Jiang Ran steadied his breathing and looked at Cheng ngxue. “Y-you… your last mory, is it still the car accident?”
Cheng ngxue nodded. “I clearly rember we were on our way to the college entrance exam. It was the second day of the exam.”
“But then you suddenly beca like a different person. You dragged and ran toward the suburbs, and you were terrified of sothing too—you kept muttering the whole ti.”
“What was I muttering?”
Jiang Ran hurriedly pressed, “Do you still rember what I was muttering?”
“Of course I do!”
Cheng ngxue blinked. “I kept asking you, and you wouldn’t tell —you were panicking so badly, your forehead was covered in sweat, and you just kept saying—”
“‘Don’t co again—don’t co again—’”
Jiang Ran drew in a deep breath.
Cheng ngxue’s account was exactly the sa as what Li Yini had said back then.
That also proved Li Yini really had downloaded Cheng ngxue’s mories and knew everything Cheng ngxue had once known.
Since Cheng ngxue’s consciousness was still stuck on June 8, 2023, that ant ever since her mories had been extracted by Puppe, she had remained in a “sleeping” state.
One sleep, like Sleeping Beauty in a fairy tale, and more than twenty years had flowed by in an instant, until she finally awakened today.
Jiang Ran gave a helpless smile.
“Xiaoxue, it isn’t 2023 anymore.”
“Huh?”
Cheng ngxue widened her eyes. “Jiang Ran, stop teasing ! If it’s not 2023, what year could it possibly be?”
“2045.”
“Pfft—”
Cheng ngxue burst into laughter and punched Jiang Ran lightly. “What, do you think I’m a three-year-old? If it were really 2045, we’d both be forty! How could you still look like this? How could I still look like this?”
Suddenly, she seed to notice sothing. Rising onto her tiptoes, she flattened her palm on top of her head and compared her height to Jiang Ran’s.
“Ew—you’re so fake! Absolutely disgusting!”
“What?” Jiang Ran asked, baffled.
“Did you secretly put height lifts in your shoes?”
Cheng ngxue crossed her arms and looked at him with disdain. “I was wondering why this felt so weird. How did you suddenly get so much taller than ?”
Heh.
Jiang Ran chuckled softly and shook his head.
In Cheng ngxue’s mories, he was still his seventeen-year-old self from 2023. But now he was already nineteen. Two years of college had added another six centiters to his height, so naturally it couldn’t be compared.
“A lot of this is complicated to explain to you. I’ll tell you slowly—if we have enough ti.”
Jiang Ran felt that there were probably only around ten minutes left before 39 minutes and 11 seconds.
Of course he knew this virtual world was about to reboot soon, and even if he explained everything clearly to Cheng ngxue, it would all be for nothing.
But—
This was the real Cheng ngxue, his real childhood sweetheart. Even if the explanation was completely aningless, he still wanted to talk with her a little longer.
“Let’s get out of here first. We can talk while we walk.”
Still shaken, he glanced at the shell nearby that looked ready to explode at any mont and took two steps back. “Who knows when these drones and robots might suddenly go back to normal.”
“Okay.”
Cheng ngxue also nodded like soone who had narrowly survived disaster. “Just now I think I even saw an amusent park underground—and then I hit my head, and the ceiling above disappeared too. Could it be that I’m dreaming right now?”
“Well, it’s kind of like a dream.”
Jiang Ran patted Cheng ngxue on the back, motioning for her to walk forward. “Co on. We’ll talk as we go.”
Along the way, they strolled through a world where ti had stopped.
All pedestrians and traffic had turned into motionless background scenery, making way for the boy and girl at the end of ti.
The wind no longer rustled, leaves hung suspended in the air, and clouds no longer drifted.
Everything had wandered into the strange encounter of an oil painting. Only at the street corners Jiang Ran and Cheng ngxue passed did a one-of-a-kind reflection slide by.
“You’re saying this world is fake?!”
Cheng ngxue was stunned. “B-but everything here feels so real. I really thought I was dreaming just now!”
“Consciousness-upload surgery, a virtual digital world, all that stuff—hey, hey, hey, you’re not ssing with , right? Is this so kind of prank reality show?”
She turned around and walked backward, glancing left and right, searching the silent street for hidden caras.
—
Of course she trusted Jiang Ran, but the story was simply too absurd. Her mind couldn’t accept it.
