Chapter 174 - System vs. System (XXIV)
Thus, by the time 061’s eyes opened again, he was back in the Valley of the Lost Butterflies where he had been forcibly taken.
The vipers in the mountain had perished, and her young snakes had fled when Jing Xufeng’s men searched the valley.
Now that the mist has cleared from the mountain, there are only dead branches and leaves left, and we can only wait for time to heal the wounds left by the demons.
061 Holding onto a tree, barely able to stand, he lifted his hand to his temple and called up his data, only to have his brow furrowed by a beeping, banging mess of electrical noise.
The signals he could emit were so weak that he could not even dock with Chi Xiaochi and could not even return to Lord GOD space.
The good and the bad are both relative, however, as Lord GOD is also unable to monitor his movements and will not be aware of Ji Zuoshan’s presence.
A cloud of energy from Ji Zuoshan’s incarnation floated round and round him, anxious but helpless: “Teacher Six, are you all right?”
The electrical injury originates from within the 061 body and is a data level damage.
Although Ji Zuoshan’s spiritual power is strong, most of it works on itself.
In other words, he knows how to destroy efficiently, but he does not know how to heal others.
061 Without making any demands, he said “thank you”, wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, and sat down against a tree to rest for a while.
Ji Zuoshan feels a little guilty: “I didn’t help much.”
061 smiled, “That’s very kind.”
Ji Zuoshan was already shy, not very talkative, and didn’t want to waste 061’s energy, so he just floated quietly around him, pretending to be a light.
061 Resting for a moment with his eyes closed, he suddenly asked a question, “You didn’t come that day, the day the Lord GOD space was destroyed, did you?”
”No.” Ji Zuoshan said, “It’s Luo Qian, Xiao Wang, and Zhan Yanchao, the three of them.”
061 Shallow smile, “Hmm. It occurred to me that you shouldn’t be the kind of person who would just strike out and hurt someone.”
Ji Zuoshan was even more surprised than 061: “Hmm? Who hurt someone? Zhan Yanchao?”
061 shook his head once, stating that he wasn’t sure, “How did they find the Lord GOD space?”
Ji Zuoshan a little embarrassed: “They ah ……”
……
At this moment in time, in the Lord GOD space, “In a Moment”.
089 stood in front of Lord GOD with a smile on his face and a heartless, “What did you call me for, boss?”
Lord GOD said, “You look good, you’re almost healed, you’ve worked hard.”
089 opened his mouth: “Boss, don’t just verbally encourage me, give me a pay rise for the sake of my work injury.”
Lord GOD : “……”
It decided not to give 089 any more freedom to play.
089 The power of that broken mouth is not something it wants to learn more about.
Lord GOD asked, “Did you see the intruder the other day.”
089 shook his head, “Nope.”
”Did you see what weapon they used to wound you.”
089 had a laugh: “Boss, you’re so funny. I haven’t even seen anyone yet.”
”But you were injured head-on.”
089 said, “Boss, I can’t see people, but they can see me, they came up with a Nine Yin White Bone Claw and gave me a hole, what moves do I have? Yes.”
…… This self-questioning really takes your breath away.
Lord GOD was patient and ended the conversation early: “Well, you’re just fine, go home early and get some rest.”
089 was turned back on just as soon as the box was opened, with a look of impatience and a flirty kiss to Lord GOD before he covered the door and left.
Only after he had left did Lord GOD ask the AI, “How did the …… check go?”
”He’s not lying.” The AI that had just sneaked into 089’s memory system reported truthfully, “His memory cut off until he was startled by a loud noise behind him, turned around, and the next thing he knew, he was blacked out. Please be assured that he is not hiding anything.”
Lord GOD gave a laugh: “Just in case. There’s no need to worry too much about stupid people like him. It’s the smarty-pants who are the most feared, like that 061 . …… He’s now under the control of the other system, I think.”
The AI checked again to make sure it was correct before reporting back, “Yes. His signal is barely detectable anymore.”
Lord GOD can’t hide the pleasure in his words: “Good, it’ll teach him a lesson and it’ll be good.”
089 All the way back to the dormitory, I was bored, so I opened the drawer where I kept my snacks and picked a packet of opened caramel biscuits, and picked a book from the shelf.
023 had just come out of the bathroom with a mop and was furious to see him like this, “I just swept the floor!”
089 looked down, “Ouch,” and hastily apologised, “Sorry sorry sorry haha.”
023, his cheeks rounded with anger, went back to fetch a broom and swept again.
As he passed 089’s side, he didn’t have the heart to say, “Feet!”
089 dutifully lifted his feet up while handing him the bag of biscuits, “Eat?”
