Pandora’s Box

There are a lot of gaming terminologies I do not 100% comprehend so please be patient with me.

After talking and laughing at dinner, Lu Feng and Cheng Yichen went into the kitchen to clean up. This was their exclusive time together and us juniors entertained ourselves in the living room.

I glanced over at Zhuo Wenyang again. He turned on his laptop and focused without an expression on his face.

Was he unhappy?

I suddenly felt a little nervous.

Was it because I was playing games with Ke Luo and ignoring him? I could not help but be stuck in his dilemma, my thoughts rushing wildly.

I really did not know if he was willing to game. After all, the last time he played games was to merely keep his father company. Additionally, I had never seen him do anything to purely past time. He was not someone who’d like to waste time.

It didn’t seem appropriate for us to continuously extend an invitation for him to reluctantly accept it. Ultimately, his concept of time was different from ours.

I suspected that his greatest pastime was to read and listen to music. Spending a few hours in a shooting game that did not bring any gains was certainly far less appealing to him than finishing a book.

Satisfied with food and drinks, Ke Luo was in high spirits when he asked, “Are we still playing?”

I glanced over at Zhuo Wenyang hesitantly. Could I be any more obvious?

Ke Luo continued to insist, “Let’s play, let’s slam two more games. I feel good.”

“Let’s play.”

It was Zhuo Wenyang who spoke up.

“???”

Zhuo Wenyang finally raised his head from his laptop and looked over, “I’ll play too.”

“???”

“I finished installing the game,” he said, “I studied videos and strategies, and have a general understanding now. I should be okay.”

“???”

Ke Luo smiled and said, “Okay, okay, send me your ID and I’ll add you.”

The system prompted, “YouJump has joined the team.”

“????”

I stared at the newly formed three-person team in shock. The game was played in either two’s or four’s so the three-person team needed to be re-matched with an additional person. DV happened to be online at the moment so I joined him instead. As soon as DV entered the team, he was dumbfounded into silence for a brief moment before saying, “Damn it, your names are really unified.”

I slowly regained my senses when I jumped off the plane. This was the first time I brought Zhuo Wenyang to play a game!

I felt my blood boiling in excitement and was planning on how I would guide and support him throughout the game. I finally understood the intentions of those who brought out dogs to impress girls! (best analogy I can think of in comparison)

Originally, we intended to sit together offline and directly talk to each other if we encountered a difficult situation. However, there were outsiders in the team so I turned on the game voice feature in order to maintain communication with DV.

During the entire time, DV heard me prattle nonstop. “Wenyang is here. I picked up something useful, can AWM be used? It’s okay. It doesn’t matter if you are not that familiar with it; you can get used to it if you use it a lot. I will give you this one.”

“Wenyang, I have bullets here. I’ll give them all to you.”

“It’s okay, I’ve already killed that guy for you. I’ll help you out.”

“I just touched a third-level head. I’ll give it to you.”

“Do you still have any medicine left? I’ll give it to you.”

DV couldn’t help asking, “Ah, is this our sister-in-law?”

“…….”

I silently turned off the microphone. I found a two-person off-road vehicle and immediately drove it to Zhuo Wenyang. I courteously said, “Wenyang, come on and get in the car.”

Ke Luo spoke up, “Ah? What about me?”

“Isn’t DV still there?”

Ke Luo turned his head to directly stare at me, “He doesn’t have a car. Do you want me to run with him on my back?”

I turned on my mic and shouted to DV, “Hurry up and find a car for Sister Soymilk!”

When he heard that he had a younger sister, DV immediately regained his spirits. After a while, he really acquired a jeep.

Ke Luo shook his head and sighed, “I cried in the jeep while he was jumping and laughing in it.” (A two-person off-road vehicle is a jumping vehicle.)

The four of us stumbled along the way. Ke Luo and I took Zhuo Wenyang and DV, as if we were journeying to the west to learn ancient scriptures. After venturing through, we fell, helped, fell, helped, and were finally dragged to the final circle of destiny.

