“If we were back together, wouldn’t we be sitting at the same table?” Ming Li countered.
“True.”
After agreeing, Zhu Hanxing became even more puzzled. “Then why? What’s her angle?”
Ming Li gave the same answer: “I don’t know.”
She didn’t even know why Gu Qingshuang kept calling her to talk about the Gu family’s affairs, including Gu Liufu and Gu Xueqiang.
At first, Ming Li guessed it was because Gu Qingshuang had no one else to share these things with—someone she wasn’t afraid of losing face in front of. But then she remembered the last time she had seen Gu Qingshuang eating with Liu Siwang and Chun Liuyi. Their relationship seemed to have improved significantly.
So, the current Gu Qingshuang wasn’t alone. If she had friends, why was she still looking for her?
Ming Li felt an intuitive sense of danger, but she was unwilling to follow that line of thought. She simply put it out of her mind.
So when Zhu Hanxing brought it up, Ming Li just shook her head. “Who knows.”
Zhu Hanxing asked, “Is it that you don’t want to know, or you really don’t know?”
“I don’t want to.” Ming Li looked out at the sunlight, which carried the chill of winter.
Without realizing it, another winter had arrived. The year was almost over.
This year of ups and downs was finally coming to a calm conclusion. Her life now was good, and she liked it this way.
Ming Li didn’t want to think about other things. There might be some unresolved knots between her and Gu Qingshuang, but they didn’t matter anymore.
To her, the relationship was over. The curtain had long since fallen on her and Gu Qingshuang’s story.
So, whatever happened in the aftermath didn’t matter.
Ming Li felt a trace of curiosity, but she wouldn’t pursue it.
Zhu Hanxing stared at her for a long time before suddenly bursting into laughter.
“What are you laughing at?” Ming Li asked.
“I’m happy for you,” Zhu Hanxing said.
Ming Li tilted her head. “?”
“I can clearly see a certain phrase written all over you.”
“What?”
Zhu Hanxing said slowly, “Leaving a wrong relationship is like a rebirth.”
Zhu Hanxing hadn’t seen Ming Li for half a month. Last time, there were still traces of melancholy in her. Now, her brow was clear and peaceful.
“What about you?” Ming Li took the opportunity to ask. “Are you planning on being ‘reborn’ from your own wrong relationship?”
Zhu Hanxing shook her head mysteriously. “I’m different.”
“How are you different?”
Zhu Hanxing didn’t answer directly. Instead, she recited a line of poetry: “Drawing a sword to cut water only makes it flow more.”
Ming Li knew how hard it was to make that decision. Even she had wavered back and forth several times before finally resolving to give up on that marriage.
“Do you still know how to feel pain?” Ming Li suddenly asked.
“I’m not an idiot,” Zhu Hanxing said as if it were obvious. “Of course I do.”
“Good,” Ming Li said. “Only make the decision when it hurts so much you can’t take it anymore.”
Zhu Hanxing shrugged and sprawled lazily on the sofa, her eyes half-closed as she thought about who-knows-what.
After a long silence, Ming Li returned to her desk and opened a file to start working.
Then she heard Zhu Hanxing ask in a drowsy voice, “Do you still like Gu Qingshuang?”
Ming Li’s hand stopped. Her eyes scanned the lines of text on the paper, but the words didn’t register in her mind.
Instead, her mind drifted to the scene of Gu Qingshuang eating at the next table—so different from when they first met.
The cold winter sun reflected off her desk, reminding her of that afternoon in the hospital.
Gu Qingshuang had stood before her, blocking out most of the harsh sunlight.
After a long time, Ming Li answered softly, “A little bit.”
In a while, she probably wouldn’t.
Or maybe she still would, but it would only be a negligible amount of affection.
Something destined to remain only in her memory.
Zhu Hanxing didn’t laugh. She fell into deep thought before breaking the silence again. “So, Gu Qingshuang was your first love?”
“Yeah,” Ming Li said.
If Zhu Hanxing had asked this a month ago, Ming Li probably would have denied it.
Back then, she wasn’t open enough; she was still hiding her feelings and her past.
But now, she could answer the question calmly.
“Then your first love was a hell-level dungeon. Everything should be smooth sailing from now on,” Zhu Hanxing said.
Ming Li teased her back, “And what about your first love? Didn’t you also run into a tough nut like Chun Liuyi?”
Zhu Hanxing suddenly snapped her eyes open. “No, she wasn’t.”
Ming Li blinked. “She wasn’t hard enough to conquer?”
“No.” Zhu Hanxing relaxed back into her lazy posture. “I mean, she wasn’t my first love.”
Ming Li: “…”
Zhu Hanxing said casually, “My first love was Yan Xiyun.”
Ming Li mentally scanned everyone she knew but couldn’t place the name.
“You were in a relationship in middle school?” Ming Li asked.
Zhu Hanxing wagged a finger. “It was when I first started out in the industry.”
Zhu Hanxing searched for Yan Xiyun and showed her phone to Ming Li. It was an actress with only a hundred thousand followers. She looked very ethereal, with large eyes, a high nose bridge, and a perfectly shaped face.
Ming Li looked at the photo and asked, “Did she have work done?”
“No,” Zhu Hanxing said. “She was only eighteen when I worked with her. She just looks like that. Her mom looks like that, too.”
Ming Li was stunned. “You’ve even met her mom?”
“We were on the same set; her mom stayed with the production,” Zhu Hanxing explained. “If she hadn’t just turned eighteen, I would have pursued her.”
Ming Li: “…”
After knowing her for so many years, Ming Li finally realized that Zhu Hanxing liked older women, not younger ones.
After leaving the restaurant, Gu Qingshuang’s chest had been feeling uncomfortable—perhaps from eating too much too suddenly.
She found a bench on the street and sat with her eyes closed to rest. She hadn’t managed to speak to Ming Li today, but she had still drawn some strength from being near her.
Thinking about what was going to happen tomorrow, she couldn’t help but feel nervous. Her breathing was becoming erratic.
Gu Qingshuang thought that she still wasn’t strong enough.
She wasn’t like Gu Xueqiang, who could eat and sleep as usual, even finding time to go to the hospital to pressure Gu Liufu into finishing his letter of confession so he could read it at his own “funeral.”
Gu Qingshuang didn’t know the specifics of how they communicated. She only received brief, sparse replies from Gu Xueqiang.
But even those were enough to make her heart tremble.
Gu Qingshuang was nowhere near as composed as she had acted with Ming Li. She could only manage small bites of food every day; anything more, and she would throw it up.
Just as she had resolved to move out of Gu Manor, her grandmother passed away. She had no choice but to stay and live with Gu Xueqiang.
After the grandmother’s death, Gu Manor lost what little life it had left. Gu Xueqiang was silent every day, acting like a machine. Gu Qingshuang didn’t dare speak to her, fearing she might say the wrong thing and trigger her. The doctors said Gu Xueqiang shouldn’t get agitated.
When Gu Qingshuang was at home, she could go the whole day without saying a word. At the hospital, she performed her duties mechanically. Aside from saying things like “cut the suture” to her assistants during surgery, her communication with patients during rounds had dwindled significantly.
By the end of the day, she spoke fewer than twenty sentences.
Gu Qingshuang felt as though her vocal cords were rusting from disuse, but she truly didn’t know what to say.
Life was so dull it had lost all color.
![Saving the Supporting Female Characters [Quick Transmigration]](https://dobytranslations.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/sup.webp "Saving the Supporting Female Characters [Quick Transmigration]")
