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“The world of difference between heaven and earth.”
These words were too heavy. Song Chuci staggered a step.
Song Chuci’s body quivered slightly, his pupils trembling as he stood in shock. He looked at the boy in front of him with anxious eyes, as if he couldn’t believe the hurtful words that came from the other person’s mouth at all.
Song Chuci is a person with a strong desire to control. In front of him, Luo Cheng’s actions will always be faintly at a disadvantage. But today, at this moment, the youth in front of him had completely pulled him down from the sky and stepped on the soles of his feet with one sentence.
Luo Cheng’s words pierced Song Chuci’s heart thoroughly–his biggest weakness, his nì lín[1] that no one could touch.
The fashion industry is a luxurious and glamorous place. Here is the back garden of the upper class, one of the world’s top five magazines, there had never been an editor-in-chief born from such a low status.
Song Chuci was the first.
When he had just become the editor-in-chief of Muse, many people were talking secretly behind his back, poking his spine, despising him as someone with no background. Some even bluntly ridiculed his origin.
Over the years, Song Chuci used his abilities to shut these people up.
Afterward, no one dared to talk about Song Chuci’s rights and wrongs in front of him. If Xi Ze is the fashion godfather of the fashion industry, then besides Xi Ze, he is the unique powerhouse in China’s fashion circle.
Three years–Song Chuci has been in this position for three years now. He hadn’t heard any more kinds of irony and insult, but all those words couldn’t enter his heart. Only this time, what the youth had said was clearly much lighter than what the others had said, but it made him feel as if he had been cut open by a knife, thrown under the sky, nakedly enduring the scorching sun.
His face paled for an instant, but Song Chuci withheld the pain in his heart and asked calmly, “Who said something to you?”
Song Chuci was not stupid. Luo Cheng had obviously cried. Now that he ran to him saying such slanderous words shows that during the hours when he disappeared, someone was telling Luo Cheng about his past; letting him misunderstand Song Chuci.
But the response to Song Chuci’s question was an even colder look from Luo Cheng.
He gazed at Song Chuci with an indescribable look: partially disappointed, partially angry, and partially disgusted to the extreme. This repulsive look caused Song Chuci to feel like he was on pins and needles, his body stiff. He tried to tell himself that this was the person he liked, this person didn’t actually hate him.
However, Luo Cheng’s following words made Song Chuci’s self-comfort sound even more ridiculous.
“I know they want to split us apart, they want us to separate. But Song Chuci, I’m not stupid. I just didn’t want to fuss about it. Don’t take me as a fool. Those things that you did are real and truly happened. Just consider yourself for a second, how did you reach your current position in such a short period of time? Song Chuci, there are some things that can’t be hidden for a lifetime. I thought my love for you would let me ignore these things, but after I really discovering your disgusting and dirty acts, Song Chuci, I can only hate you…”
“Do you know what you are talking about?”
Song Chuci’s calm voice sounded.
There was a gleam of water in Luo Cheng’s eyes, but he gritted his teeth and said with a smile: “I know. I’m telling you, I’m sick of you.”
Song Chuci looked on with a composed and peaceful look at the stranger in front of him. He watched for a long time before he finally laughed lowly: “You are the first person I’ve liked, Luo Cheng. I, Song Chuci, have never been a person with a clean past, but from the beginning to the end, the only person I’ve ever liked is you. Is this not enough?”
“Not enough.”
These two simple words caused Song Chuci’s eyes to redden and his fingers tightly clenched into his palm. After a long time, he said, “You are the first person for me to like. After being with you I have only been with you. Is this enough?”
“Not enough.”
Five deep crescent-shaped marks have already been dug into the palm of his hand. Song Chuci stared at the boy in front of him with complicated and profound eyes. He seemed to be struggling, but in the end, everything turned into one sentence.
This sentence was very calmly said, but in Song Chuci’s heart, it was already his last sliver of hope.
He said: “No matter how I got here before, now and in the future, I only have you–you love me and I love you: you know that other people’s words are to break us up, so Luo Cheng, forget those words and stay with me, is it enough?”
Towards the end, he had said spoken very humbly. Although his eyes were still firm, his back was slightly twisted. He stretched out his hand to touch the youth’s face, but just as he touched the tears on the boy’s face, his hand was slapped away by Luo Cheng.
