Chapter Four: Seven Days Later
When Chen Yaoting woke up, his first sensation wasn't pain.
It was hunger.
He was starving.
As if someone had scooped out his stomach and left it empty for an entire week.
He opened his eyes and saw a white ceiling.
The light was soft.
There was a faint smell of disinfectant in the air.
For several seconds, he had no idea where he was.
Then his memories came rushing back, as if someone had suddenly flipped a switch.
LEV.
Gu Chengyue.
NT$680 million.
NT$150 million.
Seven days.
He abruptly sat up.
“What date is it?”
Someone immediately walked over.
It was a nurse.
“Mr. Chen, don't sit up so fast.”
“What date is it?”
“August twenty-third.”
Chen Yaoting stared at her.
His mind cleared instantly.
It really had been seven days.
The last thing he remembered was nine o'clock on the morning of August sixteenth.
Now it was August twenty-third.
The seven days in between were a complete blank.
It wasn't like sleeping, where you felt as if one night had passed.
It was more like lying in bed one second, then having seven days brutally cut out of the calendar the next.
He looked down at his hands.
His right hand.
His left hand.
He moved his fingers.
Everything was normal.
Then he touched his face.
His nose.
His chin.
His ears.
Still his own.
He even threw off the covers and looked at his body.
There were no obvious wounds.
No cast.
No bandages.
“Is anything wrong with me?”
“Your vital signs are currently normal,” the nurse said.
“What do you mean, ‘currently’?”
“Anyone who's just regained consciousness needs to be monitored.”
“What about Gu Chengyue?”
The nurse paused.
“Ms. Shen will explain everything to you.”
Chen Yaoting immediately asked another question:
“Where's my phone?”
“It will be returned after the doctor completes the examination.”
“What about the money?”
“I don't know anything about the financial process.”
At that, he actually laughed.
Of course.
The first thing he asked after waking up was still about money.
But NT$150 million was no small matter.
That was why he'd been willing to hand over seven whole days of his life.
Over the next hour, he underwent a battery of tests.
Neurological reflexes.
Vision.
Memory tests.
Basic arithmetic.
They even had him state the date, his name, his address, and the most recent event he remembered.
“August sixteenth, around nine in the morning. I was getting ready to begin synchronization.”
The doctor nodded.
“Do you remember any images from the time in between?”
“No.”
“What about dreams?”
Chen Yaoting thought for a moment.
“I don't think so.”
“None at all?”
“At least, I don't remember any.”
The doctor asked again:
“Do you feel as if anything has become familiar?”
“What do you mean?”
“For example, a place you've never been to before suddenly feels familiar.”
“No.”
“Any changes in your taste?”
“I just woke up. How would I know?”
The doctor nodded and recorded it on a tablet.
After the examination ended, Ms. Shen finally came in.
She was carrying his phone and wallet.
The first thing Chen Yaoting said was:
“Did it work?”
“It worked.”
“Did Gu Chengyue really use my body for seven days?”
“Yes.”
“The whole time?”
“Yes.”
“Then what about the money?”
Ms. Shen handed him his phone.
“You can check for yourself.”
Chen Yaoting practically snatched it from her.
The phone had power.
And the battery was full.
He unlocked it with Face ID.
The first thing he opened was his banking app.
He logged in.
The balance loaded.
A few seconds later, the screen displayed:
152,436,817.
Chen Yaoting froze as if he'd been nailed to the bed.
More than NT$152 million.
He stared at the string of numbers.
He didn't blink.
Then he refreshed it.
The number was still the same.
He tapped the transaction history.
August twenty-third.
LEV Corporation.
Deposit received.
NT$150,000,000.
It was real.
NT$150 million.
Every last cent.
His breathing suddenly quickened.
“Holy shit.”
Ms. Shen stood beside him.
She said nothing.
“It really came through.”
He said it again.
“Really. NT$150 million.”
In that moment, all the discomfort, questions, and fear he'd felt before were somehow washed away by the number, diluted by more than half.
