Dow and Carbon-Based Monkey Breeding Guidelines

Chapter 989: Shooting Down the Stars (Part )

When Shi Qi was willing to sit down again, he put forward a condition that he should sit in the living room closest to the entrance and that they should keep a safe distance from each other. She seemed no longer afraid that he was secretly committing crimes, but began to doubt his mental state. However, she could not explain the candies, so she did not really say that he was crazy, but just sat there with an unpredictable expression.

Luo Binhan was not actually afraid that she would run away or think he was a mental patient. He was not even worried that she would call the police. As long as she didn't jump out of the window out of fear, other problems could be explained slowly. He first went to the kitchen to turn down the stove and turned on all the ventilation systems in the apartment. Then he returned to the living room, sat down at the farthest place from Shi Qi, and began to tell the simplest story that would be most likely to make her believe.

"Zhou Yu disappeared a few years ago," he said. "Zhou Yu and I put a lot of effort into finding her, but the more we looked, the less clues we had. There was no motive for suicide, no potential enemies, no blackmail calls, and even surveillance couldn't find her whereabouts. It was as if she disappeared on her way home. I also thought that she might have been a victim of human trafficking, but... it was unlikely. She disappeared in the city center, so it's impossible that there would be no clues of the criminal. And you should also have an impression of her character. She is not someone who can be lured into an alley by sweet talk or a few tears."

"I remember you said before that she..."

"She died. Yes. But we didn't know it at the time. At the time we...still had hope in our hearts. But then something strange happened to me. I met a strange man. He had some, let's put it simply, he had a lot of superpowers, and although he looked a lot like us, you could tell at a glance that he was not an ordinary person."

The defensiveness on Shi Qi's face had gradually faded, replaced by concentration and doubt. She was slowly listening to his words, but she didn't believe them yet. Luo Binhan hesitated for a moment and decided not to describe Jing Huang's specific situation in detail, so as not to completely lose Shi Qi's trust. After all, Jing Huang was not like the alien in their impression. It was difficult for him to make Shi Qi believe that Li Li and Jing Huang could exist at the same time without actual evidence.

"He came from outside our world," he said vaguely, "to destroy one of his enemies, who also came from outside. Then he finished his work and left."

"gone?"

"Yes. Back to the outside world."

Shi Qi glanced out the window, as if wondering how far away the "outer space" he mentioned was. Luo Binhan had no choice but to say, "I don't know where he went, but he is somewhere in the universe. Because I took that guy in for a while, these strange things were left in my house. There are not many of them, and you just found the most dangerous one."

"What are those glowing things? Their chemical weapons?"

"No, just candy."

Shi Qi stared at him. Luo Binhan knew he couldn't change his words, otherwise she would only distrust him more. "That's just their candy." He repeated, "Otherwise I wouldn't just throw it in the cupboard... It's true, Shi Qi, I've seen them put this kind of candy in their mouths casually, and nothing happened. But I forgot that there is a huge physiological difference between them and us, just like us and dogs."

"Where is Zhou Yu? What does her disappearance have to do with this incident?"

"She was also killed by an alien. Not the one who used to live in my house, but his enemy. She ran into the alien the night she disappeared and might have suspected him, so he killed her to silence her. I don't know the details... someone else told me about her death. Anyway, someone has avenged her."

Shi Qi's reaction to hearing about the murder was not intense. He just widened his eyes a little, then sighed blankly.

"Zhou Yu... do you know about this?"

"He knows. If you have any doubts, I can also help you contact him and ask him to go over Zhou Yu's affairs with you. You know he won't tell anyone nonsense about Zhou Yu."

Shi Qi silently folded his hands on his knees, his face showing no emotion. How much did she accept these words? Luo Binhan was actually not sure at all. He had never shared these secrets with anyone else except Zhou Yu, but Zhou Yu might know more than him.

After a long while, she raised her hands from her knees, as if she wanted to wipe the marks on her face, but when she noticed Luo Binhan's gaze, she put them back. "What happened to your injury today?" she asked, "You looked different the last time you came to the hospital. Didn't the person who was at your house leave? Didn't the person who killed Zhou Yu die? What happened to you recently?"

Luo Binhan thought for a while. Shi Qi's attitude was serious and strange, and the train of thought in his questions was also very clear, which meant that he had to be more cautious in answering. "Something has come back to us." He said carefully, "Something related to Zhou Yu's murderer. It got to me more than a month ago. This thing is very dangerous, and I'm worried that it will affect the people around me, so I have to prepare a plan to get rid of it. I just got it done yesterday... almost done."

