“I’m asking you, is your leg hurting again?”
Qiu Yiran lit up the screen on the phone in her hand and dazedly lifted her eyelids a bit. “The ambulance is almost here.”
She didn’t answer directly.
But Li Wuhui already knew that Qiu Yiran must be in severe pain.
She closed her eyelids briefly, then opened them again, but her gaze remained fixed on Qiu Yiran’s left leg—
It was wrapped in thick fleece pants, looking no different from a normal person’s leg.
But anyone who hadn’t experienced this kind of pain firsthand could never truly empathize with Qiu Yiran right now.
Every extra second of pain was torture for her entire nervous system, like being roasted over fire and electrocuted at the same time.
Li Wuhui closed her eyes again, her voice hoarse. “How much longer until the ambulance gets here?”
Qiu Yiran silently checked her phone. “It should be soon.”
“Why hasn’t the phone rung yet?” Li Wuhui pressed.
She stared straight at the snow drifting down. At this moment, she suddenly didn’t like the snow anymore.
“Maybe they’re on their way.” Qiu Yiran comforted her.
“Liar.”
Li Wuhui’s voice trembled.
Qiu Yiran let out a breath and lit up the screen again—the signal bars had vanished five minutes ago.
“Qiu Yiran.” Li Wuhui looked at the swirling snow.
“Yeah?”
Qiu Yiran was in too much pain to keep her eyes open; tears and sweat slowly trickled down from her eyelids, stinging her eyes too.
“I’ll get you out of here.” Li Wuhui’s voice was soft, but it carried weight.
“What?” Qiu Yiran hadn’t heard clearly.
Li Wuhui didn’t repeat it.
She seemed to steel herself for something, fastening her seatbelt again, then taking a very deep breath.
“I’ll get you out of here.”
Li Wuhui stepped on the accelerator and repeated it.
As if she’d made up her mind completely.
Qiu Yiran forced her eyes open against the pain. In extreme agony, everything she saw flickered in and out of brightness—like there was a light switch in her head, flipping on and off with her vision.
And so.
The Li Wuhui she saw was also flickering in and out, like a dream she couldn’t make out clearly.
She no longer had the strength to stop her.
She didn’t know where the road ahead would lead. But she knew their situation was very dangerous—
A blizzard, fever, a phone with no signal, and visibility so low on the road.
“Li Wuhui.”
So, she fought to stay conscious and say what she wanted to say before passing out. “Do you remember the third condition I mentioned before we set out?”
The Li Wuhui in her flickering vision alternated between Li Chunfeng and Li Wuhui.
But whether it was Li Chunfeng or Li Wuhui, the woman always had her back straight and rigid, her attitude resolute.
“Don’t talk nonsense.”
“What if,” Qiu Yiran’s voice was faint, “I’m saying what if. What if this snow turns out worse than we thought, what if I accidentally fall asleep soon, what if the car breaks down after I do, what if you start feeling cold, scared, like we’re about to die and you can’t drive anymore—then you have to run out first by yourself, find someone calm and rational to come save me, got it?”
“No what ifs.” Li Wuhui’s voice sounded certain.
Qiu Yiran gazed at her profile.
She didn’t know how much longer she could stare so unabashedly.
“Hearing you say that gives me a lot of confidence.” Qiu Yiran said.
Li Wuhui’s expression softened.
Qiu Yiran closed her eyes for a moment, then continued, “But I still want you to promise me.”
“No what ifs.” Li Wuhui repeated stubbornly.
“You’re so stubborn.” Qiu Yiran sighed. “And you always go back on your word.”
“You know it.”
The car stalled inexplicably again, for some unknown reason.
Li Wuhui’s voice carried more hesitation and unease, but she tried to suppress it, speaking in a joking tone. “Making a deal with me is a bad bargain.”
“So—”
Just before Qiu Yiran’s consciousness fully sank, she knew the car had stopped moving again.
