APP: Extra 3 – Shen Yi and Su Qing

Feng Yu drove the car to the suburbs and stopped. He thought of the information he had found before and felt bitter.

His family was powerful in this world and it wasn’t difficult to find out Su Qing’s past experience. At first, understanding this was just for the convenience of approaching and taking care of Su Qing. After knowing that Su Qing’s parents had died and he was alone, Feng Yu felt a bit distressed. After all, he grew up worry free and at peace with his parents. Feng Yu tried his best but once he approached, he fell uncontrollably.

When Su Qing was very young, his father passed away. He was a soldier in the army and died for the country. He was a heroic martyr and Su Qing was his son. His father was handsome, young, talented and promising while his mother was gentle and beautiful. They were very affectionate and the envy of others. Then one of them suddenly disappeared.

At that time, Su Qing’s mother had just given birth to Su Qing. She got postpartum depression and becoming a widow caused her to completely collapse. She had severe depression. She stopped managing the house and became hysterical. Her illness was so serious that she had a tendency for negative aggression. She also didn’t recognize her child. Once Su Qing was a bit older, he was hurt by her and almost died.

In the past few years, the condition of Su Qing’s mother was good and bad. She was constantly discharged and admitted again. Most of the time, Su Qing lived with his grandparents.

Su Qing had been very smart and sensible since he was a child. He seemed to know that his family was exhausted and wandering on the edge of a nervous breakdown. He never caused trouble for anyone, didn’t cry or make noise. He was always quiet. He worked to help his family and went to the hospital to take care of his mother.

His grades had always been very good. He knew he didn’t have the right to be willful, that it wasn’t easy for anyone. It was already difficult for him to live well. He could only get rid of the quagmire of life by trying his best to outline the beauty. He knew there was a lot of evil in life but he could only tell himself to believe in good. It was because hate didn’t make people’s lives better.

Once Su Qing was 18 years old, the balance he was trying to maintain collapsed. The string that had been tense for over 10 years broke.

That year, Su Qing finished the university entrance examination and estimated that the future was promising. He happily went to the hospital to see his mother to tell her the good news, only to find out about her suicide.

***

There was a lump in Feng Yu’s throat. He just wanted to take care of Su Qing but he found that Su Qing wasn’t willing. He seemed to be soft but he was actually very assertive. He knew what he was doing and had no regrets.

In front of Su Qing’s clear and clean eyes, he always saw his own ugliness and felt ashamed of himself. He suddenly understood why the legendary movie emperor Shen Yi would choose Su Qing. It wasn’t just his appearance.

The night breeze blew past Feng Yu and he controlled his mind. He returned all the points he had collected to Xie Chi. He immediately felt much more relaxed and happy, like he could draw a clean end to this disgraceful love.

This was the most beautiful person he had loved and they would never meet again. He thought he was saving Su Qing from the sea of suffering but in fact, Su Qing was tranquil on the other side. It was he himself who was struggling in the sea of suffering. A loafer would always fall in love with a good family. It was like some type of prophecy.

***

Su Qing sat on the bed, looking at the bottles on the table that hadn’t been opened for a long time with a slightly proud smile. Diazepam and all types of melatonin—he already hadn’t taken them in ages. It hadn’t taken long from being unable to sleep all night to sleeping until dawn without any dreams.

Su Qing raised his head and looked out the French windows, watching the large trucks that were only allowed to pass late at night moving further and further away on the highway. The starry sky above his head was shining. It seemed to be within reach but it was actually far away.

Perhaps that man was getting further and further away. Su Qing didn’t often think of him. It was only in Su Qing’s sleep that he visited that man again.

Su Qing remembered his grandparents often saying that things would pass. There were no hurdles that couldn’t be passed and everything was fine. Yes, everything would pass. Time was the best medicine.

Maybe one day, he would completely forget that person. Then even if he came, Su Qing could smile calmly at him.

***

That night, Su Qing had a dream.

