Chapter 1

—• VOLUME 1: Morning Wind Soaring •—

Jiangbei, Bei Cheng Tian Street:

This was the area with the highest concentration of gay men in the entire Mountain City. Starbucks, Häagen-Dazs, Ali & Aide Western Restaurant, Bullfighter, Starlight 68—all kinds of eateries and shopping malls blasted cold air, just like Beijing’s Wangfujing or Guangzhou’s China Plaza.

From the time work ended, flamboyant gay men would pass through here—some meeting online friends, others on dates to watch movies. There were tall ones, short ones, chubby bears, and twink bottoms. Some wore yellow or green tapered pants with little leather shoes and carried LV bags, while others had fair, rosy skin, wore circle lenses, and sported eyeshadow like enchantingly wicked creatures. Occasionally, a muscular hunk in a tank top would walk by, his toned arms drawing blatant stares and whispered comments from the passing gay boys.

After much deliberation, Lin Ze finally sent a text to the guy he’d hooked up with the day before. If the other party wasn’t taking the initiative, he’d do it himself.

Lin Ze asked if he wanted to come to Bei Cheng Tian Street for dinner with Zheng Jie. No reply.

Standing in the plaza, he watched the flamboyant passersby. This year, the trendy look was the “crisp cut”—everyone seemed to love shaving the sides of their head down to a stubble, leaving the top short and spiked like a rooster’s comb. He stopped outside Bei Cheng Tian Street and sent Zheng Jie a text.

Inside Häagen-Dazs, a young bottom glanced at him while distractedly tapping on his phone.

Zheng Jie looked like he’d just been fished out of water when he found Lin Ze. “Are they gone yet?” he asked.

Lin Ze said, “No, they were still waiting when I left. Want me to give you the money now?”

Zheng Jie replied, “Lend me a thousand. I’ve got another thousand on me—I’ll pay the interest first. Next month, I’ll help you pay your credit card bill.”

Once Zheng Jie arrived, the eyes of the young gays in Häagen-Dazs practically glued themselves to him. Through the glass wall, they chatted and laughed, even waving at Lin Ze and Zheng Jie.

Lin Ze was already annoyed by the heat. He’d slept all day at home, and now that he was outside, he was sweating. He took Zheng Jie to an ATM and withdrew a thousand for him.

Zheng Jie made a call in a secluded corner of the plaza, signaling for Lin Ze to hide first.

Lin Ze went into Starbucks, ordered an iced water, and sat down to watch.

Under the scorching heat, Zheng Jie’s features seemed slightly distorted. After waiting a full ten minutes, a few gangsters showed up. Zheng Jie, taller than all of them, stood there counting out money while talking nonstop—probably telling them not to bother Lin Ze.

Lin Ze couldn’t help but feel sorry for Zheng Jie. Zheng Jie’s mother had been a gambling addict since their childhood—lottery tickets, double-color balls, mahjong, anything that could be gambled on, she’d throw herself into it. She racked up endless gambling debts and still kept coming to Zheng Jie for money.

Zheng Jie’s father had gone south for business, while his aunt still lived in Mountain City, locked in a bitter feud with his mother—they’d kill each other if they met. With a gambling addict for a mother, Zheng Jie’s childhood was spent dealing with debt collectors, arguments, and hunger. The household money went to gambling, Zheng Jie’s alimony went to gambling—it was an endless cycle of debt.

Zheng Jie was tall and well-built with a good personality, yet he could never find a girlfriend. Similarly, Lin Ze, who considered himself quite a catch in the gay community, was perpetually single. The two had always been brothers in hardship. Zheng Jie knew about Lin Ze’s sexual orientation and never judged him. After all, in life, having a friend like this was rare.

Even after entering society, Zheng Jie still gave his mother small sums of money every month. Once, Lin Ze asked Zheng Jie how much his mother actually owed. The answer?

1.4 million.

Lin Ze felt like he’d never earn that much in his lifetime. Besides, Zheng Jie couldn’t even afford a house. His aunt had some money, but that had nothing to do with their family.

After sending the debt collectors away, Zheng Jie walked into Starbucks and let out a sigh.

The two looked at each other, speechless.

“Let’s eat,” Lin Ze said. “I’m starving—didn’t have lunch.”

“Skewers,” Zheng Jie replied.

Meat and vegetable skewers, three yuan each. Mountain City was a highly inclusive place. The owner cursed back and forth with customers while serving food. Despite the 40-degree daytime heat, by evening, hot pot stalls filled the streets. Shirtless men bragged endlessly to their girlfriends, sweating profusely as they ate spicy hot pot in the sweltering heat.

Drinking beer in the old city district felt like a completely different world compared to the glittering Starlight 68 and Hilton Hotel next door.

“My aunt set me up on another blind date today,” Zheng Jie muttered.

