Xie Jin’s name was placed at the very top of the shortlist of potential owners in Bai Ying’s heart.
Perhaps because he had already secretly regarded Xie Jin as his future owner, Bai Ying couldn’t help but walk closer to him. Even the rest of the crew noticed that a little tail seemed to have appeared behind the film emperor. Everyone harbored kind thoughts about it—after all, Xie Jin had countless fans, and they all saw Bai Ying as one of them.
On the contrary, Xie Jin’s attitude left everyone incredulous.
Xie Jin treated people mildly, but that was merely due to his upbringing. With prolonged contact, one could discover that he was actually a cold-hearted person who always maintained just the right distance from others. He always handled his relationships with fans well, keeping them from feeling embarrassed or awkward while subtly pulling away. Yet, with Bai Ying’s approach, Xie Jin seemed to welcome it; he even quietly closed the distance between them himself.
Among Xie Jin’s props was a real sword. He had learned swordsmanship as a child, and dangerous blades were like extensions of his arms in his hands. One day after filming wrapped, Xie Jin seemed struck by a whim. He slashed down a cluster of small yellow flowers with the blade, sheathed it, and handed the bouquet to Bai Ying. Everyone who saw it couldn’t help but mutter inwardly.
Would Xie Film Emperor be this nice to a fan…?
Two people knew exactly what was on Xie Jin’s mind.
Seeing Bai Ying clutching the dew-kissed flowers as he walked beside Xie Jin, his bright eyes fixed on the tall swordsman still in costume, Tan Ming and Lu Changjun ground their teeth in secret frustration.
Tan Ming began frequently adding extra meals for Bai Ying.
Lu Changjun desperately snatched up Bai Ying’s chores.
Yet no matter what they did, they couldn’t stop Bai Ying and Xie Jin from growing closer. The two felt deeply unsettled. They had met Bai Ying first—why had Xie Jin, the latecomer, taken the lead?
Some were smug, some were dejected, and some were oblivious.
On the eleventh day since arriving on set, it happened to be the crew’s routine trip down the mountain for supplies. However, they had a major scene to shoot that day, so most of the logistics staff had to stay on site to help out. With manpower short, Bai Ying, as an outsider, volunteered to help with the procurement.
He took the long list from the logistics team and headed down the mountain in the crew’s ultra-sturdy van with Lu Changjun. The crew was stationed deep in Wenxiang Mountain, next to a deserted village abandoned for decades. The dirt roads from the last century, left behind after the villagers relocated en masse, had been battered by rain and wind into uneven ruts overgrown with weeds. After a long stretch of bumpy mountain road, they finally reached the flat winding highway around the outer edges of Wenxiang Mountain.
The winding road had several sharp turns, and even seasoned drivers who ran it often had to be cautious. But Lu Changjun, no stranger to racing games, had excellent driving skills. On his first time tackling this route, he handled it effortlessly and had taken the wheel himself.
Bai Ying sat in the passenger seat, scanning the list and recalling the locations of various shops in town. There was a lot to buy, and time was tight—they had to make the round trip in a single day. Once night fell, the mountain roads would become treacherous.
It took over an hour to drive down. They set off under clear skies, bright sunshine, and not a cloud in sight. But halfway down, raindrops suddenly pelted the windshield, leaving long streaks.
One drop, two drops, then a torrent hammered down. A massive bank of dark gray storm clouds rolled in, plunging the sky into darkness. Lu Changjun’s face changed instantly.
His phone vibrated. Bai Ying pulled it out and saw a severe thunderstorm warning from the weather service.
“How did it come on so suddenly?” Bai Ying muttered. But there was no time to worry about the abrupt weather shift—they were already more than halfway down, and descending was faster than climbing back. Turning around wasn’t an option. Bai Ying turned to Lu Changjun. “Xiao Lu, drive carefully. Looks like we’ll have to stay in town tonight.”
“Got it.” Lu Changjun turned on the wipers, but the downpour quickly became a deluge, as if buckets of water were being dumped straight onto the windshield. The wipers couldn’t keep up. Visibility dropped to near zero. Lu Changjun slowed way down, navigating the winding highway in the torrential rain like steering a small boat through a disorienting ocean storm.
Lu Changjun was glad there were no other cars on the road. In this weather, one slip could mean disaster.
But his relief didn’t last. Amid the drumming rain, he heard a thunderous roar—not lightning, but like a building collapsing, earth crumbling!
“Watch out!” Lu Changjun barely had time to shout.
A torrent of mud and water surged toward them. Lu Changjun yanked the wheel hard, trying to swerve the van away from the debris flow barreling straight at them and shield Bai Ying in the passenger seat from the brunt of it. But it was too late. The wheels spun uselessly, skidding. Lu Changjun gritted his teeth, unbuckled his seatbelt, and threw himself over Bai Ying.
The van was swept off the highway by the unstoppable mudflow!
Everything spun in a dizzying whirl. Bai Ying clung desperately to the man on top of him. The seatbelt still strapped to him kept them both from being flung out. He heard the glass shattering under the strain and felt something—shards or gravel—gashing his exposed hand. Pain hadn’t registered yet. Bai Ying had no idea how Lu Changjun, shielding him, was faring.
