Day One on the Deserted Island: The Beautiful Younger Man…
Ni Fang’s words placed Fang Yuyao in a difficult position.
When surviving on a deserted island, the chances of survival differed dramatically depending on whether one was alone or had a companion.
Had this question been posted online, someone would undoubtedly have replied:
“Even if the other person is your mortal enemy, in such extreme circumstances, you should both calm down, cooperate fully, and search for a way to survive.”
Reason told Fang Yuyao that cooperating with Ni Fang, the first boyfriend she had broken up with ten years ago, was the key to preserving her life.
Her emotions, however, hissed angrily inside her.
Furious, she rolled her eyes at him.
Ni Fang took in her expression.
Not a trace of his arrogant demeanour changed.
He was clearly completely at ease, certain that Fang Yuyao had no potential partner other than him.
Fang Yuyao hated that expression of his.
The words of refusal hovered on the tip of her tongue, ready to burst out.
The hunger in her stomach, the dryness in her mouth, and her own dishevelled appearance stood in stark contrast to the impeccably dressed Ni Fang before her.
They looked as though they existed at opposite extremes.
She knew exactly what consequences refusing him would bring, but her stubborn desire to preserve her pride was overwhelming—
Just as she was about to sneer and reject Ni Fang’s condescending, thoroughly unkind invitation, she heard another familiar male voice from nearby.
The beautiful younger man she had dated for two months before they broke up because of the distance strode towards her.
Xiao Zhiran had eyes only for her, and his voice was filled with delight.
“Yuyao!”
Before Fang Yuyao had time to be shocked by the appearance of another familiar person on the island, she looked into Xiao Zhiran’s bright, flame-like eyes.
A smile slowly blossomed across her face.
Ni Fang’s expression darkened.
He appeared calm, but his gaze became heavy and shadowed. The muscles along his jaw suddenly tightened.
Fang Yuyao knew he must be furious.
They had been each other’s first loves as teenagers. They had spent more than three years in a sweet, affectionate relationship before it ended miserably when she abruptly dumped him without warning.
Even after so many years, she still understood what every small movement of her former boyfriend represented.
The handsome man and the beautiful young man came face-to-face.
“Yuyao, are you all right?”
Xiao Zhiran’s gaze was far from friendly as he examined Ni Fang. However, he quickly focused all his attention on the bedraggled Fang Yuyao.
He was holding an extremely tempting green coconut.
When he saw Fang Yuyao’s cracked lips, his first reaction was to offer it to her.
“You must be thirsty. I just found this coconut. Hurry and drink.”
His heart aching for her, he moved swiftly and used a nearby rock to break open the shell before handing the coconut to Fang Yuyao.
One was her first boyfriend, with whom she had ended things in an especially undignified manner.
The other was a former boyfriend for whom her feelings had never faded, and whom she had only been forced to leave because of the distance between them.
Even a fool would know which man made the better survival partner on a deserted island.
Fang Yuyao accepted the green coconut and drank several mouthfuls, easing her thirst.
Ever since seeing Xiao Zhiran, her face had remained radiant. Her beautiful eyes glimmered with affection as she asked curiously, “I didn’t know you were on this cruise too.”
While passing her the coconut, Xiao Zhiran had already moved to her side.
He gently took her hand.
His palm was burning hot, its warmth comforting her.
There was a second of silence.
Xiao Zhiran attempted to lie.
“It was a university research trip—”
Then he saw the teasing look in Fang Yuyao’s eyes and immediately deflated.
“All right. I saw on your social media that you’d won the prize, so I bought a ticket for the same cruise.”
Fang Yuyao smiled helplessly.
She squeezed his fingertips affectionately.
“Idiot.”
The intimacy between them, as though nobody else existed, clearly stabbed someone where it hurt.
Ni Fang gave a cold laugh.
Fang Yuyao turned towards him.
This time, her rejection was even firmer, leaving absolutely no room for persuasion.
“I won’t be going to your campsite.”
Xiao Zhiran did not know what had happened before his arrival.
He did not even know that Ni Fang was Fang Yuyao’s first boyfriend.
That did not prevent him from acting as Fang Yuyao’s shield and glaring warily at the other man.
Ni Fang’s icy gaze swept over their joined hands.
Without saying another word, he turned and strode away.
As the handsome man entered the jungle, the quiet green surroundings cast a harsh, almost cruel coldness across him.
