Chapter 7

Chapter 7 - 7 006 City of Romantic Encounters Chapter 7: 006: City of Romantic Encounters Chapter 7: 006: City of Romantic Encounters Wen Changling discarded the original travel guide, it was obvious that Xie Shang had been to Lileitu before. He was very familiar with the place and even spoke the local language.

The next day, she and Xie Shang went skydiving. The wind was so loud in the helicopter that she couldn’t hear what Xie Shang was saying.

He moved behind her, close to her.

“The noise is too loud, not suitable for wearing a hearing aid.”

Then he was the first to jump out of the helicopter.

Wen Changling removed her hearing aid, accompanied by an instructor, and also jumped down. Without the hearing aid, at three thousand meters high, she could only hear a faint buzzing sound. The fierce wind made her skin hurt, and that pain, along with the violent heartbeat and rapid breathing, made every cell feel the exhilaration of a narrow escape.

In the afternoon, they went to the Underwater World of Lileitu, which was different from the underwater worlds back home, not suitable for children. This was a place for adults to revel.

The Underwater World of Lileitu hosted a crazy survival game—Deep Sea Escape. Participants had to sign a life-or-death agreement. The organizer would provide an oxygen tank that could last for fifteen minutes underwater, then bind the contestant’s hands and feet and lock them in an underwater chamber.

If you managed to escape, you could win five million in Lai currency and get rich overnight. Of course, you could give up at any moment.

What a crazy game.

From the moment one entered, exclamations from all around never ceased, it was Wen Changling’s first time at such a place.

Looking around, the stands were full of people of all genders and skin colors, with the sea surface currently very calm.

“Will anyone actually play?”

This was gambling with one’s life.

Even though you could give up, the Underwater World was infinitely changeable.

“Yes,” Xie Shang took Wen Changling to a front row seat, “Those who go down are all gamblers. Faced with huge monetary temptation, many are ready to risk their lives, with very few actually giving up.”

He seemed to understand the survival rules here very well.

“Wait for me here.”

Wen Changling was surprised, her gaze following him intently, showing her anxiety, “You’re going to participate?”

But he clearly wasn’t someone short of money.

“I’m not here to watch others play games.”

He left his jacket on the seat and walked down from the stands.

The staff asked him if he was sure about participating. He said yes and signed the life-or-death agreement.

Before going into the sea, from a distance, he looked towards the stands, found Wen Changling’s position, gave her a calm glance, emotionless, and then turned and jumped into the sea.

One by one, the gamblers began to risk their lives.

On the giant electronic screen to the left, spectators placed their bets, betting on who would give up, who would escape, and who would be buried at sea. Madness and chaos—in such an environment, you would more than once doubt who was the mad one, whether the world had gone mad.

Less than three minutes passed, and someone emerged from the sea. Spectators who had bet wrong cursed in disappointment and quickly shifted their attention to the next adventurer.

Xie Shang was right; faced with great temptation, few actually gave up.

Wen Changling kept checking the time, unable to help standing up, searching the endless sea for Xie Shang’s figure. As time neared the limit of the oxygen supply, her anxiety increased, her palms beginning to sweat.

At the fifteen-minute mark, the timer on the electronic screen turned from green to red. What followed was the deathly three minutes, after which professional divers would go down to retrieve the bodies.

Some successfully escaped, some sank to the bottom, some laughed, some cried and shouted. Wen Changling’s heart raced, everything was so chaotic, like a dream that kept teasing the nerves but from which she could not wake up.

At seventeen minutes and forty-two seconds, the hitherto calm sea surface suddenly burst with splashing water.

Xie Shang was the last challenger to independently escape from the sea bottom.

Someone cheered, not knowing who, Wen Changling sweated profusely, feeling as if time had frozen on her, stunned as she watched Xie Shang walk towards her, the sea water dripping from his platinum hair onto the mole on his collarbone. His eyes, always appearing deeply affectionate towards anyone, were wet, unreachable in their lofty detachment. Despite his elegant composure, there was a rebellious wickedness deep in his gaze.

“You look very pale,” he sat next to Wen Changling, casually drying his wet hair with a towel, with a very normal complexion, showing no signs of post-hypoxia, “Were you worried about me?”

Wen Changling didn’t move an inch, still hadn’t snapped back to reality, when his sense of smell began working a step ahead of his brain.

Xie Shang had a woody fragrance about him, an enigmatic kind of agarwood, or perhaps sandalwood, with a heavier note of incense burning in the background.

“Sorry, I should have told you beforehand that I played this game when I was eighteen, I’m not a beginner,” he said in an even tone, simply stating a fact, “Two minutes and fifty-eight seconds, no one has broken my escape record yet.”

Changling was a bit angry, “Then why did you take so long to come up?”

“I wanted to test if the oxygen tank was enough for fifteen minutes.”

It was enough for him.

Some weren’t enough because, under extreme tension, people tend to overbreathe.

“Do you want to play? I can go down with you.”

Changling shook his head decisively.

Xie Shang nodded, showing understanding, not insisting.

Changling couldn’t figure it out; he seemed affluent and carefree, exuding an aristocratic demeanor bred from a scholarly family.

She’d seen him gracefully light incense, his posture elegant and composed. And just now, he signed a life and death waiver without batting an eye, plunging into the ocean’s depths, his fists clenched.

There was a torn sense of conflict about him, capable of refined grace yet also crazed excitement. His world was one of startling waves and shocking turns.

On the third day, Xie Shang took the five million he had won from Underwater World, along with Wen Changling, to the underground boxing ring. Yesterday was a game with life at stake; today, Xie Shang was betting money. He placed all five million on an underdog fighter from Ruina.

When Lileitu’s fighter lay motionless under the overwhelming force of Ruina’s fighter, amid the shouts of the crowd, Xie Shang turned to Changling and asked, “Do you feel it?”

She turned to look at Xie Shang.

He was undeniably good-looking, but strangely, the intense allure Xie Shang possessed did not stem from his physical appearance. He had a kind of strangulating tension, a sense of being on the verge of losing control, an indescribable, subtle desire.

She was half a beat too slow, “What?”

“Excitement.”

She did feel it, the urge to scream out in exhilaration and the reckless, seize-the-day kind of thrill.

They returned to the hotel in the afternoon.

Changling was staying on the thirty-eighth floor, Xie Shang on the sixteenth. The elevator stopped at the sixteenth floor, but Xie Shang didn’t get off.

“At seven o’clock tonight, there’s a masquerade ball at Sleepless City, want to go?”

Changling hesitated for a moment, “I don’t have a mask.” She didn’t have a gown either.

“I’ll prepare it.”

The elevator reached the thirty-eighth floor, and after seeing Changling enter her room, Xie Shang pressed the button for the sixteenth floor again.

At five, the hotel’s attendant knocked on Changling’s door.

“Madam, this is what your companion has prepared for you.”

In addition to a half-mask, there was also a red dress. The mask was painted with patterns Changling couldn’t decipher, shaped like a rabbit.

She dressed and went downstairs.

Xie Shang was already waiting at the entrance. Upon seeing her, he sized her up briefly, his gaze restrained and polite, not offensive, then he opened the car door for her.

“It suits you very well,” he said.

Except for her glasses, which she hadn’t taken off.

The dress fit her perfectly, with its cinched waist, open back, and a slit that extended to the thigh, showcasing all of Changling’s physical strengths.

The ball was bustling, attended by many people, mostly tourists. Changling had done her homework before coming; Sleepless City had another name—City of Romantic Encounters.