Outside the windows, the world had turned into a muddy, chaotic water-kingdom.
The downpour showed no sign of easing—if anything, it grew more violent.
Fat raindrops hammered the roof, the hood, the windshield in a relentless crack-crack-crack, like countless invisible hands pounding on this steel cage with manic impatience.
The wipers thrashed left and right at their highest setting, carving out a heartbeat of clarity—only for the view to be swallowed again by a fresher, thicker sheet of rain, leaving nothing but warped, trembling smears of light and color.
A long line of cars lay stranded like dead, scale-covered serpents, sprawled across streets that were turning into rising, filthy rivers. No end in sight. No sense of movement. No hope.
Half-submerged tires churned uselessly. A few drivers, unable to bear it, leaned on their horns—but the sound barely escaped the cabins before the rain crushed it into nothing, weak and hopeless.
Inside and outside the vehicle felt like two worlds cut apart by force.
The air-conditioning fought to keep the cabin warm and dry, but compared to the damp cold seeping in from every direction, it still felt flimsy. The air carried a strange blend: leather, the faint sweet scent clinging to Belle, and the wet, metallic breath of rain.
"Ugh—"
A long, tragic sigh rose from the back seat, puncturing the heavy quiet.
Belle had melted into the soft leather like a boneless cat, all sparkle gone from her eyes. Her little face scrunched into a full-body declaration of life is pain.
"One rainstorm," she whined, voice trembling with grievance, "destroyed the perfect plan I spent a whole week designing and looking forward to…"
As she complained, her arms tightened around Qianye like a drowning person clinging to the only piece of driftwood left.
Her slim arms were deceptively strong, wrapping around his narrow frame with a possessiveness that left no room for negotiation—like she wanted to knead him into her warmth, fuse him into her bloodstream, and use him as a shield against bad weather, stalled time, and her own simmering irritation.
"Hhhh… hehehe… Qianye…"
She buried her face into his neck and hair, nose brushing the cool softness of his strands as if confirming territory by scent. Her expression softened into a dreamy, flushed satisfaction, almost obsessive.
"You smell like… you're getting even nicer…"
Her words were muffled, half-drowsy, like a sleep-talking confession. Warm breath grazed his skin, tickling.
"Belle… relax," Qianye pleaded, his voice strained with helpless gentleness as his chest compressed. He patted the arm locked around his waist. "Loosen up a little… I can't breathe."
Belle's embrace was warm and soft, but when she got carried away, it crossed the line from comforting into lethal.
Up front, Wise's eyebrows were knotted so hard you could wedge a coin between them.
His long fingers gripped the cold steering wheel until his knuckles blanched. He drummed it in irritation, then flicked a quick glance at the rear-view mirror—
—and caught, with cruel precision, the sight of his sister radiating a suspicious pink aura, looking like she was about to swallow Qianye whole.
Big-brother instinct flared: Protect the family's "piglet" from carnivorous flowers.
After a moment's hesitation, he intervened, keeping his tone even.
"Belle. Don't squeeze him that tight. Qianye can't breathe. Have some restraint."
"What?!" Belle snapped like someone had stepped on her tail.
She puffed her cheeks—and instead of loosening, tightened again as if declaring ownership, yanking Qianye deeper into her embrace.
"I've been working like crazy lately! Sorting a million stupid tapes, dealing with difficult customers—I'm exhausted, body and soul! Now I finally get to rest, and I'm not allowed to enjoy myself and recharge my desperately needed Qianye-energy?"
She argued with the righteous confidence of someone convinced Qianye was her personal charging station and emotional-support plush, completely ignoring his reddening face and the tiny, doomed struggle in his shoulders.
Wise knew ordinary lecturing was useless now. His eyes narrowed with tired resignation.
Time to deploy the proven, ultimate weapon for dealing with Belle.
He inhaled lightly and spoke in a tone so flat it sounded like final judgment.
"Belle. If you keep being selfish and ignoring how Qianye feels…"
"…Fine."
