She wasn’t lying when she said filming starts at six in the morning. The preparations for shooting are complex and meticulous; with call time at six, you often have to be on set by five-thirty. Ying Yin needs to have her makeup done, so she has to get up even earlier.
Yin Xueqing is a woman who cherishes her appearance. Even in a place as isolated as this, she still faces the mirror every day to groom herself. She had never cut her hair short in her entire life, but Ying Yin had trimmed hers to chin length for a revolutionary film – and since then, she had extensions put back in, turning them into shoulder-length waves, gathered into a low bun with a sheer gauze hair tie, with stray wisps around her forehead – exuding an air of seductive femininity.
In winter, Aqiap doesn’t see daylight until past eight in the morning Beijing time. When the clock strikes six, it’s actually only four in Aqiap – the darkest hour before dawn.
The makeup artist, having worked on so many shoots, was already seasoned. Despite her drowsiness, she carefully painted Ying Yin’s slender brows and lipstick with focused precision. As she was packing up her kit, she was caught off guard by Ying Yin’s question. “Could you spare me some makeup?”
Of course she could. The makeup artist was warm and enthusiastic, opening up the entire case. “Go ahead and pick whatever you want.”
Ying Yin nodded and began to browse seriously. She was generally quite lazy about makeup and hadn’t brought her own cosmetics here. After wrapping up and washing her face, if she wanted to put on makeup again, she’d have to borrow.
“This eyeliner suits you better – it’s fine and natural. The one Yin Xueqing uses is too heavy,” the artist said, holding out a pencil.
Ying Yin took it and closed her fingers around it.
“This brow pencil has a nice brown tone. I sharpened it and haven’t used it since,” the artist added.
Ying Yin smiled and accepted it.
“There are plenty of lipsticks,” the artist said, pulling open a drawer with two neat rows, upper and lower.
“I’d like one that’s light and natural.”
“How about this one? It’s a velvet texture with a hint of coral, which matches the warm tone of the brow pencil,” the artist suggested. “It’s perfect for a winter like this.”
Ying Yin had used this one before. She paused to recall, then gave a slight nod and took the lipstick as well. “This will do.”
The artist closed the case and chatted with her with a smile. “It’s rare to see you wear makeup off-screen. Is it because of the New Year today?”
Ying Yin gave a soft “mm,” and said in a gentle voice, “Today is different.”
The makeup room was nothing more than a small wooden cabin, but the vanity table was exquisite – it belonged to the lady of the house herself, painted white, with carved floral details on the corners and small brass rings on the drawers. Rumor had it that it was part of her dowry when she got married, and she had taken care of it for thirty years. Ying Yin pulled open one of the drawers and placed her chosen items inside.
She pushed the door open and stepped out. The morning star was still bright, but the moon had already vanished from sight.
The set was buzzing with activity, the sweet, warm aroma of instant coffee lingering in the air. Ying Yin personally tested the lighting, walked through the blocking, and rehearsed the scene with Jiang Te.
She was very patient, guiding Jiang Te step by step to adjust his movements. This scene belonged to Ha Ying – Yin Xueqing had just learned about his divorce from his wife, Nuerxiya, and the two sat down to talk about it.
Ha Ying was the first man in this village to get a divorce in the past fifty years. His reason had nothing to do with violence, marital discord, or conflicting habits – it was simply because he no longer loved her.
Of course, he had loved Nuerxiya once. Among the herders, love came shyly and directly – perhaps he had simply caught a glimpse of her milking the cows in the yard at dawn and his heart stirred. Marriage among the herders was just as quick: the parents met, the guests and the newlyweds danced a lively, joyous dance on the June grasslands, and that was that. But two years later, love had worn thin. They had no children yet, so he decided to end it.
“My wife doesn’t love me either. It’s just that my lack of love is spoken aloud, while hers is endured in silence,” he told Yin Xueqing.
The divorce process was arduous. People from both their clans came to urge him, begging him not to be so willful. His wife also pleaded with him to endure.
“You’re only twenty-three. You love Mulati – you’ve grown up together, you just realized it a little late. Why not go live with him?” he asked his wife.
“Nobody gets divorced here.”
“The law says we both have that freedom.”
“Everyone here lives like this.” His wife’s face, accustomed to endurance, stared back at him blankly.
