The waves beat rhythmically against the ship’s side, and Lu Mingfei slowly opened his eyes.
“Shouting loudly won’t help. The so-called spiritual power of words, Yanling may use language, but what takes effect is the heart that resonates with that language,” said someone softly amidst the sound of the sea breeze.
“Lu Mingze?” Lu Mingfei stood up. It felt as though he had fallen asleep on this deck—Bronze City, the Dragon King, and Nono were all just part of a dream.
The stars above him, the vast, dark ocean below—no islands, no land. Amidst the endless water, there was a white sailboat drifting. Two people were on it—him and the young man in the black suit, with a lace tie.
“I came to see you because you’re about to die,” Lu Mingze said, sitting on the ship’s side, swinging his legs, kicking up splashes in the black sea.
Lu Mingfei stared at him blankly for a while, then slowly lay back down, facing the sky, breathing in the cold sea breeze.
“What are you doing?” Lu Mingze asked.
“Trying to rest! I still have things to do once I’m done dreaming,” Lu Mingfei panted heavily, “I’m really busy! Please! Even if I’m your summoned creature, at least respect my rights. Don’t just summon me into a dream out of nowhere when I’m busy to the point of coughing up blood, okay?”
“Don’t waste your energy; do you think this is a halftime break? When you’re dreaming, time in reality doesn’t freeze, so while we’re talking here, you could have already died out there. In the real world, that girl has a wound in her chest, losing 90% of her blood. Her consciousness is fading, her heartbeat is racing like an overclocked motorcycle, and it could stop at any moment. Then her life would end, leaving you all alone, trapped in a diving bell, facing a Dragon King. A noble first-generation dragon, directly descended from the Black Emperor Nidhogg, with pure blood and unmatched power, and now fused with the Dragon Servitor ‘Samson.’” Lu Mingze shrugged. “You’re really about to die, at any moment.”
“None of your business!” Lu Mingfei shouted.
“Don’t you feel sad, dying alone like that?” Lu Mingze tilted his head, curiously studying Lu Mingfei. “Oh, I forgot, you never thought of yourself as lonely. How pathetic…” Lu Mingze’s voice was unnaturally heavy for his age. “Even more pathetic than loneliness is not even realizing how lonely you are, or knowing you’re lonely but lying to yourself about it.”
“Lonely? Can I eat that? Are you a poet, being so dramatic about loneliness?” Lu Mingfei paced irritably on the deck. “Enough already! I don’t have time to play with you!”
“Alright, calm down. Though time isn’t frozen, it’s moving slower outside than it is here. So when you go back, there’s still a chance to save your friend—if you have the ability to save her.” Lu Mingze said.
“Why didn’t you say that earlier? Let me rest a bit more; I’m exhausted.” Lu Mingfei lay down again, breathing heavily.
After watching the waves silently for a while, Lu Mingze turned to Lu Mingfei and said, “Hey, loser, do you have any life goals?”
“I’ve thought about it!”
“Tell me about it?”
“I want to blow a hole in the Himalayas so that warm Indian Ocean air can cross over the roof of the world to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, turning our great country’s thousand miles of glaciers into fertile land where people can live happily, achieving a real Shangri-La!”
“That’s a line from Ge You in Be There or Be Square, and it’s impossible. The altitude is too high; even if you blasted a hole, the warm air wouldn’t reach up there.” Lu Mingze didn’t even blink. “You’re talking nonsense.”
“If you know it’s nonsense, why are you even asking? I can’t be bothered with you.” Lu Mingfei turned his back to him.
“Just tell me. Maybe I can help you? Maybe I’m actually quite good at… slaying dragons?” Lu Mingze’s eyes were sly.
“You?” Lu Mingfei flipped over immediately.
“You should understand by now that I’m not an ordinary person, considering we’re able to have this conversation here.” Lu Mingze’s voice was persuasive. “Tell me, why did you choose Cassell College? Taking such risks isn’t worth it for you, is it?”
Lu Mingfei scratched his head, thinking for a long time. “You said it yourself, right? Everyone has to have a reason to convince themselves to do the dragon-slaying stuff… That night, I thought about it over and over and could only come up with one reason: to make my parents proud. Sometimes I think it’s ridiculous—I passed the 3E exam by cheating, and I have no idea how I got an ‘S’ rating. You helped me solve the Bronze City map, and I impulsively shot Caesar and Chu Zihang, instantly becoming a campus legend… Do you think that’s what it means to be successful?”
“Luck is also a form of success,” Lu Mingze said. “But someone like you shouldn’t have joined the Student Union; then you wouldn’t have been sent to this place.”
“A girl used her beauty to pull me in,” Lu Mingfei murmured, gazing up at the sky. “As a man, how could I resist that?”
“Are you really going to spend your whole life hopelessly pining after girls who are out of your league?” Lu Mingze sneered.
“What do you mean by ‘out of my league’?”
“It means the chances are as slim as Mars colliding with Earth.” Lu Mingze shrugged.
“You don’t understand—you’re not even an adult yet.” Lu Mingfei looked directly at Lu Mingze.
“I don’t understand?” Lu Mingze stared back.
“You don’t understand that feeling. For years, no one thought you mattered. No one cared what you did today. Eventually, even you start to feel like you’re unnecessary. Whether you live or die doesn’t really matter to anyone but yourself. You spend lots of time daydreaming because you don’t know what to do. People say you lack self-worth and confidence, but where is this supposed ‘self-worth’ supposed to come from? Those people don’t actually care about you; they only criticize. You end up talking to yourself in your head because no one else will listen. Where’s the worth in that?” Lu Mingfei’s voice grew louder.
Lu Mingze watched him silently.
“One day, you feel like you’re being stepped on, but you’re so used to being worthless that you don’t even want to stand up. You just want to stay there. But then the door opens, light comes in, and a beautiful girl—wearing ten-centimeter heels, a short skirt, driving a Ferrari—pulls you out of the screening room, and suddenly you’re someone cool, in front of everyone…” Lu Mingfei sat up, clenching his fist. “That feeling… It’s powerful… Do you get it? I’ve never felt that cool before!”