The more he thought about it, the more Qi Yuyang felt that the current Xue Qing and the past Xue Qing are almost two completely different people.
Although he was still not very talkative or very expressive, the Xue Qing now felt a lot more human compared to before. He can smile, can feel frustrated, can feel sad and the look in his eyes also carried some warmth which was completely different from the ones in his memory which seemed like he was just looking at an inanimate object.
In just six years, Xue Qing had undergone a large change. Qi Yuyang had no idea what he had experienced during this time, but he could tell that Xue Qing was slowly getting better; becoming healthier and adapting to the world.
Just like him.
Xue Qing knew about the kidnapping case six years ago but he chose to come back to his side. They have been together for more than half a year now and Xue Qing had never asked him for anything apart from that time when he asked to be the leading actor. Thinking back now, it was probably something he had done in order to make him lower his guard and allow him to stay by his side.
In fact, he didn't care about the leading actor role or how his career developed, let alone how much money he made. If it was like this, why did he come to him?
In order to…..help him ease the pain?
The silent companionship, the hints to see a doctor, and even helping him find Xue Xingfan's student who could help free him from the hypnosis. Gathering all the clues together, no matter how stupid he may be, Qi Yuyang should realise what it meant.
Xue Qing just wanted him to return to normal, nothing more.
Even if....it would bring him harm once he recovers.
Please read this from kk translates
From his previous conversations with Xue Qing, he could tell that Xue Qing had no good feelings for his father and even thinks that he is a person of very poor personality. It was probably something Xue Xingfan had done deliberately. He had done it so well that even after kidnapping Qi Yuyang, Xue Qing didn't have any doubts at all and just thought that he was doing it for the money. At that time, Xue Qing had an imperfect personality, an unsound mentality and he was still very ignorant of the world, unable to distinguish between good and evil, so he became indifferent to everything that was happening around him.
But when Xue Xingfan left him, he slowly grew on his own and came to understand that there were good and evil in this world. He felt that it was wrong to hypnotise Qi Yuyang and make him suffer throughout his life, so he returned.
Although Xue Qing's psychological state and personality had developed a lot, his past personality still influenced his current self greatly. He still didn't care about many things including his own life and safety.
In the early days, in order to protect Xue Qing, Qi Yuyang had set Xue Qing's phone up so that he could locate him at any time. Xue Qing himself also knew this. When he returned home and saw that Xue Qing wasn't there, in an instant, Qi Yuyang's blood ran cold. He was only able to breath a sigh of relief when he saw that Xue Qing's suitcases were still there and his clothes were not missing. After recovering, he drove off to Xue Qing's location.
When he discovered that it was a cemetery, he stepped on the brake.
He didn't dare enter.
He was afraid of angering the dead.
.....
Chi Zhao thought Qi Yuyang had just arrived but in fact he had been outside for more than half an hour.
Chi Zhao quickly put away the things in his hands, straightened up and pretended to inadvertently notice Qi Yuyang in the distance.
He looked at Qi Yuyang in the distance. The meaning in his eyes were clear. It was asking him to come over.
With this, Qi Yuyang was even more certain that Xue Qing really didn't know that Xia Lan's death wasn't an accident.
Qi Yuyang slowly walked to Chi Zhao's side. Chi Zhao pointed at the tombstone, "This is my mother."
Qi Yuyang pressed his lips together tightly, completely unable to say a single word.
Chi Zhao felt that something didn't seem right. They way he looked at Xia Lan's tombstone seemed....how should he put it, it seemed very bitter.
Chi Zhao was silent for a moment. He had only just come here to take a look and he had been here long enough now. He put his hands in his pockets, took a step back and called out to Qi Yuyang, "Come on, let's go back."
Chi Zhao walked ahead while Qi Yuyang followed behind him. When he was about to go through a small path, Qi Yuyang looked back. Xia Lan's tombstone was located at the corner of this path. Although desolate, it was quiet. Just looking at it from this angle made people feel lonely and sad.
Qi Yuyang looked back for a few seconds before turning his head back and quickly catching up to Chi Zhao's departing figure.
.....