Lin Ze tore off the edges of the lettuce leaves skewered on bamboo sticks and tossed a whole head of lettuce into the spicy pot. “Mhm,” he grunted. The two sat on small stools, picking through the forest of skewers stuck in the hot pot.

“This time, don’t tell your date about your mom,” Lin Ze warned. “Every time you spill the beans, it ends in a breakup.”

Zheng Jie managed a rare smile. “We’ll work hard together. Laozi refuses to believe there aren’t any good women willing to start from scratch with me.”

“Who’d want to struggle with you? No car, no house, a bleak future—at best, you’ll be a small-time supervisor. It’s not like there’s some bright future ahead. Even if you get married, you’d still be renting,” Lin Ze scoffed.

“You’re not much better off,” Zheng Jie retorted.

“Yeah, but I’m not getting married,” Lin Ze countered.

After graduating college, Lin Ze came out of the closet and cut ties with his family. His father beat him half to death, so he left their hometown in a small Sichuan county with Zheng Jie and moved to Chongqing to make a living, never contacting his family again.

His father acted like he never had a son. Of course, compared to Zheng Jie’s aunt, who kept setting him up on blind dates, Lin Ze preferred his freedom.

Lin Ze worked as a junior reporter at a newspaper, earning 5,200 yuan a month including bonuses, with some transportation subsidies. His year-end bonus was around 10,000 to 20,000 yuan. His life wasn’t as tight as Zheng Jie’s—he could even afford to bring his laptop to Starbucks and play the bourgeois intellectual occasionally.

But Lin Ze was frustrated too. He was frustrated about being gay and not being able to find a partner.

“We need to move,” Zheng Jie said.

Lin Ze thought about it. The gangsters had somehow found their place. If they came once, they’d definitely come again. They’d have to prepare three months’ rent as a deposit and move.

Zheng Jie didn’t say anything about dragging Lin Ze into this. He just drank until his eyes turned red, pouring Lin Ze glass after glass.

Lin Ze thought to himself, This solution is just treating the symptoms, not the root cause. But since ancient times, it’s been natural for sons to pay their fathers’ debts. If Zheng Jie didn’t pay those gangsters, they’d keep harassing them.

He thought of Yu Hua’s To Live. From another perspective, if a son was useless and racked up a pile of debt, the parents would have no choice but to sell their house and land to pay it off.

Zheng Jie really had it rough. But the thought of moving made Lin Ze irritable.

Zheng Jie’s face was flushed from drinking as he slung an arm around Lin Ze. The two staggered home together.

“Brother,” Zheng Jie mumbled, “tell me, what’s wrong with me? Huh? What’s so bad about me?”

Lin Ze was also a bit drunk, swaying as he walked. “You’ve got no car, no house! If you marry a wife, you expect her to live in a rental with you?”

“I’m a good guy! All she needs to do is stick with me! We’ll get a house!” Zheng Jie insisted.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Lin Ze replied. “Then tell me, what’s wrong with me? I’m a good guy too—why can’t I find anyone?”

Zheng Jie stopped walking and poked Lin Ze’s head. “You’re too empty inside, man.”

Zheng Jie vomited as they walked. Dizzy and bleary-eyed, Lin Ze hauled him into the elevator and carried him home. He turned off the lights and went to his room to sleep.

Tossing and turning in the dark, Lin Ze found the air conditioning too cold—empty, lonely, freezing. After a while, he got up, turned on his computer, and watched some gay porn. He jerked off, tossed the tissues into the trash, and fell asleep exhausted but satisfied.

The next day, the two got up one after the other to go to work. Lin Ze’s company required taking the light rail and then transferring to a bus, a commute that took nearly an hour. On the train, everyone was glued to their phones—scrolling through Weibo, texting, reading news online.

Lin Ze flipped through a newspaper on the train but found no interesting news. This week’s feature was probably still about the rising Yangtze River. Figuring out how to connect it to lifestyle and entertainment topics was tough. No celebrities were coming to Chongqing for concerts either… He pulled out his phone and, after some thought, sent another text to the guy he’d hooked up with yesterday:

[Had lunch yet?]

Still no reply. Lin Ze switched to a QQ group where he connected with reporters from Taiwan and Hong Kong, asking about Apple Daily’s headline today—Cecilia Cheung and Nicholas Tse were divorcing. That could work… Jacky Cheung was holding a concert in Wanzhou. Poor “God of Songs,” still performing at his age to support his family, and in a suburban county no less.

After gathering some information and checking portal sites (NetEase was still full of elitists), Lin Ze opened another group chat. It was the usual crowd of flamboyant gays calling each other “hubby” and “wifey,” posting hardcore nude pics of men, and complaining about having to work on Monday.

A QQ friend request popped up—username: “Fitness Coach.”