DV could not be moved here. After he laid down the gun besides us, there were two other people alive on the opposing side. There were not many places to hide. Ke Luo clicked on one and was immediately shot in the head by the remaining survivor at the same time.

After the opponent succeeded, he agilely disappeared. I supposed he hid to apply medication. He wanted to survive the last wave of poison by applying medicine to restore blood. Eventually, as long as he could last a little longer than his opponent, even by a second, he would win.

The last poisonous circle was about to shrink and there were almost no safe areas anymore. I only had a useless first aid kit on me and I gave Zhuo Wenyang the only medical kit left. There may not be a chance of winning even with the medicine.

Thus, I called out to Zhuo Wenyang, “Tap up your energy. Painkillers! Adrenaline! Fill it up to the max! Go to the edge of the poison and wipe off a bit of blood. Use the medical kit when I tell you to.”

“Okay.”

“Use!”

I located where the opponent man was and, in the last moments of my lifeline, I shot the figure in the pit.

Then, my screen flashed to gray — I gave up the first aid kit to get my blood back up, and of course, I only lasted two seconds in this poisonous circle. Although my shot struck him, it failed to directly eliminate the opponent.

However, he also failed to finish applying medicine.

After he was instantly poisoned to death, the only remaining person left survived by relying on the medical kit was Zhuo Wenyang.

Ultimately, our team successfully ate and left no crumbs~~

DV shouted, “Damn right!”

“…..,” Ke Luo looked at me meaningfully, “Must be hard, buddy.”

“Hey, hey, hey,” I countered.

Zhuo Wenyang also looked for me, “Thank you.”

Ke Luo smiled and said, “To be honest, it’s the first time I’ve seen you play, Wenyang. Your level is pretty good.”

Although he could not be compared with a veterans like Ke Luo and me because he lacked actual combat experience, he had strong execution abilities and judgement. Overall, with his calmness and composure, he was at least better than DV.

Zhuo Wenyang shook his head and denied, “There is still a lot of room for improvement so I need to work harder.”

“……”

I thought he was just playing this game casually.

I sent a message to Zhuo Wenyang, “Are you going to play seriously?”

“Mm.”

“Why?” This game wasn’t the chosen one so, was this anything worth risking his valuable time? “Is this particularly any fun?”

He thought about it and replied, “It’s alright.”

“Then what about it?” Wasting time playing games? He was someone who wanted to be a scientist on top of his studies and company.

He watched me for a moment and replied, “I already let you know what I enjoy, so I want to know what you like as well.”

“…..”

I stared at the messages and my whole face promptly turned a shade of red, and my ears were hot.

Ke Luo glanced over in concern, “What’s wrong with you? Skin allergies? Fever? Are you okay? You still playing?”

I was extremely happy tonight. Not only did I feel refreshed after winning various rounds, Zhuo Wenyang’s words made me feel elated.

I was still thinking about it over and over before heading to bed. Although he spoke normally and there were no overt emotions, I could not shake my feelings off. It was strange that even though he was a man of few words, how was it that he could sometimes speak so well?

I couldn’t sleep. I got up and took out the notebooks he lent me.

His handwriting was so beautiful! I flipped through it endlessly. I finally understood what it meant when people say “one’s writing is representative of oneself” and “seeing another’s handwriting is akin to meeting their face.”

As I was flipping through it, a piece of yellowed draft note fell out.

This unremarkable piece of paper was tightly inserted between pages because it did not fall out when I flipped through the notebook a few times prior. Zhuo Wenyang probably did not take note of it when he lent this notebook to me.

This seemingly common note had calculation formulas listed and cramped onto it in addition to some ineligible words. These written, scattered words repeatedly read “Lin Jing, Lin Jing.”

I was taken aback for a moment.

So did we truly have a good relationship at one point?

Also, I could not remember this person at all.

I stared at it uncomfortably. Because of my amnesia, I also felt a little guilty.