FLME Ch105

Chapter 105: Returning to the Original World IF Line: (End)

Not having an ID card was indeed a big issue. This question from his sister reminded Yu Wen that now wasn’t a good time to introduce his boyfriend to his parents.

His parents wouldn’t say much about him coming out, but if he brought home someone without proper documentation, his parents might faint on the spot.

Yu Wen used his own ID card to book a room at a hotel 500 meters away for Xie Heyu to stay in.

Xie Heyu clearly wanted to stay with him, kissing him clingily before they parted. But he understood the situation was special and didn’t try to keep him.

While Yu Wen was taking Xie Heyu to the hotel, his parents had already returned home. Yu Wen hurried back and gave them both a big hug, then said, “Mom, Dad, I have a boyfriend.”

Parents: “…”

Yu Ting was leaning against the kitchen door, spreading her arms in an “I told you he’s gone crazy” gesture.

Given that the story about traveling through time was too abstract to believe, Yu Wen didn’t want to force his parents to overhaul their worldview at their age. He didn’t mention anything about “crazy” and instead summarized Xie Heyu as his college boyfriend, fabricating a harmonious and happy love story.

“…So,” Yu Wen continued, “Our relationship is great. If things are still this good next year, I’ll bring him back to meet you.”

There was a reason for this.

He wasn’t sure if Xie Heyu would travel back again. There were too many uncontrollable factors. What if, like him, Xie Heyu was summoned back to the original world? At least then, it could be explained as a breakup due to incompatible personalities.

A year of observation would give him and Xie Heyu some time to adjust, and also allow his parents time to accept the situation.

But he clearly underestimated his parents.

It took his parents only half an hour to accept it.

“Oh, the young man looks promising. From his appearance, he must have a bright future.” Yu Wen’s father was looking at a recent photo on Yu Wen’s phone, squinting his eyes and studying it for a moment before kindly saying, “Very good, very good…”

Yu Ting: “…Dad, are you crazy?”

Yu Wen’s father smiled kindly. “Xiao Wen likes him, doesn’t he?”

He didn’t care about who the person was, trusting that his son would know who to choose. He only needed to support him.

Yu Wen’s mother glanced at the photo a couple of times, nodding in approval. “The young man is quite handsome. Even if he’s a block of wood, it’s still pleasant to look at every day.”

Yu Ting: “…”

She barely managed to keep herself from revealing that the pretty boy was an undocumented immigrant with no job.

Yu Wen felt reassured by his parents’ open-mindedness. The next day, he woke up early to find Xie Heyu. His father saw him leaving and didn’t say anything, but handed him two sandwiches.

“If you can’t eat them, give them to someone else,” his father said meaningfully.

Yu Wen carried the two sandwiches to find Xie Heyu. It was just after 6 AM, completely out of sync with his usual biological clock, and with no sleep from tossing and turning all night. When Xie Heyu opened the door, Yu Wen collapsed onto him like a boneless koala.

They slept again until about 9 AM. Yu Wen only got up to freshen up then.

Standing side by side with Xie Heyu in front of the bathroom mirror, brushing their teeth and vaguely discussing their next plans, Yu Wen suddenly received a call from an unknown number.

“Hello, is this Yu Wen, the senior? I’m a student from South City No.1 High School. We met yesterday, and your boyfriend gave me a watch…”

The call was from the kind-hearted boy who had helped them meet the day before. He said he had found Xie Heyu’s things but had no contact details. After wracking his brain, he remembered Xie Heyu’s clever idea and contacted Yu Wen via the alumni list to get his number.

“What did you find?”

“His ID card.”

Yu Wen: “…”

Both of them froze, the toothpaste foam in their mouths, momentarily forgetting to spit it out.

They agreed to meet at the school gate. Xie Heyu took the ID card, examined it for a moment, and raised an eyebrow. “It’s like youth restored.”

The ID card listed his age as 20.

Yu Wen: “Wow.”

Not daring to be careless, the two took a taxi to the nearby high-speed rail station, bought tickets, and passed the identity verification gate. As soon as their faces were verified, Yu Wen sighed, “Such a familiar scene. Back when I traveled, it was with an equally mysterious ID card. It seems like there’s someone watching over us after all…”

Xie Heyu had a ghostly expression on his face.

