Chapter 294: The Genius Billiards Girl
At this moment, BB-chan wore a mischievous smirk, looking like a little devil who had just seen a grand scheme succeed.
However, a promise was a promise. Shirou decided to take her around for a bit more fun. The bustling commercial street was beginning to fill with office workers heading out for a late lunch, creating a steady flow of people.
"How about over here?" Shirou pointed toward a nearby game center.
"Yes! BB-chan wants to play that!" The girl pointed toward a long, green-topped table. In the center, various colored balls were held in a triangular rack, with pockets at the corners and sides connected to net bags.
"Billiards? Do you know how to play?" Shirou asked, surprised.
"Hee-hee! I saw it in a TV drama! Male Lead A, the rich and all-powerful school heartthrob, and Male Lead B, the genius snooker player, had a billiards match to fight for the ownership of a part-time girl at a pool club. I've learned all the rules and poses! BB-chan wants to be like the protagonist and use that ultimate technique where all the balls go in on the first break—the legendary Cyclone Charge Tornado Jump Shot!" The purple-haired girl pumped her fist, speaking with great excitement.
"I see... I have no idea what show you were watching, but let's give it a try," Shirou said, wiping sweat from his brow.
"Then Senpai, let's play 8-ball, the simplest way," BB-chan suggested.
"Sure," Shirou agreed casually, smiling as he saw through her little plan. "That's the only set of rules you actually know, isn't it?"
"Hmph! Senpai! BB-chan may be a novice, but my learning capacity and intelligence are top-tier!" The purple-haired girl refused to back down, responding with a wicked grin.
Billiards is a common hobby in modern life. However, in the past, it was a highly elegant competitive sport. Originally, it was an ultra-high-class game reserved only for the British Royal Family, dukes, and the powerful earls of the capital. This was because, at the time, billiards balls could only be made from ivory. Masses of ivory had to be shipped from overseas and polished into spheres of identical weight and size.
BB-chan, wearing her prominent Western-style blouse uniform, looked unexpectedly fitting in this setting. As she leaned forward, holding the cue stick with her slender hands, her posture revealed a unique, linear aesthetic beauty.
Going first, BB-chan adopted a practiced stance. She pressed four fingers firmly against the table, raised her thumb, aimed the cue at the center, and struck the cue ball sharply. The white ball streaked forward, hitting the center of the triangular formation and scattering the colored balls toward the corners.
The various balls rolled and collided with crisp sounds, yet each came to a stop away from the pockets, leaving no obvious openings.
"Hee-hee! No hole-in-one on the break, but not bad!" BB-chan winked at Shirou, giving him a provocative smile.
She had made a good break. The balls were scattered across three sides of the table—perfectly balanced to deny her opponent an easy opportunity while opening up the board. Now, she just had to wait for a chance to sink them.
However, as her senior, Shirou couldn't let his junior's provocation go unanswered. He picked up the chalk and rubbed the tip of his cue, his gaze locking onto the table.
He soon found an opening. The cue ball rolled, spinning along a tilted trajectory to clip a side ball. The target ball struck the left rail, rebounded, and dropped cleanly into the right side pocket.
Shirou stood up and said with a light laugh, "Then the solids are mine."
"A good shot, indeed. But the battle has only just begun," BB-chan said, her competitive spirit fully ignited.
To ensure the beginner experienced the fun of the game, Shirou decided to go a little easy on her. In any competition, whether it's board games or sports, being utterly crushed before you can even enjoy yourself often leads to frustration and quitting.
He settled on a rhythm: sink a ball, then intentionally miss the next one to give the girl a chance to score.
Shirou used a draw shot to sink a solid ball sitting near a pocket. Because of the backspin, the cue ball rolled backward after the collision. Following his plan, he missed his next target, leaving the cue ball in a perfect position for the girl.
As a "Super AI" turned human, BB possessed incredible potential. At the start, even with Shirou setting up shots for her, it took her three or four tries to sink a ball. Now, as long as the angle wasn't too difficult, she could make it in one go—a leap in progress.
"Oh, not bad at all," Shirou praised.
"Hee-hee! You better try harder, Senpai. BB-chan has found the knack!" The purple-haired girl laughed triumphantly.
This time, Shirou seized an opportunity and sank two balls in a row. He was down to his last target, the number 15 ball. If he cleared that, he would only need to sink the 8-ball in a designated pocket to win.
Shirou knocked the 15 ball into the hole with a straight shot, then bumped the black 8-ball out from the corner, leaving it at a perfect angle right in front of the target pocket.
Then it was BB-chan's turn.
This time, the purple-haired girl seemed to have truly found her "feel." With a side-spin shot, she knocked the 1 ball into the pocket at a seventy-degree angle. On her next shot, she used a bank shot to graze the 3 ball, sending it into the opposite pocket. Finally, she used the bridge stick to aim at her last striped ball, completing a triple-streak.
The cue ball bounced back, stopping right in line with the black 8-ball, which was less than ten centimeters from the pocket. With a gentle push of the long cue, the 8-ball dropped in. The purple-haired girl had come from behind to snatch the victory!
"I won! BB-chan won!" She hopped up and down in joy.
"One more round!" Shirou said, his competitive fire finally lit.
"Sure! But Shirou-senpai~! BB-chan will only get stronger and stronger," she teased.
This time, Shirou stopped holding back. He sank three balls in two consecutive runs, looked for his openings, and secured a solid victory.
"Ugh! Two balls short! One more round!" The purple-haired girl raised a finger, unwilling to accept the loss.
"Sure—" Shirou was about to agree, having quite a bit of fun himself.
Just then, the phone in Shirou's pocket rang. It was 1:45 PM. It would take just under five minutes to walk from here to the meeting spot.