"You asked me to turn off my phone because of this thing? But you said you had solved it."

Luo Binhan hesitated for a moment and decided not to tell him about Li Li. Li Li's background was too complicated, and it didn't quite match his previous story, and it couldn't be explained in a few simple sentences. And once he wanted to explain why he suddenly became wary of Li Li, it would inevitably involve how Li Li had spied on everyone before. Both of these questions would shake Shi Qi's shaky trust in him, and he didn't want to gamble on that right now.

"I just want to be on the safe side." He answered quickly, pretending that the pause just now was a choice of words. "I'm worried that the dangerous thing has not completely disappeared. It has many strange abilities, and maybe there are some that I don't know about. After all, it can run across the universe to us. What if it can monitor the network... I've been worried that it will notice our relationship, so I haven't contacted you much in the past month."

"Is this also related to your wanting me to go to Europe?"

"Yes. I think if we leave here and go to a strange place, the situation might be a little safer. And to be honest, I'm not that attached to my hometown now... I can't tell whether I have more good memories or bad memories here."

Shi Qi looked at her knees again, her expression like a judge examining a difficult case. Luo Binhan carefully watched her reaction, trying to figure out what would happen to him today. The worst outcome was that he would have to undergo drug testing and mental evaluation, and the best outcome... he didn't even know. Could Shi Qi accept such an explanation? She didn't seem to be merciful. "Candy," she said suddenly.

"what?"

"What are those aliens you mentioned coming to our place for? Just for reconnaissance? Or for resources?"

"I don't know," Robinson said. "They seem to have a big plan, or they seem to be just acting crazy."

"So they're dangerous? And yet you once took one in."

"It's okay to take one in. Their danger doesn't lie in killing people and snatching land."

"So what's the big plan you're talking about?"

Luo Binhan thought about it and felt that the wishing machine, like Jing Huang's life experience, was a concept that should not be discussed in detail at the moment. So he explained vaguely: "They want to rewrite the entire system... In their eyes, we are probably just ants, and normally we can't hinder them. But now they want to interfere with an entire ecosystem; they want to turn all ants, flies, and bees into humans, or simply eliminate them all, so that the entire ecosystem becomes simple and controllable - I know, based on our experience, this is simply not possible. If all insects become extinct, the ecology of our planet will be over, anyway, we are over. But they... their lives are different from ours. You think, the ancients would also feel that they can't live without candles and oil lamps, but we rarely use them now, not even when there is a power outage. Maybe for them, an ecosystem without insects can also function. They don't want to eliminate us first, they just want to conquer the entire system, and we have something here that happens to be useful - it seems that they think there is some kind of special pesticide hidden on our planet, the kind that can exterminate insects at one time. One side wants to find it, and the other side doesn't want to find it."

Shi Qi listened in a daze, and after a while asked: "What will happen if they find out? Will we all die?"

"I really don't know." Luo Binhan said. He remembered that Zhou Yu had announced to him in a simple sentence in the morning that the Lord of Dreams would never wake up again. That tone was very firm to Zhou Yu, and he was probably sure of it. "I haven't seen that bottle of special insecticide either, but I heard others say it's very powerful. But if it's really that powerful, I think insects would have been extinct long ago. Anyway, in my opinion, this is not something we can worry about."

Shi Qi's reaction to his story was the same as always. She seemed to listen carefully, but didn't take it seriously. She suddenly asked, "Did that person leave those moving candies for you?"

Luo Binhan didn't quite understand why she suddenly turned the topic to this. He hesitated for a moment and said, "I left it here as a souvenir."

"Aren't they here to do their job? Why are they carrying candy with them?"

"People going to the battlefield also bring chocolate and candy."

"I know. But... I can't connect those candies to what you said. They feel so familiar when I hold them, like something from the cartoons I watched as a kid."

"Shi Qi," Luo Binhan warned, "are you addicted to those candies?"

"No. It's just that I don't know how to describe that feeling. I felt like I suddenly became a child at that moment."

"I'm not sure what effect it has on you." Luo Binhan said carefully, "Under normal circumstances, that thing won't cause hallucinations or auditory hallucinations. It just makes people more...relaxed, lose self-control, and become very emotional, a bit like drinking." "So, some people become very aggressive after taking it?"

"No, it shouldn't. They thought about that when they designed it. After you eat it, it will reduce your desire to move. You will feel happier sitting and singing and talking. It won't be enough for fighting. It will only make you weak and confused when you get beaten."

