As though he had been floating and slowly came back to earth then, he started to regain his consciousness… His vision was blurry at first, but he could sense there was four more figures inside the room. When the dizziness wore out, he saw his friend Yi Xing and three strange guys in front of him. Lu Han immediately sit up, only to fall back to the bed because of a throbbing pain in his head,which he thought was a normal thing for someone who survived an avalanche. The guys gathered around him in an instant, the look of worry evident in their eyes:

“Luhan, are you okay?” The smallest guy asked

“Hyung, you’re feeling alright?”

“I’m sorry I tossed the ball too hard, hyung.” A tanned boy apologized.

Lu Han didn’t know what happened, but he was astounded that these strange people showered him with questions in Korean,which he knew, obviously, he was the son of Premier Lu of Tang, who deals with foreign affairs, after all. Only then did he realize that Yi Xing hadn’t asked him anything yet, and since Yi Xing was the only one here he knew and might gave Lu Han a grasp of what was going on, Lu Han asked in Chinese:

“Yi Xing, who are these people?”

Yi Xing’s facial expressions went from a blank to a shocked one, he muttered: “Mwoh…mwoh? My name is Lay and you always speak Korean to make fun of my poor Hangul!! Who are you and what have you done to Xi Luhan?” At the same time, the smallest and palest of the four put his hand on Lu Han’s forehead like he was checking Lu Han’s temperature and jokingly commented to the dark-skinned guy that apologized to him earlier: “Kai ah, look what have you done, I think the basketball hit Luhan hyung a little too hard!”

Feeling offended by the sudden contact, Lu Han shoved the pale guy’s hand away :”Watch who you are touching!“ “Xi Luhan? My name is just Lu Han!! Who in the world have their last name as ‘Xi’? Yi Xing, what are you playing at?” He turned his attention back to Yi Xing, who simply facepalmed and gathered the other guys: “I think we got real problems here…”

“Yeah right. Luhan hyung is usually soft, he never shoves me off like that.” The short guy whined while massaging his wrist making Lu Han feel a little guilty. “Aww, Suho hyung you know how offensive Luhan hyung gets when he’s sick...Just let it go…”The youngest one who had a really fair complexion cooed Suho, Lu Han supposed that was the short guy’s name. Then the four started putting their heads together and whispering things so Lu Han couldn’t hear what they were talking about.

Finally able to sit up, Lu Han took a look of his surroundings and felt even more shocked than when he heard Yi Xing called him by a weird last name. He wasn’t in his room, that he was positive of. The furniture there were all weird-looking: there were some bars and globes on the wall to provide lights instead of the paper lanterns, yet the light they gave outwas as eye blinding as the Moon's. The shelves and tables have simple designs instead of those usual sculptural ones, but honestly, Lu Han liked it better this way, this way everything just look more sophisticated and also meant less jobs for the carpenters. He also noticed the flat, black board that were hung vertically on the wall near a window, the window there was made of something transparent, Lu Han didn’t know what…then he took a glance at his side and saw that on the bedside table there was a tall drink, much taller than his familiar ceramic cups and it looked like it was made from the same material as the window. As curiosity was driving him crazy, Lu Han raised the cup to ask the guys:

“What is this?”

And the four fellas stared at him with even wider eyes than before, now they truly looked terrified, especially the tanned boy whose name Lu Han thought was Kai that apologized to him before, he started punching the wall and rubbing his head like he was in pain while murmuring some profanities. Those actions got Yi Xing, Suho and the other boy to pay attention to him, which annoyed Lu Han very much since he had never been ignored before, especially when he had asked something out of curiosity. Fortunately, turning his head to Lu Han, the young boy answered simply:

” Hyung, that’s a glass.”

“A glass? What is it made of?” Lu Han asked again, rendering his new companion even more confused, still he replied: “Glass. Gawd, Luhan hyung, you really lost your mind?”

“Glass, fascinating.” Lu Han completely slipped the guy’s question. After his curiosity had been satisfied, he remembered that he was in a strange place ,with strange furniture and strange companies. He thought he had been kidnapped, but then again, the supposed kidnappers weren’t wearing masks, that was a fatal mistake if they really had kidnapped him, besides, Yi Xing was here too, Yi Xing would never betray their friendship.But even Yi Xing didn’t seem like himself here ,he called himself ‘Lay’...Could it be? These people rescued him after the avalanche?

