Blade of Glory [Figure Skating]

The tulips in the garden are blooming very beautifully, and there are even tiny drops of water on the petals after being cared for carefully.All of this made Alek, who thought he would never see Qingyue during this trip, couldn't help but look forward to it in his heart.Looking forward to... the owner of this villa can be here right now.Perhaps when he opened the door of the study, he would find him dozing off in the study on this mild afternoon, with a childish look on his face.

Thinking of this, Alek stopped abruptly, but a kind of longing finally defeated his cowardice for more than a year, and made him put the key into the villa gate.He turned the key once, and the other keys on the keychain made crisp and pleasant sounds in this quiet afternoon.

When the sound of the door being opened came from the keyhole of the door, Alek heard a series of... eager footsteps running down the stairs, as if the sound was pulling at his heartstrings.Therefore, when the door lock was unlocked, he pushed the door open vigorously, allowing a piece of sunlight behind him to pour into the villa that had been set on fire and then renovated as new.

However... the person who rushed down the stairs on the second floor because he heard the sound of Alek turning the key opened was not the person he thought.

"It's you……?"

It was a sound that Alek had been hearing from time to time since he entered the senior division of figure skating.That voice... belonged to his old rival, Freyr, the Light of Planden.

Perhaps seeing each other here, Freire and Alek were equally surprised.This retired figure skater, who can almost be called the national idol of Planden, gradually turned his focus to flamenco dance performance and composition after the end of the last Olympic Games.But after Qingyue disappeared, he came to Xishu almost every month, and came to the country where Qingyue's talent and dreams were realized, and finally contributed to his sad back.

This garden villa has been completely renovated, and Freire has been coming here to clean it every once in a while, planting the flowers he bought in the garden of the villa, and filling the refrigerator with food.Even after Freire retired, he wasn't much more relaxed than before, but coming here every once in a while and doing these things for this seemingly empty villa made him feel extremely calm.

He would bring the discs he liked to the study room where Qing Yue often stayed, put the discs on the music player, and enjoy the surround sound formed by the speakers there.He would make a cup of freshly ground coffee for himself using the coffee machine at Qingyue's home and the coffee beans he bought here, and turned the swivel chair to the floor-to-ceiling glass windows of the study with a layer of white translucent curtains drawn.Drinking coffee, listening to those music, and looking at the place in front of the villa.

At that time, he would fantasize that... he fell asleep after drinking coffee, and when he opened his eyes, he would see the surprised look of Qing Yue who came back here.

If Freire couldn't wait for Qing Yue to come back until the next morning, he should pack up the luggage he brought and lock the door of the villa again.There may be some disappointment, but there will also be another kind of expectation.

He expected Qing Yue to come back here soon, and found that the water and electricity in the house were still on.And there will be food that he puts in regularly in the refrigerator, and there will still be the warmth of home here.

Although this kind of time has passed for a long time, and... it may continue for a long time, Frere seems to regard it as a part of his life, a... habit that can continue forever.

Today, Freire fell asleep sitting on the swivel chair in the study because he was too busy with work a few days ago.While asleep, he heard... the sound of a key unlocking the door from the first floor.A kind of ecstasy hit his heart like this, causing him to stand up abruptly, open the door and rush down the spiral staircase.

But in the end, what Freire saw was not the person he had been waiting for for half a year, but... his long-standing rival in love and career, Alek.All hope and anticipation associated with good visions were abruptly wiped out by a basin of icy water falling from the sky.Looking at the bunch of keys in Alek's hand, Freire suddenly understood a reality that he didn't want to face.

Alek, who had been in a relationship with Qingyue for many years... has always had the key to this house.

When Freire understood this, he suddenly remembered how he borrowed the key of the house from Qingyue's mother when the house was being renovated, and how he changed the door of the house Always keep the lock cylinder.The purpose... is to let Qing Yue use the key in his hand to open the door when he comes back one day.

But now, Qingyue hasn't come back yet, but Alek has used the key in his hand to open the door of the house he has carefully maintained.

The expression on Freire's face changed from joy to indifference, and although Alek had never expressed his emotions so simply on his face, anyone with a discerning eye could still see the change in his expression at the moment.But Freire didn't seem to have the heart to observe these at all.Without saying a word to Alexo, he turned and went upstairs again, intending to return to the study where he had just been.However, he heard Alek's voice calling him to stop.