“Have you ever eaten it?”

Luo Binhan was silent. He had to choose between lying and exposing more secrets. "I have eaten it," he admitted, "but the reaction was not as strong as yours. This thing varies from person to person, and I... my physique was somewhat affected by those people."

"Only physical fitness?"

Luo Binhan glanced at her in surprise. "Shi Qi," he declared, "I am not responsible for lurking here to lead them, and there is no such thing as naturalization or surrender. They are not here to conquer or rule. Even if they are, they don't need me. It would be faster for them to just go and harvest all the food in the fields."

Shi Qi finally gave another short smile, as if he found his statement a little funny. "That's not what I meant."

"what is that?"

"You look a lot like my father."

"Shi Qi, this is not funny."

"Just listen to me first."

Luo Binhan wanted to make another face to ease the atmosphere, but he had a strange feeling that made him dare not move. Shi Qi no longer seemed angry, but he was not joking either. He was immersed in his own thoughts.

"When I was a child, I always felt that I was closer to my father. Although he was very busy at work, he would still play with me and watch cartoons and comics with me when he was at home. When I was in junior high school, I even thought he was childish, because even if I pretended to be mature and said I wanted to watch the news, he would deliberately play dumb and turn on the cartoon channel, and would not listen to my mother's complaints. He also liked to read novels, and would lend me books without telling my mother, and talk to me about the plots in them... So, at that time, I felt that he was the person who understood me the most in the world, cared about me more than my mother who was always worried about my brother, and was willing to do anything for me. However, one night when he came back drunk, he dropped his mobile phone under the sofa. At that time, mobile phones were not smart phones. Yes, I just wanted to open the cover to see if it was broken, and I saw a text message just came in. Although I couldn’t understand it at the time, I felt that the sender’s words were very strange, as if he was begging my father for something. The next morning, I asked my father what was going on, and he said it was a harassing call, trying to extort money from him - at that time his expression and tone became very strange, so bored, so cold, much more terrible than my mother who was always sad and complaining. I never thought he could speak in that voice. But later I learned that the person who sent the text message that night was actually the family of the whistleblower, who wanted him to let his children go and stop taking revenge. "

When she said this, Luo Binhan was already a little uneasy. "Shi Qi..." he whispered, "I am not..."

Shi Qi still had a strange smile on his face, immersed in the past. "I'm not saying that you did the same thing. It's just... isn't this incredible? A loving father turned out to be a cruel and greedy person, just like when I just walked out of the candy store, I saw the streets full of starving bodies... There will never be scenes of children being killed by villains in cartoons, and there will never be fairies in fairy tales in horror movies, but this world actually allows these two scenes to exist at the same time. I have always found it very strange..."

"Shi Qi!" Luo Binhan said hurriedly, "You need to have a good rest first. The candy still has an effect on you——"

"I'm fine." Shi Qi said, "I was just thinking... This is because we live in reality. Whether it's a fairy tale or a horror movie, what we see is just one side of reality. Do you know why my father is willing to watch cartoons with me?"

"Even people who do bad things have feelings, Shi Qi. Because you are his daughter, that's it - I'm not saying there's anything praiseworthy about this, he's just okay in this regard."

Shi Qi suddenly laughed. "That's true," she said. "But when I grew up, I suddenly realized that he never asked about my studies or hobbies, he was just willing to play with me. In fact, the reason was very simple, because he also liked to watch cartoons and read novels, but my mother would complain if he did these things alone, so he said he was accompanying me. Every time I think of him, I feel very strange... What was he thinking when he saw the protagonist in the cartoon defeat the villain, or the knight in the novel kill the evil official? Why could he enjoy these plots while destroying the family of the person who reported him? I kept thinking about this question, and later I really asked him. When I visited him in prison, he actually told me that he was under too much pressure at that time... Because the pressure of real life was too great, he didn't want to get involved in too realistic things, and only wanted to watch beautiful and relaxing things..."

Luo Binhan looked at her with a sad face. Shi Qi's eyes were brighter and clearer than ever before, so he knew that she was not affected by the candy.

"When we first met," she said, "I told you everything about my family because I didn't want you to feel cheated, and to regret it later when we developed feelings for each other, thinking that I just wanted to find a rich man to rely on from the beginning. But you really didn't seem to care at all, and you were even very positive... I just found it unbelievable. Did you have a crush on me before? But you obviously didn't pay much attention to me when you were in school. Or was it just because of those few short meetings? But you also said that you didn't believe in love at first sight... I finally figured it out now. In fact, I was wrong. I shouldn't have told you about my affairs before you expressed your feelings. Because your reaction at that time was precisely because of this story."

