling. Anyone bold enough to pat a lion’s backside might find himself bitten.
During the ceremony, Zhuang Xiao appeared onstage with the host for an interactive segment. This was his first visit to the Golden Horse Awards, and he promptly received a baptism by fire. The host teased him relentlessly and then asked, “Mr. Zhuang, I hear you’ve recently made a film about espionage during the Republic of China. Did you deliberately choose to play a Nationalist army officer?”
Zhuang Xiao nodded. “Yes. I chose that role.”
The host followed up without pausing for breath. “Does that mean you personally have a special attachment to and appreciation of our Nationalist armed forces?”
Watching the livestream, Pei Yan muttered, “Fuck.”
That was a trap. It wasn’t the first time an entertainment awards host had asked an artist a politically sensitive question and tried to force an answer.
“That character was more complex. I simply chose the more complicated character, whose loyalty and treachery are difficult to judge,” Zhuang Xiao answered smoothly, looking at the host. “Besides, my partner Mr. Pei plays a Communist soldier. So I think I have an even more special appreciation for and attachment to the Communist forces.”
A startling shiver went up Pei Yan’s spine. Was that really something Brother Xiao had said?
The audience took a few seconds to react, then began whistling, cheering, and applauding. Any time Zhuang Xiao mentioned Mr. Pei in public, people paid close attention.
The host did everything he could to fan the flames. He brought up that famous suggestive photograph of Pei Yan tying Zhuang Xiao’s shoelace, then ran up to Zhuang Xiao and pretended to kneel on one knee to tie his shoe. The entire auditorium roared with laughter.
Without changing his expression, Zhuang Xiao stepped back and refused to let the host touch his shoe. “Mr. Pei already tied a knot I can’t undo. No need to trouble you to kneel down.”
It was all terribly funny, in the name of entertainment and ratings.
Pei Yan wanted to ridicule the host, yet found himself nervous and sweating, unable to look away from the screen. Zhuang Xiao appeared composed onstage, but everything he said was a firecracker. He seemed almost recklessly unconcerned about the consequences. It was as if he was about to come out…
Their mahjong hand had long been ready to win. One little spark before the public might give somebody the winning tile and leave their entire hand overturned and exposed.
* * *
Dragon Battles Heaven’s Pass won Best Action Design and Best Visual Effects at the Golden Horse Awards that year. Though neither was Zhuang Xiao’s individual award, he’d made an impressive trip to Taiwan and picked up more fans along the way.
For the first time, Pei Yan spent the night at his father-in-law’s home, in the apartment Zhuang Xiao had recently rented for his father.
It was much cleaner and brighter, and the building management was stricter and more responsible. In the previous building, the corridor had been cluttered with drying laundry, rubbish, and odds and ends, reeking unpleasantly. Old Man Zhuang had arranged empty liquor bottles in Eight-Trigram formations, practically a minefield that kept strangers away. Here the building managers would sweep such things aside without a second thought, so Old Man Zhuang had moved all his precious bottles indoors.
Inside was even better. They could play with them!
Pei Yan didn’t find the old man’s eccentricity irritating. He found it amusing.
The old and young men played at knocking over liquor bottles with marbles and laughed themselves silly. As Zhuang Xiao would have said, You and my father are perfectly matched when it comes to drunken antics. Why did I ever fall for you?
Pei Yan had noticed the old man drinking less and eating more. He felt his emotional pep talks and kindly persuasion had finally begun to work, and was rather proud of himself.
“You haven’t got marbles, so we’ll use coins!” he suggested. “American quarters, twenty-five cents. Brother Xiao gave me these. They mean something special to both of us.”
They lined up liquor bottles against a wall and numbered them 1, 2, 3, and 4. Crouching or kneeling ten meters away like children, they flicked quarters with two fingers at the bottles. If someone called out “one,” he had to hit bottle number one. They had to prove whose aim was best.
“Whoever loses has to fry sliced steamed buns,” Pei Yan announced.
“You’ll do it. You’ll lose, brat!” the old man declared.
“Sir, you can’t keep inching closer! … That’s cheating! … Come back here!” Pei Yan shouted.
“Damn… Your aim really is good…” He clutched his head.
