Chapter 213: Heavy Rain

**Chapter 213: Heavy Rain**

Wen Xian stole a sidelong glance.

Shen Zhao’s hair was soaked with sweat, half of it clinging to his temples and revealing a smooth forehead. He was wrapped in Wen Xian’s oversized black trench coat. His nose was sharp and handsome, and aside from looking slightly youthful, he was the spitting image of the one in Wen Xian’s home.

“…”

Wen Xian stiffly broke the silence. “You go to 33rd Middle School?”

Shen Zhao pulled the coat tighter around himself. “Yeah.”

He added, “I’m in the experimental class. I might switch schools after next month’s placement exams.”

Nan City schools used standardized placement exams, and top scorers could be recruited by prestigious institutions like Foreign Language Academy.

Wen Xian said, “That’s good.”

Awkwardly, he turned to look out the window. The tension in the car was suffocating. He wanted to say something but couldn’t think of what.

Luckily, Uncle Wu turned the steering wheel and pulled over, telling Wen Xian, “We’ve arrived at No. 471 Lingjiang Zhuang Road, but the road ahead is too narrow for the car.”

They were at the entrance of an alley, squeezed between two buildings so close together that you could barely see a sliver of sky. It was even narrower than most so-called “one-line-sky” scenic spots. The residents here never saw sunlight, and reaching out a hand could almost hook a neighbor’s window. People called them “handshake buildings” around here.

Wen Xian stepped out first, hesitating slightly.

In their past life, he probably offered his arm to help Shen Zhao home.

Shen Zhao had a leg injury. As a matter of courtesy, Wen Xian would have done the same for anyone—help them home, then walk away and forget all about it.

Who knew things would get so complicated later?

Lost in thought, he froze in place. Shen Zhao didn’t call him either. He just looked down and tried to hobble out on his bad leg.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa—”

Wen Xian quickly reached out. “…Careful. Hold onto me.”

Shen Zhao hesitated for a moment before letting his hand hover over Wen Xian’s arm.

His touch was cautious, as if ready to pull back at the slightest movement.

Nervously trembling.

Wen Xian thought it was odd.

They were both wearing thin spring clothes, the fabric barely blocking body heat. Wordlessly, Wen Xian guided Shen Zhao forward, remembering their past life.

The only time they had ever walked arm-in-arm so peacefully was on their wedding day.

Shen Zhao had few relatives or friends. Most of the guests were from Wen Xian’s side. The Wen-Shen marriage was all politics, and everyone faked cheerfulness. Only the newlyweds stood awkwardly in the middle of the banquet—the bouquet and rings both chosen by the wedding company—completely out of sync, like strangers.

Back then, Shen Zhao had also stiffly linked arms with Wen Xian, ready to let go at any second.

At the time, Wen Xian thought Shen Zhao was just going through the motions of their arranged marriage, hating every minute of it.

But if that was true, why’d he hang onto that coat for a whole decade?

Was he really that attached to it?

Shen Zhao's home was located at the end of the "handshake buildings," a type of densely packed urban housing, in a converted first-floor garage. Walls had been erected and a door installed, but the interior remained dim and damp, illuminated only by electric lights. The corners were covered in persistent, ingrained stains that could not be scrubbed away.

Wen Xian frowned almost imperceptibly.

The Shen Zhao he knew was refined and elegant, his beautiful body always clad in well-tailored suits. If not for Shen Zhao insisting on marrying him, countless men and women in Nancheng would have gladly shared a fleeting romance with him. Someone like him should have been raised in luxury. Yet all Wen Xian saw now were patches of mold, air so cold and damp it seeped into the bones, and bedding so thin it seemed dangerously inadequate.

Outside, the temperature hovered near eighty-six degrees Fahrenheit, yet standing here, Wen Xian felt chilled to the core.

He remembered—Shen Zhao was always cold.

His blankets were thicker than most, the heat cranked up high in winter, and he loved wearing beige high-neck wool sweaters. When they shared a bed, they’d start on opposite sides, but Shen Zhao would unconsciously scoot closer in his sleep, pressing against Wen Xian for warmth. Wen Xian would sweat from the heat, while Shen Zhao found the temperature just right.

In winter, he also caught colds more easily than most.

"..."

Wen Xian pressed his lips together but ultimately said nothing.

They were barely acquaintances—it wouldn’t be appropriate to offer him a blanket.

Shen Zhao seemed slightly uneasy and stopped first at the doorway. “I can go in alone. Thank you.”

Wen Xian nodded.

