The beach was almost empty at night. The city lights were far behind him, the sea stretched forward black and endless beneath the cloudy sky, and wind moved across the sand carrying the salt scent of the tide. Shen Qingyu walked without an umbrella. Rain dampened his hair and coat, and the cold air slipped beneath his collar and pressed against the glands at the back of his neck, making him shiver faintly. He had been here once before, at sixteen — the night his engagement was cancelled. He had not remembered it clearly until now. Back then, after leaving the Shen house in the aftermath of the fever, he had come to this beach alone in the early hours before dawn, sat on the sand, and cried until he could not breathe. Not because he loved Xie Linchuan, but because he had finally understood that no one in that house would choose him. He had cried quietly, angrily, shamefully, like a child who hated himself for still wanting comfort.

Then someone had appeared beside him — a tall man in a dark coat, cold-faced, deep-eyed, with a presence so oppressive that even the sea wind seemed to move around him. The man had not asked why he was crying, had not told him not to cry, had not said it would be fine. He had only handed him a clean handkerchief. Shen Qingyu had stared at the handkerchief, then at him, and the man said, "It's clean," his voice low, a little cold, a little awkward. For some reason, Shen Qingyu had taken it and cried into a stranger's handkerchief for nearly half an hour while the man stood beside him the whole time — silent, patient, not comforting, not leaving. Later, when Shen Qingyu finally stopped, embarrassed and exhausted, the man asked, "Can you walk?" Shen Qingyu said yes, stood, and immediately stumbled. The man caught him by the arm, and his palm was warm — not gentle in a soft way, but steady. Afterward, he drove Shen Qingyu back to the Shen house, and before getting out of the car Shen Qingyu asked, "What's your name?" The man glanced at him. "Lu Jingheng."

At sixteen, Shen Qingyu already knew that name. The Lu family's young head. The empire's strongest SSS+ Enigma. A man people spoke of with both awe and fear. Shen Qingyu held the damp handkerchief and said, "I'll return this," and Lu Jingheng gave him a number. They exchanged contact information, but Shen Qingyu never returned the handkerchief, and Lu Jingheng never asked for it. For two years, that contact remained in his phone — silent, unused, like a door he never opened.

At midnight, Shen Qingyu reached the same stretch of beach. The rain had stopped and clouds drifted apart to reveal a thin moon. He stood where the sand met the stone steps and looked at the dark sea, and his phone vibrated continuously in his pocket. He did not check it — he already knew what the messages would be: insults, questions, maybe one or two false comforts, maybe Fang Yao asking where he was. He should reply to her later. He should tell her he was alive. For now, he only wanted one quiet minute on the first day of being eighteen. The wind lifted his wet hair, and under the moonlight Shen Qingyu's face was pale enough to look almost transparent, his eyes dry, his lips colourless from the cold. He looked nothing like the dazzling young film emperor on stage five days ago. He looked like someone who had crawled out of a collapsed dream and did not yet know whether to keep standing.

A voice sounded behind him. "You'll get sick standing there." Shen Qingyu froze, and for a moment he thought exhaustion had made him hallucinate — but then he turned. A man stood a few steps away beneath the dim beach light, tall and broad-shouldered in a dark coat, with cold handsome features, deep-set eyes, and the same oppressive silence, the same cedar-and-cold-rain pheromone presence, restrained but impossible to ignore. Lu Jingheng. Two years had changed him only slightly — he looked more mature, sharper, more controlled, the kind of man who did not need to raise his voice to make a room quiet. Shen Qingyu stared at him, and Lu Jingheng looked back. Neither spoke for several seconds. Finally, Shen Qingyu asked, "Why are you here?" "Passing by." It was such an obvious lie that Shen Qingyu almost laughed. "At midnight. On a beach." "Mn." "In the rain." "It stopped." Shen Qingyu looked at him, and Lu Jingheng remained expressionless, completely serious. A strange feeling rose in Shen Qingyu's chest — not warmth, not yet, but something more dangerous: the urge to laugh while standing at the edge of ruin.