Old Man Zhuang hadn’t lost his martial-arts skills. His internal strength, hands, and eyes were still precise. He actually defeated his son-in-law at flicking the coins.
Pei Yan dutifully put on an apron and went to the kitchen to fry the steamed-bun slices.
“I want sesame paste and white sugar on them. Both!” Old Man Zhuang ordered from the door.
“All right! I know! You really know how to eat!” Pei Yan grumbled.
* * *
Pei Yan spent the night on the living-room sofa. He couldn’t help recalling the night before Zhuang Xiao left for Taipei, when they had made love until dawn. Brother Xiao had been a little rough lately and especially clingy in bed…
Zhuang Xiao pressed him against the wall, facing him, lifted one of his legs and rested it on his shoulder.
Pei Yan was pressed close against the wall, driven upward thrust by thrust. His shoulders and back repeatedly struck the hard surface. It hurt and felt good at the same time, thrillingly so. Zhuang Xiao bit his shoulder, sucked at his chest, and deliberately nibbled his nipples to make him cry out. Thrusting into him from below, Zhuang Xiao breathed hotly into his ear and asked, “Do you like it?” “Does it feel good?” …
“Do you like me?”
“Do you love me?”
Pei Yan was drenched in sweat and could barely stand, his entire body shaking up and down under each thrust. Over and over, he said, “I like you,” “I like you so much.” Then Zhuang Xiao fucked him until he was howling, unable to take any more, forcing him to cry “I love you” over and over…
Pei Yan didn’t know what had come over Zhuang Xiao, but he could tell he was doing it deliberately. Zhuang Xiao rarely went wild like this in bed. It was as though he were suppressing some fierce emotion, needing to confirm over and over that their feelings were still as passionate and loving as before, that the promises between them remained unshakable and neither had given his heart to anyone else.
Zhuang Xiao fucked Pei Yan until he came, but still wouldn’t let him go, gripping his waist and taking him from behind again… In the middle of the night, when Pei Yan wanted to get out of bed to use the toilet, Zhuang Xiao wouldn’t release him. Even going to the bathroom, they were naked and still joined together, fitted so closely that they couldn’t take a step apart…
“Brother, Brother, don’t… Ah! Ah!” Pei Yan could barely walk. He was about to sink to his knees in the middle of the living room. Zhuang Xiao held him tightly and made him shuffle forward while thrusting into him from behind.
Whenever Pei Yan called him “Brother” in bed, it meant he was yielding to his man and begging for mercy. Even his sturdy body couldn’t withstand Brother Xiao going all out, several rounds in a single night. Zhuang Xiao seemed determined to make him soften, plead, and surrender completely, rough with him like a roaring male lion…
Zhuang Xiao bit him, kissed his ear, and told him again and again, “I love you too.” “Yanyan, I love you…”
Meanwhile, the studio was also at work.
Soon after Sleeping with the Enemy wrapped, with a powerful new sponsor behind them, the studio rushed into production on its next film. Zhuang Xiao had taken temporary leave from the set to attend the ceremony in Taipei. He and Pei Yan were working together again on a new film, Assassinate the Brother, already nearly halfway through filming in Tianjin.
The production plan for this film had been worked out in bed, playing cards with President Yan and Deputy President Ling. The two actors visited Deputy Ling’s holiday home in Utah, went skiing with the couple on snow-covered mountains, then lit a fire in the cabin to warm up that night.
Pei Yan challenged Yan Xiaodao to a drinking contest. As fellow countrymen they drank to their hearts’ content, flushed with alcohol, and even made wagers on drinking games. The other two watched the pair with mutual exasperation, unwilling to join their antics.
Then all four of them played cards together on the bedroom bed…
Pei Yan had always dreamed of shooting a genuine widescreen Eastern wuxia epic on film stock. He had a subject and a draft script already, an eventful biographical story set during the late Qing about Dong Haichuan, founder of Baguazhang. Zhuang Xiao himself would perform the martial art onscreen, in a historical biography tailor-made for Brother Xiao.
Unfortunately, they lacked the funds, equipment, and experienced crew. They hadn’t dared take on such a huge project yet.
