📢 Loves Points Top Up is Closed Until it Fixed

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    Chapter 38: It Was Just a Game, No One Took It Seriously

    “I was just thinking… you might only be more disappointed when you see me,” An Yue said in a low voice.

    “Disappointed?” Ye Qinghe’s tone was filled with desolation. “Before I met you, I never had any hope in my life.”

    Outside the window, the night had grown deep. The air carried the earthy scent of an impending storm, and faint rumbles of thunder echoed from the distant mountains. The night unsettled An Yue, making his heart restless. He sat there in silence, his mind drifting back to the painful memories of his failed relationship. He, too, had once experienced the despair of being abandoned—of having all hope crushed.

    When he first heard about Ye Qinghe’s past transgressions, An Yue had felt nothing but anger. Ye Qinghe had admitted to his reckless behavior, saying he had never truly loved anyone, yet had cycled through countless partners. An Yue had no way of knowing how many of those people had been just as casual as Ye Qinghe, or if there had been someone foolish enough to love him wholeheartedly.

    An Yue had once been that kind of fool. He had spent sleepless nights cursing love and the deceitful people who played with it. But now, seeing Ye Qinghe in such agony, An Yue realized something—watching a so-called “bad person” suffer didn’t bring him any joy.

    Even if the perpetrator suffered, it wouldn’t erase the pain of those they had hurt.

    For a fleeting moment, revenge might feel satisfying, but deep inside, the wounds remained unhealed. The heartbreak, the confusion, the endless “whys”—they still craved answers and comfort.

    Back when Director Zhong had taken him to Ye Qinghe’s hospital room, An Yue had no idea that behind the composed, blind chairman lay such heavy grief. He had never intended to comfort a scumbag. After all, scumbags didn’t deserve forgiveness.

    Yet, at this moment, An Yu wanted to tell his own story.

    “I… I’m not as good as you think. I can’t bring you any hope either,” An Yue murmured, his voice hoarse and rough. “I told you before that I’m an ugly mess, and it’s true. That’s what my ex-boyfriend said about me…” His voice grew so quiet it was almost inaudible.

    Ex-boyfriend?

    For the first time, Teacher An Yue had mentioned something personal. Ye Qinghe immediately became alert, listening intently.

    “That person… I guess you could say he was my senior. We met at an event.” An Yue’s voice was calm, but there was a hint of hesitation. “He approached me and asked if I could sing a song for him.”

    “You can sing?” Ye Qinghe interrupted, slightly surprised. “Didn’t you say you were completely tone-deaf?”

    “I can’t.” An Yue sighed helplessly. “Anyway, not long after we met, he started pursuing me, saying that he liked me.” He spoke slowly, as if carefully dismantling a bomb buried deep within his flesh.

    Maybe it was the strange emotions of the night—too chaotic, too conflicted. They should have been celebrating, yet they were talking about the most painful parts of their past. They should have been guarding their feelings, yet they were baring their hearts to each other without restraint.

    An Yue felt an overwhelming urge to confide. “I was young back then, naive and clueless. All I knew was studying—I never thought about why such a humorous, popular senior would like a bookworm like me.” He gave a bitter smile. “Maybe it was vanity. He confessed to me in front of so many people, and with everyone cheering, I just went along with it. I never even stopped to think about whether I actually liked men. Before I knew it, I was already ‘bent.'”

    He chuckled self-deprecatingly. “Well, bent is bent. I wasn’t sure if I liked men, but I did like him. Just hearing his voice made me incredibly happy. At first, I wasn’t used to being touched by a guy, but my senior was always hugging me, kissing me, telling me that’s what people do when they like someone. Over time, I got used to it. Then, when we finally slept together, he clung to me even more. Every time we met, he would take me to his place and refuse to let me leave. Back then, I thought making love was his way of showing love. I really believed… he loved me.”

    A bitter laugh escaped his lips, trembling with suppressed emotions. “Later, I realized something—s*x is just s*x. It has nothing to do with love.”

    Ye Qinghe felt a sharp pang in his chest. An Yue’s pained laughter cut through him like a blade, making it difficult to breathe.

    An Yue had always carried an air of restraint, so much so that he seemed almost ascetic. But now, he sat here, exposing his wounds without reservation—telling him, in the rawest and most vulnerable way, about how he had given himself to his ex-boyfriend.

    Outside the window, a flash of lightning streaked across the sky, followed by a deep, rumbling thunder. An Yue flinched. Then came the downpour—rain crashing against the windows like a stampede of wild horses.

