Chapter 250 - A Perfect New World (XIV)

It was a long night.

It was so long that Chi Xiaochi found it hard to believe when he remembered it later.

After half past seven he looked frequently at the door, but only waited time and again for the waiter who asked him if he was going to serve the food.

Chi Xiaochi hadn’t eaten lunch and was now a bit hungry. He wanted to order a salad, but thought it would be insincere to eat before he arrived, so he politely turned down the waiter and said he would wait.

The room is classically decorated in European style, with Wilde’s poems on the walls, written in floral script.

After memorising the poem by heart, Chi Xiaochi, bored out of her mind, turns her head to make a face at herself in the floor-to-ceiling window.

When the dew of the eustoma dried, he dipped it in lemonade and sprinkled it on the petals.

At eight o’clock, he sent a private message to the person whose name was a string of random jumbled symbols.

”I’m already here.” Chi Xiaochi tried to look upbeat, “I guess you’re already downstairs.”

He takes a glass of red wine and counts the 132 neon lights of various sizes outside the window before looking down at his phone.

No response.

Chi Xiaochi checked the road conditions and found no traffic jams in the vicinity.

He looked up the records and confirmed that their appointment was indeed for 7.30 this evening.

Chi Xiaochi began to ramble.

He wondered, if he was in a game now, whether he would need to create a trigger to get out of a new plot line.

Was it because his bow tie wasn’t hung well enough, was it because there was a little dust on his shoes now?

Maybe he’ll come through the door just in time to tie his bow tie, wipe off the dust, and look up again.

But when he straightened up, the door was still ajar.

Outside there is the clink of cups and plates and the faint sound of human voices and a faint Happy Birthday song coming from outside.

Everything was none of his business.

Chi Xiaochi picks up her phone and edits a private message, “How long until you come?”

His index finger rested on the send button for a long time before he moved his finger back to the keyboard and deleted the sentence.

He typed in four words, “Are you ……” lying to me.

Without waiting to type Wen, Chi Xiaochi immediately deleted the first four words, pretending that nothing had happened, that the thought had never occurred to him.

The final words he sent out were, “I’ll wait until you come.”

Chi Xiaochi waited until the 132 neon lights went out one by one.

At three o’clock in the morning, it was as if he were sitting in the only house with light in the city, while the outside was filled with a tidal wave of darkness.

After finishing three bottles of red wine, the waiter pushed the door open.

Seeing that it was not Lou Ying, Chi Xiaochi leaned back on the cushion and looked at him with slightly drunken eyes, just as he was about to repeat that he did not need to serve, he heard the waiter politely say, “Sir, we are closing. Your ……”

Chi Xiaochi is silent.

He whispered, “Go away and leave a light on for me.”

His voice was too low for the waiter to hear, “What did you say, sir?”

”Nothing.” Chi Xiaochi lowered her eyes to her reflection in the floor-to-ceiling window and let out a soft laugh, “Pay the bill.”

The waiter went to make the order.

Chi Xiaochi lifts a hand to rub his eyes and picks up his phone.

The most recent private message with him stopped an hour ago and was sent by him with no reply.

The last dozen or so entries have been ridiculously silly self-questions from him alone.

Even so, Chi Xiaochi is careful to ask for advice: “Can I come back tomorrow?”

This time, he received a quick reply from the other side.

”You cannot send a message due to the other party’s settings”.

There was a crisp crack of glass in the box.

The waiter, who had turned back with the list, was startled at the sound, quickened his pace and pushed open the compartment door –

On the floor were the guests’ recently emptied bottles of red wine, probably accidentally knocked off the corner of the table when they fell, pieces of sharp breakage falling into the shag of the carpet, reflecting the shattered, watery barge of light in the crystal light.

The waiter was busy saying, “Sir, don’t move, be careful of getting hurt. I’ll have someone come and clean it up right away.”

The guest sat in his seat, one hand on the table, shaking slightly, “Excuse me. Is there a broom.”

The waiter quickly rang the notification bell, “Sir, please don’t move. Just a moment.”

Chi Xiaochi bent down and picked up all the large pieces from the floor, stacked them one by one and placed them in the corner of the table.

After signing the order, he pulled his suit jacket, which had been ironed without a single wrinkle, up over his arm and walked slowly out the door with his hands in his pockets.

