Midway through the convoy route, an ambush hits fast, loud and violent. It happened around hour five.
The forest thinned into a broken stretch of highway flanked by collapsed signs and burned-out cars.
Yin Yue was halfway through emotionally ranking apocalypse snacks when the first shot rang out.
Not a groan, not a scream but a gunshot.
Followed by four more.
The convoy slammed to a halt. The third truck skidded sideways into a ditch.
"Bandits," Liang Yu muttered, already moving.
Yin Yue blinked. "We get bandits now? That feels retro."
Liang Yu shoved open the door. "Stay low, and don't be reckless."
Yin Yue climbed out after him, pulling his frying pan from the side holster like a slightly deranged warrior-chef.
The woods erupted.
Men in tattered armor, eyes glassy with infection but still thinking still aiming. Not full zombies even worse.
Semi-aware. Half-crazed but too smart and too fast.
Yin Yue ducked behind the engine block, heart pounding.
One of the bandits came at him with a jagged blade. He parried with the frying pan.
The sound was pure chaos: metal on metal, shouts, gunfire, crunching leaves.
Behind him Liang Yu.
A blur of movement. Calculated, clean, efficient.
And then a bullet sliced the air toward Yin Yue. He didn't see it coming.
But Liang Yu did. He turned and stepped in front of him.
Took the hit barely a grazing shot across the arm that spun him sideways.
"Are you insane?!" Yin Yue shouted, grabbing his sleeve, pulling him behind cover.
"You weren't watching your left."
"You were supposed to let me die dramatically, not heroically intercept gunfire!"
Liang Yu winced. "You're shouting."
"I'm furious!"
> 💥 SYSTEM 520:
⚠️ ML INJURED: Minor
💘 Host Emotional State: Explosive Concern
💬 Subtext Level: 'I Love You' with Threatening Undertone
Another grenade went off in the trees.
Yin Yue clutched his shirt.
"If you die first," he snapped, "I swear to god I will find your ghost and make it marry me."
Liang Yu blinked. "So we're dying together now?"
Yin Yue growled. "What, like that's new?"
Liang Yu smiled.
Yin Yue immediately hit him with the frying pan. Lightly on the uninjured shoulder.
"Don't smile while you're bleeding," he muttered. "It's extremely distracting."
> 💘 ML AFFECTION: +3 (Delirious and Bleeding)
💬 Host Flirt Style: Emotional Breakdown with Romance Undertones
🧠 System Note: This is not even their worst fight
The bandits fled after a few more minutes of resistance.
The team regrouped and Yin Yue sat in the dirt beside Liang Yu, pressing gauze to his arm and muttering nonstop.
"You're a menace."
"You're loud."
"You love me."
"I didn't say that."
"Yet."
Liang Yu didn't argue.
After surviving the ambush, the group shelters in a half-collapsed roadside diner.
The roadside diner looked like it had lost a fight with time, weather, and three separate natural disasters.
The front windows were shattered. One of the booths had a tree growing through it. The sign still read "LUNCH SPECIAL PANCAKES &…" and then trailed off into a rusted blur.
They barricaded the doors then laid out sleeping bags. While tried to pretend the air didn't smell like grease and ghosts.
Yin Yue shivered dramatically.
"Cold," he announced to no one in particular. "I'm perishing. This is a slow, tragic death. Write this in the logs."
Jiang tossed him a tarp. "Use that."
"I need something warm, emotionally significant, and slightly oversized."
Liang Yu stood from where he was cleaning his bandage. Walked over, took off his jacket and dropped it over Yin Yue's head.
Yin Yue froze under it.
"...This doesn't mean I forgive you for getting shot," he said, muffled.
"You're still mad?"
"You bled on purpose."
Liang Yu raised an eyebrow. "It was a graze."
"It was a performance."
"You're wearing my jacket."
"I'm wearing it out of survival necessity, not emotional weakness."
> 💻 SYSTEM 520:
🧥 Boyfriend Jacket: Equipped
💘 Affection Symbol: Peak Level
🫠 Host Mood: Screaming Internally
📢 Public Awareness: 100% (Jiang is Watching)
Yin Yue sat down on an intact stool at the bar. Zipped the jacket up. Snuggled deeper into it than was strictly necessary.
Jiang walked by and paused.
Raised an eyebrow. "Do you two ever stop?"
Yin Yue said, "Only when he shuts me up with kisses."
Liang Yu blinked.
Jiang blinked harder.
"…I wasn't ready for that answer," she muttered.
Yin Yue grinned and Liang Yu leaned in.
Whispered near his ear: "You want one now?"
Yin Yue froze and short-circuited.
Then shoved him lightly away. "Not in front of the pancakes sign!"
> 💘 ML Affection: Smirking Level
🧠 Host Embarrassment: High
🫶 Public Flirt Rating: 12/10
Later, when most of the group was dozing and the lights were low, Liang Yu kissed him anyway.
Just once. Soft and behind the booth with the tree growing through it. Yin Yue didn't complain.
While the others sleep, Liang Yu sharpens his knives beside a cracked diner window.
The clink of metal on whetstone echoed softly through the abandoned diner.
Outside, wind rustled trees. Somewhere far off, a crow screamed because nature was dramatic like that.
Liang Yu sat near the window, methodically drawing his blade across the stone. Precise and controlled. Like everything he did.
Yin Yue sat across from him on a broken vinyl bench, one leg tucked under the other, chin in his palm.
He wasn't watching. Except he absolutely was.
"You're very intense about your knives," Yin Yue said quietly.