The two watched him leave.
Only then did they finally have the opportunity to exchange the information they had gathered.
After several rounds of conversation, Fang Yuyao learned that Xiao Zhiran had also lost consciousness when the cruise ship capsized and awakened on this island.
Unlike Fang Yuyao, who had managed to place her phone inside a waterproof pouch and had been wearing a waterproof mechanical watch, Xiao Zhiran was still a university student and normally used a smartwatch from a popular phone brand.
After being submerged in seawater, it had long since stopped functioning.
He had also failed to grab his phone in time.
“My cabin flooded too quickly,” he explained. “I only had enough time to put on my backpack. I couldn’t do anything else.”
The backpack was waterproof.
Among the electronic devices inside was a laptop he had deliberately brought onto the cruise in case his academic supervisor contacted him with work.
However, it was not a specialised laptop and did not possess a satellite communications module, so it naturally could not be used to request rescue.
Xiao Zhiran had awakened some distance away from the beach where Fang Yuyao had washed ashore.
Fang Yuyao’s beach was on the southern side of the island, while Xiao Zhiran’s was on the south-eastern side.
This area possessed the source of fresh water she had searched everywhere for but had been unable to locate.
There was a large grove of coconut trees, and several mature coconuts had already fallen onto the beach.
His backpack was a waterproof commuting model.
The laptop, power bank, charging cable, data cable, and wireless earphones had all been stored inside its most water-resistant compartment. Those electronic devices still had a reasonable amount of power remaining.
After waking that morning, he had only glanced at the time before switching off the laptop to preserve its battery for emergencies.
The bag also contained a dual-purpose sun-and-rain umbrella that Fang Yuyao had left at his home when they were together, a small portable mirror for touching up her makeup, and a hair tie.
The remaining contents fully displayed the true nature of a male university student:
A half-finished bottle of mineral water.
A packet of soft cotton tissues.
A box of rolled dental floss.
A key ring whose charm included a German multipurpose tool knife small enough to pass through security checks.
Xiao Zhiran squatted obediently to one side as Fang Yuyao inventoried the contents of his backpack.
When she uncovered the personal belongings she had left with him, the beautiful young man looked at her resentfully.
Fang Yuyao understood the meaning in his eyes.
Unable to suppress her amusement, she leaned over and kissed him beneath his expectant gaze.
The two people whose feelings had never truly faded reluctantly separated.
Xiao Zhiran was breathing slightly heavily. His heart pounded fiercely inside his chest, and the medium-thickness fabric of his sweatpants could not conceal the young man’s excitement.
Fortunately, he knew this was not the time for inappropriate behaviour.
After forcefully suppressing those thoughts, he began discussing their situation with Fang Yuyao.
“Other than the coconuts, we don’t have any food,” Xiao Zhiran said.
Fang Yuyao added, “The weather on an island can change quickly. We need to find suitable shelter.”
They had to arrange their next steps as soon as possible.
They needed a place that could protect them from wind and rain, as well as a reliable and sustainable source of food.
The bare beach and the sparse shade beneath the coconut trees were certainly not suitable places to live.
They also needed to find reasonably safe food before sunset.
Coconut water was nature’s electrolyte drink.
After consuming an entire coconut, Fang Yuyao’s need for food temporarily diminished considerably.
On a deserted island, dehydration was far more deadly than hunger.
She looked around.
The coconut grove in this area was sufficient to provide them with drinking water for the immediate future.
Their most urgent survival crisis had temporarily passed.
Given the current situation, Fang Yuyao could not be certain how many survivors remained on the island.
Naturally, she hoped there would be more.
Teamwork was always preferable to struggling alone.
Ni Fang’s cold face briefly flashed through her mind.
Fang Yuyao believed there had been nobody else with him.
That meant he was alone.
She quickly cast the thought aside.
She was not particularly concerned about his safety. A disagreeable former boyfriend who had managed to establish a “campsite” within such a short time hardly needed her worrying over him.
She looked again at Xiao Zhiran’s enthusiastic, fiery, and dazzlingly handsome face.
Fang Yuyao exhaled deeply.
As expected, cooperating with a former boyfriend for whom she still had feelings was much more pleasant.
Her thoughts jumped rapidly from one subject to another.
Before long, the two began preparing to search the nearby area for a place that could shelter them from wind and rain.