"Then when we go to Public Security to update our business asset certification—the tedious procedures, the line, the forms, the questioning…"
"You can go by yourself."
"I'm sure a 'legendary Proxy' can handle it independently."
"What?!" Belle shrieked, instantly electrified, voice climbing into the stratosphere.
"Brother! How can you be so cruel?! So cold?! So heartless?! If we go, we go together! You can't abandon me!"
Facing Public Security alone—the sharp-eyed officers, the rigid procedures, the endless questions—just imagining it made her scalp tingle.
What if she said the wrong thing? What if some veteran officer noticed a twitch, an expression, something that didn't match a "normal video store clerk"?
The consequences didn't bear thinking about.
Wise didn't argue. He just looked at her in the mirror with a calm choose wisely stare, then returned his focus to the deadlocked traffic.
Belle's momentum deflated instantly.
She began to loosen her arms in tiny, resentful increments, whining under her breath like a wronged creature.
"Waaah… so mean… my Qianye-energy… I haven't recharged to the safe threshold yet… now I'm forced to downgrade from high-efficiency absorption mode to pathetic low-efficiency mode… the low-battery alarm is gonna go off…"
Freed at last, Qianye inhaled deeply, greedily drinking in the cabin air like a fish returned to water. He rubbed his aching ribs and chest, equal parts grateful and embarrassed.
He couldn't help feeling honestly confused.
Under clothes, Belle didn't exactly look… overwhelmingly endowed. And yet the pressure he'd just experienced had been terrifyingly real.
How did something that looked so soft and modest generate the kind of suffocating force that made it feel like even his soul was being squeezed out?
Perhaps one of New Eridu's unsolved mysteries.
But the awkward thought was quickly swept aside by harsher reality.
Qianye looked out at the paused world—rain like a white curtain, tail-lights chained into a stagnant river—and voiced what all three were thinking.
"We haven't moved at all… If this keeps up, who knows how long we'll be stuck."
As if answering him, a familiar female voice pierced the rain, faint but clear enough, likely through a loudspeaker—steady, professional, and quietly commanding as it attempted to herd chaos back into order.
"Sorry for the inconvenience, citizens. Please remain patient. A vehicle has stalled at the intersection ahead due to flooding, blocking the main lane. A tow truck is on its way, but the weather is slowing response time. Please stay calm, wait in an orderly fashion, and do not exit your vehicles or change lanes at will. It's dangerous…"
That voice hit the cramped cabin like a stone dropped into already-turbulent water.
All three recognized it at once.
Zhu Yuan.
Belle's expression turned complicated—sympathy, worry, a weary helplessness, and a small, annoyed of course it's her all tangled together.
She held her breath and peeked at her brother and Qianye from the corner of her eye, like she feared any twitch would break fragile balance.
Deep down, Belle had always pitied Zhu Yuan. She understood—she really did—that the arrest back then had been laced with pressure and coercion, that Zhu Yuan hadn't been free to choose.
But she also knew that incident had carved a deep crack between them. It wasn't something a few apologies could stitch shut overnight.
Wise's response was colder.
His mouth tightened into a hard line. His grip on the wheel subtly increased; tendons rose on the back of his hand.
Belle had tried, again and again, to explain Zhu Yuan's position to him. But rational understanding and emotional acceptance weren't the same thing.
Zhu Yuan had personally taken Qianye—someone Wise had watched grow up, someone he protected like a little brother—dragged him away as a "suspect," made him endure a night that never should've happened.
A thorn remained.
"Forgiveness" was easy to say. Removing the thorn from your heart took time—time and sincerity.
And Qianye… the person who had absorbed the most impact, the closest to the blade…
His reaction was the most subtle.
His gaze flickered once—so faint it could be missed—then lowered to his hands folded in his lap.
He had told Zhu Yuan he forgave her. He'd tried to let the past close.
But body language told the truth words couldn't.
