"All right, I just thought you seemed a little out of it and wanted to help you snap out of it. Don't be mad at Brian. Your old uncle's actually a pretty good guy. Even kind of...well, cute, maybe?"
Liao Ji thought back to the brief but pleasant conversation he'd had with the bearded man in the private room, then came up with that description.🐙☢ ♣☢
But when Irin heard him, the girl just rolled her eyes.
Cute?
One of you called the other cute, and the other called him a stupid, nice guy. Great, so I'm the only one nobody likes—the big bad villain!
But that wasn't the point. What Irin cared about more right now was...
"Y-You antique, don't tell me you actually believed his nonsense!"
"Not exactly. I mean, we've only known each other for half a day at most. I'm pretty confident in my charm, but not so narcissistic that I'd believe that."
Liao Ji shrugged, then quickly turned the conversation right back around.
"Though you're acting pretty strangely, Miss Irin. Could it be that you really fell in love with me at first sight, a lovesick girl dazzled by my handsome face?"
"You—Pfft!"
After the girl predictably let loose a string of curses, Liao Ji felt relieved.
Because...
"As a precaution, I should tell you this first, Miss Irin. I already have someone I love." Liao Ji looked very serious as he said it.
Even if he played for twenty-four hours a day without eating, drinking, or sleeping, it would take more than a year to rack up tens of thousands of hours in a game. And there was no way he could actually do that. In reality, Liao Ji had spent four or five years reaching that total.
Spending so much time on an obscure single-player game wasn't really Liao Ji's style. But back then, he'd been going through a dark period in his real life. So it was less that he'd been playing a game, and more that it had been...a spiritual refuge, a shelter from reality.
That was why Liao Ji had grown so attached to Falling and the characters he'd raised. They'd brought him happiness and comfort during that time. He'd truly enjoyed gradually raising the girls he loved and making them stronger. Maybe that was what it meant to be a character fanatic.
Later, after they helped him climb out of that low point, he started putting more of his energy back into reality. He'd also become more focused on efficiency in the game, thinking only about clearing it as quickly as possible.
Pfft. It really was just like that picture the internet jokers were always posting.
[Don't let women in real life fool you!]
Liao Ji chuckled at himself. But in the end, he'd already made up his mind when he chose the Second Playthrough: he'd make up for the regrets of the first playthrough. No matter what, this time he'd make it up to them. He'd absolutely spend time getting close to his beloved girls!
Liao Ji hadn't tried to hide his expression. So as he remembered his time in the game, the girl beside him saw the genuine, involuntary smile on his face, the fondness and happiness in it. Irin knew very well that it would be hard to fake such feelings.
"But you said you came from the Wasteland five hundred years ago..."
"That's right. So the person I love is from five hundred years ago, too."
"Th-Then, isn't she already..." Irin's voice suddenly grew quiet. It felt as if a massive stone were pressing against her chest.
From Liao Ji's few short sentences, Irin had already pieced together the outline of a story.
Two people who were deeply in love had been separated for all kinds of reasons. Then, when one of them finally woke up and went looking for the other, she discovered the greatest and most insurmountable distance in the world stood between them: time.
A sorrow she couldn't put into words suddenly filled Irin. It was like being a little girl again, hiding under the covers as she secretly read romance novels and cried her eyes out over the tragic parts.
Irin had never imagined something like that could happen in real life—and right before her eyes, no less.
In an instant, the girl's gaze softened as she looked at the young man across from her.
As for Liao Ji...
Uh.
Seeing the sympathy and heartache on the girl's face, Liao Ji thought it over and decided not to set her straight.
After all, if Irin found out that "they" were all still around—and that "they" was plural—it would kind of ruin the mood.
But before Liao Ji could say anything, Irin pressed him again.
"So that's why you said you were going to find them... The Great Emperor's five Vanguards. You're hoping they can help you find traces of the person you love, aren't you?"
Uh.
Liao Ji lifted his head slightly and gazed into the distance. Moonlight fell across him.
He let out a long sigh, then shook his head and gave a faint smile, making it seem as if he knew the road ahead was a dead end but was determined to press on regardless. At last, he nodded to Irin.
