CH 10

Chapter 10 – Delighted To See And Hear

Kaleido, you can change your name to Gayleido, alright

Everyone was shocked by this scene.

Not to mention the vast number of fans who had already thought that the transfer of the candy wrapper had failed. 

[HOLYSHITHOLYSHITHOLYSHITHOLYSHITHOLYSHITHOLYSHITHOLYSHITHOLYSHITHOLYSHITHOLYSHITHOLYSHIT]

[Holy sh*t! Why didn’t I record this?! Which sister recorded this?! I’m going to put it on repeat 10,000 times! ]

[This shocked my entire cram school….]

[Omgomg, I even have goosebumps now what kind of idol drama plot was that scene just now ah!!!]

[Terrific! TingJue is amazing, they’ve made a reservation on the Hot Search list now….]

[These ups and downs are brilliant]

[Xiao Pei is too gong-like! Wolf cub, you’re awesome!!]

[What have I done to be done like this by the TingJue CP ah!!!]

“Holy…” Lu Yuan was completely shocked, but his last remaining trace of reason compelled him to change his words in front of the camera, “….crap.”

It was at this moment that Pei Tingsong became clear-headed, and that’s when he felt that he had been possessed by something for an instant. Logically speaking, his part of the mission for the game had been successfully accomplished by now.

That’s right, that’s right. 

Upon coming to this realization, he quickly withdrew his hands from where they were holding Fang Juexia in place and pulled away from his lips.

However, Fang Juexia still hadn’t managed to react to all this yet.

His eyes were muddled, his head was in a complete mess, and every nerve in his body was sluggishly standing still. So, that candy wrapper just stayed on his lips for less than a second before it fluttered off and fell down. The light motion it flickered with as it descended downwards made it seem as though it was very satisfied with the development it had brought about.

“AHHHHHHHH JUEXIA! IT FELL!”

What?

Fang Juexia reached out in a panic and managed to grab the cellophane candy wrapper that had escaped his lips. He looked at everyone in chagrin and confusion.

In not even three seconds, this roller coaster game had finally ended with a dramatic failure.

The director regretfully noted, “The game challenge failed, and the pass failed at the last person in the line, so Juexia has to accept the punishment.”

[Ah, Juexia alone?]

[How can my beautiful baby be so miserable ah 5555]

[Juexia was scared into failing ba, who could have expected such a development ah]

[Writing in my blood to beg that Xiao Pei accompanies jx in bearing the punishment!!]

When Ling Yi saw these lines on the barrage on the screen, he also started to yell and jump around with them. “They’re right, it was only because Xiao Pei scared Juexia that he forgot to suck in a breath and secure the candy wrapper. Xiao Pei is responsible for half of the failure!!”

At this, Pei Tingsong’s expression was full of question marks, and he reached out to push aside Ling Yi’s head, which the person had stuck closer to him while speaking. 

Ling Yi immediately fled to the captain and complained, “Miaomiao! He’s shoving me!”

He Ziyan once again forced away Ling Yi’s arms which were hugging Jiang Miao. “Go, shoving you back.”

Lu Yuan said, “I also agree that Xiao Pei should be punished together with Fang Juexia!” Saying so, he then fell to his knees with his hands devoutly clasped together and pleaded, “Begging you! Let my group members get the chance to record a clip of them doing the hand flower dance ba!”

“No? Based on what?” Xiao Pei refused, “It didn’t fall down when it was with me.”

Jiang Miao, who shouldered the heavy responsibility of cueing people while on the show, took the punishment box from the staff and smiled like a Bodhisattva as he said, “However we do it… Juexia, you should draw a punishment first ba.”

Fang Juexia raised his hand and took off his pajama hoodie, thinking that it was the cause for his feverish cheeks. Without saying a word, he reached into the box, and without much hesitation, chose one of the two remaining punishment slips.

[Teacher Fang: the bottom line of K’s emotions]

[Juexia isn’t calm, but in a daze ba hahahaha, so cuuuute]

[Please draw Two Fire’s! Begging you, I’m willing to exchange my height with Ling Yi’s for a lifetime!]

“Clip, clip, clip…” Lu Yuan chanted as he hung on Fang Juexia’s shoulder. 

Opening the note, Fang Juexia showed the side with the punishment written on it to the camera. 

