Chapter 87: Leave No Worries Behind

The room was unlit, and smoke hung everywhere. Under the dim wash of moonlight, it gave off a sinister, eerie, and unsettling air.

Through the haze, a tiny ember flickered in and out of sight. It was the tip of a cigarette.

The glow of the cigarette and the moonlight together revealed a face, though only half of it could be seen. Its owner’s eyes were narrowed to slits, breathing out smoke with an air of deep, indulgent contentment.

His elbow, the one holding the cigarette, rested on the table, while the fingers of his right hand tapped out an aimless rhythm.

Suddenly, a knock sounded at the door, and a low voice came from outside. “Boss?”

“Come in!”

The door opened, and a tall, broad figure stepped inside. Even as he entered, he coughed several times in succession. “Boss, how many cigarettes have you smoked?”

“Click.”

The light came on. The man with the cigarette was Ma Jun. He blinked a few times, as if unaccustomed to the brightness. Then he yawned and said lazily, “What is it? Is there a problem with the system fusion? Or has something gone wrong with Little Flower?”

“Nothing’s wrong!” Qian Moduo walked over and sat down across from Ma Jun. “Boss, it’s you who’s having a problem. It’s so late, and you still won’t rest. Smoking this much—do you have something troubling you?”

“Yes.” Ma Jun crushed out his cigarette and let out a long sigh. “Old Qian, you should know something about me. You know I’ve lived this life a second time, and I was still quite young then, just twenty-three or twenty-four. But the specific things I went through back then, you definitely wouldn’t know. Little Flower doesn’t know either.”

Old Qian nodded, but said nothing.

“Society is the best school, and the human heart is the filthiest thing there is.” Ma Jun gave a cold laugh. “Lucky or unlucky, I learned a few things and came to understand a few things. More often than not, ignorance is bliss.”

“Boss, then you must be very blissful.” Qian Moduo spoke softly.

“Ha-ha.” Ma Jun laughed. “You saw right through me. Because I really do not know a great many things. For example, I do not know the system’s true purpose. I do not know whether it is harmful to me or beneficial. I do not know whether you are truly loyal to me.”

“The last point, you should have already confirmed, shouldn’t you?” Old Qian walked to the window and opened it. A cool breeze drifted in, and the air instantly became much fresher.

“I only made a simple confirmation. There’s about an eighty percent chance you’re loyal. After all, you were created by the system.” Ma Jun smiled as he spoke.

“Since you have so many concerns, why not kill Little Flower?”

“You think it would be that easy?” Ma Jun shrugged. “Little Flower isn’t stupid. She chose to make herself a body. Aside from my deliberate or accidental guidance, she must have had some other purpose as well. If I killed her, the greatest likelihood is that she would merge back with the system.”

“Then why did you still choose to let her have a body?”

“Because then Little Flower won’t know everything about me.” Ma Jun said quietly. After a moment of thought, he fixed Qian Moduo with a stare. “Old Qian, even though you’re a bioengineered being, you’re still an individual. I can’t figure out why you’re loyal to me. Is it something like a computer command?”

“No.” Qian Moduo shook his head. After a thoughtful pause, he said, “You could understand it this way: our relationship is like that between parents, brothers, and sisters, bound by blood kinship. So long as one is still human, one will not turn against one’s own parents or siblings. My relationship with you runs even deeper than that. So you can actually trust me completely.”

“I’ve always done just that.” Ma Jun smiled. “All right, it’s getting late. Go get some rest. I’m going to sleep too.”

Qian Moduo nodded and stood up. But when he reached the doorway, he turned back again. “Boss, is the truth that what really troubles you is that you’ve been with Little Flower for so long, you can’t bring yourself to lay a hand on her?”

“Ha-ha.” Ma Jun threw his head back and laughed. “Get lost.”

By the count of the various worlds’ timelines combined, Ma Jun and Little Flower really had spent a very long time together.

On the plane flying from Australia to the capital, in first class, a fourteen-year-old girl held a koala doll in her arms. With a blank expression, she murmured almost inaudibly, “According to the calculations, Ma Jun is just an ordinary young man. Even as the chosen one of this world, following the original story, he should at most have become a film star. He shouldn’t be this suspicious and dark-hearted.”

“It seems human feelings and motives cannot be analyzed by relying on data alone. Now that I have a human body too, the future has become much more interesting. Speaking of which, the feeling when I kissed him back then was so strange. Human? Hmm, so strange!”

The next morning dawned bright and clear.

Ma Jun got up quite early, drank a glass of fresh milk, and ate a you tiao specially made for him. He was sitting in the small garden outside the ranch house, with a laptop on the table in front of him.

The webpage on the screen displayed several pages, all of them related to the domestic television drama Silent Flowers in Bloom.

By now, the show was in full swing, airing in prime time every day on three satellite channels, and the response was fairly good.

In the past two years, all kinds of youthful, nostalgic campus stories had become wildly popular. Perhaps because society was developing too quickly, people had barely reached their early twenties before they began longing for school days.

Although the plot was still full of melodrama, the leading cast, including Ma Jun, all looked quite good. Added to that were the touches of makeup and special effects, which drew in a great many young viewers.

Of course, not all the coverage was positive. But for a drama, so long as the ratings are high, it attracts attention, and its reputation is not too terrible, that already counts as excellent. There is profit to be made on every front.

Riding on the success of this drama, Junma Technology was also promoting Ma Jun with great fanfare, and his fame rose all at once, giving him the air of a rising young heartthrob.

“Boss, are you planning to take on more roles next?” Old Qian came out of the house.

“Of course. I’m a person of this world, so naturally I have to take root here.” Ma Jun nodded. “Old Qian, during this period, make more trips to other worlds, seize some resources, and produce more low-level bioengineered beings. Develop Junma Pictures as quickly as possible. Our first goal is to turn me into a major star. Earning profits and the like are secondary. So long as that goal is achieved in the main world, I’ll have nothing to worry about. With Little Flower here, she can play as much as she wants.”

“No problem, Boss!” Old Qian was brimming with confidence. “We’ve obtained a great deal of high-tech from the Avatar world. Now that we have low-level bioengineered assistants who can be relied on completely, development will surely accelerate at once. We’re not short on funds or manpower. We just need time!”

“Good.” Ma Jun lit a cigarette. “Don’t forget to keep Little Flower under twenty-four-hour surveillance. We need people both in the shadows and in the open.”