77: Chapter 77 He fell asleep, but his hands didn't.

The door to the first-class cabin closed.

The commotion from the economy class outside was muffled by a layer of metal, sounding indistinct.

Li Li placed Jiang Rumu onto the lie-flat seat by the window, propped her cast-encased leg properly on the footrest, grabbed a blanket from the overhead bin, shook it out, smoothed it with one hand, and covered her with it.

The entire sequence of movements was fluid and effortless.

Jiang Rumu clutched the blanket and curled up slightly.

"Stop carrying me all the time."

"Your leg is in a cast."

"I can use crutches."

"Where would I find crutches on a plane? Do you plan to use an inflatable pillow as a cane?"

Jiang Rumu shut her mouth.

The first-class cabin of the Eastern Airlines 777 was spacious enough. A motorized partition stood between the two middle seats; when raised, it provided privacy, and when lowered, it created a semi-open space.

Li Li sat in his own seat and adjusted it to a semi-reclined angle.

Sleepy. Really sleepy.

The slow-release physical optimization was running in the background, with muscle fibers undergoing micro-reconstruction every few hours, and the only signal his body was sending was one word—sleep.

In the bottom right corner of his cracked phone screen, the progress bar had inched up by 0.02%.

[Side effects: drowsiness, increased appetite. Suggestion: sleep more and eat more; you aren't on a deadline.]

Li Li placed his phone face down on the armrest. He fell asleep in three seconds.

— Next door.

Jiang Rumu stared at the ceiling.

Not sleepy. She had slept for two days and two nights on the aircraft carrier, eaten well, and had the military doctor check her blood pressure and deliver medicine on time every day; she was wide awake now.

She took out her phone. The screen had two cracks, but the touch function still worked. The plane had just passed over Ala Country airspace, and the in-flight Wi-Fi flickered on and off.

She hesitated for half a second. She opened TikTok.

The red dots on her message list were so numerous that her phone almost crashed.

She didn't check her DMs or comments; she went straight to live stream. She started the broadcast.

No beauty filters, no effects, no lighting.

The warm overhead light of the first-class cabin shone on her face, her ponytail was tied messily, stray hairs clung to her temples, and the dirt under her fingernails hadn't been fully cleaned away even after washing three times.

The first second the stream popped up—zero. The second second—370,000. The fifth second—4.8 million.

The comments flooded the screen until it was completely white.

[Ahhhhhh!!! Is it really her! Is it really her!!]

[Jiang Rumu!! She's alive!! Am I dreaming!!]

[Wreath refund request submitted.jpg]

[My photoshopped memorial photo was a waste of time.jpg]

The number of viewers was still skyrocketing. Eight million. Twelve million.

Jiang Rumu looked at the screen full of comments, couldn't hold it in, and smiled.

"...Hello, everyone."

Her voice was still a bit hoarse.

The comments paused for half a second, then exploded at an even crazier speed.

[She spoke!! A living person can speak!!]

[Do you know the whole internet burned paper money for you for three days! Refund!!]

The gift bar exploded. Carnivals, Emperor sets, rockets, castles—golden special effects flew up from the bottom of the screen, so dense that the video lagged.

She looked down at the gift bar. She turned it off. She cut off the tipping channel directly.

[??? Sis, why did you turn it off! Let me spend money!]

[Living people don't accept paper money, huh?? Okay, understood.]

Jiang Rumu shook her head at the camera.

"Thank you all, really, there's no need. It's enough that you came to see me; save your money to buy yourselves something good to eat."

She paused.

"I'm reporting in to let everyone know I'm safe. My foot has a minor injury, it's not serious."

She tilted the camera down, revealing her cast-encased leg.

[Minor injury??? That's a cast, sis!!]

[Can you sign the cast? I want to sign it.]

The number of viewers surpassed 20 million.

Jiang Rumu picked a few comments to reply to. Regarding what happened over those few days—the desert car chase, the base infiltration, stealing the plane, the aircraft carrier landing—she didn't leave out a single word. She was professional.

[Where is Li Li!!! Is Li Li next to you!!]

[Li Li is with Mu!! Make him come out!!]

[Show us a glimpse, please!]

