Li Shuoxing was in a happy mood and continued to rub his hair.
Su Mingqian protested, but got no response. Favourability silently -1.
Li Shuoxing quickly took his hand back.
So the little 1 that was deducted was silently added back.
Looking at this scene, Li Shuoxing almost stretched his hand to the screen again…
No, no, impulse is the devil.
Li Shuoxing took two deep breaths to curb his desire.
There’s no point in jumping across the same thing over and over again.
We need to make it different, make it unique, make it—well, sustainable.
Li Shuoxing coughed and said, “Cub, put those down. Come and see the new stuff in the lounge. In addition to the vinyl record player, I got something else new, in front of the bookshelf.”
Su Mingqian was stunned. He looked at the position Li Shuoxing mentioned and finally saw what was standing in front of the bookshelf.
He said, “What’s this?”
Li Shuoxing: “Self-service weekly rack, with four weekly publications refreshed every day. You can buy the ones you want to read.”
Su Mingqian was really interested.
He put down the materials in his hands, walked to the rack and looked at the LCD screen on it.
On the screen, four weekly publications were already in place.
Li Shuoxing swept a glance. Just as he saw the name Nature , he saw the little person standing in front of the rack raise his finger without hesitation, pointing right on that Nature .
At the same time, the system popped up a prompt.
“Your lover is trying to buy the weekly publication Nature , which is priced at 60 contribution points. Do you pay? Yes/No”
In addition to this prompt, Li Shuoxing also saw another one.
“Your lover is trying to buy the weekly publication Nature , which is priced at 60 contribution points. Do you authorise your lover to use the game contribution points? Yes/No”
Two different prompts for the same situation appeared on the phone screen at the same time.
Li Shuoxing pondered for a moment. He felt that the former was a one-time authorisation, while the latter was a long-term authorisation. Considering that it was impossible for him to be in the game all the time, and the little person couldn’t be short of money when he wanted to buy something, he decisively chose the latter.
Alas.
As a mature app.
Besides making money, you’ve learned to spend money.
I’m not upset.
This is an inevitable step to go through.
Li Shuoxing calmly made his choice, and the game popped up a reminder again.
“You are authorising your lover to use the game contribution points. After authorisation, your lover will be able to freely use all of your contributions (including contribution pool contributions and love credit card contributions). Do you confirm the authorisation? Yes/No”
After the second selection, a new card popped up on the screen. The card looked very similar to the love credit card Li Shuoxing had on hand, just a little smaller with a customisable card name.
Li Shuoxing pondered for a moment.
Gave the card a name.
“Cub’s Exclusive Little Wallet”
Then selected to confirm.
The game data transmitted seamlessly.
Su Mingqian, who was about to advance his salary from Ximu to purchase a weekly publication, suddenly noticed that the light screen popped up without anyone speaking, and a prompt appeared on it.
[Mailbox]:
You have received a new email from the bank.
Su Mingqian: “?”
He opened the email with a strange mood and read it.
“Dear Mr Su Mingqian,
Your credit card [Cub’s Exclusive Little Wallet] has been processed and is now in your courtyard mailbox. Please promptly check for it.”
Su Mingqian: “…”
He looked at that [Cub’s Exclusive Little Wallet] for a full ten seconds before turning to the courtyard, getting the mail and taking out the credit card inside.
Credit card in hand.
It was pink.
Su Mingqian: “…”
He paused again, this time for twenty seconds.
Then he began to worry.
The clothes in my closet won’t turn turn pink one day too, will they…
But he still silently accepted all this. He took the cub’s exclusive pink credit card, went back to the weekly rack, swiped the card to buy Nature , then held up the magazine, reading it as he made his way to the couch.
He was so engrossed in reading that he didn’t even feel pain when his leg bumped into the furniture in the room.
The little person didn’t feel pain, but Li Shuoxing felt it for him.
Li Shuoxing couldn’t help reaching out and nudging around the little person, protecting him, helping him and keeping him on the right path.
Of course, the most important thing was watching the little person swaying like a roly-poly toy, super—fun!
Just as Li Shuoxing was having a blast, even secretly increasing the strength of his pushing just in time to protect the falling cub, Su Mingqian, who was reading the magazine, suddenly looked up.
He was very serious. “Ximu!”
Li Shuoxing quickly let go and sat upright, pretending to be serious. “What? What’s wrong? I didn’t do anything—”
The magazine reminded Su Mingqian of something he hadn’t thought of before. He asked Li Shuoxing, “About George’s contact information, have you checked the SCI papers?”
Li Shuoxing was stunned. Then, as if struck by lightning, his head cleared in an instant.
“Right! George won so many awards. He must have published many papers, and these papers published in professional journals should have contact information attached to them! Dang, I just went around in such a big circle…”
Li Shuoxing quickly went online, entered the knowledge network, and searched for papers published by George Warren.