When Zhu Yuan sent those careful messages—full of apology, trembling invitations, nervous hope—he answered politely but distantly. I'm a bit busy. Thanks for checking in. Maybe next time.
He knew he needed time.
Time to convince the invisible barrier inside him to loosen, time to reconcile with what had happened—not out of courtesy or kindness, but real peace.
Now, hearing her voice again, all that pressed against the surface.
The cabin fell into a silent awkwardness.
The shared hope was simple:
Please don't notice this car.
Let Zhu Yuan remain background noise, not a person who steps into their space. No face-to-face. No awkwardness. No scrutiny.
But fate, as always, enjoyed cruelty.
Perhaps because Zhu Yuan had seen Belle's distinctive brown-and-black three-wheeled vehicle before, perhaps because she remembered them—
After telling Seth—standing nearby in a raincoat—to temporarily hold the line here, Zhu Yuan raised her standard-issue black Public Security umbrella, lowered her posture against the wind, and strode straight toward their car through the running floodwater.
Drops streamed off the umbrella's edge like beaded curtains, falling in rhythmic lines.
The rain blurred the world into frosted glass. Only when she reached the front of their vehicle did Zhu Yuan manage to make out the driver through the windshield.
Wise.
Her heart tightened.
She wanted to greet him naturally, to soften things, to pry open even a crack in the old stiffness—she had rehearsed phrases, polite and mild—
But the moment she met Wise's gaze through the glass, calm and unreadable yet unmistakably distant, every prepared word jammed in her throat.
A dull heaviness spread through her chest.
She knew—better than anyone—that no matter how "reasonable" her excuses were, she had already created a debt that couldn't be erased by good manners.
Still…
The desire to get closer to Qianye, to make amends, tangled around her heart like vines. And Jane's earlier words—the vow of Sisyphus—still burned in her ears like a whip.
If she wanted even the slightest chance of moving forward, Wise was an obstacle she had to face.
So she forced her lips into what she hoped was a proper smile—though it came out stiff—and gave Wise a small nod through the rain-smeared glass.
But it was only the prelude.
When she stepped a fraction closer and her sight angle shifted enough to see into the back seat—
Her feet froze.
She saw Belle, giving her a strained, uncertain smile.
And beside Belle—
Qianye.
The person who haunted her waking hours, the person she longed for and didn't feel worthy to approach, the person she carried guilt for like a weight in her bones.
Everything she'd built in her mind—every script, every opening line—collapsed into blankness and a heart pounding too fast.
She opened her mouth.
Nothing came out.
A parade of possible greetings flashed through her head—professional inquiries, careful concern, apologetic reassurances—and she rejected them all in the same instant.
Too stiff. Too false. Too calculated.
Finally, after a silence that felt so long even the rain seemed to pause for it, she managed a voice—dry, trembling at the edge, clumsy in its plainness.
"Qianye… are you… are you okay?"
Five words. And it felt like they cost her everything.
Qianye's lashes trembled. He lifted his eyes and looked at her—standing under the umbrella, half-hidden, face tight with anxiety and hope and a vulnerability she couldn't fully hide.
His expression formed that familiar gentle smile, warm as a habit—like a reflex to soothe awkwardness.
"I'm fine," he said softly. "Thank you for your concern, Officer Zhu Yuan."
The tone was polite. The smile was perfect—almost too perfect.
Zhu Yuan, with an officer's eyes and a woman's instincts, caught the truth underneath: in the clear green of his gaze lived a faint reluctance, a careful distance.
A barrier.
Invisible, but real.
It pricked her heart like a needle.
Logic told her what to do.
Be polite. Leave. Say Good, please stay patient, and walk away. Give time. Give space.
Force would only make it worse.
But that rational thought was immediately crushed by something hotter—something stubborn, aching, and ugly.
Especially when she saw, from the corner of her eye, Belle's hand tug Qianye's arm—subtle, instinctive, protective—pulling him a touch closer to herself.