Jiang Rumu glanced over to the next seat. The partition was lowered. Li Li was curled up in his seat, the blanket pulled up to his chest, his head tilted toward the porthole, his breathing deep and steady. He was dead asleep.

"He's here. He's asleep, don't disturb him."

[The same first-class cabin????]

[Asleep? This man really always disconnects at critical moments.]

[Can you secretly turn the phone over so we can take a look?]

"No." She said it flatly.

The number of viewers stabilized at 28 million and was still slowly rising.

The sound of a cart rolling over the carpet came from the front. A flight attendant knocked on the cabin door twice.

"Ma'am, your meal is here. Would you like the sweet and sour pork ribs rice or the kung pao chicken rice?"

Jiang Rumu's hand paused on the armrest. Sweet and sour pork ribs. These four words fell into her ears, and she froze for a beat.

Li Li had turned back at the watertight door of the bridge— "Let's go. When we return home, I'll treat you to sweet and sour pork ribs."

Delia had leaned back against the broken chair— "Li Li, you owe me a meal of sweet and sour pork ribs."

"...Pork ribs."

"Alright, sweet and sour pork ribs rice, please wait a moment." The flight attendant set down the meal tray, left one for the next seat as well, and stepped out quietly.

Jiang Rumu propped her phone on the edge of the small tray table, with the camera angled toward the meal tray.

Comments: [It's here, it's here! Battlefield mukbang 2.0!] [Sis, stop talking and eat! I'm hungry watching this!]

She first opened the fruit box, stuffing two pieces of mango and blueberry into her mouth. She tore the film off the yogurt and drank half the container in one go. She tore the bread by hand and dipped it in the yogurt. Occasionally, she looked up at the comments and replied.

"The bread is average, the yogurt is okay, it tastes better than the one on the aircraft carrier."

[On the aircraft carrier?? You've been on an aircraft carrier??]

Jiang Rumu realized she had let something slip and quickly hit the brakes. "Don't ask. Eat."

31 million viewers online. The fruit and yogurt were finished.

She reached out and peeled back the foil lid of the sweet and sour pork ribs rice. Steam rose up. Caramel-colored sauce coated the pork ribs, glistening and arranged on top of the white rice.

It was airplane food, not exactly great. But she stared at that plate of pork ribs, and she froze again. Three seconds. Five seconds. 30 million people were watching her face.

[Sis? What's wrong?] [The way she's looking at the pork ribs is off.]

Jiang Rumu lowered her head, her eyelashes fluttering twice.

"It's nothing." She picked up her chopsticks and picked up a piece of pork rib. "I remembered a... friend."

She put the pork rib into her mouth. Chewed twice. Swallowed. The comments went quiet for a few seconds.

[Friend? What friend?] [She seems to be holding something back.]

She didn't explain further. She buried her head in her rice, eating much slower than before. The mukbang turned into silent eating.

The camera wasn't turned off, and 30 million people watched her eat mouthful by mouthful in silence; the previous liveliness was gone. The comments scrolled by slowly, mostly comforting her.

Then one comment drifted by. The text was very small, mixed in with thousands of messages, and should have flashed by.

[Sis, this amethyst necklace is so pretty, where did you buy it?]

Jiang Rumu's chopsticks hovered in mid-air.

She looked down. Below her collarbone, the amethyst hung quietly.

When Delia had bent down to put it on her, her fingertips had brushed against the back of her neck. "Sorry." That was her last word.

The chopsticks slipped from her fingers, clattering against the edge of the meal tray with a crisp sound. Jiang Rumu turned her head. Her jaw tightened. Her nostrils flared.

She wiped her eyes quickly with the back of her hand, but it was too late. Tears fell onto the blanket.

She buried her face into the cushion on the side of the seat, her shoulders shook violently twice, and a very short whimper escaped her throat.

She had already cried on the aircraft carrier. The things she had managed to suppress were all brought back up by a comment, a plate of sweet and sour pork ribs, and an amethyst.

30 million people in the live stream. Absolute silence. The comments stopped for a full four seconds. Then what flooded in were no longer question marks.

[Don't cry, we are here.] [I don't know what happened, but I want to cry because you are crying.] [That friend... are they not coming back?]