“Let’s save for another couple of years before we shoot The Life of Dong Haichuan,” Pei Yan said. “Spending someone else’s money makes my hands sweat. I don’t want to squander all your hard-earned money, Knife Lord.”
“That’s not squandering,” Yan Xiaodao said as he laid down a card. “I know major productions carry risks, but I trust both of your abilities.”
“I’m afraid of betraying so much trust.” Pei Yan smiled and laid down a card too. “What if we can’t earn your investment back?”
“There’s more to life than making money,” Yan Xiaodao said. “Lots of people are capable of that. What I trust is the ideas and taste behind the stories you two choose, your passion, and your drawing power. Audiences think the same way. When they see both your names on the poster, they already have an idea what that film will say.”
The audience trusted their reputation. Since they had chosen this path, they must stay on it and not ruin their own names.
Zhuang Xiao nodded to President Yan. “Old Pei and I will do our best. We’ll do what we’ve promised and what we ought to.”
“Good!” Yan Xiaodao cheerfully laid down a powerful straight. “Then I’ll put all I can into helping you two, and do what I’ve promised and what I ought to.”
The studio had amassed several wuxia scripts. Pei Yan wanted to make them all, but funding and energy were limited.
One step at a time. One bite at a time.
Without saying a word, Ling He laid down his cards in a rapid clatter and defeated the other three. By then the three gentlemen had agreed on the collaboration for Assassinate the Brother. They lost at cards so disastrously that night that Zhuang Xiao and Pei Yan practically lost their underpants. They couldn’t beat the other couple at cards; those two were the God of Gamblers and the Gambling Sage of the jianghu, who could combine forces to crush any opponent at the table.
As the loser, Zhuang Xiao had to go to the kitchen and prepare a late-night snack, making a large pot of hand-rolled noodles. Pei Yan hadn’t lost out either. Though he’d lost at cards all evening, he hadn’t had to sell his looks or sleep with anybody, yet he’d still managed to coax a substantial investment out of President Yan.
So the new film began shooting at the Tianjin Film Base not long afterward.
The Tianjin base was organized around two hubs, North Station and the concession-era Five Great Avenues in Heping District. It also incorporated the old Qing post office, former bank buildings, famous people’s residences, and other historical sites. The operator had vacated and refurbished some of these structures, renovated them, and reopened them for business, recreating the grandeur of old Tianjin on the map.
President Yan was among the project’s major shareholders, and Pei Yan had invested too. They later called it the Longtu Film Base, with the cultural company renamed Longtu Pictures, echoing Pei Yan’s own studio name from afar.
Neither Zhuang Xiao nor Pei Yan took a fee from the production budget. They waived their acting salaries.
Why collect a salary from a film they were financing and producing themselves? If it made money, everyone would share the profit; if it lost money, everyone would bear the loss.
Pei Yan went so far as to designate himself an unpaid “friendly guest appearance.” He would neither charge a cent nor contribute a cent of salary expense. It nearly drove his Second Uncle Zhang Shaochi to his grave with fury.
The script for Assassinate the Brother was based on the “Assassination of Ma” case, one of the Four Great Strange Cases of the late Qing. The new screenplay moved the action from the late Qing to the Republican period. A powerful Nationalist government official was unexpectedly assassinated. The righteous-looking bandit who had killed him surrendered his weapon and allowed himself to be arrested, but his act exposed a twisting, extraordinary secret from years before. The murdered government official had been a treacherous monster, a predator who had betrayed his friends…
The film was about loyalty, human nature, and the perils of the jianghu. Three sworn brothers, bound by oaths and blood, had their brotherhood torn apart by ambition and the corrupting lure of self-interest until they raised weapons against one another.
Naturally Pei Yan took the part of the “Third Brother,” hot-blooded, earnest, and heroic, prepared to have his heart and liver torn out for the sake of brotherly loyalty.
Zhuang Xiao played the “Eldest Brother,” outwardly respectable but inwardly ambitious and ruthless. He completely overturned his usual image, remaining a villain from beginning to end, someone audiences would hate so much they wanted to tear him apart.
Pei Yan then approached President Yan to discuss a problem. Their trio of brothers still lacked a steadfast and honest “Second Brother.”
