After Lin Yuyan left, Gu Yaoyang returned to the basement floor, to the office area. Sister Ling was there. Several contracts were lying on the table, all of them were invitations from top clubs in the circle, wanting to sign Gu Yaoyang into their club.

Sister Ling said to him, “These are all great offers, but their headquarters are a bit far away, all abroad, but there are enough guarantees in terms of treatment, which makes it much better than the black market.”

Gu Yaoyang pulled a chair, sat down, picked up a copy of the invitation, and looked at the contract.

Sister Ling was a little surprised, he would usually ignore these invites, but today he had actually shown a little bit of interest in them. “What do you think.. Yo-?” She switched her question as her eyes fell on Gu Yaoyang’s ear and asked, “Where did that earring come from? A gift?”

Gu Yaoyang raised his eyebrows but didn’t answer the question, but she could obviously see the joy in his eyes.

Sister Ling was stunned for a moment before leaning on the chair and lit a lady’s cigarette, feeling a little relieved. After so many years, she finally saw a little light in Gu Yaoyang’s eyes.

Sister Ling’s real name is Zou Yuling, She’s too old-fashioned and never disclosed it to the public. She had been working hard from the bottom ever since she was a teenager and knew some people from both the black and white sides of the world. Naturally, she also knew Gu Yaoyang’s father. He was a formidable character. Back when he was alive, he could cover the sky with one hand in Linzhou.

But after all, this is a messy world. He had done all kinds of illegal and chaotic things. It was his fate to live, and it was also his fate to die.

Although Gu Yaoyang never got involved in his father’s affairs, as his son, from the moment he was born, the knife was already placed right above his neck, ready to kill him at any given moment.

He couldn’t go to school outside, and it was also impossible for him to have normal peers. In addition to learning self-defense skills every single day, he took classes with private teachers. No matter how many things he learned, it didn’t mean much to him.

After all, there was a good chance that he wouldn’t survive to see tomorrow.

When he was twelve years old, the unexpected happened. His father was killed by his enemy and his mother was implicated as well, even Gu Yaoyang got sliced and was left alive with only a single breath remaining.

Sister Ling didn’t know how he escaped. When she saw him again, she was already in the black market arena. More or less, the Gu family was kind to her but she couldn’t repay them at the time, so for the time being, she let him stay at her bar.

“Do you think that old man Gu Hong will come out of prison?”

Sister Ling breathed out a ring of smoke, a light lipstick stain was left on the cigarette holder.

Gu Yaoyang flipped through the contract and answered, “Don’t know.”

Sister Ling: “I don’t think it would affect you if he couldn’t come out, right?”

Gu Yaoyang seemed to be studying the terms of a certain contract and didn’t reply to Sister Ling’s question.

“You’ve been messing around for these past few years. Do you want to wait for him to come out to avenge your parents? Or are you afraid he’ll come out and give you another bullet?”

Gu Yaoyang remained silent.

Sister Ling continued, “I advise you not to wait. How long would it take for him to get out of there? Maybe one day he’ll get cancer and die? You’ve just turned eighteen and your life has just begun, you can’t always be like this..”

“You sound like a good person.” Said Gu Yaoyang as he coldly glanced at her.

Sister Ling didn’t have any self-consciousness and asked him, “Why? Am I not a good person?”

Gu Yaoyang didn’t want to talk nonsense with her. He placed a contract on the table before standing up and said, “This one.”

Sister Ling blinked, not responding to his words. Her gaze seemed to ask him, “What is this?”

Gu Yaoyang didn’t explain, he merely turned around to leave and said, “But I won’t be a player.”

Not a player..

Does he mean that.. he agreed to sign the contract?

Sister Ling was left shocked in the office for more than ten minutes. Unexpectedly, after talking about it for more than ten years, Gu Yaoyang agreed so deftly?! She hurriedly stood up on her ten centimeter high heels and ran to the door, shouting at the empty corridor, “Then what are you going to do?!”

No one paid her any attention, except for the empty echo.

Lin Yuyan arrived home at noon and changed his clothes after arriving. It was only about a week, but it felt like a whole year had passed, and every day he spent there was very fulfilling. He saw many things he had never seen before, met people he would never meet in his usual life, and learned how to cook noodles, stir fry vegetables, and wash his clothes. Although the food tasted really bad and the clothes weren’t fully clean, at least these were all his own handiwork.

Looking at the time, he wanted to send a text to Gu Yaoyang just in case, but he abruptly remembered that he had never asked for Gu Yaoyang’s phone number.

Never mind then.

Lin Yuyan closed his eyes, thinking that they would never contact each other again in the future. It probably didn’t matter if he reported that he safely arrived back home to the other.

After lying down for five minutes, he abruptly got up, ran to his bag, and found a note.

On the note was the written address Gu Yaoyang had left for the school, and a string of cell phone numbers. Lin Yuyan happily laughed and saved the cell phone number, sending a text message to report that he had safely arrived home.

