ATAFBS Chapter 8

Once he returned to his room, Yu Juan took a lukewarm shower and quickly forced himself to get that silly matter off his mind. By the time he got on the bed, he had calmed down.

When the alarm clock rang an unknown amount of time later, Yu Juan opened his eyes and brought his laptop on the bed before contacting the person he had an appointment with.

There were too many types of medicine in the pictures he had secretly taken last time, and not all of them could be found online. Moreover, it was close to impossible even for pharmacists to recognise which medicine it was just based on its appearance.

Yu Juan paid for an online appointment with a doctor.

The other party was definitely a professional– after looking at the pictures Yu Juan sent, he answered almost immediately: “The patient should’ve just been in a serious accident, right?”

Yu Juan answered affirmatively and asked: “So I want to ask, those medicines, are they really appropriate for recovery? Is there anything wrong with them?”

Fifteen minutes later, after the doctor finished looking at the pictures more carefully, he sent a reply: “Those medicines are quite expensive and also relatively conservative. Some of them have better alternatives, but the difference shouldn’t be too big. As for whether they are genuine or not…there are a few I don’t recognise. I asked my colleagues from other departments just now, and they said there’s no issue.”

Yu Juan breathed a sigh of relief.

Based on the prices of the medicine and the questions Yu Juan had asked, the doctor could guess that the situation should be something that was difficult to share. However, since his client showed concern for the patient and he also gained a profit from it, it wasn’t his business to ask more– though he did give another warning: “It’ll still be best if you could seek an appointment for a comprehensive health check. If you aren’t careful enough, such a serious accident can easily leave behind permanent injuries.”

Laying on the bed, Yu Juan looked at the reply sent by the doctor and gave a light, subtle sigh before saying: “I understand, thank you.”

After sending the remaining payment to the other party, he shut down the laptop.

The protagonist’s slight limp was a character setting for the novel. The author explained that if the protagonist didn’t lose something so important that it would be deeply engraved into his bones, it would be difficult to justify his revenge against the antagonists for their wrongdoings, and the readers might even feel that his retaliation was unnecessary.

Such a physical disability would be reflected in every aspect. As someone who had to sit in a wheelchair all year long and use crutches to walk with dignity, people would either pity and sympathise with him or ridicule him. Only when the time would come would they realise that he was actually someone with extreme resolve despite appearing outwardly weak.

Yu Juan had seen quite a number of comments mentioning how the protagonist’s disability made the novel more satisfying. It was, after all, merely a setting that could be used whenever the situation called for it. The author had no intention to write about how the protagonist’s lifestyle would be affected, nor did they care about what others might say. At the end of the day, it was only a novel.

Yu Juan then transmigrated into this very novel, <The Count of Baicheng>.

He became an insignificant cannon fodder, someone who was terminally ill, and was forced to suffer through the remaining days of that character’s life.

He always felt that, if he closed his eyes, he wouldn’t be able to open them the next second.

In the midst of such continuous torment, Yu Juan would sometimes hope that he could just die sooner rather than later.

The way in which a fictional novel was written didn’t matter. However, it was a completely different situation if it turned into reality.

The past 22 years of Zhou Huiyue’s life might have been smooth, but Yu Juan had heard the sound of crutches hitting the ground approaching until the other person stood in front of him fifteen years later.

Could it be changed?

Yu Juan suddenly thought that this matter had nothing to do with him at all.

It was the protagonist’s life, the protagonist’s fate– and Yu Juan wanted nothing to do with it.

The phone suddenly rang. Yu Juan glanced at it, though he didn’t answer when he saw that it was an unfamiliar number.

The default ringtone played again and again until he couldn’t ignore it any longer.

He resigned himself to answer– although there was no caller ID, he knew who the other party was.

“Yu Juan.”

They were obviously only half a corridor apart when Yu Juan heard Zhou Huiyue’s voice coming from the other side of the phone. Maybe it was because of the electromagnetic waves being re-converted into sound waves, but Zhou Huiyue’s voice was a bit distorted. It even sounded somewhat gentle.

Yu Juan hummed lightly.

He called out that person’s name, “Zhou Huiyue.”

Previously at the stairs, Zhou Huiyue hadn’t brought his phone but still asked for Yu Juan’s phone number.

It was a bit strange. Yu Juan was slow to react and just now realised– he had only told Zhou Huiyue his number once, but the other party had remembered it.

Why hadn’t Zhou Huiyue told him instead? It wasn’t like he hadn’t brought his phone.

This was what Yu Juan was thinking, so he was a bit absent-minded and didn’t hang up. Zhou Huiyue also didn’t, and the two people were heard breathing quietly.

For some reason, the more quiet Zhou Huiyue was, the more Yu Juan’s heart beat faster.

After a few minutes, Yu Juan heard Zhou Huiyue say, “The candy’s sweet.”

The matter he had tried so hard to forget was once again brought up by Zhou Huiyue.

This was really…

A second later, with his heart beating quickly, Yu Juan hung up.

As expected, the protagonist was his enemy.

Yu Juan bit his lips, looked at the new number on the screen, and clicked to save it.

The contact name should’ve stayed as it was, “enemy”– he had even already spelled it out, but his fingertips continued to hang in mid-air due to being hesitant and undecided.

Yu Juan tilted his head and looked at his own reflection on the window glass. The sky outside had already darkened. There was one more window screen that couldn’t be seen, but regardless of whether it could be seen or not, it was only there because Zhou Huiyue had repaired it.

A while later, Yu Juan sighed in resignation and re-wrote the characters.

“The Count of Bu Yu Mountain”

—was the protagonist of the novel where the main character came back for revenge.

The phone vibrated once when a message from “The Count of Bu Yu Mountain” came through.

“The medicine’s really bitter, could you return the candies to me?”

Yu Juan, “?”

It was him who bought the candies, how come he still had to return them to someone?

Yu Juan thought about changing the contact name.

**

After hanging up, Zhou Huiyue looked at the number on his phone. The latest call went on for 4 minutes and 30 seconds.

He didn’t understand what Yu Juan was thinking about, what he wanted to do, nor why he wanted to stay here. It was like having an uncertain variable in his plan.

It didn’t seem like it would cause too big a problem, but Zhou Huiyue was used to doing things perfectly.

With 22 years of losses, he didn’t want there to be another failure.

Even so, he still waited at the staircase to ask for Yu Juan’s phone number– something he already had.

There was suddenly a noise outside the door. It was a really light rattling sound, a sound that was quite similar to a cat bumping into something on its way.

Zhou Huiyue had heard it.

A moment later, he turned the wheelchair to go to the door.

There was nobody outside, but standing on its lonesome in the corridor was a glass bottle filled up with candies.

Zhou Huiyue picked it up, opened it, and once again ate one candy.

Really sour.

Zhou Huiyue couldn’t help but laugh.

Yu Juan might have really gotten tricked. The whole thing was sour.

Zhou Huiyue stared at the icing sugar that stained his fingertips, paused for a moment, then once again used a paper towel to clean himself. He then picked up the phone that had half its screen broken and saved the number to his contact list.

The contact name was “Eldest Young Lady”.

In fact, he hadn’t given it much thought– it just felt right.

In Zhou Huiyue’s past life, the amount of people he had gotten to meet was innumerable– yet there was not a single one who was like Yu Juan.

It was the arrogant, bad-tempered yet easily soft-hearted, green-eyed eldest young lady.