After his university entrance examination, he held the last words left to him by his mother and shook, cold all over. The words on the paper were neat and tidy, indicating that his mother was extremely conscious at the last moment. She died in a sober state.

The words on the paper were beautiful: Su Su, this world is very beautiful. Your mother can’t go out in it but you have to believe in beauty. It is only by living well that you can meet better people. There is nothing you can’t get through.

Yes, there was nothing he couldn’t get through.

He tore up the note and calmly handled his mother’s funeral. People around him were very worried about Su Qing but Su Qing said he was fine. After so many years of helplessness, there was finally an ending. This was also a type of relief for him.

He read, ate and did everything alone. He was always smiling.

—Until the death of his grandparents one after another. They seemed to have been hanging on for their daughter. Once their daughter was gone, their heart knots were gone and they completely left for another world.

In the dream, he returned home blankly, closed the door and laughed hard for a while. He slowly crouched down, hugged himself into a ball and burst out weeping. He was too tired. He wanted someone to lean on and be lazy with.

He would meet that beautiful person, right? He was no longer sure.

***

After that day, an app suddenly appeared on his mobile phone. The name of the app was ‘supernatural movie actor app’. He had slowly lost everything. He wanted someone to rely on. He wanted to meet a beautiful person.

He met Shen Yi in his newcomer movie. He had been in a trance at the time and his state was extremely bad. Shen Yi saved his life several times. He felt that the battered heart in his chest was alive again.

***

The moment Shen Yi came out, he looked around. He didn’t see Su Qing and the light in his eyes quietly faded. He anxiously asked Xie Chi, “Where is Su Qing?”

Xie Chi was stunned. “Didn’t you not want him to know you were dead?”

Shen Yi’s expression changed. “You stupid son, can’t you tell it is the opposite of what I wrote?”

Xie Chi, “?”

Stupid son? Xie Chi narrowed his eyes slightly.

Shen Yi thought about Su Qing and how he hadn’t been back in so long. “You can’t say that I am dead but couldn’t you hint for me? Something like I couldn’t go back in so long because I was delayed by something?”

“Forget it.” Shen Yi spoke extremely quickly. “Is he okay? No one cares about him, right?”

The anger that had just been ignited in Xie Chi was extinguished by these words. He felt weak and coughed. “No.”

“Then give me the address. I’ll find him.”

Xie Chi pointed to the luggage on the sofa. “It is all ready for you.”

“The address has been sent to your app conversation box and I have already transferred you the points you need to go to his world.”

Shen Yi was startled. He hadn’t expected Xie Chi to be so thoughtful and his anger was blown away. “Well done. It is worthy of praise.”

Xie Chi, “?”

Xie Chi endured it and held back. It was he who was wrong in the first place.

Shen Yi glanced at the huge amount of luggage and frowned. “What is this? Why is there so much?”

Xie Chi answered quietly, “There is a razor, foundation, hair wax, cufflinks and a suit. Find the time to clean up on the way. I won’t keep you. I know you want to see him right now. We will talk about things when you get back.”

“……” Shen Yi sighed. “We are truly a family.”

He was smiling as he spoke. Everything Xie Chi did was out of consideration for him. Xie Chi knew what he needed.

“Yes, it is a family.” Xie Chi repeated it, his expression somewhat subtle.

Shen Yi told him, “I’m going. I will come back and thank you.”

He was walking away with his luggage when he suddenly turned his head and raised his eyebrow. He suggested with a smile. “Would you like to come with me to see him? Your boyfriend as well?”

It was like seeing the parents.

The light in Xie Chi’s eyes grew deeper. “You go first. I won’t disturb you. I will come with him later.”

“Okay.” The more Shen Yi looked at Xie Chi, the more satisfied he was.

***

Xie Chi watched Shen Yi striding away with the suitcases and murmured to himself. “I don’t know why but after knowing he is our son, I’m not angry at anything he says to me anymore.”

