Chapter 10: Sincere Lies
He was so serious that Fu Rangyi found him somewhat foolish, completely unaware of how private that location was.
This person truly had no sense of boundaries and no guard up.
Did he share the special marks on his body like this with those friends who sent him postcards too?
Then what specialness was there to speak of?
Special.
Fu Rangyi suddenly realized something very serious—this brain of his, which had already been repeatedly self-disciplined countless times, had once again begun producing these dangerous words.
He sternly ordered himself to stop, trying to strip away these concepts: unique, special, possession, belonging… These thoughts would only bring him unnecessary trouble.
After Zhu Zhixi finished speaking, he sat back down and said casually, “This kind of thing is still pretty private. It feels like something only real couples and real spouses would know.”
“Is that so?” Fu Rangyi’s tone was much colder than before.
“Yeah.” Zhu Zhixi answered very naturally. “The one on my body happens to be covered if I wear jeans. Under normal circumstances, you can’t see it.”
Fu Rangyi merely looked at him, very quietly.
“What about you?” He suddenly threw the topic back. Before getting an answer, he raised the end of his brow and answered first with a smile, “I know you have a mole on the web between the thumb and index finger of your right hand. And here too.”
He touched the back of his neck. “Where your gland is.”
Fu Rangyi’s expression became even stranger.
“How do you know?”
“Unlike some people, my eyes work very well.” Zhu Zhixi was still smug. “But anyone can see those. Do you have any that can’t usually be seen?”
“You don’t need to know.” Fu Rangyi lowered his eyes, his fingers lightly tapping the tabletop. “No one will test you on this kind of thing. Even if someone does, you can refuse to answer. That’s an offense against you.”
Fine.
Zhu Zhixi knew he was a difficult clam spirit to pry open, with boundaries so strong they were practically Great Wall level. Being able to ask this much was already pretty good.
He looked at the fully filled-out questionnaire, deeply satisfied and brimming with confidence. “All right, I think that’s about enough. Didn’t you say we’re going to your house for dinner in a few days? This time, there definitely won’t be any problems.”
Fu Rangyi thought he was a little too naive.
It was almost impossible to lie without being discovered.
“Is doing all this useful?”
“How is it not useful?” Zhu Zhixi put down the pen, lay on the table, turned his face sideways, and looked at him very seriously. “Understanding each other is very difficult.”
“Understanding is not love,” Fu Rangyi said.
“You’re right.” Zhu Zhixi admitted this, while sitting up straight and continuing to explain.
“But sometimes, couples who are truly together don’t understand each other either. It’s just that they’re affected by pheromones, developing mating desire and reproductive desire, and mistakenly thinking that’s love.”
“Do they actually love each other? If it were real, there wouldn’t be so many tragedies in this world. That’s not love at all. Truly loving each other isn’t like that.”
Fu Rangyi lifted his eyes and stared at him, his gaze solemn and serious. He did not completely agree, but he respected Zhu Zhixi’s expression and did not interrupt at all.
Only after quietly listening to him finish did he speak in a low voice.
“So, what is your view? In your eyes, what is loving each other?”
“The first step of love is understanding each other.” Zhu Zhixi’s tone was certain. “Without this step, it’s just passion. Sooner or later, they’ll separate.”
Fu Rangyi did not comment on this, even though in his view, love was a self-deceptive illusion.
Love based on understanding was the same.
But without showing it, he guided the direction of the topic. “You say that as if you’re an expert in this area, very experienced.”
Zhu Zhixi paused for a second or two. For the first time, he did not fire back. His expression was even unexpectedly sincere.
“If you mean dating, I’ve never done that. I admit this is just armchair theory.”
“But I love my family, my friends, and every stranger I’ve ever met who helped me. I know very clearly what that feeling is. So I know that the deeper the understanding, the deeper the emotional connection between people.”
Fu Rangyi was silent for a few seconds.
He had to admit that, for a certain moment, he truly had been moved by this overly sincere speech.
But very quickly, he came back to himself and became rational and steady again.