Something sour and sharp rose in Zhu Yuan's chest.
Jealousy? Panic? A fear of being replaced?
She couldn't name it fast enough to control it.
She wanted to pull Qianye out of the car, out of this enclosed space that made her feel excluded. She wanted just five minutes alone—just words, just a chance.
But her body felt rooted to the flooded ground.
She had no standing. No right. No qualification.
And then her own vow mocked her—
Sisyphus. Stone. Summit.
If she couldn't take even this step, what "stone" was she pushing? What "summit" was she even talking about?
No.
She wouldn't retreat.
She inhaled cold, wet air—like she could breathe courage into her lungs.
Then she tilted her umbrella wider, shifting it to cover the rear window area, shielding the car's opening from the rain. At the same time, she looked at Wise—asking, with her eyes, for him to lower the back window.
Wise stared at her through the rain-beaded glass.
His gaze was deep, calculating—like a machine running analysis on every micro-expression, every hint of intent, every dangerous desire.
The silence between them felt like a century.
At last, under Zhu Yuan's stubborn persistence—something close to pleading—Wise made a choice.
He pressed the window button.
The rear window slid down.
Cold wet air rushed into the warm cabin like a thief. Zhu Yuan's scent came with it: rainwater, uniform fabric, and something faint—perhaps a hint of gardenia.
Her breathing, slightly too quick, became audible.
Wise didn't speak. He waited—like a strict examiner.
And then Zhu Yuan spoke, carefully steady, trying to keep it professional, though her tension leaked at the edges.
"Qianye. And… both shop owners," she added, flicking a glance at Wise, "the intersection ahead may be blocked for a long while. And this rain… who knows when it'll stop."
She paused, eyes sweeping quickly over Qianye and Belle before returning to Wise.
"Would you… be willing to come to the Lumina Square Public Security substation for a bit? It's close. You can have hot tea, warm up, wait out the rain. It'll be more comfortable than sitting in the car."
As if afraid the offer sounded too thin, she hurried to add, voice more earnest.
"Don't worry about your vehicle. I'll assign reliable officers to watch it. Once traffic clears, we'll have it brought back to your video store—or anywhere you specify."
Wise's brow tightened immediately.
He was ready to refuse.
He could smell it: ambition. Opportunity-making. An attempt to create time and space—private space.
Not just kindness. Not just help.
She wanted more.
Belle, however, sensed the rejection forming. She tugged lightly at Qianye's sleeve beneath the seat line, eyes wide with pleading. Then she glanced at Wise too—silently begging him not to slam the door.
She genuinely wanted the ice to crack. She wanted things to soften. She didn't want Zhu Yuan's effort to be crushed on contact.
In the end, under Belle's hopeful gaze—and something inside himself that might have been tiredness, or mercy, or a quiet desire to let the past stop holding everyone hostage—Qianye turned his face slightly away from Zhu Yuan's complicated eyes and released a barely audible sigh.
Then he nodded.
"…Alright," he said gently, the warmth in his voice threaded with a faint taste of compromise. "Then… we'll trouble you, Officer Zhu Yuan."
Belle's face lit up instantly, relief bursting into a bright smile.
"Yes! Yes! Let's go! I'm dying in this car—thank you, Zhu Yuan!"
For a heartbeat, Zhu Yuan's expression cracked open like clouds pierced by sudden sun.
A huge smile bloomed—so bright it looked almost impossible, disbelief and joy tangled together.
A jolt of pure exhilaration surged through her body.
She shoved her left hand behind her back, interlacing her fingers out of sight, gripping hard—white-knuckled—trying to stop the trembling that betrayed how violently her emotions were shaking her.
She did it.
The first step.
This wasn't just "waiting out the rain."
This was her stone moving off the mud.
She forced herself to keep her voice controlled, though it rose with obvious happiness.
"Not trouble at all—really, not at all. Please wait a moment. I'll arrange everything here, then I'll bring you over. It'll be quick."
