Chapter 90: This Is... Awkward!

A new day begins.

The sun and moon complete their endless exchange, and teachers and students likewise finish handing over the helmets.

But in some places, such as the special detention block, there is still only eternal night.

Because electricity costs money, the lights here only come on for a brief moment when guards enter, or when the current is so plentiful that it would be wasted otherwise.

Even so, life in the dark is every bit as lively. Some sing off-key songs, some tell stories that make no sense at all, and some engage in unmentionable acts...

Darkness cannot stop the people here, because super evolution has granted many humans and creatures the ability to see in the dark.

Red, yellow, green, blue, fierce, somber, timid, shrinking away... all kinds of eyes move and glimmer in the blackness.

And the polluted beings that look frightening, even disgusting, such as the old storyteller, become surprisingly welcome in this darkness, because the corrupted parts of their bodies glow too, in red and yellow and green and blue, making excellent cold light sources that pierce the dark and gather people close.

In this age, to be alive is simply to live; there is no room for pretense, and no room for anxiety.

In the darkness, Alpha Princess also crawled forward under Ye Chao's watchful gaze, following the camera section by section.

"Do we really have to do this?" Ye Chao was still a little hesitant.

"There is no other way!" Alpha Princess was quite certain. "We can't get relay technology or base-station technology. Even if we did, and even if we learned it, we still wouldn't be able to gather enough materials in a short time to establish contact with other cities. Only satellites..."

"Actually, we don't have to be in such a hurry..."

"Yes, you're not in a hurry. You can just sit around reading. It's this palace that is cheap and eager to meddle, running around and doing everything for others, bending my back to serve people, and in the end getting no thanks and only complaints..."

After that lament, repeated dozens of times, even Ye Chao, whose emotional intelligence was below zero, knew better than to say another word. He continued to watch Alpha Princess crawl along while flipping through his book.

Before long, they had reached the room of the man in sunglasses.

Inside, only the man in sunglasses and his roommate remained, facing each other from afar, both asleep and snoring like thunder.

After securing the camera and overriding the surveillance here, and after choosing the angle and working out the plan, Alpha Princess walked up to the man in sunglasses.

"Hey, wake up! Wake up!"

Ah, it worked again.

While Alpha Princess was surprised and Ye Chao secretly laughed, the man in sunglasses had already sprung up in one motion. "You finally came!"

Quick reflexes, fast movement. Either life had made him cautious, or he had not been asleep at all and was only pretending.

Then he went blank.

Because light burst before him, and in that radiance appeared a woman of beauty beyond all description, lovely as mist and dawn clouds. Those fierce eyes, those legs, that rear, that figure... no scene of the mortal world could compare; only a fairy from the heavens could rival her.

The man in sunglasses could hardly believe it. He rubbed his eyes hard, then slapped himself twice, doubting that he was dreaming.

"You're not dreaming." Alpha Princess paused, giving him time to recover.

"From one of my believers," she emphasized the word with deliberate disdain, "I heard an interesting piece of news. But when I tried to verify it, I ran into a little trouble, so I came specially to ask you... for confirmation."

Alpha Princess smiled brightly, her voice deliberately deepened with resonance, carrying an alluring magnetism. "Originally, if your answer satisfied me, I would have rescued you. But now it seems there is no need, is that right?"

The man in sunglasses seemed to be waiting for someone to save him.

Ye Chao suddenly understood: it was from that first, cryptic line the man had spoken.

"No need for what?" the man in sunglasses asked, a little dazed. "Oh." He understood, patting his stomach. "You're waiting for food? Hasn't it reached breakfast time yet? You can rescue me from here? What do you want to confirm?"

He asked casually, then poked Alpha Princess with his finger, as if a brat had sneaked into a women's bath.

Pretty quick on the uptake, wasn't he? Alpha Princess smiled.

"My believer—the one who got the Wi-Fi signal from you—told me everything. So last night at nine, I used the method you described to connect to that satellite. The connection did go through, but when it came time to register..."

Alpha Princess did not hide anything. She recounted everything exactly as it happened, watching the changes in the man's expression.

The police's rough handling had to be thanked for smashing his sunglasses and revealing his eyes; otherwise it would have been hard to tell whether he was lying.

The man in sunglasses withdrew his finger. He seemed to be listening, and yet not listening at all. His face fell. "It's not real... As expected, where there is perfection, there must be lies. I said it already—how could there be such a perfect woman in this world?"

Before he could finish, Alpha Princess kicked him flat to the floor.

Ah, hit again?!

She's in top form. Two for two.

"Who says I'm not real? I've looked like this since I was born, and I haven't changed for more than thirty years! Who dares say I'm not real? I'm not one of those cheap, seductive tramps who has to rely on plastic surgery, makeup, and photo editing every day—those evil tricks!" Alpha Princess said indignantly.

The man in sunglasses stared at her in astonishment.

Still bristling, Alpha Princess went on, "Of course I'm real! My true body is busy refining the world of virtual numbers, so where would I have time to linger with you? Of course the only one I can send is an avatar projection! Do you think you're worth my personal visit?"

To pose is to be carried by the wind; she was never without it.

The man's expression rose and fell with Alpha Princess's words.

But the strange thing was that the changes had nothing to do with whether the words were favorable to him. They were bound tightly to something else.

Alpha Princess, who was trying to establish some kind of baseline, analyzed it carefully and froze. "You're analyzing whether I'm lying?"

The man in sunglasses thought about it for a moment, then also froze. "You too..."

That was awkward.

That familiar curve, that trajectory so unlike an ordinary person's. Though it was not the direct mind-reading of someone saying, "Heh, I can read minds," "Oh no, he can read minds too," "Why are you reading me?" "How would you know I'm reading you if you weren't reading me?" "How would I know you're reading me reading you if I weren't reading you reading me"—that kind of naked mutual harm—it was close enough. No mistake about it.

"..."

"..."

Everything was understood without being said.

This damned age of catastrophe, and these damned abilities.

Alpha Princess knew she was reading microexpressions and analyzing them with big data, but she did not know what the man in sunglasses was using.

What irritated her most was that the man in sunglasses even covered his face with his hand. She could not tell whether it was accidental or whether he had seen through her.

"His eyes can emit electromagnetic waves. He probably can see them too. He may well be reading your brain waves," Ye Chao reminded her from the side.

So that was it. Alpha Princess suddenly understood, but at once became puzzled again. She was a program—how could she have brain waves? And they could be seen? How was that designed? It was all rather baffling.

Ye Chao said nothing more, only two words:

"There are."

At first hearing, those words seemed plain enough. But on reflection... they were terrifying.

"Y-Ye, Ye, Ye, Ye, Ye Zi Chao! You also... you also could always see it?!"

Oh no, it looks like I said too much...

Ye Chao Affection -100!

Ye Chao Affection -100!

Ye Chao Affection -100!