The four of them discussed the septic tank issue for a few minutes (Mo Tan remained silent for most of the time), and eventually, Yi Dong, Kang Lan, and Wan Yang happily reached a consensus—that announcement was definitely a prank by Wu Zui Company.
Due to some concerns that were not to be revealed to outsiders, Mo Tan reserved his opinion on this…
They chatted about things in the game for a while longer, until Wan Yang let out a short shriek: “Holy crap!”
“Brother, what are you trying to do?!” Kang Lan flinched at his loud voice, rubbing his ears and grimacing as he complained, “I know you War Priests have battle songs, but can we not sing them in real life…?”
Wan Yang ignored him, just staring blankly around, and after a long silence, he looked at Yi Dong with a complex expression: “Liar!”
Yi Dong: “?!”
Kang Lan’s expression instantly became very interesting, then he quietly nudged Mo Tan with his elbow and whispered, “There’s a story here~”
“Heh.” The latter gave a dry laugh, shaking his head, “I probably know why…”
Sure enough, Wan Yang glared, waved his large hand, and pointed steadily at a large poster hanging behind the TV, saying in a deep voice, “Say again that you’re not Gu Gu Jiang’s fan!”
Yi Dong’s face turned ashen: “I’m really not her fan! I’m her…”
“Son.”
The two people beside them said in unison.
Wan Yang: “Huh?”
Yi Dong sighed, collapsing weakly onto the sofa: “Actually…”
Five minutes later
Wan Yang clutched his head in pain, lamenting with a pale face: “It turns out the idol I’ve liked for so many years is an obasan! Her son is even three months older than me! Ah!!!”
“Hey, hey, hey, who are you calling an obasan?” Yi Dong glared at him with an unfriendly expression, huffing, “My mom is forever seventeen (self-proclaimed), if you say that to her face, you might get beaten to death…”
Mo Tan nodded vigorously beside him, secretly memorizing Yi Dong’s recent ‘self-proclaimed’ comment, planning to talk to Gu Ayi (Aunt Gu) about it when he visited again, to achieve his sinister goal of retaliation.
“Alright, alright, let’s not talk about idol disillusionment for now.” Kang Lan stretched, pulled out his phone, and glanced at it: “We still have over an hour until the scheduled time, should we early birds play something?”
Wan Yang lay sprawled on the sofa: “I’m going to die without Innocent World to play…”
Yi Dong nodded: “Seconded.”
“You two are exaggerating, aren’t you?” Kang Lan’s mouth twitched, and he said to the two with a forced smile, “Innocent World can only be played for 12 hours a day, do you two just lie like corpses in the game pods all day?”
Mo Tan shrugged: “Let’s play board games, I remember Yi Dong has a whole bunch.”
“I do have some.” Yi Dong nodded, then added, “But they’re not mine, they’re my mom’s.”
Wan Yang immediately jumped up as if he had been injected with chicken blood: “I want to play! I want to play!!!”
Kang Lan pushed up his glasses like a professional tennis player: “It’s time to let you guys witness my Kang Lan Domain, hmm…”
Then the doorbell rang.
“Looks like everyone is used to coming a bit early.” Yi Dong, who had already gotten up and was walking towards the second floor, shrugged, then turned back and said, “I’ll go get the board games, who wants to open the door?”
Wan Yang pulled his neck back: “I’m afraid of the cold.”
Kang Lan buried himself in a pile of cushions: “I haven’t recovered yet either.”
“Then I’ll go.” Mo Tan smiled, then stood up and walked towards the entrance hall.
Wan Yang’s cheering voice came from behind: “There’s a one-quarter chance it’s a guy, and a three-quarter chance it’s a girl, you won’t lose out by going!”
“Yeah, I’m so happy.” Mo Tan turned back and retorted, then tightened his clothes and stepped forward to open the door.
Outside stood a tall girl in a pure white down jacket, wearing a yellow knitted hat. Her slightly nervous small face held a timid smile, and as Mo Tan opened the door, she instinctively pulled her neck back and retreated half a step, like a startled rabbit.
Looking at the pretty face he saw every day recently, Mo Tan instinctively touched his collar, then after half a second of stunned, he gave the other party an awkward priest’s salute: “Happy New Year, Holy Maiden~”
“Mo Tan!” Yu Cheng, who was also stunned for half a second, immediately let out a joyful gasp. Her previous panic instantly dissipated for the most part, and she happily bounced in place: “I thought it would be Student Yi Dong who came out! That’s great~ Happy New Year!”