"That's right."
The girl nodded in understanding. It was just as she'd expected.
Now all the questions in Irin's mind had been answered. Why was Liao Ji so fixated on the Great Emperor's Vanguards? Why wouldn't he give up, even after she'd told him how exalted and revered those five Vanguards were now?
Irin tried to put herself in Liao Ji's shoes. If the person she loved could only be saved by facing the five people at the pinnacle of the world's power and strength...
In the end, the girl came to a conclusion: she'd make the same choice as Liao Ji. Even if they were the legendary Vanguards of the Great Emperor, Irin was certain she'd face them without fear.
Thinking about it that way, the young man across from her seemed to grow taller in her eyes.
"Hmph. Fine, fine, I admit I misjudged you. I didn't know you were such a devoted person, you antique. With feelings like that, you've earned yourself a good brother. I, Irin, accept you!"
Irin held out her pinky fist toward Liao Ji. When the young man across from her still didn't react, she glared at him until he held out his own fist. Then she bumped it firmly against hers.
"This is a Contract among us scavengers. From now on, you're my buddy, Irin's pal. And what matters to my buddy matters to me, so don't worry. I'll help you! No matter how crazy things get, I'll go crazy right along with you!"
"Thanks."
"But, um...ahem. Before that, antique, you still have to cure my mom." Irin's face turned red. She seemed to realize that she'd just made such a bold promise, only to immediately turn around and ask him for help. She felt a little embarrassed.
But they were buddies now, right? Helping each other out was perfectly normal between good friends!
Besides...
"Curing my mom will also help us find the Saintess!"
"Oh? How so? Is your mother part of The Church?"
Liao Ji had only asked on a whim, but the girl actually nodded.
"Heh, you catch on quick. That's right. My mom used to be a full-fledged nun in The Church. She even went to Michelle City and was praised by the bishop there!"
"That was a bishop, you know! Do you get it? He's on a completely different level from the lousy priest here in Black Cave!" Irin looked incredibly proud.
That was an unexpected bonus for Liao Ji, like finding out halfway through a quest that there was a hidden reward.
If he could use Irin's mother as a connection to get into The Church and establish ties quickly, he should be able to meet Stia much sooner.
However...
Perhaps she'd noticed Liao Ji's confusion. Irin's expression dimmed a little, and she turned her head slightly as she spoke.
"Six years ago, that bastard of a father of mine became Corrupted and lost control. The Knights Order killed him as a Corrupted Corpse monster, and my mom got dragged into it too. That damn priest stripped her of her status as a nun, then punished us for blasphemy by confiscating every last bit of savings we'd worked so hard to build up! Our lives went downhill after that. If Brian hadn't helped us out, we might've starved to death on the street."
"So ever since then, even though my mom kept hoping I'd stay in school and become a nun in The Church when I grew up, I'd already seen through it. The so-called Church is just a bunch of censored bastards! Helping the unfortunate? Bringing us happiness? What a load of censored crap! I dropped out and went with Brian into the wilderness, where I learned scavenging from him. That was how our lives slowly got back on track. But who could've guessed that just as things were finally starting to get better, my mom would suddenly..."
Irin clenched her teeth. Liao Ji now understood why the girl resented the priest and The Church so much.
"All right. You've already made it through the hardest part, haven't you? Once we get to your auntie's place and cure her, you'll leave Black Cave and start a new life."
"And I want you to know that even if your mother were an ordinary person, I'd still take this just as seriously and do everything I could to cure her. I promised you that from the start. Our work contract—uh, should I call it brotherly friendship now?"
Liao Ji's earnest words struck Irin like a powerful jolt of electricity, making her heart pound. She hurriedly reminded herself that he was a buddy, a brother, then said, a little flustered:
"Antique, you must've tricked plenty of girls with those flirting skills of yours, right? You've got a whole arsenal of lines to leave people swooning!"
Liao Ji nodded and admitted it readily. "That might be the power of two hundred romance comics."
