Winter Returns

Chapter 198 "Selfie"

An eyeball.

An eyeball covered in bloodshot veins.

Zhang Shutong held his breath, staring intently at the image on his phone screen.

At the last moment, he didn't run away, but instead hid under the desk, taking advantage of the loud noise from the window.

Zhang Shutong quickly calculated in his mind that if he ran, it would be tantamount to completely exposing himself, and the man's next move would not be to confirm but to break down the door.

But how much time could that door buy him?
Less than half a minute.

This is a man who can recycle clay figures. His skills are likely on par with Lu Qinglian's. Even if he gained half a minute, he had already exhausted some of his energy before coming to the dormitory, so he might not be able to outrun the other party.

So he had no choice but to gamble. Zhang Shutong huddled under the desk, staring at the door behind the bunk bed. Not long ago, to avoid making a sound, he had only pushed open a small gap to squeeze through. Only upon closer inspection could one see that the bunk bed was only slightly tilted.

The other party was separated by a window, and it was already dark. Moreover, the window could only be opened a crack, so they might not have noticed that something had been moved.

So all he could do was wait. He tensed all his muscles, ready to run without hesitation as soon as he heard the other party make his next move. But the air seemed to freeze. The dimly lit room was so quiet it was suffocating. He was now in the man's blind spot. Zhang Shutong held his phone out in front of him, and the image captured by the front-facing camera immediately appeared on the screen.

One eyeball.

Or perhaps the light was too dim, and only one eyeball was visible. But before Zhang Shutong could discern anything, the eyeball vanished.

Then came another teeth-grinding sound as the window slammed shut.

Zhang Shutong felt half relieved.

Bet right.

My palms were already covered in sweat.

But he still needed to confirm the man's whereabouts, so Zhang Shutong held his breath and didn't rush to get up.

He listened carefully to the footsteps in the corridor through the door. The footsteps grew farther and farther away, and it sounded like they were heading towards the stairs in the center of the dormitory building. Then the footsteps disappeared.

Go back or continue the pursuit?
A question arose in Zhang Shutong's mind.

He finally had a chance to see the other person's face clearly.

He had very little time to make a decision.

Zhang Shutong calculated the time in his mind. This was a tenement building with a continuous corridor in front of it.

If they wait until the man goes downstairs, he'll likely be discovered when he comes out of the house; now is the only time to act.

While the man is still in the stairwell!

Zhang Shutong gently unlocked the door. He first pushed it open a crack and heard faint footsteps in the corridor. Without hesitation, Zhang Shutong quickly crawled out of the door, carefully closed it again, and then leaned against the corridor wall, lowered his head, and stared intently at the entrance of the dormitory building.

...five seconds, seven seconds, eight seconds—

A brown hat came into view!

The other person was wearing a hat with a metal ornament on the brim.

Before Zhang Shutong could see any more clearly, the man had just stepped out of the dormitory building when he immediately turned around and veered to one side, hugging the building's facade.

The night was thick and the view was empty. Zhang Shutong tiptoed, but ultimately gave up on the idea of ​​leaning out of the corridor.

He waited patiently for a moment, making sure that he couldn't see anything from this vantage point, and then quickly walked towards the stairs.

The other person was about to go around to the back of the dormitory building. He could have quietly followed the man to find out where he was going or even where he was hiding.

Thinking of this, Zhang Shutong clenched his fists tightly, his palms already covered in sweat. He hadn't expected to have such a big harvest right from the start.

Next, he had to remain calm and extremely careful; one wrong step could lead to disaster... But before he could even reach the bottom of the stairs, the sound of a car engine starting up reached his ears—

Zhang Shutong cursed under his breath; the other party had indeed come in a car. He quickly ran down the stairs and then ran towards the back of the building, but as soon as he turned the corner, the car started moving.

Zhang Shutong, supporting his knees, gasped for breath. In the darkness, only a red taillight could be seen rapidly shrinking. Under the reflection, apart from confirming that it was a sedan, the model, color, and license plate were all indistinguishable!
He paused for a moment, slammed his fist on the wall, and then ran upstairs without stopping.

The car drove off in the direction of the hospital!
So he must now rush to Lu Qinglian's location. Ideally, the man would walk there, and he would quietly follow behind, and together with Lu Qinglian, they would subdue the other party when they reached the old house.