Xie Xinglan came in and paused before answering uncertainly, “Perhaps it is because he seems intellectually disabled?”

Xie Chi, “……”

***

Shen Yi rented a car and drove to the address given by Xie Chi. He entered it into the navigation and found it was 100 kilometers away. If he drove quickly, it would take over an hour to get there.

Shen Yi couldn’t wait that long. He looked at Su Qing’s new phone number that Xie Chi sent to his conversation box and hesitated for a few seconds. Then he copied it and called it with his phone bound to the app.

A phone bound to the app could make calls outside the app but those outside the app couldn’t call in. There was nothing to be afraid about. He would chase back his person at all costs.

“Hello? Who is it?” It was a man who answered the phone.

Shen Yi’s heart tightened. “Is this Su Qing’s number?”

“Yes, he went to eat and left his phone here so I picked it up for him. What is going on? If you have something important to say to him then I’ll go to him. If it isn’t important, wait for him to come back and talk to you. Eh? This name…”

“Hello? Hello?”

The voice over there suddenly became quieter. Shen Yi thought the signal was bad because he was in a tunnel. After a while, he heard some sound from the other side.

“Hahahahaha, this damn note says ‘Dog Man’. I’m laughing to death. Su Su can actually curse as well. This is so rare…”

Shen Yi whose face had stiffened slightly, “……”

The person on the other side finished laughing. Then he coughed and said solemnly, “The signal was a bit bad. What matter do you want to talk about?”

Shen Yi answered coldly, “I’m hanging up. I’ll talk to him later.”

“Eh? Hey—”

“Weird person.”

***

Su Qing’s world was very similar to his world. It should be a close parallel world. The split in the timeline was very late so the urban pattern was similar. Shen Yi drove on the highway and the high-rise buildings passed rapidly. On the glass of the car, he could always see Su Qing’s shadow.

He had previously glanced at the time on the app. Over 500 days had passed since the day he left. It was almost a year and a half. For him, it was just a matter of closing and opening his eyes but what about Su Su? How had he been in this year and a half?

Shen Yi felt panic for the first time. He had rushed all this way but it was only once he was alone that all the questions he needed to consider came to the surface.

He was a bit irritable and didn’t want to continue thinking about it. He hated ruminating on emotions, feeling sorrow and pain. Rather than worrying over this, he should think about how to make it up to Su Su.

The only thing he was certain about was that he loved Su Su and he needed to get Su Su back. He would deal with the various problems one by one. Even if Su Su didn’t wait for him, didn’t love him anymore or was with others, he would chase Su Su back.

He would regret it if he didn’t chase. Shen Yi wasn’t a man to force others but if given the chance, he would definitely stick to it to the end.

The mirage-like panic disappeared at the moment of clear thinking. He just wanted to run toward Su Qing.

***

The closer Shen Yi got, the more Shen Yi remembered. The memories he had forgotten on purpose were vivid.

***

“Is he a mute person who can’t talk?”

Two newcomers gathered and pointed at Su Qing who wasn’t far away.

“I don’t know. He hasn’t spoken. Still, he looks really amazing for a man—”

Shen Yi interrupted them. “Keep your mouths clean.”

He instinctively glanced in the direction they were looking at and was stunned. It was a man but the first impression was ‘beautiful’. Beautiful, thin and weak, like a dodder.

Shen Yi frowned. This person wasn’t effeminate but he definitely wasn’t masculine. He was a type that Shen Yi wasn’t used to. He always disliked people with delicate looks and thin bodies because most of the time, it meant they were sensitive, delicate, emotional and not easy to get along with.

Shen Yi hated trouble. He didn’t pay much attention at the time. He went looking for clues but when he saw this man, Shen Yi actually saved him. He half-hugged Su Qing out of trouble and the first impression he got was ‘thin’. The second impression was ‘refreshing’.