023 turned back to the bathroom with the dustpan and broom and said with disgust, “Sweet and greasy.”
089: “It’s delicious.”
023: “You’re the only one in the system who loves these biscuits, 009 don’t even eat them. Don’t say I didn’t warn you, sooner or later you’ll develop diabetes, three shots of insulin a day and you’ll be honest.”
089 bit into a biscuit and said vaguely, “I need to use my brain, so I’ll eat something sweet to make up for it.”
023 replied from a distance, “Your brain is going to be stuck in molasses.”
With a smile, 089 reached into the biscuit bag and fished out the next biscuit.
But this biscuit, covered in thick, thick caramel, is a little different.
Written on the biscuit in white chocolate sauce are a few words that I don’t know what to make of: “Believe it. Channel it.”
089 looks at the six words for a moment, looks unmoved, clicks and eats the biscuit and reaches into the bag again.
Before touching the next biscuit, his fingertips touched a miniature memory.
089 holds the memory in his fingers, but does not rush to take it out, tapping it like a chess piece on the bottom of the box, as if weighing whether it is trustworthy.
It took him twenty seconds to make a decision before 023 walked out of the bathroom.
089 Remove the memory and pair access the brain consciousness.
In a flash, 20 minutes of brand new memories flooded into his mind.
…… That’s what he remembers from the night of the incident.
After receiving a summons from Lord GOD, he then copied the memories and put them into this memory, and promptly took matters into his own hands and completely emptied the memory of everything related to what he had seen that day, finally placing the memory in this bag of caramel biscuits that only he would eat, and writing a reminder in white chocolate sauce that he would remember to retrieve the memories when he returned.
After all, the best way to cover up the truth is to forget it.
Twenty minutes isn’t a lot of information for the system, and when 023 came out with the mop, 089 had even replaced it with a book, lying on his back with the book in one hand, one hand behind his head, and crossing his legs in a big way, like a landlady of all evil.
…… Looking at him like that, 023 kind of wanted to dislike the mop in his face.
But the other man is still half injured, so he can only think about it.
And 089, who is reading, has his memory rewind to the night when those three spirits invaded.
Before all that had happened, 089 was sitting in the duty room, eating matcha lasagna while a doggy serial was playing on the public.
As the sister hisses tearfully to the heroine about why she is stealing my hero, three transparent energy apparitions emerge behind him.
The three energy beings looked at each other, and one of them, the tallest youth, holding his neck and moving it from side to side a little, approached him noiselessly, intending to hold him hostage and ask for some information.
089 turned his back on them, took the last little piece of cake to his mouth, licked the cream off his fork and said cordially, as if greeting old friends, “There you are.”
The man who had prepared the raid was startled in turn.
”I can’t believe I caught it, and I don’t know if my luck is considered good or bad.”
089 turned around from his swivel chair as if he was not very surprised by their arrival.
He took a count of the number of energy beings present, “Hmm? A little more people came in than I thought. I thought I could only send in two at a time at most. Quite good, now we can get a table of mahjong together.”
With that, he waved his hand and added an extra layer of protection and soundproofing data to the duty room.
This series of statements plus his actions confused those three.
The youth who had intended to sneak up on him said suspiciously, “You know us?”
089 mused, “Something like that.”
The young man sounded agitated and looked like he wanted to come up and take him by the forelock, “You’re the 061?
089 pressed his palm down, “Hey hey, don’t guess, I know you guys, but you don’t know me. Instead of wasting time guessing around, let’s all save each other’s time ……”
He ran his eyes over the three and selected an energy body whose face could not be seen, but whose figure could be judged to be female: “What you want, I might be able to help you obtain it. …… Luo Qian .”
The tall woman who hadn’t said a word since earlier was stunned at the words, “How do you know my name?”
089 laughed, “I know a lot about that. I also know that the man who invaded the other day was called Ji Zuoshan.”
There was a moment of collective silence from all three.
Wang Xizhou, who had come with them to the scene, was clearly not expecting this and could not help but glance at Luo Qian with his eyes.
Luo Qian’s mind is now at rest.
She has been in the army for many years and has been in battle, so she has a delicate heart to judge the situation.
”Did 061 tell you that?”
”He hasn’t been back for a long time and doesn’t know about the intruder.”
”You knew Ji Zuoshan was here but didn’t tell anyone else, why?”
”Well ……”
089 pressed his temples as if in serious remembrance, but his eyes were fixed on Luo Qian.
In the soft, warm light, his light brown pupils and the teardrop at the end of his eye stand out.