”What is happening?” As Lu Han was considering the possibilities, he ran a hand to his hair and found it much shorter then he remembered, that wasn't all, his hair was yellow too! One shock after another, Lu Han looked down on his body only to find weird clothing on it.  Also, the blanket he was using had patterns of a funny looking duck all over! Hastily kicking the it out almost instantly, he shouted at the guys:

“Where in the world am I? Did you kidnapped me? What have you done to my hair you bastards? "

The other three just dropped their shoulders in defeat, while Yi Xing slowly approached Lu Han: “Luhan, calm down. I know this is hard, but you’re gonna be fine. You’re just like this because Kai hit you on the head with the basketball and-“

“What basketball? I passed out because I was buried in the avalanche." Lu Han interrupted Yi Xing, he could recall the previous events, he remembered her, of whom memories brought back the suffocating pain in his heart.

"Hyung, you're really talking nonsense now. It's the middle of summer, how can there possibly be an avalanche?" The young boy butted in.

"Sehun, that's fine. Just leave him." Suho patted the tall boy - seemingly named Sehun - on the back and gave Yi Xing a meaningful look. Having caught the unsaid words, Lay had nodded to Suho before turning back to Lu Han : "Okay, an avalanche hit you it is, but we're gonna fix that,we’ll contact your parents and take you to the hospital, just rest assured Lu ge. "

Lu Han was really surprised at Yi Xing’s mentioning of his parents,but before he could ask another question,the four guys had already left the room. So Lu Han sank back into his thoughts about how he got here,who were the guys,why did they act like they have known him for ages when they couldn’t get his name right and what actually happened to him to cause his headache, the single most different detail between his and their stories.

Lu Han could reminisce everything happened like a movie..

His fist balled up as he watched them settling the coffin of his beloved Yun Er on the snow with a tight grip on his heart, leaving him breathless. He could never imagine that Yun’er would be the one to say goodbye first..”And you didn’t even say farewell..”

Lu Han remembered himself almost broke down as Zi Tao, the spy he had sent to secretly protect her informed him of her suicide.Billions of questions rushed to his mind at that moment,he couldn’t figure out why Yun Er would give up..why did she choose to kill herself..even if she succumbed to her bastard of a father’s wish and married the prince, he would still be able to see her, maybe even talk to her, she would still live. But this way, Lu Han couldn't even see her for the last time,as he certainly couldn't attend her funeral officially, their families' rivalry couldn't allow him to. So there he stood, on a low mountain, looking down on her so-called funeral. Only her mother and few servants were presented to help with carrying her coffin and... his heart was clutched at that thought, to set it aflame, to throughoutly wipe off the trace of her existence..

"Lu Han gege, you are very handsome. Your eyes, your eyes are so bright! It's like I can see the whole universe in your eyes."

Lu Han still remembered how it seemed like his entire world had lightened up at her innocent remark. But that light in his eyes had been dominated by the darkness of his misery as he watched over the dismal scene, Chancellor Im, whose stupidity directly killed his daughter was not there either.  Lu Han knew that Yun Er was never the favourite of her family. Deemed hideous by the society, she didn't stand much chance marrying a powerful man to strengthen the noble Lim clan's power like Lim Wei had wished. But burning her corpse in secret? Were they that ashamed of Yun Er? Because she had run away with him?

He then felt the extreme remorse crawling up and finally took a firm grasp on his heart, squeezing life out of his soul. The pain was so unbearable that Lu Han had to kneel down on the snow,his hand holding tightly onto his chest like it could ease the emotional pain. Still trying to catch his breath,Lu Han felt a familiar hand on his shoulder, so he looked behind only to be greeted by an expected figure.

“Your Highness” he bid, he knew Jia Heng was trying to keep a low profile, but the bordeaux civilian outfit couldn’t hide any of the royal aura surrounding his ex-friend and love rival at all. While the two of them tried to obscure their agony by pulling their stern faces on and looked directly into each other eyes, Jia Heng looked slightly amused at the way the other’s eyes gave away his true pain inside and Lu Han felt extremely irritated as he was almost a head shorter than Jia Heng was.

“I figured I would find you here.” Jia Heng decided to break the tense silence and walked pass Lu Han to stand by the cliff ,his back facing Han to avoid seeing eye to eye with him again, in fear That he himself would gave in to his honest pain too, something that Jia Heng hadn’t permitted anyone but Yun Er to witness.

Lu Han forced out a low,almost inaudible chuckle,without turning back to look at Jia Heng, and asked: “And why do I own the honor of having your Highness the Crown Prince to find me himself?” As Jia Heng didn’t answer after a while, Lu Han turned around and was met with the horror of the fire that the Lims’ servants had set slowly making its way to Yun Er’s coffin.

His lover, it had been 16 days since they last met, ‘Great Heavens, wasn’t it worst enough that I wasn’t by her side when life slipped away from her? Now I cannot even see her face one last time before all our memories gone to ash?’ Those thoughts screamed inside Lu Han’s head as his eyes were brimmed with tears,looking up, he saw Jia Heng had closed his eyes painfully, his shoulders shaking slightly like he was also holding back the tears.

