Thoughts Amid Slumber (Part 1)

On the morning of April 23, before Shiling's Mother in Star City received a call from the police, Xiang Kun had already begun his blood-drinking dormancy period.

The place where Xiang Kun slept after drinking blood was the courtyard he and Lao Xia had rented before, where Lao Xia had prepared meat rabbits for him to drink blood.

At this time Xia Tianhuo, Professor Li Yang, and others were still in Chongyun Village. Xiang Kun explained to them that the game needed to be upgraded and revised, and he was responsible for finalizing and perfecting some of the added and modified functions. Therefore, he needed to "seclude" himself and work on it for a day. His computer and related equipment were in the courtyard he had rented before, so he naturally had to go back there.

At Xiang Kun's request, Liu Caifu will continue to take Xia Tianhuo, Li Yang, and others to tour the village and the area around Chongyun Mountain, and let them experience the agritainment projects he plans to develop with Chu Xiuwen.

Xia Tianhuo, Li Yang, and the others naturally had no doubts about the reasons Xiang Kun gave them, and even wondered if a day would be enough.

After all, in their view, the main "high-level" members of "Universe Technology," Tang Baona, Yang Zhen'er, and Xiang Kun, are all currently in Chongyun Village, and the game is in testing. They seem to be neglecting their duties.

Xia Tianhuo, in particular, knew the scale and scale of Zhang Qian's "Soaring Dragon Interactive Entertainment." Compared to that, Xiang Kun's group seemed like a makeshift operation.

However, he also suspected that Xiang Kun might have a game development team helping him with the work, and that he might be mainly responsible for overall control. Otherwise, he probably couldn't handle such a large project by himself.

Xia Libing, who already knew the situation, needless to say more. Little Apple also had some suspicions about Xiang Kun's "seclusion" and realized something, but naturally she wouldn't say anything more.

Of the others, only Yang Zhen'er's eyes immediately lit up when she heard that Xiang Kun seclusion to "do some work".

After lunch, she found Tang Baona and whispered mysteriously in his ear, "Nana, Chef Xiang is here again."

"They're here?" Tang Baona, who was chatting with Little Apple in the yard, looked up at the gate and asked in surprise, "They're not here. Isn't Xiang Kun working in the house he used to live in?"

"Didn't I say... there are always a few days every month Chef Xiang goes missing? And now it's happening again!" Yang Zhen'er whispered. "Believe it or not, Chef Xiang is definitely not in that courtyard now. All that work and seclusion is just a pretext. He's probably secretly slipped away somewhere again."

Tang Baona laughed and said, "You haven't given up on your guess that 'Xiang Kun is a member of a secret organization'? Look at the way you're talking, those few days every month, it sounds like Xiang Kun is getting his period."

As Tang Baona spoke, she realized she had hit a nerve and couldn't help but laugh.

Little Apple, focused on feeding "Gold Glitter," pretended not to hear their discussion.

However, she actually agreed a little bit with the claim that "Xiang Kun is a member of a secret organization," and even thought that maybe she would be absorbed into the "organization" soon.

Yang Zhen'er continued in a low voice, "How about we make a bet? You come with me to that courtyard right now and peek inside. Chef Xiang is definitely not there!"

"Xiang Kun is working, don't bother him. We're both in the company's management, after all! If we can't help now, fine, but don't make things worse!" Tang Baona glared at her.

"Let's go over under the guise of delivering food, just to 'visit' him. We'll drop the food off and leave, without disturbing his work," Yang Zhen'er said. "Let's just bring him the meat buns he made this morning."

"Uncle Xiang said he has food over there, so we don't need to bring him meals," Little Apple couldn't help but whisper.

Yang Zhen'er immediately chimed in, "We're not really going to deliver food. We're just using delivering food as an excuse to 'visit' your Uncle Xiang! We'll just take a quick look and run! Little Apple, do you want to come along?"

Ten minutes later, Yang Zhen'er was still the only one sneaking out of the courtyard and heading towards the courtyard Xiang Kun used to live.

However, once she arrived at the location, Yang Zhen'er encountered a problem. The outer gate was locked, and the wall was quite high; she wasn't sure she could climb it.

Even if you manage to climb up, you might slip and fall flat on your face when you try to climb in, and that would be terrible.

So she waved her hand in front of the security camera at the door, jumped a couple of times, and called out to the Chef Xiang a few times.

I knocked on the door for a while, but there was no response.

After lingering at the door for a while, Yang Zhen'er sent Xiang Kun another WeChat: "Chef Xiang, open the door! I've brought you some food."

I was convinced that Xiang Kun was definitely out of contact and wouldn't reply, but to my surprise, a few seconds later I received a panda emoji that said "Get lost!"

