Chapter 47

Li Teng walked over to the woman in the sunglasses and asked, “Is something the matter?”

“Stay still,” replied the woman. She reached out and knocked lightly on Li Teng’s head thrice with her fingers. Then, she turned to leave.

“Weren’t you intending to tell me something? What’s the meaning behind knocking thrice on my head?” asked Li Teng. He was utterly confused.

“You’re a clever man. Think about it yourself.” She started to walk back to the coffee table.

“How am I supposed to do that? Surely you have to give me a hint?”

“No hints. You’re such a clever person, and you’ll definitely understand what I mean. Also, if you figure it out, don’t ever ask me to verify it,” replied the woman in the sunglasses before she quickly walked away.

The bus bringing them to the airport had already arrived. Under the crew members’ urging, everyone quickly boarded the bus. Li Teng didn’t have the chance to ask any further.

“By knocking thrice, is she saying that she wants to go on a date with me at 3 a.m.?

“It’s probably 1 or 2 a.m. by now, right?

“The thing is, how am I supposed to look for her after we return to the stone pillars?

“What’s she up to?

“I can figure it out with my cleverness?

“Without any hint at all, no matter how goddamn smart I am, I’m not going to figure it out, isn’t it!

“Is she kidding me?”

The airport security check was very strict. Apart from clothes, they were not allowed to bring even a plastic bag with them.

Of course, they could deposit the things that they couldn’t bring back to the airport for free. The next time they came, they could collect it just by showing up.

It was late-night when they had set off.

It was still dark when Li Teng got back to the stone pillar.

It felt especially awful at this point every time. It was as if he had suddenly fallen from a warm and comfortable world into the deep abyss of hell.

Of course, the film studio couldn’t be said to be a warm and comfortable world, either. Someone was always out to kill him, after all.

However, there were food and drinks there. Just this aspect alone made it tons better than the stone pillar.

His return this time was a little different from the previous time.

The last time he came back, it had snowed for a whole day on top of the stone pillar, causing his bed to become buried in snow.

Li Teng had almost been frozen to death. He had narrowly escaped death by digging a snow cave and hiding in it.

At least there wasn’t anything out of the ordinary when he returned at night this time. There wasn’t any extreme weather.

The first thing Li Teng did when he returned to his broken bed was to check whether his bottle of mineral water was still there—it was.

Li Teng breathed a sigh of relief.

The bottle of water was his life itself.

Should a drought persist on the stone pillar, with the bottle of water, he would be able to survive. Without it, it would be very tough for him to last beyond three days.

It was possible to do other things only if he was alive. If he was dead, everything would come to an end.

He had such a filling meal today. He had eaten a good 12 steamed buns and a whole roast chicken.

When one was full, they wouldn’t be cold.

Moreover, chicken meat wasn’t like steamed buns, which were fully digested the moment they entered the gut.

There were protein and fat in roast chicken, so it would take longer for it to digest, thereby allowing him to last a while longer.

When Li Teng thought of the roast chicken, the woman in the sunglasses came to his mind again.

She had knocked thrice on his head just before they had parted. What exactly did that mean?

Oh, did it represent a sentence?

What kind of content was there in a three-word sentence?

“‘I love you’?

“Hahahahahaha…

“She fell in love with me at first sight because I’m handsome?

“Not only did she buy me a roast chicken, she even wants to date me!

“I’ve figured it out. I’m such a genius!

“But I don’t want to get into a romantic relationship with anyone here.

“That’s just giving myself an extra burden.

“So, I shall reject her firmly the next time I go to the film studio.

“Although a clear and definite rejection will injure her pride and even lead her to hate me, it can’t be helped.

“Why am I just so lovable?

“Smart, handsome, upright, with integrity, positive, optimistic, strong-willed, brave, willing to take on responsibilities, mature, reliable, sincere, forthright, witty, steadfast, calm, shameless…

“I possess all the merits of a Chinese man.