Still half-asleep, Lin Ze thought it might be someone he knew. He accepted and asked:

[Who’s this?]

Fitness Coach: [176 cm, 68 kg, top. You?]

Lin Ze expressionlessly dragged the contact into his block list. He got off the light rail and squeezed onto a bus to work.

At the start of the month, the company got a new director. New brooms sweep clean—he began reorganizing, lecturing, and holding meetings. From now on, no more coming in late or leaving early. Reporters had to return to the office by 6 PM to clock out after interviews.

Half the staff felt like quitting. Lin Ze could practically hear the collective wails of despair around him.

“Lin Ze,” the director called.

Lin Ze put away his phone and looked up. The director said, “You’ll be joining Huang Zhen’s team. From now on, no more field reporting. Focus on assisting her with the image database.”

Lin Ze: “…”

This news hit like a bolt from the blue. Lin Ze turned to look—his colleague Huang Zhen smiled at him.

“Why?” Lin Ze knew asking directly in this setting was taboo, but he couldn’t help it. “I’ve been in the entertainment channel for two years. The features I worked on just launched. I’d like to stay in entertainment.”

The director replied, “The website has its considerations. With your skills, you’ll do well in any channel. If you have concerns, come to my office after the meeting.”

Lin Ze was stunned. What the hell? He’d known the director was changing—the previous one was fired by headquarters for inflating website traffic. Now a new director had been sent down, and without understanding anything, he was shuffling people around?

Being transferred to another channel was one thing, but to Huang Zhen’s team?!

A year ago, Huang Zhen had just joined as Lin Ze’s intern. Lin Ze taught her everything, mentoring her step by step. Huang Zhen lazed around, unwilling to go out for interviews. Eventually, the previous director assigned her to the image database, barely managing her probation period.

And now Lin Ze was being sent to work under his former intern! The world had truly gone mad. He’d worked himself to the bone, rain or shine, interviewing daily. The entertainment channel’s traffic was the highest on the entire site, growing faster than real estate. At this rate, Lin Ze could’ve become the channel editor within a year.

Right as his career was taking off, he’d been blindsided by this absurd move.

The director introduced another new hire, a guy named Xiao Kang—a fresh graduate from a prestigious university, assigned to the entertainment channel to replace Lin Ze.

“Lin Ze, after the meeting, hand over your interview resources to Xiao Kang,” the director instructed.

Lin Ze finally understood—they were pushing him out. Two years’ worth of interview contacts, experts’ business cards, cinema and theater managers, celebrity agents’ phone numbers—all his hard-earned resources—were now to be handed to a newcomer. It was a blatant screw-over.

He nodded, stood up, and slammed the door on his way out.

This was a terrible move. Slamming the door in the director’s face was a first in the website’s history. Lin Ze knew his colleagues would be buzzing after he left—some gloating, some sighing, some watching the drama unfold, some sympathetic.

“Don’t be impulsive, Lin Ze,” a colleague from the entertainment channel chased after him.

“Don’t talk to me right now. Seriously.”

Silently, he packed his things and sat at a desk in another channel’s office. The image database team had only three people: editor Huang Zhen, a newly regularized employee, and now Lin Ze.

Huang Zhen and the newbie were still in the meeting. As Lin Ze sat down and turned on his computer, he felt like he was about to explode. A hand placed a cup of coffee beside him—the deputy director.

“You need to apologize,” the deputy urged.

“Apologize my ass!” Lin Ze snapped. “He shoves me onto the bench as soon as he arrives! Why not just rob me outright? Laozi would rather quit and take all my resources than leave them for that bastard!”

The deputy, a man in his thirties, smiled. “That wasn’t a good move. The new guy just started last week, and you made a scene at the first meeting. Do you know what he said?”

Lin Ze didn’t need to ask. The new director had probably played the magnanimous card—”It’s fine, it’s fine”—to show off his broad-mindedness while secretly seething and plotting revenge.

“I don’t care what he thinks.”

He took a sip of coffee, opened a Word document, and typed two words: Resignation Letter.

The deputy’s smile vanished.

“Lin Ze, think this through. Don’t act on impulse.”

“I know,” Lin Ze muttered, typing rapidly. “Go do your work. Don’t worry about me.”

The deputy had a decent relationship with Lin Ze. “Why do this? If you’re leaving, at least wait for a better time.”

“Wait until he fires me and gives me that pathetic severance?” Lin Ze scoffed. “I’m not that desperate.”

“Just wait. Don’t be rash. You—”

“I’ll think it over carefully.”

Someone called for the deputy outside, forcing him to leave. Alone in the office, Lin Ze kept typing. Halfway through the resignation letter, he finally calmed down. Minimizing the document, he sipped his coffee and weighed the pros and cons.

