Chapter 115: The Older You Grow, The Lonelier You Become

“What new song? Wait for me—I want to hear it too.” Su Tong had not yet begun to play when Yang Feifei pushed open the door, leading Xiao Yu and Xiao Xiao inside.

In that short while, Xiao Yu and Xiao Xiao had already grown close to Yang Feifei, as though they had known one another for years. There was no helping it. A goddess’s beauty was no exaggeration; even little Xiao Xiao admitted that Yang Feifei was extremely pretty.

Beautiful things always brought people joy and affection.

After entering the practice room, Xiao Xiao spotted the enormous mirror on the left wall. Delighted, she hugged a teddy bear and ran over to the mirror, then began dancing with great seriousness.

“Xiao Xiao, be quiet, all right? Big brother is going to play the piano.” Su Tong waved to her.

The little girl hurried back to his side. With one hand she hugged the toy, and with the other she covered her mouth, showing that she would behave and make no sound.

Xiao Yu came over as well and stood beside Su Tong.

Su Tong glanced at Lin Yin, lowered both hands, and began to play.

The piano notes rang like droplets from a spring, flowing softly onward. In a daze, Lin Yin felt that the entire world had been reduced to Su Tong alone, sitting there in utter solitude.

Yang Feifei sensed something too, but not as deeply or completely as Lin Yin, because she had not seen the lyrics.

Su Tong played for more than half a minute, then looked toward Lin Yin with a puzzled expression. She still had not begun to sing. They had already reached that part.

“Sister Yin, why aren’t you singing?” Su Tong stopped playing.

Lin Yin lowered her head. “I… I was too absorbed. The way you played made me want to cry. I couldn’t sing.”

Su Tong did not know whether he ought to be pleased or saddened. Was his playing really that good?

“Su Tong, you play the piano wonderfully,” Yang Feifei said. “I don’t know what the lyrics are, but the melody itself sounds a little sorrowful. It makes my heart ache.”

“Little Tong, sing it through once first. Then I can make some adjustments and learn a little by following you.” For some reason, Lin Yin was filled with anticipation. Su Tong’s state just now had briefly made her feel that he was the person best suited to sing this song.

On the surface, he was broad-minded, optimistic, and cheerful, as though he did not know what sorrow or parting grief meant. Yet just now, Lin Yin had glimpsed the loneliness buried deep within him.

“Haha. If I sing it, it will turn into a towering mountain, majestic and impassable, standing before you. You won’t know how many years it will take to cross. Do you really have the courage to challenge it?” Su Tong laughed.

“Would being a little more modest kill you?” Yang Feifei once again found him irritating. He truly did possess the ability, but speaking like that would discourage Lin Yin.

“Don’t be mean to my sister!” Seeing Yang Feifei scold Su Tong, Xiao Xiao angrily threw the teddy bear from her arms onto the floor. It was a toy Yang Feifei had given her.

Xiao Yu also removed the bracelet Yang Feifei had given her and placed it on the piano stand.

Yang Feifei froze. Then, in a sight rarer than any wonder, her face flushed red. Being rejected by two angelic little children was simply too humiliating.

“Hehe, Big Sister was only joking with your brother. Good girl, Xiao Yu, put it back on. Something Big Sister gives you is very precious—money couldn’t buy it. Xiao Xiao, Big Sister was wrong. The teddy bear is very comfortable to hug, isn’t it?”

Yang Feifei shamelessly went over to coax the two little treasures, without the slightest trace of a goddess’s dignity. At that moment, she was nothing more than an ordinary young girl.

Xiao Yu and Xiao Xiao ignored her.

Yang Feifei was deeply wounded. Just moments ago, the three of them had been as close as sisters, almost like mother and daughters. How had everything changed so suddenly?

Seeing Yang Feifei’s pitiful expression, Su Tong finally spoke. “Xiao Yu, you can put the bracelet back on. Xiao Xiao, pick up the teddy bear too, and give it back to Big Sister before we go home. Actually, Big Sister has been very kind to your brother as well. Xiao Xiao, you mustn’t behave like this again. You have to be polite. Throwing things is wrong.”