Everyone here lives like this – revolving around the four seasons and three meals a day, around the stove and the horses, taking the sheep out at dawn and returning at dusk, spinning like tops. They pay attention to how the young horses are feeling today, to how the trees are growing, but they cannot attend to their own inner selves. What that thing was, Ha Ying couldn’t put into words – but he could feel it.
Everyone here lives like this. And so, after the divorce, both he and Nuerxiya became strange shadows in the village. A shadow has no will of its own – it is gawked at, glanced sideways at, gossiped about. Every day, as Nuerxiya carried water back from the creek with a wooden basin on her shoulder, she would pass by Ha Ying’s cabin and always turn her face to peer through the window at how he was living inside. Her gaze was oddly detached and numbed, like a strip of white tape.
In this scene, Ha Ying is the protagonist, and Yin Xueqing is the listener. Haying finally asks, “When soap dissolves in water, you can buy a new one; when ice melts in the sun, you wait for next winter; when the trough in the stable runs empty, you fill it with fresh hay. So why, when love disappears, do people not leave? In Altay, we move our herds to summer pastures because the winter grass has been eaten – we know to take the sheep to where there is grazing. But we don’t allow our lives to make the same transition.”
“Because life isn’t just about love – it’s also about responsibility.” After saying this, Yin Xueqing suddenly let out a laugh. She found it absurd – an actress is heartless, a whore is faithless, and here she was, a prostitute, teaching a man about responsibility.
“You take love too seriously. It’s supposed to be something beautiful, but you’ve put a lock on it and made it unbearably heavy.” He said this as he unbuckled the horse’s bridle and reins, then gave it a firm slap on the rump. “Go!”
The horse reared its neck, let out a neigh, and galloped off wildly, kicking up puffs of snow like blossoms beneath its hooves.
Jiang Te and Ying Yin had finished running through the scene when he noticed her staring blankly, as if she’d forgotten her lines.
“What’s wrong?”
“Love is something beautiful, but you’ve put a lock on it, so it’s become unbearably heavy.” Ying Yin murmured to herself.
It wasn’t the first time she’d come across these words, but just now, as Jiang Te looked at her with those eyes – eyes that belonged to the snow-capped mountains and grasslands – and spoke them aloud, she felt as though she was hearing them for the very first time.
“Shen Ling’s dialogue is truly wonderful.”
She snapped back to the present, gave Jiang Te a few pointers – detailed and patient.
Jiang Te gazed at her for a long moment, feeling that something about her seemed different today.
“After you finish this film, what do you plan to do next?” Ying Yin asked, as if casually.
“Return to the mountains that belong to me.”
Ying Yin pressed her lips together. “I’m afraid you won’t be able to go back. Once this film comes out, you’ll become famous. Many people will adore you, and the flashbulbs will be aimed at you. You’ve walked through Haying’s world, and when you come out, you won’t be the same person anymore.”
“I’m still me – I’ve just met you.”
Ying Yin tilted her head slightly, gazing at him calmly. “Jiang Te, you need to learn to separate reality from fiction. That’s for your own good.”
“Does that mean I can’t see you again?”
“If you still want to see me, you will lose your mountain.”
Jiang Te’s heart trembled violently, like tumbling boulders setting off a low, rumbling echo of summer thunder.
Ying Yin looked at him for a moment, then gave a very slight, slow shake of her head, a soft smile on her face. “Remember to find a way of acting that protects yourself better.”
With that, she didn’t wait for Jiang Te’s response. She turned and walked back to her own resting spot. There, a stove was burning, and a woolen blanket lay draped over a wooden chair. She sat down, focused intently on warming herself by the fire, and waited for filming to begin.
Since this scene was Jiang Te’s moment to shine, the pace of shooting was not within Ying Yin’s control. He had been fine during the rehearsal, but once the camera started rolling, Jiang Te was clearly distracted.
“What’s on your mind?”
After multiple NG takes, Lishan called him over to the director’s tent and asked bluntly, with a stern tone. “Your mind is unsettled. Go take a break.”
Jiang Te lifted his gaze – his eyes carried a deep, piercing question – and then glanced toward Ying Yin outside the tent. She seemed unusually busy today; during every break between takes, she was on her phone, sending messages.
To Ying Fan, she wrote: Happy New Year. May you live a long life, stay beautiful forever, and grow old gracefully.