The fire built up and soon engulfed to whole wooden coffin, it was then that Lu Han became petrified, he felt the fire in his heart, he felt the fire in his heart blazed up as well,only in a inverse way...The fiercer the actual fire burned,the weaker Lu Han's inner flame became along with all the hope he had been clinging onto. Lu Han felt his knees dropped to the ground in a complete defeat by fate, the cold from the snow beneath him was freezing, but he couldn't feel any of it as his body was numb.

From his peripheral vision Jia Heng threw him a rather contradicted and confused glance, but Lu Han's mind was too paralyzed to analyze that look.

Seconds passed...He heard the neigh of Jia Heng's horse, indicating his depature...Minutes passed...The fire started to burn down...Lu Han lost the count of time until only a pile of ash was left in front of his dark eyes...He heard his own bellow echoing in the vast space of the mountains,his throat burned from the screaming,his body trembling but Lu Han didn't give a damn.

Dead at heart, he took the rumble of an upcoming avalanche as welcoming.He would had slit his own throat if there wasn't the burden of upholding the clan's honor on his head anyway...An accident like the coming avalanche would be the perfect solution to all his problems: his approaching wedding with Zhu Xuan - the name of his bride as he heard, his responsibilities,his miserable life life without Yun Er ahead..

Fully braced himself for the impact,Lu Han took in a deep breath, "Let us say goodbye with smiles!" Yun Er's words replayed in his mind and unconsciously, he smiled.

"I'll never leave you, love."He whispered as a cold, formidable force struck his body, covering his vision with white - their favorite color.

"Luhan hyung!! Can you hear me?" Apparently he was too engrossed in memories to notice that Suho had come back to the room and were trying to communicate with him then.

"What do you want?" Lu Han buffed.

"Let's go have you checked up now. We set up the appointment already, these neurologic things really cannot be messed with, the sooner the better." The pale guy answered while tossing him some clothes from what Lu Han supposed was a closet.

Lu Han gave what Suho threw him a skeptical look, they didn't seem like any of clothes he'd been wearing before. Sensing the confusion in his look, Suho eyed him and simply shrugged: “It’s fine if you don’t want to change, but I’m not sure how the ladies will react to those Donald Ducks boxers”

It took a while (and some instructions from Suho) before Lu Han came out of the room,wearing weird clothes: a short-sleeved navy blue shirt and a pair of pants made from a comfortable material called jeans with pockets that devide the pants to two different sides with leather belts that didn't differentiate much from what he usually used.

"Finally you're done! Jesus, it's only a medical check up, not some fancy date."Kai complained with a groan. Suho whispered something (Lu Han supposed it's his oblivion to the clothing here) into Kai's ears and immediately he got pale and started rubbing his hair in that frustrated manner again.

Yi Xing, or Lay as he insisted, sat up from the chair and handed Lu Han a small, strange looking device with a large piece of flat glass covering its front."Here's your phone, Lu.Sorry I took it, but we needed your parents' contacts, they'll be here as soon as possible,by the way.Let's go."

Lu Han was about to ask what the device call 'phone' was but decided to hold it in, they were going out and if he would take this chance to escape from these strangers, better not letting them worry about him even more. So he followed them out of the house,which was only a room of a much larger building, into a strange vehicle called car then they drove out to a very unfamiliar, futuristic-looking city.

The life-like paintings all over the place, those huge boxes containing people in it, tall and large constructions covered by glass like that of the house they just came out from,blinking lights everywhere,in every colors,...Lu Han just couldn't hide his bewilderment at the scene,while Kai on the other hand looked more and more terrified, he kept looking at Luhan with widen, disbelief eyes.

Noticing the tanned guy's uncomfortableness, Lu Han tried to ease out the atmosphere: "Where is the other friend...uh..Sehun?".

Lay,who was in the passenger's seat, answered him:"Sehun has to go to the university to hand in an assignment.But no worries, he'll catch up with us at the hospital."

Lu Han just nodded and continued looking out the car window, while he kept wondering about their surroundings, the car stopped in front of a white building surrounded by a peaceful garden. Out of the car, Lu Han tried to read the caption on top of the building but failed as he couldn't make out the alphabet.

Suddenly, a figure walked pass him, leaving behind a faint, yet familiar floral scent lingered in the air. As Lu Han turned to look at the passerby, his eyes met with the sight of a girl donning a simple white shirt and jeans, her back facing him yet somehow Lu Han felt like he knew her. He kept on watching as she turned to greet an elderly woman, only to miss a few breaths : captivating doe-like eyes behind the lavish veil of lashes, porcelain skin with the rosy blush on her cheek, delicate nose, thin yet glistening lips that curve up into sweet smiles that reveal her perfect set of pearly whites...

He muttered two words - a name that felt ever so familiar to his trembling lips:"Yun Er?"