Since the start of the treatment, Chi Zhao and Qi Yuyang had never gotten intimate with each other. Although they shared the same bed, they had clear boundaries between them. Everything was peaceful, like couples who have been married for many years.
But recently, Chi Zhao would from time to time spend the night in the guest room. Each time, he would give a properly planned out excuse, but both knew that this was just the beginning of the distance between them widening. Chi Zhao was doing this to test if Qi Yuyang still relied on him so that it wouldn't be too difficult on him in the future. As for Qi Yuyang, he did this because he couldn't say no to Chi Zhao and he also felt that he wasn't qualified to ask Chi Zhao for anything.
It was another evening of the two sharing the same bed. Chi Zhao left the bathroom still steaming from the heat, laid down and got ready to sleep.
Qi Yuyang on the other hand was leaning against the head of the bed reading something with a serious expression.
It took about ten to twenty minutes for Chi Zhao to fall asleep and as for the thing in Qi Yuyang's hand, he read it for more than an hour. It was clearly only two pages long and it was also an electronic document so it could be read in one glance, but he had actually taken such a long time to read through it.
The contents of this document were the various assets Chi Zhao had been sorting out the past few days. Qi Yuyang stared at the various numbers without any warmth in his eyes and then finally gently placed his phone aside.
Organising his assets, selling his house and visiting his mother's tombstone after so many years, those actions felt too much like he was preparing for a long journey with no intention to return. Chi Zhao however had not packed any of his belongings or shown any intention of leaving during this time. After contacting the agent during the day, Chi Zhao had also asked around about a couple of reliable charity foundations…
Qi Yuyang took a deep breath. He looked at the person lying quietly next to him and it took him a long time to restrain his urge to reach out and hold that person in his arms.
Tomorrow was the last day of treatment.
Please read this from kk translates
Cheng Ran had told him that after tomorrow, all his memories would be recovered and the hypnosis control Xue Xingfan had used on him would be completely gone. At that time, he would no longer have headaches and he would no longer have to rely on Xue Qing.
Strong sorrow surged inside him. In fact, his mindset had changed as he underwent treatment. The onlooker sees more than the player in the game. Cheng Ran and Xue Qing were right. He was indeed abnormal; he was indeed ill. He was ill to the point that the boundary between human beings and objects have blurred.
Before receiving treatment, he had arrogantly thought that Xue Qing cannot leave him no matter what. He thought that he had these thoughts because he loved Xue Qing. He had thought that since love was selfish, having such thoughts was normal.
But it was in fact not normal. It was just his paranoid disregard of the wishes of others. He selfishly concealed the truth and, in this relationship that was never clear or unclear, Xue Qing was never put in a position that was on the same level as himself. He had advertised this corrupt possessiveness as love. If that was love, then love was too terrible.
The more his condition was treated, the clearer Qi Yuyang's mind became and he could now see what kind of choice was the right one.
Sometimes, the relationship between the two was a dead knot. If you ignored this dead knot, this hard and stubborn lump will remain in your heart forever. No matter when, that feeling of being tightly bound and restricted would never subside. Time can never take away pain, it can only make people adapt to pain.
The process of untying this dead knot can be even more painful and, after untying, the bloody wound would be exposed in front of everyone. Wounds however can always heal.
.....
That night, Qi Yuyang watched Chi Zhao for a long time. He watched him for so long, the system itself began to feel uncomfortable. When it was dawn, Qi Yuyang got out of bed, dressed neatly, placed a document by Chi Zhao's pillow and then left the room. Chi Zhao only opened his eyes three hours later.
Seeing that Qi Yuyang wasn't around, Chi Zhao was surprised. He asked the system, "Where did Qi Yuyang go?"
The system could no longer speak.
Chi Zhao blinked a few times, "Why aren't you speaking?"
[I can't speak.]
Chi Zhao had a bad feeling. He asked nervously, "What's wrong? Did something happen?"
[Emm.....]
Chi Zhao: "....Tell me now!"
[Remember when we first came, I said that you can clear this world even while lying down?]
Chi Zhao answered suspiciously, "Yes, I remember. So what happened?"