Li Wuhui turned to look at her. Outside the side window was a vast white world blanketed in snow.
“You have to come find me and settle the score after you wake up.”
Finally, Li Wuhui forced a smile at her and spat out the warning word by word.
“Got it?”
Qiu Yiran couldn’t respond.
Because she finally passed out from the pain.
She lost all awareness, feeling nothing of where her body ended up.
No dreams.
Not sleep.
A blackout.
So she had no idea—
How terrified and panicked Li Wuhui had been alone after she passed out, or what had happened next.
She only knew that when she jolted awake again—
Her consciousness still felt heavy, like it had been scorched with fever, then hurled from a great height and slammed back into her body.
Her vision still flickered in and out.
Qiu Yiran struggled to open her eyes and found herself still in the car. Her first instinct wasn’t to check the road—it was to look beside her—
She wasn’t alone.
Her first reaction was disappointment; she’d rather Li Wuhui had abandoned her and the car to run off by now.
Her second reaction was that something felt off.
Li Wuhui was still in the car.
The woman was slumped over the steering wheel, her hunched shoulders shaking, her curly hair draped over her shoulder with the tips trembling too. She looked like she was…
Sobbing uncontrollably.
The thought hit Qiu Yiran like a shock.
In her panic, she suddenly coughed violently, like a blower inside her body blasting air outward.
No time to think more, she struggled up and patted Li Wuhui’s shoulder on the driver’s seat.
“Li Wuhui, don’t be scared.”
Her voice was raspy from the inflammation, like it’d been tortured in hell and sent back up.
Li Wuhui, who had been trembling, froze the instant she coughed.
And when Qiu Yiran’s burning palm touched her back, Li Wuhui hastily lifted her face.
Their eyes met.
Li Wuhui’s eyes were bloodshot.
Then she looked her over from top to bottom.
Only then did Li Wuhui seem to snap out of it. She lowered her head and haphazardly wiped the cooling tears from her face.
“I called your name so many times before—why didn’t you wake up?”
Her voice broke intermittently, like lingering fear mixed with accusation.
Qiu Yiran realized and instinctively apologized first. “Sorry, I—”
“Fool.”
Li Wuhui cut her off, wiping her still-red eyes with the back of her hand. “Why are you the one apologizing for this?”
Qiu Yiran was at a loss.
She thought they’d been trapped in the blizzard, unable to escape, facing some desperate situation. The pain and inflammation still tormented her; her reactions were slow and dull.
“But you do need to apologize.” Li Wuhui suddenly said.
Qiu Yiran was baffled, not knowing what to say.
Li Wuhui reached over.
This time without dodging, she gently wiped the cooling tears from Qiu Yiran’s face. Even with bloodshot eyes, her tone remained resolute. “Because I told you long ago—there’s absolutely no what ifs.”
Qiu Yiran froze.
She instinctively looked outside the car—
And realized their car was parked outside a massive, brightly lit building. They were no longer on the desolate, roadless highway in the wilderness—it looked like a hospital.
The red cross was obvious in the night.
So…
Li Wuhui had really driven her to the hospital? In a raging snowstorm, with no phone signal, even while Qiu Yiran was out cold?
Li Wuhui had really overcome her own fears, done exactly as she said, and made Qiu Yiran see it?
“You don’t believe me.”
While she was still dazed, Li Wuhui’s voice came again, almost irrefutable in the car. “But you still haven’t realized your mistake.”
“So you have to apologize to me.” Her tone seemed righteous, but because she’d just been crying, it came off more like sulking.
“Yeah.”
Qiu Yiran smiled, remembering that phrase used to describe Li Wuhui—she was resolute, proud, and always believed in things others wouldn’t.
She knew now that she was the one who needed to move on in that matter.
The realization brought helplessness, fear, and confusion, but like an indulgent parent praising a well-deserving child, she sincerely complimented her. “You’re amazing, Li Wuhui.”