There was a light fragrance on this person’s body that couldn’t be suppressed by the blood. Perhaps this person had a cleanliness habit and paid special attention to cleaning. This fragrance was soaked into the bones. Su Qing’s skin wasn’t hard or strong. It was very soft. His speech was gentle and clear, just like his name.

Shen Yi was uncomfortable. This was different from the men he had contact with in the past. He felt that men should be vigorous, generous and bright. It was only now that he realized there were indeed gentle and delicate men like Su Qing.

This was a person he didn’t understand at all and he had no desire to understand. He just wanted to stay away.

***

Shen Yi thought he was crazy the second time he rescued Su Qing. He came on a mission, not to sympathize with others.

“You have only one life. If you don’t cherish it then I won’t bother to save you. You can kill yourself.” He put this person down and turned around coldly, only to be hugged by Su Qing.

Shen Yi was stiff at the time. Shen Yi later realized that the man in his arms was crying. His shoulders were moving but he made no sound. Sure enough. Shen Yi had a headache. Su Qing was indeed as sensitive and fragile as he thought. This was the type of person he was most annoyed with.

“What are you doing?” He wondered.

“…I thought of my father.”

He was turned into a father? Shen Yi didn’t know if he should laugh or cry. “…What happened to your father?”

“He is dead.”

Shen Yi’s playful expression froze. “What about your other relatives?”

“Dead.”

Shen Yi didn’t know what to do with Su Qing for a while. He was born with weak emotions and a strong rationality. He felt that many people around him were stupid. Jiang Shuo was stupid and his father was stupid his whole life. His mother who insisted on keeping Lian Shi was also stupid.

He hated emotions so he didn’t understand the pain of bereavement. He felt that when people were alive, they should do something, whether it was changing others or changing the world. They should give it some meaning instead of being confined to the past. As long as one was still alive, one could always do something to change the current situation.

“How old are you?”

“19 years old.”

At the time, Shen Yi thought that he would indeed be a father soon. He was exactly 30. Shen Yi laughed at his thoughts. The man in his arms was still crying so he awkwardly patted Su Qing on the back as if coaxing him.

***

Later, the shy and introverted Su Qing openly followed Shen Yi, acting for him and providing him with useful and useless clues. In the entire movie, he was a good and quiet follower.

Shen Yi was flustered. He didn’t know how to get along with this type of person. He felt that his voice was strange when he stayed with Su Qing. He couldn’t use a tone of brotherhood when talking to Su Qing and his gentle tone didn’t sound like himself.

Shen Yi thought that once this movie was over, he would have nothing to do with Su Qing. He didn’t expect Su Qing to stick to him like a small rice cake.

In the past, Shen Yi might’ve been kind to Su Qing but he knew why he came here. He had no time to be distracted doing other things. For the first time, Shen Yi didn’t know what to do with a person.

It seemed that for everyone apart from Su Qing, he could classify them as quickly as possible, distinguish their importance and deal with them reasonably. If the importance was low then he could ignore them. He liked to measure the value of people and pursue the maximum benefits. Now he found that Su Qing couldn’t be classified by him.

Su Qing didn’t have strong abilities and couldn’t help him in what he was going to do. It stood to reason that he shouldn’t spend time on Su Qing but for some reason, he couldn’t say the words of rejection. He was worried that Su Qing would be sad.

Shen Yi was a bit upset. This wasn’t like him. So that day when Su Qing came, Shen Yi put on a posture of rejection and asked, “What do you want?”

Su Qing was stunned and lowered his head. “I want to be friends with you.”

Friends?

Shen Yi smiled.

In the app, pets were everywhere. He didn’t want to make friends in the app. If he needed to make friends, he would make strong friends. It was because they had the ability to protect themselves and wouldn’t be easily victimized by Pet. A friend meant importance. He didn’t want them to be killed because of him.

He could easily change his name but he didn’t know when his identity would be discovered by the Pet organization. At that time, his friends would definitely bear the brunt and the weakest of them would be the first to suffer.

