National treasure

Cheng Ling thought that Zhong Zhe's strangeness was just dissatisfaction with the room and doubts about the bed allocation at night.

"I'm going to take a quilt to spread on the floor, and you sleep on the bed."

Zhong Zhe nodded, but the expression on his face did not quickly return to normal.

Cheng Ling thought for a while, and he probably guessed that what he said before made Zhong Zhe feel embarrassed.

He had read Zhong Zhe's information and knew his sexual orientation, so he used it without thinking.

If Zhong Zhe was a woman, he would have used the same scene, but deep down...Cheng Ling looked at Zhong Zhe who put down his things. buttons until the entire neck is exposed.

Now, he turned back to him.

The double-breasted white dress wraps Zhong Zhe's waist too tightly, creating some kind of uniform restraint. However, his posture is loose at the moment, and the black ribbon on the open collar falls on both sides, like a touch on a pure white canvas. The deep black curves attract all eyes.

There, the skin is exposed, drawing an irregular deep V, winding all the way down, and disappearing.

Deep down in his heart, Cheng Ling understood Zhong Zhe's desire, just as he clearly understood his own.

He had seen enough of his beauty tonight, he looked back with a cold face.Cheng Ling didn't like any mood swings, especially during missions, so he turned and left the room.

When he came back with the quilt in his arms, Zhong Zhe was already washing up.

At night, the lights were dimmed, and Zhong Zhe was tossing and turning in bed, unable to fall asleep no matter what.

"Not used to people?"

Cheng Ling finally spoke.

Zhong Zhe hummed.

"I'm not used to it either." Cheng Ling answered very simply.

Zhong Zhe couldn't help laughing.

"It seems like it will take us a while to get used to it. What a sacrifice for our country."

Now it was Cheng Ling's turn to smile, "Is it just this level of sacrifice?"

"Otherwise? If you don't enter the room, you will be thrown out?"

After the words came out of his mouth, Zhong Zhe realized that he was used to sloppiness and accidentally let go.

This is really embarrassing.

The room was silent for a few seconds.

"I was in a hurry before..." Cheng Ling's tone came down slowly, followed by a relieved explanation, "You know, I have read your information.".

"Yeah." Zhong Zhe didn't dare to speak nonsense for a moment.

He changed the subject, "How did the glass curtain wall in the bathroom break? Did you two really jump like that?"

"The other party broke the glass first, and I jumped down."

"You are all right, and the gangster is all right?"

"Well. He died during the pursuit later."

"My God, the height of the hotel's storey is not low. The two floors must be more than six meters." Zhong Zhe admired this movement power very much. No matter the gangster or Chengling, not only did he not break his leg, but he was still alive and kicking.

"Well, this organization is a bit unusual." When Cheng Ling said this, he remembered something. He got up and turned on the spotlight by the bed.

"That man has a tattoo, do you see what you find?"

He suddenly thought of that tattoo, which had a peculiar style and an ancient and simple temperament. He should show it to Zhong Zhe.

Zhong Zhe stared at the vermilion bird pattern on the phone screen for a moment, "Which person is the pattern pattern on?"

He looked up at Cheng Ling, and Cheng Ling read from his expression that Zhong Zhe had seen this pattern before.

Without waiting for Cheng Ling to answer, Zhong Zhe began to explain, "What is the meaning of this pattern? It's hard to say what it represents. The reason why I was surprised was that before my father passed away, I received a letter. The date was not long before his death. It took about a week. The back of the envelope was sealed with an ancient form of sealing lacquer, and the pattern on it was this bird pattern."

Zhong Zhe returned the phone to Cheng Ling, and sat up completely from the crooked bed. "I found this envelope when I was sorting out the relics. At that time, I thought it was strange, and I looked at it carefully. There was only the addressee on it, but no sender. The letter inside was also missing, and I couldn't find it at all."

There are no valuable clues, so it seems that they can only be handed over to the rear support team, hoping to gain something.

After turning off the light, the two lay down again.

After seeing the bird pattern, Zhong Zhe couldn't fall asleep more and more, and all kinds of things related to his father came back to his mind. Before and after the accident, memories flashed back violently in the dark, and he even felt it difficult to breathe.

"Zhong Zhe?!"

Hearing his very disordered breathing, Cheng Ling leaned up vigilantly.

The flashback was completely interrupted, and Zhong Zhe took a few deep breaths before recovering.

Cheng Ling asked him, "What's wrong?"

Zhong Zhe said in a low voice: "I thought about the time before and after my father's death."

Cheng Ling recalled the record in the document, "Your father died in an accident, right?"

"Yes, an avalanche. The wooden house on the mountain collapsed and was buried."

"You were only 16?"

"Yeah." Zhong Zhe still paid attention to his breathing, he didn't want to let himself fall into a dangerous flashback again.

In the darkness, Cheng Ling could clearly hear his actions.

"Are you adjusting your breathing?"

Zhong Zhe responded, he knew that Cheng Ling was wondering, after so many years, he shouldn't have such a violent reaction.

Inside, it was pitch black.

He decided to speak out: "I was there, in the same cabin as my father."

Cheng Ling sat up abruptly, "There is no mention of this in the records!"

"It should be because I was intact and I didn't suffer any trauma. When people found me, I could walk and jump, and I was sent to the hospital as usual. After the hospital examination, there was really nothing to record. What's more, it happened in a remote place. In the mountains, it's not surprising that there aren't any official records."

Cheng Ling keenly felt what was buried behind Zhong Zhe's calm narration. "No. According to the information, your father was found by the search and rescue team after a full 30 hours, and there was a couple in the house at that time, who were university colleagues he invited to go with him."

