Ch 36: Text Messages Across Time

On the night of October 11, 2004, in a senior-year classroom at Xuhu No. 1 High School, Lin Wu sat staring out the window. The past few days in Xuhu had been under low-pressure weather. It seemed the pressure had finally broken. At 7:10, after a sudden clap of thunder, rain began to fall. Within half an hour, it had turned from a light drizzle into a raging storm, as if releasing all the pent-up heaviness of the past days.

“Lin Wu, did you bring an umbrella?” Li Jing had just finished a set of practice questions and tapped him to ask.

“I did. It’s in the back,” Lin Wu said, pointing behind the classroom. He had sensed bad weather that morning and brought one, though with how heavy the rain was now, he wasn’t sure it would help.

“That’s good. My dad’s coming later. If you didn’t have one, I could ask him to bring an extra.” Li Jing said kindly.

“Thanks, but it’s okay.” Lin Wu smiled, and the two discussed a math problem for a bit. At 7:45, during break, he sent Qin Weidong a message: 【Don’t come tonight. I’ll go to your dorm to find you.】

They only had two umbrellas at home. He had taken one and left the other for Luo Xiaorong. He wasn’t sure if Qin Weidong had one at the dorm, and the weather wasn’t suitable for biking anyway. Earlier that evening, he had already moved his bicycle into the indoor rack at school. After class, he planned to go straight to Qin Weidong’s dorm to avoid unnecessary trouble.

【No need, I’ll come find you.】Qin Weidong replied quickly.

【The rain is pretty heavy right now.】Lin Wu looked outside. Many low-lying areas were already filled with water. He wanted to say more, but Qin Weidong didn’t respond, and the class bell rang. He had to put his phone away.

At 8:30, school ended. Many parents had come to pick up students. Because of the weather, the school allowed them to bring umbrellas inside. Lin Wu saw Li Jing’s father, who quickly took her home. Rain poured down relentlessly as students left in small groups.

As usual, Lin Wu packed his bag. Since it was raining, he only brought two exercise books. After finishing, he took out his phone to message Qin Weidong.

“Lin Wu!” a classmate called from the door.

“What is it?” Lin Wu looked up.

“Someone’s looking for you!” The classmate stepped aside, revealing Qin Weidong in a black raincoat.

Qin Weidong was soaked through. He took off his hood and stood aside so as not to block others, waving at Lin Wu. “I’m all wet, so I won’t come in. Take your stuff first.”

Only then did Lin Wu notice the two plastic bags in his hand. Walking over, he asked, “Why did you come?”

“Had nothing to do after school, so I came. The rain’s too heavy right now. Go change first. There are too many people at the entrance. We’ll find a place to get a taxi later.” Qin Weidong handed him one of the bags.

When Lin Wu took it, their hands brushed briefly. Qin Weidong’s hand felt cold.

Opening the bag, Lin Wu found a pair of boots and a new raincoat inside.

“You just bought these?” he asked, surprised.

“From the school store. Figured you didn’t have a raincoat, so I got an extra.”

“I could’ve just gone to your dorm,” Lin Wu said. He was someone who valued boundaries, and the gesture felt a little awkward to him.

“There’s no quilt cover or toothbrush at my dorm. I can’t stay there tonight. Come on, go change.”

Qin Weidong waved it off. It was true his dorm lacked those things, but he could easily borrow a toothbrush. He had come mainly because he was worried about the weather.

“Thank you.” After a brief pause, Lin Wu returned to his seat, changed into the boots, and put on the raincoat. Qin Weidong had bought himself a black one, while Lin Wu’s was yellow. It fit perfectly.

“Let’s go,” Lin Wu said after changing.

“Let’s go.” Qin Weidong naturally took the bag with Lin Wu’s shoes.

“I can carry it myself.”

“One bag or two, it’s the same for me. It’s cold outside. Just keep your hands inside your sleeves.”

Qin Weidong didn’t let him carry anything. Holding both bags, one with his shoes and one with Lin Wu’s, he walked ahead. Unable to take them back, Lin Wu jogged to catch up.

Ten minutes later, they left the school gates. Outside was chaotic: students, cars, bicycles, colorful umbrellas, and rain whipped wildly by the wind, everything squeezed together. There were no taxis available. Just as Qin Weidong had said, they walked about a kilometer before finding one in a more open area.

The whole day had been exhausting. By the time they got home, it was already 9:50. After washing up, they collapsed onto the bed.

“Aren’t you doing homework?” Qin Weidong asked.

“No.” Lin Wu had planned to study, but he was too tired. He decided to do it tomorrow in class.

“Let’s send the message and sleep early.” Lin Wu looked drained, and Qin Weidong wasn’t much better.

After resting for a bit, at 10:12, Lin Wu sent: 【Is there a new ending?】

Over the past ten days, they had opened six ending lines. This had become their usual opening line.