Previously, his monthly salary plus bonuses had been over 5,000 yuan. Since he joined the entertainment channel, its traffic had steadily risen, and his features were well-received. By year’s end, 6,000 yuan a month wouldn’t have been a stretch, plus a year-end bonus of at least 20,000.

Now, stuck in the website’s least popular channel, his bonuses would plummet. With just the base salary, he’d be lucky to get 2,800—maybe over 3,000 on a good month. Huang Zhen’s strategy was to flood the image database with suggestive, swimsuit-clad clickbait, turning it into softcore porn for traffic bonuses.

As a journalist, Lin Ze knew this year’s average monthly income in the city center was 3,360 yuan. He’d instantly become a drag on Mountain City’s hardworking masses. He laughed bitterly—2,800 a month, with 800 for rent, over 100 for utilities, 300 for transport (no more subsidies now that he wasn’t a reporter).

Food, socializing, lending money to that deadbeat Zheng Jie… After all that, there’d be nothing left.

The worst part? A clueless newbie was taking over the interview resources he’d painstakingly built over two years. The new director was practically a bandit!

His former intern-turned-boss Huang Zhen returned, sitting across from him with a sharp, pale face.

Lin Ze nodded at her. Though resentful, there was no point taking it out on her. This was just business—she hadn’t done anything wrong.

He reopened the document and kept typing his resignation. It wasn’t about pride—he genuinely couldn’t see a way forward.

Huang Zhen leaned forward. “Xiao Lin, I was hoping we could work together to make this channel shine, not fall behind the others. I didn’t realize you were so against the image database.”

Lin Ze noted the shift from “Ze-ge” to “Xiao Lin.” He replied, “It’s not about the channel. It’s me—I’m not used to desk work after being a reporter.” He kept typing.

“You’re too impulsive. I’ve got so many ideas, but no one to help execute them.”

Lin Ze grunted. Huang Zhen’s “ideas” were what he feared most—wild, impractical notions that only created more work.

Huang Zhen added, “But I’m not sure why Director Wang assigned you to assist me.”

Lin Ze stopped typing. He sensed Huang Zhen knew something. This whole thing was fishy—no sane boss would make such a blatant power move unless they didn’t care about morale.

Even the deputy director—when the previous director left, Lin Ze had thought he’d be promoted. Instead, headquarters sent someone new. He’d felt sorry for the deputy then, but now the axe had fallen on him.

No, he had to get to the bottom of this, or he’d never sleep tonight.

He decided to ask later—why was he being transferred?

Logging into QQ, he wanted to consult some friends.

A notification flashed in the corner—the “Fitness Coach” again. Lin Ze opened it, saw the repeat friend request, and accepted.

The guy sent a photo—one Lin Ze had posted on a gay forum back in college. Young, bright-eyed, with sharp brows and a straight nose, wearing a white T-shirt, cropped pants, and flip-flops, leaning on Chaotianmen’s railing to watch the river.

[Is this you? How old are you?] Fitness Coach asked.

Lin Ze replied: [I don’t do one-night stands.]

Another message popped up. Fitness Coach: [You misunderstood. I’m serious—looking for someone to settle down with.]

Serious? Fine, friends first.

Lin Ze had no energy for deep conversations about life right now. His own life was a mess. He typed: [Sorry, my mistake. You led with stats, so I thought it was a hookup.]

Fitness Coach: [No worries, bro. What should I call you? How old?]

Lin Ze: [Call me A’Ze. Got work stuff to handle—chat later.]

Fitness Coach: [Sure, I’ve got clients too.]

Zheng Jie’s QQ icon flashed. Lin Ze clicked it:

[Brother, Laozi’s quitting. Can’t take it anymore.]

Lin Ze: [Same. Let’s quit together.]

Zheng Jie: [Not joking. Going to pick up goods.]

Another icon flashed—Lin Ze’s younger brother, Yang Yu.

Yang Yu: [Brother, send money.]

Lin Ze wanted to scream.

Lin Ze: [Yang Yu! Give me a break! I just sent you 1,000 last month! Spent it already?]

Yang Yu: [Bought an iPhone.]

Lin Ze nearly spat blood. Yang Yu added: [Got a phone plan too.]

Lin Ze: [500. That’s it.]

Yang Yu: [The plan’s 300 a month. Broke this month—can you send 600? I’ll spend less next month.]

Lin Ze realized Yang Yu had probably bought one for his girlfriend too. This leech of a brother was worse than the gangsters harassing Zheng Jie. But his parents had raised him for 18 years before disowning him after learning he was gay. Sending some money to help his brother was the least he could do.

Besides, Yang Yu having a girlfriend was good—at least he could carry on the family line, sparing Lin Ze the pressure.

Lin Ze: [Don’t skimp on food. Here’s 600. That’s all—your brother’s about to sell blood.]

Yang Yu: [Thanks.]