His physiological preference

"Level 4.6, not a major problem. No casualties have been reported so far."

Zhou Zhanyu said, "I'm in S City, I just arrived tonight. I heard it was an earthquake in Yunzhen, and then I remembered you said last time that your sister-in-law came to see Yun brocade. Yunzhen is famous for its Yun brocade, so she wouldn't have gone there, would she?"

Qin Yuzheng did not answer. He had already taken the phone away from his ear, opened the call log, and dialed Yang Zhiyan's number.

Beep—beep—beep—beep—The number you dialed is temporarily unavailable.

He hung up and dialed again. Beep—beep—beep—beep—The number you dialed is temporarily unavailable.

Dial again. Dial again. Dial again.

More than a dozen calls went unanswered.

Qin Yuzheng sat up in bed, his bare feet on the floor, holding his phone to his ear, listening to the message repeated more than a dozen times: "The number you dialed is temporarily unavailable."

With one hand on his knee, he slowly tapped his fingers on it.

His expression didn't change, but his eyes did. Something was breaking inside them.

He dialed Fang Yibin's number.

"Fang Yibin, come pick me up at Shengshi Tianxi right away and we'll go to the airport."

His voice was flat, so flat it sounded like he was giving instructions for a routine task, but Fang Yibin had followed him for five years and could hear a kind of urgency in that "immediately" that he had never heard before.

"Secretary Qin, what happened?"

"There was an earthquake in Yunzhen. She's there. I can't get through to her on the phone," Qin Yuzheng said. Fang Yibin was silent for a second on the other end, then quickly realized who his leader was referring to as "she."

Qin Yuzheng never mentions anyone; his world consists only of work, documents, and meetings.

The person who's so eager must be the one who confessed their feelings but was rejected, the one who can't have the love they desire.

"I'll be right there." Fang Yibin hung up the phone.

Qin Yuzheng took out a piece of clothing from the closet and changed out of his pajamas.

When I got to the entryway and bent down to put on my shoes, my hands were shaking, and it took me two tries to tie the shoelaces.

He stood up, picked up his car keys and wallet from the entryway cabinet, opened the door, and went out.

The motion-activated lights in the hallway turned on. He walked to the elevator and pressed the button. While waiting for the elevator, he dialed Yang Zhiyan's number again.

The number you dialed is temporarily unavailable. He took the phone away from his ear, looked at the two characters "Zhiyan" on the screen, and gently rubbed his thumb on them.

The elevator arrived, he stepped inside, and the door closed.

Fang Yibin arrived quickly. When Qin Yuzheng sat in the back seat, Fang Yibin glanced at him in the rearview mirror.

His expression remained calm, but Fang Yibin noticed his fingers tapping incessantly on his knees, without rhythm or pattern, clearly indicating his agitation.

"Secretary Qin, the plane tickets are booked. It's the next flight to S City, landing at six o'clock."

"Hmm." Qin Yuzheng leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. He wasn't asleep.

He went over it in his mind again and again: she went to Yunzhen to find Yun Jin. She said she was staying at a guesthouse called "Waiting for the Wind". She said on the phone, "The rain has stopped, but the road is still not open." She said, "I guess I can only leave in a couple of days."

Why didn't he let her leave sooner?

He opened his eyes, took out his phone, and dialed again. The number you have dialed is temporarily unavailable.

He put down his phone and looked out the car window at the streetlights rushing past.

The light swept across his face frame by frame, brightening and dimming, brightening and dimming, like a never-ending pendulum counting down the time for him.

When the plane landed in S City, it was just getting light. A thin line of pale white, grayish-blue, stretched across the eastern horizon.

When Qin Yuzheng walked out of the arrival hall, he saw Zhou Zhanyu standing at the exit, wearing a dark jacket and holding a cup of coffee. Zhou Zhanyu handed the coffee to Qin Yuzheng.

"Zheng, the car is outside." Zhou Zhanyu didn't waste any more words and turned to walk ahead.

