Resources (1/2)
From a young age, Gu Yilan had always been a walking topic generator wherever he went.
Gong Chuang had a similar academic path and personally witnessed how Gu Yilan consistently topped the “hot topics” on the anonymous forums of every school they attended—elementary, middle, high school, and university.
After all, being young, good-looking, and academically outstanding—any one of these could spark conversations. But when all three qualities were concentrated in one person, he naturally became the center of attention.
What made it worse—or more intriguing—was Gu Yilan’s perpetual indifference. He was the epitome of the untouchable “high mountain flower,” clearly uninterested in forums or public opinion. People felt free to dig into his life, and eventually, discussions about him became entirely open and unabashed.
When Gong Chuang had nothing better to do, he used to scroll through those posts. If he came across something funny, he’d even read it aloud to Gu Yilan. The man would merely raise an eyebrow, utterly indifferent, too lazy to even comment.
Gong Chuang soon realized he was amusing himself and stopped bringing them up altogether.
But right now, with his thoughts momentarily short-circuited, an old post from those forums suddenly resurfaced in his mind.
—A thread speculating on Gu Yilan’s sexual orientation.
The school’s anonymous forum was full of both trolls and genuinely lovestruck admirers. And since Gu Yilan clearly didn’t care, the post gained traction and blew up quickly.
The original poster claimed to have solid evidence that Gu Yilan was 100% straight—citing reasons such as his consistently plain, patternless clothing; his blunt, no-nonsense communication (telling people to “get lost” without hesitation—classic straight guy behavior); and the way he stood out among a class of overwhelmingly straight science students.
But soon others chimed in to disagree. Their main argument? Multiple classmates confirmed that Gu Yilan had virtually no female friends. How could someone like that be straight? And look at that dominant aura! That Alpha energy that made knees go weak! Obviously, he liked men!
The debate went back and forth—until someone pointed out a glaring flaw in both arguments: Gu Yilan didn’t seem to have male friends either.
And so, a third theory took the lead:
Oh—Gu Yilan must be asexual. The kind of person who could never fall in love.
“Can you even imagine what it would look like if Gu Yilan liked someone? I can’t.”
Gu Yilan was the type who could look a groupmate dead in the eye and say, “What does that have to do with me?” without flinching. A man so focused on his studies he seemed to live in a world of his own, utterly uninterested in anything else. A mystery no amount of gossip had ever been able to unravel—not even his childhood.
Gong Chuang had laughed so hard reading that thread he’d rolled around on his bed, trembling as he forwarded the post to Gu Yilan. But Gu Yilan never responded—probably didn’t even open it.
Back then, Gu Yilan was just seventeen.
Six years later, that memory came back to smack Gong Chuang in the face like a well-aimed boomerang.
He had wanted to keep questioning Su Zesui, but thinking back to Gu Yilan’s whirlwind marriage to his so-called “younger brother,” the handcuffs in the office, and the increasingly surreal behavior that made Gong Chuang wonder if he was dreaming—it all started to make a disturbing amount of sense.
The more ridiculous it was, the more likely it was true.
——He should have known. He should have guessed! If Gu Yilan was bold enough to play like that even in school, there was no way his real-life relationships were going to be simple!
Gong Chuang now wanted to dig up all those forum users who once wrote things like “he’s clearly straight,” “he’s attacking me with his dominance,” or “this iron tree will never bloom,” grab them by the collar, and scream:
“Come see this with your own eyes! Bet you didn’t expect Gu Yilan to turn out like this, huh? Hahahaha! I’ve known him for twenty years and I want to die right now!”
But of course, he couldn’t do any of that. All he could do was quietly swallow this mind-blowing secret, and like a meddling old aunt, do what little he could to support this childhood friend he barely even talked to.
[Brother Gong Chuang: Don’t make your brother worry.]
[(o^^o): Sorry.]
[Brother Gong Chuang: {Shared cloud drive link – 20GB of study materials}]
[Brother Gong Chuang: Study well. Don’t let your brother get hurt.]
When he saw the word “hurt,” Su Zesui froze. He instinctively looked up, wanting to check on the bite mark he’d left on Gu Yilan.
Every time he touched Gu Yilan, his whole body would heat up and his breathing would quicken. So this time, he held himself back. He simply sat up and poked the man’s arm with his finger.
“Mm?” Gu Yilan was saving and sending a document without even looking up.
“Brother,” Su Zesui pointed to his own neck and asked, “does it hurt?”
Gu Yilan caught his gesture out of the corner of his eye, paused, and finally said: “It doesn’t hurt.”
At the time, Gu Yilan had instinctively let out a quiet hiss—not because it hurt all that much, but simply because he hadn’t expected the usually obedient boy to suddenly bite him without warning. Pain-wise, it really wasn’t a big deal to him.
Seeing the boy still looking so worried and remorseful, Gu Yilan calmly added, “It’s just a little red.”
But Su Zesui still looked uneasy. After all, Gu Yilan had been wearing high-collared shirts the past couple of days. With concern in his voice, he asked, “Did you put on any ointment?”
Gu Yilan frowned, noting how the boy was clearly getting ready to apply medicine for him in person, and casually lied, “Mm.”
