Gu Yanchen’s scalpel was a legend at the city forensic center. It had dissected hundreds of baffling cases and cut through the most complex tissues, yet on the day he met Su Tang, it proved “useless” for the first time.
That day, she pushed a dessert cart straight into his world. Tiramisu smeared all over him, and cream got on his autopsy report. Everyone waited for the ice-cold man to fly into a rage, but he just looked at her flushed ears and said softly, “Next time… try mango mousse.”
From then on, a sweet aroma began to drift through the chilly forensic center.
His notebook of autopsy data gained a page of “Dessert Notes”: the crème brûlée should be caramelized for three minutes because she doesn’t like bitter flavors; the brown sugar and ginger tea needs its ginger peeled because she can’t handle spicy food; the icing on the cookies she makes is always crooked, but he cares about them more than any piece of evidence.
In the corner of her dessert shop sits a “scalpel” made of chocolate. It was his gift, clumsily carved with the words “Sweet only for you,” like the tenderness he hides beneath his lab coat. He can analyze the ingredients of a poison with pinpoint accuracy, yet he might get her allergy wrong; he can watch life and death unfold without a change of expression, yet when someone gives her a hard time, he uses his knowledge of anatomy to put them in their place.
When the sharpest blade meets the softest candy, he finally understands:
Some things are hard so they can protect; some sweetness exists to melt them.
Just as he finally lays down his scalpel and takes the candy she offers. “Su Tang, you’re in charge of how sweet the rest of my life will be.”
This is a story about “an ice-cold forensic doctor being slowly sweetened by a pastry chef.” No matter how sharp the blade, it can never cut through the sweetness that winds around the heart.