Jiang Rumu couldn't see the comments. She curled up in the cushion, keeping her voice very low. When she cried on the aircraft carrier, she had Li Li's shoulder to bury her face in, but now 30 million people were staring at her. She was Jiang Rumu. The last backbone of the entertainment industry. She couldn't break down.

But the sound leaked from her throat, and she couldn't stop it.

Next door. Li Li was dragged out of sleep by a series of intermittent sobs. His consciousness was blurred for two seconds, thinking he was still in the aircraft carrier cabin. Then he heard it clearly—it was Jiang Rumu.

He didn't open his eyes, just tilted his head. The partition was half-raised; the movement from over there was very light, but in the quiet first-class cabin, it was clear enough.

He turned over and reached out his right hand. His arm crossed over the partition and rested on the back of Jiang Rumu's head. His fingers gathered around it. He patted it twice. He didn't speak. The pressure was neither heavy nor light. It was exactly the same as on the bridge of the aircraft carrier.

Jiang Rumu tensed up for a moment, then her shoulders relaxed instead. She didn't pull away, nor did she turn her head. Her tears rubbed against the cushion, and her nose was heavily congested.

Li Li's hand rested on the back of her head, his thumb pressing against the crown of her head. "Stop thinking about it." Three words, his voice thick with sleepiness. Then he pulled his hand back, turned over, and went back to sleep. He kept his eyes closed the entire time. He didn't see the phone propped on the edge of the small tray table at all.

The camera angle was perfect. Above the half-raised partition, an arm reached over and pressed down on Jiang Rumu's messy hair. The action was so natural that it didn't look like it was in front of 30 million people.

The comments went from dead silence to a nuclear explosion.

[!!!!!!!!!!!!!!]

[That hand!! Whose hand is that!!!!]

[Li Li!! There's a thin callus on the web of his hand!!!]

[He's sleeping, right?? He doesn't know about the live stream????]

[Unconscious action!! Everyone, this is an unconscious action!!!!!!]

[It's over, it's over, it's over, I'm shipping the real thing.]

The number of viewers jumped from 31 million to 46 million.

Jiang Rumu was still buried in the cushion. She didn't know what the camera had captured. She only felt the lingering warmth of his palm on the back of her head, her nose was congested, and her eyes felt sore and swollen.

And 30 million people had just seen a sleeping man, separated by half a wall, reach out with his eyes closed to comfort a crying woman.

The speed of the scrolling comments was so fast that the server issued a warning.

One comment, pinned to the top, in the largest font size and with the most expensive special effects, hung steadily in the center of the screen— [The CP the whole internet has been shipping for half a month, this one moment is enough to last a lifetime.]

Jiang Rumu finally raised her head.

She took a tissue and blew her nose, scanned the comments with red eyes, and looked for two seconds. Then she saw that one. Her face turned red from her neck to the tips of her ears. She whipped her head around. On the other side of the partition, Li Li was lying with his back to her, his breathing steady. —He didn't know.

She reached out quickly and placed her phone screen face down on the small tray table. But it was too late. In the top right corner of the live stream, the screen recording button showed a small red dot. 46 million people.

During the action of her reaching out to cover the phone, the comments exploded again.

[She's blushing!!!! She's blushing, ahhhhh!] [Covering the phone is useless! I've already recorded eight copies!] [I'm going to show this video to my grandson.]

Jiang Rumu buried her face back into the cushion. This time it wasn't to cry. It was because she wanted to suffocate herself.

The phone was face down on the table, but the live stream hadn't ended—she forgot to turn it off.

The screen showed the warm light of the first-class cabin ceiling and a small piece of the exposed cast. 46 million people stared at the ceiling, and not a single person left.

Comments: [Even if it's filming the ceiling, I'm not leaving.] [This live room is my home today.]

Meanwhile. In a seat towards the back of the economy class aisle. Yin Ruoying put down the makeup mirror in her hand. She stared at the replay clip of Jiang Rumu's live stream on her phone screen—that hand reaching over the partition had already been forwarded 120,000 times in two seconds.

She exited the page. She opened another dialog box.

She typed a line of text, then deleted it. She typed it again. Sent. The name on the other end was— "Company · President Zhou".