“That’s strange.”
Jiang Ran suddenly stopped and frowned.
Why hadn’t the virtual world reached its reboot collapse point yet?
They had been walking for at least twenty minutes, but none of the visual glitches—the static, the garbled distortions—had appeared.
“Could it be that because everything in the virtual world has stopped, glitches won’t appear and it won’t reboot?”
“If I think about it from the perspective of a computer program, if the whole world is in a paused state, then all computation has stopped. Naturally there wouldn’t be any hardware load either… could that be the reason?”
With that question in mind, Jiang Ran turned and walked into a shop.
It was a n’s clothing store. A saleswoman stood there like a wax figure, her smile frozen on her face as she introduced products to the male custor in front of her.
The male custor was naturally motionless as well, standing there listening—though with the entire world in ti-stop, Jiang Ran had no way of knowing what they had been talking about.
But he wasn’t here to eavesdrop. His goal was to find a watch.
Perfect. The custor happened to be wearing an expensive chanical watch.
In this highly advanced virtual world, watches naturally served only as decoration. Even in Jiang Ran’s 2025, that trend had already begun.
He leaned closer, turned the man’s wrist, and looked at the dial.
10:31:21.
He waited for a long ti, but the second hand never trembled.
All right then.
It seed that at this exact mont, absolutely everything in this virtual world had truly stopped, including ti itself. The only beings able to drift outside of ti were Jiang Ran and Cheng ngxue.
Jiang Ran rolled up the custor’s sleeve and started undoing the strap, preparing to take the watch.
Even though the ti on it wasn’t moving right now, having a watch on hand still gave him an extra sense of security. He could use it to monitor when ti started flowing again.
Thunk!
A small fist smacked into Jiang Ran’s back.
“What are you doing!”
Cheng ngxue glared at him reproachfully. “Why are you stealing sothing?”
“Does this even count as stealing?”
Jiang Ran spread his hands. “Ti is literally stopped right now, and we don’t know when this world’s going to reboot anyway. Taking one watch from him doesn’t matter.”
“Besides, I forgot to tell you earlier—this place has basically already achieved a utopian society. Most goods are provided for free.”
“That still doesn’t make it okay!”
Cheng ngxue couldn’t understand it. “You still can’t steal!”
“Uh…”
Jiang Ran surrendered. “Okay, okay.”
That was just the kind of kind and pure-hearted person Cheng ngxue was. No matter what state she was in—even in a dream—she had zero tolerance for petty theft.
“But I really do need a watch.”
Jiang Ran said bluntly, “Because so things are already moving beyond my previous experience. I need to gather so data.”
“If you won’t let take his watch, then fine—I know a watch shop that gives them away for free. Let’s go get one there.”
“Hmph!”
Cheng ngxue snorted softly. “That’s more like it! But how are we getting there? On that flying motorcycle again?”
“Yep.”
Jiang Ran nodded and walked toward the roadside.
Cheng ngxue followed behind him. “By the way, the whole world is frozen right now—even the hands on the watch aren’t moving. Are you sure that flying motorcycle can still work? Don’t drop halfway there.”
Jiang Ran stopped short. The question genuinely stumped him.
He scratched his head. “Mm… I think it should work, right? I an, the flying motorcycle runs on electricity. Look, a lot of the shops still have their lights on, so I think it should still be usable. What do you think?”
Cheng ngxue seed convinced.
“What you’re saying makes sense.”
She nodded. “I think it should be [fine].”
The two of them reached the roadside. Jiang Ran climbed onto a shared flying scooter and gently twisted the throttle. Lift force pushed the bike upward, and it slowly rose off the ground.
“Look!”
“It actually works!”
Both Jiang Ran and Cheng ngxue were stunned, but the shock soon turned into a perfectly mutual smile.
“Hop on!”
“Coming! Giddy-up!”
Amid Cheng ngxue’s delighted, childlike laughter, the flying scooter carried童真与童话 into the sky, and she wrapped her arms around Jiang Ran’s waist, marveling at the wonder of this world.
“Hey.”
Leaning against Jiang Ran’s back, she called softly.
“Hm?” Jiang Ran turned his head.
Cheng ngxue bit her lower lip, hesitating. “If this really isn’t a dream—but a virtual world—”
She paused.
Then, gathering her courage, she finally asked the question she had been holding in for so long.