As he searched, he was in shock. “I can’t believe I forgot the simplest way to search contact information. It must be because I’ve graduated from school and no longer use the knowledge network to search for papers… Thinking back to the days when I searched the knowledge network to write essays to brush up my grades in preparation for applying to foreign colleges, it’s as if they were like a lifetime ago.”
Su Mingqian was a little curious. “Which school did you apply to?”
Li Shuoxing: “I won’t tell you which school, I didn’t get in anyway. This is the eternal pain in my heart…”
That said, without waiting for Su Mingqian to speak, Li Shuoxing sighed and told what happened back then.
“Back then, I was very well prepared. When I sent all the documents to that school, I was sure I would pass. However, there was an accident. I misplaced one of the documents with a short story I wrote.”
Su Mingqian responded, “You misplaced your application document with a novel?”
Li Shuoxing spat out one word, “Yes.”
Li Shuoxing spat out another sentence, “Not only did I misplace it, but I only realised I had misplaced it a month later and even completely missed the opportunity to make it up.”
Li Shuoxing spat out a third time, “When I think about the person coming to see the documents but getting a novel instead, it’s fortunate it’s in Chinese. They probably couldn’t understand it, otherwise it really is a shameful play.”
Su Mingqian: “…”
Li Shuoxing said heavily, “Anyway, since then I’ve missed out on this school and become a complete author… ha!”
His voice suddenly rose at the end.
The voice Su Mingqian heard was suddenly filled with excitement.
He said, “Cub, I found his work email!”
He naturally got excited too.
Half stimulated by the good news, half infected by Ximu.
He began to anticipate.
Anticipating more good news, and anticipating Ximu’s voice.
Su Mingqian didn’t see it.
While thinking that, a +50 jumped out of his head, and twice in succession.
Outside the screen, Li Shuoxing, who was focused on writing an email, didn’t notice this little surprise.
He mulled things over and quickly wrote an email similar to the one he had just sent to Mary, but with slightly different details, still emphasising Su and grey eyes.
Within two seconds of sending it.
The mailbox received a new email. It was from George.
The reply came so quickly, but Li Shuoxing didn’t have good feelings.
He clicked on the email and, sure enough, it was an automatic reply from the mailbox.
“Hello,
I have received your email. I will take the time to read it. However, I am currently involved in a long-term study and my response time is uncertain. I hope you can understand.
G.W.”
Li Shuoxing took an extra look at the “long-term study” in the email before sending a screenshot of it all to the little person.
After sending it, he said optimistically, “The search was a bit complicated, but after all, we found two people’s accounts, which is double insurance. There should be someone who can reply to us. Even if neither replies—Cub, you can still choose to sleep more and dream more. We have three more chances to find clues.”
“Ximu, you talk like you’re playing a game.” Su Mingqian suddenly laughed, then said, “Okay Ximu, it’s time for you to go offline. Don’t forget you have writing to do. I’m going to read periodicals too. I’ll check your progress later.”
Li Shuoxing: “…”
Facing such a cub, he couldn’t say that he had a hard day of travelling and should take time off from writing. He could only go offline obediently and type words well.
Of course, the reason he began writing wasn’t all because of the cub’s urging…
He did think of something he needed to add.
Li Shuoxing opened the document and looked at the plot to be posted tomorrow.
In tomorrow’s plot, the consciousness in the rusty copper strip would awaken for a moment.
In the original setting, the rusty copper strip’s consciousness was an old grandfather.
But all the way through writing, Li Shuoxing had always been hesitant. The main reason was that he had a stronger and stronger sense of substitution for Su Mingqian, and felt more like the Su Mingqian in the novel was the Su Mingqian in the game, and the grandfather should also be himself… Then he decided to satisfy himself.
He deleted the old grandfather setting and replaced it with himself.
Of course, he couldn’t use his real name directly. That’d be too narcissistic.
He used “Cunxing”.
Anyway, when he was just born, this had nearly become the name in his household register.
After determining the name, Li Shuoxing decided to add some characteristics to himself.
Big shot was a must.
But it wasn’t so interesting to be just a cool and wild big shot, so in combination with the setting of the rusty copper strip being broken, he gave “Cunxing” a setting of losing money. He would get very distressed that his treasure would disappear for no reason every now and then. So the moment he woke up and saw Su Mingqian, he couldn’t wait to make a decision.
[A distant and deep voice came from the rusty copper strip, and the awakened consciousness said to him, “I am very weak now… I have an extremely difficult and daunting responsibility to hand over to you.”
There was no free lunch in the world.
If you took the benefits of others, you had to eliminate the misfortunes for them.
Su Mingqian said calmly, “Tell me.”
The next moment, an orb shimmering with pink light appeared in front of Su Mingqian’s eyes.
Cunxing solemnly said, “All my savings over the years are here. While I’m asleep, you will take good care of it for me. If you need to, you can also take and use some of it. Alright, I’m tired, I’m going to sleep, good…”
Su Mingqian: “???”
Wait, don’t sleep. What about the difficult and daunting you said?! ]
— Nine Crossings
The next day.
The new chapter was posted online and Cunxing appeared.