Winter Time Rendering

Chapter 155: Chapter 65: "Vertical Pupil

He subconsciously walked down the steps and dazedly extended a hand. Snowflakes danced in the wind, landing softly in his palm. The icy sensation made him shudder.

It was snowing...

’But why is this happening?’

’No matter how much this butterfly flaps its wings, I can’t possibly change the weather, can I?’

’Does this mean it wasn’t a "rewind," but that I jumped straight into another timeline?’

’A parallel universe?’

Zhang Shutong quickly pulled out his phone and searched for the weather forecast for December 6th. But the local forecast didn’t mention snow at all. Below the search bar was just a single line:

"Sunny. As of 11:00 AM Beijing time, the current temperature is -2 degrees Celsius. The high for today is expected to be 3 degrees Celsius. Drink plenty of hot water, bundle up, and be careful not to catch a cold..."

But now, that message looked utterly bizarre and sent a chill down his spine.

Zhang Shutong looked around blankly. The commercial street before him was cast in a gray haze. The already-not-so-clean streets were now covered in a thin layer of snow, and dirty slush trickled along the curbs toward the center of the road.

No one around him seemed to find it strange. Pedestrians hurried along with their heads down. He stood rooted to the spot, and for a moment, it felt like the world was spinning. The slush flowed to his feet, branching out like twigs and slowly soaking the soles of his shoes.

He started walking through the swirling snow, his pace quick. Zhang Shutong’s gaze locked onto the milk tea shop, where a few of his close friends were taking shelter from the snow under the sign. They saw him and waved.

"Over here, over here! We forgot to ask, what flavor do you want..."

Zhang Shutong quickly caught his breath and casually named a flavor. Ruoping asked how his stomach was doing, and he deliberately said he’d caught a chill. Ruoping nodded and said it was indeed cold today... In truth, Zhang Shutong wanted to know when the snow had started.

He chatted with them for a bit more, deliberately complaining that the weather forecast was completely unreliable, since it had clearly said there would be no snow today.

The weather forecasts these days really weren’t that accurate. His comment drew a nod of agreement from Ruoping.

"I know, right? My mom still spends money subscribing to text alerts. I keep telling her they’re not accurate. Wasn’t it still sunny when we got out of school? We just had lunch, and now it’s snowing..."

Zhang Shutong’s heart skipped a beat. He knew Ruoping was wrong. To be precise, the snow hadn’t started in the middle of lunch. It had started the exact moment he returned from eight years in the future, when everyone raised their glasses and said, "Cheers."

He then subtly probed them about last night. To his relief, the night they caught the poachers was still the same as before.

Zhang Shutong summed up the changes that had occurred since the rewind:

The minor friction at the restaurant. That one was okay; it was because of him.

Gu Qiuyan’s period, which was due to the drop in temperature and her catching a chill.

Of course, the root cause of it all was the snow.

’If this were a parallel universe, the weather forecast should have changed along with it. But it didn’t, which means this is still a variable caused by the "rewind."’

This bizarre snowfall offered no clues whatsoever. He could only quietly file it away in his mind as another thought surfaced:

’Why was the rewind point for this loop the group lunch?’

’The first time, I went back to Wednesday. The second time, to Thursday. So the third time... I obviously don’t want a third time, but following this pattern, would it be Friday?’

But Zhang Shutong had another theory. He still remembered the mechanism of the "rewind":

If something bad happens to someone near you, you will return to a key node before the event.

The emphasis was on the last two words—

"Key node."

’That might explain it. In the original timeline, because of the "scarf incident," my relationship with Gu Qiuyan fell to a freezing point and was never repaired, right up until she was killed. I was too preoccupied to pay attention to the conflict on the commercial street or the real killer.’

’So I was sent back to Thursday afternoon, which happened to be the day of the monthly seat change. By a strange twist of fate, we became desk mates, and I gradually got to know more about her and her family situation. That "seat change" was the key to mending our relationship.’

’So what about this time?’

Zhang Shutong wondered if it had something to do with this lunch. ’Did I miss a clue at the Lake Fish Restaurant?’

’No, that’s not right.’

’The commercial street was a dead end.’

He recalled the clues he’d brought back from eight years in the future. Several of them pointed to Lu Qinglian. And it just so happened that he had run into her on the rooftop after lunch on Thursday. At the time, he’d just felt a bit speechless that someone had occupied his little hideout, and the two of them ended up chatting for a bit.

That was the last time he had a somewhat lengthy conversation with Lu Qinglian until the night before the rewind.

’If my previous judgment was correct and I should be paying more attention to Lu Qinglian, could it be that this time’s key node is the "rooftop conversation"? Did my past self overlook something?’

’Then the next course of action seemed clear.’

Taking the milk tea from Ruoping, Zhang Shutong took another deep look at the man inside through the window. He used his phone to take a picture of the man’s face.

He had originally planned to say goodbye to his friends next, as they all had their own things to do:

Du Kang was going to rent a videotape, Qingyi was going to borrow a book... That was how he remembered it, but the snow had changed that, too. No one wanted to wander around in the snow, so they all just rode their bikes back to school.

Once they were through the school gates, Zhang Shutong apologized, ditched his bike, and hurried into the academic building. He bounded up the stairs and stopped at the end of the hallway.

The lighting wasn’t very good here. He lifted his head and looked toward the entrance shrouded in shadow.

’The rooftop again...’

Zhang Shutong almost instinctively turned his head. The afternoon winter sun slanted into the corridor, casting the shadows of the window bars on the terrazzo floor. But this time it was daytime, and there were a few students walking in the hallway. Hearing their footsteps, he finally confirmed that the empty night of old movies was truly gone, buried in time along with a cold-blooded bastard.

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