Itâs barely past the nighttime rush hour at this point so the roads are still packed. Shao Yanxi continues to sulk and Liu Yuâan canât dig anything out of him no matter how he asked. He even closed his eyes to run away metaphorically.
Liu Yuâan is really frustrated that he just keeps everything to himself instead. He feels like beating someone up, but of course, he treasures him too much to do that.
They thus drive home like this. When they arrive, Liu Yuâan calls out to him, saying, âweâre home,â and unfastens his seatbelt. Shao Yanxi pulls his arm back though.
âI need to ask you something,â Shao Yanxi, despite his comically engorged eyes, has a seriousness to his expression, âis this world the first world you have ever been to?â
Oh? Liu Yuâanâs mind quickly grasps what heâs getting at. He smiles a little and leans forward, kissing him on the eye, and says, âthis is not the first world, but, it is the first-ever world in which I had a partner. I never thought about it, but the cannon fodder is usually single in these virtual worlds, huh. Now that I think about it, perhaps the reason Iâve been single despite going to so many worlds before, is so that I can finally meet you, clean. To meet my bestest best baby, Yanxi. I love you. So stop overthinking it, ok?â
Shao Yanxi tears up again. His tear glands really are oversensitive.
The more Liu Yuâan said, the more he felt like crying, first from sadness, then from surprise and happiness.
He sniffles, but still tries to act calm. He slowly leans over towards Liu Yuâan under his gentle, loving gaze, and hugs his waist, before burying his head in his chest.
Soon enough, Liu Yuâanâs puffer coat is wet. He has enough clothes on inside and doesnât notice it for now. He holds Shao Yanxiâs waist with one hand, and caress his head with the other. Rubbing through his hair, he kisses Shao Yanxiâs ear.
The tingling sensation makes Shao Yanxi shudder slightly, but he doesnât object, letting Liu Yuâanâs tongue run the shape of his ear. He gets the seatbelt out of the way, so that Liu Yuâanâs hand can sneak into his clothes, and touch him on his chest. He canât help but start expecting something inside.
He âmmâs quietly and closes his eyes, feeling how Liu Yuâanâs tongue moves from his ear towards his lips, and pry it open, stretching inside and establishing itself within his mouth. It dances with his own tongue, asserting himself, dominating him.
Shao Yanxi feels slightly out of breath, but he doesnât want to push Liu Yuâan away either; he likes the feeling, the feeling that he is deeply loved and cherished by Liu Yuâan. He also likes the feeling when they are âinteractingâ in bed at a negative distance away as well.
Liu Yuâan seems to know exactly what he is thinking. âWant me?â And he goes on to satisfy him here and now.
Uh, in the car park. Even though he knows itâs practically deserted most of the time, when his mind calms back down a little, Shao Yanxi angrily complains, âLiu Yuâan, you bastard, you canât wait until weâre back at home? What if we were seen?â
While Shao Yanxi is grinding his teeth, Liu Yuâan kisses his eyes again, âthereâs nobody here. Donât worry.â
Qingjiangshui is developed by Shao Yanxi, and as mentioned before, itâs rather expensive as well. In this particular building, besides them and Shao Yanxiâs guards, thereâs barely anyone living here.
Their car is parked in the corner, blocked by pillars and other cars too. Liu Yuâan of course thought about privacy before committing to the act; he doesnât have that kind of fetish, to want to be seen in the act.
Shao Yanxi understands that as well, of course, but with his tummy full of Liu Yuâanâs stuff, that keeps sloshing around and would threaten to flow outside when he walks so Liu Yuâan had to carry him, heâs just angry, and decides to assign all blame to Liu Yuâan.
Liu Yuâan knows how shy he is, and he did bonk him a bit hard just now, so he complies with whatever Shao Yanxi says, until theyâre back home.
When Liu Yuâan is carrying him to the bathroom to get cleaned up, Shao Yanxi stops him, and asks, âwhen I die, and you finally go to another world, would you ever find someone elseâŠâ
While he says it in as unfriendly a tone as possible, he looks really down when he speaks.
Shao Yanxi himself knows how unreasonable it is to demand Liu Yuâan never to have someone else in this or another world or even the main world forever. He should be happy that Liu Yuâan is wholly dedicated to him his entire life here, but, when he imagines him being with someone else in the future, to kiss them, to hug them, to call them baby, to flirt with them⊠He just canât help it.
He would want to cry, to throw a tantrum, to kill them.
Liu Yuâan really is right about his antagonistic tendencies. He has no morals. He is beyond salvation.
Though Liu Yuâan has considered the question already. He is certain that he likes Shao Yanxi, so much so that he doesnât want to separate from him.
He thus thought about bringing him outside to his world. What makes it more difficult though is⊠mainly the difference between them, in a broad sense.
Humanity is already galactic, of course. The labour force is entirely automated. People have a lot of free time.
Too much free time, in fact, that theyâre restless and do reckless things, like having wars and fighting. Not the formal âI hereby declare warâ kind, but the sneaky, guerilla, undercurrent kind.
Most importantly, he ranks triple-S in psychic strength. At his adulthood ceremony, that warmongering dad of his wanted him to expand territory and influence for him. So he ran and assumed a fake identity.
