I am a Flower Vase in an Infinite World / I Am a Useless flower in an infinite

Chapter 41

Tang Ning nodded hastily.

Qi Yun took out his phone, opened a video, placing it in the center for both to watch. To see the video, Tang Ning had to lean in.

The video began with a cacophony of voices, the camera shaking, moving from a dirty floor to peeling walls, then swaying to a dim ceiling. Finally, it penetrated a group of people, focusing on a crying face.

The face of Zhang crying.

In the moment the camera focused, the entire scene seemed to brighten up.

The surrounded youth was soaked, as if just drenched, the wet white shirt outlining a slender waist. From strands of hair to eyelashes, everything was dripping, like a pink rose blooming in a storm.

"Feeling cold?" someone asked him.

The bewildered youth opened his mouth, trembling lips struggling to form complete words.

"How did a cold shower turn into this?"

"Why didn't you undress for the bath?"

"Give him a smoke to warm up."

...

All around were malicious laughter, a lit cigarette handed to the youth's lips.

Tang Ning watched the person in the video, identical to him, drenched like a drowned rat. Involuntarily, he recalled the thunderstorm night he escaped the villa in the first scenario.

As if invisible droplets were falling from his hair, chin, and the hem of his clothes, the familiar dampness and disarray made Tang Ning shiver uncontrollably.

The "Tang Ning" in the video shook his head, pushing away the cigarette. Someone impatiently forced it into his mouth.

Tang Ning's wrist throbbed with pain; the agony from being restrained by pairs of hands yesterday had spread throughout his body.

The camera gradually zoomed in, close enough to see every expression. When "Tang Ning" was choked by the smoke and kept coughing, the group around him had stopped laughing.

Their faces transformed from malicious grins to an eerily unanimous blank stare.

Beneath the milky smoke, "Tang Ning" looked fragile, like an elusive mist, unrealistically beautiful. The boy closest to him adjusted his breath, seemingly smelling the scent of the smoke exhaled by "Tang Ning."

In his eyes, an undisguised fascination.

"They are infatuated with you."

"But same-sex attraction isn't accepted in this era."

"They don't want to admit they've committed a crime."

"So they want to tarnish this beauty."

Qi Yun's voice was cold and compelling, each word sounding like a judgment of sin. It peeled Tang Ning's thoughts away from the video and diary. Suddenly, Qi Yun softened his tone:

"It was never your fault."

"There's nothing wrong with you."

Qi Yun cupped Tang Ning's face, whispering, "You are beauty itself."

If he were the real "Tang Ning," hearing these words should have completely enchanted him, right?

Staring into Qi Yun's affectionate peach blossom eyes, a thought involuntarily emerged in Tang Ning's mind.

But he was just an external player.

What he cared about most right now was...

Tang Ning extended his hand, pointing at several faces in the video. "I feel like they look familiar, like people from our class."