Qin Yuzheng followed him and got into the car. Zhou Zhanyu started the car and drove out of the parking lot.

It takes more than two hours to drive from S City to Yun Town. Qin Yuzheng sat in the passenger seat, holding his phone, glancing at the screen every few minutes. No messages, no calls, no news from her whatsoever.

He dialed her number, but no one answered. He had lost count of how many times he had dialed.

From 1 a.m. until now, dozens of calls have been made, but not a single one has been answered.

His right index finger was constantly rubbing the side of the phone; the movement was so subtle that it was almost unnoticeable unless you looked closely.

Zhou Zhanyu noticed. He had known Qin Yuzheng for twenty years, from high school to now, from a naive teenager to a political bigwig.

He had seen Qin Yuzheng calmly shoot on the basketball court, speak composedly at meetings, and drink heavily without getting drunk at the dinner table.

He had never seen Qin Yuzheng like this before, so panicked and distraught.

"Brother Qin, you're only level 4.6, you'll be fine," Zhou Zhanyu said.

"I know," Qin Yuzheng said. His voice was flat, but his eyes never left the phone screen.

When the car entered Yunzhen, it was already broad daylight. Sunlight shone from behind the eastern mountain ridge, bathing the entire town in a golden glow.

The town looks unchanged; the houses are still there, the roads are still there, and the trees are still there.

There were no collapsed buildings, no broken glass scattered on the ground, and no sirens blaring from ambulances and fire trucks.

The town seemed to wake up from a nightmare, stretch, yawn, and then realize that it was just a small 4.6 magnitude earthquake, just a few shakes, just a night with no real danger.

Qin Yuzheng felt a sense of relief.

The car stopped in front of the "Waiting for the Wind" B&B.

Qin Yuzheng pushed open the car door, stood at the entrance of the guesthouse, and looked at the wooden door.

The door was closed, and on the stone steps by the door was a potted green ivy that had been knocked over by last night's earthquake. The pot was broken, soil was scattered all over the ground, the roots of the green ivy were exposed, and the leaves were still green.

He pushed open the wooden door and went inside. Several people were sitting in the courtyard, wrapped in blankets and leaning against the wall. Some were dozing off, some were chatting quietly, and some were eating breakfast.

Sister Zhao was standing in the middle of the courtyard, holding a bowl of porridge, talking to a guest. Hearing footsteps, she turned around.

Then she stopped moving.

Looking at the man standing at the door, he was handsome, with an extraordinary demeanor and an imposing presence.

But his hair was a bit messy, he had dark circles under his eyes, and his lips were a bit dry.

His gaze swept across the courtyard, over every face, every person wrapped in a blanket, and every person dozing against the wall.

Sister Zhao walked over carrying a bowl of porridge. "Who are you looking for?"

"Yang Zhiyan," Qin Yuzheng said, "lives here."

Sister Zhao glanced at him. The aura emanating from this man made her instinctively wary; this was someone she wouldn't want to mess with in the future.

She has run a bed and breakfast for over ten years and has met all sorts of people, so she has a good eye for people.

"What's your relationship to her?" Sister Zhao asked.

"Boyfriend," Qin Yuzheng said firmly.

Sister Zhao looked at him. His expression showed no nervousness or guilt.

Sister Zhao thought of last night, when the earthquake struck and the girl ran out barefoot, sat in the yard wrapped in a blanket, and chatted and dozed off out of boredom, but her phone was in the room and she hadn't taken it out.

"The second floor, the innermost room," Sister Zhao said, "Everyone came out after the earthquake, but she didn't go back until dawn. She's probably still sleeping."

She took Qin Yuzheng up there.

Qin Yuzheng asked, "Is she alright?"

Sister Zhao noticed that his eyes were bloodshot and there were dark circles under them.

"It's nothing, I was just scared," Sister Zhao said.

Qin Yuzheng walked to the innermost door, stopped, and knocked on the door three times.

The proprietress stood a little distance away and watched.