New Life

"Jingming... don't leave me. I love you, I love you..."

Li Yu heard the conversation coming from the bathroom stall and couldn't help stopping in his tracks.

He did not choose to push the door open. He merely leaned against the wall, staring at his polished shoes, lost in thought.

"What about Li Yu? What will happen to him?"

"I..." The speaker suddenly fell silent. After a moment of silence hung in the air, he found his voice again. "Jingming, you know I don't love him."

Don't love him?

Li Yu thought that perhaps he should sneer coldly right now, but his heart was terrifyingly calm. Only a faint wave of nausea rose within him.

It was not until he heard footsteps that Li Yu lifted his head.

"Xiao Yu? What are you doing here?"

There was a hint of panic in the man's voice. Li Yu gave his first smile of the night. "What is it, Shen Zhonglou? This is a public restroom. Why can't I be here?"

The moment Shen Zhonglou met Li Yu's eyes, his heart seemed to skip a beat. He did not know how long Li Yu had been standing outside, nor how much he had heard.

But then he straightened up, finding the absurdity of his own alarm.

Li Yu had always clung to him relentlessly. Even if he had heard something, Li Yu would never be willing to leave him...

"We're breaking up."

"What?" Shen Zhonglou almost thought he had misheard. He could not imagine that Li Yu would be the one to say those words first.

"I said, Shen Zhonglou, we're breaking up."

Li Yu still wore a smile. There was not the slightest trace of sadness in his expression, and his tone was as calm as if he were merely making small talk with Shen Zhonglou.

Before Shen Zhonglou could react, Li Yu turned and left.

He left cleanly and decisively, without giving Shen Zhonglou a single glance.

"Brother Lou, Li Yu... could it be because of me? He must have misunderstood something. Should I go explain it to him?"

Although Xie Jingming had not come out of the bathroom stall just now, he had heard Li Yu's words as well.

He had seen how good Li Yu had been to Shen Zhonglou in the past. Now, Li Yu had proposed breaking up so calmly. It truly caught him off guard. He had thought it would take much longer to reach this point...

Only then did Shen Zhonglou snap out of it at Xie Jingming's voice. His expression was awful, and he failed to rein in his tone. "No need. I never liked him in the first place. It's better that we broke up."

Then Shen Zhonglou seemed to remember something, and his expression eased. "Jingming, I'm single now. Are you willing to stay for me?"

Xie Jingming could not help rolling his eyes inwardly, but he maintained that affectionate expression on his face. "Brother Lou, the moment I heard you say you loved me, I had already decided not to leave."

He had never planned to leave in the first place. The talk about booking a plane ticket had only been meant to scare Shen Zhonglou and make him feel miserable.

The more miserable he was, the more he would cherish what he regained.

After Li Yu left the restroom, the nausea finally eased somewhat. In its place came a sense of relief.

That was right. Relief.

When he thought about how he had once been willing to live or die for a scumbag like Shen Zhonglou, he wanted to laugh.

Back then, he had been so innocent, whether in love or in his career. Shen Zhonglou had not only tricked him until he was covered in wounds, but also got the entire internet to turn against him. He had disappeared from public view for a while and developed all sorts of psychological disorders. The one time he went out, he got into a car accident.

In the end, he died. Fortunately, his soul bound itself to the Quick Transmigration Bureau's system. The system told him that if he completed the assigned tasks in every mission world, he would be able to be reborn.

And now, he truly had been reborn—back to the day of his nineteenth birthday.

The first thing he did was break up with that scumbag. He felt that this was his true rebirth.

"Li Yu, happy birthday."

Just as Li Yu stood staring blankly at the fountain in the courtyard, a voice interrupted his thoughts. He turned toward the newcomer. For a moment, he did not recognize him, but he still accepted the wine offered to him.

"Thank you."

A crisp clink rang out. Li Yu tipped his head back slightly, his Adam's apple bobbing as he drained the red wine in one go.

Li Yu looked beautiful when he drank. His fair neck tilted back, graceful as a white swan, leaving even the person offering the toast staring blankly for a moment.

Only after finishing the wine did Li Yu vaguely remember that the man before him was named Zhang He, the eldest young master of the Zhang family. They had always gotten along well.

"Why are you out here alone? Where's Shen Zhonglou?"

The moment Zhang He asked, he regretted it.

In Li Yu and Shen Zhonglou's relationship, Li Yu had always been the one who gave more. Yet on Li Yu's nineteenth birthday, Shen Zhonglou was not by his side. Wasn't that question only going to make Li Yu sad?

"He's with Xie Jingming."

"That Shen Zhonglou is really too..."

Zhang He wanted to curse Shen Zhonglou out, but with Li Yu standing beside him, he only got halfway through before falling silent.

Instead, Li Yu continued for him. "He's too much of an idiot, right? I think so too, so I broke up with him. Whatever happens to him from now on has nothing to do with me."

"You broke up? Really?" Zhang He's voice rose despite himself. Realizing he had lost his composure, he cleared his throat and continued, "Li Yu, well done!"

Li Yu raised a brow and smiled. How had he never noticed before that Zhang He was quite interesting?

After chatting for a while longer, Li Yu finally went back into the villa. After all, he was the star of this birthday party and still had guests to entertain.

As Zhang He watched Li Yu's departing figure, he took out his phone and dialed a number.

"What is it?"

The man on the other end had a hoarse, low voice, carrying an inexplicable magnetism. It could even be described as sexy.

"Brother Chi! Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit! I have earth-shattering news for you! Li Yu broke up with Shen Zhonglou!"

Zhang He could not suppress the excitement in his voice. He had long known that his best friend liked Li Yu—liked him desperately. Unfortunately, Li Yu had only had Shen Zhonglou in his eyes before. How could there have been room for anyone else?

But now things were different. Li Yu had broken up with him. Didn't that mean his best friend finally had a chance?

Chi Yan naturally heard Zhang He clearly. Perhaps he was too excited, or perhaps for some other reason, but he accidentally hung up the call.

His heart raced as his gaze fell on the photograph tucked beside his pillow.

The person in the photo had just stepped out of a car, red-lipped and white-toothed, with outstanding proportions. That especially narrow waist had effortlessly stolen someone's heart.

Chi Yan stroked the face in the photograph, and a few traces of tenderness unconsciously entered his expression. "Little Yu..."