They waited for a reply. Normally, it would come within a minute. But this time, five minutes passed with no response.

“Didn’t he see it?” Lin Wu and Qin Weidong both sat up.

【S?】Qin Weidong sent another message. No reply.

“Maybe he’s busy and hasn’t seen it yet,” Qin Weidong said, noticing Lin Wu’s frown. “Last time with the seventh ending, he replied late too. Could be something like that.”

“Mm.” Lin Wu steadied himself.

Both of them waited for a reply, but until the time-channel closed, there was no response at all.

“Maybe there’s no signal?” Qin Weidong checked carefully. Since his messages were sending successfully, his phone clearly wasn’t the problem.

“I don’t know. Let’s check again tomorrow,” Lin Wu said, though his brows were tightly knit, showing he was far from calm.

At first, they thought the other side was simply delayed. But over the next three days, it was as if the other person had vanished completely, like they had never existed.

“Should we start a new ending line?” On the night of October 15, Qin Weidong asked after returning home with Lin Wu.

He was usually easygoing, but even he felt something was wrong now. They had been out of contact for four days, and during that time he had come up with two possibilities:

First, the other person’s phone had encountered some uncontrollable issue, like being damaged, lost, or stolen. Translated on Hololo novels. They would have to wait until the phone was recovered.

Second, the time-channel had shut down due to some rule, and the two timelines had returned to normal.

Aside from those, there was a third possibility he didn’t dare think about. In the fifteenth ending, something might have happened to Lin Wu, altering the entire life trajectory where he recognized the unknown number and began sending time messages.

But if that were true, the unknown number still held memories of the previous fourteen endings. Whether or not he knew Lin Wu in that fifteenth ending, he should still know their 2004 selves. He shouldn’t have just disappeared.

The more Qin Weidong thought about it, the more chaotic his thoughts became. He looked at Lin Wu. “Lin Wu…”

“Mm?” Lin Wu turned to him.

“Let’s start a new ending line. No matter what happened in the fifteenth one, we restart. Or we go back to the sixth ending. In that one, Wang Jiahui survived. Yeah, let’s go back to the sixth, then start again…” Qin Weidong’s thoughts spiraled. His gut told him the fifteenth ending wasn’t good.

“I’ll think about it,” Lin Wu said. He had also been considering restarting.

His main concern was this: what if losing contact with 2024 meant the fifteenth ending had actually succeeded? He didn’t know why he could connect past and future, but “the fifteenth ending succeeded, so the time messages disappeared” was logically plausible.

He wasn’t sure whether restarting would affect a possibly existing “perfect ending,” so he hesitated.

“No need to think. We give up on the fifteenth ending,” Qin Weidong said firmly.

“…Alright. If there’s still no message tonight, we’ll start a new one tomorrow,” Lin Wu nodded after a moment’s thought.

“You agree?” Qin Weidong hadn’t expected it to be so easy.

“Why wouldn’t I?” Lin Wu smiled faintly. With everything unclear, this was a reasonable approach. Still, moving forward without knowing the outcome felt terrible, like crossing a river by feeling for stones.

At ten o’clock, the two lay on the bed staring at their phones. Though they had agreed to restart if nothing came, after four days of silence, neither of them truly expected a message tonight.

Then, in the quiet, at 10:12, the inbox lit up.

Both of them shot upright.

Sender: Unknown number.

Message:

【On December 5, 2004, Lin Wu was killed while lying in wait at the second factory building. Time of death: between 9:30 and 11:30 p.m. Afterward, the killer committed five more murders and has never been caught.】

【Return to the sixth ending.】

“Lin Wu died?!” Qin Weidong jumped to his feet. He hit his head on the way up but didn’t notice. His heart seemed to stop for a moment. He immediately typed back:

【Was Lin Wu killed because of the ambush, or because he was a male student?】

【Will the killer change targets from female students to male students?】

【What about Lin Wu’s mom?】

…

Qin Weidong tried to steady himself, then looked to the side. From his angle, he could see Lin Wu’s slightly messy hair. Lin Wu was here, wearing pajamas, warm, alive.

“It hasn’t happened yet. We can still change it. But we can’t do the fifteenth ending anymore. Anything involving the factory ambush is off the table…” Qin Weidong sat back down, speaking quickly, like someone who had narrowly escaped disaster.

Halfway through, he stopped.

Because Lin Wu had taken the phone from his hand and was rereading the message, brows furrowed.

In the input box, he typed and erased several times, until only three words remained:

【Who are you?】

Qin Weidong didn’t know who the sender was.

But Lin Wu did.

It was supposed to be his future self.

If he had truly died during the ambush… then who was sending this message now?

He looked calm, but inside, his thoughts were just as chaotic as Qin Weidong’s.

✧˖°.──⋆⭒˚.⋆💌⋆⭒˚.⋆──✧˖°.

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