She turned and strode back toward Seth—steps light, almost buoyant, though she tried to keep her officer's posture. Her back carried something like release… and something like momentum.
Inside the car, Wise watched her go.
Then he glanced in the mirror at the back seat—Belle's relief, Qianye's calm—and let out a quiet sigh that barely existed.
He stared back at the storm.
"Belle. Qianye," he said softly, "do you two understand what you're doing?"
Belle's voice came from behind him—firm, stubborn, unusually clear.
"Brother, I only know this: we can't stay trapped in the past forever. If we can't face old mistakes… how do we ever move forward?"
Wise didn't answer.
He lowered the window again.
This time, without Zhu Yuan's umbrella, rain slapped straight into the cabin on the wind.
"Ah! Brother, what are you doing?!"
"Cooling you down. Alright, alright—closing it—ow! Stop pinching my waist!"
Outside, the rain kept roaring.
And somewhere within that roar, a door—barely—had opened.
Join here to read ahead.
In Star Rail, Ultra-Beast Armored — Have I Caught "Equilibrium"? l (Chapter 80)
Uma Musume, But I Only Have Five Years Left to Live (Chapter 178)
Zenless Zone Zero: I'm a Doctor, Not a Bangboo (Chapter 150)
Ben Tennyson Wants to Join the Justice League ( 126 )
TYPE-MOON: Redemption Beginning with the Holy Grail War (Chapter110)
Yu-Gi-Oh! — Transmigrated into the White Dragon Girl (Chapter190)
"Is this chat group even serious?" (Chapter105)
I, Lord Ravager, Utterly Loyal! (Chapter222)
Can Playing Games Save the World? 65
Crossover Anime Multiverse: The Demon Hunter of an Unnatural World 77
From Junkman to Wasteland 66
Weekly Refresh of Overpowered 31
I'm Grinding Proficiency Like 46
From Kiana, Lord Ravager, Onwa 190
Honkai: Is This Still the Prev 42
Elf: My Starter Pokémon Is Inc 65
Warhammer: My Primarch Is Remi 170
From Demon Slayer to Grand Ass Volume2/5
The Way the Umamusume Look at 68
Uma Musume, but My Cheat Power 215
Naruto: Weaving the Future, Be 65
Zenless Zone Zero, but Kamen R 76
Multiverse Crossover: The Perf 66
My Cyberpsycho Girlfriend 65
Uma Musume: The Dark Trainer 200
Uma Musume: A Calamity Born fr 154
I, a Reincarnation-Loop Player Volume4/30
The Violent Girl Group Is Beat 115
Uma Musume: The Horse Girl Who 67
Uma Musume: From Beginner 130
Becoming a Horse Girl, I Will 85
Uma Musume: I Want All 105
I Can Copy Unique Skills 100
Summoning an Evil God, but the 70
Supernatural Multiverse 90
My Harem Is Indescribable 85
Jujutsu Kaisen: Heroic Spirit 90
"I'm just a Valkyrie passing through." 68
Uma Musume: Today Is Another Romantic Battlefield 81
Still playing traditional Honk 69
The Most Filial Son Under Heav 65
What Should I Do After Switchi - Volume2/3
Reincarnated as a Demon, Skill 60
Hell-Difficulty Dungeon? 55
Transmigrated as Sukuna 61
Checking In in Demon Slayer 65
The Reincarnating Trainer of Tracen Academy 80
I Refuse to Become a Heroic 66
My Best Friend Into a Slime? 58
A Saiyan Stands Above Marvel 65
What Do You Mean by Using a Lab Mod to Be the Hero? 63
Tanya Starts from Re:Zero 59
Why did they assign me to Uma 55
MYGO Beauties 56
DanMachi: Emiya the Giant Hero 45
The Gacha Merchant Who Started 49
Honkai's Otherworld? Wait—Who Are You People?! 36
Emiya Shirou, Determined to Slay Every Curse and Evil Spirit 15
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