[Full manuscript completed. The story will launch once it reaches 500 bookmarks.]
Living far from the world in a remote small town, Sang Ning had spent several years as a laid-back author when she received a call from an unfamiliar number one day.
The voice was incredibly seductive. It belonged to a man, with a distinctive, magnetic quality that made Sang Ning's heart tremble. She almost thought the male lead from her novel had come to life.
The man claimed to be her mother's attending physician. Her mother had suddenly fallen ill and needed surgery at the hospital. He asked when she would be coming back so she could sign the consent forms.
Wait, why did that voice sound more and more like her high school nemesis, Shen Baiyu?
-
Back in the city she hadn't visited for years, she went to the hospital and saw her mother, as well as the attending physician.
As expected, it was Shen Baiyu.
When they were young, Shen Baiyu was the brightest star in school.
He was a brilliant young man, from a wealthy family of doctors, with good looks to match.
But all of that was nothing compared to the force of his personality.
He stood in the crowd with his back straight and his gaze cool. He seemed quiet and composed, but there was an edge to him, an unbearable arrogance, as if he alone ruled the world.
And he really did get good grades.
Whether it was a major exam or a minor one, his name was always near the top of the honors list, in first or second place in the grade.
The only person who could compete with him was Sang Ning.
They sat one behind the other, always at odds, constantly trying to outdo each other.
Before the college entrance exam, Shen Baiyu wrote in Sang Ning's notebook, "A king never meets another king. We'll meet at the summit."
-
Ten years later, Sang Ning had assumed he would have turned into an oily, bald middle-aged man. Who knew that not only had he avoided being oily and bald, but he had instead evolved into the ultimate ascetic type?
In his white coat, he stood tall and still had that same proud edge.
The only difference was that they tacitly avoided mentioning the past and were more polite to each other than strangers.
After all, she had skipped the college entrance exam back then and run away in disgrace.
Sang Ning thought it was for the best.
But one rainy night, everything changed.
Rain pattered steadily outside. In the room, it was impossible to tell whose heartbeat was pounding, thumping in time with the other.
That night, they were tangled together like the rain: damp and unending.
It was after that night that Sang Ning discovered she was pregnant.
She fled to a small mountain village, planning to keep the child and leave the father behind, but Shen Baiyu still found her.
"Let's get married."
He pulled her into his arms, his breath warm against the crown of her head, his voice trembling and hoarse beside her ear.
"I've been looking for you for ten years. Don't make me look anymore."
"I'll go crazy."
"Sang Ning, I surrender."
Sang Ning was stunned. How could real life be even more outrageous than a novel?
But when she looked up, she saw tenderness in the man's eyes, along with nervousness and a cautious, hopeful anticipation, and something else, deep inside.
It was fear.
Shen Baiyu, the man who had always stood at the summit and never bowed his head, was afraid.
Afraid she would reject him, afraid she would turn away, afraid she would disappear again.
Sang Ning suddenly felt something inside her gently give way.
Beyond the starlight lies darkness. Baiyu was her star, and he would light the way for her, watching over the road behind her and the road ahead.
*Pregnancy before love / secret crush from the male lead / reunion after years apart / both are each other's first and only, happy ending
*Arrogant, restrained oral surgeon × bright, resilient online novelist
Theme: Embrace love and embrace life.