He speaks slowly to people he doesn’t know well, but automatically cuts out much of the trash talk that distracts from his vision, so that his usual lazy chatter is removed and his logic is quite clear.
”After entering the Lord GOD space, the intruders did not go anywhere but straight into the archive room, with too clear a purpose. And after taking inventory, the shelves contained no reduction in files. The intruder should have had enough time to take any of the files with him, but he didn’t, which proves he didn’t come to steal them.”
”The alarm went off for nearly 30 seconds after the security system detected his presence before it was disarmed. But why did that intruder stay for another 30 seconds after he knew he had been discovered? Clearly he was capable of leaving just as the alarm was sounding.”
”There was a deep handprint on the side of the fallen cabinet. Of course, our security system has a strong signal emission and he should have been in a lot of pain by then, but not only did he not rush off, he lingered for a full half minute and toppled the cabinet.”
”I wondered if he was going through the file when he was caught trying to put that back but was controlled by the security system and couldn’t do it for a while, so he had to push the shelf down.”
”After all, the best way to hide a leaf is to keep it hidden in the forest.”
”On the fallen shelf, all the paper files added up to a total of 375. I took the opportunity to check them all while I was helping 339 in the archives to sort them out. Later, I came to the conclusion that out of all of them, only 61 brought out a monster like Ji Zuoshan who had the ability to infiltrate our system by himself.”
Without waiting for Luo Qian’s question, 089 narrowed his eyes and smiled: “Because my lover is a gossip, I know that Ji Zuoshan has some good friends, such as you and Luo Qian, so I thought you might come back after Ji Zuoshan’s failure last time. But you can rest assured, I guessed something was wrong after I found 61’s file in there from the floor full of files, just in case, I took my own file as a substitute and slipped his file onto my shelf by hand. When 339 in the archives reported the list of 375 files, there was no 61 on it at all, so you needn’t worry that our bosses will associate it with Ji Zuoshan.”
After saying so much in one breath, 089 stared at Luo Qian with a smile on his face: “I have already made my sincerity clear. What about Miss Luo Qian.”
”We’re here for two reasons.” 089 spoke slowly and clearly, leaving Luo Qian enough time to think, and Luo Qian reciprocated with great sincerity, “Firstly, we want to find out what that 061 does, and secondly, we want to do some damage to the place, a kind of revenge. Which of these things can you help us with?”
089 whistled, “Neither one is difficult. But you have to be careful. Our boss has a bad temper, and if he knew where you were from, he’d probably give up his money to fuck you. I don’t think things were good when Ji Zuoshan went back last time.”
At these words, Zhan Yanchao secretly clenched his fist.
Luo Qian, on the other hand, sighs softly.
Xiao Ji is the war hero of the entire planet. A few days ago, he suddenly vomited blood and fainted in his quarters, causing a panic within the military for a while. Fortunately, the news was blocked in time so that no further disturbances were caused.
The result of the examination was that he had suffered a heavy blow to his mental faculties, the cause of which was unknown.
The medic was at a loss, and Ji Zuoshan, in a coma, kept talking intermittently in strange dreams.
…… 061 , 061 , archives, put back.
At first, Luo Qian thought he was just talking nonsense because he was so badly injured, but the more they listened, the worse it became.
That 061, it seems to be a person?
Luo Qian carried out the test and, with little effort, located a teleportation channel in Ji Zuoshan’s mental energy.
This place, I believe, is the one that caused him to be injured.
Luo Qian, who did not know about Ji Zuoshan’s connection to 061, would not have imagined that this was a story of repayment.
The military mindset led them to suspect that “Lord GOD Space” was a strange alien dimension that could affect the safety of their planet, and Ji Zuoshan went there privately to find out what was going on, only to be injured by the people there.
So they decided that it was a good idea to come and go.
With the teleportation channel marked, Luo Qian used an entire Alpha army, plus himself, Wang Xizhou, and Zhan Yanchao, an Alpha of superior mental ability, to open a channel and travel thousands of miles and several dimensions to seek revenge.
089 Naturally, Luo Qian 061 would not be told what he had done.
Otherwise, if that Zhan went mad on the spot, he might not be able to pull it off.
089 played it down lightly: “61 is Ji Zuoshan’s friend, just like you guys. When Ji Zuoshan wakes up, you can ask him. But I don’t suggest you go to the archives to find anything related to 61. Since Ji Zuoshan’s last visit, the archive room has been more closely monitored than the rest of the place.”
Luo Qian weighed up the situation and nodded his head, “Then there is only one thing left for us to do.”
