Chapter 107

Forty-eight hours passed.

Fifty-six hours passed.

Day and night cycled, and the morning star once again adorned the dawn of the East, the golden seventy-two hours for disaster rescue had also elapsed.

“Why?” Shang Mingbao’s lips were dry and cracked, muttering incoherently with only murky syllables emerging.

Her vocal cords had lost their ability to produce sound; each attempt to use them resulted in a burning pain.

“We’ve searched this river area three times,” the rescue team leader said.

“Continue, please. Can we continue?” Shang Mingbao grasped his sleeve, her gaze struggling to focus. “He has a good physique; maybe we missed him. He’s waiting for me to find him. He’s still holding on…”

“You’re the boss; it’s up to you.”

The search continued for another two days. During this time, Shang Mingbao had not eaten a single grain of rice, only drinking water. Any food chewed in her mouth triggered habitual nausea, but she had nothing left to vomit. Everyone could see her precarious state; the only clarity in her eyes was maintained by sheer willpower.

Xiang Feiran was waiting beneath some ruins; just a little faster, a little faster… before the fireworks ended. Fireworks appeared in her night sky.

“Who is setting off fireworks here?” Shang Mingbao looked up.

The bodyguards and rescue team beside her fell silent.

The rain-cleared night sky was clear, with no clouds or stars.

One hundred and twenty hours later.

“Miss Shang, our drones, helicopters, search dogs, and detectors have covered the coordinates for five days. Almost no sites with traces of the accident have been missed. He might have been eaten by wild animals or drifted downstream with the river. I advise you to give up.” The rescue team leader removed his hat.

Shang Mingbao’s gaze sluggishly turned to his face. “You’re getting paid for this…”

“Yes, even if you want us to search here for another month or two, we can do that, but it’s meaningless.” The German’s face was solemn. “Two bodies have floated downstream. You… can go identify them.”

Shang Mingbao’s eyes were like black holes. “Search for another two days, please.”

“My team also needs rest.”

They and another team had been searching non-stop for five days. Even with rotations, their physical limits had been reached.

“Search for another two days. I,” Shang Mingbao bowed her head, her eyes turning slowly, “I’ll kneel and bow my head for you. Tell me what you want; I can give you anything.”

Rather than kneeling, it was her softened body that was supported by the team leader and the bodyguards behind her.

“Okay, search for another two days, but please be mentally prepared.” The German, unable to bear it, whistled to assemble the team.

Shang Mingbao nodded, lowering her eyelashes. “I’m prepared. Yes, I’m prepared.”

Everyone could see that her calmness was a facade, the last self-protective mechanism built by her consciousness, but no one dared to expose it.

Two days later, Shang Yuye and Wen Youyi arrived in Chitwan. They walked from the helicopter landing point where Essie was to the rescue site and saw their little daughter.

She was sitting on a half-high mound of earth eating bread, looking haggard. Her ghostly white face had no expression, and her eyes were unmoving. Only her fingers were picking at the bread, her lips chewing. Her ten fingers, thin and transparent like scallions, had split nails and blood crusts at the nail beds. The small amount of food she ate couldn’t even satisfy a sparrow, but after eating, she turned her face to one side and vomited.

Wen Youyi could no longer bear it and rushed over to support her, using his sleeve to wipe her mouth.

Shang Mingbao thought she was hallucinating again, her gaze focusing and then dispersing on her mother’s face.

“Babe, babe…” Wen Youyi knelt in the dirt, holding her face in his arms, silently weeping.

Assistant Xiao Lai arrived soon after, first opening the thermos and then handing over wet tissues.

Shang Mingbao allowed the person in front of her to wipe her face, gently, with a pleasant fragrance. Her gaze, crossing over the shoulders of the person in front, saw the tall and imposing man standing neither far nor near. Her eyes shrank slightly before returning to the person in front.

Wen Youyi was already in tears.

“Mom…” A rough, painful voice emerged from Shang Mingbao’s throat, a sound learned early in human life, an instinctive sound after forgetting everything.

Xiao Lai couldn’t bear to see her like this and slightly turned his face away.

Wen Youyi gripped the wet tissues tightly, embracing Shang Mingbao fiercely, like a mother eagle protecting its young. “Give up, child.”

Shang Mingbao had lost track of time, saying in a dazed manner, “The golden rescue time hasn’t passed. There are seventy-two hours, and I still have twelve hours left.”

Wen Youyi’s voice was blocked as if stuffed with cotton, unable to speak the truth.

The sharp, continuous buzzing sound of the day and night, even if one fell asleep, was pierced by a deep voice—

Shang Yuye looked at her, speaking clearly word by word, “He has officially been listed as missing by the embassy.”

