Chapter 125: Password (8)
125 – Password (8)
“If…” Lin Xun looked at Dong Jun. “If you were having a wonderful dream. Would you want to wake up, or would you want to keep dreaming?”
Dong Jun opened his eyes. His pupils were black, dark like a deep pool at the heart of a forest at night. The surface of his eyes reflected the car’s interior lights, like stars mirrored on water. Nighttime deep pools, lakes, and rivers possess a certain mysterious allure; the world is never short of news about exhausted night-shift drivers who, in a dazed and confused state, veer off course and plunge straight into the water.
He asked, “Why do you ask?”
Lin Xun: “Hmm… a personality test?”
Dong Jun seemed to genuinely think it over seriously.
A minute later, he replied, “I’d probably wait to wake up naturally.”
Lin Xun: “Why?”
Dong Jun: “Why ask why? Does it not match your expectations?”
“It doesn’t,” Lin Xun shook his head, thought for a moment, and said, “All dreams end eventually, so no matter how good they are, they’re meaningless. I’d want to wake up immediately and face reality.”
Dong Jun slowly curved the corners of his lips. When this man smiled, it was as gentle as a spring breeze. He spoke softly, “What if reality is terrible?”
Lin Xun: “Then it’s even more important to wake up, so there’s more time to deal with those terrible situations in reality.”
Dong Jun, who had been holding his wrist, let go and slowly moved his hand up along Lin Xun’s arm, finally coming to rest on his cheek. His touch was light, tracing the outline of his jaw. He gazed at him for a long time without speaking.
Only when Lin Xun blinked in confusion did he hear Dong Jun say, “What if reality is so bad that there’s no way to handle it at all?”
Lin Xun was stumped by his question.
After thinking for a long time, he said, “But no matter how bad it is, you still have to wake up sooner or later.”
“Mhm,” Dong Jun’s voice carried a slight nasal tone. “So while I continue dreaming, I’m also prepared to accept reality.”
“Although that’s very reasonable,” Lin Xun said, “it doesn’t quite seem like you.”
Dong Jun smiled again.
He asked, “Should I choose to wake up immediately?”
Lin Xun: “Mhm.”
Dong Jun brought Lin Xun’s hand to his lips and gently kissed it. “You have to allow for special circumstances, baby.”
Lin Xun bit his lip and thought for a long time before saying, “Alright then.”
He looked at Dong Jun and suddenly said, “…I really like you.”
“Thank you,” Dong Jun pulled him down to kiss his lips. “I like you too, baby.”
Lin Xun was so flustered by being called “baby” by his crush that his scalp tingled, and he was kissed until he was dizzy. By the time he regained his senses, three more buttons had been undone.
“I can’t take it,” he whimpered weakly against his crush’s chest. “I won’t be able to walk back.”
His crush’s reply was utterly emotionless: “You can.”
Lin Xun: “?”
It turned out this person was right. Aside from feeling mentally dazed, he didn’t have any major physical discomfort. Or, to put it another way, this person knew exactly how to make him expend the least amount of energy.
But in the end, he couldn’t take it anymore and pleaded softly, “Could you… be gentler? Tomorrow… I’m going back tomorrow.”
Dong Jun: “What if you don’t go back?”
Lin Xun was breathless, his words coming in fragments: “Tomorrow… if not tomorrow, then the day after, really.”
Dong Jun: “You want to go back the day after tomorrow?”
This person was impossible to communicate with, really.
He then stayed in the car for a long time, so long that he lost track of time. By the time everything was finally over, Wang Anquan had already been frantically messaging in the group chat, asking if he had been dragged away by monsters.
Lin Xun replied: Maybe.
Wang Anquan: Then how do we fish you out?
Lin Suanfa: No need, I fished myself out.
He really had fished himself out—he felt Dong Jun should be satisfied by now. As expected, nothing else went wrong afterward. He straightened his clothes again and opened the car door.
The next moment, the Goddess of the Luo River gave a reminder: It’s raining outside, please be careful when going out.
Dong Jun took an umbrella from the car and said, “I’ll walk you out.”
As soon as they left the underground garage, they heard the sound of pouring rain outside. The sky was gloomy and dark, with a heavy downpour. Dong Jun held a black umbrella over both of them. Because of the heavy rain, people around them were hurrying along, and no one paid them any attention.
Lin Xun found his own car based on memory—they had arrived early, so the car was parked in the above-ground area.
He knocked on the car window.
The window slid down, revealing Wang Anquan’s impatient face, clearly about to scold him for being late. He opened his mouth and started, “You…”
Before he could finish, he turned and saw Dong Jun, falling silent.
Lin Xun avoided a scolding and happily got into the car, saying goodbye to Dong Jun.
Dong Jun said to him, “See you tomorrow.”
Lin Xun acknowledged him, and the car slowly started, driving into the rain ahead. Lin Xun turned to look out the back window. Dong Jun’s figure, holding the umbrella, stood there, not moving until the car drove farther and farther away, disappearing into the gray rain and mist between heaven and earth.
Lin Xun sat back down, suddenly feeling down. He picked up his phone, opened the notes app, and added two lines after a series of dates and times.
6.11, Tuesday. Arrival: 10am, Departure: 4pm.
Jia Gou leaned over, holding his phone, and asked, “Suanfa, have you been to MO recently? I found something good.”
But Lin Xun was lost in endless mental calculations. Even though he heard what was said, his mind had no room to process it. He asked perfunctorily, “What?”
Jia Gou immediately seemed dissatisfied and glanced at his phone screen. “What are you doing?”
Lin Xun: “Calculating something. Pass me the tablet.”