Once Su Tong had spoken, Xiao Yu and Xiao Xiao stopped sulking. The older sister put the bracelet back on, and the younger one picked up the teddy bear.

Yang Feifei was left feeling awkward. Lin Yin had been rather melancholy, but seeing Yang Feifei unable to save face, she could not help snickering to herself.

“Apologize to Big Sister,” Su Tong told Xiao Yu and Xiao Xiao.

Though the sisters were reluctant, they obeyed.

“Sorry.”

“Haha… the one who should be apologizing is Big Sister,” Yang Feifei said gloomily. “Big Sister has a bad temper and frightened you.”

By then, Xiao Yu and Xiao Xiao had already rejected her and did not want to pay her any attention.

Only then did Lin Yin speak. “Little Tong, go ahead and sing. It’s all right. I’m not someone who is easily discouraged, and I adjusted my mindset a long time ago.”

“That’s good.” Su Tong nodded and composed himself.

The piano sounded once more, like an unnoticed stream winding through a deep ravine, murmuring onward, its tranquility carrying an indescribable sorrow.

Perhaps influenced by her feelings moments before, Yang Feifei suddenly felt that everyone around her had departed, leaving her alone where she stood.

Xiao Yu and Xiao Xiao were still too young to grasp the mood within the music, but Lin Yin and Yang Feifei had already been drawn into a world where flowers were withering everywhere.

Dinner was ready by then. Sister Yaya pushed open the door, intending to call everyone to eat, but when she saw Su Tong’s back, the words died in her throat.

“Many years later,

you returned to my side.

Insecurity filled your weary eyes…”

The moment Su Tong began to sing, the entire world seemed to collapse with his voice. Within a mere few seconds, only he remained.

In Yang Feifei’s eyes, in Lin Yin’s eyes, and even in Sister Yaya’s eyes, there was only one person: a solitary figure wandering through the world alone.

No matter how prosperous the mortal realm might be, no matter how brilliant life might become, none of it had anything to do with him. He was merely a passerby in this world, arriving in loneliness and departing in desolation.

When the original singer, Fu Yan, sang this song, it merely caused listeners to connect it with their own lives. A faint sadness would rise within them as they mourned the splendor that had passed, along with certain people and things.

But when Su Tong sang it, he had already surpassed that realm. While the music still touched listeners who had lived through such experiences, the loneliness and sorrow in the depths of his heart surged forth as well, filling the air and leaving nowhere untouched.

What kind of loneliness was his?

What had passed away was not merely a few people and things, but the entire world.

No one could understand that feeling, and no one could sing it.

In this world, there was only him.

Just as Lin Yin had thought earlier, this song was in truth best suited to him.

Slowly, as they projected themselves into his loneliness and then saw their own reflections within it, Lin Yin’s emotional defenses collapsed first. Yang Feifei soon followed, and the two women wept so hard they could no longer make a sound.

For the first time, Sister Yaya felt an overwhelming desire to embrace that figure, to keep him from being alone, to tell him, You are not alone.

“Where have your innocent eyes gone?”

That line of the song made Yang Feifei and Lin Yin weep even harder. They had grown up, and their innocence was gone. The people they had once loved had long since become calculating and worldly—perhaps even tainted beyond recognition.

Only Su Tong’s eyes remained pure. In Yang Feifei and Lin Yin, they stirred the feeling that the phrase untouched by worldly concerns truly belonged to him.

He was genuinely innocent, utterly out of place in this chaotic, complicated, and evil world.

Xiao Yu had been born for music. She understood its rhythm and the emotion within her brother’s performance, and she could not help edging closer to Su Tong once more.

She was only ten, still growing, with little experience of life. Yet she could feel her brother’s loneliness.

When the final piano note faded away, Xiao Yu threw her arms around her brother, holding him with all her strength and burying her face against him.

Xiao Xiao did not quite understand, but she crawled into Su Tong’s arms all the same. Even if she could not hear her brother’s sadness in the music, she could see it.