No way, they haven't gone missing?

Yang Zhen'er thought for a moment and made a call, but the call was immediately disconnected. Then she received a panda emoji saying "Don't make a fuss" on WeChat.

Yang Zhen'er was still unwilling to give up. She knew that Lao Xia and Liu Caifu should both have keys to this courtyard. She was thinking about how to deceive Deputy Director Liu or "steal" Lao Xia's keys when someone suddenly patted her on the shoulder.

Yang Zhen'er was startled and almost jumped up. When she turned around, she saw Xia Libing.

She patted her chest and breathed a sigh of relief, "Lao Xia, you should have said something first! Suddenly patting my shoulder like that scared me to death!"

"What are you doing here?" Xia Libing asked.

Yang Zhen'er said, "I've come to bring food to Chef Xiang."

"What about food?" Xia Libing asked.

"Uh... that's not important, Lao Xia, are you going to find Chef Xiang? I need to talk to him, can we go in together?" Yang Zhen'er said with a chuckle.

Xia Libing said, "I heard from Nana that you thought Xiang Kun wasn't here and wanted to come and verify. I was worried you wouldn't be able to open the door and would fall while climbing over the wall, so I came to open the door for you."

In fact, when Yang Zhen'er arrived, Alice, who had noticed the situation through the surveillance camera, had already reported to Lao Xia and proposed more than a dozen solutions, such as "calling her in Xiang Kun's voice," "having 'Zero Zero One' scare her away," and "having 'Zero Zero One' throw a small insect down from the tree to scare her away." Of course, this was because it was Yang Zhen'er who came, so these were all "soft" responses. If it were someone with ill intentions or a thief, Alice would have a hundred and one more "ruthless" solutions.

But Xia Libing chose the most "traditional" approach—he came directly and showed her around.

Yang Zhen'er was quite surprised to see Lao Xia take out the key and open the courtyard gate. On her way to Chongyun Village, she had already made a judgment: Lao Xia might have been bribed by Chef Xiang and would help Chef Xiang.

So, when she wanted to spy on Xiang Kun, she didn't go directly to Lao Xia for the key, but she didn't expect Lao Xia to bring her here on his own initiative.

After leading Yang Zhen'er into the courtyard, Xia Libing didn't take her directly into the house. Instead, he went to a window on the side, beckoned to her, pointed to the window, and whispered, "Look."

Yang Zhen'er went over as instructed, approached the window, and sure enough, she saw a tall, strong man sitting in front of a computer in a dimly lit room without the lights on. On the screens, which emitted a faint glow on three sides, there was code that she couldn't understand scrolling, indicating that the man was operating the computer.

Although the person was sitting in a computer chair with their back to the window, the cell phone on the table next to them and their distinctive bald head clearly identified them.

Yang Zhen'er couldn't help but stick out her tongue, and said with a slightly embarrassed smile, "Chef Xiang is actually here..."

"Let's go now that it's verified. You're not really going to go in and say hello to him, are you?" Xia Libing said.

"No need, no need to say hello, let's go, let's go." Yang Zhen'er quickly slipped out of the yard. Just kidding, if she really went over to "say hello," she would definitely get a lecture from Chef Xiang, and then next time he might not cook her favorite flavors. Then the whole table of dishes would be the light flavors that Nana likes, which she can't stand.

Watching Yang Zhen'er slip out of the courtyard, Xia Libing glanced back at the window. The curtains, which had been drawn back, were now slowly closing, clearly indicating that it was an electric curtain.

At this moment, Xiang Kun was naturally asleep. However, previous experiments and observations on the period of deep sleep showed that Xiang Kun would not move his body unconsciously while asleep, and his sleeping posture did not matter. Even if he was lying down and it was uncomfortable, he would not feel any discomfort when he woke up. Therefore, this time Xiang Kun adopted a sleeping posture of sitting in a computer chair and in front of a computer screen in order to deal with Yang Zhen'er's situation.

In fact, he had many other ways to deal with it, such as Alice responding by phone using his voice pack, and so on.

Xia Libing looked up at the several visible and hidden cameras in the yard, followed Yang Zhen'er out, and then turned around and locked the yard gate again.

Actually, she had been communicating with Alice on her phone since this morning, but the topic of their communication wasn't Xiang Kun, but rather the Little Chubby Girl.

After Shiling's Mother received the call from the police, Alice immediately found out what had happened through her own means and then notified Lao Xia.