    He stared blankly at the storm outside before continuing his story.

    “One day, he suddenly disappeared. Just like that, he never showed up again. That was when I realized… aside from his phone number, I had no other way to contact him. I was terrified. I was afraid something had happened to him. I searched everywhere, but I couldn’t even find his friends.”

    “Wasn’t he your senior? How could he be impossible to find? You had so many classmates—you could’ve asked them,” Ye Qinghe interjected, finding the situation hard to believe.

    “He had already graduated by then,” An Yue muttered hoarsely.

    “Maybe… maybe something really happened to him,” Ye Qinghe said hesitantly. “Don’t think the worst. You’re such a good person—your senior wouldn’t… he wouldn’t have hurt you on purpose.”

    Even though this was An Yue’s ex-boyfriend, a person Ye Qinghe should hate, he couldn’t bring himself to speak ill of him.

    Because he knew just how cruel true malice could be.

    Unfortunately, reality was far from what he had hoped.

    An Yue let out a soft chuckle, his tone light and indifferent. “Heaven must have been watching over him—my senior was perfectly fine. Nothing happened to him. His disappearance was simply because the game had ended.”

    “I was frantic, searching for him everywhere. That night, the storm was just like this—thunder crashing, rain pouring, the wind howling. I was terrified, but I refused to give up. I ran through the streets aimlessly, and finally, I found a place he used to visit. And then… I heard his voice.”

    An Yue’s tone was detached, but the words he spoke carried a weight that was suffocating. “There was a lot of laughter. And… I heard my own voice. It was faint, but I recognized it. It was me… at that moment.”

    His voice was hoarse and quiet, tinged with suppressed anger and humiliation. “I had no idea he secretly recorded it. And then he played it for his friends. They were all laughing at me.”

    Ye Qinghe’s lips parted slightly in shock. He sat frozen, unable to move as he listened to An Yue’s story.

    “I heard my senior say… he said I was ugly. That if not for a bet, he wouldn’t have been able to stomach being with me. He recorded those sounds just to prove that he had completed the challenge.” An Yue lowered his head, wrapping his arms around his knees. “See? If he hadn’t lost a round of Truth or Dare, he wouldn’t even have bothered to ‘play’ with me. So tell me, am I really that hideous? Do you still want to look at me?”

    A chill ran down Ye Qinghe’s spine.

    This story… why did it feel so familiar? The details were different, but the cruelty, the malice—it was the same.

    “An Yue…” Ye Qinghe’s face was ashen. His throat felt tight, as if someone was strangling him, making it nearly impossible to speak. “Your family… who do you live with?”

    “Huh?” Caught off guard by the sudden question, An Yue blinked in confusion. “My parents, my older brother, and me.”

    Ye Qinghe exhaled sharply.

    Thank god. It wasn’t him.

    That little blind from back then had neither a father nor an older brother.

    Ye Qinghe cursed himself for even having such an absurd suspicion. An Yue was perfectly fine—he had clear eyesight. There was no way the two incidents were connected. Besides, he clearly remembered that celebration night… it hadn’t been raining. He had been slightly tipsy, and he had stumbled to a nearby hotel to rest.

    Relief barely had time to settle before a wave of heartache rushed in.

    The methods were eerily similar. The cruel game, the humiliating recording used as proof—it was exactly the same. Was this some kind of divine punishment? Had his sins not been atoned for, and now fate was making sure everyone around him suffered as well?

    “An Yue… he’s going to regret it.”

    Ye Qinghe felt like he was being torn in two.

    As someone who had once hurt that boy, he was deeply ashamed of the unforgivable things he had done. He longed for a chance to apologize, to seek forgiveness—but he didn’t even have the courage to face the past.

    But as An Yue’s pursuer, he was furious. He wanted to tear that bastard apart. He knew men like that were beyond redemption.

    His emotions were a tangled mess—guilt, anger, resentment. His voice was laced with venom as he gritted out, “If he ever sees you again, he’ll regret it for the rest of his life.”

    An Yue remained seated on the ground, unmoving. He watched Ye Qinghe lash out in righteous fury on his behalf. He stayed still, kept his voice calm, knowing that Ye Qinghe couldn’t see—knowing that his tears could fall freely, one after another, without being noticed.

    “A few years after we broke up… I ran into him again,” he whispered. “That person… had already completely forgotten me.”