“If you need a Second Brother, go find one. Hire somebody,” Yan Xiaodao said.
But hiring an outsider was expensive. They wanted someone cheap. As Pei Yan put it, people in the family were cheapest of all, especially if they could save another acting fee.
This utterly tragic Second Brother needed to look handsome, honest, and heroic. He also had to be the strongest fighter of all three men, someone who could really handle himself.
An action star with the right age and appearance was difficult to find. If they failed, they would have to hire an actor who couldn’t fight and compensate with stunt doubles and editing. That would look much worse. All the fight choreography would have to be changed, and the action scenes wouldn’t stand up to scrutiny.
And so Yan Xiaodao, the film’s major investor, was talked and prodded into another acting appearance. He went from playing a grenade-throwing extra to becoming the film’s third male lead, the “Second Brother.”
Yan Xiaodao threw up his hands. “You two get up to all kinds of scheming in the film, and I’m the unlucky bastard who ends up taking the fall for both of you?”
On set, Pei Yan spun a pistol around his finger and smiled. “President Yan, you don’t have that many scenes. You’ll be finished in two weeks. Your business won’t suffer, and then you can go home and rest.”
“Rubbish!” Yan Xiaodao snapped, pulling his suit jacket open and planting his hands on his hips inside the soundstage. “I’ve read the damn script! I only get a few days on camera before they kill me off! I’m dead before I’ve even had enough fun acting!”
“Even if you haven’t had enough, you’ll have to bow and leave the stage,” Zhuang Xiao, the big boss, told him. “Your loyal Third Brother will avenge you.”
“He damn well better!” Yan Xiaodao ordered his fictional Third Brother Pei. “Give them a savage beating! …”
The film had another supporting actor willing to take a reduced fee for the sake of appearing in a small role.
One character was a spoiled young gentleman from a wealthy family, with even less screen time than the famous opera performer “White Crane” in the earlier film. Pei Yan contacted Brother Rong and asked whether he would help by doing a friendly cameo.
Xing Rong readily agreed. “Send me the script. Just let me know ahead of time when you need me on set, Yanyan.”
His fee?
“Whatever you think is right. It’s a favor between friends. I don’t really care how much you pay me,” Xing Rong replied.
Xing Rong had had nothing to do for months. There were no new film roles, and his company had sidelined him and stopped giving him work.
President Zhang had frozen him out partly to let the trouble blow over. Better keep that volatile little fellow out of sight before he offended anyone else.
Xing Rong had gone south to clear his head and spent two months in Hainan. Beijing’s winter was far too cold.
He deliberately avoided the north because he didn’t want to run into the person he missed. He hadn’t seen Xiao-Sa for over two months. Baby Sa kept messaging and trying to contact him, but Xing Rong offered excuse after excuse, avoiding any meeting.
Shang Xuelin, that filthy old lecher, had issued an informal order to hunt him down in the jianghu, boasting that he would make trouble for Xing Rong and ensure he never got another movie. Xing Rong’s own manager had disappeared from view for two months too, too frightened to show his face in case somebody broke his arms or legs.
Xing Rong didn’t want to drag innocent people into his problems, especially Xiao-Sa.
He didn’t dare accept other work. But he dared accept Pei Yan’s film. He didn’t care about the fee or what Zhang Shaochi might think. If the company boss was displeased, that would be an excellent reason for the two sides to part ways.
Xing Rong flew alone from Hainan back to Beijing. After a few days of boredom at home, lonely and single, unable to sleep comfortably by himself, he went to a rehabilitation hospital.
He went for one reason: he missed a particular man desperately and couldn’t bring himself to meet him, so he quietly visited someone else.
He went to the rehabilitation center to see Sa Risheng’s sworn brother Eriletu.
When you cherished someone, you naturally extended that affection to those close to him. For Xing Rong, if he couldn’t see Xiao-Sa, seeing someone connected to him might bring his heart a little comfort.
