On a Stormy Night, the Campus Belle Knocked on My Door Seeking Shelter
Chapter 14: Sleep Soundly

Chapter 14: Chapter 14: Sleep Soundly

After a complicated farewell to Zhou Hao, Chen Mo picked up Teacher Li’s raincoat, which he’d taken off earlier. He snuck back to Teacher Li’s house and placed it in front of the door.

He didn’t alert Teacher Li, however, because some extremely faint sounds were coming from inside the house. They were the kind of adult noises that only someone with very good hearing could detect.

On the way home, as the downpour drenched him, Chen Mo’s mood gradually began to lift.

’If Zhou Hao really is the killer, at least he’s still at a stage where he can be guided back to the right path and have those violent tendencies curbed.’

’Of all the people I met tonight, I can’t think of anyone more suspicious than him for the time being.’

For the moment, Chen Mo could only designate Zhou Hao as the prime suspect and wait to see if any new cases arose.

’Most importantly, I have to keep Su Yuqing by my side for now. I can’t let her face any danger alone.’

’I’ll sort through all the clues from tonight first.’

Relying on his own efforts might not be enough. He planned to compile all the clues he’d gathered in his past life, along with those he’d found tonight, into a single case file. Then, he would find some fellow mystery enthusiasts to help him sort through it all.

In his past life, he had relied on this very method to view cases from new and unusual angles, identify blind spots, and ultimately crack them.

Of course, it wasn’t a foolproof method. The accuracy of any deduction was determined by the density of the clues. If the clues were too few and far between, it was difficult to formulate any logical reasoning at all.

Even in an anime like *Detective Conan*, which wasn’t purely focused on deduction, the protagonist was always seen at the crime scene, proactively collecting useful clues.

Even Kogoro, the show’s comic relief character who usually spouted nonsense theories, could deliver cool, well-reasoned deductions in the rare episodes where he got serious and collected clues himself.

This just went to show how crucial clue-gathering was.

Sometimes, a single missing clue was all it took to completely derail the protagonist’s line of reasoning.

Likewise, this was a common trope in conventional mystery novels.

In other words, no matter how brilliant the mind, it was still nearly impossible to fully deduce and solve a case without sufficient clues.

Chen Mo found himself wishing for one of those sudden flashes of inspiration, a moment where a single, offhand comment could unravel the entire mystery.

It was past midnight when he arrived home. Su Yuqing was curled up under a blanket, dozing on and off.

CLICK!

At the sound of the door opening, her eyes snapped open, and she whipped her head toward the entrance.

"Chen Mo!"

Seeing Chen Mo had finally returned, a happy smile instantly lit up her face, and she trotted over to him.

But as she got closer, she saw that he was soaked to the bone, looking like a drowned rat.

She asked with concern, "How did you get completely soaked just from going out to get a midnight snack?"

Having walked all the way back in the downpour, Chen Mo was naturally soaked. He grinned and said, "The storm was too much. The umbrella broke, the snack blew away, so no late-night meal for you."

"Go take a hot bath, quickly! You’ll catch a cold if you stay like that," Su Yuqing said, her face etched with concern.

"Yeah. Oh, right, the bed in the guest room is just a bed frame. My parents bought this apartment so I’d be closer to school, so it’s pretty bare-bones. It only has the stuff I use daily, and there are no extra sheets or anything. For tonight, you could just make do on the sofa... or you could squeeze in with me..." Chen Mo grinned and gestured toward his bedroom.

Su Yuqing blushed and said, "I’ll be fine on the sofa."

"I was kidding. You take the bed. I’ll sleep on the sofa. Let me just take a bath first." As soon as he finished speaking, Chen Mo began to strip off his soaking-wet clothes right then and there.

Su Yuqing was still blushing with her head down over Chen Mo’s offer to share the bed when she suddenly heard the rustle of fabric.

His clothes were holding an incredible amount of water. If he walked any further, he would leave a trail of water all over the floor—a floor he had just mopped after Su Yuqing’s bath. He had no desire to do it all over again.

That was why Chen Mo decided to simply strip off his clothes right there and carry them into the other room.

As Su Yuqing instinctively looked up at the sound, her pupils constricted—Chen Mo had just flung off his wet inner shirt. His damp, messy hair framed his slightly flushed collarbones, which unexpectedly filled her vision. His lean abdomen glistened under the pendant light, and as he shook his hair, his V-lines appeared at the waistband of his pants.

Droplets of water traced a path from his shoulder blades down his spine, gathering into a single, glistening drop in the small of his back.

Flustered, she started to turn away, but couldn’t stop herself from stealing a few more glances.

By this point, Chen Mo had also taken off his long pants, leaving him in just his shorts.

When Chen Mo bent down to gather his wet clothes from the floor, the sight of his taut leg muscles made the tips of Su Yuqing’s ears burn. From the corner of her eye, she saw a trickle of water trace its way down his rippling abs, disappearing under the black waistband of his shorts to darken the fabric. Her throat suddenly felt as if it were stuffed with cotton, rendering her speechless.

Su Yuqing could feel her frantic heartbeat pounding in her ears. Her face was scorching hot, yet she couldn’t stop stealing glances at Chen Mo’s lean waist.

"I’m going to take a bath. I’ll call you in to sleep in the bedroom after I’m done." Chen Mo, oblivious to her reaction, simply gave her a smile, grabbed his soaked clothes, and walked toward his bedroom.

Su Yuqing nodded mechanically in response. It wasn’t until he was gone that she couldn’t help but press the backs of both hands firmly against her scorching cheeks.

The moment the backs of her hands met her cheeks, the coolness was a stark contrast to the burning heat.

The contact felt like warm, damp silk sliding across her skin, but the fleeting coolness was quickly engulfed by a wave of heat from the blood pounding beneath. She could even feel the capillaries in her earlobes vibrating against her fingertips.

It wasn’t until she heard the sound of the shower running from the bathroom that she finally collapsed onto the edge of the sofa, as if all her bones had dissolved.

The instant she switched, pressing her slightly sweaty palms to her cheeks instead, the cool dampness warred with the scalding blood surging beneath her skin. Even her breath seemed to carry a rising mist.

The veins in her earlobes throbbed, as if trying to burst through the thin skin. The image from that brief, stunning glimpse burned its way down her spine—his glistening shoulder blades seemed to flutter again and again in her memory, until even the sound of the downpour outside melted into a thick, syrupy roar.

Just thinking about what she had just seen made Su Yuqing’s mind go numb and tingly. She collapsed fully onto the sofa, breathing heavily.

All the while, her ears strained to catch any sound from Chen Mo’s bedroom.

She had unknowingly twisted the tassels on the blanket into knots. Suddenly, Su Yuqing realized she was counting the sounds of the water from the bathroom.

’Seventeen... the clink on the tile. Twenty-three... the buzz of the showerhead...’

As she counted, her eyelids grew heavier and heavier, until they closed without her even noticing.

Some time later, Chen Mo walked out with a bath towel wrapped around his waist.

He had intended to wake Su Yuqing and tell her to sleep in the bed, but he found her curled up into a fluffy ball on the sofa, clutching the blanket like a kitten. With each breath, her nostrils flared gently, and she made soft, airy sounds like a napping kitten. She was fast asleep, a peaceful expression on her face, occasionally letting out a muffled whimper along with the rumbles of thunder.