meet
St. Anton, Austria.
The light tapping on the windowpane became more frequent.
Yagyu Kazuna picked up his coffee and took a sip. Through the rising steam, he gazed hazily at the snowflakes outside the window, a mixture of silver and shadow.
The snow fell even heavier.
She took a deep breath and glanced at her watch—6:25 PM, just in time for dinner.
Eating is the most important thing.
She picked up her fork again, poked around in the plate in front of her, and began to focus on devouring the sausages and cheese that had grown somewhat cold and hard.
Most people in the restaurant didn't have such an appetite.
At 18:35, it was the 9th hour since the Austrian government issued a red alert for an emergency blizzard, and also the 9th hour they had been trapped in this hotel at the ski resort.
The cable car was out of service, and communications were down. The last call for help from the hotel that morning was answered with the message: the whole of Austria is currently being hit by a blizzard, and the municipal authorities are overwhelmed, but they will arrange rescue efforts as soon as possible.
We can only wait.
Fortunately, this small hotel located halfway up the mountain has relatively ample supplies due to its inconvenient transportation, and its independent power supply is also functioning properly. If used sparingly, there shouldn't be any supply problems within three days.
But the unknown always brings anxiety.
The not-so-spacious restaurant was already full, with a few people sitting or standing—besides the original guests, there were also many skiers who were stuck here and unable to go down the mountain—the air was unusually quiet because of worry, and the cheerful Christmas carols sounded jarring, let alone a meal.
Tezuka sat in the corner. When he looked up at the window, he naturally noticed the person dining alone by the window opposite.
While the other tourists comforted each other, she stood out as a lone traveler. The other person was focused on their plate, appearing remarkably calm. The other person also had an Asian face, just like hers, and Tezuka couldn't help but glance at them a few more times, even noticing the pickled herring that had been tossed aside on the other person's plate.
"Salted herring doesn't taste very good."
Recalling the pickled herring he had just tasted, his phoenix eyes behind his glasses narrowed slightly. He then picked up the hot coffee on the table, took a sip, and suppressed the taste in his memory.
He was brought here by his coach, Kerber, to relax. Kerber felt that he had been a bit impatient lately, so his training needed to be paused for a few days.
The word "impatience" has appeared only a handful of times in Tezuka's life over the past 20 years, but his stagnant training data shows that he was indeed affected by his first attempt to win the Australian Open. To adjust his form, he took his coach's advice and came to an Austrian ski resort during peak season to relax.
Contrary to his wishes, he is now trapped here.
Tezuka wasn't particularly worried about the current situation. He looked down, stroking his coffee cup, his thoughts drifting back to the training plan. A moment later, his glasses fogged up from the steam. He looked up and moved away from the cup, and as the fog cleared, the figure sitting by the window came into view again.
She had put down her fork and was resting her chin on her hand, gazing out the window at the blizzard. Her fair profile was partially obscured by her long, flowing hair, but Tezuka could still sense her ease in that posture, as if they weren't trapped here, but rather enjoying an ordinary snowy night.
Perhaps influenced by her, he relaxed his back and leaned back in the high chair, no longer thinking about training. Instead, he followed her gaze to the gray-blue night outside the window, and for once, he emptied his mind and spaced out.
The second hand of the wall clock ticked away, one tick at a time.
Suddenly, a cry of surprise came from not far away—
"Oh my god! What's wrong, honey!"
Someone has fainted! Is there a doctor?
This couldn't be worse! A commotion broke out around them, with multiple languages mingling as they relayed the bad news.
Tezuka immediately put down his coffee, got up, and quickly walked in that direction—he knew some first aid and might be able to help.
At the same time, He Zou nimbly moved through the gathered crowd, her gaze quickly sweeping across the ground, allowing her to clearly see the patient's appearance.
On the ground, a man in his forties lay slumped in his wife's arms. His body was twitching slightly and intermittently, his face was pale, covered in cold sweat, his eyes rolled upwards, revealing a large amount of white, and white foam was oozing from the corners of his lips, which were purplish in color.
He Zou's mind raced, speculating about the symptoms: typical tonic-clonic contractions, could it be epilepsy?
The patient's wife gripped his hand tightly, trembling with fear and incoherent: "Oliver, wake up! Good heavens, he has diabetes, but he took his medication today..."
diabetes.
This word gave He Zou a direction for judgment. She quickly knelt down beside the patient and said to the flustered lady, "Madam, I am a medical student. Please let me take a look." As she spoke, she touched the patient's carotid artery with two fingers.
Hearing that the other party was still a student, the lady looked at her with some hesitation. There was still no doctor coming over. Even if she was a medical student, she would know more about medicine than ordinary people without professional knowledge. Entrusting her husband to her was the best choice.
Moreover, the other person spoke very fluent German, so they must be an international student. Based on her trust in the rigor of German medical studies, she assumed that the other person was at least an excellent student with solid professional knowledge.
She held her husband's hand tightly, her mind racing with all sorts of thoughts, trying to convince herself to settle down.
"Please let go of his hand, let me do it." Without giving her any more time to hesitate, He Zou spoke to the lady in a gentle, unquestionable tone, loosening the patient's tie and gently turning his head to one side. "Is there a cushion or pillow to put under his head?"
"A cushion... a pillow...?" The distraught lady, upon hearing Hezou's words, searched around for these two items.
As she looked around helplessly, Tezuka, who was standing to the side, understood what Kanade meant. He quickly took off his heavy ski jacket, folded it neatly, and handed it to her.
Without looking up, He Zou took the coat and placed it under the patient's neck to prevent the patient's head from hitting the ground or the tongue from falling back and blocking the airway during convulsions.
