Chapter 217: The Hidden Protection

The grayish-white light spots filtered through the translucent white gauze curtains, quietly settling on the cool floor.

Saita Aina woke in an aching exhaustion, habitually turning over to embrace the boy beside her, but her fingertips touched a startling coldness.

She instantly became mostly clear-headed.

That face so close to her held a sickly pallor, a faint redness smudged around the eye sockets, and the eyelashes trembling uneasily.

Even the fingers exposed outside the blanket were cold as ice, as if he was not sleeping peacefully but struggling through a silent storm.

“Akane?”

Saita Aina sat up with a heartache and held his cold fingers. Her warm palm gently covered his forehead.

His temperature was normal—no fever.

Hearing the call, Hoshitani Kazune’s eyes flew open like a startled deer, his curled-up body instantly stiffening.

“Aina Onee-san… you’re awake.”

“What’s wrong with you? You look awful, and your hands are so cold.”

Saita Aina frowned tightly. The memories from her half-sleep gradually returned.

She vaguely remembered that after last night’s intimacy the bed beside her seemed to have been empty for a hard stretch of time.

“Did you leave the bed last night? Are you feeling unwell somewhere, or did you have a nightmare again?”

At those words, a thin layer of cold sweat instantly seeped across Hoshitani Kazune’s back.

Only he knew that the black untraceable mobile phone was at this moment pressed dead under his pillow, tight against the gap in the mattress.

If Saita Aina’s fingers reached even slightly further down and lifted that light pillow, the secret capable of destroying all the trust between them would be exposed in the morning light.

“N-no, I’m not unwell…”

Hoshitani Kazune hurriedly lowered his eyes, the long lashes hiding his evasive gaze.

He forced down the dryness in his throat and made his trembling voice sound as steady as possible, weaving a stiff lie,

“It might be… that I’m not used to the bed. I was very thirsty in the middle of the night, so I went to the kitchen to drink some water and sat outside for a while…”

Saita Aina looked at the boy’s eyes, like a bird startled by the mere twang of a bow, and an extremely faint doubt flashed through the bottom of her heart.

But that sliver of doubt was instantly drowned by an overwhelming tenderness.

Yes, they had only just fled to cold Hokkaido…

His spirit was already stretched taut to the breaking point.

How could exhaustion after intimacy, tangled with fear of a new environment, possibly let him sleep peacefully?

“I’m sorry, Akane. I was too willful last night and didn’t consider your state.”

Saita Aina blamed herself deeply, gently bending down to hold Hoshitani Kazune tightly in her arms, trying to use her not-so-broad shoulders and body warmth to warm his cold shell.

“Don’t worry about anything today. Stay home and catch up on sleep. Don’t push yourself, understand?”

Hoshitani Kazune was wrapped in a soft fragrance, his chin resting on her shoulder.

He nodded obediently, but the heart in his chest twisted violently with a heavy guilt.

The crisp sound of the anti-theft door closing seemed to drain the last bit of extra oxygen from the room.

The footsteps in the hallway, fading further and further away, carried off Saita Aina, who wore a dark trench coat, hidden fatigue in her eyes, and still forced out a gentle smile to try her luck.

She said she was going to a farther street to look for even a sliver of hope for short work at small restaurants, convenience stores, and cleaning companies.

The second she truly left, Hoshitani Kazune, who had nodded obediently in the foyer, turned around almost like a madman and stumbled back into the bedroom.

He yanked up the pillow and grabbed the black phone hidden in the darkness.

The screen lit up, and the faint light stung his eyes.

The interface still rested on the sentence Chika had sent last night:

[You have already worked very hard.]

He stared fixedly at those words, his fingers unconsciously rubbing the cold edge of the phone.

Buzz—

a slight tremor, the phone vibrated in his palm.

Chika had sent new messages, as calm and restrained as an instruction manual, just as always:

[If you didn’t sleep well last night, don’t force yourself to go out today.]

[The green vegetables in the fridge are about to spoil. You can boil them first for lunch.]

[No need to reply.]

Rationality roared in his mind, telling him he should casually toss this phone on the coffee table and let it become nothing more than a cold “fugitive contact tool.”

He did exactly that, but when he walked to the kitchen and had just washed two yellowing leaves, his gaze uncontrollably clung through the sliding door to that device.

What if Aina Onee-san suddenly came back?

He turned back again and tucked the phone properly into the pocket of his hoodie.

Through the thin fabric, that heavy weight pressed against his thigh like a branding iron.

In despair, he made excuses for himself at the bottom of his heart—

Miss Chika was just a friend. He only needed to glance at that survival information.

He had not betrayed Aina Onee-san, only did not want her to suffer so much.

But when he opened his wallet and looked at the pitifully thin stack of cash, the cold wind of reality instantly blew away all his self-hypnosis.

There was not much food left and not much money left.

The image of Aina Onee-san’s wretched attempt to find work in the rain last night still swayed before his eyes.

Without Chika’s guidance, could they really survive in this cold northern land?

He dried his hands and tremblingly opened the input box, repeatedly deleting and editing the words.