“That’s why I’m so lovable.”

Li Teng entered dreamland as he mused over this.

…

When he woke up the next morning, Li Teng stayed in bed, not quite willing to get up.

He had a very long dream the previous night, the kind where the content was very harmonious.

Perhaps because he had been too full the previous night, he had ended up having indecent thoughts 1.

Li Teng reconsidered the decision he made the previous night. “Although I will reject her for sure, if she wants to make certain things, like love, with me, I can consider doing it with her without any romantic emotions.

“But if I do that sort of thing yet I don’t enter a romantic relationship with her, wouldn’t that make me a scumbag?

“Never mind, I’ll just reject her clearly and maintain a distance from her.

“I am an upright and positive man. I will not be a scumbag.”

Speaking of sunshine 1… Li Teng had discovered something amiss in the morning when the sun came up.

As noon gradually drew nearer, the top of the stone pillar’s temperature also rose higher and higher. It slowly turned from ‘hot’ to ‘burning hot’.

“This doesn’t make sense! How can it be so hot when we’re so high up? And it even snowed a few days ago!”

Li Teng’s clothes were fully drenched in perspiration. He took off all of his clothes and laid still underneath the bed.

But soon, Li Teng couldn’t stay underneath the bed anymore.

The rock floor at the top of the stone pillar was becoming hotter and hotter. It was already somewhat burning his flesh.

If he continued to lay there like that, he would be cooked through.

Left with no other choice, Li Teng could only lay back onto the bed.

The water content in Li Teng’s body quickly evaporated from the high temperature. However, he didn’t yet dare to touch the one and only bottle of water he had.

It hadn’t reached the most difficult point yet.

The temperature also let Li Teng somewhat understand why that refined old lady hadn’t managed to persist and survive the other time.

If this weather carried on, Li Teng felt that he probably wouldn’t be able to hang in there for that long, even if he had a bottle of water.

The only thing he could do now was to stay still and minimize the loss of water content in his body as much as possible.

…

The afternoon became increasingly hard to get through.

Although it had only been a day, Li Teng’s thirst had already reached the same level as what it was a few days ago.

The hotter it was, the faster the loss of water content in one’s body would be.

At last, Li Teng couldn’t hold himself back from opening the mineral water bottle anymore and took a couple of tiny sips.

He really wished he could finish the entire bottle, but he didn’t dare to.

Hopefully, the weather would be cooler the next day. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be able to survive for long.

At last, the sun set.

The disappearance of the sun didn’t cause the temperature to drop much. It was still very hot and stuffy, illogically, and unusually so.

Li Teng didn’t even produce any urine beyond a few drops the whole day. He felt like he was close to being baked into a dry corpse from the sun.

Before he went to sleep, he couldn’t resist taking another few sips of water.

In no time, only 200 milliliters out of the original 600 milliliters were left in the bottle.

Please rain tomorrow!! Otherwise, I’m going to die.

Li Teng dreamed a lot that night, too. However, there wasn’t any of that harmonious content anymore.

There was only one theme in all of his dreams, and that was going about everywhere to look for water.

He dreamed that he found a tap. With his mouth under the tap’s mouth, he turned it on and began to take large gulps of water. Yet, no matter how much he drank, it simply didn’t relieve even a bit of his thirst.

This went on until he finally woke up feeling very tired.

He could already see the first glimmer of dawn.

It had only been a day, but Li Teng found that his body had already become extremely weak.

He attempted to sit up, but the world around him started to spin.

This wasn’t a good sign. It was a forewarning that his bodily functions were about to break down completely.

Please don’t let it be as hot today as what it was yesterday anymore.

Li Teng didn’t want to die here.

He had to go back to the film studio alive and firmly and clearly reject the woman in the sunglasses.

One must finish what he started.

Footnotes:

There’s a Chinese saying that when one is warm and full, he will develop sinful thoughts

A bright, lively, and positive boy is also known as a ‘sunshine boy’ in Chinese