Tao Fangyi carefully packed his luggage.
He didn’t have much to bring, but Li Yao had grabbed the stack of food drawings Ren Xinxin drew.
Ren Xinxin hadn’t liked the Tao Fangyi doll much lately. Probably because Tao Fangyi’s face had turned blue, and timid little Ren Xinxin found him kind of creepy now.
“This is for you.” Tao Fangyi handed Li Yao a small packet. Inside were two birthday candles—a “1” and a “4.”
He also gave Li Yao a tiny box and told her to open it when she turned fourteen.
It was a surprise.
“Have things been going all right for you lately?” Tao Fangyi asked while tidying up his things.
“So-so. Some small drama at school.” Li Yao described in detail how a group of her classmates had split into factions, argued, and cut ties over nothing more than a difference in a tiny hobby.
Li Yao found it all a huge hassle, though she clearly had her own leanings and didn’t agree with the other side either.
“What do you think?” Li Yao asked Tao Fangyi after finishing her story.
“I’ve never played mobile games.” Tao Fangyi’s current trend was still rock and roll, but Wang had told him rock had exploded into popularity back in the last century, and the last century could already be called “ancient.”
“But it’s perfectly normal for kids your age to clash and argue as they explore.” This kind of conflict helped them discover their true selves.
“So our arguments are boring?” Li Yao asked.
“Not boring. This is your only time being thirteen—everything about you is novel.” Tao Fangyi adjusted the space inside his briefcase and then put away the stack of children’s drawings Li Yao had brought him. “You’ve only breathed air for thirteen years. This is your first time in middle school. It’s all very interesting.”
He fastened his briefcase, then asked Li Yao to step out—he needed to change clothes.
“You don’t have anything on. Why avoid me?” Wang asked Tao Fangyi.
“I mind.” Tao Fangyi huffed and puffed as he took off his overalls. Then the embroidered cross-star eyes on his face vanished, replaced by plain, unremarkable dot eyes.
His blue hair also changed back to black fabric.
Tao Fangyi put on a shirt and tied a bow tie.
“My god, you even have shirt stays.” Wang was shocked. “You’re a doll. Why wear shirt stays?”
“It’s no good if my shirt comes untucked while I’m running around.” Tao Fangyi put on his suit jacket and changed into his little black pocket-sized leather shoes.
Once fully dressed, he clutched his bow tie, bounced a couple of times, and asked Wang, “How do I look? Not too casual, is it?”
Wang reached out silently, flipped up the back of Tao Fangyi’s suit jacket, unbuttoned the single large button on his tiny vest, and tugged his shirt out.
“Hey!” Tao Fangyi hugged the hem of his shirt. “No touching without permission!”
Tao Fangyi started straightening his clothes again.
When Wang tried to reach out a second time, Tao Fangyi dodged him with a huge leap.
“Your proper appearance doesn’t match your look at all. I wanted to muss you up.” Wang said bluntly.
Tao Fangyi’s original doll design had a pile of cute accessories added, but now his appearance had none of that.
Tao Fangyi’s outfit was plain, but that plain outfit on a two-heads-tall doll looked bizarre.
Especially since Wang noticed Tao Fangyi had even strapped shirt stays around his impossibly stubby little legs.
The shirt stays were ridiculously tiny and looked particularly amusing.
“Hey, let me play with your shirt stays.” He wanted to see if the little clips actually functioned properly.
“No.” Tao Fangyi neatened himself up again and patted down his suit to make sure the fabric hadn’t wrinkled.
Feeling a little uneasy, Tao Fangyi warned Wang: “When you follow me to the Nineteenth Level, you can’t go pulling at other people’s clothes. It’s terribly rude.”
“I’ve got no interest in other people’s clothes. I’m not some pervert.” Wang snorted.
“Something else very important—lower your head.” Tao Fangyi tried his best to raise a hand, but he didn’t even reach Wang’s knees height-wise.
Wang bent down and brought his head close to Tao Fangyi’s round hand.
Then Wang felt a warm current flow into his body. He suddenly became light, floating in the air. His arms and legs grew shorter and shorter until, at last, Wang shrank to the same height as Tao Fangyi and dropped to the ground.
Wang was dumbfounded. He looked at his hands—he still had five fingers, but they looked absurdly tiny.
“This way you stand out less.” Tao Fangyi knocked on the round shell of Wang’s head.
Now they were the same height, but Wang wasn’t a rag doll—he still had skin and flesh.
Wang’s appearance had become much more abstract.
Half of his round head was a mouth.
Wang’s mouth couldn’t close at all. His lips were extremely thin, practically nonexistent. Normally, his mood could be read by whether the corners were turned up or down, and right now, the corners of Wang’s mouth were drooping practically to the floor.
The upper half of Wang’s head was wrapped in bandages, and the bandage strips floated around his skull.
“Oh! You really do have bandages on your body.” Tao Fangyi noticed Wang’s torso and legs were also wrapped in bandages. Wang had mentioned before that his body was bandaged too, but Tao Fangyi had assumed Wang was just teasing him, trying to provoke.
“I never gave you permission to do this!” Wang clenched his cartoonified hands. “All my dignity is gone!”
“But you look like a mummy now—very exotic, like royalty from a foreign land.” Tao Fangyi reopened his briefcase. He rummaged around inside and eventually pulled out an outfit.
The moment Wang saw the clothes, he took two steps back and whirled to run. But Tao Fangyi seized his bandages and stopped him.
“These clothes look great! So sunny.” Tao Fangyi knew Wang had an aversion to cheerful, upbeat clothes, and he thought that was a bad thing.