Chi Xiaochi felt a slight darkness in front of him as he walked out of the tower, where the lift workers were off duty, and looked back to see that the only light still on in the tower had disappeared.

Chi Xiaochi took the darkness for granted and walked aimlessly for a while along the dimly lit lampposts under the road, suddenly too tired to move, too tired to even hail a taxi or call one.

He dialed one of the only two phone numbers he could remember: “Lucas, call the company car to come and pick me up.”

When Lucas came to pick him up, Chi Xiaochi was sitting by the road in front of a mobile phone shop, bent over and with his face buried in his knees.

Lucas seems to have taken advantage of his vacation last night to change his hair colour, with the ends dyed a light powder blue and smelling a little of hair dye on him.

He came out in a hurry, still wearing his favourite bunny pyjamas.

Chi Xiaochi looked up at him, “Nice haircut, Mr Tony.”

For the first time, Lucas didn’t correct him and hurried down from the car and knelt in front of him, “My ancestor, what’s wrong with you? Weren’t you out meeting friends?”

”Pigeonholed.”

Chi Xiaochi summed up his nearly nine-hour wait in three words before trying to stand up, but his face paled slightly and he held his leg, not daring to move: “…… numb.”

Lucas, who is a neat freak, hesitates for a moment but sits down next to Chi Xiaochi with a broken face: “Then lean on me.”

Chi Xiaochi laughs, “I’m telling you, there are probably still paparazzi following me around. The headlines are still about buying drinks on the street, and when I lean on this, tomorrow’s headlines will be about a popular movie star sneaking up on his agent.”

”Fuck you, Rattler.” Lucas said, “With the amount of money we have, I’m the one who’s submarining you.”

Chi Xiaochi poked him, “Isn’t that usually the old mother.”

Lucas: “Fuck off. Read the context and understand. Today I’m your old man.”

He snatched the tens of thousands of dollars worth of suits from Chi Xiaochi’s hand, balled them up into a pillow and placed it on his right shoulder: “I know your stink, here, lean on it.”

Chi Xiaochi asks, “Are you really not afraid to film? It’s going to cost PR money.”

Lucas said, “Shoot, let them shoot, let them shoot and get over it. It’s not like I’m at a disadvantage to be rumoured with you anyway.”

Chi Xiaochi then really leaned in.

He called Lucas: “O Tony.”

Lucas: “Are you looking to die.”

Chi Xiaochi asked him, “Have you ever had that feeling? A person who knows he’s being played, but still has that little bit of hope that there’s a chance he’s not being played.”

Lucas agrees, “Yeah, I feel that way when I’m kryptonite and draw cards.”

Chi Xiaochi : “Do you think this man is stupid?”

Lucas asserted, “Big dumbass.”

Chi Xiaochi was amused and couldn’t stop laughing.

Lucas looked at him sideways, “So, is the big dork going back? We’ve got some soup at home.”

Chi Xiaochi straightened up, “Back.”

Over the next few days, Lucas stayed by his side, calling the PR department to sort out the night’s troubles and scolding Chi Xiaochi for the liar in various ways.

He did the best he could.

It’s just that even Lucas doesn’t understand how Chi Xiaochi spent those nine hours.

Hearing things from someone, even if the narrator is moving, can never compare to experiencing them first hand.

What’s more, what he heard was nothing more than a flippant remark by Chi Xiaochi.

–I was tricked into meeting someone posing as a good friend from the past, waited for hours in vain and in the end, he blacked me out.

Chi Xiaochi is not used to showing his wounds and telling people how good his “best friend” is to him.

He is an adult and knows what is right and what is wrong. He knows that communication is the way to open his heart, that he can do exercise instead of taking sleeping pills if he can’t sleep, and that smoking causes lung cancer.

He was just too lazy to do it for Chi Xiaochi.

People’s sorrows and joys are never interchangeable, so Chi Xiaochi has made himself an island.

Suddenly, one day, because of an accident, he came into a whole new world. He has to live on with someone else’s face and identity, so he dares not muddle through and get by.

He learns to do the right thing and plan the future for each host as best he can.

Because she knows what it is like to be unhappy, Chi Xiaochi wants them to be happy.

