The car on the return trip was like a moving coffin, silence pressing heavily into every inch of the air.
The neon lights outside the window were blurred by rain into vague patches of color, rapidly retreating and reflecting in Zong Yi's calm, emotionless eyes.
She held the steering wheel, her knuckles slightly pale from the force, her gaze fixed straight ahead on the road that the windshield wipers kept scraping yet still remained muddy and indistinct.
In the back seat, Yan Hanxie leaned against the side window with her eyes closed, as if asleep.
The passing lights outside cast flickering shadows across her pale face.
She had already changed into the clean clothes sent by the assistant—a soft cream-colored cashmere cardigan replacing that stiff and restrictive dark blue suit. Her long hair fell loose, softening some of her overly sharp contours.
On her left wrist, the string of sandalwood prayer beads rested quietly against her skin in the dim light, occasionally swaying very slightly with the car's gentle bumps.
She looked much calmer, at least on the surface. The medicine seemed to have completely stabilized the sudden collapse, leaving only the deep exhaustion after overexertion on her face, like a wasteland ravaged by a storm.
Since leaving that dark equipment room filled with clutter, the two of them had not exchanged a single word.
Zong Yi silently carried out her duties as a driver and subordinate, while Yan Hanxie silently accepted that deliberate, cold distance.
Only the low hum of the air conditioner, the sound of tires rolling over the wet road, and their deliberately suppressed yet clearly audible breathing remained in the air.
The car drove into the underground parking garage of Yan Hanxie's apartment and stopped.
"We've arrived, President Yan." Zong Yi's voice was steady and emotionless, breaking the deathly silence of the journey.
Yan Hanxie slowly opened her eyes, her gaze somewhat vacant as she adjusted to the garage's pale white lighting.
She did not move immediately. Her eyes fell on the familiar, cold concrete pillars and parking lines outside the car window.
"Today…" she spoke, her voice still carrying the hoarseness that had not fully faded, her speech slow, as if weighing every word. "Thank you."
Those two words again.
From the indistinct murmur in the equipment room, to this moment's clear yet distant expression of thanks.
Zong Yi did not respond. She simply unfastened her seatbelt, preparing to get out of the car.
"And also," Yan Hanxie's voice sounded again, stopping her movement, "I'm sorry."
Zong Yi's motion paused, her fingers stopping on the metal buckle of the seatbelt.
She did not turn back. From the rearview mirror inside the car, she could see the silhouette of Yan Hanxie's side profile—still pale, expressionless.
"For letting you see… what you shouldn't have seen," Yan Hanxie added. Her tone was flat, like she was stating a fact unrelated to herself. "And for causing you trouble."
The apology, like the thanks, was cut cleanly and neatly—polite, proper, and drawing a clear boundary.
Zong Yi's fingertips curled unconsciously, the cold touch of the metal buckle spreading across her skin.
She said nothing. She silently pushed open the car door, stepped out, walked around to the other side, and opened the rear door.
Yan Hanxie held onto the door frame and slowly got out of the car.
The soft texture of the cashmere cardigan made her look thinner than usual, and less aggressive.
She stood still. She did not immediately walk toward the elevator. Instead, she turned around and faced Zong Yi.
The garage's motion sensor light, which had gone out due to the long stillness, lit up again, the pale light covering the two of them.
"About the medicine," Yan Hanxie looked at her. Her gaze had returned to its usual calmness, though deep inside there was still lingering exhaustion. "And about what happened today—I don't want a third person to know."
Her voice was not loud, but it carried an unquestionable meaning. "For the company, for you, and for me, it won't do any good."
A completely businesslike tone.
Using "the company" and "pros and cons" as the reason, blocking off any possibility of personal inquiry or concern.
Zong Yi met her gaze. After a few seconds, she gave a slight nod. "Understood."
Concise. Distant.
Like the most standard response of a subordinate to a superior's instruction.
Yan Hanxie seemed as if she wanted to say something more. Her lips moved slightly, but in the end she only nodded.
"Be careful on the way back."
After saying that, she turned and walked toward the elevator.
Her steps were slower than usual, carrying the light, floating weakness of someone recovering from a serious illness. Yet her back remained straight, the soft cashmere cardigan still outlining a trace of lonely sharpness.
Zong Yi stood where she was, watching her press the elevator button, watching the elevator doors open, watching her walk in and turn around to face outside.
The two of them, separated by a short distance, had their gazes meet briefly—one last time—through the narrowing gap as the elevator doors slowly closed.
Yan Hanxie's eyes were very calm, deep like a cold pool, reflecting the icy light of the elevator's ceiling lamp, and also reflecting Zong Yi's own expressionless face.