After taking basic precautions, she looked at her watch and began to silently count the duration of the convulsions.
Occasionally, her long, loose purple hair would slip down from her shoulders, obstructing her view and movements.
She grabbed a strand of hair from her neck with her right hand, and quickly coiled the rest of her hair around her left hand several times, skillfully turning the cumbersome long hair into a bundle. Finally, she habitually reached for her wrist, but only touched the cold metal watch strap.
Before she could even find a suitable hair tie replacement, a white wristband was handed to her from the side. She accepted it as naturally as a doctor being handed a scalpel during surgery, and styled her long hair into a neat low bun. A few stray strands of hair remained loosely curled behind her ears and around her neck, but she had no time to care.
Even during those few seconds spent dealing with her hair, Kazusa's gaze never left the patient. Her eyelids were lowered, and her unusually young face displayed a focused calmness beyond her years. At that moment, all her senses seemed to be concentrated on the patient, completely isolating her from external distractions.
Seeing her professional first aid, the restless crowd gradually quieted down.
"The convulsions have lasted for about 40 seconds." Kazusa's brain raced. A diabetic patient suddenly lost consciousness and convulsed... Hypoglycemic coma? Acute cerebrovascular accident? Or epilepsy itself?
The patient was pale and sweating, exhibiting some characteristics of hypoglycemia, while the convulsions could be a sign of cerebrovascular disease. He continued to observe the patient; the convulsions gradually stopped after about a minute, but the patient remained unconscious and in a coma.
He Zou immediately looked up and asked the patient's wife, "Madam, when was his last meal? Has his blood sugar been measured?"
"After being trapped here, he was very worried. For lunch... he only had a cup of black coffee three hours ago..."
"I didn't eat lunch," "I only drank black coffee"—from the other person's flustered statement, Kanade calmly extracted useful information and concluded that it was a complication of diabetic epilepsy caused by hypoglycemia.
She then spoke loudly—
"Hot coffee! Sugar! Lots of sugar!"
Her voice was somewhat abrupt, and in the tense atmosphere, the people closest to her didn't react, even though she was speaking standard German, and even though Austria is a German-speaking region.
Tezuka, who had first aid knowledge, was the first to act. Without hesitation, he turned around, squeezed through the crowd, walked to the bar, put a large amount of sugar cubes into the hot coffee, stirred it, and steadily handed it to her.
He Zou took the cup, observed the patient's lip color, and said without looking up, "Help me pry open his mouth."
Her voice wasn't as loud as before, but it cut through the surrounding noise and reached Tezuka's ears precisely. Without hesitation, he stepped forward, squatted down, and pried open the patient's tightly clenched jaw.
This execution clearly pleased Hezou, who took a moment to say, "Well done."
Upon hearing this, Tezuka belatedly realized that both her praise and the previous instruction were in Japanese.
Did she speak her native language unintentionally, or... did she know him?
Unaware of Tezuka's gaze, Kazusa carefully dipped her finger in a small amount of hot, sweet coffee and gently, quickly applied it to the patient's oral mucosa and gums—a region rich in capillaries that could partially absorb sugar while minimizing the risk of choking.
And so, the chorus continued to repeat this action without interruption.
Finally, a few minutes later, the unconscious man let out a groan, though very weak, but Kanade breathed a sigh of relief and stopped giving him sugar.
Tezuka, who had been helping her maintain her posture, finally let go.
Under the tense gaze of everyone, the man's eyelids twitched, and he slowly opened his eyes. Although he was still dazed, his consciousness had clearly returned.
"Oliver! Oh, thank God!" The lady beside her, her eyes red with tears, hugged her husband tightly and wept with joy, not even having time to thank them.
At the same time, a burst of celebratory applause erupted from the tense crowd.
Only then did Kazusa stand up. She first straightened her slightly disheveled clothes and hair before raising her eyebrows and fixing her gaze precisely on Tezuka's face, her eyes crinkling into a smile:
"Hello, I'm Melodia. Thank you for your assistance and... headband."
Like a blooming Dorotha.
——
Forty-eight hours later, the municipal rescue team finally arrived.
Snow was cleared to eliminate potential hazards. As dawn broke, the hotel was already bustling with people.
A medical team also arrived, and the patient who had previously suffered an epileptic seizure had been injected with a high concentration of glucose.
Everything is being restored, but the rescue team leader said that blizzards are likely to return, and it is not safe to stay here.
There weren't enough rescue vehicles, so the passengers had to be evacuated in batches. He Zou was in the first batch with other women and girls. She stood at the back of the line with her simple luggage and, out of habit, looked around to observe the situation.
The snowfall lessened, and visibility improved. Two black tire tracks were visible on the road leading down the mountain from the hotel.
As long as she could wait for rescue, she wasn't helpless. She had seen real desperate situations before, so she didn't find these three days difficult to endure.
"It was a pretty good vacation."
Thinking this, Zou waved to the woman outside the car who was determined to wait for her husband to leave together, and then got into the car.
"Click—"
Just as Tezuka was about to board the vehicle, he heard a soft sound and felt something strange under his feet. He moved it aside and saw something deeply embedded in the snow.
It was a wristwatch.
A women's watch with a slightly outdated design that looked somewhat familiar to him.
Tezuka paused for a moment, then bent down and picked it up. Fortunately, the thick layer of snow protected it, and the dial was undamaged.
He wiped the snow water off the bag with a handkerchief, glanced at the noisy scene, hesitated for a moment, and then put it away.
"I hope there will be a chance to return it to its rightful owner."
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