To Ke Yu, she wrote: May everything go your way in the new year, and may you grow old together with Shang Lu.
To Mai Anyan, she wrote: May all your artists achieve great fame and success, and may they stay healthy in body and mind.
Finally, she sent a WeChat message to Shang Shao:
“Mr. Shang, good afternoon. Are you busy on New Year’s Eve? We’re about to say goodbye to the year we’ve shared, and I still feel like I’m dreaming. Next year will be better, won’t it? When the snow melts, beneath it lies green grassland – full of life. Wishing you joy through all four seasons, and your meals on time.”
She imagined him now, in his Hong Kong home that resembled an art gallery – his gentle, righteous mother by his side, surrounded by close-knit, affectionate siblings, all sipping tea and chatting about the world. The sunlight would be lovely, the sea breeze pleasant, with servants moving busily between the living room and kitchen behind them, and the scent of flowers lingering in every corner. His space had been swept clean and renewed – and surely his heart would be swept clean too. When would he go to La Base again? She longed to see him once more.
Shang Shao did not reply.
Time moved so quickly in Aqiap – after two takes, it was suddenly half past three. The next scene was a kissing scene that Li Shan had hastily added to the schedule, requiring a set change and new lighting setups. Clearly, they were running late again – there was no way they’d wrap by four o’clock.
The assistant director and the department heads went around reassuring everyone, urging them to stay focused and push through in one go so they could finish early and celebrate the New Year properly.
“Miss Ying isn’t here!” one of the lighting crew called out. “Mr. Fu, have you seen her?”
Mr. Fu was the director of photography, overseeing both the camera and lighting departments. Though he was practically Li Shan’s go-to, he also took on many outside jobs and had worked with Ying Yin two or three times before.
Lighting was the top priority – a tedious and time-consuming process. A scene rich with subtext often took an hour or two just to get the lighting right. To save time and reduce workload, many actors used stand-ins for lighting, which was perfectly acceptable – but not on Li Shan’s set. He believed that an actor had to be intimately familiar with the lighting and camera angles to fully tap into their on-screen expressiveness, and the dull, mechanical process of lighting and blocking was precisely how that familiarity was built.
Ying Yin had always done her own lighting tests. With her absent now, the lighting crew’s work slowed to a crawl. Mr. Fu scanned the set, spotted Junyi, and called out to her, “Junyi! Where’s Miss Ying?”
Junyi, upon hearing him ask, only then realized that Ying Yin wasn’t with the lighting crew.
“Go find her!” Mr. Fu shouted, waving his hand.
Junyi found Tiwen. “Tiwen, have you seen Ying Yin?”
Tiwen didn’t know either. She looked around and said, “Maybe Li Shan called her over to discuss the scene?”
Li Shan was also nowhere to be seen at the moment, so the guess seemed reasonable. Cheng Junyi nodded. “Alright, I’ll go tell Mr. Fu.”
She made her way back from the tent to the set. “Mr. Fu, Miss Ying is – huh.” She paused in surprise, blinking. “Director Li is right here – so where’s Ying Yin? She didn’t go with you to discuss the scene?”
Li Shan stood with a handheld viewfinder in his hands, his feet clad in black cotton cloth shoes planted wide apart, his upper body leaning back as he studied the frame through the viewfinder. All of this had been decided once before, but it wasn’t uncommon for him to suddenly change his mind on a whim, so the camera crew simply waited for him.
Hearing Junyi’s words, he furrowed his brows and pondered for a few more seconds before straightening up. As he called Mr. Fu over, he said to Junyi, “I haven’t seen her. Is she with Jiang Te?”
Junyi spun around the set like a little top, round and round. She ran into Jiang Te and asked him, but he said he hadn’t seen her. So Junyi headed toward the dressing room. The reason she left it for last was that Ying Yin rarely went back there to rest during work – she usually just sat in her spot and drank some hot water. The dressing room and makeup room were the same small wooden cabin. When Junyi arrived, she noticed that the freshly fallen snow on the door lock had clearly been disturbed.
She pushed the door open. The stove still held some lingering warmth, but the figure before the vanity mirror was gone.
“Sis? Yinyin?” Junyi called out twice. No one answered.
