The pills had dragged him deep, far deeper than sleep ought to go. Shu Yao's body lay motionless upon his bed, breath shallow, lashes quivering faintly as if even in unconsciousness he fought against the weight of dreams. The blanket twisted around his frame, but the true snare was not cotton nor thread—it was the nightmare that bound him, a prison woven from shadows and grief.
When the world steadied itself again, he was no longer in his home. He was standing in the wide, cavernous hush of Bai Qi's office. The mahogany desk loomed in the center, its surface cold and gleaming like a lake of darkened glass. At the far end, Bai Qi sat in his leather chair, his face hidden by distance, posture severe, as if carved into the room itself.
Shu Yao lingered in the doorway, his pulse sharp beneath his skin. A single draft curled past his ankles. He wanted to step back, to leave, but the hinges sealed behind him with an invisible weight. He was trapped, frozen in the threshold where silence pressed against his lungs.
Then Bai Qi rose.
The chair scraped back across the floor, a sound that cleaved the silence like a blade. His figure straightened, tall and deliberate, moving slowly from behind the desk. Shu Yao flinched. Something primal inside him urged him to look away, to hide—but the moment his eyes shifted, Bai Qi's gaze caught him.
And that gaze burned.
Obsidian, rimmed in red, as though scalded by grief. It was the look of a man who had drowned in his own sorrow and resurfaced with fury instead of air. Shu Yao's breath caught. His feet betrayed him—one hesitant step forward, then another—as though instinct carried him toward the man he both feared and loved.
But when Bai Qi's eyes hardened into a glare, Shu Yao halted mid-motion, the air thick between them. He turned his head aside, unable to endure the weight of that stare. His heart hammered, and yet he could not make himself flee.
Bai Qi's voice cut through the silence, heavy as lead, raw as something torn open.
"Do you know why I am like this?"
Shu Yao's throat worked, but no answer came. He shook his head faintly, still refusing to meet that gaze.
"Won't you ask me?" Bai Qi's voice cracked, a fissure in the stone. "Won't you ask me why I am like this?"
Shu Yao forced himself to look. His autumn-colored eyes, trembling, lifted back to the face he had adored in secret for so long. And it was that moment Bai Qi seized him—hands gripping his shoulders, iron fingers digging in not with cruelty, but with desperation. Shu Yao flinched, not from pain but from the storm in Bai Qi's words.
"Because… it was all your fault." The words tore out of him, raw and brutal. "You. Why are you still alive?"
The office seemed to tilt beneath Shu Yao's feet. The air thinned, his breath faltering. It was not the strength of Bai Qi's grip that crushed him—it was those words, sharp and merciless, as if they could carve straight into his chest.
His tears threatened, shimmering in his autumn eyes, but he held his voice steady. The man before him—this vision of Bai Qi—was the man he loved, and the sight of him unraveling like this tore deeper than any cruelty.
His lips parted, trembling. He wanted to speak, to beg, to soothe. But his thoughts tangled—was it because Bai Qi had discovered his secret love? Was that why he was lashing out?
The dream offered no mercy.
Bai Qi's glare darkened further. His voice rose, sharp and breaking.
"Why are you still here? Why can't you die?"
Shu Yao's lips quivered, the ache of words he could not restrain breaking free at last.
"Bai Qi… what happened to you? You shouldn't be like this… you—"
His voice cracked, his hand trembling as it rose of its own accord, finally cupping Bai Qi's cheek. His palm pressed against that fevered skin, fragile but resolute.
"You were not like this, Bai Qi."
For an instant, something flickered in those eyes. Something human. Something familiar.
But it vanished in an instant. Bai Qi's jaw tightened, teeth gritting audibly, and with a sudden violent force, he shoved Shu Yao backwards.
The marble floor accepted him mercilessly, the cold stone colliding with his body. The impact drove the air from his lungs, leaving him staring upward in stunned silence. He blinked rapidly, his vision trembling with tears.
