He Is Not Human

Lin Zhiyi stayed in the guest room all morning.

She didn't cry. She thought she would, considering how absurd last night's upheaval was, how far it exceeded her understanding. But when she sat on the edge of the bed, watching the drizzling rain outside the window, she found her emotions strangely calm.

Like a ship that had drifted at sea for a long time, finally seeing an iceberg—it felt relieved instead.

This was as bad as it could get.

She stood up and walked to the window, peering through the gaps in the wooden boards. The courtyard of the Xie family's old mansion was large, planted with several centuries-old plum trees, now beaten down with broken branches everywhere. In the distance, the fountain pool was filled with muddy rainwater, and something seemed to be reflecting light in the water.

She squinted. Scales. Golden scales, floating on the surface, like abandoned fish scales but larger than any fish scales—each one as wide as her palm.

Lin Zhiyi took a deep breath, turned around, and opened the door.

The hallway was quiet, covered with thick carpet, making no sound as she walked. She went down the stairs, her footsteps swallowed by the empty living room.

Xie Jin was not there.

A breakfast was laid out on the table, already cold. Sandwich, milk, and a cup of black tea still steaming. Beside it was a note with vigorous handwriting: "I'm going to take care of some things. I'll be back in the afternoon. Don't leave the house."

Lin Zhiyi sneered, crumpled the note, and threw it into the trash can.

Why should she listen to him?

She went back to her room, changed clothes, grabbed her bag, and headed straight for the front door. The gate of the Xie family's old mansion was a heavy iron gate, usually guarded by security, but today, for some reason, no one was there—only rain streaming down the stone pillars of the porch.

Lin Zhiyi pushed open the door and stepped into the rain.

The rain was heavier than she expected. She hadn't brought an umbrella, and her coat was soaked through after just a few steps. She hailed a taxi and gave the address of the small apartment she had before marriage.

As the car drove out of the grounds of the Xie family's old mansion, she looked back. The gray building disappeared into the rain curtain, like a sleeping beast. She turned her head and looked no more.

By the time she returned to the apartment, it was already noon.

She hadn't lived here for three months, and a thin layer of dust covered the furniture. She threw her bag on the sofa, turned on the air conditioner, then walked into the bathroom and ran a full tub of hot water.

She needed a bath. She needed a good sleep. She needed to treat all of this as a bizarre dream.

She took off her clothes and stepped into the bathtub. The warm water rose over her shoulders, and she finally let out a long breath.

But just then, the scar on her wrist burned fiercely.

Lin Zhiyi cried out in pain, nearly slipping out of the tub. She covered her wrist and saw the golden scar brightening at a visible rate, as if something was trying to burrow out of her skin.

At the same time, the sky outside the window suddenly darkened.

It wasn't the darkness of clouds blocking the sun—it was as if someone had plunged the entire city into ink. Streetlights lit up one by one, but the light couldn't penetrate the eerie blackness.

Lin Zhiyi scrambled out of the tub, put on a bathrobe, and walked to the window to pull open the curtains.

Then she saw a sight she would never forget.

Above the city, a golden dragon was circling. It wasn't the fleeting phantom she had glimpsed last night—this was a real dragon. Its body was hundreds of meters long, its golden scales emitting blinding light in the darkness, its whiskers dancing as if alive. Where it passed, clouds churned and thunder roared.

Lin Zhiyi's blood froze.

Because she realized the dragon was flying toward her. Not toward her direction—toward her. More precisely, it was flying toward the scar on her wrist.

The dragon's roar grew closer, shaking the windowpanes. Lin Zhiyi wanted to run, but her legs were nailed to the floor, unable to move.

Boom—

The entire apartment building shook.

The golden dragon didn't crash through the glass. It stopped right outside her window. Its pair of golden vertical pupils stared straight into her eyes, burning with pain and longing she couldn't understand.

"Xie... Jin?" Lin Zhiyi blurted out.