Mo Tan blinked: “Is he that scary-looking?”
“Ah! I didn’t mean that!” Yu Cheng shook her head vigorously, wrinkling her small nose, “It’s just that we’re not very familiar, so I’d definitely be flustered and not know what to say…”
“So how shy are you, there are plenty of common topics, aren’t there~” Mo Tan scratched his hair, stepping aside and saying, “Come in first, it’s cold outside.”
“Mm, thank you~”
Yu Cheng nodded gently, a little awkwardly, and walked into the entrance hall.
Mo Tan got Yu Cheng a pair of slippers, then led the way to the living room.
“You’re too slow~” Wan Yang saw Mo Tan return and first shouted, then saw Yu Cheng following closely behind him. He immediately raised his arm and greeted, “Yo, Student Yu Cheng, Happy New Year~”
Yu Cheng blushed and nodded, peeking half her head from behind Mo Tan and whispering, “Ha… Happy New Year, Student Wan Yang, and Student Kang Lan.”
“Still so introverted~” Kang Lan smiled familiarly, teasing, “Good girls who can arrive an hour early are rare these days.”
Yu Cheng gently shook her head: “I’ve been waking up earlier recently, and there’s nothing else to do… Wow!”
She suddenly looked up around her, her small face flushed with excitement: “Gu Gu Jiang is everywhere!”
“But she’s already married.”
“And she has a son.”
“Sigh…”
“Sigh…”
Kang Lan and Wan Yang both let out a long, drawn-out sigh.
“Huh?” Yu Cheng blinked her eyes, then whispered, “So she didn’t lie to me!”
Mo Tan, who was closest to her, paused: “You know each other?”
“Yeah, we chatted a few words at a comic convention in S City.” Yu Cheng smiled shyly, gently tapping her chin with her small hand: “Gu Gu Jiang quietly told me that she’s already married, and her son is about the same age as me, ah! She told me to keep it a secret at the time…”
Mo Tan gave a dry laugh: “It’s okay, I already knew, hmm, the son is here.”
Yu Cheng tilted her head: “Son?”
“Mo Tan, that’s enough!” Yi Dong, who was carrying a large pile of board games downstairs, stretched his neck and shouted, “Are you really that petty! Hey, Student Yu Cheng, Happy New Year.”
“Ha… Happy New Year, sorry to bother you.” Yu Cheng nodded gently to Yi Dong over Mo Tan’s shoulder, then considerately changed the subject: “Um, has everyone seen the announcement?”
All four nodded: “We saw it.”
“Hmm, actually, I think the first point is a bit unrealistic…”
Yu Cheng, trying hard to find common ground with everyone, smiled timidly: “It should be an official little joke, right?”
“Definitely, how could something like that happen?” Yi Dong placed the large pile of board games on the coffee table and smiled at Yu Cheng: “Please sit wherever you like… Uh, your relationship seems surprisingly good.”
Yu Cheng then realized that she had been talking to them while shrinking behind Mo Tan since entering the room. She quickly took two steps to the side, somewhat awkwardly whispering, “Mo Tan takes good care of me in the game…”
Kang Lan narrowed his eyes slightly, pushing up his glasses like a high school detective: “You didn’t add ‘Student’ just now.”
Yu Cheng shivered, her expression a bit awkward.
Wan Yang, however, shook his head indifferently: “Isn’t that obvious? They’ve been moving together in the game for quite some time now, how could they not be familiar?”
“Yeah, it feels too out of place to call each other ‘Student’ in the game.” Mo Tan smiled very naturally, spreading his hands: “You can’t be too obvious when clinging to someone for support~”
【But I was still misunderstood…】
Yu Cheng quietly added a sentence in her heart, then obediently sat down on the edge of the sofa.
…
At the same time
B City, a certain express company 6F
The elevator door suddenly opened without warning, and a man dressed in flamboyant clothes abruptly walked out. He wore an extremely out-of-season floral shirt and baggy shorts, with flip-flops on his feet. Despite having a head of white hair, his lazy face in no way resembled an old man nearing two hundred and fifty years old.
By the way, even in 2049, the average human lifespan hasn't changed much; only the accidental death rate has significantly decreased. Therefore, this two hundred and fifty year old is still quite peculiar…
“So why can’t they just open the entrance directly on the seventh floor, it’s such a hassle.” He muttered in a low voice, then listlessly walked up the stairs leading to the seventh floor, suddenly disappearing from the observation range of the surrounding ornamental cameras halfway up.
