Lin's learning ability was far stronger than Bai Ci had anticipated. After she used concrete descriptions like “piping hot meals” and “sun-dried blankets” to explain the “sweetness of love,” he immediately plunged into the pile of floral materials and began one round of attempts after another.
The first bouquet used all-pink roses paired with baby's breath, but the petals were trimmed too neatly, making it look stiff. The second added cream-colored lisianthus, but they were packed so tightly that it felt bloated and oppressive. The third incorporated yellow daisies for embellishment, but the pink-and-yellow combination was cloyingly sweet.
“Still not right,” he said, placing all the unsatisfactory bouquets on the checkout counter. His pale gray eyes drooped as he poked at a pink rose petal. “It doesn't have that... warm feeling in the heart.”
Bai Ci leaned against the flower rack, twirling a eucalyptus stem in her hand. She wasn't a florist. All the flower meanings and symbolism she had memorized back when she hosted emotional murder mystery games were completely useless right now.
“Actually, you don't have to limit yourself to pink or thoughts of sweetness,” she began, choosing her words carefully. “Sweetness can also be a sudden surprise, or a moment of peace. Have you ever had a moment... where you suddenly felt incredibly happy because of something?”
She was only speaking casually based on her experience hosting emotional scripts, but Lin listened with extraordinary seriousness. A light slowly gathered in his pale gray eyes, as if stars had fallen into them.
“When I met you,” he said softly, a faint blush creeping onto his cheeks again. Without hesitating further, he turned back to select the flowers.
This time, he didn't stick to an all-pink color scheme. Instead, he chose a few gradient pink-and-white roses as the base, then picked several pale yellow ranunculi, and cut a few drooping white bellflowers to accent the edges of the bouquet.
Watching his movements, Bai Ci suddenly felt that this suspected non-human entity with his bizarre way of thinking seemed to have truly understood what “feeling” meant.
“Is this much better?” Lin held the bouquet out to her, his eyes filled with anticipation.
Bai Ci nodded and said sincerely, “It's beautiful.”
But upon hearing her praise, Lin's brow furrowed. He turned around twice with the bouquet in hand, still feeling that something was missing.
“Not special enough,” he murmured to himself. “This still isn't enough.”
He set the bouquet down, turned, and walked quickly to the backyard. When he returned, he had a small bunch of strange red flowers in his hand.
The color of the flowers was extraordinarily intense—not the crimson of a rose, nor the vibrant red of a miniature rose, but rather like the color of fresh blood just before it coagulates, possessing a bizarre luster.
The shape of the petals was even stranger. The edges were irregularly jagged, and the veins bulged clearly, like winding blood vessels under the skin, as if life itself were flowing within them.
Lin carefully placed the flower in the very center of the bouquet.
“You're adding this?” The flower emitted a faint, coppery-sweet scent, causing Bai Ci to instinctively take half a step back.
“Yes, this flower is called ‘Heartvein’.” Lin picked one up with a pair of tweezers and carefully tucked it into the center of the bouquet.
Once the “Heartvein” was added, the originally soft bouquet gained a vibrant tension. The pink-and-white roses contrasting against the deep red petals did indeed evoke a sweet sensation of “being enveloped in love.”
Staring at the trembling red flower, Bai Ci couldn't help but ask, “Is this flower very rare? I've never seen it before.”
“It's one I bred myself. I'm the only one who has it.” Lin flashed a smile, as if showing off his treasure. “You won't find it in any of the nearby flower shops.”
“There are other flower shops nearby?” Bai Ci's heart skipped a beat.
“Yes, over at the street corner,” Lin replied casually, reaching out to adjust the forget-me-nots in the bouquet. “I hate him. He never breeds his own. His flowers are imported from Moridom. They're just empty shells, yet they trick quite a few bargain-hunting humans.”
【July 10, Sunny. Daddy took me out to play today! We went to the flower shop we talked about before. The owner brother gave me a little daisy and said I was very cute. Daddy bought a big bouquet of white flowers, saying we'd put them at home. Then we went to the convenience store next to the flower shop. Daddy bought me strawberry ice cream, it was so yummy! I haven't been this happy in a long time. I want to save today up, and I hope every day can be like this.】
The contents of the diary suddenly flashed in her mind, and the bad premonition in Bai Ci's heart grew rapidly. She asked, “Is it the flower shop next to a convenience store?”
“A'ci, don't buy flowers from his shop. Things from Moridom aren't good for humans.” Lin didn't answer directly, but his words were already a tacit confirmation of Bai Ci's question.
Moridom—a completely new place name. Normally, it would be a clue worth paying attention to, but Bai Ci was already so overwhelmed by the consequences of her own carelessness that she had no room to think about anything else.
She had gone to the wrong place!
Connecting the diary entries in her memory with reality, cold sweat instantly drenched the back of Bai Ci's pajamas.
Sunflower Florist was never the flower shop in the diary. Following the coincidental clue of “sunflowers,” she had plunged headfirst into a completely unrelated dead end.
This flower shop, this Lin—from the very beginning, they had nothing to do with the family tragedy in the diary. She had simply blundered into another dangerous vortex and even gotten herself entangled as a “fiancée.”
“What makes them bad?” Bai Ci's voice sounded calm enough, but in reality, her soul was already floating away.
Lin was not the type to read people well. He didn't notice Bai Ci's seemingly calm but actually panicked heart, nor did he sense the change in atmosphere. He was simply making a reluctant compromise because he had to talk about something he disliked.
“I don't know. Humans are very fragile; coming into contact with power is bad for them.” As if suddenly remembering something, Lin held the newly finished bouquet and distanced himself from Bai Ci. “I forgot, you can't be in contact with ‘Heartvein’ for too long either. Although I won't hurt you, the existence of power itself is a hazard.”
Lin's protective action eased Bai Ci's tension slightly. Fortunately, he harbored no malice, so things weren't entirely terrible.
“Lin, do you remember just now...” Bai Ci planned to tell Lin that Mary, who had been making the harassing calls, might be related to the flower shop on the street corner. Things had already reached this point; what else could she do? She might as well throw caution to the wind and try.
Just then, the phone in Bai Ci's pocket suddenly vibrated. The familiar ringtone shattered the silence of the flower shop like a death knell.
This time, the call connected faster than ever before. Before Bai Ci's hand could even reach her pocket, the ringing stopped, and the call was automatically answered.
“Hello there, I'm Mary.” The sound of dripping water, along with that distorted female voice, rang in her ear. “I'm right behind you.”
An icy chill instantly enveloped the entire flower shop, far more intense than any time before. Bai Ci could even feel the hairs on the back of her neck being stirred by a draft, as if someone were breathing directly onto her neck.
She whipped around, but there was no one behind her. Only her own pale face and Lin's stunned expression were reflected in the glass door. Yet, that chill was drawing closer and closer, and the ring on her middle finger began to burn, as if resisting some invisible entity.
“Come hide here.”
An icy hand suddenly wrapped around Bai Ci's waist, pulling her tightly into his embrace.
Lin's chin rested against the crown of her head. The cold scent of decaying leaves on his body became exceptionally rich, forming an invisible barrier that shut out the freezing chill.
“I will protect you,” Lin's voice sounded above her head, flat but carrying an unprecedented determination.
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