But the man happens to have a car. How long does it take to drive from the dormitory to the hospital? Only four or five minutes. How could he possibly catch up with a car?!

Moreover, Zhang Shutong had a bad feeling. He still didn't know what the man was waiting for. All Zhang Shutong knew was that his original plans were all messed up, and he couldn't gamble this time.

He slammed the dormitory door open, his feet moving without stopping, but he didn't forget to lock it. Now his only advantage was that he had clearly seen the man's features, but the other party hadn't noticed that he had been in the dormitory.

Zhang Shutong squeezed through the hidden door and burst forward with all his might. He didn't know how much time had passed, but he felt like his lungs were about to explode. When he finally saw the short-haired figure, the breath he had been holding in his chest suddenly let out.

"What's wrong with you?" Lu Qinglian's calm voice came from the darkness.

Zhang Shutong briefly recounted what had just happened to her, then, still breathless, said:

"He... he's probably driving faster than me, and he's very likely lying in ambush up there... Now we have two choices, first... get out immediately, or..."

"Or go to the dormitory building and flank them again from the ground?" Lu Qinglian continued his suggestion.

Zhang Shutong nodded, taking this time to recover his strength.

"Then let's choose the first one." She made the decision instantly. "Go up there immediately."

"But I think the second one..."

“First run from here to the basement, then run from the dormitory back to the hospital, Zhang Shutong, the plan is good, but even the most perfect plan requires you to be able to carry it out.” Lu Qinglian pointed out the crux of the matter, “With your current physical strength, you are not capable of executing this plan.”

“Also,” a faint flashlight shone in front of him, and Lu Qinglian frowned, “I remember your illness flared up underground, you’d better go up quickly.”

Upon hearing this, Zhang Shutong realized that he had been panting for a while, but his breathing was still not steady. Even if it wasn't a relapse of his anxiety disorder, the air underground was too polluted and not suitable for strenuous exercise at all.

Zhang Shutong tried to regulate his breathing and remained silent for a moment.

Lu Qinglian had already taken out her phone:
Are you sure that car left in the direction of the hospital?

"Eighty percent."

"Three minutes to recover." She snapped her phone shut, turned around, and tossed her short hair. "Remember to hide behind me." Actually, it didn't take three minutes. After silently counting to less than a minute, Zhang Shutong nodded to Lu Qinglian.

The two walked towards the stairs one after the other. They hadn't closed the iron gate when they came down, so they could now walk directly back to the ground and have time to react even if the man suddenly attacked.

One step, two steps, three steps, four steps... Zhang Shutong followed behind Lu Qinglian, keeping a one-meter distance between them to prevent any sudden changes that might leave the other party with no room to dodge.

Just as Lu Qinglian was about to walk out of the stairwell, Zhang Shutong grabbed her sleeve. The girl paused, and Zhang Shutong shook the jacket that he had already crumpled up. Seeing this, she turned to the side, and Zhang Shutong threw it forcefully, repeating the same trick.

The sound of clothes hitting the ground reached their ears. They listened quietly for a few seconds, then Lu Qinglian flicked her baton, the tip tapping the stone wall. At the same time, she suddenly exerted force with her toes—

This was the signal to act. Zhang Shutong rushed up the stairs as well. In an instant, the two went from being extremely still to being extremely active. By the time Zhang Shutong reached the ground, Lu Qinglian had already rushed out of the old house.

—Regardless of what happens next, choosing an outdoor location, rather than an old house that could collapse at any moment, was something that had been agreed upon beforehand. But as soon as Zhang Shutong stepped out of the house, she heard her soft voice:
"Safety."

Turning her head, Lu Qinglian circled around the back of the house, put away her baton, and looked calm.

There's no one around here.

"How is that possible?" Zhang Shutong said instinctively.

“You’re wrong,” she said. “There’s another possibility: that person is the same man we saw on the rooftop, and not the one we’re looking for.”

Zhang Shutong frowned, turned on his flashlight in disbelief, and shone it around, but this was just a wasteland with no obstruction to his view, so he couldn't see any people.

But the car was clearly heading towards the hospital.

Does that mean the other party hasn't arrived yet? What happened on the way?
A false alarm?
But this can no longer be considered a "false alarm," at least the man really was there among them. But what exactly was he thinking?