He couldn't even stop himself from laughing.
At first, it was barely audible.
Then it grew louder and more obvious.
NT$150 million.
He'd really turned his life around.
Not almost.
Not maybe.
He already had.
Starting today, he was no longer the man who couldn't pay his rent, whose credit-card bills were being chased down, and who had to check the discount stickers before buying a convenience-store lunch box.
He really had NT$150 million.
Ms. Shen watched him laugh for a while.
Only then did she say:
“There are some additional records you need to review.”
“What?”
“The records from the experience term.”
That made his smile slowly fade.
“I can see them?”
“Some of them.”
“What did Gu Chengyue do during those seven days?”
“You have the right to obtain the body-use report.”
Ms. Shen took out a tablet.
A schedule appeared on the screen.
Day One.
Left the medical center.
Traveled to Taipei.
Dinner.
Lodging.
Day Two.
Went out.
Shopping.
Dining.
Private itinerary.
Day Three.
Went out.
Social engagements.
Rest.
Day Four.
Itinerary confidential.
Day Five.
Itinerary confidential.
Day Six.
Private itinerary.
Day Seven.
Returned to the medical center.
Chen Yaoting frowned when he reached Days Four and Five.
“What does ‘itinerary confidential’ mean?”
“It involves the client's business privacy.”
“He used my body. I can't know what he did?”
“If no harm was done to your body, certain details may be kept confidential under the contract.”
“Then how am I supposed to know whether he used me to do something weird?”
“The medical examination will confirm that.”
“I'm not only asking whether I was injured.”
Ms. Shen looked at him.
“What do you want to know?”
Chen Yaoting paused.
“Did he sleep with any women?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“I'm sure.”
“Did he touch my girlfriend?”
“No.”
At that, he visibly relaxed.
“That's good, at least.”
He continued reading.
The second page contained the expense records.
The very first entry left him stunned.
August sixteenth.
Dinner.
NT$38,600.
“One person spent thirty-eight thousand six hundred on dinner?”
“Mr. Gu had company.”
The next entry.
Designer clothing.
NT$486,000.
Then the next.
Shoes.
NT$93,000.
Liquor.
NT$217,000.
Lodging.
More than NT$200,000 per night.
The more Chen Yaoting read, the more excited he became.
“Who paid for all this?”
“Mr. Gu.”
“Where's the stuff?”
“Some of it belongs to you.”
“What does that mean?”
“Anything purchased in your size and registered as a gift belongs to you after the end of the experience.”
Chen Yaoting looked up.
“So the clothes and shoes are mine?”
“Yes.”
“Where are they?”
“They've been delivered to your residence.”
He almost laughed again.
The old man hadn't just given him NT$150 million.
He'd gone shopping for him, too?
Ms. Shen continued:
“There is also a car.”
Chen Yaoting stopped dead.
“What?”
“Mr. Gu purchased a car during the experience term.”
“What kind of car?”
“A Porsche.”
“Huh?”
“A 911 Carrera GTS.”
He thought he'd heard wrong.
“Wait.”
“That belongs to him, right?”
“It is registered in your name.”
The room fell silent.
Chen Yaoting stared at Ms. Shen.
“What did you say?”
“The owner of the vehicle is you.”
“Why would he buy it for me?”
“Mr. Gu said he needed transportation during the experience term.”
“He didn't have to put it in my name.”
“He made that decision himself.”
Chen Yaoting's mind couldn't quite process it.
NT$150 million.
Designer goods.
A Porsche.
Seven days.
He'd originally thought he was just sleeping for a week in exchange for money.
Instead, he woke up to find that someone had forcibly shoved his life ten years forward.
“Where's the car?”
“Underground parking.”
He immediately threw off the covers.
“I want to see it.”
“The doctor hasn't officially cleared you to leave yet.”
“I'm perfectly fine right now.”
“At least wait another half hour for observation.”
Chen Yaoting sat back down.
