IWOL Chapter 358: The Unlucky Child (Lin Hangzhi x Xia Qiongyun)

1.

When Lin Hangzhi was young, he thought that his life was a tragedy written in capital letters.

Since he was a child, he often suffered all kinds of unlucky things, such as having diarrhea with no toilet paper in sight or buying a box of milk that was missing its straw. Every time the teacher asked a question and he didn’t know the answer, the teacher would always pick him to answer…In the end, he gradually got used to this kind of life. He was just a little bit more unlucky than others, and this wasn’t anything too terrible.

His parents comforted him by telling him that he was merely conserving his luck. Since he was constantly unlucky now, it must have meant that he would be very lucky in the future.

After a long time, Lin Hangzhi realized that his life was not just a tragedy; it was a magnificent tragedy.

He worked so hard to enter medical school and survived the internship period. When he was approaching 30, he finally became a doctor. In the end, he was accused of making a mistake on the operating table and leaving gauze in a patient’s stomach. The medical accident resulted in him being punished and losing his job.

After he’d packed all his things and left, a billboard was blown down by the wind, and it smashed him dead. He’d just walked out of the hospital but was carried back in vertically.

Now, it’d been three days since he woke up from the ICU, and the three years of traveling in the Pure White Realm was just like a dream he had while he was in a coma.

His parents came to accompany him, and seeing their son wrapped almost like a mummy on the bed, his mother’s eyes became red and swollen. She wiped her tears and took his hand in hers. “Son, mom is wrong. You’re born with bad luck. This is fate.”

Lin Hangzhi was relieved. He understood that his so-called bad luck was only a manifestation of his ability in the Pure White Realm. In the past, he didn’t know how to be lucky, but now, the Pure White Realm had taught him how.

Lin Hangzhi’s recovery was very fast, and he was discharged from the hospital within nearly half a month. On the day he was discharged from the hospital, the sun was shining and the wind was fresh. Everything looked beautiful. Lin Hangzhi walked out with the sun shining on his face. He took a deep breath and smiled, ready to welcome a new life.

Then he promptly stepped on air and fell down the stairs.

2.

He broke his leg.

3.

It took at least one full month for him to be able to walk on that broken leg. The hope that Lin Hangzhi felt toward the rest of his life was like a small flame in a rainstorm, and it was extinguished with a sizzle.

He was paralyzed in bed with the air conditioner blowing, watching variety shows and eating potato chips. He didn’t know how he would be able to find another job in a hospital in the future. Lin Hangzhi thought about it and decided that, later, he would try to get a job at a private hospital. If that didn’t work out, he would feed himself with fortune-telling. He’d tried it before, and his ability of fortune and misfortune was still good. It was just that it wasn’t as exaggerated as it’d been in the Pure White Realm, and the backlash was also much smaller.

But now, there was no Victor to give him treatment.

Although there was a road of difficultes before him, Lin Hangzhi believed that all these could be solved. He had hands and feet. Surely he wouldn’t starve to death?

His retired parents temporarily moved in to live with him. That day, his dad went out for a walk, while his mother was cooking in the kitchen. As Lin Hangzhi was drinking a sip of Fat House Happy water, he heard his mother shout from the kitchen, “Hangzhi! Do you want to eat beef or pork this afternoon?”

Lin Hangzhi thought for three seconds and shouted, “Beef!”

It was good that his parents are temporarily staying with him. At work, he was full of strategy, but at home, no matter how old he was, to his parents, he was always be that unlucky child who was wronged and came crying home.

Lin Hangzhi had originally intended to find the others after he was discharged from the hospital. Due to a certain tacit understanding, they didn’t leave each other their mobile phone number or other contactm methods; instead, they gave their home addresses. But suddenly ending up like this, he couldn’t go anywhere at all.

It had been a month since he came back. When he went to bed every day, he would miss the others. He missed Cui’er, Dong Zheng, Linhai, and Xia Qiongyun, all of whom came out with him, and he also missed Que’er, Victor, and Fu Zhe, who stayed in the Pur White Realm.

I don’t know what happened to the others….Lin Hangzhi sighed sadly and poured himself a coke.

It was at this moment that a knock sounded at the door.

4.

“Coming.” Mother Lin wiped off the water on her hands and went to open the door.

The door opened, and there was a young woman standing with her eyes down, as if she was deep in thoughts. Seeing that the door had opened, she hurriedly smiled, and for a moment, her gaze swept past Mother Lin to the room behind her, silently and calmly gathering information.

Her straight black hair just barely passed her shoulders. She wore blue crystal stud earrings and a navy blue casual dress that made her complexion appear more pale, while her high heels made the lines of her calves more elegant. Mother Lin was startled to see such a pretty girl in front of her. She wiped her hands on her apron and asked, “Young woman, who are you looking for?”

“Auntie, may I ask if Lin Hangzhi is here?” she asked politely.

Looking for Hangzhi? Could she possibly be his girlfriend? No, no, no, how could her son have such a beautiful girlfriend. And looking at the bag she carried, the jewelry on her body, and her temperament, it was clear that she came from a wealthy family.

These thoughts flashed through Mother Lin’s mind, and she hurriedly said, “He is, he is. Hangzhi! Someone’s here for you!”

“Ah?” Lin Hangzhi’s dispirited voice sounded distantly from the bedroom. This was immediately followed by a crash and the sound of man’s scream.

They both looked toward the bedroom, and Mother Lin said in a worried voice, “What’s wrong?!”

