Chapter 10 The Forgotten Starlight

——She forgot his name, but always remembered that the ring on the ring finger of her left hand must not be taken off.

After returning to China, Ruan Xingchen grew up like all ordinary girls. She went to elementary school, middle school, and finally was admitted to the Medical School of Peking University and Tsinghua University.

Time has carved a regular pattern of growth into her body, sculpting her striking features. The only thing she has left is the silver ring on her left ring finger, which has always remained in its original position. Even when her fingers grew thicker and the ring got stuck on her knuckle and could not be removed, she never considered forcing it off.

She likes to plant sunflowers in the yard. Every summer, the golden sea of ​​flowers attracts children from the neighborhood to come and play.

She always sat on a bamboo chair beside the flower field, stroking the ring with her fingertips habitually, watching the sunlight spread over the ring surface, and in a trance she seemed to touch a distant warmth.

"Xingchen, who gave you this ring?" a friend once asked curiously.

She looked down at the ring, lost in thought for a moment: "A...very important person."

But she couldn't remember who it was—

When he was 12 years old, Ruan Xingchen was in a car accident.

It was a rainy night. The taxi she was riding in skidded on a bridge across the river, crashed through the guardrail, and tumbled into the river. As the icy water poured into the car, she vaguely saw the silver ring on her left ring finger gleaming faintly in the darkness.

"Xiaohan...Brother..."

She murmured the name unconsciously, and then fell into darkness.

When she woke up in the hospital, her memory was like a torn puzzle. She remembered her mother, the medical team, the scorching sun and rainy seasons of Southeast Asia, but she had forgotten the boy she had called "Brother Xiaohan" in the slums.

"What is this?" She asked blankly, looking at the silver ring on her left ring finger.

Doctor Ruan held her hand with red eyes and said, "This is a gift from a very important person."

"Where is he?"

"Mom doesn't know either."

After being discharged from the hospital, Ruan Xingchen began to have the same dream over and over again.

Humid Southeast Asian nights, sunflowers, candy wrapper boats, and a pair of eyes… as dark as the night.

She always woke up with tears streaming down her face.

"Eternal Day..." She whispered the word, feeling an inexplicable pain in her heart.

During her college years, Ruan Xingchen had grown to be even more eye-catching. Her skin was as white and smooth as fine mutton-fat porcelain, with a faint pink tint. Her eyebrows and eyes seemed to have been carefully outlined by a painter, and her eyelashes were as long as butterfly wings. When she smiled, her eyes were filled with stars, and when she was quiet, she had a fragile and cold feeling.

There have always been many boys pursuing Ruan Xingchen, but she always politely refuses them.

"Why do you keep wearing this old ring?" my roommate and best friend Lin Miaomiao once asked curiously, "Could it be a token of our love?"

Ruan Xingchen lowered his head and turned the ring, saying softly, "I'm waiting for someone."

"who?"

"…I have no idea."

She only knew that every time someone tried to hold her hand, the ring would get hot like a branding iron, reminding her that she couldn't take it off, couldn't forget, because someone was waiting for her.

When Ruan Xingchen was twenty years old, he was already used to being asked the same question:

"Who gave you your ring?"

The suitor's eyes always fall on the silver ring on her left hand first. The ring body is a little worn, but the words "Eternal Daylight" are still clear.

"A very important person," she always answered, and then politely declined the flowers or gifts offered.

"Xingchen, it's time for you to fall in love." Lin Miaomiao sighed for the hundredth time, "You can't wear this old ring forever, right?"

Ruan Xingchen looked down at the coffee cup. In the steam, the scratch on the ring looked like a wound that could not be healed.

“…Wait a little longer.”

Medical school was a heavy workload, and Ruan Xingchen spent almost all her time in the lab. Late one night, while she was sorting specimens in the anatomy room, the smell of formalin suddenly triggered a vague memory:

In a trance, she heard the chirping of cicadas in the rainforest and a young man's hoarse voice, "Wait for me."

She suddenly held on to the dissecting table, her temples throbbing.

"Headache again?" A classmate handed over the painkillers. "Are you still experiencing these flashbacks from the accident?"

Ruan Xingchen shook his head, but his eyes unconsciously fell on the corner of the anatomical diagram he drew - there was always a small sunflower there, sketched casually as if by muscle memory.

No one knows why she painted this, not even herself.

She didn't even know—

"Eternal Daylight" has long been engraved on another ring with "Starlight" on it, becoming an obsession that transcends life and death.

And fate is about to throw this pair of forgotten and awaited souls back into each other's world in the cruelest way.