However, he did not leave the building, but merely appeared at the same time and place, in what was, in a sense, a semi-dimensional space.
In any case, he leisurely made his way to the top floor, then his expression suddenly became extremely colorful, exclaiming, “Transforming this place into a buffet restaurant? My goodness, whose genius idea is this!?”
Before him was an extremely spacious area. Aside from a large round table in the center and a dozen scattered chairs around it, it was indistinguishable from an ordinary buffet restaurant in every other aspect. Rows of long tables were piled high with various dishes and drinks, ranging from Chinese to Western and some unidentifiable styles. The overall color scheme was predominantly festive red and gold, and in a corner, there was even a piano playing automatically. A large screen hanging in the center of the ceiling displayed a countdown to midnight. Although there weren't many people inside, it still felt very festive.
Hmm, very festive indeed, there were even two strings of firecrackers crackling and exploding in mid-air…
“It was Ice Pupil’s idea, that girl. She seems to think that combining New Year’s breakfast, New Year’s lunch, and New Year’s Eve dinner is the entire meaning of celebrating the New Year.”
A silver-haired youth, who looked no more than Fourteen or fifteen years old, walked over with two small bottles of baijiu. His low-temperature tone was filled with helplessness and displeasure: “Long time no see, Shensuan, want a bottle?”
“I haven’t been Shensuan for a long time.” The middle-aged man nearing two hundred and fifty years old rolled his eyes, casually took a bottle of wine, and showed a bitter smile as if he had been hit in the groin: “But I think in this current environment, drinking red wine is more… ”
“I thought so too, Boss Du.” The silver-haired youth corrected the address, then shook the baijiu in his hand: “But your esteemed disciple said that according to historical records from who knows where, celebrating the New Year goes better with baijiu, so this is how it is.”
Boss Du casually twisted open the cap, took a big gulp, then solemnly said to the young man in front of him: “Seriously, Su Shui Shi, I think you guys should have just killed that bastard back then, with his twisted values, deceiving his master, betraying his ancestors, and being possessed by evil spirits!”
“Stop with the polite nonsense, just call me by my name.” The young man called Su Shui Shi said coolly, then glanced at Boss Du: “If we had really killed him back then, would you still be able to hold your grandson now?”
Boss Du pondered for a moment, then grinned proudly: “Wan Teng, you still don’t know, do you~ Xiao Yu can even carry me now…”
“Tch.” The other party snorted, saying something shocking: “My son can also carry me.”
It seems this person’s appearance also has nothing to do with his age.
It’s not scientific, not magical, not evolutionary at all…
“Have some shame, your son could carry you when he was in elementary school, alright.” A tall woman in a rose-colored long dress with dazzling red hair appeared behind Wan Teng, carrying a tray, and pressed down hard on the latter’s hair: “I was wondering why you stayed at the door for so long, so it turns out Shensuan is here, let’s go in and talk, everyone else is basically here.”
“I already told you not to call me that anymore.” Boss Du pouted, walking inside with the rather strange-looking couple beside him, and asked, “Who among the ones who should be here isn’t here?”
The red-haired woman, full of an older sister vibe, answered with narrowed eyes: “Our scumbag savior. By the way, Senior Du Tian, can’t you calculate it yourself? If you can’t calculate it, can’t you open your Dark Eye and see?”
“Are you trying to say there isn’t enough ‘karma’ left?” Du Tian glared at the former impatiently, then suddenly felt an extremely dangerous aura. Without a word, he did a backflip and leaped several meters away, then turned his head to look at a fully laden long table: “Holy crap, what is this?!”
Wan Teng introduced expressionlessly: “High-explosive eggs, Claymore-style tea bombs, fusion fried rice, execution crispy rice, exploding popcorn, bombing chicken. I can’t name the rest. My sister tried to stop it, but failed…”
Boss Du was covered in cold sweat: “…”
The red-haired woman elbowed Wan Teng, making him stumble, and angrily said: “When will you stop habitually calling your wife ‘sister’! I’ve been married to you for twenty years!”
Boss Du sighed, looking at the few people who had gathered around at some point: “Let’s talk about something serious…”
“What serious business?”
“I did a divination a while ago, though it was very vague… but our plan should have succeeded.”
The surroundings suddenly fell silent, and the two flying firecrackers instantly extinguished.
“Then it went out of control the moment it succeeded~”
Chapter 224: The End