Under the cover of night.
"A pretty good bunch of kids."
On a distant mountaintop, Li Kengqiang sat atop a massive boulder, supporting himself with his hands behind him as the evening wind sent his floral shirt fluttering.
A pair of pitch-black sunglasses rested on his nose, concealing his expression. Only the faint upturn of his lips was visible.
Nie Jinshan, dressed in a Zhongshan suit, stood atop the mountain as straight as a sturdy pine. His gaze remained fixed on the bonfire in the distance as he spoke calmly.
"Do you miss it?"
"What?"
"Your brothers." Nie Jinshan glanced at him. "Back then, you were exactly like Lin Qiye is now..."
Li Kengqiang, usually so frivolous and sly, fell silent for once. He sighed and lay back on the boulder, his eyes beneath the sunglasses watching the brilliant stars overhead.
After an unknown amount of time, he finally spoke slowly.
"Old Nie, do you know what's been hardest for me since becoming a Heroic Spirit?"
"Loneliness?"
"No, it's that I fucking can't get drunk!" Li Kengqiang could not help swearing. "This Heroic Spirit body of mine won't get drunk no matter how much I drink!
I want to get completely wasted like these kids too... even if it's just once."
Li Kengqiang took a deep breath and muttered in a voice only he could hear.
"Then I could dream of them again..."
Nie Jinshan said nothing. He gazed deeply at Li Kengqiang on the boulder, then turned and walked away.
Only after a long while did a voice slowly drift into Li Kengqiang's ears.
"...Take good care of them."
The cold wind swept across the silent mountain peak. Li Kengqiang lay motionless atop the boulder, like the corpse of a man who had drunk himself to death.
The