It was a fact that Su Qing wasn’t strong. It was impossible for him to be friends with Su Qing because it might kill Su Qing.

“I don’t need friends,” Shen Yi answered in a cold voice.

Su Qing looked up. “Why?”

“There is no reason.”

“Is it because I am too weak?”

Shen Yi couldn’t help frowning. Then he thought about it and realized he was right, so he smiled. “You know it.”

The blood drained from Su Qing’s face. “I understand.”

Shen Yi thought that Su Qing would retreat and leave him. He didn’t expect Su Qing to be a completely different person the next time he appeared in front of Shen Yi. He used to instinctively lower his head to avoid the eyes of outsiders. Now he raised his head easily to meet Shen Yi’s gaze and seemed completely reborn.

He used to always wear very dark clothing which made people ignore his existence. He was dull and tasteless. Now he had changed to bright colors and combined with his exquisite facial features, he looked like a bit of bright color on a black color which made people stop to stare.

Shen Yi secretly watched him a few times before returning to his senses and instructing coldly, “Don’t pester me anymore.”

Su Qing approached. “I like you.”

Shen Yi’s expression changed completely. “Are you joking?”

“I’m not joking, I’m serious. Shen Yi, I like you.”

Shen Yi didn’t expect such a shy person to be so bold. He had nowhere to hide his hands and could only stare at Su Qing coldly. Su Qing smiled at him. “I only know that life is very short. If I like someone, I must tell him because I might not have time to say it before they die.”

“Are you cursing me?” Shen Yi finished this sentence and his face froze. What did he say?

Su Qing told him, “I think I should fight for someone since I am still alive.”

Shen Yi’s heart fell for a second before waking up. Falling in love? It was also with a man. What a joke. He couldn’t give anything. His time and energy were completely occupied. He had a fake face and fake name. He didn’t deserve to fall in love at all.

Shen Yi had thought that if one day he fell in love with someone, he hoped the burden on him would’ve been removed at that time. This way, he could shoulder the responsibility and shelter the person he loved from the wind and rain, making them worry free.

That wasn’t the case now. Currently, he was a miser when it came to love. He knew he was unworthy and shouldn’t be in love. He didn’t want to delay Su Qing.

“I don’t need it.” Shen Yi clenched his hands as he answered lightly.

“Why?”

It came again. Shen Yi hated this question because he was forced to lie, trick and hurt this person. He looked at Su Qing and laughed. “You are so beautiful and there is no shortage of people to protect you. Don’t rely on me.”

Su Qing’s lips turned pale. “No… it isn’t like that.”

Shen Yi couldn’t bear it but he didn’t look away and cruelly continued, “Don’t pester me. I hate feelings and don’t have time to fall in love—”

Su Qing interrupted, almost muttering to himself. “No time?”

Shen Yi thought he was the one being asked and was about to reply with ‘yes’. However, Su Qing had already risen on his tiptoes, kissing Shen Yi’s lips and prying apart his lips clumsily. His eyes were bright like there were stars living in them.

Shen Yi froze completely before reacting and angrily pushing Su Qing away. “What are you doing? Are you crazy?!”

He didn’t understand why Su Qing didn’t cherish himself. Shen Yi felt he was crazy as well. A man kissed him but he didn’t feel sick. He felt distressed for some reason.

Su Qing told him, “I’m not crazy. If you don’t have time then don’t fall in love. I checked. People like you should prefer to have timely fun?”

Shen Yi looked at Su Qing’s new clothes and finally understood. He smiled angrily. “I’m not like that—”

Before he could finish, Su Qing had blocked his lips again. Shen Yi tried to push him away but he fell into Su Qing’s eyes.

These eyes had the innocence of a child who wasn’t stained with dust but had returned to the basics after the vicissitudes of life. They were clean, warm, pious and determined. They clearly knew nothing but they made people burn with lust.

For a second, Shen Yi forgot the way forward.

---

Proofreader: Purichan