Chapter 1

༺ 𓆩  Chapter 1  𓆪 ༻ 

「Translator — Creator」

᠃ ⚘᠂ ⚘ ˚ ⚘ ᠂ ⚘ ᠃

“We… should break up.”

The season’s first snow had finally begun to fall. It arrived a little late, yet somehow, it felt just right—like the world itself had been waiting for this moment.

The girl standing before him shivered slightly. She was wrapped snugly in a thick plaid scarf, and it was a shame — because if she hadn’t been, he might’ve caught a glimpse of her slender neck, pale and delicate like freshly fallen snow.

She kept her eyes downcast, her expression unreadable. Instead of answering Su Yu, she lifted her hand and caught a few fragile snowflakes as they floated down with the wind. They melted the instant they landed in her palm.

“…Okay. I understand.”

Su Yu parted his lips, wanting to say something more. But the words stuck in his throat, refusing to come out. After a long struggle, all that escaped was a vague and ambiguous sentence: “Let’s just… calm down.”

The girl lifted her head. Her watery eyes shimmered like ripples in a misty lake — glistening, with just the faintest touch of red. She blinked. Still adorable, just as always.

“…Okay. I understand.”

That again…

Su Yu’s fist clenched, hidden within the sleeve of his coat. They had been together for a long time. She had always been obedient—always answered him with those same words.

He used to find comfort in her compliance. But over time, that simple phrase had become a curse, a binding spell that coiled tighter and tighter around him. No matter how hard he struggled, he couldn’t break free.

..

.

.

And just like that, they broke up—on the day winter’s first snow finally arrived.

What was the reason?

Su Yu couldn’t really say.

Maybe it was the mounting weight of life.

Maybe they had simply grown apart.

Or maybe… he had changed.

She had always been an exceptional girl.

So exceptional that it took Su Yu four long years to win her heart.

His one-sided love began in their first year of high school and finally blossomed by the end of their freshman year in college.

She was never short of admirers. That face of hers—so breathtaking that Su Yu found it stunning no matter how many times he saw it—drew in too many suitors to count.

In comparison, he was nothing. Insignificant.

A simp, one might say in today’s term. That’s what Su Yu would have been called.

Luckily, back when he was courting her, the term hadn’t been coined yet. He could still deceive himself, call it "devotion"—pure, unwavering love.

It was as if he were on a battlefield of endless yellow sands, charging forward with a million others, trampling over mountains of corpses, fighting desperately for victory.

And by some miracle, he had been the last one standing. He was the lone soldier who made it onto the city tower, seizing the banner of triumph.

They were together for five years—from their sophomore year in college until the second year after they began working.

She was brilliant. Always standing in the light.

He stood behind her, watching.

At first, he had felt pride.

Eventually, that pride turned to shame.

To stay close to her, Su Yu pushed himself harder than he ever had in his life. He had never done anything worth boasting about—until he got into the same university as her. That feat alone became known among their high school peers as the Eighth Wonder of the World.

But for some people, no matter how much they fight, their destination remains fixed.

Su Yu thought being in the same university would close the distance between them.

He was wrong.

She never stopped moving forward. And he… had long since stopped.

He leaned on the reputation of a decent university, landed a decent job after graduation, earned a decent salary, and gave her a decent life.

She often worked late into the night. So it was usually him who cooked.

She came home to sit beside him, eating takeout or his barely-edible homemade dishes. She never once complained.

But Su Yu would rather she had complained.

They weren’t parallel lines.

They had crossed.

And now, they were drifting further and further apart.

The cafeteria meals at her company were more luxurious than the restaurants he took her to.

The polite gifts her clients gave her were more lavish than the holiday presents he racked his brain over.

She lived in a world Su Yu didn’t understand. They had less and less to talk about.

All these little things… they piled up in the corners of their life.

One by one.

More and more.

Until Su Yu couldn’t ignore them anymore.

Because if he kept ignoring them, they would soon rise above his ankles and drown him.

That was what her close friend once told him.

Back then, Su Yu hated her. Arrogant and proud, he had never believed he was unworthy.