His gaze swept over the sparse furnishings inside—a simple bed and desk, barely furnished but clean and tidy. At the far end stood an old-fashioned wardrobe, atop which sat a makeshift altar. A white porcelain plate held a few scattered offerings, and three sticks of low-quality incense burned slowly in the holder.

On the altar was a black-and-white photograph of a woman.

She appeared to be in her early forties, with a gentle, calm demeanor—her face soft and unassuming, the kind of kind-faced woman familiar to neighbors as a friendly local auntie.

Wen Xian looked away. “…Don’t let the broken skin on your wound get wet. Your sprained ankle isn’t too serious—just rub some liniment on it. And the bruise on your waist needs to be worked out too. By the way, do you have any safflower oil?”

Shen Zhao nodded. “Yes.”

Wen Xian took a step back. “Alright, then I’ll be going.”

“Wait—” Shen Zhao called out, holding up his clothes. “I got them dirty. I’ll wash them and return them tomorrow.”

Wen Xian didn’t remember what happened to those clothes later, but since they were still in Shen Zhao’s possession after their marriage, they probably never made it back to him. And with no washing machine in this place, Shen Zhao would likely have to hand-wash them.

Wen Xian shrugged. “It’s fine. You can keep them.”

With that, he turned away, glancing briefly at the unit number on the handshake building before walking off.

That night, Wen Xian made a call alone in his bedroom.

It was a number he had dialed often in his previous life—committed to memory.

After three rings, a raspy male voice answered, likely from years of smoking. “Hello?”

Wen Xian lowered his voice to sound older. “Hey. A friend of a friend referred me. I need someone to look into someone privately. You available?”

Back in his past life, after marrying Shen Zhao, he had hired a private investigator. After all, they shared a room—if Shen Zhao really wanted to take down the Shen family, he needed to be prepared. Plus, Shen Jixing’s death had been suspicious. When Wen Xian investigated later, nearly all evidence had vanished. In Nancheng, aside from a few prominent names, no one else could have erased everything so thoroughly.

This detective was experienced, recommended by another wealthy friend of his—specializing in catching cheating elites red-handed. Wen Xian had worked with him before—he did reliable work.

The man on the other end wasted no time. “Who?”

Wen Xian replied, “Just some student from the 33rd Middle School. Name’s Shen Zhao.”

After getting married, they seemed too mild-mannered and harmless, and the guy in the alley didn’t come across as a bad dude at all. But the hard truth was that Shen Jixing’s family got wiped out. Now that he’d gone back in time, Wen Xian had the chance to uncover what really happened.

If Shen Zhao was born a villain, there would’ve been red flags back in his school days.

Once he settled on the fee and payment details with the detective, Wen Xian locked his phone and flopped onto the bed. But before he could even close his eyes, something weird floated up—a faint blue glow like some creepy ghost light, glaring at him full of resentment.

66 stared at him eerily, drawling in this spooky, dreamy voice, “M~y~ d~e~a~r~ h~o~s~t… d~i~d~ y~o~u~ f~o~r~g~e~t~ s~o~m~e~t~h~i~n~g~?”

Wen Xian: “….”

He’d totally blanked on that.

Rescuing Shen Zhao, grabbing dinner at home, rushing to contact the detective—Wen Xian completely forgot about the system.

He coughed awkwardly. “Well, isn’t that just what any decent high schooler would do? If someone’s getting jumped in some alley, even if it’s not part of the mission, could you really just walk away?”

66: “….”

It actually thought for a moment and realized it couldn’t.

But that didn’t excuse Wen Xian for messing things up. 66 warned, “Fine, I’ll give you a pass this time. But you better get your act together for the next few missions.”

Wen Xian sheepishly rubbed his nose.

66 opened the mission log again. “This one’s super easy. Tomorrow afternoon after school, Nan City’s gonna get dumped on by this crazy storm. Just sit tight and take the bus home—you’re done.”

Wen Xian’s heart clenched.

A rare heavy rain?

Nan City was prone to typhoons. Every spring and summer, rainfall often topped 500mm. With its ancient drainage system, floods were common—and the slums always got hit hardest.

And Shen Zhao lived on the first floor.

That room never got any sunlight and was already musty even when it wasn’t raining. If the floodwaters came in, what was Shen Zhao supposed to do?

As 66 kept yammering on, Wen Xian suddenly reached out and grabbed it. “66, let me ask you something.”

66 tilted its head. “Hmm?”

Wen Xian: “Can I… buy you off?”

66: “Huh?”