Written on it in bold and big letters were: The group will select another member who is to be shut up in a closet with the person responsible for drawing the punishment, and then the two of them will be left alone in there for five minutes. 

[AHHHHHHH IT’S THE PUNISHMENT WRITTEN BY Fire GE!]

[Two Fire is too awesome! K is so amazing to have you!]

[Holy shit holy shit!! K group is really all gongs!!]

[The closet! My God, I surrender!]

[Kaleido, you can change your name to Gayleido ba, you can even think of such a gay punishment hahaha]

[As we all know, Kaleido has no straight men.]

“Ah! My little clip! My hope has been dashed to pieces!” Lu Yuan was holding his head and squatting on the ground as he grumbled, “I even already found the specific video that I wanted you guys to imitate.”

Pei Tingsong raised his eyebrows. “Then why don’t you be the one to just do it?”

Lu Yuan suddenly stood up and adjusted his collar, before refusing, “In that case, let’s just forget about it.”

As soon as Ling Yi saw the punishment, he stamped his foot and shouted, “Ahhhhhh, Juexia, who are you going to choose!? Who?”

Fang Juexia was in a quandary when Jiang Miao suggested, “Why don’t you choose the person who passed you the candy wrapper?”

Lu Yuan immediately made a “please” gesture towards Pei Tingsong. “I agree! Please enter the closet.”

Ling Yi was already laughing hard enough to roll around on the sofa. “Hahaha, remember to come out in five minutes oh!”

“What are you guys talking about?!” Pei Tingsong didn’t know what was going on, but he could distinctly sense that his welcome night to the dorm was becoming stranger and stranger.

Not daring to wait for him to understand, Ling Yi and Lu Yuan began to push at his back, and nudged him into one of the rooms. Ling Yi shouted, “Juexia’s closet is big! Head to our room!”

“Wait, isn’t it…” Pei Tingsong was completely baffled. “I didn’t lose, so why should I also go in, I’m not going.” Saying that, he then pointed to Fang Juexia and ordered, “You’re also not allowed to go in.”

I’m the benefactor here—the one who helped you get rid of that big problem after all. 

But before Fang Juexia could say anything, He Ziyan grabbed the initiative and broke his daydream apart first. “That won’t work. Juexia drew the note that I had written, so of course, I will set the rules.” With that, he waved his finger quite dominantly and directed, “Force Lao Liu into there.”

“Aye.” Ling Yi and Lu Yuan responded in unison, then trapped Xiao Pei, who was the tallest in the group, between them, and dragged him against his will into Juexia’s room. Jiang Miao kept smiling from behind them and glanced back at Juexia. “You don’t want to go in?”

Fang Juexia was naturally reluctant to do so internally, but he had been the one to lose the game, and he had also been the one who just had to draw this particular punishment. In fact, rather than being shut up into a closet together with Pei Tingsong, he would prefer to record a clip of himself doing the hand-flower dance. 

“Can the punishment be changed?” Fang Juexia asked.

[Is Juexia embarrassed? Hahaha]

[God, if I were Juexia, I would definitely still be muddled, it was all too stimulating]

[Our beautiful baby is really miserable. He was clutched at by the neck and kissed, and he still has to suffer punishment lolololol]

Jiang Miao laughed, “That’s not my call.” After saying that, he cast a gentle look over at the staff and said, “How about you work through things a bit more here? It’ll be fine, everyone will wait for you.”

As soon as this sentence was uttered, Fang Juexia’s [not willing to trouble others] mechanism was triggered. He sighed silently and went to his room.

By now, the barrage was already covered in messages—

[AHHHHHHHHHH the ceremony is over, into the bridal chamber with you!!!]

[Congratulations to the two newlyweds!! A harmonious union lasting a hundred years!!!]

[999999999999999]

[Wtf, when I clicked in, I didn’t think it would be so wonderful x]

[Holy shit, this group’s livestream is too exciting lolololol I can actually witness people coming out of the closet with my own eyes in this lifetime hahahahaha]

[Juexia is really so coldly cute. He has no expression on his face, but he still obediently went in]

The staff carried the recording equipment into the room, opened the closet door, and forced both of the people to hand over their cellphones to them. Fang Juexia took off his slippers and of his own free will, entered the inky-dark space, but Pei Tingsong kept pretty much shouting and yelling as Ling Yi and Lu Yuan tripped him up and tossed him into the closet. 