Qiu Yiran lay groggily against the headrest, genuinely happy for her.
After saying that, she glanced at the snow falling outside and coughed a few times.
She’d wanted to say more.
“Don’t talk yet.”
Li Wuhui stopped her immediately, her voice thick with congestion. “I’ll get out first and call someone. Wait here—don’t get out yourself or let the cold wind hit you.”
Qiu Yiran nodded and said “Okay,” but couldn’t make the sound.
Her consciousness sank again.
But she could feel—
Li Wuhui opened the car door and got out.
Li Wuhui hurried through the snow into the hospital entrance.
Li Wuhui ran back out from the hospital entrance, a large crowd of people behind her.
Qiu Yiran smiled faintly.
Then couldn’t stop coughing—
Right then, the car door opened, cold wind rushed in, and she was lifted onto a stretcher all at once.
The unfamiliar crowd made her suddenly panic.
In her haze, she opened her eyes.
The world was full of snow; flakes drifted into her eyes and melted. She saw Li Wuhui’s eyes.
She relaxed a little.
But after entering the hospital doors, the stretcher was surrounded by people, packed tight.
She didn’t dare pass out completely. Even lying on the stretcher, clutching her leg, she couldn’t relax.
In her fluster, she searched for Li Wuhui again.
And like a telepathic link.
Li Wuhui’s gaze squeezed through the gap the next second.
Locking with hers.
But after one turn—
The dense crowd separated them.
Qiu Yiran breathed hard, twisting her head anxiously to look again.
This time she saw.
Li Wuhui had moved to another gap, searching for her gaze too.
In that moment, Qiu Yiran suddenly felt no pain. She smiled unconsciously.
They were like playing hide-and-seek.
Searching for each other in this unfamiliar world. Only seeing each other’s eyes brought a bit of security.
This stretch of the journey felt just like in the movies.
After that.
Qiu Yiran was shuffled between different stretchers and beds in the strange hospital, wheeled around for tests.
She hadn’t fully lost consciousness.
She knew her prosthetic leg was probably about to be removed, exposed to all these people’s eyes.
She also knew that through it all, Li Wuhui stayed by her side, following her bed, as if afraid she’d feel scared in the unfamiliar place. Whenever her hand reached out grasping at air—
Li Wuhui gripped it without hesitation.
Her palm was cool but slick with cold sweat. Even in a snowstorm, normal people wouldn’t sweat that much.
Qiu Yiran forced her eyes open.
Everyone was looking down at her—blue eyes, green eyes, and…
Li Wuhui’s eyes.
The prosthetic leg was removed without mercy. Qiu Yiran wiggled her fingers.
Li Wuhui gripped her hand tightly.
Sweat trickled from her eyelids. Qiu Yiran couldn’t speak but lifted the corner of her mouth at Li Wuhui.
Seeing her smile, Li Wuhui’s expression turned odd, like she was about to cry but holding it back desperately.
So amid all the unfamiliar faces, she watched her with that strange look.
As if afraid she’d be abandoned or something would go wrong while her mind was foggy.
Li Wuhui held her tight and, to distract her, suddenly asked, “Qiu Yiran, can I have a reward?”
“A reward?” Qiu Yiran found it odd.
“Yeah. After all, I did something so amazing.” Li Wuhui kept her eyes down.
By this time, many people with skin colors different from theirs had already gathered around, chattering away in some language.
Qiu Yiran couldn’t understand it.
Her eyelids gradually drooped, and her vision almost faded to black. The surroundings were very noisy, with everyone vying to speak first—it was that chattering Russian, all flooding into her mind.
But faintly, Qiu Yiran still heard—
“After you recover from your illness.”
“Before we go to Paris to get divorced…”
And amid that noisy, chaotic unfamiliar language, one sentence in Chinese reached her ears clearly and accurately, as if suppressing a sob.
“Let’s go see the Northern Lights one more time.”
Really, Li Chunfeng, why do you always go back on your word?
