One day, Lin Yu learned a secret: the world he lived in was the setting of a campus novel.
His older brother, Chi Feiyu, was sunny, dazzling, and beloved by everyone. He was the “chosen one,” destined to stand up for Chen Xi, the transfer student.
And Chen Xi, poor, pitiful, and as delicate as a white flower, was the “protagonist” waiting to be rescued.
Lin Yu found it disgusting. Why should his brother have to save someone else?
So he stepped in. He helped Chen Xi recover from his injuries, jumped into a lake to rescue him from drowning, acted decisively when Chen Xi was bullied, and even took a knife for him during a kidnapping.
Everyone thought Lin Yu liked Chen Xi.
Only Chen Xi knew that Lin Yu looked at him as if he were a carefully sculpted work of art.
“Chen Xi, you have to fight for what you want. You have to resist,” Lin Yu said. “You have to take charge of your own destiny.”
Chen Xi remained calm on the surface, but inside, a storm was raging.
He asked why.
Lin Yu didn’t answer. He only smiled to himself: I’ve simply done everything a younger brother should.
A year later, Chen Xi had gone from a transfer student who used to hide in a corner to someone who won a gold medal, entered a prestigious university, and became the person everyone looked up to.
Meanwhile, Chi Feiyu lounged nearby, chatting with the System. Every now and then, when the mood struck, he’d trade in some points and give his younger brother a dazzling display of fireworks on a winter night.
Lin Yu thought he’d done his job very well.
Until graduation day, when Chen Xi cornered him in an empty classroom, eyes lowered and smiling. “Lin Yu, did you turn me into who I am today because you wanted me to stay away from your brother, or… because you wanted me to become someone worthy of standing beside you?”
The door was pushed open from outside.
Chi Feiyu stood in the backlight, his expression impossible to make out.
“What are you two talking about?” he said with a smile as he walked in and casually put an arm around Lin Yu’s shoulders. “Xiaoyu, let’s go home.”
Theme: In the face of a predetermined fate, love is the only variable.
