The elevator doors slid open with a muted chime.
Shu Yao stepped out, his reflection faintly warping in the polished marble floor. The corridor stretched before him—long, silent, empty. At the end of it, light spilled faintly from a half-open door.
Bai Qi's office.
His pulse stuttered. The memory of that night still clung to him like smoke. The rain. The blood. The silence that followed. He had replayed it so many times that it no longer felt like memory—it was punishment.
He swallowed hard, clutching the thin folder to his chest. His fingers trembled as he walked, each step echoing too loudly in the stillness. When he reached the door, he exhaled slowly, pressing a hand against his chest as if to steady the frantic rhythm beneath his ribs.
He knocked once.
No reply.
Then came the voice—low, cold, metallic. "Come in."
That voice.
Once warm. Once familiar. Now sharp enough to cut through bone.
Shu Yao opened the door. The office smelled faintly of coffee and rain—Bai Qi's scent lingered beneath both, cruelly recognizable.
Behind the vast mahagony desk, Bai Qi sat with his, eyes fixed on the glowing laptop screen. His fingers moved across the keyboard with mechanical precision, the quiet tap-tap-tap filling the air like the ticking of a clock counting down to something inevitable.
Shu Yao hesitated by the doorway. His throat tightened. He bowed slightly. "The file you requested, sir."
He crossed the room, placed the file carefully on the desk. His voice was barely a whisper, fragile as glass. "It's the final report from the finance division."
He didn't expect an answer. He didn't even expect to be seen.
But Bai Qi stopped typing.
The keys fell silent.
The change in rhythm was almost imperceptible—but it was enough. Shu Yao's breath hitched. The air grew heavy, dense with something unspoken.
Bai Qi's gaze lifted from the screen.
For a moment, the man who had once smiled at him across morning coffee flickered in those obsidian eyes—then vanished. What replaced it was a storm barely contained.
Shu Yao lowered his head quickly. He didn't dare meet his gaze. His knees felt unsteady. His voice, when it came, was trembling. "If that's all, I'll take my leave—"
"You."
The single word froze him in place.
The chair scraped back. A sound sharp as thunder.
Shu Yao's heart lurched. His lungs refused to move. Slowly—mechanically—he looked up.
Bai Qi was standing now. His expression unreadable, but his eyes… his eyes burned. Fury, grief, disbelief—they warred inside him, twisting his face into something Shu Yao barely recognized.
"What are you standing there for?" Bai Qi's voice cracked through the room. "To waste my time?"
The words struck harder than any blow.
Shu Yao flinched violently. He bowed again, lower this time, his voice small. "I'm sorry, sir."
No answer. Only the soft hum of the city bleeding in through the tall windows.
Shu Yao turned to leave, and walked towards the door he wrapped his fingers around, the doorknob. bowed his head, steps unsteady. But before he could take a step—
"It's not over, Shu Yao."
The tone stopped him cold.
He froze mid-motion, breath held. He didn't turn around. He couldn't.
Then came the words—the ones that would carve themselves into his mind for the rest of his life.
"Don't ever think of forgiveness," Bai Qi said quietly. "I wouldn't forgive you for what you did."
The silence that followed was suffocating.
Shu Yao's lips parted, but no sound emerged. His throat burned. His eyes stung, but no tears came. He could only nod—small, almost invisible—and reach for the handle again.
The door creaked softly as he stepped out.
Behind him, Bai Qi's voice rose, raw and breaking.
"Do you think pretending like nothing happened will save you?" His words were a whip now, slicing through the air. "Go to hell, Shu Yao!"
Shu Yao's hand stilled on the doorframe.
"I wish you had died instead of her!" Bai Qi's voice cracked on the last word. "I wish it was you!"
The door shut softly.
Outside, Shu Yao stood in the empty hallway, his back pressed to the door, eyes wide. The words echoed through him, bouncing inside his skull until they lost all meaning.
He could still hear Bai Qi's voice on the other side—muffled now, hoarse, breaking apart.
I wish it was you.
A tremor passed through him. His fingers curled against his chest. His heart felt like it was bleeding through every breath.
He whispered, almost soundlessly, "You're right."
The corridor swallowed the words.
"I shouldn't have let her take my place."
His reflection wavered faintly in the glass wall beside him—pale, hollow-eyed, a ghost draped in office light. The suit clung awkwardly to his thin frame. His lips were colorless. His hands shook like a sinner before confession.
He pressed his palm to the cold glass, watching the tremor ripple through the mirrored image.
"I should've been the one," he murmured.
The lights above flickered. The elevator at the end of the corridor opened with a quiet sigh.
He walked slowly—each step deliberate, detached, as though his body had decided to move before his mind could follow. The doors slid open. The golden glow of the top floor dimmed behind him.
Just before stepping inside, Shu Yao looked back once—at the closed door of Bai Qi's office, where he believes a faint shadow still moved inside.
For a fleeting second, he thought he saw Bai Qi collapse into his chair, hands over his face. But the doors closed before he could be sure.
The descent began.
The elevator lights flickered, casting pale reflections across the steel walls. Shu Yao stood motionless, eyes distant. The hum of the machinery sounded like a heartbeat—slow, mechanical, endless.
Down, down, down—each floor passing like a quiet countdown to oblivion.
The elevator doors parted with a quiet sigh, spilling Shu Yao into the near-empty lobby.
Only the low hum of fluorescent lights and the distant tick of a wall clock accompanied him.
Everything smelled faintly of paper, metal, and rain.
He didn't look at anyone—there was no one left to look at.
His steps echoed softly against the marble floor as he crossed to the glass doors at the front of the building.
