Courtyard House: My Long and Hard Body Makes Me Play with All the Women in the Courtyard

"I'm not leaving."

Lin Wan stretched out her hand: "Then, let's go home?"

Su Ting looked at that hand; it was so familiar, as if it were etched into his bones.

He raised his hand, just as he was about to grasp it—

"Wait a minute," he suddenly said.

Lin Wan raised an eyebrow: "What is it now?"

Su Ting stared at him, saying each word clearly: "You promised me you'd teach me how to write novels. You said you'd write a protagonist who kicks the Dream Tower Master to pieces, not because he's fearless of death, nor because he's fearless of life, but because..."

"But what?" Lin Wan asked with a smile.

“It’s because someone is waiting for him to come home.” Su Ting finally smiled, his eyes red-rimmed. “You haven’t taught me how to write the ending yet.”

Lin Wan smiled, opened her arms, and hugged him tightly, just like she had done on the rooftop back then.

“Now,” he whispered in his ear, “we’ll start with the first chapter.”

In the distance, beneath the osmanthus tree, a girl's clear voice could be faintly heard:

"If you don't come back soon, the glutinous rice balls will slump!"

Lin Wan let go of him, grabbed his hand, and ran: "Let's go! Xiao Yin's glutinous rice balls will kill us if they get soggy!"

Su Ting was pulled along by him, staggered a few steps, and suddenly turned around.

Lin Xing stood on the street corner, his figure already as faint as the morning mist.

She waved to him gently, her lips moving silently.

—Remember to laugh.

Su Ting didn't say anything, but just grinned and turned to chase after the figure running towards the osmanthus tree.

"Lin Wan! The first chapter you write has to be the one where I kick you!"

Chapter 1303 This is what you call a winning start!

"Why?" Lin Wan didn't even turn her head, her steps light as if she were walking on the wind. "You were the one who pounced on me and hugged me! That kick didn't even land properly!"

"That's because you were hiding!" Su Ting chased after him, panting, his arm aching from Lin Wan's grip, but a long-dormant fire burned in his heart. "What I want is a thrilling opening—'The protagonist kicks the traitor off the rooftop, the wind whips up his clothes, and the sun rises behind him'! That's what you call a killer opening!"

Lin Wan suddenly stopped, turned around abruptly, and her eyes were frighteningly bright: "Then you have to tell me first, do you think I'm a traitor?"

Su Ting was taken aback.

The two stood in the middle of the stone path, the sunlight slanting, casting dappled shadows from the trees. The fragrance of osmanthus blossoms drifted from afar, and the sweet aroma of glutinous rice balls seemed to waft to their noses.

“I…” Su Ting opened his mouth, but couldn’t say anything.

Lin Wan smiled, a smile tinged with bitterness and warmth: "You really think I ran away? Hidden? Afraid? Su Ting, on the thirteenth floor of the Dream Tower, I was 'nailed' to the eighth floor. They took away my memories, peeling them away layer by layer, asking me, 'What are you most afraid of?' I said, I'm afraid Su Ting won't be able to find me. They laughed and said, 'Then we'll let you live, so he'll never find you.'"

He raised his hand and pointed to his temple: "I call your name every second. But I can't go out, and I can't come back. I have to wait for someone who is willing to risk their life just to hear me say 'I'm here'."

Su Ting choked up.

“So you didn’t betray me.” Lin Wan gently patted his shoulder. “You’re the only madman who fought his way in, stepping on the bloodstains I left behind.”

"Then you're not allowed to change the way I kicked you!" Su Ting suddenly retorted, "That kick was when I was seventeen, I kicked you thirty-one times in my dream! You dodged it every time! This time—this time I have to land the kick!"

Lin Wan stared at him for three seconds, then suddenly burst out laughing: "Fine! I'll write that you kicked him! But you have to promise me—in the next chapter, you have to cry like an idiot."

"Bullshit!" Su Ting rolled his eyes. "The protagonist never cries!"

"So, under the wind chimes just now, whose eyes were red? Who was trembling like a leaf after calling out 'Lin Wan'?" Lin Wan grinned mischievously. "I bet Xiao Yin when you shed your first tear—she said it was when you said 'I'm not leaving'; I said it would only fall when you saw the letter your mother left for you."

"A letter?" Su Ting looked up abruptly. "What letter?"

Lin Wan didn't answer, but just blinked: "In the first chapter you kicked me, in the second chapter I took you to see someone—but she only showed the letter to 'the person who went home'."

"You're doing this again!" Su Ting gritted his teeth. "Playing hard to get is a disease, you know?"

"But you're a reader," Lin Wan shrugged, looking completely matter-of-fact. "How are you going to keep up with the updates if I don't pay attention?"

Su Ting was so angry that he kicked her.

This time, Lin Wan didn't dodge.

"boom!"

The toe of the shoe slammed into his shin, making him cry out and jump up: "Go easy on him! This is the future bestselling male lead! You can't afford to pay for it if you break him!"

"You, the protagonist, are incredibly resilient," Su Ting sneered. "You've been dead for seven years and you're still not truly dead."

"That's because someone won't let go of the past." Lin Wan rubbed her leg, but smiled brightly. "Let's go. If we dawdle any longer, Xiao Yin will really put peppercorns in."