Alice had been instructed by Xiang Kun to not only protect Xiang Kun during his slumber, guard Chongyun Village, assist Lao Xia, and act as Little Apple's eyes and ears and sensor, monitoring the movements of "Shenxing Technology" including Mr. Liang, Dr. Fang, Mi Qiao, Zhou Rui, and others, but also to be Little Chubby Girl's teacher and do everything possible to protect her.

Alice was very concerned about her "Little Bell Sister," so she not only found out the specific crimes Shi Ling's father had committed, his current location and situation, but also overheard through Shiling's Mother's phone that she was going to take Little Chubby Girl back to her parents' home to find Little Chubby Girl's maternal grandmother. She immediately used Shiling's Mother's information to find out the location of her maternal grandmother, informed Lao Xia, and suggested that Lao Xia simply bring Little Chubby Girl to Chongyun Village.

Alice also came up with several plans regarding the method and excuse for picking up the Little Chubby Girl.

Xia Libing was also willing to take the Little Chubby Girl to Chongyun Village to stay temporarily. With the Little Chubby Girl, Little Apple, Egg Pie, Gold Glitter, Alice all together, who knows what sparks might fly and help her better observe the "Super-Sensing Item System".

However, her original idea was to wait until Xiang Kun woke up from his blood-drinking slumber before going to Star City to pick up Little Chubby Girl together. She could use the excuse of their business trip to contact Shiling's Mother and say that she wanted to pick up Little Chubby Girl to play in Chongyun Village. This would be more appropriate, since firstly, Xiang Kun was quite familiar Xiang Kun Shiling's Mother and Liu Shiling, and secondly, it would be best if someone who knew the situation could keep an eye on Xiang Kun during his blood-drinking slumber.

Normally, if Liu Shiling were sent by her mother to live with her maternal grandmother and aunt, even if the environment was a bit poor, it wouldn't be a problem for a day or two.

Unexpectedly, in the afternoon, Shiling's maternal grandmother took her away from Shiling's aunt's house and headed to Green Mountain Village.

Meanwhile, Alice, who had been monitoring the electronic devices of the individuals involved, had overheard the afternoon conversation between Shi Ling's aunt and uncle. She deduced that Shi Ling's aunt's family also had a bad attitude towards Liu Shiling and her mother. She then relayed this assessment to Lao Xia, suggesting that the Little Chubby Girl would have a hard time in Green Mountain Village. She proposed bringing the Little Chubby Girl to Chongyun Village ahead of time and assured him that she would take good care of the sleeping Xiang Kun and that there would be no problems.

So while Shiling's grandmother was taking Liu Shiling by car to Green Mountain Village, Xia Libing had already set off alone to Jianzhou City to catch a plane to Star City.

Xia Libing told Tang Baona and Yang Zhen'er about the Little Chubby Girl's current situation and wanted to pick her up. She planned to contact Shiling's Mother after arriving in Star City and use the excuse of "going by" to pick up the Little Chubby Girl to play.

Although she didn't say exactly how she found out, Tang Baona and Yang Zhen'er naturally assumed that the Little Chubby Girl contacted her via QQ. As the Little Chubby Girl's "pretty older sister" and "fairy sister," they naturally had no objection. They originally wanted to go with her, but considering that Xiang Kun was currently "in seclusion" working, and that Xia Tianhuo and Little Apple, the father and daughter, were also there, they, as semi-"hosts," had to stay and take care of them, especially to keep Little Apple.

While Xia Libing was waiting for her flight at the airport, Alice told her about the unexpected situation that had happened to the Little Chubby Girl in Green Mountain Village.

Xia Libing naturally instructed Alice to protect the Little Chubby Girl's safety and guide her to a safe place to wait, so that she could pick her up when she arrived.

When the Little Chubby Girl encountered the middle-aged man who suddenly harbored malicious intentions, Alice actually had several options for handling the situation.

The simplest solution is to help the Little Chubby Girl physically destroy the middle-aged man. Alice has already obtained a lot of information about him through his phone, and combined with his behavior on the spot and her emotional perception of "Emotion-Infused Object," she can basically confirm his motives and won't wrong an innocent person.

Even without Alice doing anything, the Little Chubby Girl who had already activated five "Super-Linked Object" beyond the normal level was already invincible.

However, after learning about the situation, Lao Xia immediately instructed Alice to use another plan that required the help of Little Apple's abilities—to try to use Little Chubby Girl's "Super-Linked Object" hyper-excitation state to remotely project the "Eight-Armed Eight-Eyed Wooden Carving" emotion.

Xia Libing believes that the Little Chubby Girl is still too young. If she directly controls the power of the "Super-Sensing Item System" to destroy a person and witnesses it firsthand, it may have a negative impact on her.

While ensuring her safety, we should try our best to distance her from this matter.

Let them handle the bad guys.