Picking Up an Ancestor and Bringing Them Home

It was eleven at night. Lin Fan dragged his leaden legs out of the brightly lit office building.

The city's neon lights blurred into a hazy patch in his tired eyes, mirroring the chaotic state of his mind. Another standard "996" blessed day of overwork. His neck was stiff, his back ached, and the only consolation was the meager overtime pay on the time-tracking app and the liberating feeling of finally being able to collapse in his rented room.

"Lin Fan, I want to see the initial draft of that requirement tomorrow morning." The project manager's casual parting words echoed in his ears like a curse.

"Initial draft... Easy for him to say. Does he even know what time it is?" Lin Fan muttered under his breath, rubbing his dry, swollen eyes. Resigned, he started walking towards the subway station. The last train had long gone. He could only hope that his little electric scooter, as tired as he was, would carry him across half the city back to his ten-square-meter rented room in the old residential complex.

The evening breeze, cool with the early touch of summer, dispelled some of his fatigue. The complex where he rented was old, with good greenery and lush trees. Because of this, at night, the streetlights were cut into fragmented pieces by the dense foliage, casting large, unsettling, shifting shadows on the ground.

It was quiet all around, only the sound of his own footsteps echoing on the empty paths of the complex, occasionally punctuated by a distant dog bark.

For some reason, Lin Fan felt uneasy tonight. Perhaps he was too tired, or perhaps the area where the streetlights had been broken for days and no one had fixed them was simply too dark. He subconsciously quickened his pace, just wanting to get back to his small nest, which, though cramped, offered him a sense of security.

Just as he turned the corner of a residential building, with his unit door just ahead, his steps abruptly halted.

Under a streetlight not far ahead, a blurry figure sat leaning against the lamp post, head bowed, motionless.

Lin Fan's heart skipped a beat. A drunkard? A homeless person? Or...?

His instinct was to walk around, to avoid trouble. Who wasn't struggling to survive these days? But as his gaze swept over the person, he couldn't help but freeze.

In the faint light cast by the distant streetlamp, he could see that the person was wearing... very strange clothes.

They weren't modern attire, more like costumes from some ancient drama. The material seemed ordinary, yet in the dim light, it flowed with an indescribable texture, neither silk nor cloth. Wide sleeves and a long robe, even covered in dust and wrinkled, inexplicably gave off a sense of... fallen nobility?

A cascade of ink-black hair, unbound, fell loosely, obscuring most of his face, revealing only a sharply defined jawline and pale skin.

"What's going on? Did someone pass out from a cosplay session?" Lin Fan thought, but his feet felt rooted to the spot.

The main reason was that this person... was too clean.

Not the clothes, but the aura. Even slumped there so dishevelledly, there was no slovenliness of a vagrant or the decadence of a drunkard. Instead, he looked like a finely crafted jade sculpture accidentally dropped into the human world, possessing a quietness and... ancientness that was utterly out of place in the noisy, bustling marketplace.

Lin Fan shook his head, convinced he was hallucinating from overtime. He tentatively stepped closer, lowering his voice, "Hey, buddy? Are you okay?"

No response.

Only the rustling of leaves in the evening breeze.

Lin Fan felt a prickle of unease. What if he was... dead? Mustering his courage, he moved closer, almost able to smell a faint, crisp scent, like pine needles after snow, completely unlike the alcohol or sweat he expected.

"Big brother? Wake up? Do you need me to call an ambulance?" he raised his voice, carefully nudging the person's... robe hem? with his toe.

The moment his toe touched the seemingly soft fabric, an extremely faint, electric-like sensation made him yank his foot back.

Almost simultaneously, the head that had been bowed down moved.

The long hair slid aside, revealing a face.

Lin Fan's breath hitched.

It was an extremely young, yet extremely ancient face. Conflicting sensations clashed in his mind. Sword-like eyebrows slanted towards his temples, his nose was high like a mountain ridge, his lips were pale, pressed into a hard, straight line. Most striking were the eyes that slowly opened.

Deep and dark, like bottomless ancient wells. Initially, they held a vacant chaos, as if covered by eternal ice, devoid of any human emotion. But soon, something incredibly sharp seemed to awaken beneath the ice, like a divine sword sealed for eons about to be unsheathed. Just the sweep of his gaze made Lin Fan's skin tingle, and a chill ran down his spine.

Those eyes held the indifference of looking down on ants, and a hint of displeasure at being disturbed.

Lin Fan instinctively took half a step back, his heart pounding. This was definitely not the look of an ordinary person!