Letu had earlier been taken by his family to a hospital near Baotou, but treatment there had gone poorly. Zhuang Xiao had arranged to bring the young man back to Beijing to continue treatment. Xing Rong knew the hospital and even the room number. He had once promised to visit Xiao-Sa’s anda together with him. But he’d never kept that promise. Instead he’d spent a night with Baby Sa and then pushed him away…
The room was quiet enough to hear breath that sounded almost like faint murmuring. The people meant to be keeping watch happened to be away. Xing Rong nodded in greeting to the patient in bed.
To his surprise, Letu was awake and looking straight at him.
He had regained consciousness, but his gaze was unfocused and his memory entirely gone. He didn’t recognize anyone. The severe injury he’d suffered at the back of the head made it terribly, terribly difficult for his cognitive functions and memories to recover…
“I’m Xiao-Sa’s friend,” Xing Rong said.
Letu kept looking at him. His lips moved faintly, but he said nothing.
“Xiao-Sa. Sa Risheng. Your anda. Me, Xiao-Sa’s friend,” Xing Rong repeated slowly, one word at a time, watching for a reaction. None came.
“I’ve come to visit. I’ve brought you lots of tasty snacks.” Xing Rong was carrying several shopping bags.
He sat in the sun-filled hospital room for the whole afternoon, opening all sorts of snacks and feeding them to the patient.
“These are cream wafers. Xiao-Sa likes them best.”
“I bet you have similar tastes. You probably both like milky flavors.”
“You can take your time eating, okay? That great big eater isn’t here today. Nobody’s going to steal your food. Heh. So you like these too…”
“Sichuan-style shredded beef. Spicy. Xiao-Sa really likes this as well.”
“Ha, you like spicy food too. Of course you’re sworn brothers.”
“You can eat just as much as he can… Slow down a little…”
Letu’s ability to chew had not recovered fully. Hard, chewy foods such as dried beef were difficult for him, and he almost choked. Xing Rong quickly helped him spit it out. Better stick to wafers.
The patient chewed silently, scattering biscuit crumbs over his lips and clothes. His fingers moved slowly and clumsily. Xing Rong had to bring almost every bite to his mouth. Letu didn’t even understand that he should lick or wipe the crumbs away from the corners of his lips. He seemed completely dazed and helpless…
Xing Rong kept taking tissues out and gently wiping his mouth.
It was unbearably sad to see. He was still so young.
“You look a lot like Xiao-Sa…” Xing Rong said, talking freely to himself because the other man didn’t seem to understand.
“Your eyes, your nose. So similar.” He smiled, eyes lowered. “Both very handsome.”
He seemed to have developed an obsession with exactly this kind of man. Narrow eyes, a high nose, a long face, and that distinctive, simple quality to the features, so unmistakably masculine.
“Only I suppose you haven’t trained in a long time. You’re thinner than him. Much thinner,” he continued.
“Xiao-Sa’s gotten fat now!” Xing Rong couldn’t help laughing. “All right, fat’s not really the word. He’s a big, solid ox. The sheer weight of him could crush me…”
He blushed as he said it. Perhaps the afternoon sun was too bright. He turned his face away from the slanting light, his eyes stinging. The emotions he’d long kept pressed down were about to overflow through his eyes and breath…
Xing Rong took out his phone and browsed the photographs he had saved. He never contacted Xiao-Sa first, but he’d kept every picture, even those hopelessly blurry, abstract landscape photographs Xiao-Sa had taken. He looked at them over and over, remembering those days.
“This one was taken when Xiao-Sa and I were making a film on the Huitengxile Grassland. We were riding horses.”
“These are Mongolian yurts at Huitengxile. There’s a lake nearby. Xiao-Sa was bathing naked in the lake and I secretly saw him. Hahaha, he was so shy…”
“This was taken on the day filming wrapped. We had a bonfire banquet that night. Xiao-Sa was roasting a whole sheep. You must know how to roast sheep too, right? Isn’t that something every man on the grasslands has to know or he’ll never find a wife?”
“And this is the grassland and flock near his home in Xilingol. Xiao-Sa was herding sheep on horseback. He sent me the photo. I’ve never visited that part of his home.”
Xing Rong went through the pictures one by one, showing Letu his memories of the handsome “Milk Tea Young Prince.”