“From what I’ve heard, I think you’ve exaggerated the role of love and mutual understanding. I’m not saying this view is wrong, only that it’s a little emotional. But try pulling the perspective farther away, magnifying it to a more macro level. At that point, you’ll discover that, let alone love, happiness, desire, pain… all of it can be ignored, because human existence itself is extremely insignificant.”
This view was too negative.
Zhu Zhixi wanted to refute him, but Fu Rangyi continued the discussion.
“If, as you said, every pair of lovers made a list like this and understood each other, would that prevent tragedy? Not necessarily, right?”
Fu Rangyi put his glasses back on. The lenses refracted blue light, concealing his pale irises and creating an illusion that he was impossible to read.
“There is a portion of people in this world where, even if you spend a great deal of time communicating deeply with them, in the end you’ll discover that what resonates with you is not that person’s essence, but their false packaging. Then you’ll be disappointed. You’ll be hurt. Your active exploration and active exposure will instead create an even greater tragedy.”
He was no longer sharply confronting Zhu Zhixi with sarcasm. Instead, he steadily output the opposing view, his tone gentle, restrained, and even full of patience.
Yet this made Zhu Zhixi pause in a daze for a moment.
That light sheet of paper was held between Fu Rangyi’s fingers.
He looked at Zhu Zhixi, also for the first time like an elder telling him something. “When another person fully understands you, it also means they know how to hurt you.”
After listening, Zhu Zhixi did not immediately refute him. Instead, he looked into his eyes.
For a certain moment, he had the hazy feeling that he was about to touch the real Fu Rangyi. It was an intuition. He had touched something that looked like it would shatter with the slightest contact.
But very quickly, it disappeared.
Fu Rangyi had not only rapidly put on his protective shell, but even become the version of himself he showed outsiders—restrained, mature, even carrying a kind of gentle authority.
But not only did this fail to make Zhu Zhixi retreat, it instead made him braver the more frustrated he became.
“Teacher Fu, when you regard something as a weapon, only then does it become a weapon.”
He looked at Fu Rangyi, his gaze brave and frank.
“How this world treats you also depends on how you view this world. So I’m not afraid. No matter who it is, as long as they want to understand me and want to be friends with me, I’ll honestly open myself up and give them my sincerest answer. As long as they want to.”
His eyelids were so pale they seemed almost translucent, as if the veins beneath could be touched, yet his pitch-black pupils were bright enough to press upon others.
Fu Rangyi’s gaze was dark and heavy.
Between them, there appeared a brief, evenly matched stalemate.
Until Fu Rangyi suddenly found the contradiction and chose to break it.
“Is that so?”
“Of course.” Zhu Zhixi did not hesitate at all.
“Then that’s very strange. Before, I suspected that perhaps your family had forced you to go on blind dates, get married, and settle down. But I saw with my own eyes that they love you very much and don’t seem like people who would do such things. And you don’t actually need a marriage that badly either.”
He stood up, but his hand moved downward, his fingertip hooking the necklace around Zhu Zhixi’s neck. Lowering his eyes, he stared at the star-ring pendant trembling at his fingertip.
“So, for someone as sincere as you, why did you enter a fake marriage with me?”
Zhu Zhixi froze.
Belatedly, he realized that in that conversation just now, he had unknowingly been pulled into a trap of attack and counterattack. From the person asking questions, he had become the one being interrogated. Step by step, they had bitten into each other until, in the end, Fu Rangyi delivered the final blow and asked the question he truly wanted to ask.
Over the past many days, Zhu Zhixi had hesitated before over whether to tell him. Although the essence of their marriage was mutual exploitation, making his cooperation partner remain completely in the dark also left him feeling uneasy.
But even if he said it, no one would believe him, right? At the very beginning, he had already asked almost everyone around him.
Zhu Zhixi clenched his left hand.
The living room suddenly quieted. Warm-toned light filled the entire space, and the flowing air seemed to become thick maple syrup, wrapping around them.
Fu Rangyi sat there at ease, his right elbow propped on the edge of the wooden table, his palm supporting his chin.
A gaze almost like examination came through the glass lenses, landing directly on Zhu Zhixi’s face.
