I am twenty-three years old.
I've tightened screws on assembly lines, hauled packages in express delivery piles, and shuttled between meal trays and polite conversations.
Now, I pick up a camera, attempting to capture the light in children's eyes.
However, behind all of this, confusion envelops me like a thick fog.
I always fantasize when I'm alone.
My mind is occasionally a noisy battlefield.
There, I have incarnated countless times as a hero saving the world, overcoming obstacles, growing on a long journey, and gaining fervent love and strong friendship.
Ultimately, amidst the cheers of the masses, I slay the arrogant Devil King and then roam freely between heaven and earth.
Or perhaps, I am the dying general.
Blood stains my tattered armor, my vision blurs, and I watch the tear about to fall from my beloved's eye.
Amidst the enemy's earth-shattering roars, I prop up my broken body with a fractured spine, raise my blunted longsword one last time, and charge into the tide-like enemy formation until my sword breaks and my bones are buried in the yellow sand.
These are all me.
Yet, none of them are me.
Whenever my fantasies reach their Peak, a huge sense of disparity instantly crushes the real me, and tears flow without warning.
This is not sentimental affectation, but a kind of inferiority etched into my bones, burning.
For a period, anxiety coiled around my heart like a vine, and the physical manifestations that occurred constantly made me wish I were dead.
Every breath I took was a struggle against this world.
Day after day, I prayed for a moment of respite, for reality to show a little leniency.
Finally, I had enough.
Ignoring the gazes of those around me, I resigned from that seemingly "stable" but suffocating job, like a wounded beast, curling into an unknown corner to lick my wounds, trying to piece together my broken self again.
It was in that silent ruin that a thought, like an ice pick, pierced through the fog: continue to perfect my story.
Plans? They are merely sandcastles in the wind.
Life? It has always been unreasonably hasty.
Most storms arrive without warning.
And all I can do is stand tall, understand it, and accept it.
Thus, this book struggled into existence from this ruin and Epiphany.
I have written many novels, but they were all discontinued for various reasons.
Was it insufficient writing skill? Or an unyielding will?
I always found countless excuses for myself, but this time, I'm tired.
I don't delude myself that this novel can change my life; I just want to give myself an explanation.
I want to prove myself.
That I am not as useless as my family says.
I can always handle the relationships around me, but in the end, I am always the lonely one.
Am I lacking in love?
I have a mother who loves me very much.
Am I lonely?
I have a girl who has been by my side for six years.
They always give me the greatest love, but I have nothing to repay them with.
I hate myself.
I hate my lack of ability.
I hate the self that always avoids things.
Never mind, there's no point in saying more.
A very boring preface, right?
Do you also smell a familiar, ordinary human Qi?
I am not a brilliant "Great Love Immortal Venerable," nor do I need to live up to anyone's expectations.
I am me.
As that Immortal Master so magnanimously said: Reading a book, isn't it just for fun? If it makes you feel stifled, just close it.
The world is vast, and there will always be a story to your taste.
Solemn Declaration: Please do not bring your brain to this book.
Details? Let them go; they cannot withstand scrutiny.