As a result, in a roundabout way, he ended up back in his own parallel world.

This is not a desert island, it is a huge paradise.

It was the familiarity of being surrounded by everything he had ever known, and it was this familiarity, which he could fully immerse himself in, that was so addictive.

Honestly, what is different about this world from any other world.

In the final analysis, the hundred hustle and bustle and youthful prosperity of this world did not belong to him.

When Chi Xiaochi came back to his senses, he was surprised to find that he was habitually pinching the flesh of his inner arm.

He was taken aback and immediately released his hand and pressed up against the back of it with his other hand.

It was an old problem of his, and he was often guilty of it when his mind strayed.

Lucas has corrected him so many times that sometimes when he takes his clothes off for magazine covers, Lucas is like, “Oh my God, what’s wrong with you? Who beat you up?”

Chi Xiaochi blurted out, “I went to boxing practice.”

Lucas: “Boxing to the inner thighs? What kind of porno boxing? I’m going to report it.”

Lucas has always told him what to do, but in the end, there is nothing he can do about Chi Xiaochi.

Because even Chi Xiaochi has never thought about what it would be like to be Chi Xiaochi properly.

Later, this problem was naturally corrected as I switched to someone else’s body and couldn’t do as I pleased.

Chi Xiaochi thinks that this is probably why Lord GOD sent him down to this world.

After all, of all the roles he’s played, Chi Xiaochi is the only one he’s failed at.

Suddenly, Chi Xiaochi’s desk was knocked a few centimetres askew, waking him from his hallucinatory dream.

The table and the seat in front of them had some kind of conflict and were kicking each other’s stools.

The girl at the table called the girl in front of her a “backstabber” and she was beaten with a rolled up textbook.

Chi Xiaochi took a break from his emotions, swept up the rice carving left in his palm 089, put it in his mouth and served it down with water from a glass of water.

He wanted to call out to Lou for some peace of mind, but remembered that 089 was now on duty there, so he swallowed his words and just looked down and smiled.

……

The Lord GOD space, ‘in a moment’, is filled with a myriad of gases and dust, like a small nebula, pulled by gravity, with cosmic wandering debris swirling around it, but on closer inspection, a film-like motion picture shimmers and flows between the dust, passing over it silently frame by frame.

Each piece of dust is the story of a person’s life.

Lord GOD has just returned from the General System and has not yet transformed from a human body into a giant suspended brain, so his body is extremely small within the large “space between”.

It was because he did not like the feeling of insignificance that he chose for himself the “brain”, a form of work that was at least dignified in appearance.

He asked the AI, “All in their place?”

The AI replied, “Yes. 061 has gone back and 089 is back on duty.”

LORD GOD Hmmm.

The AI paused for a moment and spoke up to ask, “Are you really not worried?”

Lord GOD renders a dusty object to his eyes, examines it for two seconds and loses interest, waving it away with his hand: “What’s the worry?”

AI: “You are moving too much. As a rule, the worlds are supposed to be progressively more difficult, they don’t schedule the last one as a C level difficulty ……”

”That’s how I award good employees.” Lord GOD said with a smirk, “He’s gotten to so many random hard times before and solved them all on his own, is it wrong for me to wish him a safe transition in his last world?”

AI: “With all due respect ……”

LORD GOD : “You’ve said it straight enough.”

The AI missed the irony in Lord GOD’s words and said to himself, “Combined with the previous anomalous data, it’s too likely that 061 will report it.”

”Let him report it.” Lord GOD examined a speck of dust in front of him, “He doesn’t remember, anyway, what he himself was dealt with for last time.”

The AI is silent.

He knew that Lord GOD was acquainted with Inspector R99, who was directly responsible for the “slag recovery system” in the inspectorate.

The AI reminded him, “You can have R99 call back his report, but you can’t find a reason to format him like you did back then.”

After all, Lord GOD couldn’t have found a good reason to take it down without the brainy lovebrain host reporting 061, who had asked him for leave, for being away from work.

”There are reasons.” Lord GOD said, “Why do you think, I made that agreement with him that allowed him to have his true form in all worlds?”

The AI doesn’t speak.

LORD GOD waved away two more disinterested specks of dust: “That agreement, I didn’t even send it to headquarters. …… To put it bluntly, it was a scrap of paper.”