089 gave another piece of advice, “We suggest not hurting anyone, burn the archive room down, and if that doesn’t help, our boss’s room is called ‘Between a Moment’, three hundred metres to the right of the door. Don’t go and beat him up yourself, he has high authority and thick skin, he can’t be beaten up.”
Wang Xizhou was stunned to hear this.
He felt that this man was simply the legendary teammate who sold his teammates by the pound.
What the hell does he want.
Zhan Yanchao had the same concern: “What makes you so helpful?”
”‘Help’ then, is a milder term.” 089 laughed, “To be precise, our relationship is a partnership of interests.”
Luo Qian squeezed Zhan Yanchao’s shoulder and gestured for him to be quiet: “How?”
089 With a show of hands, “Don’t you guys think that you owe me a favour for all the explanations I’ve given you and all the pointers I’ve given you.”
Luo Qian said, “What do you want us to do in return?”
”Simple.” 089 said, “You guys just do one thing for me.”
”What is it?”
”I’m not thinking about it right now.”
Zhan Yanchao, who is not a personality to be easily convinced, asked rhetorically, “Do you keep thinking badly and we keep owing and being on call?”
089 thought about it, “There’s nothing wrong with you saying that.”
”You-”
089 Crossed his fingers in front of his lips, “Shhh.”
He removed the data barrier outside the room and lowered his voice with it, “If you don’t agree, that’s fine, I’ll call someone.”
Zhan Yanchao had never seen anyone so brazen and quick to turn the other cheek, and his jaw dropped for a moment.
Luo Qian asks, “Aren’t you afraid of being exposed?”
”I’m scared. But I’m only one person, you’re three. Oh, and add Ji Zuoshan from last time. If our boss finds out, you guys probably won’t have a good time.”
089 Fingers gently stroked the teardrop at the end of his eye: “Your planet has hardly recovered its peace, and if it were to fall back into a state of war, many things would be bad, wouldn’t they?”
In a few short words of bluff and fright, he kidnapped a planet, sat on it and used an entire planet as his bargaining chip.
Zhan Yanchao : “…… holy shit. Luo Qian , let’s kill him.”
Luo Qian had a bit of a headache: “Deputy Division Zhan, go out with Xiao Wang to check out the situation and take care of concealment.”
Zhan Yanchao went out reluctantly.
Luo Qian untied the red spike of the mecha key at his waist, unwrapped the thin knot, parted it in half and handed it to 089 quite dryly: “This charm has been with me for more than ten years, it has absorbed a lot of radiation from Na Man metal, it is equivalent to a small sensor and radiator, when you need anything, press it twice in a row, a slight induction will be generated from my side. But let me make it clear in advance that I do not owe this favour to you, Ji Zuoshan does. I will give this to him when I return. If 061 is really your friend, then it is nothing to let him owe you a favour. But if you have lied, then our partnership will be dissolved. Are you able to accept that?”
089 took the red spike and laughed, “You are thinking too much, this is an opportunity I had no intention of keeping for myself. For the sake of my own life, I will not see you again. I will pass on this favour to our family61 and ask you to give this to Ji Zuoshan as well. I hope you will all pull him through in his time of need.”
Luo Qian could not hide his admiration and said, “You are very clever.”
”Thanks.” 089 laughed and said, “It’s not often that someone compliments me like that.”
Luo Qian was a bit surprised by this answer: “Really?”
089 Mirthless: “It’s not easy to raise a family, a little less sharpness is better for everyone.”
Luo Qian said, “But have you considered that you, the man on duty, are responsible if we just leave?”
089 said, “Don’t worry, I’ll handle myself.”
What followed was, unsurprisingly, chaos in the Lord GOD space, with the sound of fires starting, doors slamming and fire alarms activating ……
Luo Qian and the others have long since erased the traces of their visit and withdrawn.
And 089 will have to arrange a way back for himself.
He sat back in his chair, biting down on his tie with his mouth open and clenching his left hand into a fist against his right collarbone, adjusting it at the right angle to ensure that the wound looked like someone taller than him had struck him.
He breathed a soft sigh of relief, moved his fingers and sighed to himself, “…… It’s not easy to raise a family.”
In the next instant, a command to destroy spilled out from between his fingers, instantly cracking the bones of his own shoulder in tatters.
Without uttering a word, he fell backwards with the momentum of the command’s impact, stumbling to the ground and rolling hard a few times.
089 loosened his grip on his tie and vomited a mouthful of blood as well.
This wound will trade itself for not being noticed by Lord GOD, for keeping the person closest to you, 023, safe, for continuing to be happily salty, for a favour for 061, and for 023 to look after him.
A very good deal too.
Not being clever is indeed a good thing in exchange for a lot of interest and a little affection, isn’t it.
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