The Secret Realm of Time, His and Her Life Through the Changes

"Wang Jie, you're awake." Shang Yibo was awakened by a distant and ethereal voice. He opened his eyes forcefully and could feel his eyeballs rolling around in their sockets. His eyelids were heavy, and he tried to open them a crack. The light that came in was a bit dazzling, and he could vaguely see the face of an old man moving in front of him. At the same time, he felt his body being shaken rhythmically.

"Is Wang Jie awake? Grandpa," the young man asked anxiously. "Thank goodness, he's finally awake! He scared me to death."

"The doctor said he'll be fine if he wakes up in the next couple of days," an old man's voice said. "Jian Zheng, could you please stay here and watch over things while I get the doctor to give him another check-up?"

The rustling sound, the sound of a door closing.

A few moments later, several people came in. After whispering among themselves for a while, a man who sounded like a doctor said, "The indicators are normal. He just woke up, so let him rest for a bit. He can have some liquid food later. We'll do another check-up tomorrow, and if there are no problems, he can be discharged."

"Thank you, doctor," the old man replied happily.

Then came rustling sounds, hurried footsteps, and the sound of a door closing.

"Jian Zheng, could you please stay here with Wang Jie for a while? I'll go back and cook him some porridge and bring him some side dishes," the old man said softly.

“Okay, you go ahead. You should eat something and rest for a bit,” the man thought for a moment and then added, “Or, I can just buy some porridge from the shop downstairs and bring it up. You can go back and rest, and come back tonight. You haven’t slept much these past two days, you’ve been with him the whole time, your body won’t be able to take it.”

"It's alright, it's alright. Wang Jie getting better is the most important thing. I'll head back now and should be back in about two hours. Thank you."

Shang Yibo had been awake for a while, initially his eyes were a little droopy, but now they were wide open. His mind raced. Where was he? It must be a hospital. Why was he lying in a hospital bed? Who was the old man from earlier? Who was the young man who spoke? And who was "Wang Jie" that they and the doctor were calling out?

"Hey, stop pretending now that you're awake. Those big, innocent eyes have been terrifying these past few days," the young man said to Shang Yibo as he turned back after seeing the old man out.

"What's wrong? Did you lie there like a madman?"

"Hey, hey, say something! Can you speak?" The young man looked at Shang Yibo, who remained silent and dazed, somewhat at a loss. "Can't you speak? Don't scare me. Are you better or not?"

"The doctor said everything was fine during the checkup, so why does he look like he's gone mad?" the man muttered to himself.

Then, he leaned down, his face close to Shang Yibo's, their noses almost touching, and said, "Is he stupid or just not fully awake yet?"

As soon as the man opened his mouth to speak, spittle flew directly into Shang Yibo's face.

Shang Yibo quickly tilted his head to the side to avoid the spittle, but he couldn't escape the bad breath.

Then, the man started shaking Shang Yibo's shoulders. Just as he reached out to slap Shang Yibo's face, Shang Yibo finally couldn't take it anymore and said, "What are you doing?"

"Hey, you can finally talk! How are you?"

"I'm fine," Shang Yibo replied. Judging from the situation, if he didn't say anything soon, he would go to find a doctor.

"You are... Jian Zheng, what's going on?" Shang Yibo originally wanted to ask "Who are you?" but seeing that the young man seemed to know him well, and that the old man here had called him "Jian Zheng," which must be his name, he changed his mind and called him by his name. That way, he could ask about the situation.

"You don't remember? Tsk tsk, that was pretty close, quite scary." Jian Zheng pouted, plopped down on the edge of the bed, and began to vividly recount the story. "It was last week, it rained for several days in a row, you remember? That day, we left school, I was about to go home, but you insisted on going to Xiao Jing's house to tutor her. I told you there was a big downpour that night and asked you to send a message to Xiao Jing not to go, but you wouldn't listen. You insisted on going, saying that exams were coming up and you needed to cram to get good grades. You even said that the tuition had already been paid, and if you missed class, you'd get a refund, and you'd already planned to spend that money, so you couldn't get a refund. Blah blah blah, I couldn't argue with you, so I just went home by myself."

In the middle of the night, my grandfather came to my house and knocked on the door anxiously, waking up the whole family. It was almost 12 o'clock. My grandfather said that I had not come home yet and he was very worried. If I lived at school, I would definitely tell my family in advance. It is impossible for me to not come home to sleep without telling them.

The rain that day was exceptionally heavy, almost unbelievably so, accompanied by bursts of thunderstorms. The weather forecast even issued a yellow disaster warning.

