Sakurako drank the juice her father brought her and slept soundly through the night. When she groggily awoke, she found herself removed from her familiar little bed, swaying unsteadily inside a speeding vehicle.

The car felt like a coffin: a low roof pressed down above her and a narrow seat beneath her. When she finally braced her heavy head against the seatback and managed to sit up in the rear, she saw no one in the car besides the driver.

“How did I get here?” Sakurako lowered her legs, which had been resting on the back seat, adjusted her posture, primly straightened her clothing, and addressed the driver.

“That’s what I’ve been contemplating as well, Miss. What a strange coincidence that you fell asleep in my car,” the driver chuckled, the brim of his baseball cap tilting playfully as he glanced in the rearview mirror. He casually took off the cap, shook out his flattened hair, letting it cascade past his ears onto his neck.

The rearview mirror reflected a familiar face, one that was now smiling and blinking at Sakurako.

Xiao Shu? Seeing that face brought a jolt of surprise, and a question mark immediately formed in her mind. No, it wasn’t Xiao Shu. Following a sharp instinct, she answered that question for herself, trying to take a deep breath to calm down. Looking again into the mirror, the resemblance was striking! That face possessed Xiao Shu’s eyebrows, Xiao Shu’s nose, Xiao Shu’s mouth, Xiao Shu’s cheeks—it looked almost exactly like him. Anyone else certainly wouldn't be able to tell them apart.

Yet, she could sense several subtle differences. First, the eyes. Xiao Shu’s eyes were clear and transparent; she could tell what he was thinking the moment she looked at him. Those eyes were like a deep, still pool, always seeming to invite one to peer in, yet upon truly looking, they appeared bottomless and impenetrable. Then there was the expression. Though Xiao Shu was accomplished, his face still carried the unmistakable freshness of a high school student; he might deliberately give Sakurako a charming sidelong glance, but he wouldn't knowingly direct a gaze brimming with veiled desire toward a girl. Of course, the most definitive difference was the hair—no one’s hair grows three full inches overnight.

“Who are you?” Sakurako asked seriously.

“I thought I might confuse you for a little longer! But here you are, asking me that less than a minute after waking up,” the driver replied, flashing an awkward smile through the mirror. He deliberately scratched his head with one hand, feigning disappointment.

“Are you one of the Li family?” Seeing that he wouldn’t answer directly, Sakurako probed, tilting her head to peer out the window. Ahead was a panel van, and the roadside was lined with low shade trees. The car seemed to be traveling on a highway.

“What do you think? If I told you I was a human trafficker, would you scream and try to climb over to the front seat to wrestle the steering wheel from me?” The driver avoided her question, deliberately leading her on to guess.

Sensing he was intentionally teasing her, Sakurako fell silent, gazing out the window, neither pressing further nor offering replies, choosing instead to meditate on her current predicament. She recalled her parents bustling about last night, packing numerous items as if preparing for a long journey. Now, she was sitting in a car driven by someone who looked uncannily like Li Xiao Shu—she would tentatively classify him as a relative—and to claim they had no blood relation was highly suspect. They were almost certainly going somewhere, having arranged for someone from the Li household to drive her. She had slept through the entire process, having no idea when she was carried into the vehicle—how embarrassing.

Thinking of this, Sakurako’s cheeks involuntarily flushed. She lowered her voice, tinged with a delicate shyness, and asked, “Excuse me, how exactly did I get into the car?”