“That blue-and-white tracksuit is definitely a school uniform!” Wang struggled with all his short legs’ might, but his strength couldn’t match Tao Fangyi’s, so he couldn’t flee at all.
“I refuse! Why do you get to wear a suit while I wear something like that?!” Wang yelled.
“I’m your guardian. We can’t dress exactly alike, can we?” Tao Fangyi glanced at the blue-and-white tracksuit in his hand, then sighed softly and rummaged for a few more items.
Denim overalls, a brightly colored outdoor jacket covered in cartoon patterns, a robe of bizarre shape, and even a tutu skirt.
In the end, Wang compromised. The blue-and-white tracksuit might be ugly, but at least it didn’t make him look like a mistake.
A clattering, jangling noise came from Wang’s mouth. He was probably cursing, but Tao Fangyi couldn’t understand him.
All Tao Fangyi knew was that Wang had put on that blue-and-white tracksuit.
Since Wang had accepted the tracksuit, there was no need to bring out the black Zhongshan suit anymore.
“So youthful! So energetic!” Tao Fangyi praised while folding the other clothes back into his briefcase. “You could blend right in with a high schooler’s running drill and no one would find you out of place.”
Having no idea that he had missed out on a much more normal outfit, Wang sneered, “Who are you calling a high schooler? Are high schoolers bursting with vitality?” High school running drills? Weren’t those just zombie parades?
Wang looked at his hands and then asked, “I’m not going to stay like this forever, am I?”
“No. It’s only like this when you go back to the Nineteenth Level. Once you come out, you’ll return to normal.” Everything was prepared. Tao Fangyi opened the door and let Li Yao back in so he could say a final farewell to the child.
And conveniently close the child’s Heavenly Eye.
With her Heavenly Eye closed, Li Yao could no longer see Wang, but Tao Fangyi remained a physical entity.
“I’ll never see you again, will I?” Li Yao crouched down to speak with Tao Fangyi.
“Perhaps we’ll meet again in your next reincarnation,” Tao Fangyi told her.
“But that person won’t be Li Yao.” After saying this, Li Yao thought for a moment and added, “And the fox from a past life wasn’t Li Yao either.”
“Our encounter is ending now, isn’t it?” Li Yao was a little sad, but she was smiling. This time it wasn’t a forced smile.
Tao Fangyi carried his briefcase and extended his hand toward Li Yao. “It’s time to say goodbye.”
Li Yao’s smile widened. She reached out and shook his hand, moving it up and down lightly. “I’m very glad I met you.”
“I’m very glad I could reunite with you too,” Tao Fangyi said. “I’m glad that the child in my memories, the one who couldn’t speak clearly, has grown into an impressive middle schooler.”
“Ha ha, middle schoolers aren’t impressive.” Tears slid down Li Yao’s cheeks. She wiped her face.
“Very impressive. Ask Ren Xinxin if you don’t believe me.” Tao Fangyi gestured above his head. “You grew this tall in the blink of an eye. Kids really are amazing.”
Li Yao laughed again for a while, and as she laughed, her voice slowly faded away.
Li Yao and Tao Fangyi looked at each other.
They held each other’s gaze for a long while. Then Li Yao lifted her hand. “So… goodbye?”
“Goodbye.” Tao Fangyi nodded. He took Wang’s hand and walked toward the wall.
The instant he touched the wall, a flash of white light flickered. Tao Fangyi’s body sank into the wall and vanished completely.
He really left.
Li Yao stared at the wall for a long time, then ran over and touched it. The wall was solid.
This dreamlike journey had ended.
After making her choice that night, Li Yao realized she was still unwilling to let go.
Even though real life wasn’t perfect, even though there were so many frustrating things.
Now, when she opened her phone, she saw classmates arguing over the conflict.
The kindergarten teacher at Ren Xinxin’s school refused to admit fault and kept calling to hassle them.
Li Yao still missed her father, still missed her past self.
It seemed like nothing had changed.
Li Yao stood up. She opened the window and pushed aside the screen.
It was early morning on Saturday, and everyone else was still asleep. Li Yao took a deep breath of the morning air, then stared up at the sky.
As the sun slowly rose, Li Yao noticed a tiny snail on the windowsill. On its shell rested a drop of dew, and it kept inching forward.
Where was it going? What was its destination?
Li Yao didn’t know.
But when the sunlight glimmered through that drop of dew, it was so beautiful.
Li Yao watched the snail, and somehow she felt something stir inside her. Even though nothing had happened, she felt so happy.
What was she happy about?
Maybe the morning breeze was just too gentle.
Once she realized her joy, she felt joy because of that joy.
“So which path is Li Yao on now?” Wang stood in the elevator, pressed close to Tao Fangyi.
“Hard to say. Too many uncertainties.” Tao Fangyi reminded him, “She’s still a thirteen-year-old kid. Still too young.”
“I hate that kind of uncertainty.” Wang crossed his arms over his chest.
“But everything is uncertain.” Tao Fangyi tidied his hair while looking at his reflection in the elevator mirror.
The elevator let out a ding. Tao Fangyi immediately straightened up and grabbed Wang’s hand. “We’re here.”
Wang was a little nervous.
After all, the Nineteenth Level was their Special Administration’s most mysterious department, and he had just learned that the Nineteenth Level had the highest average combat strength. Their department head was even the Heavenly Dao.
The elevator doors slowly opened.
As if finally drawing aside a quiet curtain, noisy chatter and the sound of wheels gradually reached Wang’s ears.
Tao Fangyi led Wang out of the elevator.
Wang looked around at the surroundings and couldn’t help but let out a “Wow.”