Luo Cheng’s face was streaming with tears. Song Chuci knew that this kid would always hiccup when crying, but now he resisted it. The youth just kept crying while looking at himself with indifferent disgust–sitting high up in the sky looking down at the lowest and most detestable dust.
“Song Chuci! Until now, are you are still capable of saying these words in front of me? You said that you love me, I love you, and we are going to be together? I’ll tell you: I have never liked you before. Even if I did, from now on, as long as I hear your name, I will only think ‘how could I have loved such a disgusting person like you!’”
“Luo Cheng!”
“Song Chuci, you have nothing to explain, as long as we are still breathing, me, Luo Cheng, and you, we will never see each other again!”[2]
“Luo Cheng!”
“Song Chuci, you really make me sick.”
At the end of this sentence, Luo Cheng turned and left.
With a bang, the door slammed into Song Chuci who wanted to chase after him, knocking him backward. The skin on the palm of his hand that had been clenched tightly directly burst with blood, dripping and staining his palm all over.
Song Chuci sat on the floor of the hallway in a daze, staring at the dark door.
At this moment, the sudden sound of a clock indicating the hour came from inside the house.
It was 12 o’clock. That person’s birthday had already passed, and the gift he carefully prepared was never given. He tasted the bitter result of all his hard work.
Song Chuci had not had this feeling for years.
It was as if in the eyes of that person, he was the most despicable and lowly villain. Even if he had climbed to his current position, he was still only a nouveau riche. He would never have the right to stand side by side with him.
The etiquette he had studied for ten years became a joke at this time. He had studied the mannerisms of the upper class for five years, yet at this time, he had become a farce for the other party to laugh at.
No matter how hard he works, in the eyes of some people, he will only ever be a jest for after meals.
He is dirt, the dirtiest of dirt. Even if he climbs to the sky, even if he could make those who once despised himself look up, he still couldn’t keep the only person he had ever loved in his life by his side. He had stood higher in the sky and, with one foot, kicked him to the back to the ground.
The light was on, but his heart was dark.
Song Chuci was not a weak person. He did not show more collapse at this time, just stared at the ground blankly. It was unknown how long it took before he started to move.
Song Chuci’s fingers trembled as he took out his phone, but he still dialed Luo Cheng’s number. However, right as his call went through, he had only said: “The things you know about me may be true, but I really do love you!”
Before the other side very quickly replied: “Fuck off!”
No matter how many times Song Chuci tried calling again, the call never went through again. His number had been blacklisted.
It was as if Song Chuci couldn’t be exhausted. Every time his call was rejected he would call one more time. In the end, he had called over a hundred times. When his phone had run out of power and automatically shut down, Song Chuci suddenly started laughing.
His eyes were bloodshot as he smiled, seeming to be in a cross between laughing and crying. His voice echoed gently in the quiet room as tears cascaded down his cheeks, wetting his face.
When he first entered the magazine company and had his finger stepped on, he did not cry; when he was promoted but abused behind the scenes, he did not cry. The name Song Chuci seemed to be synonymous with strength, even he himself did not expect that this youth would have such a big hold over him.
Why? How could the person who hates me the most be you?
It could be anyone, after all, I am not a person worthy of sympathy, but why does that person have to be you?
Before starting this game, Song Chuci hadn’t expected that he would fall so severely one day; in other words, before this moment, he had not considered that this young man’s contempt could make him fall from heaven to hell in an instant, never to turn back.
Those frigidly cold eyes, Song Chuci couldn’t forget it even now. With every blink of his eye, the young man’s gaze appeared in his mind–full of rebuke and disgust, as if looking at the vilest thing in the world.
The look in his eyes seemed to turn into countless dull knives, slashing his heart all at once. From gash to gash, blood was flowing from the wounds in his heart, the fresh blood mottled and glaring. Every laceration exposed his raw flesh, each wound indescribably terrifying.
There are some things that simply cannot be explained.
In order to achieve his current status, in order to make those who had looked down upon himself have to look up, he, Song Chuci, was truly never clean. He had accepted the unspoken rules. Among those women, there were both young and old. If one were to say he was essentially prostituting, it couldn’t even have been called an exaggeration.
He was not only good-looking and smart, but also understood the inner workings of the system.