The person looked at him, his brow furrowing almost imperceptibly, as if trying to identify something, or perhaps suppressing immense pain and... weakness? He spoke, his voice low and hoarse, yet possessing a strange, undeniable rhythm. The words he uttered made Lin Fan gape.

"Where... is this place? Who... are you?"

Lin Fan: "???"

Brother, are you that invested in the role?!

He took a deep breath, trying to communicate with modern common sense: "Buddy, which film crew did you escape from? Drank too much, or is your blood sugar low? Do you need me to contact your friends or the police?"

The person, or rather, this handsome man in ancient costume, seemed to have difficulty understanding Lin Fan's words. He looked around, gazing at the distant, towering cement forest dotted with sparse lights. The confusion in his eyes deepened, then transformed into a shock and... disgust that Lin Fan couldn't comprehend.

"Film crew? Hmph..." he snorted, seeming to try and stand up. But as soon as he moved, he swayed violently, forced to lean back against the lamp post, his face seeming even paler. He raised a hand as if to gather something, but his fingertips were empty, only a faint disturbance of air.

Lin Fan clearly saw a fleeting look of disbelief and deep humiliation flash in his eyes.

"If not for the Heavenly Dao's change, the laws shifting, causing this One to lose all magic power, my soul injured..." he spoke with a hint of gritted teeth, but his weakness made his threat lack deterrence. "How could mere mortal iron get close? You..."

Before he could finish, a very untimely "grumble" sound clearly emanated from his abdomen.

The scene became intensely awkward.

The gaze that could freeze metal and stone instantly froze, then showed a crack.

Lin Fan: "..."

Handsome ancient man: "..."

Their eyes met, and the air seemed to fall silent.

Lin Fan looked at the man's proud posture, clearly starving but still maintaining his dignity. For some reason, his earlier fear vanished, replaced by an absurd sense of hilarity.

Suppressing a smile, he fumbled in his cheap backpack, emblazoned with the company logo, and pulled out a individually wrapped bun he hadn't finished during the company tea break that afternoon, intending to eat it for a late-night snack. He offered it.

"Here, have something to tide you over."

The man's gaze fell on the colorful bun wrapper, his eyes filled with scrutiny, wariness, and... a hint of unconcealed curiosity. He didn't take it.

Lin Fan sighed, then simply tore open the wrapper himself. He broke off a small piece of the soft bread inside and popped it into his mouth in front of the man, mumbling, "See? It's not poisoned. Just a normal bun."

Seeing that Lin Fan was fine after eating it, or perhaps hunger had finally overcome dignity and vigilance, he hesitated before finally extending his hand. His fingers were long, pale, and well-defined, like a work of art, though his movement to take the bread was slightly stiff and clumsy.

He imitated Lin Fan, putting the small piece of bread into his mouth.

Then, Lin Fan witnessed what could only be described as "pupil dilation shock."

Those eyes, usually as still as a deep well, widened for a fleeting moment as his tongue touched the soft, sweet bread. Although his expression management was impeccable, quickly returning to impassive, Lin Fan still caught the rapid movement of his Adam's apple and a flash of light in his eyes, a light called "true fragrance."

He ate quickly, but his posture was not rude. It could even be said to possess a residual, ingrained elegance. However, the speed betrayed his true physiological needs at that moment.

After finishing the small piece, his gaze involuntarily drifted to the remaining bread in Lin Fan's hand.

Lin Fan felt both exasperated and amused. He handed the rest of the bread to him entirely. "Eat slowly, don't choke."

This time, he didn't hesitate. He took it and finished it in a flash, leaving not even a crumb.

After eating, he seemed to have regained a little strength. When he looked at Lin Fan again, his eyes still lacked warmth, but the pure indifference and hostility seemed to have diminished by an imperceptible degree.

"This... is acceptable," he commented, his tone strained.

Lin Fan almost burst out laughing. "Acceptable"? Who was it just now eating like a starving ghost reborn?

"Look, big brother," Lin Fan squatted down, trying to appear as approachable as possible, "What's going on with you? Amnesia? Or did you get lost from a film crew? Where do you live? I can help you get a taxi?"

The other party was silent for a moment, as if processing Lin Fan's words, or perhaps weighing them. Finally, he raised his eyes, his deep gaze meeting Lin Fan's directly, with a probing quality Lin Fan couldn't understand.

"This One... does not know," he replied bluntly. "I woke up here. My divine sense is blocked, my Celestial Essence is dormant, and I am incompatible with this realm..."

He paused, his gaze lingering on Lin Fan for a moment as if confirming something, then added, "Only on you, your aura... is slightly different."

Lin Fan felt a chill from his stare. "Different? How different? Like the smell of sweat from not showering for three days?"