”With all the irregularities he’s done in these worlds, plus his relationship with Chi Xiaochi …… all I have to do is write up a report on his actions in any of them and submit it, and it’s more than enough to destroy him, not to mention formatting.”

The AI sighed slightly, “It’s better not to destroy it. There’s always a shortage of people in the system ……”

”I know.” Lord GOD said, “He’s a great employee. So he’ll forget where he’s going back to.”

”If he had any sense, he should have stayed in that world with Chi Xiaochi for as long as he could.”

Having said that about 061, Lord GOD then asked, “How many more missions are due in 089?”

The AI checked the data and replied, “212 times.”

”Try to get him as much work as possible.” Lord GOD said, “It does seem to be getting more and more work these days. You need a second-in-command.”

……

The next class was PE, which would normally have been split between other subject teachers, but for the special reasons of the day, the PE teacher made an exception and rejoined the class.

The P.E. teacher at the second school has always been irresponsible, and after a token assembly and roll call, it was time for everyone to have a free spell.

The same table invited him to play basketball.

Chi Xiaochi said, “No.”

Tablemate: “What do you mean no? No fight?”

Chi Xiaochi : “No.”

Tablemate: “So what are you growing so tall for? You’re holding the sky down?”

Chi Xiaochi: “To make you short. Did you learn the language Wen.”

The same table hammered Chi Xiaochi: “Damn it. The organisation has given you a difficult and honourable task, to fill in for the other team and be my undercover agent.”

Chi Xiaochi and he signed this obscene partnership agreement before sitting on a wooden bench on the edge of the field to rest, his head resting on the backrest, staring up at the sky.

It’s not that he can’t play basketball, he’s just a bit tired.

However, Chi Xiaochi was on the sidelines for less than ten minutes before an under-strength player from the opposing team came off.

When he got up on the field, his table gave him a thumbs up.

Chi Xiaochi gives a thumbs up.

Chi Xiaochi used to do a film about an injured basketball player and practiced with a professional coach for a long time to complete a few moves, and then went for a run on the basketball court from time to time to work up a sweat.

Although he hasn’t played basketball for a long time and doesn’t have much of a feel for shooting, he still has the skills to carry the ball over the top plus play match-ups when he’s moving around.

He was so tall that his tablemates had to chase Chi Xiaochi around day after day, shouting at him to slow down and shout at him that he was a rabbit.

Chi Xiaochi’s muscles and spirit were much more relaxed and his body was warming up after the activity.

At half-time, he ran to the sidelines, took the small half bottle of mineral water he had left over from earlier and poured it over his head, then pulled up his little vest and wiped his face.

As he pulled up his shirt, the whispered comments of the girls in his class on the sidelines turned steeply into little squeals of excitement.

He sat on the bench, arms pressed into his knees, head down to control the water.

The cool water running over his neck in the hot sun was pleasant and stimulated his head to buzz.

Chi Xiaochi gasped, his mind in a bit of a trance.

The memories from earlier still consumed his mind and until now he had not been able to fully come out of them, his heart felt like an empty piece and he always felt uncomfortable.

He vaguely heard his tablemate call out to him twice, I think it was about to go on or something.

Chi Xiaochi took another moment to slow down and just as he looked up, he saw a basketball land on the rubber floor not far from him and swirl and bounce straight towards his face.

He didn’t think Chi Xiaochi would be able to catch such a simple ball, but the ball went straight for Chi Xiaochi’s face.

In a moment of despair, he thought, “It’s over, he’s going to be the public enemy of all the girls in the class.

What basketball player doesn’t get a bump or two from a basketball?

Chi Xiaochi closed his eyes and sort of did a primary guard to take a hard face.

However, the rubbery wind that had hit my face was suddenly stopped.

Chi Xiaochi waited long enough for the pain to come and when he opened his eyes, he saw a hand reaching out from his shoulder and grabbing the entire basketball empty.

Chi Xiaochi turned his head and saw Lou Ying standing behind his chair at some point.

Chi Xiaochi was stunned, as was Lou Ying who saw Chi Xiaochi.