Perhaps it was because the space was so empty that her voice seemed to echo back at her. Suddenly, a wave of unease washed over her. Junyi suppressed it, her steps feeling a little unsteady, and carefully pushed open the bathroom door. The simple washbasin was still wet, as if someone had just used it. In the open wastebasket lay a crumpled, damp towel.
Someone had washed their face here just moments ago.
But who could it be? They hadn’t wrapped yet – she shouldn’t have taken off Yin Xueqing’s makeup.
Junyi gripped the doorframe, her eyes wide. She swallowed hard, then abruptly turned and walked away.
Her steps grew faster and faster, her gaze hollow and unfocused, until after a long moment it finally came back into focus.
Her snow boots tramped along the muddy village path, kicking up clumps of sodden earth from the melting snow. Bang – the door to the girls’ bedroom was shoved open with force, slamming against the wall. It was quiet in here too, as if no one had come through.
Junyi had been so careful – how could she have known that the green coat in the wardrobe was gone, and in its place hung Yin Xueqing’s costume?
She had already changed back into her own clothes. Before the kissing scene.
“No, no, no…” Cheng Junyi whispered to herself, trying to calm down. She ran like the wind to find Tiwen. “She wouldn’t – she’s on medication, she hasn’t met Mr. Shang yet, she hasn’t even wrapped filming yet…”
She found plenty of reasons – full, logical, convincing ones.
But before she could even make it back to the director’s tent, hot tears were already streaming down her face without her realizing it.
That time – last time – she hadn’t made it in time. She had been so stupid, sent away by Ying Yin. If Mai Anyan hadn’t suddenly sensed something was wrong, she would have slept forever on that bed. Junyi didn’t know how cold the light above the emergency room entrance was – all she remembered was the sign that hung high above, “IN EMERGENCY,” glowing so fiercely red.
She had still alarmed Tiwen, and Tiwen had still alarmed the director.
Li Shan’s viewfinder clattered to the ground. His aged face, always so resolute and stern, was now animated by shock in a way it had never been before.
“Find her! Find her!” He didn’t bother to bend down and pick it up. With a sweep of his arm, he took off running – his elderly steps stumbling slightly from the sudden burst of motion. “Hurry!”
“Li Shan!” Tiwen called out his full name.
Li Shan turned back, his eyes meeting those of the young girl, and he understood at once. He nodded, then instructed the assistant director in a hoarse voice, “Send everyone out to look for her. Say there’s just one last scene left, and we’re waiting for Miss Ying to do the lighting test.”
This snowy expanse was too vast, stretching endlessly in every direction. The snow-capped spruce trees stood like black silhouettes along the mountainside, and not a single bird could be seen perching there for half a day.
The crew, over a hundred people strong, scattered along the winding paths of the village.
They had rented too many houses – any door they pushed open could reveal something unforeseen. The local herders were also stirred from their routines, repeatedly asked whether they had seen a woman with her hair in a low bun, wearing a rose-red knit sweater and a black down jacket.
“She wouldn’t be in the village,” Junyi said with absolute certainty. “She would have left the village!”
“Look for footprints!” Tiwen made the snap decision. “Send some people outside the village – look for fresh footprints!”
From the helicopter, the people on the ground looked like tiny ants, trudging about in frantic disarray.
It had taken off from the provincial capital airport, flying five hundred kilometers across the sky to get there.
“Mr. Shang, where should we land?” The pilot manipulated the cockpit controls, hovering the twin-engine rotorcraft at an altitude where the ground was clearly visible. The roar of the rotor blades was deafening, and he had to pull one side of his headset away and shout to be heard.
Many people below had stopped in their tracks, wondering why a helicopter had suddenly appeared in the sky at this hour.
Was it from the production crew? They hadn’t heard the aerial team mention anything.
The bright green figure was just a tiny speck against the snow – like a tender sprout.
Shang Shao’s pupils contracted sharply.
He didn’t know anything – he simply recognized her.
A strong, ominous intuition surged in his heart, and he desperately urged the pilot to land.
“We can’t land there!” the pilot replied, leaning over to survey the terrain. “I can only set you down over there!”
That was a natural ledge, slightly lower than the mountainside. The straight-line distance from Ying Yin was over a hundred meters, but to hike up there on foot would probably take fifteen or twenty minutes.
“Use the rope ladder!”