He turned back toward the sea. "Did you see the news?" "Yes." "Then you should stay away from me." Lu Jingheng did not answer. "I am currently the entertainment industry's hottest potato." "I know." "If you stand too close, you might get burned." Lu Jingheng looked at his thin, rain-damp coat, then said, "You look colder than hot." Shen Qingyu paused, and then he really laughed — very softly, hoarse from exhaustion, but real. Lu Jingheng watched him, and after a while he walked closer and held out a handkerchief. Again. Clean, folded, plain white. Shen Qingyu stared at it as memory folded over the present: sixteen and eighteen, cancelled engagement and collapsed career, a beach and a man who did not ask him to explain before offering something clean. He did not take the handkerchief immediately. "Mr. Lu, do you always carry these around for people crying on beaches?" Lu Jingheng said, "Only twice." Shen Qingyu looked up, and their eyes met with the wind moving between them.

For some reason, his throat tightened. He had not cried in the past five days — not when the rumours exploded, not when the clips were edited, not when Xingchen suspended him, not when Fang Yao apologised, not when the contract was cancelled, not when the internet called him vicious and arrogant and disgusting and unworthy. But at this moment, looking at a handkerchief he had once taken from this man two years ago, he suddenly felt the unbearable weight of being seen in the same place twice: both times ruined, both times alone, both times pretending he could still stand. Shen Qingyu reached out and took the handkerchief. His fingers brushed Lu Jingheng's, and Lu Jingheng's hand was warm. Shen Qingyu lowered his eyes. "Thank you." "Mn." They stood quietly while the sea moved in the darkness.

After a long time, Shen Qingyu said, "Lu Jingheng." "Mn." "Are you married?" "No." "Engaged?" "No." "Do you have someone you like?" Lu Jingheng paused — longer than the others. Shen Qingyu turned his head slightly. "Hard to answer?" "No." "Then?" "I don't know what counts." Shen Qingyu was silent for a moment, and then he smiled. Not coldly, not sharply, not with the restrained control he used beneath award lights or the cold edge he gave the Shen family — it was reckless and tired and almost beautiful in its brokenness. "Then do you want to marry me?" The words fell between them lightly, so lightly that even Shen Qingyu himself seemed surprised after saying them. Lu Jingheng's expression did not change, but his eyes did — very slightly, the dark pupils becoming deeper and heavier, as if something silent had suddenly pressed down beneath the surface.

Shen Qingyu held the handkerchief and looked at him, the wind lifting his wet hair away from his face, his eyes bright from feverish exhaustion, his lips pale, his whole body carrying the fragile sharpness of someone who had nothing left to lose and therefore dared to gamble with everything. "I just turned eighteen." "I know." "I have no agency now." "I know." "My reputation is terrible." "I know." "The whole internet is scolding me." "I know." "The Shen family won't help me." "I know." "I might not be able to act again." Lu Jingheng looked at him. "You will." Shen Qingyu paused — the answer was too certain, as if the entire world's judgement weighed less than one sentence from him. His fingers tightened around the handkerchief. "Mr. Lu, I'm not asking for comfort." "I'm not comforting you." "Then what are you doing?" "Stating a fact." Shen Qingyu stared at him, and Lu Jingheng's voice was low and steady: "You are good at acting. So you will act again."

For a long time, Shen Qingyu could not speak. The whole internet had judged his character, his agency had judged his risk, the Shen family had judged his temperament, and Xie Linchuan had judged his lovability — but Lu Jingheng, standing on a cold beach at midnight, looked at the ruins of his career and said he was good at acting, so he would act again, as if it were that simple, as if the truth could still matter. Shen Qingyu lowered his eyes, and the reckless impulse from earlier did not fade but became clearer. He had lost the engagement arranged by his dead parents, the family name that never protected him, the career he built with discipline and blood, and public favour before he ever truly possessed it — but he was eighteen now, legally an adult, free to sign contracts, free to leave, free to choose a door no one had prepared for him. He looked up again. "Lu Jingheng, I'm serious." "So am I." Shen Qingyu's breath caught — Lu Jingheng had not agreed clearly, not yet, but something in his tone had already crossed the line between question and answer.