Liang Yu didn't look up. "They keep us alive."
Yin Yue nodded. "Right. Life-saving. Symbolic. Still very pointy."
Clink. Clink.
"Do you—" Yin Yue hesitated. "Do you ever get tired of being the one everyone depends on?"
"No."
"That's a lie."
Liang Yu looked up.
Yin Yue stared at him. "You don't have to be perfect. I'm allowed to ask, you know."
Silence.
Then:
"Yes," Liang Yu said. "Sometimes I do."
Yin Yue leaned forward. "Then why do you do it?"
Another Clink and pause.
"Because if I don't," Liang Yu said softly, "someone I care about might not make it."
Yin Yue swallowed. That wasn't what he'd meant to ask. Not really but now that they were here.
"Why do you keep choosing me?" he whispered.
Liang Yu didn't flinch, didn't blink and didn't even slow down.
He just said, "Because I don't want a future that doesn't have you in it."
> 💥 SYSTEM 520:
💘 Emotional Honesty Surge
🫠 Host Status: Devastated in a Good Way
💬 Subtext Decoded: "I love you" in Liang Yu dialect
Yin Yue blinked fast, rubbed at his nose.
"You know, when you say stuff like that, it kind of makes all the emotional breakdowns worth it."
Liang Yu looked up. "I know."
Yin Yue smiled and then sighed.
"God, I love you."
Liang Yu paused. Met his eyes.
"Good," he said.
And that was it. No drama. Just good.
> 🧠 Host Internal Monologue: Screaming
💘 ML Affection: Too High to Track
🎯 Relationship Level: Solid, Soft, Sharpened Like a Knife
The convoy reached the drop zone at sunset. No further ambushes. No close calls.
A makeshift checkpoint had been built out of sandbags and salvage guarded, reinforced, dusted with the faint smell of gunpowder and garden soil. Survivors with clean clothes and old scars greeted them. No chaos. No alarms.
Yin Yue leaned against the side of the truck, chewing the inside of his cheek.
They'd made it safely. Which should've been enough. But his chest wouldn't unclench.
Because Liang Yu was helping unload boxes and prepping to escort the last leg alone.
The final run would take five hours through neutral territory, then loop back to their home base in another direction. Yin Yue wasn't on that route.
And suddenly, every kiss felt temporary. Every touch felt borrowed. He waited until the last crate was lifted. Then pulled Liang Yu behind the truck.
Didn't say anything at first. Just looked at him.
Liang Yu paused. "What is it?"
Yin Yue's voice was small. "If something happens.."
"It won't."
"Still. Say it."
Liang Yu stared at him for a beat.
Then stepped close and kissed him. Longer this time for sure.
With one hand on his jaw and the other curled around the back of his neck like something sacred.
When he pulled back, he pressed their foreheads together.
And whispered, "Always."
> 💘 ML Affection: Boundless
💬 Relationship Status: Promised
🧠 Host Emotional Damage: Gentle but Irreversible
💥 SYSTEM 520: Logging Milestone — First Promise Not to Die
Yin Yue didn't cry but he smiled only barely.
Then shoved Liang Yu's shoulder. "Come back in one piece."
"I always do."
"Liar."
"You'll fix me if I don't."
Yin Yue smirked. "Yeah. I'm the emotional duct tape in this relationship."
Liang Yu kissed his cheek. Then turned and walked away. Didn't look back and didn't have to because Yin Yue was still standing there, watching, waiting and smiling.
Liang Yu is gone. Yin Yue is still at base. It's fine really. He's totally fine, he's eating and sleeping.
But the compound felt bigger when he wasn't here. Which was ridiculous.
It was still the same three buildings, same courtyard, same creaky bunkhouse where the windows only opened if you whispered to them.
But without Liang Yu, the shadows felt longer. The quiet felt heavier.
Yin Yue stood in the kitchen, stirring canned soup over a weak burner with the precision of someone doing everything not to think.
He was wearing Liang Yu's hoodie again. Because it was warm and not because it smelled like him. Absolutely not.
"You're being dramatic," he muttered to the soup. "He's coming back in two days. You're not tragic. You're independent. You are a fully evolved emotional lifeform."
The soup bubbled, unimpressed.
> 💻 SYSTEM 520:
🧠 HOST STATUS: Mildly Unhinged
💘 ML DISTANCE: 42km
🧥 Boyfriend Clothing: In Use
🍲 Comfort Food Level: Desperate
Jiang wandered in and paused.
Took in the hoodie, the soup, the soft sighs.
"...You okay?"
"I'm thriving."
"You're wearing his hoodie again."
"It's part of my new identity."
"As what?"
"A sad housewife."
Jiang raised an eyebrow.
"You know he's alive, right?"
"I know."
"He's probably fine."
"I know."
Jiang smirked. "You could just say you miss him."
Yin Yue scoffed. "What? I miss him? Out loud? In front of other people?"
Jiang took a bowl of soup, patted his shoulder, and walked out.
Yin Yue stared at the door. Then at the soup.
Then whispered, "...I miss him. Tell no one."
> 💘 EMOTIONAL STATE: Denial with a Splash of Yearning
💬 System Suggestion: Start a journal or scream into your pillow
🧠 Host Mood: Soup-based emotional repression
He sat down with his bowl and took a bite.
It tasted like longing and sadness and maybe beans.
He smiled anyway because he was going to see Liang Yu again. Soon.
And when he did, he was going to tell him everything he hadn't said. Even if he had to whisper it into his hoodie.