The other party didn't answer his teasing. He merely frowned slightly, as if contemplating an extremely complex problem.

The night wind grew colder. Lin Fan looked at this person in thin ancient costume, of unknown origin, speaking strangely, yet inexplicably possessing an aura that made it impossible to abandon him. His mind was in turmoil.

Leave him here? Setting aside the unpredictable nature of people these days, what if he was truly a lost person with a mental illness? If something happened to him on a night like this, his conscience wouldn't allow it. Call the police? How would he explain it to them? Say he found a handsome guy who claimed to be "This One" and might have time-traveled from a cultivation drama set?

Take him home?

The thought itself startled Lin Fan. What a joke! His place was tiny; how could another person live there? And this was a stranger! What if...

His gaze met those eyes again. At this moment, deep within them, besides weakness and forced pride, there seemed to be a trace of the helpless bewilderment of a castaway.

Like... a large feline, its fur drenched by the rain, yet still holding its head high?

"Forget it, forget it, consider it my bad luck!" Lin Fan gritted his teeth and stomped his foot. The sliver of sympathy he had for fellow humans ultimately won out. He took out his phone and waved it. "My name is Lin Fan, I'm a... well, an ordinary office worker. How about this, you come back with me tonight and make do for one night. Tomorrow morning, I'll help you figure out how to find your family or... your sect?"

He tried to use words the other party might understand.

The handsome man in ancient costume watched him quietly, not answering immediately. His gaze swept over Lin Fan again, that feeling of being completely seen returning. After a long while, he gave a barely perceptible nod.

"Agreed."

Just one word, yet it felt like the greatest gift Lin Fan had ever received.

Lin Fan's mouth twitched. Well, he had truly picked up an ancestor.

Resigned, he reached out to help him up. "Can you walk? My home is in that building ahead."

The other party avoided his hand and, supporting himself by a lamppost, struggled to stand. However, prolonged weakness and lack of energy made his efforts futile. After a few tries, he stumbled and nearly fell.

Lin Fan couldn't stand it. Without further ado, he put an arm around him and forcibly helped him up. "Alright, stop being so proud and suffering. Let's go!"

The arm he held was not strong, even somewhat slender, but where he touched, the muscle lines were smooth and firm, containing a sense of strength far beyond his appearance. Lin Fan muttered again, what exactly did this guy do?

The other party's body stiffened for a moment, seemingly unaccustomed to such close physical contact, but he didn't break free in the end. He allowed Lin Fan to half-support, half-carry him towards the building entrance.

They didn't speak again on the way. Only the sound of their footsteps and the other party's occasional labored breathing due to weakness echoed in the quiet night.

Lin Fan's mind was a mess. He thought he must be crazy to bring a strange man in ancient costume of unknown origin home. What would happen tomorrow? What if this person never regained his "memory"? His meager salary was barely enough to support himself, how could he support another mouth?

He secretly glanced at the person leaning against him. The other party's eyes were half-closed, long lashes casting faint shadows on his pale face. His brows were still furrowed, as if enduring some pain, or perhaps resisting this world that was so unfamiliar to him.

"Forget it, one step at a time," Lin Fan sighed, taking out his key and inserting it into the lock of the building door.

With a soft "click," the door opened. The voice-activated light in the hallway flickered on, casting a dim yellow glow.

Just then, from the corner of his eye, Lin Fan seemed to glimpse a few points of crimson light flashing in the shadows of the green belt not far behind him, like... cigarette butts?

His heart suddenly tightened, and he instinctively looked back.

The shadows shifted, revealing nothing. Only the sound of the wind rustling the leaves.

Was it an illusion?

He frowned, suppressing the unease that arose in his heart, and helped his "heaven-sent roommate" into the building.

The old, rusty hinges let out a harsh "creak" as the heavy building door slowly closed behind him, shutting out the outside world.

In the hallway, the voice-activated light extinguished due to the prolonged silence, and darkness descended once more.

Only the sound of their receding footsteps, climbing the stairs, echoed in the narrow space.

And just before the building door completely sealed, from the depths of the green belt's shadows, came a few faint, malicious chuckles and hushed voices.

"...Damn it, waited all this time for this poor little pretty boy?"

"Look at the one he's supporting, dressed so weirdly, like a fat sheep..."

"Follow him, find a deserted place... hehe."

The voices were low and quickly dissipated in the night wind, as if they had never existed.

Inside the hallway, Lin Fan supported the stranger, step by step ascending the stairs. He was completely unaware that, separated by just a door, trouble had already quietly set its sights on them.

Tonight was destined to be anything but peaceful.