Luo Binhan just shook his head. "You think too much." He said, "Shi Qi, it's not like that..."

"My father likes cartoons," Shi Qi said softly, "but you like heroic stories. When you heard how I fell into trouble and how I got up on my own, you were so moved that you wanted to help me, wanted to play the hero who rescued me, or the character who was inspired by the hero. At that time, you didn't seem to worry at all about being dragged down by me, or about how your children would be affected in the future. I thought it was just because you didn't want to show your worry, or you really loved me madly... In fact, it's because your heart is not in this world at all. You have never really lived in reality, just standing on the sidelines and watching. When I had such thoughts in the past, I would tell myself that I was just daydreaming. I also know that your family background may make you a little eccentric, but you are also a living person with flesh and blood. You will never consider everything for the sake of pursuing romance. What can turn you into a person who has no touch of the ground? To become someone who doesn't care about reality at all? Now I know the answer. You will indeed do this, and choose me for a touching story, because you have seen things beyond the sky, so reality is just something you need to escape from, and you are eager to use self-sacrifice to prove that you are a person who is out of touch with the world."

Luo Binhan was speechless for a long time. He wondered in confusion how Shi Qi viewed him. Was this view right or wrong? He himself did not know. At this moment, he could not think of anything but despair at her judgment. He had a premonition of what she would say next.

Shi Qi slowly stood up from the chair. "I believe what you said today," she said, "I think those things about aliens are true. But... we all need to think calmly, not only about the secret you told me today, but also about the relationship between us."

Luo Binhan managed to calm down. He knew he couldn't make another mistake now.

"Shi Qi," he searched for the correct answer, "I was in a bad mood when we first met again. It's true. I was a little uncomfortable with the feeling of returning to normal, but that was just a temporary stress. You can't deny our subsequent relationship just because the beginning was not good. I don't care about your family's affairs, that's just because I think it can be solved. You have solved it very well by yourself."

"I don't want sympathy." Shi Qi said to himself, "nor do I want admiration like the characters in novels. When I was a child, I was very happy that my father watched cartoons with me - but I can't be with someone who simply loves watching cartoons and is willing to act infatuated. Do you understand?"

“I understand. I really do,” Robinson said. “Don’t make a final decision today, okay? Let’s all take some time to think about it.”

Shi Qi smiled and nodded, tears glistening in his eyes. "I have to go first."

"Okay, I'll contact you later - you'd better go to the hospital for a physical examination to see if there are any hidden dangers."

He didn't even notice when Shi Qi actually left. He just stood up and cleaned up the mess in a daze. He first went to the bedroom to hide the machete back in the hanging bag, and then turned off the stove in the kitchen. He checked the situation in the pot. The water in the pot was almost boiled dry, showing a sticky purple-red color like rotten fruit pulp. He washed all the residue in the pot, and then threw it downstairs with the pillowcase and the pot to the garbage station, and then went back home and sat in a daze. After an unknown amount of time, Yu Xiaorong suddenly appeared in front of him holding Fina.

"Why did you come back so early?" Yu Xiaorong asked with raised eyebrows, "And the door is left open?"

Luo Binhan looked up at her, not in the mood to ask where she had been. Yu Xiaorong's face changed immediately. "You look as if you just went out to kill someone." She said, checking around like a hound sniffing out a scent, and within a few seconds she found a lost beret in the house.

"You brought your girlfriend here?" she asked. "Where is she?"

Luo Binhan still didn't say anything, just gave her a dry laugh. Yu Xiaorong's slightly smug expression faded, and she put down the hat she was holding high. "Could it be," she said, "that she broke up with you?"

“We haven’t reached that stage yet,” Robinson said. “It’s probably a cooling-off period.”

"what is the reason?"

Luo Binhan shook his head in frustration. "That's not important." He laughed at himself and said, "Today is really hell. My friends made me angry, and I made my girlfriend angry... It seems that I have suddenly become a character that no one welcomes."

Yu Xiaorong looked at him quietly for a while, then walked over and sat next to him, leaned her head on his shoulder, and reached out to pat his back gently.

“Do you want to eat something now?” she said. “Don’t go to work tomorrow. Let’s order takeout and watch a movie together.”

(End of this chapter)