The dragon seemed to hear her voice. Its massive head leaned closer. Its whiskers touched the glass, and a thin layer of frost formed immediately.

Then it spoke. Not in human language, but a low, ancient chant. Lin Zhiyi couldn't understand, yet she strangely grasped its meaning.

It was saying: It hurts. It was saying: Save me.

The scar on Lin Zhiyi's wrist burned so much she almost fainted. Instinctively, she reached out and pressed her hand against the cold glass.

The moment her palm touched the glass, the golden dragon let out a painful roar, its massive body twisting uncontrollably. Its scales stood up one by one, as if something was tearing them from inside.

"Xie Jin!" Lin Zhiyi shouted.

The dragon's figure writhed violently in the darkness, shattering the glass of the neighboring floor, setting off alarms everywhere. But soon it flew back, stopping again in front of Lin Zhiyi's window.

This time, there was no pain in its eyes. Instead, there was a near-reverent tenderness. It lowered its head, pressing its forehead against the glass, exactly opposite her palm.

Lin Zhiyi's tears fell without warning.

She didn't know why she was crying. Maybe from fear, maybe from the pain in her wrist, maybe because the dragon's eyes reminded her of herself three years ago—so desperate, yet so stubbornly trying to get close to someone who didn't love her.

"What do you want..." she choked out.

The golden dragon didn't answer. It closed its eyes, and its body began to shrink. Golden light burst from within it, growing so intense that Lin Zhiyi had to raise her hand to shield her eyes.

When she opened her eyes again, the window was empty.

Only a figure, naked from the waist up, was kneeling on the narrow air conditioner unit outside.

It was Xie Jin.

He was covered in blood—golden blood. The scales hadn't fully receded; a few golden scales remained on his shoulders and back, faintly glowing in the dark.

He looked up at her, his voice hoarse beyond recognition: "Zhiyi... don't look at me."

Lin Zhiyi snapped back to reality. She stumbled to open the window. Cold wind and rain poured in, instantly soaking her thin bathrobe.

"Are you insane?" she yelled. "This is the sixteenth floor!"

But Xie Jin smiled. That smile was pale and weak, as if it could shatter at any moment: "The life bond isn't broken... I can always find you."

With that, his body tilted and fell from the air conditioner.

Lin Zhiyi screamed and instinctively reached out to grab him. Her hand passed through the cold rain and caught his wrist.

In that moment, the scar on her wrist and the scar on Xie Jin's chest both flared with dazzling golden light. She felt a tremendous force surge into her body from where they touched, as if something inside her was awakening.

Xie Jin's fall stopped. He hung in her grip, golden blood dripping down her arm, but instead of falling, it was slowly absorbed by the golden scar.

Lin Zhiyi watched in horror: "Xie Jin, wake up..."

He opened his eyes. His pupils had returned to human black, but still retained a hint of vertical slit: "Why didn't you leave?"

"What?"

"I said," his voice was as light as a sigh, "why didn't you go abroad, why didn't you hide, why did you stay somewhere I could find you?"

Lin Zhiyi was startled. She realized that from the Xie family's old mansion to this apartment, she had never truly thought about escaping. She talked about divorce, but her body, her subconscious, had remained in this city where he was.

"I don't know," she said.

Xie Jin looked at her for a long time. Then he gently freed his hand from hers, grabbed the window frame himself, and flipped inside. As he landed, he swayed and fell to one knee.

"What you said earlier," he looked up, "we'll continue to play the loving couple."

"What?"

"I changed my mind," Xie Jin said. "I owe you these three years. I'll pay it back. If you want a divorce, after the shedding period is over, I'll personally send you away. But before that—"

He reached out and took her trembling wrist: "Before that, don't leave me."

The darkness outside was receding, and the city lights were coming back on.

But Lin Zhiyi knew that from the moment she grabbed his wrist, she could never escape again.