Jia Gou handed him the tablet from the back. Lin Xun opened the stylus and began writing and drawing on it, filling up one page before switching to another and starting again.
Jia Gou still expressed his confusion: “Are you calculating time?”
“You wouldn’t know this,” Wang Anquan said lazily from the front. “Suanfa is a little weirdo. He records the times he meets and leaves Dong Jun every time. I don’t know what he’s doing either. People in relationships are just strange, always needing some sense of ritual.”
Jia Gou: “Really? I don’t think Suanfa does boring things like that.”
Wang Anquan shrugged.
Their conversation didn’t affect Lin Xun’s actions. His pen paused on the tablet screen for a long time before he spoke: “The first time I met Dong Jun… how long did we meet?”
Jia Gou said, “About an hour or so, and then you got two hundred thousand.”
Lin Xun started writing.
Saturday. Arrival: 8pm, Departure: 10pm.
“Wrong,” Jia Gou said. “That day, you arrived at Galaxy at 2pm and left at 4pm.”
Lin Xun didn’t speak for a long time. Only after two minutes did he say, “It’s not wrong.”
Jia Gou: “?”
Lin Xun leaned back in his chair, feeling a chill on his forehead—perhaps cold sweat had seeped out there. Suddenly, his whole body shuddered, his hands and feet turning icy.
Jia Gou frowned. “What’s wrong with you?”
Lin Xun shook his head. “Nothing… I…”
He couldn’t speak. When faced with a major upheaval, people sometimes lose their words.
A person who dreams, while lost in a beautiful dream, also prepares themselves to face and accept reality on the day they wake up. But what is reality truly like? Is it really something that can be accepted?
He didn’t know.
Truly didn’t know.
Jia Gou: “You’re not happy?”
“Who upset our Suanfa?” Wang Anquan raised his voice loudly. “Men can’t be relied on, really, Suanfa. Only we can be relied on.”
Lin Xun said coolly, “Have you changed your gender?”
“When I say ‘men,’ the subtext is ‘your man,’ not biologically male.” Wang Anquan tossed something over. “Here, a gift for you. See, even during a competition, I don’t forget to buy you presents.”
Lin Xun caught it. “Is this the number one most boring thing?”
Anquan had mentioned that although the automatic cat feeder was boring, it could only rank second in today’s preliminaries. There was something else that could rank first.
He opened the flat box and found inside—a collar.
Lin Xun: “?”
He asked, “How is this used? An automatic dog collar?”
Anquan: “Wear it around your neck.”
Lin Xun: “My neck?”
“What else?” Anquan said. “It’s for humans, not dogs. Put it on first, then give me your phone. I’ll activate it for you.”
Lin Xun took it out of the box. It was a collar about two fingers wide, very thin, entirely black with a silver buckle. The material was soft, smooth rubber, the kind most wearable electronic devices used.
He undid the first button of his shirt—these buttons had been overused today and now had to be used once more.
After putting it on, he took out his phone and checked his reflection on the darkened screen. The black collar and its lock-shaped silver buckle peeked faintly from the collar of his white shirt, giving off a very unintended vibe.
“What do you mean by this, Anquan?” he questioned.
Anquan seemed puzzled. “What do you mean, what do I mean?”
“Why does this thing feel so…” Lin Xun touched it, choosing his words carefully. “So… erotic?”
Wang Anquan turned around. “What nonsense are you talking?”
He held up Lin Xun’s phone, showing him the interface clearly. “Sleep assistant! Sleep! You, you…”
He seemed so infuriated by Lin Xun that he was about to pass out.
Zhao Jiagou patted his shoulder. “Don’t be angry. The kid has grown up.”
“No. Is this association of his normal?” Wang Anquan fumed. “Lin Suanfa, what have you been doing lately? You weren’t like this before.”
“Sorry,” Lin Xun immediately knelt and apologized. “Sorry, bro. I’ll say sorry to you a hundred thousand times. Sorry.”
He really hadn’t meant to misinterpret it, nor had he actively browsed any inappropriate content. It was just that Dong Jun had once used a tie of the same color to tighten around his neck… that’s all.
He straightened his expression. “So, what does this sleep assistant do?”
Wang Anquan said grumpily, “Monitors sleep conditions.”
Lin Xun: “That’s it?”
“The main function is incredibly dull,” Wang Anquan said. “You know people dream, right?”
Lin Xun: “I know.”
Wang Anquan: “When you’re dreaming, you don’t know you’re dreaming, or your consciousness is very hazy. But the function of this collar is to wake you up within the dream.”
Lin Xun repeated: “Wake up within the dream?”
“Exactly, that kind of thing—you’re still in the dream, but you know you’re dreaming, and you might even be able to control your dream—because the content of the dream is determined by your brain anyway. Once you can control the dream, you can turn nightmares into pleasant dreams, actively dream about your crush, or explore your dreams and such.” As he spoke, Wang Anquan pressed an option. Instantly, some indescribable electric current or other kind of fluctuation shot rapidly along Lin Xun’s nerves all the way to the top of his head, as if cold water had been swiftly injected into his veins, making him shudder.
Lin Xun: “Wow.”
Wang Anquan said, “That’s the feeling. When the collar detects you’re in a stable dream state, it releases this signal to alert you. After that, it’s up to your own luck.”
With that, he shrugged. “See, they’re absolute geniuses when it comes to developing pointless functions like this.”
Lin Xun suddenly stared motionlessly at Wang Anquan.
Wang Anquan raised an eyebrow.
“Dad,” Lin Xun said, “from today on, you are my real father.”