Above him, Bai Qi loomed. No kindness left in those eyes, only disdain, sharp and burning, as though Shu Yao were nothing more than a wound that refused to close.
Shu Yao remained sprawled where he had fallen. The ache in his body was nothing compared to the ache in his chest. He could not move, not because he lacked strength, but because to rise meant to face that look again—and it was unbearable.
His lips parted. A broken sob slipped free despite himself.
"Bai Qi… why…"
The sound echoed through both worlds.
In the quiet, shadowed reality of his room, Shu Yao stirred faintly beneath the sheets. His cheeks glistened, streaked by tears that had slipped free in his sleep. His fists clutched the bedding tight, knuckles whitening as his lips moved, whispering the single name that haunted him.
"…Bai Qi… why…"
Back in the nightmare, the marble floor seemed to fracture beneath him. The grand office dimmed, its edges dissolving like smoke in water. Bai Qi's figure blurred, his fury fading into indistinct shadow. The weight of his words, however, lingered heavy on Shu Yao's chest, etched into his very ribs.
Shu Yao lay trembling, sobbing silently, his heart tearing between love and torment.
And then the dream began to collapse.
The walls crumbled away. The mahogany desk splintered into nothingness. Bai Qi's outline shattered like glass into shards of darkness, until all that remained was the echo of his words—and the sound of Shu Yao's own broken breaths.
The nightmare dissolved, but the pain lingered, dragging Shu Yao further into the void where another scene waited, ready to claim him.
office shattered. Its walls bled into nothingness, its marble floor dissolved like mist under rain. Shu Yao was left falling into a silence so thick it became substance, a void that pressed against his ears and stilled his breath.
When he blinked, there was no world around him. Only black. An endless dark that stretched in every direction, where even his shadow could not exist.
He did not stand. His body sank down, knees drawn to his chest, his arms encircling himself as though to stitch the pieces of his trembling form together. His forehead pressed to his knees, and the sobs came quietly—stifled and raw, carrying all the ache of words that had never found voice. His tears fell into nothing, vanishing before they could touch ground.
The void listened, silent and merciless.
Then, a shape broke the darkness.
A flicker of pale light moved, almost unreal, until it wove itself into a figure. Qing Yue stepped forward from the shadows, her form neither fully dream nor memory, her steps soundless as she crossed the unseen path toward him. She was smiling faintly, her expression soft and knowing, as though she had always been waiting here.
She crouched beside him, her presence warm in a place where warmth should not exist. Her voice came gently, threading through the void.
"Gege…"
Shu Yao's head jerked up at the sound. His autumn-colored eyes, red-rimmed and wet, widened at the sight of her face. That smile, that familiar softness—his instinct was to hide, to turn away, to shield his pain from her gaze. But Qing Yue leaned closer, her hand reaching to wipe the wet streaks from his cheek with the tenderness only a sister could possess.
"Gege," she whispered, her tone tinged with ache. "Why are you always like this?"
He said nothing. His throat ached too much, words lodging themselves there like thorns.
Qing Yue tilted her head, her gaze steady. "Gege, I know you don't share your thoughts with anyone. But can't you just tell me, at least once?"
Shu Yao's lips parted, then closed. His eyes lifted toward her, but the weight was unbearable, and he let them fall again. At last, his voice came, fragile and worn.
"It's okay… I am fine."
But Qing Yue's brow furrowed, her voice trembling with both sorrow and defiance.
"No, Gege. You are suffering. You've been suffering since you were just a fragile boy."
Her words struck him deeper than any accusation. He turned his head aside, as though the dark itself could shelter him from the truth. But Qing Yue pressed on, her voice carrying a tender strength.
"Every time I was in trouble, you were the one who helped me. You carried me out of danger, again and again."
