"So… you really thought my home was a prison, and I was your butler?"*
"I… I'm sorry. I didn't expect this to actually be your home. Thank you for telling me so much…"*
After a while, Zhou Qin and Salena finally cleared up the misunderstanding. Her earlier affectation was simply a defense mechanism—a little hedgehog prickling itself. Who could really blame her?
Salena gazed at the unfamiliar nightscape. The evening breeze was as fresh as it had been a century ago, and even the crescent moon in the sky had not changed. Yet the stars no longer clung to the night; they had fallen to the mortal world, drifting across streets and buildings, fleeting and restless.
If the moon remains the same, why have the old acquaintances become history?
She had not fully accepted that she had come over a hundred years into the future, but the city before her was undeniable proof, inescapable and real. She wanted to run, to flee from this alien future.
"I… I should go!"*
"Hey, wait! I'll go!"*
Salena lowered her head and ran in a panic toward the stairs. The desperate dash was the cry of her inner heart. She had no idea where she should go, but sometimes a frantic run was all the release one had for pent-up emotions.
Anywhere would do. She wanted to find a quiet corner to hide herself away.
But she had barely taken a few steps.
Bang! The girl's face suddenly hit something in the corridor. Zhou Qin jumped in shock.
"I… why can't I get through? Is this an invisible wall?"*
Salena rubbed her throbbing, reddened forehead, reaching forward toward the empty space. Yet her palms pressed as if against a solid plane.
Zhou Qin suddenly thought of a Pokémon called the "Suction Doll"—that silent pantomime performance was terrifyingly accurate.
There had been enough strange things tonight; surely it couldn't be real.
Despite hearing the loud impact, Zhou Qin approached Salena cautiously, half in disbelief.
"Air walls? Come on, this isn't a video game. Watch, I'll show you."*
Zhou Qin casually stepped past Salena and shrugged toward her. Of course, pretty girls always exaggerated; they just had to make it seem real.
Thump! Thump! Thump! Salena punched the air in front of her with her tiny pink fists, and to their astonishment, the sounds of striking a wall really echoed in the empty corridor.
"I'm not joking!"*
Zhou Qin stared in disbelief at the air between them, running his hand over his chin but detecting nothing. He extended his right hand toward Salena, clearing his throat: "Want me to pull you through?"*
Salena, like a princess offering her gloved hand to her knight, extended her silk-covered arm toward Zhou Qin.
Without hesitation, he grabbed her hand and tugged her toward himself.
It wasn't until another bang of a face hitting the wall rang out that Zhou Qin realized how soft her hand really was.
Thud! Well… the little face hitting the wall wasn't unpleasant to look at.
Salena's hand couldn't pass through the invisible barrier; Zhou Qin's pull merely pressed half of her face against the air wall. The strange limitation sent chills down both their spines.
"Who's making all that noise in the corridor in the middle of the night?"
Holding hands, Salena and Zhou Qin turned in unison toward the door.
The footsteps of an elderly neighbor crept closer through the thin wooden door.
Exchanging a glance, the two instinctively understood. Zhou Qin hurriedly pulled Salena back into his apartment.
Seriously… a blonde-haired, blue-eyed young lady hammering invisible walls in the dead of night? She probably expected to make the news tomorrow!
"Huh? Where did everyone go?"
The neighbor opened the door halfway, peeking out. Behind her graying head, a little girl mimicked her motions. In a delicate, childish voice, the girl laughed.
"Grandma~ you heard wrong again!"
The old lady poked her ear, scrutinized the tiny fingernail, and muttered in dissatisfaction.
"No, I didn't hear anything wrong!"
Hiding behind the closed door, Salena and Zhou Qin listened, both breaking into cold sweats.
Of course, Salena was more frightened by Zhou Qin's exaggerated reactions.
She stared at the wrist he held tightly and lightly tapped his hand with her other hand.
"Excuse me… can you let go?"*
"Sorry! Sorry!"
Startled, Zhou Qin quickly released her and collapsed onto the lazy sofa. Salena immediately sensed something was off. She thought for a moment, then angrily pointed at Zhou Qin, a mix of indignation and despair in her voice.
"This is still a prison! You're restricting my freedom using… magic? Did you bring me a hundred years into the future?!"*
Zhou Qin almost lost his mind. "Ma'am, can you stop letting your imagination run wild! Do you think I'd send you into the future just to make trouble for myself?"* He added, "And I'm not thirty yet! I can't even become a magician! I can't throw fireballs!"*
Salena leaned against the shoe cabinet near the entrance, still skeptical. After hearing the next-door door close, she opened her own door and peeked outside.
The city nightscape remained, so the problem wasn't her method of opening the door.
Turning back to Zhou Qin, she asked, "What do you mean you can't become a magician until thirty?"*
"Nothing… a bad joke. Let's figure this out. No, let's both calm down first."*
Zhou Qin rubbed his forehead in frustration. Usually, this scenario—a beautiful girl appearing at your doorstep—would be a teenage boy's dream.
But this was reality! A mysterious, possibly time-traveling girl causing an eerie air wall in the corridor…
If you dared to live with her, romance her… you'd have to be insane! No, scratch that—you'd be utterly brainless!
Sighing, Zhou Qin asked seriously, "First, let me ask you this: you still don't fully believe you've traveled over a hundred years into the future, right?"*
Salena hesitated, then nodded, admitting she hadn't accepted the truth.
Zhou Qin completely understood. If he were transported to another century, he wouldn't accept reality either just by looking at a city nightscape.
He reluctantly opened his laptop and gestured for Salena to come closer. "I'll show you some condensed history videos. Oh, they have to be in English from foreign sources. Wait a sec."*
"Victoria Era refers to the period in Britain from the 1830s to 1900, during the reign of Queen Victoria. During this time, the Industrial Revolution, led by her government, transformed the world, achieving rapid economic growth and making Britain a major power. With its powerful navy and industrial leadership, Britain dominated international trade. Many historical and literary works define the style of this period as Victorian, especially when discussing mid-to-late 19th century culture, customs, and general social attitudes."*
Kneeling beside Zhou Qin's lazy sofa, Salena stared blankly at the colorful videos streaming across the screen.
She looked dazed and dejected, only recovering after a long pause. "So… the queen died. And the empire on which the sun never set… did set."*
Mimicking Zhou Qin's motions, Salena clumsily controlled the mouse, clicking through Victorian-era encyclopedia entries. Her expression grew increasingly grave until her tightly furrowed brows finally collapsed after one last click.
"Sherlock Holmes… was written dead too?!"*
Ding! The microwave beeped. Zhou Qin, with good intentions, handed her half of tomorrow's breakfast.
"Want a bite of bun?"
Salena stared blankly at Zhou Qin's screen, took the bun in a daze, and nibbled a small bite.
All the refined etiquette and posture she had maintained were crushed under the weight of history. She truly experienced the Eastern saying "tasteless as chewing wax," unable to discern the filling.
"By the way, Holmes didn't actually die. He came back later. I heard Conan Doyle was forced to revive him after being metaphorically drowned in complaints and hit on the head with stone eggs."*
"Well done."*
Salena, like a hamster gnawing on a sunflower seed, puffed her cheeks and nibbled the bun, blankly nodding in agreement with her contemporaries. Alright, it seemed the little girl's mind had finally been blown.