Wen Xian: “Can you eat? I’ve got this whole box of fancy imported snacks—biscuits, milk, chocolates, drinks, jelly. You name it. Or can you take baths? I’ve got a tub. I can make you a milk bath.”

66: “!”

Its metaphorical mouth was watering.

Jiang Xun once took it to a hot spring—it was amazing. And it remembered how good Liang Xu’s jelly and chocolate tasted. But those treats didn’t exist in ancient times, and Liang Xu and Shi Lv never brought it along when they went bathing. It had never tried combining them before.

66 had the attention span of a goldfish. It instantly forgot everything else and chirped, “Yay!”

So Wen Xian dragged out his old baby bathtub, heated up some milk, and poured it in. He used a Lego cup to hold the drink, added a tiny slice of lemon for flair, and found a heat-resistant plastic board to lay out the snacks. It looked like a fancy floating snack setup.

66 was living its best life in there.

Wen Xian messed around with the weather app on his phone, feeling antsy.

The weather in Nancheng City was always unpredictable—raining one moment and clearing up the next, with no pattern at all. Sometimes, it could be raining on one side of the school field while the sun shone on the other; the weather forecast was always off.

Like now, it showed heavy rain tomorrow, but the probability of rain hovered around 60% regardless of the time.

If it rained in the early morning or late at night, he couldn’t just wait outside Shen Zhao’s door—it would seem too deliberate, as if he had ulterior motives.

Distracted by these thoughts, the cat, now well-fed and content, happily snuggled up to its new host. It thought this new host was truly a good person and curled up beside him, dozing off.

But Wen Xian found the weather oppressively humid and tossed and turned half the night.

The next morning, Nancheng woke to clear skies.

Wen Xian tossed two umbrellas into his backpack before heading to class.

Passing by a stall selling egg-stuffed pancakes, he glanced into the alley while waiting for his order but saw nothing. Biting into the pancake, he returned to the classroom.

Senior year was tedious—the day started with physics followed by math. Wen Xian felt like he was drowning in formulas, barely keeping his eyes open. A glance to the side revealed Shen Jixing already fast asleep.

In the afternoon, they had a math test, and Wen Xian’s performance was a total disaster.

In his past life, though he had been a slacker, he was at least from an elite foreign-language school—not a lost cause. He ranked near the bottom of the class, sure, and bombed the tough problems, but he usually got most standard questions right and understood the basic concepts. By the standards of No.33 Middle School, he was even considered a respectable student.

But coming back to high school after ten years was a different story.

His head spinning, Wen Xian couldn’t even solve the first problem. He guessed at a couple of multiple-choice answers and figured scoring 30 points would already be sheer luck, a miracle granted by the heavens.

Finally, when school ended, he looked outside—dark clouds rolled in, swallowing the sunlight, as if a storm was brewing.

As Wen Xian hurried out of the classroom and reached the alley behind the school, he scanned the surroundings. All he could see was a sea of umbrellas, students’ sneakers, and parents’ leather shoes and high heels splashing through puddles.

Too many people—hard to find anyone.

He frowned slightly, feeling restless. With one umbrella tucked under his arm and another open in his hand, he made his way through the alley to where Wu Kang’s car was parked. He pulled open the door and got in.

Wen Xian kept his gaze fixed out the window.

Rain-soaked asphalt resembled a blurred mirror, orange-red car lights casting hazy reflections. Silhouettes flickered in the downpour. The rain in Nancheng carried a bone-chilling cold and sounded deafeningly loud.

He didn’t see the person he was looking for.

Clutching the dripping umbrella, Wen Xian wondered, *Has Shen Zhao already gone home?*

Just then, Wu Kang turned the key, started the engine, and switched on the Lincoln’s windshield wipers. The tires gripped the wet road as he gave a short honk to alert pedestrians before easing the car out of the alley and onto the main road.

Wen Xian sat quietly in the car, still watching outside.

Suddenly, he caught sight of a familiar figure.

Shen Zhao stood at the intersection of the main road and the alley, looking their way.

It was a strategic spot—any car leaving the alley would inevitably pass there.

Wen Xian frowned.

Shen Zhao didn’t have an umbrella.

Heavy raindrops pelted down from the sky, soaking his jacket completely. Half of his clothes clung to his lean frame.

His hair was drenched, water droplets rolling down his jawline, yet he held an orange supermarket plastic bag tightly in his arms, shielding its contents from the rain.

Peering closer, Wen Xian finally recognized what was inside.

—It was his black trench coat.