"Do you know what marrying me means?" "Yes." "It means trouble." "Mn." "It means rumours." "Mn." "It means the Shen family." Lu Jingheng's gaze remained calm. "The Lu family is not afraid of the Shen family." "It means people will say I married you for money." "Do you care?" Shen Qingyu opened his mouth, then closed it. Did he care? Five days ago, perhaps. A year ago, certainly. At sixteen, absolutely. But now, standing at the end of everything, he suddenly realised he cared less than he thought. Let them say it — they had said worse. Lu Jingheng watched his expression and said, "If you marry me, you can still do what you want." Shen Qingyu looked at him. "What if what I want changes?" "Then change it." "What if I regret it?" "Then tell me." "What will you do?" Lu Jingheng was silent for two seconds. "Try to make you not regret it."

The answer was stiff, almost clumsy, and it did not sound romantic or like a vow from a novel or a speech beneath flowers — but Shen Qingyu's eyes suddenly stung, because Lu Jingheng had not said you won't regret it, had not decided Shen Qingyu's feelings for him, had only said he would try. For someone like Shen Qingyu, who had spent his whole life being interpreted by others, that small distinction mattered more than any grand promise. He looked at him for a long moment. "So your answer is yes?" Lu Jingheng met his gaze. "Yes."

The sea wind blew past them, and Shen Qingyu suddenly felt very tired — so tired that the cold, the humiliation, the anger, the sleeplessness, and the five days of collapse all rushed back into his body at once. His knees weakened, and Lu Jingheng stepped forward and caught him, just like two years ago, except that this time Shen Qingyu did not immediately pull away. He leaned against Lu Jingheng's arm, his forehead almost touching the man's shoulder. Lu Jingheng lowered his eyes. "You have a fever." "Probably." "Hospital." "No." "Shen Qingyu." His full name, spoken in that low voice, sounded strangely heavy. "I don't want to go to the hospital." "Then where?" Shen Qingyu was quiet. The Shen house was impossible. His apartment meant being alone. Fang Yao's place — she would worry. The beach, and he might actually freeze to death. After a moment he said, very softly, "I don't know." Lu Jingheng looked at him, then removed his coat and wrapped it around Shen Qingyu. The cedar-and-cold-rain scent surrounded him instantly, deep and controlled, carrying the pressure of an SSS+ Enigma but restrained so carefully it did not hurt him, and Shen Qingyu's tense glands slowly eased. Lu Jingheng said, "Then come with me first." "Mr. Lu, you just agreed to marry a hot potato — now you're taking him home?" "Yes." "Are you always this careless?" "No." "Then why?" Lu Jingheng looked at him. "Because you asked." Shen Qingyu stopped speaking, afraid that if he opened his mouth again something shameful might come out with his breath — something like a sob. So he let Lu Jingheng lead him away from the beach while behind them the sea kept moving, the tide erasing their footprints slowly, as if covering the final trace of the ruined eighteen-year-old who had walked there alone.

Lu Jingheng did take him home — not to the Lu family ancestral residence, but to a private villa near the city centre. The house was quiet, spacious, and clean, its decoration restrained, mostly dark wood and pale stone without unnecessary warmth, and it suited Lu Jingheng very much: cold, orderly, difficult to approach. But the moment Shen Qingyu entered, a housekeeper appeared with slippers, warm towels, and hot water as if Lu Jingheng had already arranged everything on the way. Shen Qingyu noticed and did not ask — he was too tired. A doctor arrived within twenty minutes, and Shen Qingyu sat on the sofa wrapped in Lu Jingheng's coat while the doctor checked his temperature and glands. "High fever, emotional stress, fatigue, mild pheromone instability," the doctor said carefully. "He needs rest — no more stimulation tonight." Lu Jingheng frowned. "Medicine?" "I'll prepare it." The doctor glanced at Shen Qingyu, then at Lu Jingheng, clearly curious but not daring to ask anything. Shen Qingyu found it funny. "Doctor, don't worry," he said hoarsely. "I'm not being kidnapped." The doctor nearly dropped the thermometer, and Lu Jingheng looked at Shen Qingyu, who looked back innocently. For the first time that night, the corner of Lu Jingheng's mouth seemed to move — only a little, almost invisible — but Shen Qingyu caught it, and thought, through the fever haze, that this man was actually quite interesting.