I told Grandpa that you went to Xiaojing's house for tutoring and should have been back by 8 o'clock at the normal time. Where could you have gone so late? Grandpa got even more worried, so I said, "Don't worry, I know Xiaojing's family. They used to be our neighbors. I was the one who introduced Wang Jie to the tutoring job." I said I would take Grandpa to Xiaojing's house to find you, because Grandpa was afraid of disturbing them in the middle of the night.

I told you you might have gone back to school. I called the dorm supervisor to ask, but she said you weren't in the dorm.

I sent Xiao Jing another message. It was good. After a while, Xiao Jing replied that you got home before 8 o'clock.

Grandpa became even more anxious. Later, we discussed it and I decided to take Grandpa towards Xiao Jing's house first, and then decide what to do based on the situation along the way.

We were all quite worried at the time, because given your character and actions, you wouldn't do something like this without informing or sending any news to make Grandpa worry. We were all wondering if something had happened, and afraid of making Grandpa anxious, I didn't dare to say anything.

"Fortunately, everything is alright now," Jian Zheng said in a low voice. He was still shaken as he recounted what happened that night, his face flushing and paling involuntarily. He continued, "I told Grandpa to wait for news at home, but he refused and insisted on coming out with me to look for you."

"We were out for a while when the rain gradually stopped. Xiao Jing's house is a bit far from mine, and there were no cars around late at night, so we had to walk along the road towards Xiao Jing's house to find you. When we were almost at her house, we passed Uncle Kui's small shop, which was still open with its lights on. We asked Uncle Kui, who was tidying up his things at the shop, if he had seen you. Uncle Kui said he hadn't noticed, but when the rain was at its heaviest, it seemed like a car was parked in front of us and someone was being lifted into it. He didn't see it clearly, and he wasn't sure if someone had been hit or what happened. At the time, there was thunder and lightning, so Uncle Kui didn't go out to check."

"Then, my pager went off. I saw it was a message telling me to go to Xida Hospital. When my grandfather and I arrived at the hospital, we saw you lying there. When the driver brought you in, the doctor examined you and found that you had no obvious external injuries and your body was perfectly normal, just unconscious. The driver called the police himself, and the police came and confirmed that what the driver said was true. He didn't hit anyone; he just saw a dark figure lying on the side of the road and put him in the car to take him to the hospital. The police checked your pager and found that the last number that called you was me, so they sent me a message."

Jian Zheng recounted everything that happened that day in one breath. Seeing Wang Jie listening in a daze, he patted Wang Jie's thigh through the blanket: "Are you still half asleep? What exactly happened that day?" Before Wang Jie could answer, he muttered to himself, "Anyway, it's all over now. The doctor said that as long as you wake up, you'll be fine. Haha, you're still a hero!"

Infected by Jian Zheng's enthusiastic emotions, Shang Yibo forced a smile onto his stiff face. He thought to himself, "They might have mistaken me for someone else. But this Jian Zheng is quite interesting; he's not boring at all. And that old man, um, grandfather, seems to care about him a lot. Anyway, he's just traveling to relax. It doesn't matter where he is, as long as he's away from home. Never mind, let's see how things go before deciding." Still somewhat bewildered, Shang Yibo could only accept the current situation for now.

Suddenly, he remembered that Jian Zheng had mentioned "pager" when recounting the situation. So, he tentatively asked, "You said the police contacted you? What pager message?"

"Why is he acting stupid again? It seems that the drowsy state has some aftereffects. I need to ask the doctor later. Such a smart brain can't have any aftereffects."

Jian Zheng rambled on and on with his thoughts, but didn't answer Shang Yibo's question.

“Pager?” Shang Yibo repeated the term.

Jian Zheng pulled a small, rectangular black device from his waistband, held it up in front of Shang Yibo, and said, "This will satisfy your feigned ignorance. See this? You have one too." As he spoke, he gestured towards the bedside table, where a device identical to the one in Jian Zheng's hand lay.

……

Based on what Shang Yibo has touched so far, and some clear, vague, possible, and uncertain memories, he gradually pieced together the picture after deduction.

That evening, in the villa, in the study, the conversation with my father ended unhappily. There was no argument, just the end of the conversation.

He was going on a graduation trip, so he set off early in the morning and changed his itinerary. Instead of going to the Miao village, he booked the earliest flight to Qianzhou.

Anywhere is fine, as long as I leave;

The taxi was driving very fast;

The sky was overcast; torrential rain poured down; lightning flashed and thunder roared...