Su Zesui had quite a bite, and it hadn’t been gentle. The bite mark had already turned a bluish-purple in some places—but it still wasn’t anywhere near bad enough to require treatment.
Only then did Su Zesui finally relax and return to replying to Gong Chuang’s messages.
[(o^^o): Brother said it’s just a little red. He already put on medicine. It doesn’t hurt anymore!]
After politely sending the message, Su Zesui tapped the link Gong Chuang had sent.
His phone didn’t have the cloud app installed, so he spent quite a while fumbling with it before finally downloading the software. Then, watching the snail-paced progress bar inch along, his face twisted in frustration.
But the moment Gong Chuang saw that message, he exploded again.
It was already hard enough for him to accept that Gu Yilan and Su Zesui were that kind of relationship. Now Su Zesui just had to go and describe the details?!
The soft, well-mannered tone, the horrifying, oddly specific “just red, not swollen” detail… Damn it. The cursed imagery was already playing out vividly in his mind.
Gong Chuang banged away at his keyboard in a full-blown meltdown.
[Brother Gong Chuang: Study hard. Just think of it as doing it for your brother. {Quotes previous chat: 20GB of study materials}]
[Brother Gong Chuang: How did you even convince your brother? Oh wait—maybe this is just who he’s always been, and I never saw through it. No wonder he never got close to anyone. Anyone else would be traumatized by a twist like this! (broken emoji)(broken emoji)]
[Brother Gong Chuang: Promise me, just the three of us know about this. Please, don’t tell anyone else. (begging emoji)]
[Brother Gong Chuang: Gu Yilan’s so strong—how do you two even do… that? Don’t tell me he just lies there and lets you have your way with him??]
[Brother Gong Chuang: Can you tell me more details? Please??]
Su Zesui’s phone kept buzzing nonstop—one message after another, clearly being spammed.
Gu Yilan closed his tablet and glanced over at the boy sprawled on the bed with his phone.
“Gong Chuang?” he asked. He couldn’t think of anyone else this bored.
Su Zesui didn’t dare leave the cloud storage screen in case it interrupted the download, so he hadn’t replied yet. But the preview notifications gave him a rough idea of what was being said.
He nodded. “Mm-hmm.”
Gu Yilan placed the tablet on the nightstand. “His messages are always nonsense. Ignore them. Go to sleep.”
Su Zesui, ever obedient, carefully made sure his phone stayed on the download screen, plugged it into the charger, and lay down quietly, ready to sleep.
By tomorrow morning, the massive 20GB of study materials would hopefully be downloaded and waiting for him.
Today’s social interactions had completely drained him. He closed his eyes, and before long, he was sound asleep.
Gu Yilan turned off the light and lay down too.
But he wasn’t tired. In fact, he was irritated. And the source of that irritation was Gong Chuang.
He didn’t have a psychology degree, but he’d read plenty on the subject. He knew just how critical the concept of “gradual progress” was to emotional healing. Go too fast, and it could backfire.
Gong Chuang had only just added Su Zesui on WeChat earlier that day, and now he was flooding him with messages. This sudden spike in social contact wasn’t helping the boy’s recovery—it could very well make things worse.
Gu Yilan made up his mind to have a private talk with Gong Chuang tomorrow. If he could behave, fine. If not—blocked.
In the dim, quiet night, Gu Yilan opened his eyes and looked at the delicate, fragile boy beside him.
Su Zesui was sleeping soundly, hugging a body-length pillow and clutching the plush handcuff toy Gu Yilan had once given him.
Just like Su Mingyu had said, the boy had a habit of kicking off his covers in his sleep.
Right now, not only had the blanket been kicked to the side, but his pajama top had ridden up, exposing his pale, flat stomach to the cool night air. Under the moonlight, his skin looked almost ethereal.
Gu Yilan silently sat up, moving with care. He gently pulled the boy’s shirt back down and covered him with the blanket again.
But Su Zesui had always been a light sleeper. Any touch, however slight, would yank him out of sleep, his body tensing instinctively, heart racing, ready to flee.
This time, though, when his sleepy eyes opened and caught sight of the familiar man beside him, his tight, defensive posture melted away immediately. He sank back into his dreams, even letting out a couple of soft, contented murmurs.
“…Brother…”
Gu Yilan looked down at the boy who’d dropped his pillow and wrapped his arms around his own instead. He stayed still, gaze calm as he watched.
There were faint scars on the arm Su Zesui now clung to—faint enough now, after over two weeks of treatment, to barely be noticeable.
It had been just over two weeks ago that he’d first gone to Ruikang Hospital, bloodied and wounded. That was when he first met Su Zesui.
Later, they bumped into each other again at the racing club, where he—someone who rarely got involved—helped the boy chase off some sleazy guy.
And again at a matchmaking event…
Every meeting had happened when Gu Yilan was at his worst, emotionally. None of it could be called lucky.
But thanks to the boy’s quiet persistence, they’d come this far.
“…Su Zesui,” Gu Yilan murmured under his breath, barely audible. “Let brother help you get better. Then you can go find someone even better for you, okay?”
But the sleeping boy didn’t hear him, couldn’t respond. All he did was instinctively nuzzle his fluffy head against Gu Yilan’s arm, seeking comfort in his dreams.
I thought it would be fluffy, but everywhere non sense. No logic.