He couldn’t make sense of it, simply couldn’t. He put away his ID card, sighed, and muttered, “What kind of god specifically issues ID cards?”

Yu Wen: “The Greek god who manages ID cards.”

Xie Heyu: “…”

Bo Yi was reading, and Yu Wen didn’t have many vacation days. Even though his lazy genes were ingrained in his DNA, he couldn’t stretch his vacation to more than half a month. After less than two weeks, Yu Wen packed his suitcase and returned to S City.

With the issue of being an illegal resident solved, the two of them rented an apartment near the school. Yu Wen usually stayed in the lab, while Xie Heyu took on some online illustration and freelance programming jobs, earning a decent income.

In this era, without a degree, it was hard to make progress. Although society advocated focusing on skills rather than qualifications, no formal company would open its doors to someone without any credentials.

Fortunately, Xie Heyu was skilled in many areas, especially in the arts, where his eclectic training meant he would never go hungry with one craft, and with many, he could live comfortably.

He was currently preparing for adult self-examinations. Although he wasn’t pursuing a career in research, a degree was like a necessity; even if it wasn’t urgently needed now, it was something to stock up on.

One evening when Yu Wen came home and saw him reviewing high school exams, he found the scene amusing.

“Shocking! A gold medal agent is preparing for the college entrance exam. Is it the loss of hobbies or the distortion of interests…”

Xie Heyu was helpless and found it both funny and ironic.

Having lived away for half a life, returning to prepare for high school exams—his family would laugh themselves to death if they knew.

But before the college entrance exam could take place, an unexpected event occurred.

It had been just two months since Yu Wen had completed his one-year observation period.

Before going back, during the Mid-Autumn Festival, Yu Wen struggled with whether to bring Xie Heyu home for the holiday. His parents were very enthusiastic and eager to meet his partner. Eventually, Yu Wen decided to bring Xie Heyu to boost their impression.

As soon as they exited the station, something felt off.

Yu Wen: “Why do I feel like this station is a bit small…”

Xie Heyu looked at the mirror in front of him and then at the bathtub not far away, calmly stating, “I don’t think this is a station.”

This clearly was a bathroom.

Before they could figure out what was going on, the sudden change in surroundings immediately reminded Xie Heyu of the time two months ago when he was unexpectedly transported.

He surveyed the bathroom. From its layout and smart home features, there was a vague sense of familiarity.

“Could it be someone else’s house?” Yu Wen asked nervously. “Should we go out and check?”

“Father of the cross-dressing deity, where have you dumped me this time?”

Xie Heyu nodded, and as he was about to open the door while dragging his suitcase, the door handle was turned, and a familiar face peered inside.

Four eyes met, and silence spread.

Outside the door, two barking sounds were heard, followed by the head of a husky peeking in.

The person and the dog stared at the two people with their suitcases in the bathroom.

“Blue fur, I must be hallucinating from hunger,” Xi Su said calmly. “Let’s go out and do it again.”

The person and the dog retreated, and two seconds later, the bathroom door opened again.

When the husky saw its old owner, it barked happily, its noisy calls confirming the reality of the situation for Xi Su.

He calmly asked, “Is this your new play?”

Yu Wen/Xie Heyu: “…”

Good news: They hadn’t ended up in someone else’s house;

Bad news: They had landed in the bathroom of a company villa.

Yu Wen and Xie Heyu sat side by side on the sofa, both with their hands on their knees, rarely behaving so well.

Xi Su, acting like a disciplinarian, questioned, “So, how did you two manage to bring such a big suitcase into the door without disturbing me? And why did you choose to hide in the bathroom? What’s your motive? What’s your purpose? Am I part of your play…”

At this point, Xi Su paused, suddenly suspicious, and looked at their suitcase.

“It’s not filled with… intimate items, is it?”

Yu Wen: “…”

So many questions.

Each one was hard to explain.

Yu Wen could only be thankful that it was Xi Su and not someone else. Xi Su was always a bit clueless, so he could easily brush things off. If he couldn’t explain, Yu Wen could always turn the tables and question Xi Su about why he had stolen his dog.