The door slammed shut.

The staff maintained a bit of distance, so the camera could only capture the firmly closed closet door. 

Ling Yi’s voice sounded out, “The two of you shouldn’t even think about sneakily coming out ah. There’s a camera Da Ge stationed outside, and everyone watching the stream is staring at you.” Having said that, he pulled Lu Yuan away. “Let’s go, we’re just in time to take a five minute break to go eat something.”

The sound of footsteps got farther and farther away. Inside the closet, it was so dark that you couldn’t even see your own fingers if you stretched your hand out. Many short coats hung down from above, and the only posture the two people could sit in was face to face with their knees bent. There was no space to place their four long legs comfortably, so they could only be bent and placed in a cramped position. 

With the closet door closed, this dark rectangular space was cut into two distinct regions, just like two disjoint magnetic fields, by a ray of light shining in from the crack of the door.

Pei Tingsong, who had kept losing all night, had nursed a bellyful of anger throughout, and he had, through great effort, finally managed to not lose at something, but in the end, his outcome was to actually be forced to accompany the person getting punished. What kind of logic was this?

He wanted to vent his grievances, and even more wanted to directly leave the closet, but there was a camera placed right outside. 

Leaving aside the punishment, he was even locked up with the person most contrary to himself in the entire group. Needless to say, this closet must be Fang Juexia’s. The smell prevalent in here was exactly the same as that on the clothes he had on his body—a lingering cold scent. It was just like the frosty breath that blew against one’s face when one took a popsicle out from the freezer and then unwrapped it. 

Even his smell matched his person— No warmth, no emotions, just dull and indifferent.

Compared with the wolf cub, who was at the edge of turning manic, Fang Juexia was much calmer about taking the punishment. He bent his right leg and curled up against it, then rested his chin in the curve of his elbow as he tilted his head and stared quietly at the closed closet door. Five minutes was 300 seconds, and that didn’t count as too long a time. 

Ever since he was little, he was a child who loved to just sit in a daze, and the thing he did most often when in such a daze was to count the seconds as they passed. There was a very small clock hidden in his heart, a tick tick tick that could be heard clearly with every second that went by.

In Fang Juexia’s view, these so-called hardships were just emotional factors that people attached to time by themselves while at work. Within his ever-turning internal clock, time was forever objective and direct, and thus there were no emotions that could interfere with its operations.

In this way, he could separate time and emotion, and whether he was sad or happy, the speed with which time passed always remained constant. There was no fleeting moment of happiness that darted away in a flash, and there was also no suffering that seemed to last a year. His mind remained calm because of the existence of this precision, no matter what happened.

It was the same at this moment. As long as he counted the seconds away as usual, he could forget that this was some kind of punishment.

Originally, they could have gotten through the full five minutes by being quiet. However, a burst of gurgling sounds broke this equilibrium, while also halting Fang Juexia’s little internal clock.

In the dark, he raised his chin slightly and looked sideways at the other person.

“What are you looking at?” Pei Tingsong kept his voice low in fear of being recorded by the camera outside. The tone he used was fierce, but he seemed handsome for only a second before his stomach growled again. He quickly lowered his head and subconsciously covered his stomach with both of his hands.

Although Fang Juexia’s face didn’t contain much emotion, he still turned around and stopped staring at the closet door. He knew that Pei Tingsong had had pretty much nothing to eat all night, so it was inevitable that he was hungry. If something like this had happened in the past, he would definitely have pretended that he hadn’t heard anything. In any case, he was very clear on the fact that Pei Tingsong wouldn’t die of starvation in five minutes. 

But Pei Tingsong had really been dragged into this punishment because of what he had drawn; he hadn’t really lost that game, and he had even strived greatly to win.

Fang Juexia reached out and felt around in the pocket of his pajamas in the dark. Before they had started to play the games, Ling Yi had handed him an individually wrapped mochi. Once the games had started, it had become too late for him to eat it, and he had the impression that he seemed to have stuffed it into his pocket.

Sure enough, he found this unexpected ration hoard in his pocket and took it out.