Her words painted memories against the void—memories Shu Yao had long buried. Running through alleys with her hand in his, shielding her from boys who laughed cruelly, taking blows meant for her small frame. Always stepping forward, always enduring.
His gaze dropped, heavy with shame, but she did not allow him to hide.
"Gege," she said softly, "whatever burden you are carrying… I will find out one day."
She stood slowly, her figure outlined faintly against the void's darkness, and then extended her hand. Her gesture was simple, yet filled with command—an unspoken demand that he rise with her.
Shu Yao hesitated, sadness and worry etching his features. At last, he took her hand and let her pull him up. His voice cracked as he spoke, his eyes shimmering.
"It is alright, Qing Yue. You are still young. You cannot understand—"
But she cut across him, her voice sharp with certainty.
"Gege, you were just a boy. Only eight. Then why did you push yourself so hard? Why did you suffer for me—when it should never have been your burden?"
Her words pierced through him like light through armor, and at last the tears stilled. He no longer wept, but his eyes burned red, rimmed with the rawness of long-hidden pain. His gaze lowered again, heavy,
until Qing Yue's hands rose and cupped his face.
She forced him to meet her eyes.
"I can't see you like this, Gege," she whispered. Her voice cracked, though her smile trembled with love.
And before he could respond, she leaned forward and wrapped her arms around him.
Shu Yao froze. The tears shimmered in his eyes once more, but no words came. Slowly, his own arms lifted, fragile, uncertain, until at last they wrapped around her in return. The embrace was wordless, but it said what his lips could not: that in his brokenness, he still cherished her warmth.
In reality, Shu Yao's body stilled. The restless flinches that had plagued his sleep softened, his breath evening. Upon his cheek, one final tear slipped free, trailing downward to vanish into the pillow.
The nightmare did not end. But for a moment, within its suffocating darkness, he had found a sliver of light—his sister's voice, his sister's arms, a reminder of the love he had always fought to protect.
And in that fragile reprieve, his heart steadied, waiting for whatever came next.
The dawn unfurled itself slowly, like a painter reluctant to set his brush upon the canvas of the sky. Pale morning light seeped through the curtains of Shu Yao's room, weaving silver patterns across the floorboards, stretching until it touched the edge of his bed. The silence of the room was delicate, a silence that trembled as though afraid to disturb him.
Shu Yao lay still, his body adrift between two worlds—the fading grip of sleep and the sharp edge of reality. The heavy fog of the pills loosened at last, dissolving into fragments until his lashes fluttered, weak, uncertain. His chest rose with a quiet shudder as he slowly opened his eyes.
Reality struck not with sound, but with sensation. His cheek was damp. The faint salt of tears stained his skin, proof that the weeping in his nightmare had carved itself onto his face in truth. His breath caught. A tremor seized his shoulders as his hand reached up, pale and trembling, to wipe the streaks away. Yet no gesture could erase the heaviness within—the echo of Bai Qi's obsidian eyes, cruel and rimmed with sorrow, lingering in his heart like a scar reopened.
Shu Yao straightened suddenly, his spine pressing against the bedboard, his breaths uneven, fragile. His fingers clutched the sheets as if to anchor himself to something solid, but the fabric did nothing against the ache blooming in his chest. It was not the pain of body—that dull exhaustion he had long grown accustomed to—but the sharper, unrelenting weight that lived beneath his ribs.
The words replayed, venomous in their simplicity: Why are you still alive?
He could not flee them. He could not banish the vision of Bai Qi's face twisted in disdain, nor the sound of his voice cracking under cruelty. It pressed against him until his lungs felt thin, until his body seemed too fragile for the burden.
At last, he drew his knees upward, folding himself into the smallest shape he could. His arms wrapped tightly around them, his forehead pressing against his knees. There, hidden in that cocoon of his own making, he allowed himself silence—no sobs, no words, only the trembling breath of someone who wished to vanish, if only until the ache dulled.
The morning light lingered on him, but it offered no warmth.