“Can’t do it! You have no experience – I’m responsible for your safety! The terrain below is complicated; if you jump from the ladder at that height, you could be impaled by branches!”
He no longer listened to Shang Shao’s commands. He pushed the control stick forward and gradually descended. The helicopter dove downward, the rotor blades churning up violent gusts that sent snow swirling into the air.
After hovering for a few seconds, the aircraft touched down. But before it had even fully stopped, the man on board leaped out. Inside the cabin, only the unhooked headset swung back and forth.
The snow was too deep, and he knew nothing about China’s inland climate – he was only wearing a pair of black Baroque leather shoes. With each step, the snow reached nearly to his shins. When he pulled his foot out, snow spilled into his shoes, soaking his trousers, socks, and shoes.
The cliff looked almost exactly as it had in his dreams.
He had watched her fall with his own eyes – she was so light, plummeting through the air like a weightless kite, swept helplessly by the fierce wind with nothing to hold onto.
Shang Shao strode forward in great, desperate strides. The mountainside was thick with snow-capped spruce forest; beneath the deep snow lay fallen branches and deadwood. He tripped and fell to his knees in the snow. Ignoring whatever had scratched his palms, he scrambled up with all his might and climbed onward, giving everything he had.
Blood seeped drop by drop into the snow, like wild berries.
Later – just a little later.
Slower – just a little slower.
Don’t leave so soon.
His heart, which had been awake all night, twisted and ached from the grueling climb. He pressed one hand to his chest, his airways scorched by the bitter cold, each breath stinging like needles.
He had promised to catch her.
It seemed like long enough.
Ying Yin didn’t know how long she had been standing there. She only felt that her very bones had rusted stiff.
She lowered her gaze and gently placed her phone on the snow. She didn’t want it to break – there were still many important things inside, and the address for La Base needed to be seen by Junyi.
From the cliff overlooking the wilderness, the world was draped in silver. So beautiful -she had seen enough of it.
She would come back to play another time.
Ying Yin pulled her hands out of her warm pockets. Starting from the overlapping collar of her coat, she smoothed it down, inch by inch, then gently patted the sleeves on both sides to brush off the snow. Finally, she took a deep breath, offered a faint smile, and stepped forward – calmly, gracefully.
What a pity – she still didn’t know what name he had chosen for their child.
“Ying Yin.”
She heard someone call her.
The snow absorbed all echoes, making every sound here feel desolate – so desolate it seemed unreal.
She froze, rooted to the spot. After a moment, she turned around, her smile a little dazed. “You came?”
Shang Shao pressed his lips tightly together, his breath coming in ragged, heavy gasps. His gaze never wavered, as if trying to lock her in place with his eyes alone.
“Come here to me,” he said again, his voice tight and hoarse as he watched her -steady, resolute, betraying no tremor.
This time, Ying Yin was taken aback. Her eyes fluttered as she shook off the daze of the brink, and her expression suddenly changed. “…Mr. Shang?”
She asked in a soft, incredulous voice.
In the span of a single second, her cheeks went from pale to flushed.
Her gaze locked onto him, her lips and limbs trembling – a tremor she hadn’t even been aware of. Gradually, it seized her entire body, from skin to soul, from outside in.
Her heart shook so violently she could barely bear it.
“Don’t walk forward,” Shang Shao said, reaching out his hand toward her. “Come here to me.”
“How did you get here?” Ying Yin looked behind him.
All she saw was a single trail of deep footprints.
Beside the footprints ran a trail of blood. Her gaze flickered, instinctively turning toward his hand.
Blood was winding its way down from his palm, dripping steadily onto the snow.
“Your hand…” Her eyes widened with alarm, aching for him.
“It’s nothing.” Shang Shao didn’t blink. “I received your New Year’s wishes. I replied to you – did you see it?”
Ying Yin’s gaze unconsciously drifted toward her phone. “It’s off.”
“Why is it off?”
He dared not move his feet, afraid that the heavy motion of trudging through snow would jolt her out of this fragile state.
“I…”
“You wanted some quiet, didn’t you?”
Ying Yin hesitated. “Mm.”
She gave a slight nod and tucked her hands back into the pockets of her coat.
“How did you end up so far from the set?” Shang Shao continued, “Wasn’t filming supposed to go until four? Did they wrap early, or did you skip out?”