The van slammed into the ground with a bone-jarring crash. In the massive jolt, Bai Ying blacked out.
***
Bai Ying awoke to someone shouting his name.
“Bai Ying! Bai Ying?!” The urgent voice grew clearer. Bai Ying jolted awake from unconsciousness. Rain pelted his face as someone tried to drag him from the overturned van.
“…Xiao Lu?” Bai Ying reached out, wiping the filthy mud from the young man’s face.
Seeing him awake, Lu Changjun let out a huge sigh of relief.
“Are you okay?” Lu Changjun asked tensely. “Anywhere hurting?”
Bai Ying shook his head slightly—his brain was spinning, maybe a concussion. He had some dull aches, but wasn’t sure yet if he was bleeding anywhere. What he did see was the blood on Lu Changjun’s clothes.
“Your back…” Bai Ying said hoarsely. The rain was so loud and chaotic that even this close, they had to shout.
“I’m fine,” Lu Changjun said, ignoring his mangled, bloody back. Adrenaline numbed the pain for now. “I’ll drag you out first—this thing could explode any second!”
Amid the earthy stench, a faint whiff of gasoline mingled in.
The seatbelt was already undone. Bai Ying gritted his teeth and wriggled out through the broken window with Lu Changjun’s help. The moment he emerged, he let out a muffled groan, cold sweat breaking out.
“What? Glass cut you?” Lu Changjun anxiously helped him up and into his arms.
“No…” Bai Ying shook his head. “My right leg… I think it’s broken.”
Bai Ying was supporting himself entirely on his left leg now; any pressure on the right sent searing pain shooting through him.
“I’ll carry you!” Lu Changjun tried to swing Bai Ying onto his back.
Bai Ying refused. He could see Lu Changjun’s back was a bloody mess of wounds.
Lu Changjun had no choice but to support him as they walked. He had no clue where the mudflow had dumped them—just endless trees indistinguishable in the pounding rain. The highway was out of sight. Priority one: get as far from the van as possible before it blew, then find shelter from the rain.
The heavy rain was rapidly sapping their body heat.
Lu Changjun clutched his phone in one hand, jabbing the screen with his thumb. “Damn it—no signal!”
Bai Ying gasped, “Check mine…”
His soaked clothes clung tight, outlining the phone in his pocket. Lu Changjun fished it out. Their phones were waterproof enough, but Bai Ying’s had no signal either.
“It’s okay,” Lu Changjun reassured him. “Right when I woke up, I caught a bar of signal and sent out a distress message. The crew will alert rescue teams for us.”
The rain poured relentlessly, the world a vast blur.
Bai Ying let out a long breath and stopped walking.
“What?” Lu Changjun tensed. “Leg hurting too much? Let me carry you…”
Bai Ying shook his head. “Xiao Lu, go on without me. I’m slowing you down too much.”
He couldn’t burden Lu Changjun any longer. Xiao Lu was badly hurt and had already waited who-knew-how-long in the storm for him to wake. His legs were fine—if he went alone, he might find shelter before exhaustion hit.
As for himself…
Bai Ying figured, as a snake, he could shift back to his true form, hole up somewhere, and tough it out.
“No way!” Lu Changjun rejected it without a thought. “I’m not leaving you behind!”
“Xiao Lu…” Bai Ying said helplessly.
“End of discussion.” Lu Changjun stubbornly tried to hoist him up. “You want me to abandon you? Only if I’m dead!”
The raindrops stung like pebbles on their skin.
Bai Ying felt heat building inside him, but it wasn’t good news—the rain still leached away their surface warmth, and on top of that, he was coming down with a fever.
Bai Ying grabbed Lu Changjun’s arm, holding him in a standoff. Lu Changjun just froze there, refusing to budge, as if ready to die right alongside him.
No matter what, he was taking Bai Ying with him.
Bai Ying sighed silently.
He made a decision.
Bai Ying looked up through the rain curtain into Lu Changjun’s eyes. “Xiao Lu,” he said softly, “don’t be scared.”
Lu Changjun didn’t understand why Bai Ying would say that, but the next second, he did.
The living person before him vanished into thin air! The unsupported clothes collapsed in a heap. Lu Changjun frantically caught them, then stared in shock as something alive wriggled inside!
A little white snake struggled out from the pile of clothes in his arms. The small snake had a pair of round black eyes. It was propelling itself with the front half of its body; Lu Changjun saw its tail end bent unnaturally, as if the bone there was broken.
“You’re… Bai Ying?” Lu Changjun’s voice floated, dazed, like his soul had fled.
The little white snake nodded and nuzzled his wrist.
Lu Changjun’s mind went blank. Anyone witnessing a person turn into a snake would react the same. But instinct made him clutch the clothes—Bai Ying’s—and the snake perched on top tightly.
Carrying an adult man was tough, but holding a feather-light little snake barely slowed him down.
Lu Changjun quickened his pace, drawing on past outdoor adventure experience to seek shelter.
He gradually accepted that his senior was actually a little snake and vowed to the one in his arms, “Senior, I’ll definitely protect you!”
“Hiss hiss.” The little white snake flicked its tongue and pressed its head to his chest.