Perhaps because he was a few years older, or perhaps because of his profession, although he remained silent and did not press him, he still carried a faint sense of pressure.
This gaze was not unfamiliar to Zhu Zhixi. It was Fu Rangyi’s usual state when working at home.
Half a minute later, just when Fu Rangyi was already planning to give up asking for an answer and mock Zhu Zhixi for his selective sincerity, Zhu Zhixi suddenly moved.
He stretched out his left hand toward Fu Rangyi and opened his palm.
[48 days, 17 hours, 12 minutes, 13 seconds]
What was this for?
Fu Rangyi glanced at his empty palm. For one second, he even suspected that Zhu Zhixi wanted him to put his hand on it.
“Actually, I don’t want to hide it from you, but you probably won’t believe me if I say it.”
His tone became even more serious than before.
“On the morning of the second day after I returned to the country, a few days before my blind date with you, a countdown suddenly appeared on my hand. And I discovered that the time shown on it represents how long I can still live!”
In order to make himself more credible, Zhu Zhixi described the whole process in detail, leaving nothing out. He even used his finger to trace the exact appearance of the countdown on his palm.
Of course, this also included Fu Rangyi’s important role in this absurd story.
“I discovered that only you can save me! As long as I get close to you, the countdown slows down, and even pauses. I couldn’t just watch myself die like this, so when you proposed marriage, I was thinking that this might be my only way to save myself. First, extend my life, then think of another way to completely solve this stupid countdown. That’s my purpose. I swear.”
He raised four fingers side by side beside his ear and looked at Fu Rangyi sincerely.
Fu Rangyi frowned and stayed silent for a few seconds, as if trying hard to digest this ridiculous matter.
After a while, he began raising some questions, such as “What was the countdown at first?” and “Roughly how many seconds does it pause for?” and so on.
Zhu Zhixi honestly answered every one of his doubts. Then, once again, the two of them fell into silence.
After a long while, Zhu Zhixi looked at him with an extremely sincere gaze and emphasized, “Everything I said is true.”
After saying this, he used his right hand to thump the palm of his left hand, both wronged and angry, and began muttering.
“Damn countdown. Why am I the only one who can see it? Since there’s already someone who can pause it, why can’t he see it too? Now no matter what I say, I can’t explain it clearly…”
“Let me see your hand again.” Fu Rangyi reached out toward him.
Zhu Zhixi froze. The movement of his hands also stopped. Subconsciously, he obediently handed his hand over.
Fu Rangyi did not directly hold it. His left hand supported his chin, and he tilted his head slightly, examining it with the same seriousness as if he were looking at a modeled excavation grid of a historical site.
“The countdown you mentioned, roughly where is it?” His tone was very light, and his index finger gently touched Zhu Zhixi’s palm. “Here?”
So itchy.
Zhu Zhixi suddenly felt a little unused to it. Very quickly, a thin layer of sweat appeared on his palm.
“More or less,” he hummed like a mosquito.
“Horizontal?”
His fingertip lightly slid from left to right. It felt as if a feather had brushed across his palm.
“Mm.” Zhu Zhixi felt very uncomfortable and somewhat abruptly withdrew his hand, lowering it and quietly clenching it. He even forgot to glance at the countdown.
Did he kind of believe it? He was asking in such detail…
This was actually something worth being happy about. At least so far, there was finally someone willing to seriously listen to him talk about this strange and bizarre matter. Even if Fu Rangyi could not see it, he was still looking seriously.
But.
“I have a friend from medical school,” Fu Rangyi suddenly said, breaking the brief silence.
Zhu Zhixi suddenly lifted his head.
Was this… believing him?
“Ah, actually, on the day this thing appeared, I went to the hospital…”
Fu Rangyi did not let him finish. “He studies cranial nerves. Recently, he happens to be recruiting special test subjects. I think you fit the requirements very well.”
Zhu Zhixi’s face immediately fell.
He had actually placed expectations on this sharp-tongued ghost…
“If you want to call me mentally ill, you don’t have to be so roundabout. When I say it’s true, it’s true.”
