So, just three days after meeting, Lin Li and Galina were married. As they stepped out of Manhattan City Hall, the Latina girl beside Lin Li still seemed a little dazed. The past three days had felt like a dream, and she couldn't shake the sense that none of it was real.
She turned to Lin Li, who was walking silently beside her, and asked, "So we're legally married now? Where do we go next?"
"To meet your family and plan the wedding. But before that, we need to change our clothes."
At six that evening, they arrived at an ordinary apartment complex in Queens. Compared with the upscale residential area where Lin Li lived, this neighborhood was rather more rundown, and the occasional unemployed vagrant wandered around.
They pushed open the door and entered Galina's home side by side. Her mother had been waiting for them for some time. A short-haired girl with a bowl cut sat on the sofa nearby, waving her hands while wearing virtual-reality glasses. She seemed to be locked in an intense battle with someone.
Galina's mother had curly, wavy hair and wore work clothes. She sat upright on the sofa. She taught math at a local middle school and raised her two daughters alone.
The high cost of living in New York meant that her salary often wasn't enough to cover expenses, so she sometimes took on extra work for income, such as looking after wealthy families' children or tutoring them one-on-one after school.
She was supposed to work at her employer's home in Manhattan today. But apparently, her elder daughter had married an Asian man she'd known for less than three days, so she had to put that job aside and wait at home for the two of them.
The middle-aged woman fixed a sharp gaze on Lin Li, standing beside her elder daughter. She had assumed he was yet another lowlife her daughter had met at a bar. But when she saw his impeccably tailored, high-end clothes, the words she'd meant to say changed to something else. "Hello, I'm Galina's mother. You can call me Perini."
In this age of intelligent industry, all handmade products came with steep labor costs, especially fine pieces made by master craftsmen.
She would never buy such expensive clothes herself, but some of the parents she'd encountered were quite wealthy and wore luxury goods that looked ordinary but cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. A single outfit like this might cost more than she earned in an entire year.
Still, she couldn't rule out the possibility that he'd rented it. She needed to find out more about this man.
"Hello, I'm Lin Li."
Lin Li greeted the middle-aged woman across from him with easy familiarity. As time passed, Abu had become completely integrated with him. He now looked no different from an ordinary person, even though his inner structure had become still more inhuman.
Galina sat to one side, watching Lin Li and her mother chat happily and easily. Her mother was nothing like the stern person she remembered, which struck her as rather novel.
She was Perini's daughter from her first marriage. Her biological father had died in a bombing more than a decade ago. Her mother later remarried and had Galina's younger sister with her stepfather.
But this second marriage hadn't lasted long. Her stepfather was arrested a few years ago for assault, and the marriage fell apart soon after. From then on, Perini had a bad reputation, and both Galina and her sister were often looked down on by their classmates and neighbors.
For these reasons, Galina grew to dislike school. In her rebellious phase, she often skipped class to hang out in bars and nightclubs, constantly switching from one boyfriend to the next. Her mother didn't do much to rein her in, only giving her enough money for basic living expenses.
The longer Perini talked with Lin Li, the more pleased she became. He was nothing like her daughter's previous punk boyfriends. He was well educated, spoke naturally and courteously, and, most importantly, he was wealthy.
She had just discreetly looked up Lin Li's background. He was a game lead designer. The Infinite Game Company was the Commercial Alliance's largest virtual gaming company, with military backing and partnerships with numerous major corporations and government departments. As an important figure there, Lin Li earned dozens of times her annual income.
With a warm smile, Perini said, "Now that the two of you are officially married, of course we'll have to give you a proper wedding. But you know our family's situation, so..."
"Don't worry. I'll cover all the expenses. You won't have to work as hard as you used to, either. Galina and I will do our best to help. Your family is my family."
Money was a universal medium of exchange, and how much of it a person had reflected how well they could satisfy their own desires. Often, with enough money, most problems stopped being problems.
If Lin Li had been broke, the woman before him wouldn't have treated him so well. But his wealth and social standing had sent his value in Perini's eyes soaring. Every objection turned into approval, and their conversation went smoothly.
They quickly settled on a date for the wedding. Perini began contacting relatives and coworkers, while Lin Li made the same preparations.
But just two weeks later, Lin Li and Galina walked down the aisle in a church in Brooklyn. In front of their friends and relatives, they vowed to be faithful to each other. Everyone, men and women alike, smiled and offered them their congratulations.