"Heh, two hundred romance comics? Forget the Wasteland five hundred years ago—even today, five hundred years later, those censored authors are so lazy that asking them to update one more chapter a day is like asking them to censored—kill them! They update so little, and then they still censored drag things out! They keep going on about some useless, foul-tempered female side character. A few chapters later, you look at the main plot and it hasn't moved at all. I'm so done with those censored authors! I want to lock them in a little dark room and take a whip to them, censored!"
"Five hundred years later, it's still like that, and you expect me to believe there were two hundred comics five hundred years ago? Not a chance!"
From Irin's dangerous, gritted-teeth rant, it was clear that web novels and comics hadn't developed very well in this era.
Liao Ji: "..."
"All right, let's go. Your auntie's clinic should be just around the next corner, right?"
At the same time that Liao Ji and Irin were hurrying toward the clinic—or perhaps a little earlier—
Haisha Bar.
The bar was pitch-black. Only the moonlight filtering inside revealed the wreckage left behind by the battle and the Knights Order's investigation.
Tables and chairs lay scattered, and broken bottles covered the floor. The neon tubes in the ceiling had long since gone dark, and several had crashed to the ground. The floor was smeared with grime where blood and liquor had mixed.
In this deserted, desolate bar...
Suddenly...
A red light blinked from somewhere on the wall. It stood out sharply in the gloom.
It was a...
Surveillance camera.
One of the bar's original security cameras.
When Brian had left, he'd shut off all the electrical appliances in Haisha Bar. Later, he'd even turned off the main breaker. The entire bar should've been without power, so in theory, no electrical device should've been able to work.
However...
Yes, the surveillance camera was part of the "security system." Even without the mains power, it could still be switched on thanks to its emergency backup battery.
But the problem was...
It should've been "broken."
Liao Ji had destroyed all the obvious things, including the surveillance recordings, when he used [Calamity Magnetic Pulse]. Otherwise, the Knights Order would've seen everything as soon as they arrived and checked the footage.
The Knights Order hadn't been too suspicious about that.
When a Corrupted went berserk, it released intense Corrupt Calamity contamination. Many case reports had shown that Corrupt Calamity contamination could indeed affect appliances and other inanimate objects, causing permanent malfunctions and damage.
That was exactly why the camera that had suddenly "lit up" in the darkness seemed so bizarre and inexplicable.
The red light on the surveillance camera was only the first step.
Next, the electronic monitor corresponding to the camera in the surveillance room also flickered on. Lines of text began to appear on the screen.
[Intrusion successful.]
[System reboot successful.]
[Attempting to repair corrupted data. Current progress: 14% 29% 40%]
[Maximum data restored: 91%]
[Beginning video analysis.]
The image on the electronic monitor changed. The surveillance footage from Haisha Bar over nearly the past month flashed by at high speed. At last, the final frame of the recording stopped at the instant Liao Ji used [Calamity Magnetic Pulse].
The footage after that belonged to the 9% of data "it" hadn't been able to restore.
But...
This was enough.
In the empty surveillance room late at night, the computer seemed to have a will of its own as it operated by itself. It repeatedly zoomed in on one frame of the recording.
Closer and closer.
At last, the image that "it" had magnified countless times, filling the entire electronic screen, was...
A girl's slender, fair neck.
Of course, that wasn't the important part.
The important thing was...
At the nape of the girl's neck was a complicated, profound, shackle-shaped mark. Even magnified countless times, the surveillance camera's resolution left it terribly blurry, and only its outline could be made out.
But that was enough.
[.]
[.]
[Number: 857956. Total deployment time for this "observation subject": 4,690,032 hours]
[Successfully retrieved "Calamity Magnetic" pulse waves...]
[Suspected "Contract" structure detected. Similarity to database records: 95%]
[Highest call condition confirmed. Requesting execution of "Ash" protocol.]
[Request approved. Preparing call.]
[Temporary virtual platform constructed. Complete]
[Antivirus network established]
[Pre-downloading brain-computer interface "S-11" combat chip. Complete]
[Energy monitoring. Complete]
[.]
[.]
[Awakening mother system core "Zero"...]
Before you continue