Letu stared blankly at the pictures too. He said nothing, but his heart seemed to take flight to those wide, lofty grasslands. His unfocused gaze followed the racing hooves and streaming tails of the horses.
In the pictures, the long-haired rider wore a robe and riding boots, jewels glittering across his chest. He was the brightest jewel on the grassland.
“This one’s him too,” Xing Rong said with a smile. “Xiao-Sa.”
“Xiao… Sa…” Letu said.
“Yes, Xiao-Sa,” Xing Rong replied.
“Xiao… Sa…” Letu repeated.
Xing Rong’s eyes stung. He nodded vigorously. “You said it! Do you really remember him?”
Letu lowered his eyelids as though thinking, or perhaps his injured mind had lost the ability to think and had fallen into blank confusion. His lips moved in fragmented murmurs.
“This was when Xiao-Sa and I were on Mount Qingcheng. It’s a selfie of the two of us,” Xing Rong said, smiling at the memory.
“Mmm…” Letu stared at the photograph as if he recognized somebody. He couldn’t take his eyes off it, and a bright glimmer seemed to pass through his clouded gaze. It took him a long time to form the syllables. “Rong… Rong…”
Xing Rong turned his face toward him, his own vision suddenly blurred with disbelief.
“Rong… Rong…” Letu kept repeating.
Xing Rong felt as though his brain had stopped working, his thoughts turning sluggishly. Was this real?
Or had he misheard? Was he imagining it?
“What did you say?” He pointed to himself and leaned closer so the other man could see his face. “Do you recognize me? Do you know my name?”
“Rong… Rong.” Letu looked at him.
Those clear eyes and features so much like a brother’s made Xing Rong dizzy with emotion. It was almost as if he were looking at the other man, the most precious treasure hidden in his heart.
His eyes filled with tears, his nose stung, and suddenly the tears broke free. He couldn’t stop them.
And then he understood.
He had never met Eriletu before today. How could a paralyzed patient with such extensive brain damage possibly know him by sight?
There had to have been someone else, someone who had sat at the bedside over and over during these months, showing Letu these same photographs, sharing memories of the people he’d met, speaking the names of old friends again and again… There could be no other explanation.
Golden sunlight stirred motes of dust in the room. Memories were like brilliantly blooming summer flowers. Without someone to hold on to them, they would pass and leave no trace.
Young Prince Sa had sat cross-legged on the hospital bed in that golden light, the sun gilding his forehead and nose. With his innocent smile, he’d shared the memories behind those photographs with his brother.
“This was when Rongrong and I were making a movie on the Huitengxile Grassland. I taught him how to ride a horse. He was so clumsy he didn’t even know how to make it run.”
“These are the yurts at Huitengxile, and that’s the lake nearby. I was bathing beside the lake that day, and naughty Rongrong secretly watched me. I wasn’t wearing any clothes… Ahem, Rongrong was so bad, he even laughed at me…”
“This was the day filming wrapped. We were eating and drinking around a campfire on the grassland. I roasted a whole sheep, but Rongrong didn’t get a single bite. He was sitting so far away from me…”
“There was a disaster at the film city. The two of us were digging mud out and repairing roads. Rongrong’s face was covered in mud. He looked so ugly, though he’s usually very good-looking. We ate loads of fatty-intestine rice noodles. The picture shows all the empty bowls piled together. We deliberately stacked them up to take a photograph. Hehe…”
“This was on Mount Qingcheng. Rongrong stuck a big white facial mask on his face and looked funny again. He also made me a bracelet. I really liked it… I like Rongrong too.”
* * *
Xing Rong’s face was streaked with tears. He silently wiped them away.
In that moment he suddenly regretted everything. He realized he’d been wrong all along, had understood everything backward, and had done something terribly foolish. He’d kept being foolish to this very day.
Even this paralyzed man in the bed knew who “Rongrong” was.
Yet Xing Rong himself almost seemed to have forgotten who “Rongrong” was. He had given up on himself and on his life, abandoning everything out of despair.
Letu seemed muddled and helpless, yet perhaps he was a hundred times sharper and wiser than Xing Rong. Every outsider could see the truth, while Xing Rong remained blind, wasting his own time and squandering the years that belonged to the two of them.
* * *