Xing Yue turned around, ready to head downstairs, but He Wuning remained standing at the top of the observation deck, his gaze settling on Master Zhi Yin.
Master Zhi Yin looked a little puzzled. “What is it?”
“Master, have you put skill points into it?” He Wuning glanced toward the building opposite as a hint.
The 30% of fragments he had obtained earlier had been split into several portions. In order to restrain the monster on the opposite side, he was only carrying 40% on him now.
Some of the remaining fragments had gone to the research lab for studying fragments and weapon synthesis; some had been used to enhance Yi Luo’s ability and modify the milk tea car; and another portion had been given to the Master.
Before, the Master had only had a hardening skill. Now he had added another skill: hair manipulation.
Master Zhi Yin looked confused. He glanced at the opposite building, then back at He Wuning. “Mr. He… are you asking me to ferry you to the other shore?”
Xue Xun was filled with solemn admiration. “As expected of a Master. Even such a wildly imaginative idea comes out sounding so Buddhist when he says it.”
“Manipulation followed by hardening would indeed make it possible,” Master Zhi Yin nodded. “However…”
He looked toward the opposite side again. “If there are enemies over there, it could be a little dangerous. You should be careful.”
He Wuning acknowledged him with a quiet response.
The pitch-black long staff in the Master’s hand instantly transformed into soft strands of hair, spreading from this side of the open-air observation deck toward the rooftop of the opposite building. In the next instant, the hair hardened, becoming a solid, temporary black bridge.
He Wuning gave him a slight nod, leapt up from the railing, and dashed lightly and swiftly toward the other side. In the blink of an eye, he had reached the edge of the opposite railing.
“Hey!” Xing Yue shouted, hurriedly trying to follow.
Xue Xun grabbed him. “Take the stairs! With your luck, don’t use a high-risk route like that!”
Leaving the noisy voices behind, He Wuning flipped over the railing of the opposite rooftop with the wind rushing past him—and immediately spotted Yi Luo sitting at a high point.
There was actually a child beside him, seemingly a girl, but she was so thin and malnourished that at first glance it was hard to tell her gender.
Her hands were no longer human hands, but a pair of brown beast claws. She was holding a cup of milk tea, sucking hard on the straw, completely focused, paying no particular attention to He Wuning climbing in over the railing.
He Wuning didn’t know much about animals and couldn’t tell what kind of creature those paws belonged to. If Tang Yu were here, she probably could.
He glanced at the child, then at Yi Luo, who was holding his gun and waving cheerfully at him.
Yi Luo grinned as he greeted him. “Yo, you’re here!”
He Wuning walked over and kicked the foot Yi Luo was dangling in midair. “If you’re fine, why didn’t you send a message?”
Yi Luo shrugged innocently. “Because I wasn’t fine. Look over there—I just finished dealing with that.”
He Wuning took a couple of steps forward, and his view suddenly opened up. In front of the rooftop door, a group of players lay sprawled in all directions. Judging by their appearances, they were probably all believers.
From young adults to the elderly—there were quite a lot of them.
It seemed that the young man hadn’t been lying about that.
Yi Luo jumped down to land beside him. He Wuning scowled. “You did all this by yourself? Why didn’t you call me?”
“I figured even if I did call, you wouldn’t make it in time. Who knew you’d be so creative and come over using the Master’s hair?” Yi Luo shrugged, clearly unconcerned. “Besides, dealing with this group wasn’t very hard.”
“Most of them are level-one players, obviously new to the game and without awakened abilities. And aside from a few who were muttering and getting overly emotional, most of them just begged for mercy when they saw their companions getting beaten. Hardly any real fighting strength.”
He glanced back at the dazed little girl sitting on the platform behind them. “Originally, I was planning to eliminate them completely. They’re traitors, after all. But…”
He scratched his head in frustration. “There’s a kid here.”
“It wouldn’t be right to kill people in front of a child.”
He Wuning looked at him, as if trying to determine whether he truly meant the word “kill.”
Yi Luo usually looked carefree and flippant, speaking half in jest, half in truth, making it hard to read his real intentions. But for some reason, He Wuning felt that the trace of killing intent Yi Luo had just revealed was real—and that he hadn’t intended to hide it from him.
Noticing his gaze, Yi Luo turned his head with a smile and met his eyes. “Hmm?”
He Wuning looked away. “En.”
“For a child that young, bloody violence is still too early.”
“But you still punched every single one of them once, right?”
“Haha.” Yi Luo laughed heartily and slung an arm around He Wuning’s shoulders. “Because seeing people like this really makes me angry. And even if they beg for mercy, I’m not like Xue Xun—I can’t tell whether they’re sincere or not. If it’s a trap, that’d be troublesome.”
“So it’s simpler not to give them a chance to set traps at all. Just knock them all out.”
His smile faded. “How did things go on your side?”
“Qi Hong can only see futures that are certain to happen, so… was Zhao Yantong still stabbed?”
He Wuning fell silent for a brief moment. Yi Luo misinterpreted the silence, frowning hard. “Don’t tell me…”
“There was actually a bit of a misunderstanding.”
Yi Luo rubbed his nose. “It wasn’t Zhao Yantong who got stabbed.”
“Huh?” Yi Luo didn’t react right away.
“Ahem.” With a complicated look, He Wuning took out the painting and pointed at the simple sketch on it. “Buzz cut—yes, definitely a buzz cut. But the ‘girl’ part seems to have been our imagination.”
“Ah?” Yi Luo looked utterly confused.
“Probably because of the glass barrier, plus that pose that looked like casting a spell, we subconsciously thought of Zhao Yantong, so we assumed it was a girl.”
He Wuning looked at him. “It wasn’t a girl at all. You get it now, right?”