[Hey, life never goes the way you expect it to go and it also never goes the way the system predicts it to go.]
Before Chi Zhao could explode, the system stopped going around in circles and directed Chi Zhao to the document next to his pillow. Before Chi Zhao woke up, it had scanned the contents inside.
[In short, you must remain calm after reading it. It actually isn't anything major. Although the plot has collapsed, we still have other ways to obtain points! Think about all the points you got after making Qi Yuyang suffer all this time!]
It was just one night's sleep but why did the plot collapse now?! Wasn't still going okay last night??
Chi Zhao immediately sat up and picked up the document. After opening it, he skimmed through the contents.
This document was the document about Xia Lan Qi Yuyang had read before.
After picking up the weather-beaten corner of a bill from the cemetery that day, Chi Zhao had also wondered if there was something in the plot that they didn't know about. His imagination however wasn't very good and no matter how he thought about it, he couldn't think of anything himself. He didn't expect there to be a 8pm prime time dog blood drama plot going on in the background.
Chi Zhao was stunned for a long time, "Was this left by Qi Yuyang?"
The system's voice sounded very pained.
[Yes, my condolences.]
Chi Zhao: "...…"
Just this information was enough for him to connect the dots. For example, it explained why Qi Yuyang acted so strangely that day, why Xue Xingfan would choose to do something like this to Qi Yuyang, why Xia Lan's tombstone had real money and why Xue Xingfan suddenly disappeared and never appeared before anyone ever again.
The system didn't dare breathe. It just silently watched Chi Zhao sit there in shock. After a long time, Chi Zhao spoke up again, "How exactly did Xue Xingfan die?"
The system really didn't know. All that it knew were things related to the plot and the plot was all about the protagonist. Each world was a continuous cycle of time. Everything that happened here has happened in the past and staff were responsible for collecting this information and reproducing the plot here, later allowing a system to bring a host over to complete the task.
This world has repeated countless times and every host that had entered were different, playing all kinds of roles. The system checked the database and saw that Chi Zhao was the second person to act out the role of Xue Qing. The first one had died as soon as he entered the world and naturally had no chance of triggering the hidden plot.
The system didn't directly say that it didn't know. It asked Chi Zhao to wait a little and then ran over to the main system's database to search for the rest of this worlds plot.
After more than an hour, the system finally found some traces of Xue Xingfan.
[After he released Qi Yuyang, he left with the ransom money, burnt all of it to ashes in front of his wife's grave and then stored the ashes in a sack. In the early morning of the next day, he smuggled onto a ship to country D and threw those ashes out into the sea. In country D, he found the truck driver hired by Qi Yuyang's father and set fire to the truck driver and his new girlfriend before committing suicide.]
It was just as Chi Zhao expected. He took a deep breath, "If he committed suicide, his body should be left. Where is his body?"
[Already cremated. Without any form of identification and with his clothes all torn and battered when he was found, the authorities took him for granted as a homeless man. Following the usual procedures, they publicised his death for fifteen days and when no one came to claim him, he was cremated.]
Chi Zhao balled his hands up into a fist, "Then there will also be ashes. What about the ashes?"
The system could tell what Chi Zhao was trying to get at. It seemed that he wanted to bring Xue Xingfan's ashes back for burial. Indeed, knowing that there was something like this going on behind the scenes, even if Xue Xingfan was a murderer who had also caused Qi Yuyang to suffer for so many years, the system couldn't easily regard him as a bad person.
The system was silent for a moment. It's voice sounded a little guilty.
[The ashes...the ashes are also gone. Unclaimed ashes would only be stored for five years. Two months before you came, they had just disposed of Xue Xingfan's ashes.]
Chi Zhao was a little shaken. He didn't expect that in a society like this with surveillance and monitoring everywhere recording every detail in life, someone could actually disappear so easily and without leaving a single trace.
The system didn't speak any more. Chi Zhao lowered his head and glanced at the document in his hands.
This was given to him by Qi Yuyang.
He.....
Suddenly, there was the sound of the door opening which interrupted Chi Zhao's thoughts. He subconsciously looked up at the door.