Wen Youyi felt the body in her arms shudder violently. The flesh, like red candle tears, softened and decayed, collapsing like mud in her embrace.

There were no emotions left. All emotions had been completely shattered at the moment of rescuing the wrong person.

That day, she knelt in the rain, her blood-soaked fingers scratching at her face, as if trying to scratch out a truth, a coordinate. Her appearance terrified the bodyguards; if she had a knife, perhaps she would have cut along her arms—destructive thoughts crazily occupying her consciousness, as if without doing so, she could not affirm her existence, could not vent her anger towards the heavens and herself.

In the past four days, the last trace of the soul was drained from the lifeless body, and Shang Mingbao lay unconscious in Wen Youyi’s arms.

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The smell of disinfectant in the hospital room was unpleasant.

Just one door away, the sounds of conversation in Chinese made it feel as if she were back home.

The first second of waking up was filled with joy and an unreasonable optimism—Feiran Gege had been rescued! They would come to notify her soon!

Essie sat by the bedside, stunned by the moment of brilliance when Shang Mingbao woke up, her fruit peeler pausing in mid-air.

“Sister Xiaobao?” Essie’s gaze and tone were cautious, as if dealing with a fragile bubble.

Shang Mingbao supported herself on the bed: “Fei—”

She only managed to say one word. Upon seeing Essie’s frightened expression, all the excitement and hopeful fantasies shattered into dust.

Essie couldn’t bear to tell her that an official announcement had already been made. Normally, this would be considered a matter of personal privacy, communicated only to the family by the embassy. However, in the past few days, Feiran had repeatedly topped trending searches, and countless people were concerned about his safety. After consulting with the family, the announcement had to be made truthfully, using the term “missing.”

But everyone understood that in the context of such a geological disaster, “missing” was a euphemism for death, not indicating any hope for survival but rather that there was no trace left.

The UN and the biosphere official accounts, watch brands, and the program team all issued mourning messages. The face that had captivated so many people overnight had become a black-and-white image.

The program team edited unpublished behind-the-scenes footage into a special segment just for him. There was nothing remarkable—just him being silent, either practicing drums or napping, or leaning in a corner, watching the lead singer perform, avoiding the camera even when drinking water. People only noticed how he cherished his cymbals, handling them delicately, and wiping them with a special wet cloth after practice each day.

The watch brand also released footage from forums he had participated in. The lighting at these events was cleaner and brighter than in the variety shows. He wore a shirt and casual trousers, his gestures and speech as concise as ever. His sharp jawline, usually seen while playing drums, appeared a bit more refined, a subtle sophistication he wore when on stage. The monk was right; he always felt a sense of responsibility.

Shang Mingbao did not look at her phone. Her body lying flat on the bed felt heavy, and she could no longer muster any strength.

Waking up at night, she asked Sophie, who was taking turns caring for her: “Sophie, is someone calling me outside the door?”

Visiting hours had long passed, and everything was silent, but Sophie still opened the door to check the hallway: “No.”

“Isn’t it Feiran Gege?”

Sophie removed her reading glasses and wiped her tears. Under the moonlight, Shang Mingbao lay on her side, her eyes peacefully closed, tears sliding down her nose and into her hairline.

This happened ten times or more throughout the night. Sophie always responded to her, getting up to check.

She also wished to see someone for her young lady.

Shang Mingbao could not eat; eating made her feel uncontrollable nausea, sadness, and pain. She could only rely on IV fluids to maintain basic bodily functions. The seven days of search and rescue had drained her, and she was brought back to Hong Kong by a medical plane arranged by the merchants.

While in the hospital, a couple came to visit her. The man was in a wheelchair with his legs in a cast, and his girlfriend pushed him.

Shang Mingbao recognized him and said, “Thank you for saving me.”

“Oh.”

It was the hiker who had said “I don’t love you” when she was on the brink of death.

“I was about to give up. When the accident happened, she was outside the tent, and it was open there. I thought she would be fine; her legs are stronger than mine,” the man said. “When I heard your voice, I always thought it was her. You talked so much later; please forgive me. I tried to make a sound to interrupt you, so you wouldn’t waste time, but I really had no strength left.”

Shang Mingbao sat at the head of the bed, her vacant gaze calmly looking at him: “It’s good that you’re alive.”

“It was your love for your loved one that saved me. If you hadn’t kept talking and making me think, my will to survive would have vanished. Because… we had planned to part ways after this.”

He and his fiancée both wore rings with a bright metallic sheen, seemingly new.

Shang Mingbao faintly lifted the corners of her mouth.

“And your…?” he asked cautiously.

“His name is Xiang Feiran.”

