"Maybe we should have a talk without beating around the bush."
"I'll head back first." Yao got up and walked over to Su Bai, ready to return straight to the Puzzle Piece, as though the "riddle-speaker" Su Bai had mentioned had nothing to do with him.
"Wait." Su Bai stopped Yao, then leaned down to the boy's ear. "Yao, do you have any more of that cord?"
Yao looked at Su Bai in confusion, seemingly unable to understand why Su Bai had brought up the cord.
"Can I use it to tie my hair back?" Su Bai helplessly pushed aside the rain-soaked hair blocking his vision. Water slid down the strands, making his handsome face look even more striking, but it was certainly a nuisance.
Yao paused briefly, then gave him a gentle smile completely unlike the expression he had worn when facing Su Xuan.
"For you, it's just an ordinary cord." Yao produced another white cord from somewhere and handed it to Su Bai. He looked up at Su Bai for a while longer before disappearing back into the Puzzle Piece.
Su Bai used the seemingly ordinary white cord to gather the wet hair on either side of his face behind his head. His mother, Lin Wan, often said that tying up wet hair was bad for it, but he had no other choice right now.
The dark clouds overhead still had not dispersed, and the standing water on the rooftop reflected the dim light. The Fish-Head Freaks that had been charging madly toward the rooftop through the rain also seemed to have stopped moving. Even Little Black, who had been standing on the rooftop's low wall, sat down in boredom.
Su Xuan, who had climbed to his feet, stared at the spot where Yao had disappeared, still