After waiting a long while, nobody replied. Lin Yuyan placed his phone aside and went back to his room.

The next day, his father came back home on time. He had always been punctual, arriving at exactly seven o’clock in the evening.

Lin Yuyan stood in the living room, obediently waiting for his father to enter the door to greet the other, “Dad.”

Lin Zhiyuan was in his forties. He was wearing an iron gray suit, glasses, and a serious look on his face. He hadn’t seen his son for a long time but didn’t show any happiness upon meeting him. He slightly nodded to him and directly went to the dining room.

“Have you been to Zhuo Hang’s house recently?” Lin Zhiyuan’s voice was like a deep bell, with a shallow furrow between his eyebrows.

Lin Yuyan responded with an, “En.” Afraid that he would say something wrong, he didn’t dare to add any explanation.

Lin Zhiyuan seemed a little dissatisfied with this matter, he looked at him and said, “I won’t stop you from being friends with him, but don’t get too close to him. You’ll become competitors with him in the future. Don’t forget this fact just because you have a good relationship with him.”

Lin Yuyan gave a reply but did not refute his father’s words. Inside his heart, he muttered to himself that his father had always been like this, which is why he had no friends now.

“Have you chosen a university yet?” Lin Zhiyuan asked again.

Lin Yuyan replied, “Currently. I haven’t started applying yet.”

“Study management.” Lin Zhiyuan didn’t listen to him and decided on his son’s major on his own, “I’ve already found the university for you, it’s the one in this city. You can’t go too far and also go to the company for an internship during the holidays.”

Lin Yuyan was stunned. He placed his chopsticks down and hurriedly said, “But Dad, I want to major in art..”

Lin Zhiyuan frowned and interrupted him again, “Do you still want to learn painting?”

Lin Yuyan nodded.

Lin Zhiyuan unceremoniously asked him, “Are you good at painting?”

After saying that, Lin Yuyan completely fell silent. His father left straight after dinner. He still had a meeting to attend. He didn’t even wait for his son to finish his meal.

Lin Yuyan listened to the heavy sound of the slamming door, keeping his head faced down to the table. There were still half of the shrimps left on the plate.

It was true that he wasn’t any good at painting, but his father’s blunt words still made him uncomfortable.

The phone kept ringing and his aunt helped him bring the phone upstairs. Lin Yuyan thanked her and left the dining room to answer the call.

The call was from Gu Yaoyang, he only just had time to reply when he received the text.

Lin Yuyan greeted the other in a heavy nasal voice, “Hello.”

Gu Yaoyang immediately asked him, ” What’s wrong with your voice?”

“It’s fine,” Lin Yuyan immediately came up with a random reason, “I’ve just got a cold.”

Gu Yaoyang’s background noise was noisy, it sounded like he wasn’t home, “Are you in the bar?”

Gu Yaoyang answered him, “No.” He didn’t know what to say, so he changed the topic, “What’s the matter with your text?”

Lin Yuyan answered him, “It’s nothing, just wanted to tell you that I’m home.”

“Oh.”

He was still aggrieved inside his heart, but he didn’t dare to utter a sound about it. He pretended to sneeze covertly before sniffing and said, “Well, it’s nothing, I’ll hang up first.”

“En.”

Gu Yaoyang said en and hung up the phone at the same time as he did.

Lin Yuyan softly sighed before opening the door to his studio. He sat down on the ground and started to flip through the things he had painted since childhood, some of which were okay, and some of which weren’t really okay. The confidence that he regained a few days ago was brought back down to the bottom by his father’s words. He felt ashamed and wanted to find someplace to hide, and inexplicably, he thought about Gu Yaoyang. He felt safe behind him, if he was here, he would hide behind him for a while.

After an unknown amount of time passed, with a thud, the balcony window seemed to be smashed open. Lin Yuyan stood up in confusion and walked over, pushing open the glass door in front of him.

The wind outside was a bit cold, it seemed to be cloudy outside, and there was a protective net on the fence outside the yard, which he asked the auntie to put on a few days ago. She said that the electricity was turned on. and no one would dare to climb inside.

He lowered his head and saw a person standing under the streetlamp just outside the wall with a suitcase beside him.

It was Gu Yaoyang.

“You- Why are you here?”

Gu Yaoyang sat on the lamppost and lightly answered him, “I’m here to see you cry.”

Lin Yuyan nearly forgot about this, he hurriedly wiped his swollen red eyes and pressed down the rising grievance inside his heart, and choked up a denial, “I- I didn’t cry.”

Right after he finished speaking, his tears fell with no shame, and with even more turbulence than before.

Lin Yuyan randomly rubbed his face, thinking that it was odd. He had no idea where this extra feeling of grievance came from, but from the second he saw Gu Yaoyang, it just inexplicably came to him.