The sickly one in F4 was the group's darling.

The soft morning light streamed into the ward through the glass window, and the surroundings were quiet, filled only with a gentle warmth.

Bai Ci's mind was still foggy, and when she met Bai Jiheng's ambiguous smile, she didn't react for a moment.

Bai Jiheng raised an eyebrow slightly, showing no sign of urgency, but clearly harboring mischief. He loved seeing Bai Ci's bewildered and helpless expression.

"...Third Brother." Bai Ci's voice was still a little hoarse from just waking up.

Bai Jiheng walked to the bedside, picked up the thermos on the bedside table, unscrewed the lid, and held it to Bai Ci's lips.

"Drink some water to soothe your throat first, don't call me as soon as you open your mouth, your voice will crack."

Bai Ci lowered his head and took a sip. The water was neither too hot nor too cold, just right to swallow. He took two more sips, and the water moistened his throat, slowly dissipating the dry, foreign feeling. He looked up and scanned the room, but didn't see anyone else.

Bai Jiheng took in all his little movements, a faint smile playing on his lips, deliberately not taking the initiative to speak.

Bai Ci hesitated for a moment, then finally spoke, tentatively asking in a low voice, "Where is my older brother?"

"What, the first thing you think about when you open your eyes is your eldest brother?" Bai Jiheng put the cup back on the bedside table, his voice trailing off casually, with a hint of awkwardness. "Your third brother has been here watching over you for most of the day, feeding you and taking care of you in every way, but you don't even care if your third brother is tired? And the first thing you ask when you wake up is about your eldest brother?"

"That's not what I meant..." Bai Ci hurriedly explained.

"What does that mean?"

Bai Ci was taken aback by the question, her fingers unconsciously tightening around the warm hand warmer in her arms. She lowered her head and muttered softly, "I just didn't see him..."

In my mind, Xiao Qi quietly popped her head out, holding a slice of watermelon and starting to eat melon: Goodness, Third Brother's jealousy has overflowed again! Bai Bai's number one in his heart is indeed Big Brother! It must be that Bai Ci is still intimidated by his first impression of Third Brother, and he's pinching his chin.

Bai Jiheng watched as the tips of his ears gradually turned red, and the frustration he felt from being "showed off" last night finally found a way to be relieved. He deliberately dragged out his words and slowly said, "Oh—so you didn't see anyone, so you only started looking for them as soon as you opened your eyes."

Unable to find a rebuttal, Bai Ci simply lay back down on the bed, burying half her face in the soft pillow, revealing only her light amber eyes as she looked at him with a mixture of embarrassment and innocence.

After thoroughly enjoying Bai Ci's embarrassing state, Bai Jiheng mercifully withdrew his supernatural powers and confessed:

"Big brother went to the lounge next door to change his clothes. You held his hand all night, and his back was almost stiff from sitting in that position for so long. I just chased him away."

Bai Ci was instantly stunned, her eyes filled with astonishment.

"I was holding his hand?"

"Otherwise what?" Bai Jiheng raised an eyebrow, admiring the ever-changing expression on Bai Ci's face, and added fuel to the fire, "He held on so tightly, you couldn't pull him away no matter what. If your older brother moved even slightly, you would frown, and he wouldn't dare to move. He just sat there on the edge of the bed, letting you hold on for the whole night."

Last night, in a half-dream, half-awake state, that warm touch instantly flooded Bai Ci's mind.

The warm touch in his dream, the only thing that made him feel warm in the boundless cold.

It turned out it wasn't a dream illusion at all.

He actually dared to grab Bai Yanzhi's hand and held it for the entire night.

"I...I don't know." His voice was barely audible, and he shrank deeper into the blankets, wishing he could bury his face in them. "Why didn't my brother pull away?"

Xiaoqi silently complained: Damn it, I only just realized that my brother didn't want to wake you up, so he let you hold on to him all night.

Seeing his expression, Bai Jiheng was in a good mood and wanted to tease him a bit more, but he swallowed the words back.

He thought of Bai Ci's lack of words when he said "I didn't see him," and how he looked around the room after waking up before daring to ask "Where's Big Brother?" In the end, he still softened.

Okay, enough joking around.

"Alright, alright, stop shrinking away. If you keep shrinking, you'll just crawl under the covers. It's not like it's anything shameful. You're cold, he's warm. You're holding on, that's fine, he's the one who won't pull away, and I think he's quite happy about it!"

He reached out and pulled the blanket covering half of Bai Ci's face down.

"Alright, come out here and talk properly, don't keep it all under the pillow."

Bai Ci obediently raised her head, her complexion still weak and feeble.

"How are you feeling now? Is there anything that's bothering you?"

"...No, I just feel a little weak."

Seeing his eyes closed and ears red, Bai Jiheng stopped teasing him and softened his tone: "Speaking of which, you kept talking about strawberries and osmanthus cake in your dream last night, you must have been starving. I'll have Uncle Chen make you some soft and light food later."

Bai Ci's eyelashes trembled. Strawberries and osmanthus cake—he vaguely remembered eating these in his dream, but he had no recollection of saying them aloud.

"...Was I talking in my sleep?" he asked softly.

"More than that." Bai Jiheng's lips curled up again. "The strawberries are so sweet, and I want another piece of osmanthus cake. I ordered in my dream, one dish after another. My older brother and I heard everything clearly."

Bai Ci buried her face back into the pillow.

Bai Jiheng chuckled softly, refrained from further attacking, and took out his phone, skillfully dialing Bai Yanzhi's number.

The call was answered almost instantly.

A deep, cool voice came through the receiver, tinged with an undeniable weariness: "Bai Ci is awake?"

"Yeah, she's fully awake and in good spirits, just a little weak." Bai Jiheng paused, glanced at Bai Ci, and added, "She looked for you as soon as she opened her eyes, but she was too embarrassed to ask directly when she didn't see you, so she asked around for a long time."

There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone, followed by a very soft exhale.

"I'm coming right away."

The phone hangs up.

Bai Jiheng put his phone back in his pocket and turned to look at Bai Ci.

"Did you hear that? Someone come right away."

Bai Ci lifted her face from the pillow, blinked her light brown eyes, and gave a soft "hmm".

His eyes were fixed on the door of the ward, his ears were bright red, but the corners of his mouth couldn't help but turn up slightly.

Bai Jiheng saw it all, but said nothing.

He calculated in his mind when Bai Yanzhi would arrive, and then looked at Bai Ci's expression, which was clearly waiting but pretending to be in a daze.

"You'll be there in two minutes, and your ears are still red. Take a break, or I'll warn you."

Bai Ci didn't respond, but simply pulled the blanket up to cover her still red ears.