At ten twenty in the morning, according to Fang Yuyao’s watch, they discovered a tall, solid, unusually shaped rock near the jungle on the south-eastern side of the island.
From the back, it appeared unremarkable.
However, after walking around it and climbing the slope to reach its front, they saw that the enormous rock resembled a cave with a lid.
The interior covered approximately three square metres, enough space for two people.
The top of the strange rock protruded outwards like a long, broad hat.
Fang Yuyao’s eyes lit up.
“A fire lit here wouldn’t be extinguished by the rain!”
Xiao Zhiran was equally satisfied.
He climbed onto the brim-like protrusion at the top of the rock and jumped several times on the spot, ensuring that it was solid and would not suddenly break while they slept and fall onto them.
Both of them sighed in relief after finding suitable shelter.
Their next tasks were to locate food and prepare the necessary tools for making a fire.
Fang Yuyao initially intended for them to divide the work.
One of them would remain at the shelter and repeatedly rub the fibres from an old coconut shell until they became soft and fluffy, creating tinder.
Then they would locate a suitable fireboard and attempt to start a fire using a bow drill.
The method was primitive, but it currently appeared to be their most promising option.
One person would search for edible food while the other attempted to start a fire.
It was a sensible arrangement that made full use of their available manpower.
Xiao Zhiran, however, rejected the idea.
He pressed his lips together anxiously and wore the expression that had always made Fang Yuyao soften towards him in the past.
He said unhappily, “Yuyao, I wouldn’t feel comfortable leaving you here to start the fire. I also wouldn’t feel comfortable letting you go out and search for food.”
Fang Yuyao was confused.
“But objectively speaking, this is the best method.”
That was precisely the purpose of teamwork.
Xiao Zhiran muttered resentfully, “Was breaking up also objectively the best method at the time?”
Fang Yuyao froze.
She and Xiao Zhiran had met at a concert.
They had plunged into a passionate relationship that lasted two months before the distance between them, combined with work and university, forced them apart.
Fang Yuyao had been the one to suggest breaking up.
She knew that Xiao Zhiran had many admirers at university.
Meanwhile, she had found it difficult to satisfy this energetic young lover who was eight years younger than her.
Every time they met, he left her legs so weak that she could barely return to work the following day.
Being with him had undoubtedly been joyful and sweet.
Unfortunately, the distance only intensified his enthusiasm in bed whenever they reunited, leaving Fang Yuyao dangerously short of energy when she had to return to work.
To make matters worse, Xiao Zhiran still felt terribly wronged.
He believed he had already exercised considerable restraint and had never once been properly satisfied.
During their most recent meeting, Fang Yuyao had nearly missed an important work engagement.
She had been forced to endure the pain and propose that they break up.
Even then, the separation had hardly been clean or decisive.
On the weekend before she boarded the cruise, Fang Yuyao had seen that a certain sportswear brand had released a new pair of limited-edition trainers.
They were attractive and perfectly suited to Xiao Zhiran.
Unable to resist, she bought them in his size.
…
They were two people whose feelings had never faded.
Whenever she saw shoes that suited him, her “S” attribute immediately exploded—
Shopping! Shopping!
Meanwhile, after seeing that she had won the cruise ticket, he had secretly spent a large sum of money to board the same ship.
Then, amid this life-or-death crisis, they became survivors who had no one to depend on but each other.
…
“Zhiran,” Fang Yuyao said gently.
She gazed at him with large, glistening eyes.
“Are you still angry with me?”
She was referring to the breakup.
Xiao Zhiran raised his face miserably and happened to meet Fang Yuyao’s eyes.
He wanted to say something harsh, but he simply could not bring himself to do it.
In the end, he only managed to force out several stiff words.
“I’m not angry. I still like you so much.”
Fang Yuyao admitted that his words pleased her greatly.
Only after securing food and shelter could one begin thinking about lust.
Fang Yuyao steadied herself.
“Then we’ll finish the serious work first. Afterwards, we can discuss the improper things.”
She took his hand and pleaded, “Be good. Shall we divide the work?”
Xiao Zhiran sighed.
He was completely helpless against her.
Fang Yuyao’s coquettish pleading had thoroughly defeated him.
In the end, the young man accepted the most physically demanding task: making the fire.
He would rub the coconut fibres into tinder and operate the bow drill, which would probably leave his palms covered in blisters.
He could never bear to let Fang Yuyao injure herself.
Leave a Reply