“I believe you,” Fu Rangyi said, glancing at his palm, his tone very flat. “You say you can see it, while no one else can. If it isn’t an optic nerve problem, then it’s a cranial nerve problem. Isn’t that a reasonable attribution?”
Zhu Zhixi was furious. He picked up his phone and stood up, wanting to leave. His tone was fierce when he threw out his harsh words, but his voice suddenly became extremely small.
“I’m too lazy to talk to you. Anyway, the fact is that I’m about to die, and I fake-married you to extend my life. Believe it or not.”
Fu Rangyi raised his brow. “Why did your voice suddenly get so quiet?”
“Because it’s already ten o’clock! Roommate rules!” Zhu Zhixi pointed at the clock in the living room and lowered his voice to snap at him.
Fu Rangyi froze and almost laughed.
Looking at how lively and energetic he was, Fu Rangyi felt from the bottom of his heart that the word “death” had absolutely nothing to do with Zhu Zhixi.
But his expression was so serious that it seemed almost real. Should he say that Zhu Zhixi truly deserved to have studied directing? He had such a strong sense of conviction.
Fu Rangyi turned the cup in his hand, a thin smile on his face.
“Extending your life… Your reason for marrying me really sounds like a joke.”
Zhu Zhixi had already walked away, but then he remembered something halfway and turned back. He took the questionnaire on the table that had hearts drawn on it and said in passing, “I also hope it’s a joke. Otherwise, before long, you’ll become a widower.”
Fu Rangyi also lowered his voice to an extremely small volume. “Thank you for your blessing.”
“You’re welcome. Just said it in passing!”
He slammed the door shut.
Fu Rangyi was still sitting beside the dining table, staring at the handwriting on the paper. Belatedly, he found it ridiculous, so he laughed once.
After laughing, he came back to himself and stared at the metal bracelet on his wrist, like shackles.
That night, the bracelet recorded his hormone levels and heart rate. Everything changed again and again, fluctuating frequently, very unhealthy. Fortunately, in the end, he had still seen through Zhu Zhixi’s true nature. His pheromones stabilized and returned to normal.
For the moment, he had not figured out why Zhu Zhixi wanted to lie, and even less why he would tell such a bizarre lie.
After spending these days together, he knew Zhu Zhixi was not stupid. On the contrary, he only had an innocent face. In reality, he was full of wicked tricks, with plenty of ghostly little schemes, exactly like that sticky, soft glutinous rice sugar bun.
Many people must have suffered losses at his hands, been deceived, been bewitched by his little methods of manipulating people’s hearts until they lost all reason.
Zhu Zhixi had once again left his strange cup on the dining table—this time, it was the one that looked like an apple.
He had far too many bad habits. But Fu Rangyi had already grown somewhat used to these bad habits.
He leaned back in his chair and reached out to put the cup lid on. With a clink, the apple became whole. Then he took it off again. With another crisp sound, the apple’s top was sliced away.
After playing with it for a while, he stood up and casually washed both cups, placing them side by side in the glass cabinet. Then he turned off the lights and returned to the study to read papers for a while.
When he was ready to go back to the master bedroom to sleep, light was still spilling out from the crack under the second bedroom door.
Zhu Zhixi had originally been chatting with a friend when suddenly, a chat window from [Fu Rangyi] popped up on WeChat. The last time they had messaged each other was when they added each other as friends and shared photos.
He froze for a second, then tapped in to take a look. Fu Rangyi had shared a public-account popular science advertorial with him—
“Approaching Science: The Secret of the Longevity Village.”
Although he had a bad feeling, he still could not resist opening it. Sure enough, right after swiping past the title, he saw a huge meme that said, “Sleep early to save your life.”
He was utterly speechless and casually changed Fu Rangyi’s contact name.
[Zhu Zhixi: What does it have to do with you? I’m not sleeping. I’ll just die young.]
Not long after, he received a reply.
[Pretty Widower: Your lifespan concerns my reputation.]
Author’s Note:
See, isn’t the daddy vibe here too?
After their heart-to-heart talk, Juicy gained Teacher Fu’s pheromone scent, and Teacher Fu gained Juicy’s new contact name. (Juicy = Zhi Zhixi)