“[Then what exactly happened to the real in the real world?]”
…
Jiang Ran fell silent, not turning back.
Even the speed of the flying scooter slowed, as if it had lost its strength, gliding through the air.
After more than a decade of growing up together, Cheng ngxue had long since learned how to read Jiang Ran’s heart. Her voice trembled.
“[Am I already… dead?]”
“No.”
Without even a mont’s hesitation, Jiang Ran gave that lie as a reflex.
He didn’t even know why he lied to Cheng ngxue, but the human heart was like that—emotion often made its choice before reason.
That was why, when Jiang Ran had explained the world’s background to Cheng ngxue earlier, he had deliberately avoided every part connected to her.
Puppe, the car accident, the Magician, mory upload—he had ntioned none of it.
He had originally thought the virtual world would reboot very soon, so he hadn’t wanted to burden Cheng ngxue with more pain in that limited ti.
“Then am I…”
Cheng ngxue frowned. “Am I in a coma?”
“Sothing like that.”
Jiang Ran answered vaguely as he rode.
“Will I wake up again?”
Cheng ngxue wasn’t stupid. She had already realized sothing, and the arms around Jiang Ran’s waist slowly tightened.
“[Will we still… be able to et again in the real world?]”
“Of course we will!”
Jiang Ran smiled faintly. “Co on, this virtual world is basically like that! It’s just like an online ga. Everyone plays around inside it, and when they get bored they can leave whenever they want!”
“Jiang Ran, don’t lie to .”
Cheng ngxue leaned forward, her chin resting on his shoulder as she stared into his eyes.
“In this world, you’re the person I trust most. So—”
Her voice was both light and heavy.
“You absolutely must not lie to .”
In the silent city, in the world where ti had stopped,
the little flying scooter descended from the sky and parked outside a watch shop.
Cheng ngxue looked into Jiang Ran’s eyes. Jiang Ran kept his eyes fixed ahead.
“We’ll definitely et again.”
He turned back, his gaze serious as it t hers.
“[I swear.]”
“Hehe!”
In an instant Cheng ngxue bead with joy and jumped off the back seat of the flying scooter. “That’s all I needed to hear!”
She stretched lazily and looked around the shopping street. “You’ve always been like this since we were kids. If you say sothing, you an it. If you promise sothing, you always do it.”
“Do you rember when we were little, when I fell into the river and you saved , and you almost died yourself?”
Walking forward, Cheng ngxue lifted the hair at the back of Jiang Ran’s neck and rubbed the tiny bluish scar where the pencil had pierced him. Her gaze deepened.
“Afterward I asked you why, even though you couldn’t swim, you still jumped in without hesitation and pushed toward the shore—”
…
“You probably don’t even rember it now. Your answer back then was so childish!”
Jiang Ran shook his head. “I really don’t rember.”
He only rembered the act of saving her, not her asking that question afterward.
“What did I say?” he asked, curious.
“Hehe—”
Thinking back on those little monts from the past, Cheng ngxue couldn’t help smiling, the sweetness overflowing from it.
“You said—[You promised your parents you’d protect .]”
Jiang Ran laughed softly and lowered his head. “That did happen. My parents said you were small, that kids at school might bully you, so they told to look out for you more.”
“But I don’t think that’s really such a big deal. For any childhood friends, any neighbors, any brothers and sisters—parents would say sothing like that. They’d always tell the boy to take care of the girl.”
However,
Cheng ngxue shook her head. “It’s not the sa.”
She spoke softly, “A lot of people would only treat that as a polite thing to say. Especially kids—who would really take that kind of instruction to heart?”
“But you did. You always do what you say. Every promise you make, you keep.”
“Ever since that day, I’ve always trusted you unconditionally. Whatever you say, I believe. Whatever story you tell , I take as truth.”
“Including now.”
With her hands behind her back, Cheng ngxue walked to the front of the flying scooter and smiled at Jiang Ran.
“Actually, I’ve already guessed that a lot of things are wrong. This virtual world, my condition, and even—”
“That this really might just be an insubstantial dream.”
“But with those words from you, I won’t overthink anymore! I trust you more than I trust myself!”
She held out her right fist, offering him a fist bump.
“Then I’ll be selfish for once, greedy for this dream for once. I really hope I can still have the day I wake up.”
“And even more than that, when I wake up in reality, the first person I see—”
“Will still be you.”
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