228: Chapter 228 You've never been with a man?

Su Qingxue's eyes were filled with a warning look.

"The sound just now... really wasn't very appropriate." Xu Zhixia began.

Su Qingxue's expression froze.

"There are three people sitting outside." Xu Zhixia's tone returned to her professional calmness, "Zhou Kai, a grown man, is squatting there counting, and Song Ya's face is blushing so hard it looks like it's bleeding. Liu Feifei, on the other hand, is just enjoying the show and almost brought out a small stool."

She glanced at Su Qingxue.

"President Su, when you gave a fifty-minute all-English speech at the Shengtang annual meeting, all three thousand people in the audience praised you for being dignified and elegant."

"That sound just now... how should I put it, doesn't quite match being dignified and elegant."

Su Qingxue's face went from pale to red, and from red to purple.

Her hand clutching her coat tightened.

If an ordinary person were told this, they would have long wished to find a crack in the ground to crawl into.

But Su Qingxue was not an ordinary person.

After being stunned for three seconds, she suddenly smiled.

"Xu Zhixia."

"Hm?"

"Haven't you ever touched a man?"

Xu Zhixia's expression cracked.

"Oh! I forgot, you've been single since birth." Su Qingxue tilted her head to look at her, a hint of retaliatory amusement hanging on the corners of her lips, "That's why you're making such a fuss, right?"

"This has nothing to do with whether I've dated or not..."

"It has everything to do with it." Su Qingxue interrupted her, "If you had any experience, you wouldn't have kicked the door open in the middle of the night to play the savior."

Xu Zhixia's mouth twitched.

"If you were experienced, you'd know how much the interrupted party wants to commit murder."

When Su Qingxue said this, her eyes stared straight at Xu Zhixia.

Xu Zhixia finally couldn't take it anymore and turned her face away.

"...I'm leaving."

"Go on, go on." Su Qingxue waved her hand, "If you dare break in again next time, I'll smash you to death with a stone."

Xu Zhixia lifted the curtain and went out.

The moment the curtain fell, she heard Su Qingxue curse softly inside.

The curse was directed at her.

But there was no real malice in her tone.

The two of them had known each other for nearly ten years.

From college roommates to striving on their own, and now to both of them being stranded on a Deserted Island...

Su Qingxue cursing her was pretty much just letting off steam; they wouldn't actually fall out over it.

But Xu Zhixia still felt her face burning.

Not because she was cursed at.

It was because she had indeed done something foolish.

Outside the compartment.

When Lin Fan came out, Song Ya was squatting by the campfire poking at the charcoal.

Hearing footsteps, Song Ya's hand trembled slightly, and a burning branch rolled out from the campfire.

She hurriedly poked it back with another stick, her movements so flustered that even carbon ash flew all over her face.

She didn't raise her head, but the tips of her ears were glowing red.

Lin Fan glanced at the space of this Karst Cave.

To be honest, it really wasn't big.

Inside and outside combined, it was only a few dozen square meters, with just a piece of tattered cloth separating the middle.

The soundproofing effect of this place was roughly equal to zero.

Whatever he did inside could be heard clearly outside.

Normally it wouldn't matter, and he could chase them out.

But on a rainy day, it was good for sleeping, and people also had moments of losing control; you couldn't very well take your pants off and then come out to chase people away.

He needed to find a new shelter and make a new home for these people.

...

I don't know how much time had passed, but the wind that had lasted all night suddenly died down, and the raindrops pounding against the rock wall went from dense to sparse, finally disappearing completely.

Deep down in the rock crevice below, the campfire was still burning; thanks to the previous wave of people leaving enough firewood, these people didn't freeze to death.

Yang Ningcong leaned against the stone wall, having not closed his eyes the entire night.

It wasn't that he wasn't sleepy, but that he didn't dare.

Those few skeletons were right there; they couldn't be seen in the dark, but he knew they were there.

Coupled with Xiao Chuan's ghostly nonsense, every time he closed his eyes, the image of Meng Tiantian with only one hand left surfaced in his mind.

He was terrified that that hand would come to choke his neck; if not for him, Meng Tiantian wouldn't have ended up squatting in the corner and turning into fragments.

The several women beside him huddled together, some shivering and some weeping silently.

Not a single person fell asleep.

The only one in the entire rock crevice who had closed his eyes was Wang Laoliu.

He leaned against the narrowest spot at the entrance, a short blade laid horizontally across his knees, breathing evenly.

When the first ray of grayish-white light at the horizon penetrated the crack opening, someone spoke up first, though it was unclear who.

"It's bright... It's dawn..."

No one answered, but everyone's shoulders visibly relaxed.

They had survived.

Tonight, no ghosts came to claim lives, no seawater flooded in, and there was no second explosion.

They had survived.

The hand with which Yang Ningcong clutched the PLB beacon finally loosened.

His palm was covered in either sweat or rainwater; he lowered his head to glance at the indicator light on the beacon, which was still flashing.

Red and green alternated, regular and stable.

The signal was being resent.

The Yang Family people should have already received it.

The sky was gray, and the clouds had not completely dispersed, but a bright white slit had already appeared on the eastern horizon.

Yang Ningcong took a deep breath, the salty and fishy air filling his lungs, and he unexpectedly felt immensely relieved.

It feels so good to be alive.

Several women crawled out of the crevice one after another, all disheveled, their bikinis covered in mud, sand, and ash, and their hair matted into strands, looking completely different from usual.

But no one cared about their image anymore.

Being able to stand in the light was already a luxury.

"Rescue... when is it coming?" a female assistant asked timidly.

Yang Ningcong glanced at the beacon in his hand, then looked at the sky.

"Soon." When he uttered these two words, his tone softened considerably, "As soon as the weather clears up, the helicopter can take off, at the latest by noon."

...

Inside the Karst Cave, Lin Fan opened his eyes.

The space beside him was empty, the quilt half-flipped open, still retaining body heat.

Su Qingxue was already up.

Lin Fan sat up and stretched his shoulders and neck.

Last night had truly worn him out.

The air inside the compartment was stuffier than outside, carrying an ambiguous scent mixed with sweat and the lingering fragrance of a woman.

He lifted the curtain and walked out.

Xu Zhixia was changing Zhou Kai's dressing.

Su Qingxue was looking out toward the ocean at the cave entrance, and Lin Fan knew what she was waiting for.

Standing level with her, the heavy rain had washed the air to be extremely transparent, and the visibility was more than a notch better than the previous few days.

The distant horizon was clearly visible; no ships, no helicopters.

As expected.

There was a trace of disappointment on Su Qingxue's face. She didn't speak and turned around, right as she ran into Xu Zhixia face-to-face.

Xu Zhixia's footsteps paused for a moment.

She looked Su Qingxue up and down for two seconds, her gaze lingering on the other's face for a moment.

"Your complexion is good." Xu Zhixia began with a smile on her lips, "Much better than the past couple of days, and your mental state is also a lot more stable."

Su Qingxue's movements stiffened.

She subconsciously touched her own face, then quickly put her hand down.

"I just slept well." Su Qingxue's voice was lowered, her tone deliberately maintaining her usual coldness.

Xu Zhixia didn't reply, but the corners of her mouth twitched.

That arc was very subtle—not mockery, but more like a tacit understanding of "I get it, but I won't say it."

Su Qingxue saw it.

The roots of her ears began to heat up.

The two of them walked in silence toward the inner part of the cave, not far from the remains of the campfire.

"Last night..."