He paused, and began to state the astonishing facts.

"The three of them died, and only you survived. The avalanche will completely cut off the outside world. In the collapsed wooden house, in a full 30 hours of darkness, you and... stayed for more than a day and night."

Cheng Ling really couldn't say the words "you and the three corpses". He was afraid of arousing Zhong Zhe's reaction, and he already understood too much, so he suffocated his chest for a few breaths.

Hell, he was 16 at the time.

After a moment of silence, Cheng Ling said, "How long did it take you to get used to the darkness again?"

"It's not that easy, but at least it's tolerable. The doctor said that my post-traumatic stress disorder should be mild and healed well. It's also true that after graduating from university, it has never recurred." Zhong Zhe laughed. She smiled, "But actually, I still keep the lights on all night."

Cheng Ling straightened up and turned on the floor lamp in the corner.

Then, there was another silence lying on the bed.

Zhong Zhe couldn't help but let out a long breath, "Say something, it's better than having no voice."

Cheng Ling thought for a while, and did not deliberately avoid this topic, "You know, I have met a lot because of the mission. Companions like me, enemies, people who are implicated intentionally or innocently, because in the process, there will be There are so many things beyond the tolerance of ordinary people, so no matter which party will have PTSD."

Facing the ceiling, he recalls: "I had my own bouts of stress."

Then he turned his head to look at Zhong Zhe, "So I understand what you said very well, all kinds. If there is anything next, I hope you will tell me without hesitation. Remember to throw all the upbringing of your old family to the door Go outside, what did you just say, sacrifice for the country? XX...!"

This was the first time Zhong Zhe heard Cheng Ling burst into foul language, and he amused him directly.

He curled up sideways on the bed, looking down at Cheng Ling, the lights in the room, the reassuring man, and the amused atmosphere.

Zhong Zhe remembered the words of the therapist again, guiding, relieving, acknowledging, accepting, and transcending.He is no longer the boy he was back then, and he has already passed the initial period of insomnia medication. For so many years, he followed the doctor's advice to guide and relieve him, and tried hard to admit and accept it, but he didn't know how to go beyond.

For years, he hadn't had a chance to talk about it with anyone other than a therapist, and he'd hardly thought about going to anyone.

"After the avalanche, it was completely silent. There was not a single sound in the world, except for dead silence. Death is probably like that..."

Cheng Ling quietly listened to Zhong Zhe's description, and listened to him describe the horror of death in detail. He spoke so truthfully and carefully that Cheng Ling felt as if he was directly in it.Then he started talking about darkness again.

"Eyes are useless. Fear will have a critical point. When you get close to the edge, you will feel manic. After that, you will go crazy. I learned to meditate from my father when I was very young. I wanted to stop my mind, so I started Memorizing long scrolls of Buddhist scriptures..."

Later, he spoke of hallucinations.

"Aural hallucinations, non-stop, all kinds of auditory hallucinations. There is no reality, and you can't feel any reality. So there are only dreams, endless, dreams within dreams..."

Cheng Ling listened intently all the time, and turned his whole body towards Zhong Zhe.

He listened to him describe all the environments and sensations in such detail that he could reach out and touch them.

But he didn't talk about people, not at all about his father and his two friends.

Cheng Ling understands that this is what Zhong Zhe really can't touch, it's his superficially healed wound.

In the collapsed wooden house without reality, all the environments and senses he talked about became reality, tangible and visible existence.The dead father and his friends have become a deeper psychological dark side, a memory that is only chosen to be turned over during treatment, and a wound that cannot be touched.

At night, Cheng Ling didn't fall asleep, but stayed with Zhong Zhe, listening to his breathing, turning over, and feeling his long gaze on him.

When it was close to dawn, Zhong Zhe gradually became breathing evenly and fell asleep peacefully.

Four hours later, Cheng Ling got up, sat on the sofa, and watched Zhong Zhe quietly.

Five hours later, Cheng Ling watched Zhong Zhe wake up, opened his eyes and looked for his existence, and when he saw it, a smile could not be concealed on his face.

Cheng Ling has never been a dull person.

He didn't like that smile very much. If it was just some wind blowing across the lake before, then after this night, the smile turned into a stone and was completely thrown into the center of the lake.

"morning."

"morning."

Cheng Ling got up and walked to the window, the curtain that cut off the morning light was pulled back, and the sunlight passed in front of him and sprinkled all the way to Zhong Zhe's bedside.

The morning light fills the room, driving away the darkness.

"I thought a lot about Hetu last night." Zhong Zhe sat up and said, "The intention of these people to steal Hetu is very likely that they believe that the combination of Hetu and Luoshu can bring Mysterious power, 'change the world'.

What exactly have they researched, and what will they do once Luo Shu succeeds.Only by knowing the thoughts and actions of these people can we find clues from them. "

Zhong Zhe looked up at Cheng Ling who was slowly walking towards him, "To figure this out, I have to go back to England. All the research materials over the years are there, and the writing on the tortoise shell also needs to be studied carefully."

Cheng Ling stopped by the bed, and Zhong Zhe could clearly see his serious face.

"Once you leave the national border, the implementation of top-secret missions overseas will give up a lot of backup support for the sake of concealment, and the danger will multiply.

Are you sure you want to do this? "

"Even if we don't go anywhere, danger will find us, won't it?

Are you worried about me, or about the mission? "

Zhong Zhe didn't think Cheng Ling would worry about himself.

"The task I received is that you need protection just like Hetu."

In the morning light, Zhong Zhe's eyes sparkled, and he laughed, "Why don't we leave now?"

Cheng Ling nodded in response.