“It’s okay. I just pulled a leg.” Lin Hangzhi grimaced painfully and limped out of the bedroom with a walking stick. As soon as he looked over, he saw Xia Qiongyun at the door.

As they looked at each other for a few seconds, time seemed to still. Xia Qiongyun looked exquisite, and she was dressed appropriately for the occasion, such that even if she ended up going to a dinner party, her outfit wouldn’t be out of place. Meanwhile, Lin Hangzhi was wearing large house pants and a gray T-shirt. One of his leg was tightly wrapped in plaster, his hair was messy, and there were potato chip crumbs around his mouth.

Mother Lin looked at her son, then at Xia Qiongyun, and tentatively asked, “Hangzhi, is this your friend?”

“Yes, my friend.” Lin Hangzhi came back to his senses, suppressed the ecstasy in his heart, and waved to Xia Qiongyun. “Quickly, come in.”

Xia Qiongyun nodded, smiled at Mother Lin, and walked into the house. Mother Lin stared with wide eyes at this unclear situation. “Hangzhi—”

“Auntie, my name is Xia Qiongyun. You can call me Xiao Xia.” Xia Qiongyun took a look at the condition of the house. It ought to be a rented house, and based on the size and location, Lin Hangzhi’s economic situation was similar to what she’d imagined.

After more than a month, he finally saw one of his teammates again. Lin Hangzhi wanted to cry without tears. He grabbed Xia Qiongyun’s wrist and pulled her into his bedroom. He shouted to his mother, “We’re going to have a chat. You can continue to cook. Thank you for your hard work, Mom!”

The bedroom door closed, and Mother Lin was still completely stunned.

Could she…really be his girlfriend?

Lin Hangzhi dragged a chair over for Xia Qiongyun to sit and pushed the pile of snacks on the bed aside, clearing enough space for him to sit with some difficulty. He leaned the walking stick against the headboard and rubbed his hands, not knowing what to say.

Strange as it was, he missed Xia Qiongyun a lot. But now that she was sitting in front of him, he didn’t know what to say to her.

Lin Hangzhi felt that it was very likely because of the way Xia Qiongyun was dressed. When they were in the Pure White Realm, they were either wearing tactical clothes and were dressed casually. Now that he suddenly saw her like this, he didn’t know what to say or how to feel.

The atmosphere was a bit awkward. Lin Hangzhi poured Xia Qiongyun a glass of coke, handed her a bag of unopened potato chips, pondered for a moment, and said, “That…”

“You–”

They both stopped talking at once. Then Xia Qiongyun smiled and said, “You speak first.”

The atmosphere seemed strange. Lin Hangzhi ran his fingers through his hair and forgot what he was going to say. He could only change it to a question. “Have you contacted Cui’er and the others already?”

“It’s harder to fly from Canada to Beijing than to Tianjin, so I decided to come to you first.”

“Oh.” Lin Hangzhi laughed foolishly. “I also haven’t contacted them. Look at my leg. I can’t do anything.”

“I wanted to ask, what happened to your leg?”

Lin Hangzhi said helplessly, “Hai, don’t mention it. Originally, my injury from the billboard quickly healed, but when I was discharged from the hospital, I stepped on empty hair and fell.”

Xia Qiongyun couldn’t help but laugh. “Why are you still so unlucky?”

“Who knows. In fact, I feel that my ability isn’t completely gone, but it’s not as easy to use as it’d been in the Pure White Realm.” Lin Hangzhi took out two die from under his pillow, and as he was about to throw, Xia Qiongyun held his hand.

He raised his gaze and saw that Xia Qiongyun was looking at him steadily. She said in a serious voice, “Now that Uncle is no longer here, it’s better not to use it casually.”

“…Oh, oh, okay.” Lin Hangzhi suddenly felt that something was wrong all over his body. Xia Qiongyun’s hands were very thin and delicate, different from when she was in the Pure White Realm. Obviously, in the real world, she had never done any hard work. He gripped the die in his hand, neither pulling away nor moving closer. He stalled for a bit and suddenly asked, “Are you hot?”

“I’m not hot.”

“I’m a little hot. Let me lower the air conditioner.” Lin Hangzhi turned to find the remote control and pulled his hand away. He felt relieved, but there was some unknowable regret in his heart. Before he could think more on it, he heard Xia Qiongyun laughed.

“What are you laughing about?”

Xia Qiongyun shook her head and pressed down the corners of her lips. But the corners of her eyes were still smiling. “It’s nothing. Right now…you don’t have a job?”

“No. I was reprimanded. I don’t know if I’ll be able to find a job at another hospital in the future.” Lin Hangzhi thought about it and wanted to cover his face. With a sigh, he said, “It’s a pity that I interned for some time at that hospital. If things had progressed smoothly, I should be able to become a surgeon in the next year or the year after next. Now, it’s all over.”

Xia Qiongyun said, “My family is opening a new hospital. Would you like to try it out?”

Lin Hangzhi froze. “What?”

The noon sun came in through the window, illuminating the messy bedroom, Lin Hangzhi’s short, tousled hair, and Xia Qiongyun’s serious eyes. “My dad, owing to the fact that I escaped death, wanted to build a private hospital. It’s still under construction, but once it’s completed, we’ll start recruiting doctors. Do you want to come?”

5.

Lin Hangzhi didn’t expect that soon after he came out of the Pure White Realm, the teammate who had fought side by side with him would transform into a rich woman, rush all the way over from Canada, and extend a helping hand to him who was in dire straits.

He was moved to tears.

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