He had created a miracle—hadn’t he?

What else couldn’t he do?

But in the end, he came to hate that friend for a different reason—

For not shouting those words at him sooner.

If only she had woken him up back then, he wouldn’t have chased the girl.

He could’ve stayed in his dark little corner, rotting in obscurity. At least then, she wouldn’t have had to see just how pitiful he truly was.

Su Yu loved that quote.

He had always believed it with all his heart.

That girl—the one meant to walk beside you from youth to old age— 

Why shouldn’t she have the best you could give?

But alas, this was where their story ended; they would not grow old together.

Su Yu was a worldly man—ordinary, really—and like most people, he could not escape the grief of parting; the girl left with a suitcase in tow, walking out of the small rental apartment where they had lived together for two years.

Only Su Yu remained.

Not because he wanted to stay.

But because there were still two weeks left on the lease—and leaving now meant forfeiting a sizable deposit. He sat in that familiar little room, surrounded by pieces of their shared life. And the memories came flooding back, uninvited, unstoppable.

The more he remembered, the more pathetic he felt.

She could have moved into a high-end apartment ages ago, walked through shining lobbies and under crystal chandeliers. But she had chosen to stay with him — chosen this dingy little flat where sunlight barely made it past the windows, even at noon.

He had been the one to hold her back.

For two whole years, he had trapped her here.

Something tore open inside him—just a sliver, a paper-cut of the soul. But every breath stung like fire, the wound stretching wider, deeper, until the pain made Su Yu want to shatter his own teeth.

In the end, he couldn’t bear it any longer.

He packed a bag and fled that apartment like a stray dog, tail tucked between his legs.

He found a smaller place, moved in, and surrounded himself with unfamiliar walls.

And somehow… it felt like salvation.

Later, Su Yu realized—time didn’t heal the wounds that truly haunted you.

But the growing pile of empty beer cans on the balcony could.

His life settled into a kind of peace.

A dull, motionless calm—so still that even if you dropped a boulder into its depths, not a single ripple would rise.

Su Yu thought maybe… maybe he could live like this for the rest of his life.

It wasn’t so bad.

At least the wound in his heart had stopped growing.

But fate, it seemed, wasn’t done with him.

A sudden invitation to a class reunion landed on his phone. The venue was local, the time was this weekend.

Su Yu had no reason to refuse.

Well—perhaps he did.

But it had been so long since he’d seen her.

Humans are creatures of weakness.

And Su Yu, in that moment, found himself craving news of her.

Had she moved into one of those upscale apartments?

Was she dining at outrageously expensive restaurants?

Had she found someone… someone who was actually worthy of her?

So, he went.

The reunion was held in the evening.

Su Yu arrived a little early, but she was fashionably late.

Their old classmates, none the wiser about their past relationship, cheered and made them sit together.

All they knew was that the two of them had attended the same university — and that Su Yu had nursed a hopeless crush on her all through high school.

Perhaps it was the long time apart, but to Su Yu, she looked especially beautiful that night.

More beautiful than any version of her he had ever held in memory.

Reunions always followed the same script.

The idea of “reconnecting” was just a polite disguise.

Those who organized these things were the ones with glittering careers, bold voices, stories they were dying to share.

When it was Su Yu’s turn, he just smiled faintly and said,

“I don’t have much to talk about.”

Then he tipped back a full glass of liquor.

The rim of the glass helped hide the bitter curve of his lips.

There was no need to elaborate. The silence said enough.

The girl didn’t say much either. She had always been reserved.

She and Su Yu sat like strangers at the table, caught outside the sphere of conversation.

She stared at her phone.

He drank, and kept drinking.

Glasses clinked and refilled. Somewhere along the way, someone dimmed the lights in the private room.

The mood shifted—blurred, softened, tinged with a haze of ambiguity.

Reconnecting.

Or perhaps… revisiting the words left unsaid.

The feelings that had once slipped away, unnoticed, between the spaces of time.