The two of them ran towards the osmanthus tree, playfully bickering all the way.

Deep within the shadows of the trees, an old wooden table sits beneath the shade. On the table float two bowls of plump, white glutinous rice balls in clear broth, steaming gently. Beside it sits a bottle of orange-flavored soda, its glass rim glistening with water droplets, as if it had just been scooped from a well.

Chapter 1304 Three Minutes Late

The girl stood by the table, her hair in pigtails, wearing a light blue dress with flour stains on the cuffs. She glared at the two of them, raising an eyebrow: "Three minutes late, you know that?"

"Xiao Yin!" Su Ting's voice was strained, and he almost dared not step forward.

The girl grinned, picked up a soup spoon, and pointed at him: "Add ten peppercorns to the first bowl! Add shredded ginger to the second bowl! The third bowl—oh, you didn't have a third bowl!"

“You…you really…” Su Ting stood there, not daring to move.

Xiao Yin rolled her eyes: "Of course I'm telling the truth! Do you think Lin Wan can cook glutinous rice balls that won't burn? He almost burned through the pot last time!"

Lin Wan scratched her head: "That was an accident! Flames are a symbol of passion!"

"Symbolize my foot!" Xiao Yin smacked him on the head with a spoon. "Sit down! Don't you dare steal Su Ting's glutinous rice balls! We agreed that he could have the first bite!"

The three sat around the table.

Su Ting looked down at the glutinous rice balls floating in the bowl and suddenly felt a lump in her throat.

These glutinous rice balls are exactly the same as when I was a child—thin skin, generous filling, the aroma of sesame mixed with the richness of lard, and a molten center when you bite into them. My mother always made these on the Winter Solstice, humming off-key nursery rhymes as she wrapped them.

"What's wrong, scared out of your wits?" Xiaoyin poked him. "Eat!"

Su Ting scooped up a piece and took a bite.

The scalding hot, sweet aroma exploded in my mouth instantly.

He suddenly lowered his head, his shoulders trembling slightly.

"You cried?" Lin Wan peeked in. "I knew you'd cry."

"Shut up!" Su Ting's mouth was full of glutinous rice balls, and his voice was muffled. "This is... hot!"

"Mmm, it's hot." Xiaoyin rested her chin on her hand, her eyes smiling. "Then why are your ears red?"

Su Ting didn't say anything, just kept his head down and ate voraciously, one piece after another, as if he hadn't eaten for seven years.

Lin Wan looked at him quietly, then suddenly whispered, "You're so thin, I'm afraid you'll burst if you eat a bowl of glutinous rice balls."

“I fucking want to eat ten bowls.” Su Ting raised his head, his eyes red. “I want to make up for every meal I missed in the past seven years.”

Xiaoyin suddenly reached out and gently covered the back of his hand.

“From now on, it will happen every day,” she said, “as long as you come back.”

Su Ting looked at her, then at Lin Wan, and suddenly realized that this tree, this bowl of soup, and these two people were the realities he had desperately tried to grasp, even as he had to cross the black fog, break through the rift in his memories, and be torn apart by nightmares.

“You…” his voice was hoarse, “didn’t you ever think that there were people waiting for you outside? Your parents, your friends, your classmates…they thought you were dead.”

Lin Wan was silent for a moment, then slowly said, "The people outside think we're dead. But we're here, alive and well. And they, in their dreams and memories, are waiting for us too."

“Do you know what’s the most ironic thing?” Xiaoyin said softly, “My mother visits my grave every week, bringing me my favorite red bean buns. But she doesn’t know that I can smell the red bean paste every day—because I’m here, and a whole pot of them has just been steamed.”

Su Ting was stunned.

“So this isn’t escapism.” Lin Wan looked at him. “This is another way of living. The Dream Tower took away our bodies, but it can’t take away how we choose to ‘remember’.”

"And what about your mother?" Xiaoyin suddenly asked. "When was the last time you saw her?"

Su Ting closed his eyes.

"The hospital, the white ward, the sound of the electrocardiogram monitor... very slowly. She lay there, terribly thin. I wanted to call her, but the nurse said she couldn't hear me anymore. So I sat there, held her hand, and said, 'Mom, I'm back'... and then her finger moved slightly."

“She heard it,” Lin Wan said.

Chapter 1305 The Corridor of Last Wish

“But I…” Su Ting opened her eyes, her gaze shining, “But I haven’t had a chance to tell her that I don’t blame her for leaving me alone in the hospital. I don’t blame her for being sick. I don’t blame her for leaving. I want to tell her that I think about her every day, that I dream about her…”

"So now," Xiaoyin looked at him seriously, "don't you want to tell her?"

Su Ting suddenly looked up: "How can I tell her? She's already—"

“The ninth floor of the Dream Tower, the ‘Corridor of Last Wishes’,” Lin Wan interrupted him. “It holds all the ‘unspoken words.’ If you wish, you can go in once—to see her one last time in the gap between dreams.”

"Can I...see her?"

"Yes," Lin Wan nodded, "but you must first complete a task—become an apprentice 'Dream Guardian.' Only after passing the assessment can you enter the Corridor."