Chapter 20: Wishing that I would never receive a call from Chen Wanxi...

Yu Xue turned on her phone and checked the last cutoff time for the missed calls. It was around 8 PM, so it seemed that Chen Wanxi hadn't called again after she turned off her phone yesterday.

She couldn't imagine how Yu Xue would have handled these things before. Perhaps because she was a time traveler, she had no feelings for Chen Wanxi at all. Seeing her persistence, she wasn't moved at all, only annoyed.

She could never have imagined such a family when she was in the other world.

She caught a glimpse of a stick being extended towards her out of the corner of her eye, instinctively dodged it, and turned her head to see Lin Yinyin holding four hiking poles. "What's this for? Want some?"

Yu Xue quickly took it, "Didn't you say it was a small hill? Why do we need to buy hiking poles?"

Lin Yinyin said, "No, I like to carry something in my hand when I'm hiking."

Nanpan: "Could you hold my bag for me?"

Lin Yinyin nudged his stomach with her elbow to shut him up.

The back mountain area is quite well-developed and can be considered a scenic spot. However, there were stalls on the mountain that Yu Xue climbed when she was a child, but not here. It seems that this mountain and the private hot spring over there are probably connected, and outsiders cannot enter.

This hillside wasn't exactly steep, but climbing one step after another made Yu Xue's lungs feel like they were about to burst.

"It's only been half an hour." Lin Yinyin showed her her watch. "But if you're tired, take a rest."

Upon hearing that she could rest for a while, Yu Xue immediately sat down on the steps at her feet. She didn't care if her clothes were dirty or not; she really needed to rest.

Actually, she was already feeling a bit exhausted after climbing for about ten minutes.

Wen Feng handed her a bottle of water.

Lin Yinyin turned her head and saw Nan Pan also leaning on the railing, panting heavily, saying, "I can't take it anymore, I'm exhausted."

Lin Yinyin was also panting, but not as dramatically as him. She took a sip of water, calmly and sincerely asked, "Are you feeling weak?"

Nanpan immediately straightened up, panting as she said, "Bullshit."

Lin Yinyin said, "You're out of breath after only half an hour. You're quite weak."

Nan Pan: "Damn, you kept urging me to walk faster from behind, who wouldn't be out of breath?"

Yu Xue suddenly burst out laughing.

When the two people looked over, Yu Xue immediately fell silent, realizing it was inappropriate.

However, she wasn't mocking Nan Pan. Rather, she noticed that after Lin Yinyin asked, "Are you weak?", Wen Feng, who was standing next to her, immediately stopped panting, closed his slightly open mouth, and breathed very calmly.

She recalled the scene from earlier, glanced at Wen Feng, and then lowered her head and chuckled.

Nan Pan: "..." Is it that funny?

Perhaps to prove herself, Nan Pan walked at the very front of the group, panting and calling back, "Hurry up, hurry up!"

Wen Feng followed Yu Xue at a leisurely pace. He felt that Yu Xue was particularly frightening. Several times he almost missed a step, and sometimes when he looked up, he felt like he was going to fall down the steps.

He now moves with the "fruit" like a bowl in a fruit-catching game, seizing the right moment to catch the fruit into the bowl.

Yu Xue would glance back every now and then to see if he was still there.

Lin Yinyin was right; the pavilion was very close, and the group quickly found it. There was also a small noodle shop next to it.

Lin Yinyin wanted to eat grilled sausage, while Yu Xue was so tired that she was panting and couldn't eat anything.

While paying, Lin Yinyin asked, "Boss, are you affiliated with that hot spring over there?"

The boss said, "Yes, we're from the same company."

Lin Yinyin asked again, "Why are you selling grilled sausages here? Do people actually come to climb this mountain?"

"Yes," the shopkeeper said. "Go a little further up, and after about an hour of climbing, there's a small temple with a wishing tree next to it. Lots of people go there to make wishes."

Lin Yinyin: "Does it work?"

The boss chuckled, not giving a direct answer: "That depends on how you look at it; I can't really say."

Lin Yinyin took the sausage and water, said "thank you," and then came out to tell the other three people about it.

"Are you going?" Nanpan asked.

"I'm fine with anything," Yu Xue said first.

Wen Feng said, "I'm fine with either."

Lin Yinyin: "Let's go then. We're already here, so why not go? Wait a minute, let me finish eating."

For the second half of the journey, Wen Feng practically had to pull Yu Xue along as they climbed. Yu Xue was a little embarrassed at first, but then she just couldn't keep up. She had no strength left, and it was as if Wen Feng was dragging her for one step while she took one step, her legs seemed to be fighting each other.

She's definitely not cut out for mountain climbing.

Fortunately, it really was just a small hill, and we soon reached the wishing tree. The temple was right next to it, but it wasn't open.

Red ribbons and calligraphy brushes for making wishes were laid out on a table at the temple entrance. Lin Yinyin jogged over and asked, "Do you wish to make a wish?"

Yu Xue wasn't very superstitious about this, especially since these kinds of scenic temples didn't even have a single monk; they didn't seem very effective.

Moreover, she didn't dare to write down her wishes in front of so many people.

My phone rang.

Yu Xue took it out, glanced at it, hung up, and put it back.

“Then I’ll go first.” Nan Pan was the first to step forward. “Let me think, can I make three promises?”

“Sure, you can make a stack of them and let Buddha choose.” Lin Yinyin glared at him.

"That little bit of paper might not be enough," Nan Pan said quipped.

After a moment's thought, he wrote: "May Lin Yinyin and Nanpan have a long and lasting relationship, and grow old together."

"Oh my—" Lin Yinyin teased loudly, "Forever and ever—growing old together—are you really that devoted?"

“Why am I not that sentimental?” Nan Pan poked her shoulder. “You just wait and see.”

"Okay, I'll wait for you my whole life." Lin Yinyin nudged his arm, took the pen from his hand, and wrote: May Nanpan's wish come true.

"Hahaha, are you sick in the head..." Nan Pan nudged her arm and retorted.

The two of them pushed and shoved each other as they went over to hang the cloth strip.

"Are you going to write it?" Wen Feng asked.

Yu Xue shook her head, "I won't write it."

She assumed Wen Feng wouldn't be able to write either.

But Wen Feng said, "I want to write."

"What do you want to write?" Yu Xue asked. "Can you tell me?"

Wen Feng: "I hope we can stay healthy and get rid of all illnesses."

“Hey, you can write this.” Yu Xue followed him to watch him write the note.

Wen Feng's handwriting wasn't exactly beautiful, but it was alright. Yu Xue felt that he held the pen correctly, and his writing was smooth and had a distinctive brushstroke.

It's obvious that he's the kind of person who's studied but hasn't really mastered anything.

The three of them hung up the banner. Yu Xue really didn't have any wishes, and she didn't know what to write, so she didn't write anything.

As the three were preparing to descend the mountain, Yu Xue's phone rang again.

Like a death knell, it kept ringing, seemingly never stopping until the last moment of the battery's depletion.

Her heart pounded as she listened, and the wind whipped her hair into a mess, just like the tangled strings in her mind.

“I’ll write one too,” she suddenly said, turning around.

The phone was still ringing, still in my pocket.

Wen Feng followed her and watched as she deftly grabbed a strip of cloth, slammed it onto the table with considerable force, picked up a pen, and wrote: "I hope I will never receive another call from Chen Wanxi."

After she finished writing, she left her phone on the table and took the cloth strip to hang it up.