No matter how much or how little people spoke, everyone seemed to carry a secret tucked away inside them. And as the alcohol took hold, the filters came down.

“Hey, Su Yu — you got anyone special these days?”

No one knew exactly when the topic turned to relationships, but eventually, it landed on Su Yu.

“I…”

He hesitated, turned slightly, and glanced at the girl sitting beside him. As fate would have it, their eyes met—only for a moment, then quickly turned away.

“Yeah,” Su Yu said with a soft smile, the kind that made him look like a man in love. “I’ve been seeing someone. We’re getting married soon…”

Clang—!!!

The glass in the girl’s hand slipped and shattered on the ground, sending shards of glass scattering across the floor; the sharp edges caught the light, glinting cold and cruel.

He instinctively bent down to pick them up—only to brush against her hand. He froze.

Her skin was ice.

“I’ll take care of it…” he said with a strained smile, carefully gathering the broken pieces one by one.

Just a minor interlude, nothing more. The others quickly shifted their attention back to the girl, asking her the same question. Su Yu’s hands slowed. He focused, listening — because he too wanted to know her answer.

But she simply shook her head. Said nothing at all.

Some sighed in sympathy, others rejoiced in silence.

The goddess of their high school years still hadn’t found a boyfriend.

From then on, the girl was coaxed into drinking more often.

A class reunion—it was always less about nostalgia and more about hidden motives.

When it ended, he paid his share and left early.

He walked alone through the biting winter wind, head tilted upward. His eyes stung from the dry, frigid air.

She seemed to be doing well.

Just… still single.

What a shame.

He didn’t know why he’d lied back there.

Maybe he’d had too much to drink. Maybe it was pride.

Maybe he just didn’t want to leave himself any escape route.

No second chances.

He and the girl… there was no “again” for them.

If he could live this life over again—he would rather never have met her.

It was late; the streets were empty save for a few scattered figures, lonely silhouettes meandering through the night. Each one seemed lost, their backs weighed down by silence.

Someone walked toward him from the opposite direction.

A hoodie pulled low over the face, with only a few strands of long hair fluttering in the cold wind.

It felt… familiar.

As they brushed past each other, that feeling only grew stronger.

Too familiar.

Too much like her.

He wanted to turn around—wanted to look. But before he could speak, a sharp pain tore through his chest.

It was familiar too.

The pain of that old, forgotten wound tearing open once more.

The numbness surged through his nervous system, rushing to his brain like a silent scream. His muscles spasmed violently, losing control in an instant.

His strength drained away.

He collapsed backward, crashing to the ground.

As he fell, he saw her face beneath the hood.

That face—unforgettably beautiful. A face he could never erase, no matter how many lifetimes passed.

“Why?”

Her voice trembled as she stared down at him.

“Didn’t you say… we just needed some time apart? So why are you getting married now, Xiao Yu?”

The wind whipped her hood back, revealing a face twisted with obsession and grief. Her expression—deranged, broken, radiant in its madness—was soaked with tears, warm droplets splashing onto Su Yu’s face in a desperate attempt to pass him her fading warmth.

Her grip tightened; the stun baton she held drove straight into his chest—again, and again.

The sound of the current crackling through his muscle fibers hummed like a whisper in his ear.

“Liar!”

“Kh…”

Su Yu opened his mouth, trying to speak.

But his entire body was numb; his vocal cords, paralyzed, couldn’t even form a single syllable.

He looked at her beautiful face and forced out a miserable smile.

In her dark, clear eyes, he saw hatred. Bitterness. A desperate, unrelenting unwillingness to let go.

His hand reached out, trembling, wanting to touch her cheek.

But his strength was leaving him too fast.

Just inches away—so close he could almost feel her warmth—his arm dropped.

His vision began to blur.

The sensation of death crawled over him.

“…I’m sorry, Qiange…”

He didn’t want this ending.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to end.

But his hand hit the pavement with a dull thud.

“It’s okay,” she whispered.

“We’re not finished yet.”

Her lips pressed gently against his ear.

The softness of her voice carried a chilling finality.

END of CHAPTER