    What had been a mere joke to him was something An Yue could never forget, something that had left scars so deep they would never fade.

    It was almost laughable.

    “You saw him again?”

    “Hm.” An Yue gave a muffled response.

    Ye Qinghe said angrily, “You didn’t go back and beat him up?”

    “There was no need. He doesn’t even remember me, so why should I humiliate myself?” An Yue had spoken too much tonight, his voice already hoarse beyond measure. But to Ye Qinghe’s ears, it was as if he had traveled back to that stormy night, hearing An Yu’s soul-crushing breakdown all over again.

    A sharp pain gripped Ye Qinghe’s heart.

    The living room fell silent. No one spoke. The only sound was An Yue gulping down his beer, one sip after another. Only after a streak of lightning split the sky like daylight, followed by a deafening thunderclap, did An Yue press a hand to his aching chest and, slightly intoxicated, softly ask:

    “You said… you’ve had partner after partner. Among all those people, was there not a single one you actually liked? You’ve… done it with them, right? To do that kind of thing, there has to be at least some feelings involved, doesn’t there?”

    His voice was hesitant, trembling slightly.

    “Not even a little bit? Not even the slightest bit of affection?”

    He desperately wanted to know—people like them, these heartless scoundrels—did they ever, even for a fleeting moment, feel something real while toying with others?

    He wanted to know—when they looked back at the people they had hurt, was there ever the smallest trace of guilt?

    Was there truly nothing? Did everything just vanish without a trace, as if it never happened?

    Ye Qinghe could hear the lingering resentment in An Yue’s voice. Or maybe, it was hope.

    An Yue was searching for proof. Proof that what happened back then wasn’t just a cruel joke. That maybe, against all odds, there was at least a one-in-a-million chance that there had been a shred of love—however minuscule.

    As someone who had once been just as much of a bastard as that senior, Ye Qinghe understood people like them all too well. Even now, despite his regret, when he thought of that little blind, all he felt was guilt—not love.

    No matter how much he wanted to comfort An Yue, he refused to lie to him.

    Especially now, when he was determined to pursue An Yue.

    There was no way he would leave even the tiniest chance for An Yue to hold onto feelings for that scumbag.

    “No,” Ye Qinghe shook his head. “It was all just a game. No one took it seriously.”

    An Yu felt like he had stepped onto empty air, falling into a bottomless void.

    So… no one ever took it seriously?

    “Then… what about the person who drew the heart?” An Yue’s voice grew even softer, as if he was carefully piecing his thoughts together. “The one who wished for your safety, who drew a heart just for you… That person couldn’t have been just playing around, right? Were they… an ex-lover?”

    Right now, An Yue truly wished—more than anything—that somewhere in this house, even the smallest trace of love still existed. That things weren’t this utterly tragic.

    Hearing his question, Ye Qinghe fell into silence.

    Because the truth was—he had never loved that little blindl.

    An Yue had at least gotten the chance to see his scumbag senior again. But that little blind… had completely disappeared.

    Listening to An Yue’s story, Ye Qinghe couldn’t help but imagine—what if, one day, that little blind really did appear before him, demanding justice?

    What could he say?

    Besides I’m sorry, what else was there to say?

    No matter what words he could muster, this was Ye Qinghe’s deepest, darkest secret. How could he ever let An Yue know that the man claiming to pursue him was, in truth, no different from that despicable senior?

    Ye Qinghe remained silent for a long time. So long that An Yue let out a soft “Hm?” in confusion. Only then did he finally speak.

    “No… not a lover. There was no such person.”

    “Oh.”

    An Yue exhaled lightly, as if releasing a sigh, or perhaps letting go of something that had been weighing on his heart.

    It was almost funny.

    Ye Qinghe claimed he had never liked anyone before. And yet, the very first time An Yue had ever fallen for someone, he had been completely mistaken. Between the two of them, who was truly more pitiful?

    But perhaps this wasn’t such a bad thing.

    A thirty-year-old Ye Qinghe, completely inexperienced in love, wasn’t necessarily unfortunate. It was still better than foolishly believing in love, only to end up utterly shattered.

    At least Ye Qinghe could still hope for happiness. At least he still longed for love.

    Unlike An Yue, whose heart had long since turned to stagnant water.

    (To be continued…)

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    Disclaimer & Warning:

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    ⚠️Please refrain from sharing this translation on any social media platforms, as it may result in the translation being taken down.

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