The man and his fiancée were taken aback. After surviving the disaster, he found the name on trending searches strangely familiar, as if it was someone he had heard during his final moments.

The white hospital room fell silent.

Before Sophie sent them out, Shang Mingbao suddenly stopped them: “It’s not about the time you wasted saving me. Live well, and love well.”

She clearly had grievances, sarcasm, and countless questions for the heavens, but he was also clearly innocent.

It must be fate.

Shang Mingbao looked out the window. Hong Kong had excellent greenery, and beyond the dense greenery was a deep blue bay.

Feiran Gege, someone told me that my love for you saved a living person.

Do I need to gradually practice living without you?

It’s strange. On the helicopter from Hong Kong to celebrate your thirtieth birthday, while replying to Wendy’s message and planning the Fifth Avenue flagship store, I suddenly thought that I could imagine a life without you. With work to be busy with, friends to meet, everything remains unchanged except for the absence of you. I think, for the past two years, I’ve already lived such a life, keeping you far from my life, thinking I was doing well, thinking life without you was just so-so.

Is it because that thought was too close to heaven, making the heavens hear it, and that’s why I lost you?

I now understand that it’s like a wealthy person standing on a mountain of gold and silver, eating a vegetable salad, saying they can imagine a life without money, thinking they could survive.

I don’t understand anything. I don’t understand the meaning you have for me, I don’t understand life and death, and I don’t understand what true loss is, what it’s like to truly be without you.

If I could go back, I would want to return to the night of your thirtieth birthday, to the place closest to the sky, and loudly deny that thought. Maybe then heaven would take back the decree.

There’s a secret I haven’t told anyone. I always feel that you come to see me at night. I hear you calling me “Babe,” “darling,” and your voice hasn’t changed at all.

But I can’t keep asking Sophie to get up. You don’t want to see her, do you? The person you want to see isn’t her, so she can’t see you.

When I can land, I will follow your voice.

That day, she finally had the strength to stand on her own. In the bathroom, she leaned against the sink, combing her lackluster hair, and suddenly remembered that line, “Ten years of life and death, a boundless haze.” But there weren’t ten years, only ten days. She looked at herself in the mirror and seemed to see two figures leaving in the reflection. They walked together, waving at her. Their shadows were long in the setting sun.

Those were the nineteen-year-old Shang Mingbao and the twenty-four-year-old Xiang Feiran.

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“Beep—beep—beep—”

At a makeshift shelter in Lumbini, the doctor contacted the Chinese Embassy through the Nepalese police. The news reached Xiang Weishan’s phone immediately.

Having given up on the search and returned home, Xiang Weishan arrived on a private plane as soon as possible, accompanied by Fang Suining, who had come over recklessly. Xiang Qiucheng privately instructed her to keep an eye on this uncle, especially to ensure he didn’t involve the currently secret Xiang Lianqiao.

Due to special instructions, the man, who had been in a coma for over ten days, was transferred from the shelter tent to the best local hospital.

Fang Suining fell to the ground as soon as she saw him through the door.

It was him.

Pale and serene, with a breathing tube and different IV fluids.

The doctor and police, accompanied by embassy staff, explained the situation. He had been swept by the river to an area near Lumbini, tangled in dense water plants and shrubs on the riverbank. All search and rescue teams had withdrawn, and three days ago, he was rescued by monks who had placed marigold boats by the riverbank.

No one knew how he survived. After all, seven days had passed since the night of the incident. During these seven days, he was not harmed by wild animals, bitten by snakes, attacked by crocodiles, or fed. The only thing was occasional raindrops on his face, wetting his lips.

He carried no identification to determine his nationality—whether he was Korean, Japanese, Chinese, or of mixed nationality. Nepal is a paradise for backpackers, supported by its developed tourism industry, with countless foreign tourists. However, the local government is extremely inefficient, with a chaotic office system. Only yesterday did the Chinese Embassy receive their notification and confirm his identity through comparison.

The doctor, fearing inaccuracies in English expression, spoke in Nepali, with the embassy translator relaying it to Xiang Weishan.

After listening, the translator’s expression changed slightly as they conveyed with difficulty: “He said his head and cervical spine suffered severe impact, but their equipment can’t perform a comprehensive examination.”

“He said his vital signs are very weak, with almost no detectable pulse.”

“He said,” the translator paused, “they recommend discontinuing treatment.”

The doctor continued speaking very seriously, but in English now: “Perhaps he just wanted to see you one last time, which is why he has held on until now. He is undoubtedly suffering immense pain.”

“Beep—beep—beep—”

The equipment connected to his body emitted a steady beeping sound.

The police and embassy staff left first, followed by the doctor. In the end, only Fang Suining and Xiang Weishan remained in the ward.