At this moment, Lu Qinglian said again:
"If it were me, I wouldn't run back immediately, but follow that car. Even if I can't catch up, at least I can determine its destination more clearly."

"I was a little anxious," Zhang Shutong sighed. "I was worried something might happen to you."

"...How is your illness?"

"Thank goodness, I don't think I've had a relapse," Zhang Shutong carefully felt the air rushing into his lungs. Apart from his heart pounding, he didn't feel that familiar suffocating sensation.

"Let's go." Lu Qinglian said without turning her head. "That's enough for today. Tell me the details on the way."

As she spoke, she walked back to the old house and closed the iron gate of the tunnel.

“I didn’t see anything else, just the other person’s eyes. To be honest, I couldn’t tell anything at all.” Zhang Shutong said, opening the photo album and walking a few steps to Lu Qinglian’s side. “Look, this is it…”

Lu Qinglian glanced at it, but perhaps she didn't notice anything more, and then looked away.

Zhang Shutong muttered to himself:

"It was my first time doing something like this, and I didn't get the angle right. If I had tilted the phone up a little more, I could have at least captured the hat, if not the face..."

"make it clear."

"That person was wearing a brown hat and driving a sedan. That's all we have." Zhang Shutong opened the front-facing camera and scrolled through his phone. "I estimate this angle is good..."

As he spoke, he pressed the shutter button, and a photo was taken.

Zhang Shutong stared thoughtfully at the top of the photo:
"Hmm, around 40 or 50 degrees is just right..."

But a hand snatched his phone away.

How do I delete it?

Lu Qinglian asked expressionlessly.

Zhang Shutong then realized that he had inadvertently saved a selfie of the two of them on his phone:

"Sorry, there's a navigation bar below the photo. Click the delete button."

As soon as she finished speaking, Lu Qinglian returned the phone to him.

Zhang Shutong looked at the photo album, where there was a "group photo" just a few seconds ago. He then looked at Lu Qinglian's back and thought to himself, "Actually, there's another recycle bin, but you don't know about it."

Perhaps she doesn't like taking photos, or maybe she changed her clothes today, or perhaps she doesn't like being in the same photo with other men, let alone a selfie.

But there was no point in keeping these photos. They weren't like the ones he took of Gu Qiu Mian back then, and he was too lazy to play tricks. He then opened the recycle bin.

The moment Zhang Shutong tapped the screen, a sudden thought struck him. Perhaps the photo Ruoping had asked him to take was like this, but he certainly wouldn't make a decision on his own without Lu Qinglian's permission, so he decided to delete it.

This may be Lu Qinglian's first selfie.

However, because he was studying the shooting angle at the time, the camera was looking up, which is usually a bad angle for selfies, but the girl in the picture had an oval face, which did not diminish her beauty at all.

Between Lu Qinglian and her own head, there was a glimmer of light, like a beautiful star.

Zhang Shutong stared blankly at the photo.

"You really did it on purpose." Lu Qinglian had returned to his side at some point. She slowly uttered a few words, but the temperature around her seemed to drop below zero.

Zhang Shutong's hair stood on end.

“Wait…” He suddenly turned around and looked at the spot where the light was flashing. When the two of them took this photo, they were facing the old house, which was located behind the hospital. In other words, the background of this photo was the back wall of the hospital.

Zhang Shutong looked at the back wall of the hospital. In the second-floor window, the entire corridor was lit with dim yellow lights, but the light reflected in the photo did not look like starlight. Moreover, the starlight seemed to be directly imprinted on the window.

Zhang Shutong quickly shifted his gaze, and then:

A brown hat came into view.

Not long ago, while staring at the photo, he suddenly noticed a familiar brown color under the starlight.

At this moment, Zhang Shutong finally confirmed his guess: it was not starlight at all!
It's actually the metal decoration on a man's hat!

A chill ran through their bodies. Sure enough, the man had come to the hospital. Instead of going straight to the old house, he silently observed them in the hospital corridor!

But why exactly?
Zhang Shutong still couldn't understand why, if that man was looking for "Ruoping," he didn't just ambush them directly, but instead kept observing the two of them from a distance that was neither too close nor too far.

(End of this chapter)