It was the tail end of August, and a surging tide of returning students had swept through the universities and colleges of City A. The train Fang Yu rode was no exception, its carriages packed to the brim with young scholars bound for the city.
Inside the carriage, Fang Yu sat in his assigned seat, twiddling his fingers idly, consumed by boredom.
His attire set him starkly apart from the university students around him, drawing more than a few odd, sidelong glances his way every so often.
He paid no mind to the stares, which regarded him as though he were some rare exotic creature. His gaze drifted slowly down to his own outfit, and his mouth twitched involuntarily. Next to the fashionably dressed students around him, he certainly cut the figure of a countrified, hopelessly out-of-date oddity.
He wore a frumpy, aged navy blue shirt on top, a pair of patched trousers below, and scuffed black cloth shoes on his feet. To any stranger, he would have been taken for nothing more than a migrant worker fresh from the countryside, venturing into the big city for the first time.
And yet, why should a migrant worker be met with scorn? A flicker of indignant anger stirred in Fang Yu's chest.
"What's your name?" Just as Fang Yu was staring down at his clothes, a sweet, melodic voice drifted over from the seat opposite him.
He lifted his head slowly, his sharp, piercing gaze locking onto the owner of that voice. Then, as if a sudden thought had struck him, his expression shifted in an instant, his eyes softening into the guileless, unworldly simplicity of a country boy.
"Are you speaking to me?" Fang Yu asked, his voice tinged with awkward embarrassment.
She was a stunning, sweet-faced young woman, with flowing ebony locks cascading over her shoulders. Her delicate, porcelain features were lit up by a pair of large, luminous, bright eyes, and below her straight, elegant nose sat a perfect cherry-red mouth, its hue rich and vivid without a touch of makeup. As her lips parted slightly, they revealed a flash of pearly white teeth. She wore a sky-blue V-neck short-sleeved top, which bared a swathe of milky-white skin at her chest. Her full, proud breasts rose high, the deep valley between them impossible to ignore, drawing every wandering eye.
What a breathtaking beauty, Fang Yu thought. He darted a single glance at her chest before quickly averting his eyes. They're not as full as the village chief's daughter-in-law's, he mused, but they're far firmer. Enough to make a man's heart race with restless longing.
"Hehe, of course I'm talking to you!" The young woman giggled behind her hand at his guileless, simple expression, entirely missing the sharp, piercing glint that had flashed in his eyes only moments before.
She had been watching the young man opposite her from the moment he'd sat down. There was no shortage of beautiful women in this carriage, and she knew full well she was counted among them; why else would the young men around her keep casting ravenous, wolf-like stares her way?
Yet this man sitting across from her had acted as though she didn't exist, lost in his own thoughts the entire time. It had dealt a sharp blow to her pride.
As she studied Fang Yu more closely, a small smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. Aside from his long, flowing hair that hid most of his face, and that rather… unconventional countrified getup of his, he was actually quite handsome.
He lacked the brash pretension of so many modern young men, and carried instead a quiet, rustic sincerity. That was her first impression of Fang Yu.
"My name is Fang Yu." He smiled shyly, and after answering her question, lapsed back into silence at once.
When you're away from home, keep a low profile when you need to. That was what the old man had told him before he'd left, and Fang Yu had taken those words to heart. It was why he'd slipped on a new face the moment the young woman had spoken to him.
When you're far from home, a handful of masks is the best defense you can have.