My destined match hasn't come yet

No wonder, when he watched Journey to the West as a child, his master had said that the hardest trial Tang Sanzang faced was actually the Daughter Kingdom.

Chen Shi'an hadn't understood back then. Now, he was beginning to get a taste of it.

Beat boredom-super useful.

As for whether that trial in the Daughter Kingdom was hard to get through or simply heartbreaking, only Tang Sanzang himself knew.

Now that she had helped him download WeChat, Li Wanyin moved back to a more comfortable distance, and Chen Shi'an finally felt as relaxed as he had at the start.

Even without her help, Chen Shi'an could have figured out the Wi-Fi connection and WeChat registration himself with a little time, but Li Wanyin's enthusiastic assistance had certainly saved him a lot of trouble.

Soon, Chen Shi'an had registered his own WeChat account, simply using "Chen Shi'an" as his username.

"Aren't you going to change your profile picture?" Li Wanyin asked.

"How do I change it?"

"Tap here."

Chen Shi'an didn't have many pictures on his phone, only photos of the Taoist temple, plants, and scenery he had taken up in the mountains. After a moment's thought, he picked a sunrise photo for his profile picture.

To his surprise, Li Wanyin couldn't help giggling when she saw it.

"What are you laughing at, Wanyin?"

"Haha, nothing. It's just that sometimes you really live like an old man."

"Huh?"

Chen Shi'an didn't understand. He thought it was a pretty good sunrise photo! It made a nice profile picture too: serene, peaceful, and free of worldly concerns.

"Come on, add me! I want to be your first WeChat friend!"

Li Wanyin looked quite excited. Thinking back, her first WeChat friends had been her parents. She had just started high school then, and they had bought her a phone, giving her QQ and WeChat accounts of her own.

As for whether she had ever been anyone else's first WeChat friend, Li Wanyin didn't think so. But now the opportunity was right in front of her.

"How do I add you?"

"Tap here. You can scan a QR code, or enter a phone number or WeChat ID... Hmm, save my phone number: 1890812..."

As Li Wanyin recited the number, Chen Shi'an typed it in. After he tapped search, a WeChat user with the nickname [Little Echo] appeared on the screen.

"Is this Little Echo you?"

"...Could you not say my nickname right in front of me? It's embarrassing!"

"So it is you. Let me see, your status... Life is a poem slowly unfolding, with faint echoes hidden in the wind... Hey, hey, hey!"

Before Chen Shi'an could finish reading, Li Wanyin snatched his phone away. When he looked at her again, her pretty face was flushed with embarrassment.

"Don't read my status out loud in front of me! I-it's from years ago! I just never changed it!"

"Okay, okay..."

Chen Shi'an didn't understand these rules of online etiquette. He just found it rather amusing. Was this a glimpse of Wanyin's innermost self?

He smiled, took his phone back, and sent her a friend request.

Li Wanyin took out her own phone too.

Her phone was a little better than Chen Shi'an's old-person phone, but not by much. Even with a protective case, it showed obvious signs of wear, and with more apps installed than his, it lagged horribly.

Money was tight right now, so Li Wanyin wasn't planning to replace it yet. Still, she had set herself a goal: once she received her first paycheck from a full-time job, she would spend around fifteen hundred yuan on a new phone!

"Hurry and accept, Wanyin."

"Coming, coming. Don't rush me. Give my phone a moment to catch up."

"..."

Li Wanyin finally accepted Chen Shi'an's friend request. The user named [Little Echo] appeared in his contact list, his first friend and, for now, his only one.

"Chen Shi'an" sent a [smiling face] emoji.

"Little Echo" replied with a [panda head sporting a wicked grin].

The young Taoist couldn't help laughing at the panda head's exaggerated expression in the chat window. "Where did you find that sticker, Wanyin?"

"Just save it, and you'll have it too!"

"Oh, I see..."

Chen Shi'an found it amusing and saved the sticker.

After exchanging a sticker each, they had officially added each other and said hello on WeChat. They were sitting face-to-face, after all, and weren't bored enough to start chatting through the app.

"How many WeChat friends do you have, Wanyin?"

"Hmm... Let me check. A hundred and seventy-something!"

"That many?"

"It's not that many. They're mostly teachers, classmates, friends, and relatives."

"Is your boyfriend on there?" Chen Shi'an asked curiously.

"You Taoists are interested in that stuff too?"

"Taoists get curious too."

Li Wanyin felt a little embarrassed, but Chen Shi'an was much younger than her, so she didn't read too much into it. She answered frankly, "I don't have one. When I was studying, I was busy with school. Now that I've graduated, I'm busy looking for work. Where would I find the time to date? Even my mom's been nagging me."

"Then I suppose you're not in a hurry yourself. I'd imagine you have plenty of admirers."

When someone old enough to be dating but still single was asked about their love life, their first instinct was to get flustered. Li Wanyin was no exception. Putting on a worldly air, she turned the question back on him. "What about you? I've heard Taoists can get married and have children, right?"

Chen Shi'an chuckled. "My destined match hasn't come yet."

"Wow, what a sneaky answer!"

Inspired, Li Wanyin stole his answer just as he had stolen her sticker. The next time someone asked her that question, she would say the same thing.

By unspoken agreement, they skipped past the subject of romance, which neither was good at, and went back to exploring WeChat.

"What is this Moments thing for?"

"Well, you can share your everyday life on it, and your friends can see it. Though lots of people don't post on Moments anymore."

"Oh, I see..."

"...What are you doing?"

"Looking at your Moments."

"..."

Could you stop doing embarrassing things right in front of me?

