Little Pink Starfish

Truthfully, Yuan Yuanyuan still had no idea what exactly was going on—she had never thought in that direction before. And so, she simply never thought about it.

Many things were always shrouded in mist, completely unclear—until Yuan Yuanyuan finished reading the latest issue while sitting on the toilet. At that moment, she suddenly looked up.

Wait a minute—why did the scene in the comic look so familiar?

While Yuan Yuanyuan sat there deep in thought, Tang Shi, in another place, was also falling into deep thought.

Her thought was identical to Yuan Yuanyuan’s: Why does that place look so familiar?

…A bunch of people completely out of the loop.

The only one who was actually tuned in was Qiu Ling, who had already moved far away for her studies. After reading the comic, she entered a full-on existential crisis, much like Fa Ning.

Who am I? Where am I? What am I doing…?

Though she was far away in another city, Qiu Ling quickly called Tang Shi. She tested the waters, “Tang Shi, have you gone home lately?”

“I did. I went back a few days ago,” Tang Shi replied. “But I didn’t stay long. I left pretty quickly.”

“When you were back… did you hear anything unusual?” Qiu Ling asked.

“No…” said Tang Shi. “Can you be more specific? What part exactly?”

“I mean stuff about the boss,” Qiu Ling finally got to the point. If she didn’t speak clearly, she was afraid Tang Shi wouldn’t get it.

“The boss?” Tang Shi thought for a moment. “Recently, his courtyard got sealed off… I don’t know why. I asked a few people, and they all acted weird, so I didn’t press.”

“Do you think the boss got into some serious trouble?” Tang Shi asked. “But the last time I called him, he picked up, and he sounded normal…”

“…” Qiu Ling was suddenly speechless.

Did she accidentally stumble upon a secret people get killed for knowing?

Cough cough. Qiu Ling forced herself to push aside that disturbing thought and continued asking, “Can you take a photo of the boss’s courtyard and send it to me?”

Tang Shi was confused but went to the window, took a photo, and sent it to Qiu Ling. Qiu Ling picked up the latest issue of the comic and compared it with the photo. In that instant, everything clicked into place.

“Tang Shi,” Qiu Ling asked again, “You were taught illusion arts by the boss, right?”

“Yeah,” said Tang Shi.

“…Lucky you.” Qiu Ling said something that sounded bizarre to Tang Shi, and then asked, “Have you seen Liu An since then?”

“Nope. He’s been gone for a long time too. He disappeared around the same time the boss did,” Tang Shi replied.

Qiu Ling asked a few more casual questions and then hung up. Tang Shi still had no idea what she was getting at. She thought about it for a bit, didn’t get anywhere, and decided to just go to bed.

Yuan Yuanyuan, while also being rather dense, wasn’t quite as carefree as Tang Shi. After leaving the bathroom, she kept thinking and thinking, even after she got into bed.

That vine-covered courtyard… reminded her of something.

“Hm?” Yuan Yuanyuan suddenly sat up in bed. Her eyes narrowed. She finally realized something was off—maybe that familiar feeling wasn’t her imagination after all.

She sat there in silence, thinking and thinking. Her face cycled through a series of strange expressions: sudden shock, blank dead-fish eyes… back and forth like this five or six times until morning light began to creep into the sky.

She looked up. A flock of birds flew overhead. She slapped her forehead with her palm, wiped off a cold sweat, and got up to grab something to eat.

As she stepped outside, she bumped into Fat Cat. Fat Cat looked at her and said, “Uh… what did you do last night? You look terrible.”

“I… had a nightmare,” Yuan Yuanyuan replied. She didn’t say more. She staggered out the door, grabbed her clothes, and headed off to work.

So that’s what it was.

No wonder Fa Ning looked like the sky had fallen—it made perfect sense now, because she felt the exact same way.

She never would have guessed… Yuan Yuanyuan touched her forehead. She had originally thought Seventeen and Fa Ning had a master-disciple relationship. But now it turned out she had a master-disciple relationship with Fa Ning too.

