“Why are you back?” Yu Zi stared at the man in front of him.

“Why won’t you open the door for your dad?” Yu Qing looked at the closed glass door and knocked on it with the back of his hand. The glass made a crisp sound.

Xie Dongcheng, standing nearby, finally reached out to open the door. Yu Qing directly bypassed Xie Dongcheng and swaggered into the room with one stride.

Yu Zi hadn’t seen his biological father for a whole year.

Yu Qing didn’t seem to have changed much from a year ago; his face still counted as handsome among his peers. He was wearing a well-tailored shirt and expensive custom-made leather shoes. It seemed like bankruptcy hadn’t affected him much.

Standing in this small office, Yu Qing sighed deeply as he looked around.

“Yu Zi, why are you opening a company in a place like this?!” His tone carried a hint of reproach.

Yu Zi looked puzzled, “What does it have to do with you where I open my company?”

“What, can’t I care about my son?” Yu Qing plopped down on the leather sofa where Yu Zi had just been sitting and crossed his legs.

Only then did he notice there was another person in the room and glanced at Xie Dongcheng, “You must be Xiao Xie, right?”

Xie Dongcheng stood in front of him with a blank expression and nodded.

“Enough nonsense. Why did you come back without saying a word?” Yu Zi didn’t believe he was being genuinely concerned. After neglecting his son for so many years, now, after disappearing for a year, he suddenly started showing concern?

“What’s your attitude towards your dad?” Yu Qing glanced at the watch on his wrist.

The sunlight reflected sharply off the watch face on Yu Qing’s wrist, casting a sharp light towards the two men.

Yu Zi instinctively averted his gaze and furrowed his brows.

Putting down his wrist, Yu Qing shook his head and continued, “This office doesn’t look like it’s suitable. I’ll arrange a new office building for you. How much space do you need?”

Yu Zi doubted whether he had misheard. This spendthrift father was actually offering to find him a new building?

“Yu Qing, have you gone crazy? Where did you get the money?” Yu Zi’s complexion changed slightly, but Yu Qing didn’t explain.

He cleared his throat, “You’re mistaking my kindness for weakness, aren’t you? Does this place look like a proper office to you?”

Since Yu Qing entered the room, Xie Dongcheng had been tense. At this moment, he suddenly couldn’t hold it in anymore and stepped forward to block Yu Zi.

Grimacing, he averted his gaze.

Ignoring him, Yu Qing stood up from the sofa and looked at Yu Zi, asking in a deep voice, “Aren’t you looking for investment?”

Yu Zi, who had been standing above him, had to look up at him now, “How did you know about that?”

Yu Qing chuckled, “You’ve almost visited every venture capital firm in the city. How could I not know?”

The smile on his face didn’t fade as he took another step forward, blocking Yu Zi’s view, “Will a first-round investment of one million dollars be enough?”

Yu Zi froze for a moment. Xie Dongcheng also looked up suddenly.

The sun shifted to the south, casting Yu Qing’s shadow over the heads of the two men.

“Come with me. I’ll help you with financing,” Yu Qing summed up their conversation, arms crossed, waiting for Yu Zi’s answer.

That face, so similar to Yu Zi’s, blended into the glaring noon sun.

Xie Dongcheng stood on the side, silent for a moment, then suddenly stepped forward.

Yu Zi immediately reached out to stop him and whispered softly, “I’ll talk to him alone, you go first.”

“I’m not going,” Xie Dongcheng stood still, unwilling to move.

“I said, you go first. I’ll talk to him alone,” Yu Zi lowered his voice and gave him a look.

Seeing that Xie Dongcheng still didn’t move, Yu Zi gently pushed him, and only then did Xie Dongcheng take a half step back.

The scorching sunlight pierced through the glass, baking his arms as the father and son stood facing each other. He felt like the only outsider.

Silence fell among the three for a moment, and Xie Dongcheng’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down twice.

Yu Zi repeated, “You go first.”

Yu Qing, as if already claiming victory in this game, slightly raised his right hand and pointed towards the glass door.

Xie Dongcheng took a deep breath and reluctantly moved his feet. Then, he turned and pushed open the cold door handle, leaving the office to them.

The corridor was empty, and Xie Dongcheng leaned against the wall on one side, looking through the glass door at the two figures in the office. Yu Zi was looking at Yu Qing, apparently saying something. However, the soundproofing of the double-layered glass was so good that he couldn’t hear a thing.

As Xie Dongcheng watched from a distance, he increasingly felt that these two men had such similar faces. They indeed shared the same blood.

After about five minutes, Xie Dongcheng received a new message on his phone.

He swiped to check, it was from Yu Zi, just three words: “You go back.”

Apart from that, there was no additional message. Xie Dongcheng took a deep breath but still couldn’t calm his racing heart.

He didn’t know how he drove back home. It usually took passing through five traffic lights from the office to his home. However, when he passed one intersection, the red light had turned green, but he forgot to step on the gas pedal. It wasn’t until the cars behind him started honking wildly that he snapped out of his daze and accelerated.

When he arrived at Fangjiyuan, it was already dusk.

The summer night was still hot. From the entrance of the building to the doorstep of his fifth-floor apartment, he had to climb forty-four steps. Xie Dongcheng only climbed a dozen steps and already felt his legs aching.

A few minutes later, he pushed open the door of his home, and the fish in the tank heard the movement and swam towards him.

Xie Dongcheng had no interest in playing with the fish, so he went straight to the bedroom. He sat on the edge of the bed like a lost soul, his fingers rubbing against the new sheets he had just put on.

He had just bought a king-size bed, thinking it would make Yu Zi sleep more comfortably in the future.

Suddenly, a bright flash of lightning outside the window, followed by a rumble of thunder from afar.

On a midsummer night, the rainstorm came without any warning.

Xie Dongcheng took out his phone from his pocket, opened the chat page with Yu Zi. After some hesitation, he deleted and edited, finally sending just three words: “Finished talking yet?”

Then he quickly turned off the screen of his phone. He didn’t know what he was afraid of.

After silently counting countless sixty-second intervals in his mind, he gently opened his phone, lighting up the screen.

However, the message notification was blank, Yu Zi hadn’t replied.

Rain poured down from the sky, and outside the bedroom window, the trees were battered by the storm. The birds that had nested there had long gone elsewhere to seek shelter from the rain, leaving only the mournful cry of branches and leaves colliding outside the window.

Staring at the lonely green bubble on the screen, Xie Dongcheng suddenly stood up from the edge of the bed.

He quickly opened the door, grabbed the car keys from the entrance, didn’t even bother with an umbrella, and ran into the downpour.

Five minutes later, the black Toyota broke through the rain curtain and raced towards the main road.