Then the doors closed completely, the metal surface reflecting Zong Yi's solitary figure.
The sensor light went out again.
Darkness gently swallowed everything.
Zong Yi stood there for a few more seconds before turning back and returning to the car.
She did not start the engine immediately. She simply sat in the driver's seat, listening to the faint dripping sound of pipes deep within the garage.
Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
In her mind, the scene in the equipment room replayed uncontrollably: the pale face, the unfocused eyes, the trembling hands, the scattered prayer beads, the burning yet weak breathing, the weight leaning against her shoulder, the sensation of cold fingertips brushing across her wrist… and that low, hoarse sentence—
"You saw it."
And now, those words that had been cut so cleanly—"thank you" and "sorry."
She raised her hand and looked at the inside of her wrist.
It was clean. There was nothing there.
No marks from the prayer beads tightening. No cold trace from fingertips.
Only the steady pulse beating beneath her skin.
But why did it feel as if something invisible had burned beneath that patch of skin, leaving behind an empty, faintly stinging warmth?
She suddenly started the car. The roar of the engine tore through the dead silence of the garage.
The headlights lit up, piercing the darkness. She almost roughly spun the steering wheel, pulling out of the parking spot and rushing toward the exit.
The rain had long since stopped. The streets were wet, reflecting the city lights in strange, shifting colors.
Zong Yi drove faster than usual. The scenery outside the window rushed backward, blurring into flowing bands of color.
Cold wind poured in through the half-open window, blowing against her face with the sharp chill unique to the aftermath of rain.
She needed this wind.
She needed this speed.
She needed to throw all those chaotic, forbidden images and feelings far behind her.
The car drove into the residential complex where she lived and came to a stop.
She went upstairs, opened the door, and walked into the same cold, tidy apartment devoid of human warmth.
She did not turn on the main lights. Only the small sensor light in the entrance glowed faintly.
She kicked off her shoes, walked barefoot across the floor, and went straight to the huge floor-to-ceiling window in the living room.
Outside, the city's nightscape was still dazzling, lights forming a silent sea of burning brightness.
In the distance, the high-end residential area where Yan Hanxie's apartment was located stood in the upper right of her view. The few lit windows looked like cold diamonds embedded in the night.
She did not know which window belonged to Yan Hanxie.
Perhaps she was already asleep. Perhaps she was still working. Perhaps… she was once again alone, fighting that unknown "old problem."
Zong Yi leaned her back against the cold glass window and slowly slid down to sit on the floor.
She wrapped her arms around her knees and buried her face in them.
Darkness and silence wrapped around her from all directions.
In her mind, the string of dusty sandalwood prayer beads, and Yan Hanxie's final straight yet unsteady figure walking toward the elevator, repeatedly flashed and overlapped.
Then came even earlier fragments.
In the meeting room, the slight loss of composure when the beads on Yan Hanxie's wrist swayed.
Inside the car during the rainstorm, that sentence as light as a sigh—"regret."
Under the sunset in the corridor, the brush of clothing as she passed by sideways, the hesitation to speak.
And the countless late nights or early mornings when the heavy, lingering phantom sensation on her wrist refused to disappear.
All of it was like shattered mirror fragments—sharp, chaotic, impossible to piece together—yet every piece reflected something she did not want to examine closely, but could not ignore.
She had thought she could always build high walls with reason and distance, keeping those crossing, dangerous things outside.
She had thought Yan Hanxie's "regret" and distance would be the best full stop to this absurd entanglement.
But when that seemingly solid wall was suddenly pierced by an unexpected collapse—the most vulnerable, primal fragility of life itself—she realized that behind the wall was not the empty ground she had imagined, a place where she could easily turn and leave.
It was a deeper, more uncontrollable swamp.
And what made her feel an almost panicked sense of helplessness was this—
When Yan Hanxie spoke in the most businesslike tone about "thank you" and "sorry," using "the company" and "pros and cons" to redraw the boundaries, what surged up from the bottom of her heart was not relief.
Instead, it was something sharper, colder…
A stab of pain.
As if something had just been clumsily, awkwardly touched—something she had not even had time to recognize yet—and then it was pushed farther away, more decisively than before.
Zong Yi buried her face deeper into the crook of her arms.
Outside the window, the city lights flickered tirelessly, like countless silent eyes overlooking this forest of steel and concrete, watching every lonely soul that had nowhere to place itself.
—
T/N: Apologies for not posting yesterday; I was very tired, fell asleep unintentionally, and forgot to post the chapter.
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