Ying Yin lowered her lashes. “I didn’t know how to shoot the scene, so I left.”
“Why didn’t you know how to shoot it? You’re a great actress – a Best Actress winner, aren’t you?”
At this question, tears rolled down Ying Yin’s cheeks. They were so hot, yet when they fell into the snow, they vanished without a trace.
Her eyes, the tip of her nose, and her cheeks were all flushed red, as if she had been wronged.
“Do you know why I’m here?” Shang Shao pressed on.
“Why?” Ying Yin lifted her eyes and looked at him across the distance.
The sky was overcast; the pale sunlight was hidden behind leaden gray clouds, as if dusk had already fallen. In her eyes, the man before her was dressed in a solemn black coat, his face pale, with dark circles beneath his eyes. Having traveled thousands of miles, he was cloaked in the chill of wind and snow – so deep and cold that, in his silence, he seemed distant.
And yet he was right there, within arm’s reach.
“Because last night, you told me that filming this movie was a bit difficult, and that you felt tired.”
Ying Yin’s eyes shifted slightly as she recalled those words. Her smile was so lovely when she laughed. “No film is ever easy. You’re taking it too seriously.”
“I told you – as long as you say it’s hard, I will come to help you,” Shang Shao said firmly. “Have you forgotten? At the gate of your villa, you made me a promise, and I made you one too.”
“Did you fly here?”
“A helicopter.”
“You look exhausted.”
“You were too far from me – I was afraid I wouldn’t make it in time.”
Ying Yin sniffled, her slender fingertips red from the cold as she brushed them across her warm, tear-filled eyes, wiping the tears away.
“But today is New Year’s,” she said, offering a small smile, the corners of her lips lifting slightly.
“So, Happy New Year,” Shang Shao said, taking a step toward her, watching the subtle shifts in her expression.
But the light was too dim – he couldn’t read her. And because he couldn’t, every step he took toward her felt like walking on a cliff’s edge, one misstep away from utter ruin.
Ying Yin stood rooted to the spot, not moving an inch. Her face flushed – not from the cold, but from a rising heat of its own accord.
“Don’t come any closer,” she said softly.
“Why?” Shang Shao asked calmly. His soaked shoes and socks had frozen solid by now; his toes could no longer feel the cold – only numbness and pain.
Ying Yin turned her face slightly away.
Why? Because she had come here to say goodbye to everything. Would he think she was weak? Would he be disappointed in her? She felt as though she had done something shameful, and he had caught her red-handed – she was overwhelmed with humiliation.
Tears came almost in a flood; she didn’t know if it was shame, guilt, fear, or disgrace.
Her frozen body grew warm with his approach and with these tears. Wave after wave of heat surged inside her, making her tremble violently.
She didn’t answer, but Shang Shao had already reached her side – only one step away.
His heart settled back – back to solid, safe ground.
“Tell me, why are you crying?” He stood there, reaching out to wipe the tears from the tip of Ying Yin’s nose.
In the scent of snow, that clean, crisp fragrance was sharp and vivid.
Ying Yin closed her eyes deeply, her breath thin and fragile.
Finally, she said, “I miss you.”
What a shameful lie. What a flimsy truth.
“I miss you…”
Her voice trembled violently at the end, her crimson lips quivering, tears falling in large drops. She tried to lift her gaze to him – but she didn’t succeed, because he pulled her into his arms, fiercely, tightly, holding her as if he would never let go.
“They wanted me to shoot a kissing scene, and I couldn’t do it well…” Tears seeped into the seam of her tightly pressed lips. “I missed you – I wanted to come see you…”
A sob escaped her, ragged and unguarded, and finally she cried out loud. “Shang Shao, I wanted so badly to see you…”
“I’m right here.” Shang Shao’s gaze rested on the snow.
What was this? He had found her again, yet his eyes were hollow, the light in his pupils shattered and unfocused.
Who was it that trembled with fear? His arms crossed so tightly around her, pressing against her waist, bracing against her back – blood seeping into the bright green of her coat, leaving a mark that would never fade.
“Ying Yin, I’m right here… You don’t have to come to me – I came to you. I came to you.”
His kiss fell like snow on the southern mountains, landing on the curve of her ear, on the tiny red mole on her earlobe.
“Just don’t leave… Don’t leave.”