…… Lou Ying sees Chi Xiaochi with long adult hair, wet with water, falling down her temples, a little water droplets on her eyelashes, her face floating with a post-exercise flush, her forehead showing because her hair is wet, looking healthy, young and clean, like a university student.

The two men look at each other for a few seconds and both blush.

Lou Ying missed his catch and landed on the ground, bounced twice and was caught in the arms of his tablemate who had arrived.

Lou Ying looked back and gently admonished, “Be careful with the ball.”

The tablemate looked at Lou Ying for a second, gave a “hey”, covered his face with his ball again and asked Chi Xiaochi: “…… Who is this?”

Chi Xiaochi : “My brother. In high school.”

Tablemate: “What high school lets out so early?”

Lou Ying replied for me, “Skipped class.”

The table was dutifully silenced.

To the uninitiated junior high school students, skipping class is a rather unacceptable thing to do, but Lou Ying has a standard good student face, the left side of his face is a good student, and the right side of his face is a proud son, so skipping class is totally incompatible with his aura.

The same table sniffled and asked Chi Xiaochi, “Still fighting?”

Chi Xiaochi: “Why don’t you let my brother play with you? He’s the one who taught me basketball.”

”No, no.” The tablemate resolutely conceded, “You two have a good meal and drink, I’ll go and pull the others.”

Lou Ying naturally took a seat next to Chi Xiaochi after her tablemate left.

And the missing piece of the puzzle in Chi Xiaochi’s mind has been filled in just right.

Chi Xiaochi looked over at him, “You skip class?”

”Still not quite sure about you. I’ve asked my teacher for leave and I’m not going to school until the school year starts.” Lou Ying’s tone was calm, as if he was talking about a simple matter, “I’ve finished with the system, and I’ve been rewarded with 1500 exchange points, which can be exchanged for items that can be exchanged for good sense.”

Chi Xiaochi waited for half a day and then Wen: “…… is gone?”

Lou Ying : “Well, no more.”

At the muffled thud of the basketball hitting the ground, Chi Xiaochi leaned back and said, in a feigned relief, “You could have just told me through the system.”

Lou Ying replied, “Because I want to see you.”

Chi Xiaochi looked at Lou Ying and thought, “It’s so hot, it burns his face.

”Isn’t that a bit abrupt?” Lou Ying raised his hand and gently pressed the back of his head, saying gently, “Next time I’ll be ready with enough reasons to see you again.”

Somehow, Chi Xiaochi’s heart skipped a beat.

…… Lou Ying’s tone just now made him think of the person he had tried so hard to forget.

To be honest, they are not very similar.

The person who cheated on him was very young, without the gentle, sure confidence of Lou Ying, and spoke more like a teenager in love for the first time.

Chi Xiaochi doesn’t know why he suddenly connected the two.

Is it just because they both use the word “abrupt”?

Chi Xiaochi recalls a casual conversation he had in the second world with 061, whose identity had not yet been revealed, and his suspicions about Lou Ying’s true identity.

At that point, the two talked about Lou Ying’s previous memories.

He said, “There was a little accident and it was all forgotten.”

He added, “I owe a man a date.”

And 089 says on Mi Eagles, Lou Brother was formatted.

And before formatting it, he handed a disk to 089.

Chi Xiaochi dips his hand into his trouser pocket and taps the corner of the disk twice, pondering.

Any combination of characters that can be tried, as 089 says, should have been tried.

He gave this to himself rather than to Lou Ying, probably for fear of attracting Lord GOD’s attention, and because he believed he could crack it.

…… 32-bit password ah.

Lou Ying asked him, “Why aren’t you talking, thinking about something?”

”Yeah.” Chi Xiaochi looked at Lou Ying, “Brother, do you think that Zhu Shoucheng is having a bit too smooth a time?”

Lou Ying : “Hmm?”

Chi Xiaochi: “He has been teaching for more than 20 years. The oldest child he’s ever taught is almost 40 years old. So far, no one has come forward to accuse him?”

”Time has changed, I guess.” Lou Ying didn’t find the question too difficult, “Besides, without proof, what can one accuse? In the end, we just put up with it and let it go.”

Chi Xiaochi’s eyes blinked, not entirely satisfied with the answer, “Is he that lucky? Not to mention suing him in court, not even a single blackmailer coming to his house to spill his guts?”