And Liu An… that name sounded so plain. Who would’ve thought he was actually the protagonist of this shounen battle comic?

How to describe it… it felt like someone else had raised your carefully grown vegetable, only for a pig to come along and devour it. Yuan Yuanyuan’s emotions were complicated, so she decided to stop thinking about it for now.

At the tavern, people were already discussing the latest comic. Someone asked what Fa Ning had discovered.

Yuan Yuanyuan said nothing, quietly scrubbing glasses in the corner. Sitting next to her was Si Qun. She glanced at Si Qun, who instinctively leaned away from her. She couldn’t help but think—Ji Qiu was really something. Everything under her pen could be transformed. Who would’ve thought that the cool and distant iceberg man in the comic…

And who would’ve imagined that the quiet, ordinary-looking Liu An in real life was actually Fa Ning in the comic?

Liu An. Fa Ning.

What a surreal feeling.

Yuan Yuanyuan sighed and calculated the release date of the next issue. That would probably be when the next reader explosion happened.

She felt like she could already see an invisible hourglass slowly draining—filling her with dread and anticipation.

Sometimes, a close call could change everything. In the recent popularity poll, the Red-Clothed Man barely made it through.

If he had been eliminated, he might’ve died without even knowing why. What a pathetic end that would’ve been…

Sometimes she wanted to chime in when people were discussing the comic, but she held back out of fear of slipping up. So in the end, she said nothing at all.

She thought about so many things leading up to the day of the next comic release. Before opening it, she even mentally prepared herself a little.

But when she did start reading…

…Yeah, next time they met, it would be super awkward. Yuan Yuanyuan thought to herself. She had imagined their reunion would be a touching, dramatic scene.

---

After the latest chapter dropped, the internet exploded again. The last wave of shocked readers hadn’t even calmed down, and now it happened all over again.

This time it caught everyone completely off guard. Countless people flipped back through earlier issues and echoed Yuan Yuanyuan’s exact thought: Thank god the Red-Clothed Man narrowly won—otherwise Yuan’s death would’ve made no sense at all.

“What’s going on?! I don’t understand this comic anymore! What have I even been reading for the past six months?!”
Someone online was screaming in frustration.

Qiu Ling stared at her screen, feelings churning inside her. She knew all of it was real. So when Ji Qiu said the Red-Clothed Man was actually Yuan… that wasn’t just a dramatic plot twist—it was the truth.

Yuan had once taken Fa Ning in… just thinking about it was emotionally overwhelming. If this were an ordinary comic, it would just be a matter of the author giving the protagonist a lucky break. But in the real world… could something so coincidental actually happen?

What’s more, based on the comic, Yuan had been planning this for at least six months. There’s no way that was some spur-of-the-moment decision.

Qiu Ling suddenly felt like the entire comic was a tangled web of threads—knotted and endless, impossible to unravel.

But those threads weren’t random. They were traceable… just not by her. If Qiu Ling got caught up in this by accident, she’d be doomed.

The comic showed many of Fa Ning’s inner thoughts, revealing how overwhelmed he felt. Qiu Ling was starting to believe Fa Ning might be real. Seeing his inner turmoil made her feel a little better. And through Fa Ning’s thoughts, she caught a glimpse of a very different Yuan.

[Fa Ning recalled what he had uncovered, and for a moment, didn’t know what to feel.]

[That person… was Yuan? How could that be Yuan?]

[These two were completely different people.]

[One was a little laid-back, while the other, in everyone’s eyes, was strict and meticulous.]

[One could sit down and talk calmly with him, the other had clashed with him countless times.]

[How could they be the same person?]

[And yet…]

[Fa Ning’s heart began to sink.]

[Yuan had died… beneath his own hands.]

…Seriously? Did it have to be this melodramatic? This darkly ironic? Qiu Ling sighed. Knowing that Yuan wasn’t actually dead, she couldn’t help but feel for the poor kid who had been so deeply shaken.

But the readers who didn’t know?

They were already being driven absolutely insane by this twist.