But by then, he could barely contain himself.
He picked up his phone.
Only then did he notice the mountain of unread messages.
LINE.
Instagram.
Missed calls.
More than two hundred in total.
The smile on his face suddenly stiffened.
“Did he use my phone during those seven days?”
“Yes.”
“Did he reply to any messages?”
“Some of them.”
Chen Yaoting immediately opened LINE.
His girlfriend was at the top.
Thirty-seven unread messages.
His heart jolted.
He opened the conversation.
The earliest was from the afternoon of August sixteenth.
“Didn't you say you were going to Taichung?”
Then:
“Why aren't you answering?”
That evening:
“What are you doing?”
“I called you, and you didn't pick up.”
The next day:
“Didn't you say you were going to training?”
“Your friend said you were in Taipei?”
Chen Yaoting's brow immediately furrowed.
He scrolled down.
The messages from the third day were different.
“Chen Yaoting, what the hell is wrong with you?”
“Why are you talking so weird?”
His finger stopped.
So weird.
He kept reading.
One section contained replies from his own account.
“There's a lot going on these days. I'll tell you when I get back.”
The words were ordinary enough.
But Chen Yaoting knew at a glance that they weren't his.
Not because of the content.
Because of the tone.
He would never reply like that.
His girlfriend sent another message:
“Are you mad at me?”
His account replied:
“No.”
The next message:
“I just feel like some things don't need to be explained over and over.”
By the time Chen Yaoting reached that line, his expression had slowly changed.
“He talked to my girlfriend a lot?”
“Not much, judging from the records,” Ms. Shen said.
“Can I ask him about it?”
“Mr. Gu?”
“Yes.”
“You can send a request through the company.”
“I want to ask him myself.”
“I don't recommend that right now.”
“Why not?”
“The experience just ended.”
Chen Yaoting looked up.
“How is he doing?”
This time, Ms. Shen was silent for two seconds.
“Mr. Gu has regained his original body.”
“No kidding.”
“I mean his health is worse than it was before the experience.”
Chen Yaoting froze.
“How?”
“Long-term synchronization is more taxing for the recipient.”
“How much worse?”
“He's hospitalized.”
He fell silent.
Gu Chengyue had spent NT$680 million.
He really had only wanted to buy one last stretch of youth.
Suddenly, the designer goods, luxury car, and NT$150 million seemed to carry another indescribable quality.
Like a dying man scattering money to buy himself seven days.
Chen Yaoting lowered his head.
He continued scrolling through his phone.
There were plenty of messages in his friends' group chat, too.
Someone asked him:
“Did you hit it big lately?”
“Whose car is that?”
“Holy shit, did you go stay at the Mandarin Oriental?”
Someone had even sent a photo.
It was him.
More precisely, it was his body.
He was wearing a dark suit Chen Yaoting had never seen before.
He stood beside a black Porsche.
His hair was perfectly styled.
There was a watch on his wrist.
His entire posture was unfamiliar.
It didn't look like him.
It really didn't.
The face was the same.
The body was the same.
But the way he stood, the look in his eyes, even the angle of his mouth—none of it belonged to Chen Yaoting.
Chen Yaoting zoomed in on the photo.
He stared into his own eyes.
A chill suddenly crawled up his back.
So it was true. When someone else used the same face, they really could turn it into an entirely different person.
“What day was this?”
Ms. Shen took a look.
“The second.”
“What about this watch?”
“Mr. Gu's personal property.”
“So it's not with me?”
“No.”
He gave a quiet “Oh” and continued looking at the photo.
Suddenly, he found it almost funny.
When he'd imagined himself rich, this was probably what he'd pictured.
Designer clothes.
A luxury car.
Hotels.
Expensive restaurants.
But the first person to actually live that life wasn't him.
It was Gu Chengyue.
Using his face.
Half an hour later, the doctor finally cleared him to leave.
Chen Yaoting changed back into his clothes.
Only then did he realize that even his original clothes had been washed perfectly clean.