Smiling, Lin Li walked beside his wife, holding her hand as they passed the guests. Ten transparent tentacles kept connecting to different people, reading their thoughts.
Galina's younger sister, the eleven-year-old girl, wore a pretty little dress. She clapped with a beaming smile and spoke words of congratulations, while her thoughts ran: I can't believe my stupid, ugly, trashy sister found such a great man. What a lucky break. But now I can ask my brother-in-law for money. Hehe, that's pretty nice, too.
One of Galina's classmates, a white woman wearing glasses, held Galina's hand and kept praising Lin Li. Her thoughts ran: She's a total slut, yet she managed to snag such a great guy at a nightclub. And he's an idiot too, marrying a woman like her. What a waste of a handsome face.
One of Perini's coworkers, a middle-aged man in gold-rimmed glasses, looked at the newlyweds with a polite, kindly smile. His thoughts ran: If I hadn't believed those rumors and married Perini back then, I could have had a rich son-in-law. Then I wouldn't have to work so hard like I do now.
Perini smiled broadly as she thanked everyone for their congratulations. Her thoughts ran: You all think I'm bad luck. You've all been avoiding me. Do you still dare look down on me now?
Galina held Lin Li's hand, a happy smile on her face. Her exquisite makeup made her otherwise unremarkable features look beautiful. As she looked at the friends and relatives who had once looked down on her from the bottom of their hearts, she thought: I may be useless, but I'm lucky. I found a rich man. That'll teach you! Hahaha.
An ordinary girl who used to hang around nightclubs had suddenly become a member of high society. The shock and envy this caused were hidden deep inside the guests who'd come to the wedding. Every smile looked utterly sincere.
Of course, alongside the envious, there were also those who genuinely wished them well, such as Lin Li's coworkers. His skill at keeping up a good front in his work and daily life had meant there was almost no conflict of interest among them.
But their thoughts ran: I can't believe Lin Li ended up with a woman like her. What a raw deal. Aierxue would've been better, at least she's prettier.
There were also those who didn't care, such as the priest officiating the wedding. His wrinkled old face wore a smile as his thoughts ran: Let's hurry this up. My old legs are starting to hurt again. I just want to get off work and go home to play games.
Fortunately, only Lin Li could read minds. If everyone here had freely voiced what they were thinking, the wedding's warm atmosphere would have shattered in an instant.
As he continued to sense everyone's thoughts, Lin Li said to Abu in his mind, "Everyone harbors endless malice deep inside. It's bound beneath a mask of hypocrisy, and that's how society maintains the appearance of harmony. Just as I have to disguise my coldness to fit in, we can only survive by wearing masks."
Abu had now become a section of bone in Lin Li's cervical spine, completely part of his body. Its original abilities had almost entirely become Lin Li's. By now, Abu had become a genuine mascot.
"I get it, I get it," Abu said. "There's a lot more malice in the games I play than there is in real life. It's because I'm no longer among the people in my real-life circle. Being behind a screen is like wearing a mask. You don't have to suppress your true nature."
Lin Li looked at the guests in the church, all smiling and clapping as they congratulated the couple, and at his radiant wife beside him. He alone could see everyone's hidden true selves, yet the real world wasn't all that beautiful.
The soil of malice could only grow flowers of malice. Destruction was always easier than creation; a single malicious thought could destroy all goodwill.
If everyone spoke every thought aloud, the malice inside each person would become a mass of spikes surrounding them. People would be cut off from one another. There would be no more cooperation, no more families, no more communication.
Parents and children might turn against each other over the smallest things. Glamorous celebrities would reveal their ugliness to the world. High-ranking officials and powerful elites would expose their grandiose lies and plainly tell everyone the desires hidden in the depths of their hearts.
Every conflict hidden behind a façade would be dragged into the light. People would unleash the malice within them and hurt one another, while the order of civilization crumbled into chaos.
Lin Li had understood this long ago. From the moment he learned how to disguise himself, he had been the one among humanity who wore the thickest mask.
So, even now that he had begun to feel emotions of his own and could sense the malice in everyone's hearts, he still wore his mask, just as before, and helped everyone maintain their false, beautiful world.
Whether out of an individual organism's instinct to survive or a desire to ensure civilization's orderly development, this barrier between people's hearts was necessary. Only masks of hypocrisy could hold back the endless malice deep within people.