Yi Luo furrowed his brows. “I think I get it… so who exactly was this buzz-cut person who got stabbed?”
He Wuning replied, “Master Zhi Yin.”
Yi Luo: “……”
It took him a few seconds to process that fact. “Mistaking the Master for Zhao Yantong…”
For a moment, it was hard to say whether the stabbed Master had it worse—or Zhao Yantong, who had been mistaken for the Master.
Yi Luo rubbed his temples, wearing an expression that was half amused, half exasperated. “So the Master’s okay, right?”
“He’s fine.” He Wuning glanced at the Zone E players lying on the ground in front of them. “Did you get anything out of them?”
“Nope.” Yi Luo smiled brightly. “I told you, I almost killed them. I went straight for violence the moment I got there.”
He Wuning narrowed his eyes at him, then suddenly reached out and flicked his forehead.
“Tch—!” Yi Luo hadn’t expected it at all. He stared at him in shock. “What was that for?! Why did you suddenly flick me?!”
He Wuning looked away, shoving both hands into his pockets. “Nothing.”
“I just suddenly found your smile really irritating.”
Yi Luo: “...Don’t you think you’re being a bit much?”
He Wuning turned to leave, but Yi Luo grabbed him by the collar. “Let me flick you back.”
“No.” He Wuning refused flatly.
The two were still tugging at each other when the rooftop door was kicked open. Xing Yue—who had climbed down from the opposite observation deck and then back up this building—finally arrived, panting as he clung to the doorframe. “A-are you okay?!”
“We’re fine.” He Wuning glanced at the Zone E players sprawled across the floor. “They might not be.”
“Hey, don’t talk nonsense,” Yi Luo shook his head and stretched lazily. “I only punched each of them once. They’re definitely fine. Don’t go accusing me of fraud.”
Xing Yue turned over an elderly man with a snake tail, confirmed that they were only unconscious, and nodded. He waved over the combat officers behind him, ordering them to temporarily detain everyone and interrogate them later to see if anything useful could be extracted.
His gaze then fell on the child sitting on the raised platform. Seeing the milk tea in her hands, he couldn’t help baring his teeth. “Why are you giving the enemy buffs now?”
“Was this fight too easy for you or something?”
“It really was pretty easy,” Yi Luo laughed, shrugging innocently. “But she said she was hungry.”
“About to get killed, about to be attacked, not scared at all—and instead staring at the enemy and saying she’s hungry. She must’ve been starving for real.”
Xing Yue looked at the clearly malnourished child with a complicated expression and scratched his head irritably. “If she’s hungry, you give her milk tea? Do you have any common sense?”
He reached up toward the child fiercely. “Come down. Even if you’re being locked up, there’ll be food!”
The child completely ignored Xing Yue’s outstretched arms, as if she hadn’t heard him at all.
He Wuning checked his pockets and didn’t find any proper food—only a piece of candy. He held it up toward the child, and she immediately turned her gaze over like a small animal catching the scent of a bone.
Before He Wuning could even say anything, she leapt down from the platform on her own.
He Wuning tossed the candy to Xing Yue. Xing Yue caught it, and the child immediately switched targets, scampering over to him like a puppy chasing a flying disc.
Xing Yue looked utterly miserable as he handed her the candy and shouted, “Hey! Peel off the wrapper!”
Watching him fluster around trying to coax a child, He Wuning actually found it a little funny.
Yi Luo leaned against the railing, laughing. “Xing Yue, you’ll definitely be a great mother someday.”
Xing Yue spun around in fury and flipped him off. Leaning against the railing, the two heartless idiots exchanged a knowing laugh.
Yi Luo turned his face slightly and caught sight of He Wuning’s rare smile. He Wuning immediately reined it in. “What are you staring at?”
Yi Luo reached out and pressed down hard on his head, then suddenly lowered his voice. “I really did want to kill them just now.”
“In a situation like that, if I said they were attacked by an out-of-control monster, even if I killed all of them, no one would hold me responsible.”
“Look at these stupid, selfish people. They’re still human.”
“Seeing people like this is like being reminded that humans have a dark side too.”
Something seemed to flash through his eyes. He Wuning paused, and, begrudgingly, didn’t brush away the hand resting on his head. “But you held back.”
“There was a kid there, after all.” Yi Luo smiled and stretched. “And now I’ve absorbed plenty of righteous Ningning energy from my justice-loving Blue Star companion, so I feel like I can keep being a righteous partner again!”
To his surprise, He Wuning actually punched him for daring to boldly call him “Ningning.”
Yi Luo looked at He Wuning with some hesitation. He Wuning reached out and, as if returning the favor, pressed down firmly on his head. “That’s normal.”
Yi Luo froze.
“Sometimes, when I find humans cute, I get a bit carried away with heroic idealism,” He Wuning withdrew his hand. “But I also know they’re not always cute.”
“There are still more than four hours until eight p.m. Let’s go—time to mooch some cookies from the tech department.”
Watching his retreating back, Yi Luo couldn’t help but laugh.
Q-chan squinted at him. “What are you laughing at?”
Yi Luo patted Q-chan on the head. “He’s pretty cute, isn’t he?”
“Of course!” Q-chan puffed out her cheeks and glared at him, her expression clearly saying, As if you needed to say that.
“Oh—” Yi Luo laughed. “Now that I think about it, didn’t I say something similar before? And some system questioned me about it?”
Q-chan was visibly guilty. “Don’t make things up! When did I ever say that?!”
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The author has something to say:
Mini bonus skit (not canon):
Yi Luo: In Chapter Six, I still remember all the evidence some system used to claim He Wuning wasn’t cute.
Q-chan: ……
Yi Luo: A halfway-through lackey like you can’t beat me. I’ve thought he was cute from the very beginning.
Q-chan: Damn it, don’t get so smug!
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