Ms. Shen took him by elevator to the underground parking lot.
When the elevator doors opened, he saw the car at a glance.
A dark-gray Porsche.
Low-slung.
Clean lines.
Parked beside a whole row of black business cars, it looked completely different from them.
Chen Yaoting slowly walked over.
“This is really mine?”
Ms. Shen handed him the keys.
“The documents are inside.”
He took them.
His hand was actually trembling a little.
He pressed the unlock button.
The headlights came on.
In that instant, countless memories flashed through his mind.
Riding his scooter in the rain.
His hands going numb from the cold in winter.
The scooter refusing to start.
Not having money to get it repaired at the end of the month.
Waiting at red lights and looking at the luxury cars beside him, occasionally wondering what life was like for people who drove them.
Now that unreachable thing was parked right in front of him.
And it was his.
Chen Yaoting slid into the driver's seat.
The smell of leather rushed over him.
The steering wheel was smaller than he'd imagined.
The dashboard lit up.
He touched it.
He grinned like an idiot.
“Holy shit.”
“It's real.”
He said it again.
“It really is mine.”
Ms. Shen stood outside the car.
“A reminder: you've only just completed neural recovery. Long-distance driving isn't recommended today.”
“I'll drive slowly.”
“One more thing.”
She handed him an envelope.
“Mr. Gu left this for you.”
Chen Yaoting took it.
“What is it?”
“I don't know.”
“You didn't read it?”
“It's private correspondence.”
Ms. Shen left after saying that.
Chen Yaoting sat in the car.
He looked at the white envelope.
There were only three characters on the front.
Chen Yaoting.
The handwriting was steady.
He opened it.
There was only one sheet of paper inside.
The message was short, too.
“Thank you for lending me seven days.”
The first line was perfectly normal.
The second read:
“I did many of the things I wanted to do when I was young but never got another chance to do.”
The third:
“I left the car for you because you looked at it more often than you remember.”
Chen Yaoting frowned.
What did that mean?
Maybe Gu Chengyue had learned that he liked it while accessing his memories.
He kept reading.
The fourth line.
“There is one more thing I didn't tell LEV.”
His finger stopped when he reached it.
The next sentence read:
“On the fifth day, I woke up once.”
Chen Yaoting went completely still.
The fifth day.
Woke up?
Wasn't Gu Chengyue already awake?
He immediately read on.
“Not in your body.”
“In mine.”
Chen Yaoting's breathing slowed for a beat.
The final section contained only two sentences.
“At that time, my body was lying in a hospital.”
“But the person inside it wasn't me.”
The letter ended there.
There was no signature.
No explanation.
Chen Yaoting stared at those two sentences for a long time.
At first, he thought he must have read them wrong.
He read them again.
They were the same.
The fifth day.
Gu Chengyue's consciousness had been inside Chen Yaoting's body.
Yet he had briefly “woken up” in his own original body.
Then if Gu Chengyue had been in both places at once...
Who was the other person?
Chen Yaoting immediately called Ms. Shen.
The phone rang.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
No answer.
He called again.
Still nothing.
Just then, another call came through on his phone.
An unknown number.
Chen Yaoting hesitated for two seconds.
Then answered.
“Hello?”
The person on the other end didn't speak right away.
All he could hear was slow breathing.
Chen Yaoting frowned.
“Who is this?”
Several seconds later, a young man's voice came through.
“Chen Yaoting?”
“Who are you?”
The man fell silent for a moment.
Then he asked:
“Did you just complete your first life experience?”
Chen Yaoting's grip on the phone tightened instantly.
“Who the hell are you?”
The man didn't answer.
He only said:
“If Gu Chengyue left you anything...”
“Don't give it to LEV.”
Chen Yaoting instinctively looked at the letter in his hand.
“How do you know?”
The voice on the other end gave him an answer that left him completely speechless.
“Because three years ago...”
“Gu Chengyue rented my body, too.”
Then the call ended.