Even though he had severed his relationships with the women over the years, he really had done those things. He had nothing he could explain to Luo Cheng.
After all, these are facts.
Didn’t the look in Luo Cheng say it all?
In the eyes of the person he loves, he is just an MB[3], nasty and dirty.
There is a saying called each taking what you need. In the adult world, even if reality is dark, you still have to accept it. But Song Chuci knew that the person he liked would never touch such things. He had the qualification to be pure and clean; he had the qualification to climb to a very high position without relying on such vulgar methods.
Except for He Chaoman, Xi Ze only backed Luo Cheng.
Are Chaoman and Luo Cheng the most talented models in the world?
Definitely not. The reason why Xi Ze favors them is because they are “He Chaoman” and “Luo Cheng”.
This is the reality of this world. He climbed to where he is now by his own means. Song Chuci thought he was qualified to love who he wanted to love, to possess what he wanted to possess. Yet he didn’t understand how he would be pummeled into the dirt by the one person he wanted to love most.
Song Chuci knew that even if he was just an ordinary person, Luo Cheng would not mind. But by the time they met, everything had already happened and could no longer be changed. Also, if he really was just an ordinary person, would he even ever meet Luo Cheng?
Absolutely impossible.
He didn’t blame Luo Cheng, nor did he blame himself. After sitting in the hallway for an hour, Song Chuci got up and walked to the dining table to eat the food on it. The dishes were already cold and such greasy things were unappetizing, but Song Chuci didn’t seem to notice anything as he continued to eat.
After he finished everything, there was only the cake left.
It said “for the person I love most” in jam on top, but the owner of the cake would never see it.
It was once said that if whoever broke their word first, whoever would have to wash, cook, and clean. Luo Cheng hadn’t gone back on his word yet, but Song Chuci had, so on this day, he made a lot of preparations: personally cooking, personally making a cake even if it didn’t look good.
The chill of the night sank into the man’s body and his reddened eyes unmovingly stared at the cake. He didn’t know how long he stared at it when he suddenly moved his hands. One bite, a second bite, then the third bite… Song Chuci had never been so ashamed before. Even when he was pushed into a mire and called a “son of a cousin[4],” he was not as ashamed.
That night, Song Chuci vomited all night, then collapsed in the bathroom crying and laughing.
He didn’t hate Luo Cheng, he was just laughing at himself. He laughed at himself thinking how he had acquired the whole world, yet he couldn’t have what he wanted most. The world was truly unfair to him, but did he ever have the opportunity to choose? Does he have the right to choose?
His childhood was not as miserable as some poor children, but still full of ridicule by others. His appearance was inherited from his prostitute mother, and his wisdom could have been inherited from the prostitute who was scolded by others as a bitch who didn’t know which customer was the father of her child.
Song Chuci was greedy. He had never been a good person. He wanted to get what he wanted in the simplest way. So he took a shortcut, and then he lost the love he could have had.
After a sleepless night, the next day, Song Chuci staggered into the kitchen to get a piece of bread. However, at the first bite he took, he couldn’t help but heave it all out.
He took the second bite and threw that up too; a third bite, he vomited it out again…
In the end, he threw the piece of bread aside and slumped on the ground crying and laughing.
On the other side of the city, Luo Cheng had also cried all night, when he suddenly ran out of the house again, planning to call Song Chuci while driving back. But before he walked into the garage, he was stopped by his elder sister who repeated those words, making Luo Cheng feel dead again.
A day later, Luo Cheng and Wen Ya left China and flew to the United States.
lolimelon: the saddest part is over (T^T) this was actually a bit harder to read/translate than when i first read it since i didn’t break down all the details at the time. anyways, wipe those tears, happy times ahead!
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[1] – nì lín (逆鱗) is basically someone’s ultimate weakness; 逆 means “reverse/inverse”, 鱗 means “scale” ie. fish scale, dragon scale, etc.
[2] – yes, it’s “me” and not “i”. this is proper grammar. i checked it three times \(´ー｀)/
[3] – MB basically means “mother’s cunt” and probably the shortened version of MLGB; it is most likely equivalent to the term “motherfucker” here for more details (command/control f to find)
[4] – “son of a cousin” kind of just translates as “son of a bitch”
lolimelon mtl 