"Frell!"

Hearing this voice, Fredton stopped, but did not look back.

"Qingyue...has he contacted you?"

Alek frowned, and asked this question with hope as thin as moonlight in his heart, but he got such an honest answer: "The last time I saw him was before the last World Championships."

After answering Alek's question, Frere walked up the spiral staircase to the second floor and returned to the study.He slammed the door shut and ignored the Olympic gold medalist who had won him in the last Olympics until he left the house.

You took away the wings he used to fly, but has the dream in your heart really come true?

It was an unexpected surprise.Once... both of them suddenly felt that time flies by unexpectedly.The once splendid time of the three-legged confrontation can no longer be recalled, and Qing Yue's huge mistake in the last Olympic Games can no longer be changed.But what about the future?How should they go on in a future that makes people seem to have no hope?

Since Cones, Nyolido, and Chu Xuan retired one after another, Freire and Alek withdrew from the world ice, and Qing Yue disappeared, the world ice seems to have entered an unprecedented trough.Even...Because there were too many excellent athletes shining brightly before this, this sudden downturn appeared to be even more bleak than the ice age after Naxiu and Sauron retired.

The Jiaguo rookie team that had been favored by many parties, as well as those rookies from all over the world who gradually emerged before Qingyue and others retired, chose to give up the quad jump after the three of them retired, and turned to a more conservative one, with a lot of mistakes. There are few games to capture the podium of various world-class competitions.

Because the previous era was too brilliant, the world ice circle has ushered in an irreversible retrogression period.And this retrogression is unacceptable to too many ice fans.They couldn't even believe that the era that was so close to them was over.I don't know why I feel sorry, and I don't know why I feel sorry.

So, where did Qing Yue, who disappeared after that World Championships, go?

At the age of 24, Qing Yue began a long self-imposed exile.He used any means of transportation other than airplanes to go to any corner of the world.As long as... no one knows him anywhere.Until later, he had learned some simple ways to change his appearance, hitchhiked, took coaches, trains, and ships to many places he hadn't even heard the names of.

At the beginning, he stopped skating and even felt that he couldn't do anything except skating. Even washing dishes in a restaurant would lose his job because he accidentally broke the dishes.It was not until a long time later that he gradually adapted to such a life.

He can even help the sailors on the fishing boat he was on, overhaul the jeep he was on when the car broke down, and even help some people with sudden illness on the train.

He sometimes uses the time-lapse feature of his e-mail to send a voicemail to his family, or sends them a postcard telling them he's alive when he leaves a place.

This kind of life made Qingyue feel as if he would exhaust all his physical strength every day. He was no longer being chased by the spotlights and the cameras of strange reporters, but that kind of life made him feel simple and fulfilling.But Qing Yue, who always had a pair of skates in his bag that he would take out to wipe them from time to time, felt that something was missing.

Yes, he never heard the sound of ice blades gliding across the ice.Even the sound of falling on the ice due to a failed jump will never appear by his side again.But those will always appear in his dreams.

When those dreams related to past dreams appeared again and again, and they couldn't get rid of them, Qing Yue finally bid farewell to the friends he met in the process of self-exile, and went to a place where he could see the aurora .It is a beautiful and mysterious place.There is a crystal palace that is only opened for three months every year and is built once with huge ice blocks.There are also huge snow mountains, bigger and less populated than the snow mountain where Qingyue first came into contact with figure skating.

Relying on his previous strength in skiing, Qing Yue finally found a job as a ski instructor here, specializing in teaching some ski beginners, telling them what to do on the snow, and avoiding their injuries on the snow as much as possible.With Qingyue's solid ski skills and rich knowledge, he became a very popular ski instructor here after three months of ski recovery training.

God knows how grateful Qing Yue is to Le Sheng who taught him how to ski when he finally settled down in such a beautiful place.

In addition to teaching people to ski, Qingyue also walks to the ice rink that is some distance away from the ski resort.There are often neatly placed many huge ice blocks for ice sculpture enthusiasts and crystal palaces.After getting acquainted with the people at the ice rink, Qing Yue would often wear his own skates and take a simple ladder to climb up those big ice blocks and skate there.