Fortunately...

"Huh? Only posts from the past three days are visible?"

"Hehe, you can set how far back people can see. I haven't posted anything in ages."

"What a shame. I was hoping to see how you post on Moments."

"No peeking~"

After spending these few hours together, Li Wanyin had gotten to know Chen Shi'an a little. He really was different from most people. He rarely beat around the bush and said what was on his mind, yet he had a good sense of boundaries. It was precisely that honesty and the way his words

always struck the right balance that made being around him so relaxing.

"Can you transfer money to each other on WeChat?" Chen Shi'an asked.

"Yep. You can link your bank card, then scan codes with WeChat to pay for things. Do you have Alipay?"

"Yes. It's just my first time using WeChat, so I'm not quite used to it yet."

Chen Shi'an thought for a moment. "Then I'll transfer my rent to you on WeChat every month. We can split the water, electricity, gas, and other shared expenses."

"Huh? Didn't Uncle Lin say he'd collect your half from you?"

"He won't take it from me. You can pay him for both of us."

"What is Uncle Lin to you...? He's so good to you," Li Wanyin asked curiously.

"Uncle Lin is an old acquaintance of my master's. He really does look after me, but I'd still prefer to handle the things I can manage myself."

"I see. All right, then. Hmm... Since I'm a girl, I might use more water and electricity. I'll pay a little more toward those bills."

"No need. Trying to calculate it that way would only make it harder to work out. Let's just split them evenly."

Seeing that Chen Shi'an was firm about it, Li Wanyin didn't fuss any further. She nodded. "Then if you ever need my help with anything, just say so! We're roommates, after all! Oh, did you save my number? Sometimes my phone freezes and WeChat disconnects. If something urgent comes up, call me."

"Didn't you tell me just now? I remember it."

"...Seriously? You remembered it after hearing it once? I have to check my parcel pickup code several times..."

"1890812... Is that right?"

"...!!"

She had only recited the number once, and they had spent so long chatting about other things since then. Li Wanyin hadn't expected Chen Shi'an to rattle it straight off. It left her stunned for quite a while before she finally managed to squeeze out:

"Holy shit."

Li Wanyin went back to her room, while Chen Shi'an took a change of clothes to go shower.

Perhaps this was what sharing a home usually looked like. They lived under the same roof, but most of the time, everyone stayed in their own room doing their own thing.

Li Wanyin had a laptop that was just as sluggish as her phone. At the moment, she was busy updating her résumé and sending out applications, or checking her inbox for new interview invitations. Beside her desk sat several books: study materials for the bachelor's degree upgrade exam she planned to take once she found a job and settled down.

In a world where bachelor's degrees were everywhere and junior college graduates were treated as worthless, she had neither work experience nor connections or a strong educational background. When choosing her major, she had lacked experience. Instead of picking something that taught practical skills, she had listened to her relatives and chosen business administration, a major that made finding work difficult. It sounded impressive, but employers recruiting graduates in that field wouldn't even give junior college students a glance. One could imagine how hard her job search was.

Since she hadn't turned on the air conditioner, Li Wanyin had left her door open. When Chen Shi'an came out of the shower, he happened to see her sitting at her computer, her back toward him.

The fan beside her stirred her hair. From before his shower until now, her posture in the chair hadn't changed at all.

Compared with earlier, though, her back seemed a little more weighed down.

Chen Shi'an didn't go inside. He simply asked from the doorway, "Looking for work, Wanyin?"

"Mm." Li Wanyin turned around. "Done showering?"

"Yes. I'm going to hang up my clothes."

Chen Shi'an was no longer wearing his Taoist robe. He had on a very old-fashioned undershirt, similar to a T-shirt but looser, with a row of buttons down the middle. This was what he usually wore when he wasn't in his robe.

"You wash all your clothes by hand?"

"Yes. It's only one robe, so washing it by hand is quick. How's the job search going?"

"Hmm... Not great."

"Keep at it. I believe you'll find a good job, Wanyin."

"Mm-hmm! What time do you leave for school tomorrow?"

"A little after six. You're going to your part-time job too, right?"

"Yes, but I have to wait until the mall opens. I just need to get there by ten."

"Looks like I'll be heading out first tomorrow, then."

Chen Shi'an glanced at the clock hanging in the living room. Before he knew it, it was ten at night.

"I'll go to bed now. Get some rest, Wanyin."

"Mm-hmm. Good night."

Li Wanyin didn't ask why he was going to bed so early. For people these days, wasn't "I'm going to bed" really code for "I'm going to play on my phone in bed"?

Unfortunately, Li Wanyin had guessed wrong this time. Chen Shi'an really was going to sleep.

Even though he was now in a city with good reception and had Wi-Fi at home, the number of times Chen Shi'an took out his phone could still be counted on one hand.

Chen Shi'an turned off the living room light and returned to his room.

Black Cat ran in after him, jumped onto the bed, and curled up beside his pillow.

"I reflect on myself three times each day. Fat Ink, have you reflected on yourself today?"

"Meow."

After turning off the light, Chen Shi'an lay on the bed, with a new bamboo mat beneath him, a new sheet over his stomach, and a new pillow under his head.

He hadn't turned on the air conditioner, and his window was open. The breeze blowing into the room was completely different from the mountain breeze. Even the night sky outside his window was different.

As he recalled what he had done and seen that day, what he had thought and felt, then considered tomorrow, Chen Shi'an's eyelids gradually grew heavy.

The first journey far from home in his life had gone fairly smoothly so far.

...He ought to visit his master in a dream to let him know he was safe.