They slid open at his approach with a whisper of hydraulics, and the cold air outside rushed to meet him like punishment.
The night was merciless.
Wind knifed through his sleeves, crawled beneath his collar, and made his breath shudder into the air.
But the ache in his chest—deep, raw, and strangling—was far colder than anything the city could offer.
He reached into his pocket with trembling fingers and unlocked his phone.
A taxi app blinked weakly on the screen, the little digital car creeping toward his location.
He couldn't bear the thought of calling anyone; he wouldn't let another person shoulder his ruin.
He waited beneath the awning.
Rainwater still dripped from the edges, pattering against the pavement like a heartbeat out of rhythm.
He rubbed his hands together, then pressed his fingertips to his lips, breathing warmth over them in quick, uneven gusts.
His skin was nearly numb.
His reflection in the glass door looked like a ghost—pale face, empty eyes, hair clinging to his forehead.
A gust of wind tore through the silence, scattering a few dead leaves past his shoes.
He whispered under his breath, words that dissolved into the air before they could be understood.
Upstairs, behind the tall windows of the executive office, Bai Qi was still there.
He hadn't left his desk.
He stood by the window now, the city lights framing his figure in fractured gold and blue.
The glass caught the reflection of his face—sharp, haunted, unreadable.
He saw Shu Yao below.
Small, hunched against the cold, waiting alone at the curb like something fragile left behind.
For a heartbeat, Bai Qi didn't breathe. Something inside him twisted—not mercy, not grief, but a restless, seething pulse he didn't want to name.
His fingers curled slowly against the windowsill.
The rational part of him—the man who led meetings, who signed contracts with perfect precision—told him to look away.
But his eyes refused to move.
Every time the boy shifted, the faint movement stirred the memory of that night: blood, rain, and a promise buried under screaming.
And now, seeing Shu Yao alive—still breathing, still walking—made that wound flare open again.
A cruel idea began to form, slow as smoke curling upward.
If pain was the only thing left to feel, he would share it.
He would make Shu Yao feel every ounce of the ruin he himself couldn't escape.
The headlights of a taxi glided through the rain, its tires hissing against wet asphalt.
It slowed to a stop in front of the company doors.
Below, Shu Yao lifted his head, startled by the light.
He gave a small nod to the driver, opened the back door, and slipped inside.
The door closed with a dull thud that sounded too much like finality.
Bai Qi's reflection in the window trembled. His jaw tightened, a pulse jumping at his temple.
He exhaled through his teeth, a sound more like a growl than a sigh.
"Running away," he murmured to the empty room. "You think you can run so easily huh?"
The words lingered in the air, low and venomous.
He turned from the window, the corners of his mouth twitching in something that wasn't quite a smile.
By tomorrow, he decided, he would make an announcement—something public, irreversible.
Something that would make him breathe a little easier, if only through cruelty.
Outside, the taxi disappeared into the dark veins of the city, carrying Shu Yao deeper into the night.
Inside, Bai Qi poured himself a drink, watching the amber swirl under the office light.
The taxi hummed through the city's sleeping veins, its lights glinting faintly against the rain-polished streets. Inside, Shu Yao sat still—shoulders stiff, eyes hollow, a strange chill lingered in the air. He rubbed his palms together, breathing warmth into them, fog clouding his fingertips before vanishing again.
Fatigue gnawed at him. A dull throbbing pulsed behind his temples—soft at first, then steady, like a knock that refused to stop. He pressed a hand to his forehead, trying to will it away.
"You all right, young man?" the driver asked, his eyes catching Shu Yao's reflection in the mirror.
Shu Yao startled, flinching as though pulled from a dream. "Everything's fine," he murmured quickly, his voice barely there.
The driver didn't ask again. The silence folded between them, thick and quiet, until the car rolled to a stop at the edge of a narrow lane.
Shu Yao fumbled with the door handle, his fingers stiff from cold. The air hit him the moment he stepped out—sharp, slicing through his clothes, wrapping around his bones. He thanked the driver softly and shut the door. The car's engine revved and faded, swallowed by distance.
He stood for a moment before the small gate, staring at the faint light spilling from the windows. His breath came out in clouds. One slow exhale. Then another.
When he finally rang the bell, the sound was fragile, almost apologetic.
Footsteps approached from inside—measured, dragging. The door opened with a low creak.
His mother stood there. Her face was blank, drained of every trace of warmth. In her hands, she still held Qing Yue's photo frame, her fingers gripping it like it was the only thing keeping her upright.
She didn't speak. Didn't even look at him. She turned and walked back down the hallway, the hem of her dress whispering against the floor.
Shu Yao's throat tightened. He stepped inside quietly and closed the door, the click echoing through the empty house.
His eyes drifted to the closed door of Qing Yue's room. Then to his mother's. Both sealed. Both silent.
He took a slow breath and climbed the stairs, each step heavier than the last. The air upstairs was colder somehow—thinner.
His room waited with the door ajar. Inside, Juju sat curled on the bed, a tiny ember of life in the dimness.
A faint, fractured smile touched Shu Yao's lips. "Have you been there all day?" he whispered.
The cat blinked up at him, tail flicking lazily, as if scolding him for being late.
"I'll take a shower," Shu Yao said softly. "Don't move, okay?"
Juju answered with a quiet meow.
Minutes later, Shu Yao returned in pale pajamas, hair damp, skin chilled. The room seemed to breathe around him—hollow, quiet. He slipped beneath the covers, the thick sheets brushing against his trembling frame.
Juju padded closer, curling against his chest.
The warmth was faint but real.
As his eyes fluttered shut, Shu Yao thought—at least Juju stayed.
And then the cold took him again, slow and soft, like sleep pretending to be mercy.