When Xi Su was in the wrong, he let them go.

The husky was temporarily surrendered to Xi Su as a bargaining chip, and when Yu Wen was about to leave, the dog lingered at the door, watching him with reluctance, making Yu Wen feel a pang of guilt.

Little Marseille puppy, Vadasiwa will definitely take you home.

Back at their apartment, Yu Wen and Xie Heyu sighed in relief and collapsed on the sofa, reflecting on the pattern of their two trips through time.

The conclusion they reached was… there was no pattern at all.

Yu Wen said, “Don’t worry, maybe next time we’ll figure it out.”

He felt this wasn’t over.

Sure enough, three months later, the god of time travel descended again.

Yu Wen was brushing his teeth in the bathroom when the mirror in front of him suddenly vanished. He immediately ran a couple of steps and saw that Xie Heyu, who was supposed to be sitting on the sofa reading the newspaper, had fallen on his bottom because the support had disappeared.

One person with a toothbrush in his mouth, the other getting up and dusting off his clothes, both with equally helpless expressions.

There was still no regularity in the timing; it could happen anytime and anywhere, the summoning power always delivering on its mission.

However, spatially, it seemed to favor places they often visited, such as the company dormitory, their home, or the film set. These were the likely locations.

And it usually wasn’t in crowded places.

The dorm bathroom, the storage room at home, or a small grove on the set.

Another fortunate thing was that every time they left and returned, almost no time had passed. It was as if they had returned at the exact moment they had left, so there was no need to worry about social news like “Top-tier celebrity suddenly disappearing / University student vanishing into thin air.”

Yu Wen and Xie Heyu had discussed this issue.

“It seems like we’ve gained something,” Yu Wen said solemnly. “Looking at it this way, we could live two lifetimes.”

Xie Heyu rubbed his forehead, pondering. “Maybe we should go to the hospital to check our bone age someday, see if I’m really 20 years old.”

Yu Wen: “I’m curious too. I wonder if I’m really 22.”

The random jumps continued.

However, the ever-changing locations were causing quite a bit of trouble. One winter day, Yu Wen, wearing flip-flops, was suddenly sent outdoors, and he couldn’t take it anymore. He rubbed his arms, cold from the short sleeves, and shivered, saying, “Xie Heyu, you go research time-space machines. Hurry up and create one that works stably. I’m really scared that next time I’ll end up outside with no pants on after going to the bathroom…”

Xie Heyu, also in a short-sleeve shirt and shorts, stepped into the thick snow, feeling a chill run through him. He frowned.

“Time-space machine?” Xie Heyu was somewhat incredulous at the idea, pointing at himself. “Me?”

Yu Wen nodded firmly. “Yes.”

Xie Heyu couldn’t understand where this blind trust came from, but he still thought seriously about it. He took Yu Wen’s hand and started rubbing it together for warmth. “I don’t have a degree in this world.”

Yu Wen shivered, his teeth chattering. “I don’t have a degree in that world either…”

Wasn’t that just unlucky?

After a moment of thought, Xie Heyu said, “How about you research it here, and I research it over there?”

Yu Wen froze, forgetting to shiver. He actually thought this plan made perfect sense.

“Good idea,” he said.

And so, the plan was set.

The sky was lightly snowing, and Xie Heyu went to a convenience store by the road to buy an umbrella and two hot cups of oden to warm their hands.

The store clerk thought they were strange customers.

In the bitter cold of winter, snowflakes swirling outside, these two customers were only wearing short sleeves and slippers, their outfits so thin it looked like they were doing performance art.

They bought some things and stayed inside the store to warm up. From their actions, it was clear they were a couple. The taller one kept rubbing the other’s hands, and they were chatting softly, their voices low.

Each time they spoke, the taller one would lower his head, whispering in the other’s ear, his profile serious and focused.

The clerk thought they were a very strange couple, but also a very affectionate one.

Fifteen minutes passed, and an online ride-hailing car stopped across the street. They needed to walk through the crosswalk to get to the car.

The clerk gave them two warm hand warmers.

“Have a safe journey,” she smiled.

The couple nodded in thanks and then, with a jingling sound of the bell, they opened the door and walked out.

They walked side by side into the snowstorm.