The problem is, that fake identity doesnât have the points nor the authority to coerce the Centre into cooperating. He has to use his real identity⊠Which will mean his dad will find him.
Oh, where will his fair halcyon days with Shao Yanxi go then? Heâll either be on the battlefield or on his way to the battlefield. The kind of battlefield that he canât even have Shao Yanxi tune into on TV to watch his valiant form.
What a mess.
Shao Yanxi doesnât know what Liu Yuâan is thinking of course, so when Liu Yuâan is silent, he canât help but feel more and more in the dumps. He knows he canât just hold onto Liu Yuâan forever, but⊠Canât he at least lie to him and cheer him up, just for a moment?
He feels like crying again.
He doesnât want to cry in front of Liu Yuâan for this either. He pushes him away and quickly walks into the bathroom with wobbly steps, locking the door in the process.
âYanxi!â
Liu Yuâan understands Shao Yanxiâs thought process soon enough, especially seeing how upset he seemed.
Through the glass door of the bathroom, he can see Shao Yanxi leaning on the door with his back, and slowly slouching to the floor.
He didnât even need to see his shoulders shaking to imagine heâs crying inside.
It pains him to see that. So Liu Yuâan wants to explain. Before he does, though, he asks him a question, âYanxi, are you willing to go back into the main world with me?â
When Shao Yanxi hears it, he wants to tell him âyesâ while tears still trickled down his face.
Liu Yuâan explains before heâs calmed enough to answer, âI have to tell you something before you make your final decision. One, technology has advanced. Itâs a galactic civilisation there. Two, the labour force is replaced by autonomous robots, so humans have too much free time. Three, endless free time means theyâre restless. So the world isnât at peace. People fight for power in proxy wars and skirmishes. Four, they normally happen under wraps, and most people are virtually unaffected, but⊠If itâs me, if I go back out, Iâll definitely be dragged into the battlefield. If you follow me, itâll be really painful for you without psychic strength; if you stayed somewhere safe, we wonât be able to see each other.â
Shao Yanxi ponders his words carefully, before asking, âwhy would you definitely be dragged into the battlefield.â
ââŠâ
Because I dodged my conscription?
True, but it sounds really sketchy like that.
He decides to tell Shao Yanxi this instead, âbecause our ambitious Emperor is a warmonger that keeps mongering wars to secure power and influence from other factions. He forces all residents at psychic strength A or above into conscription at 18. I dodged mine.â
Shao Yanxi is actually most shocked by the word âemperorâ in that explanation.
Their worlds really are very different, huh.
Another question strikes his mind, though. He asks, âhow old are you?â
â24.â
âI mean in your world.â
âAlso 24.â
âOh.â Shao Yanxi mutters. So heâs still younger than he is. Heâs unhappy.
âWhat did you do these six years?â
âWorking in the centre and going to the different worlds,â Liu Yuâan turns around, sitting on the glass door, back-to-back with Shao Yanxi, âyou remember âEvernight,â right? The last world I went to was a virtual world born from âEvernight.'â
Liu Yuâan can hear Shao Yanxi gasp slightly. He smiles to himself and continues, âyeah, âEvernight.â I was the Emperor of the Yaoguai. For over a hundred years.â
âOh⊠No wonder your Emperor of the Yaoguai character looked so strikingly realistic. But wait, you⊠You act really differently to the previous âLiu Yuâan,â didnât you?â
Liu Yuâan knows what heâs referring to.
If he could act so out-of-character as âLiu Yuâan,â then he wouldnât have had to act exactly like the âEmperor of the Yaoguaiâ did, would he?
Liu Yuâan explains to him, âbecause this world is no longer bound by plot, so I could just be myself, but I was maintaining the consistency of the character of the âEmperor of the Yaoguaiâ in my Evernight job.â
âWhy is this world no longer bound by plot?â Something seems to almost connect in this mind. He has even started holding his breath.
Liu Yuâan says, âbecause this virtual world has collapsed, and its timeline has been reset by us at great cost.â
Collapse, resetâŠ
Shao Yanxi could work out what they mean from the definition alone. He suspects itâs his fault too. Otherwise, Liu Yuâan wouldnât have had to âcaptureâ him either.
âCaptureâ⊠He doesnât like the word.
Thankfully Liu Yuâan distracts him with his unfortunate career, âI had to be the Emperor for over a century⊠A century! Can you even imagine? Waking up every morning and narcissistically praising myself, and then for everyone else to praise myself; repeat the entire praising verbatim⊠or not, because the praise must be unique per day, before I could go to sleepâŠâ
When Shao Yanxi recalls how Liu Yuâan was in the TV drama, and multiply that for the number of days in a century, he canât help but laugh.
Liu Yuâan hears it, and decides to add to it, âitâs really, really painful. Excruciating. Ah, I thought my ears would learn to flap shut in the end. It was super embarrassing in the beginning, that I even want to slap myself when I did it. Narcissist. No, not even the word narcissist can describe whatâs happening.â
âIt really was.â
Then Liu Yuâan shares his experience in some other worlds with him. When Shao Yanxi finally calms down a little, Liu Yuâan tells him to open the door back up.
When Shao Yanxi does though, something starts flowing outside from his nether regions. Shao Yanxiâs face immediately goes blank and then furious. He scolds Liu Yuâan inside, but still opens the door.