“Stretch out your hand.” Fang Juexia’s voice sounded out in the darkness, light and slow, as he said, “I only have here…”

Pei Tingsong was unaware of what Fang Juexia was going to do this time around, so he grumpily interrupted, “What? You feel like you haven’t made me suffer miserably enough?”

Just when he threw out these words, he felt the other party fall into silence. This feeling was a little strange; it was as if on the other end of this darkness was a little animal who was hiding there, and as long as he browbeat him even a little, this animal would stay in his place and not dare to move.

A slight thread of guilt rapidly shot up in his heart… a very little one. 

But after a few seconds, the things that happened completely deviated from the scene that Pei Tingsong had imagined. That small animal not only dared to move, it even made a very not-so-small movement. Under this heavy curtain of darkness, he couldn’t see what Fang Juexia was doing, but the sudden sensation of hands fumbling around his body caught him off guard.

Fang Juexia knew that it was useless to say anything more, so he directly reached out and wanted to give him the small snack in his hand. However, he couldn’t see anything; the tiny bit of light coming from the crevice of the closet door might be somewhat useful to Pei Tingsong, but it was totally useless to him. Fang Juexia half-knelt on the floor of the closet and leaned forward. He stretched his hand out and groped around like a blind man. This kind of recklessness was a very rare occasion for him who had always been restrained and careful.

His fingertips came into contact with the cotton coat, and after the clothes, he touched bone. Based on what his fingertips were touching, he came up with a picture of the scene in his mind. 

“What are you doing?”

Clear and distinct lines of his bones, and then to the right, was the collar of the shirt, and he even accidentally managed to rub against the exposed skin at the edge of the collar. This was probably the shoulder, Fang Juexia thought. His hand headed down, his target being reaching the other party’s hand. But along the way, his slender fingertips glided past too many places, such as Pei Tingsong’s chest, the words “melt for u” on his chest, his tight waist and abdomen, and then further down.

“Hey.”

Pei Tingsong’s voice was so deep that it fell straight into Fang Juexia’s heart, just as he grabbed Fang Juexia’s hand to stop him from recklessly groping about anymore. 

In the next moment, Pei Tingsong used some strength to pull Fang Juexia, who was already leaning towards him, closer to him.

Time was really not objective. At this moment, the speed with which it passed by had slowed down infinitely, so that when Fang Juexia’s body crossed the weak line of light coming in through the seam of the door, Pei Tingsong could clearly see the pink birthmark at the corner of his eye. It flashed in the dark, crossed the boundary of light, and then disappeared into the darkness again.

Fang Juexia wasn’t kneeling quite so stably, and as soon as he was pulled, he was forced into a position right in front of Pei Tingsong. The two of them almost ran into each other. Fang Juexia didn’t know exactly how close they were, he only knew that he could feel the other person’s warm breath directly now. 

At this moment, that infallible tiny clock hidden within his heart suddenly malfunctioned. 

—

The author has something to say:

Kaleido settings:

(top to bottom by age)

Jiang Miao: 23 years old, 177cm, group leader, secondary lead singer, hidden skill: guzheng

He Ziyan: 22 years old, 186cm, rapper, hidden skill: composer DJ

Lu Yuan: 22 years old, 178cm, main dancer, hidden skill: choreographer

Fang Juexia: 22 years old, 180cm, official face of the group with ace/center position, hidden skill: Mathematics

Ling Yi: 20 years old, 173cm, lead singer, high pitched voice, hidden skill: being funny

Pei Tingsong: 19 years old, 188cm, popular face of the group with ace/center position, hidden skill: lyric composition

Fans: Question! K’s heights are so different! Won’t the arrangement on stage be very ugly?

Jiang Miao: The stylists have considered this point. For example, the height of our shoes worn during performances is different, and the formation and standing positions will also be adjusted. The overall situation looks pretty harmonious. 

He Ziyan: It already counts as good for a small broken company to be able to gather enough people to make a debut, don’t nitpick.

Lu Yuan: It’s harmful ah. I’m 1.8m when wearing shoes, not short, not short. 

Pei Tingsong: Hehe. 

Juexia: Well…. (microphone snatched)

Ling Yi: Ah, I have worn cushioned insoles for two years now, so why do you have to expose my real height!!! I hate it!!!

ZC：﹁_ ﹁