Xiang Weishan looked at his eldest son on the old bed with unfamiliar eyes.

He gradually felt old. His once vigorous spirit, privately studying his own and his laboratory’s papers, was akin to his teenage years chasing the latest achievements from his lab.

Receiving the Young Scholar Fund at just over thirty, Xiang Weishan considered himself to have surpassed his own achievements. He had talent and ambition, but his era arrived twenty years earlier than Xiang Feiran’s.

But now, he lay quietly on the bed, with unknown health, life, and intellect.

A genius only has death, not a fall.

Fang Suining seemed to momentarily see the despair in Xiang Weishan’s eyes.

Though she disliked and despised him, she also feared him. He was the most cold-blooded and arrogant person she had ever met, his strong mental fortitude surpassing countless people and trampling on many throughout his life.

“Uncle?” Fang Suining tightened her grip and, despite trembling legs, tried to block Xiang Weishan’s view as much as possible.

Xiang Weishan glanced at her, his aged face showing a harshness as cold as ice: “Do you think he would want this body?”

“What’s wrong with this body?” Fang Suining exclaimed, “His hands and feet are fine!”

“The doctor’s meaning is that his chances of waking up are slim. Most likely, he will lie like this for the rest of his life. Even if he wakes up, his intelligence may be impaired, possibly becoming a fool or someone with severely reduced cognitive ability.”

“So what?!” Fang Suining gripped the bed railing tightly, despite her weak legs, still blocking Xiang Weishan’s view as much as possible.

Xiang Weishan looked at her with regret: “Suining, you’ve never been a genius, so you don’t understand.”

“I may not have been a genius, but I was a person! I was his sister!” Fang Suining’s tears filled her eyes, “He’s Feiran’s brother! Not someone else, not some genius or PI, he’s my cousin, your biological son! He didn’t die in the wild; how can he die in the hospital, in the decision of his family?!”

“If Feiran can hear, he must have consciousness. He just can’t move now. How do you think he feels hearing that? He will be disappointed. This is what truly kills him!”

“Suining, I won’t be disappointed.”

The breathing machine’s wheezes were so weak yet steady.

“He is Xiang Weishan. I won’t be disappointed by any of his decisions.”

Xiang Weishan’s gaze shifted from Xiang Feiran’s face to the girl in front of him. Her face was drenched in tears, her eyes filled with fear, weakness, and courage all at once.

Fang Suining thought she had persuaded him. She stumbled a few steps from the foot of the bed to Xiang Feiran’s bedside, clutching the railing tightly: “Look at him again! Uncle! Look at him one more time… He’s doing well. The doctor says he’s in pain, but he has endured it to hold on until now, not so that his family can choose to give up!”

Fang Suining kept insisting, tears streaming down her face, her blurred vision seemingly catching a slight movement in Xiang Feiran’s fingertip, which was connected to an oxygen monitor.

“Feiran’s hand moved!” Fang Suining exclaimed loudly, trembling with joy. “Doctor! Uncle, look! I’m not lying!”

“Movement is a normal nerve reaction,” Xiang Weishan said expressionlessly.

If he could move his facial nerves, Xiang Feiran would have smirked in mockery.

But he couldn’t; he just lay there with his eyes closed, unable to lift them again.

“Remove the tube. Don’t let him suffer unnecessary pain,” Xiang Weishan said through gritted teeth.

“No!” Fang Suining cried out, kneeling on the floor in desperation. “Please! Uncle! He’s your biological son! How can Nepalese doctors compare to those in China?! You are a scientist, you have the best medical team. I beg you, at least give him a chance to return home!”

She had no other way, her tears hitting the floor.

Xiang Weishan was Xiang Feiran’s only direct relative, the only person qualified to sign off on the surgery or tube removal decision.

The voice was distant and unreal, drifting above the sunlight on his thin eyelids.

Having never asked her father for anything in her life, she made a plea from the depths of her heart.

— Please, don’t remove it.

I still want to live. I can live, not for you, but for her.

He was feeling pain as if every bone and nerve in his body was fractured.

The rushing river flowed by him, wild beast footsteps paused nearby, a white hornbill once perched on his shoulder. The scent of wild roses and bodhi trees, candles and marigolds, told him that he had finally waited for people.

He had human ties.

He had human ties.

He could no longer afford to die or live casually, nor could he casually find a mountain or a wilderness to leave alone among flowers and grass.

In the summer of his twenty-first year, the red flag car that carried Fang Suining and her down from the mountain into the city. The tree shadows passed over the windshield, and he had said, “If you’re in the car, I won’t be reckless.”

She was his passenger, and he wanted to ensure her safety in this world.

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