It was the first time he had taken the initiative to ask Chika about the real problem of survival:

[Miss Chika… if the cash is not enough, is there anywhere nearby where I can work part-time without identification?]

He wanted to work, wanted to share the burden of the woman desperately protecting him.

Chika’s reply came extremely fast:

[There is. But you are not suitable to go right now. You get too nervous when you go out. If you encounter questioning, you will show fear and expose your whereabouts. Let Miss Aina ask first. I will send you a distribution map of nearby under-the-table jobs and help you filter out the high-risk places where ID checks are likely.]

Looking at the screen, a bitter torrent surged in Hoshitani Kazune’s heart.

He knew better than anyone his own weakness and incompetence.

At some point, the sky outside the window had become soaked with a misty drizzle, and the temperature dropped abruptly.

The sound of the lock turning poured into the living room along with a body of wet, cold air.

Saita Aina had returned.

That cleaning company had turned her away because she had no local address proof, and that small restaurant with the filthy kitchen not only paid an absurdly low hourly wage but also wanted to hold a copy of her ID.

Yet in the foyer she only rubbed her stiff cheeks hard and pulled out a bright smile.

“Akane, I’m back! What delicious thing did you make today?”

“Aina Onee-san!” Hoshitani Kazune went up to meet her and took her dripping trench coat.

“I used the leftover vegetables to make soup… Did—did things go well for you today?”

“Yes! Very well.” She turned her head, not daring to look into his eyes, lying in an extremely light tone. “Two stores told me to go back and wait for news. I’ll go look again tomorrow.”

She was clearly exhausted to the extreme, yet still had to force a smile.

Hoshitani Kazune only felt his heart clenched tightly by an invisible hand, even his breathing carrying the smell of blood.

That safe job list Chika had sent in the afternoon clamored madly in his mind.

At the steaming dining table, Saita Aina took a sip of hot soup and casually brought it up:

“By the way, tomorrow I’m thinking of asking at that izakaya in the next block. I heard they’re short-handed recently…”

“Don’t go to that one!”

Almost a conditioned reflex, Hoshitani Kazune blurted out.

Saita Aina froze, the hand holding the soup bowl suspended midair, confusion filling her eyes. “What’s wrong?”

Cold sweat instantly soaked Hoshitani Kazune’s back. He realized he had stepped on the edge of a cliff. “Because… because Miss Chika…”

Before the words finished, his throat seemed to choke. He slammed on the brakes and forcibly changed his words,

“I mean… I checked on the phone map today. That izakaya doesn’t have very good reviews. They say the owner is very harsh and even delays wages… so… Aina Onee-san, you should choose another one.”

The air at this moment became terrifyingly stagnant.

What kind of person was Saita Aina?

She had once been an elite who struggled through the finance department of Rongsheng Group, an accountant acutely sensitive to every detail.

That stiff pause, that name subconsciously about to slip out, fell precisely and unmistakably into her ears.

Beneath that layer of gentle smile, hidden unease and vigilance surged like an undercurrent.

But she only put down the soup bowl and quietly looked at Hoshitani Kazune’s face, pale from extreme guilt.

“Akane, did you… look at what Chika sent again today?”

“Aaa!”

Hoshitani Kazune’s body jerked violently, his knuckles clenched white. “N-no, nothing new…”

He hurriedly avoided her gaze and explained, half true and half false, his voice so faint it was almost inaudible.

“It’s just… it’s just that the previous memo happened to mention a few nearby stores. I took it out to look, that’s all.”

Saita Aina gazed deeply at him. After a moment, she raised her smile again. “I see. I understand. I’ll avoid that store tomorrow. Eat up.”

The crisis seemed to recede for the moment like dark clouds scattered by the wind, but the trickling sound of water in the bathroom seemed especially clear in the dim living room.

Hoshitani Kazune sat alone in the darkness, both hands cold as ice.

The panic of almost letting it slip during the day and the guilt toward Aina gnawed at his nerves like venomous snakes.

He felt he had ruined everything, and tremblingly took out the black phone.

[Miss Chika… I’m sorry, I almost let it slip today. Aina Onee-san might have started to suspect that I’m still reading your messages.]

He thought he would receive blame, or an order to stay completely away from Saita Aina.

However, Chika’s reply, in a posture he could never have anticipated, ruthlessly pierced through his last psychological defense.

[Aina-sun feeling uneasy is normal.]

[She lost the job she was proud of, was forced to leave Tokyo, and in this unfamiliar place, she still has to do her utmost to protect you.]

[In her eyes right now, any extra help from the outside world makes her feel that her value is being stripped away, makes her afraid.]

Hoshitani Kazune’s eyes instantly turned red, mist blurring his vision.

Immediately after, the last two messages leaped on the cold glowing screen:

[So, don’t blame her.]

[You don’t need to try to explain anything for me either. You only need to hide what should be hidden well, and protect her well. That is enough.]

“…”

He stared fixedly at the words “protect her well” on the screen, tears falling silently.

That heart, tortured by guilt and fear, suddenly gave birth to a distorted sense of relief.