"Looks like time is up. Well then, let's go," the purple-haired girl sighed with a hint of regret. She quickly adjusted, smiled, and neatly returned the cue to the rack.
The two left the game center shoulder-to-shoulder.
"Thank you, Shirou-senpai, for playing with me and buying me clothes," the girl said with a sweet smile.
"Don't mention it. Let's count this as part of your pocket money for the month—a once-a-month luxury experience," Shirou said with a chuckle.
"Eh? But it was so fun! Let's come back often!" She tugged on his arm.
"No, no. If we come often, my wallet won't survive even with my income. Learning how to make trade-offs is an important part of being human," Shirou said, waving his hand.
"Hmph. Money isn't even a problem. If you just let BB-chan alter some data, I could buy this whole street easily," she complained, not understanding.
"That's a no-go. Everything is a lesson. You said you wanted to become human, right? Then isn't it better to experience the lifestyles of the elite, the wealthy, and ordinary people across the board? Even poverty and hardship are important experiences," Shirou lectured.
"I guess..." She still didn't quite seem to get it.
Take, for example, someone like 'Jia Baoyu' from Dream of the Red Chamber. Having been pampered since childhood and never learning self-reliance, if he were suddenly to lose his family fortune and be left penniless, he truly wouldn't be able to survive. On the other hand, his social circle was extraordinary—his sister was an Imperial Consort, and he mingled with princes and lords. His insights were far beyond those of commoners.
In contrast, someone who grew up poor but later found success would have survival skills and business acumen vastly superior to Baoyu's. Yet, in aristocratic circles, he could never reach that same level of innate grace.
Human time and energy are limited; to gain some things, you must lose others. As a perfect AI, BB lacked these limitations, but now that she had a human body, she was repeating old patterns. Of course, being human isn't necessarily some grand goal worth pursuing above all else. But if BB truly yearned for it, Shirou would find a way to guide her.
Having privileges is convenient and comfortable, but those "inconveniences" are often necessary. Beyond privilege, there are many things worth pursuing and protecting—love, friendship, family—fundamental things that stem from one's own heart and are not influenced by external objects.
Beautiful childhood memories exist regardless of wealth. A rich child's memories might include tea eggs, flying abroad for vacations, or parties on cruise ships. But a poor child also has the joy of playing in the sand, lighting firecrackers, or catching insects and swimming in creeks if they live in the countryside.
Of course, the wealthy can access a broader world, while poverty and isolation can trap a person in a small, narrow circle. A child of wealth, seeing much of the world, might naturally avoid being greedy for petty gains, perhaps avoiding scams. A poor person might be more susceptible to such pitfalls.
However, the distinction between rich and poor loses meaning when one is targeted by high-end scammers or robbers. If locked in a basement by a pyramid scheme or facing a cult or a bandit, wealth doesn't matter much. The vulnerabilities of the human heart are very similar. Prayer, faith, and hobbies often have nothing to do with bank accounts. Perhaps that's why even today, high-ranking officials consult "qigong masters" and wealthy merchants donate to temples.
In certain scenarios, human life is equal. The lifestyle of the wealthy is one kind of experience; the lifestyle of the poor is another. Someone who has never eaten a multi-course French meal will feel out of place if thrown into one, even in a rented suit. But a wealthy person would be just as lost if suddenly taken to a cramped, dilapidated eatery with only two tables. It's just a matter of the cost of acquiring that experience.
The road from poverty to wealth is dozens of times harder than the road from wealth to poverty. Yet, maintaining wealth once you have it requires experience. And knowing how to
stand back up after losing everything requires experience too. Even if one becomes rich overnight, it is difficult to maintain happiness.
People say things like "Set a small goal of a hundred million," or "I'm ugly, but women love me," or "How can you get stronger without spending money?" These phrases sound domineering and world-wise. But the person who said "I'm ugly, but women love me" once said his biggest regret was creating Alibaba, because it restricted his possibility of doing other things. Of course, if he hadn't created it, he wouldn't have been able to film a movie with 'I want to fight ten people' to fulfill his kung fu dream.
Perhaps it's not a question of poverty or wealth. Balance is more important. By maintaining a healthy body and a happy mindset, one can live better. This cannot be achieved by living haphazardly. A chaotic schedule, a reckless personality, and a way of acting that lacks consideration for others will never lead to health or happiness. There are principles to being human. These experiences cannot be truly understood unless lived.
If the girl used her abilities to cheat at everything, life would just be a game played with hacks. Cheating on an exam for a perfect score or altering digits to get whatever she wanted might feel good at first, but she would lose the right to feel the true joy of the game and the sense of achievement from completing a challenge. And in this game called "Life," you can't just swap it for another or use a Save/Load function to start over.
"BB, the reason I don't let you use your powers is not just to maintain social order, but because I want you to experience life as an ordinary person. You will surely encounter things that make you feel that doing it this way was worth it," Shirou promised.
BB-chan pondered this, seemingly understanding but not quite. Then she squinted her eyes, her teeth peeking out in a dazed, cute smile. "I see. If I just changed data to have infinite money and get whatever I wanted, then I wouldn't be able to experience the happiness of having Shirou-senpai treat me to a meal right now."
"Well, as long as you're happy," Shirou replied with a helpless smile.
"Then! BB-chan is really going back this time! I've had Shirou-senpai all to myself for so long, I'm satisfied. Please take me to places I've never seen next time too!"
"Yeah, of course!" Shirou agreed naturally. He had promised to look after her for a lifetime. Looking at this face so familiar to him, he sincerely hoped that she, the school nurse Sakura, and the five girls from the Sakura Five could all find happiness.
However, both knew in their hearts that this free and easy happy time might not last much longer. The White God was a problem they would eventually have to face.
'If I had known from the start that the Shirou-senpai here could live so happily, perhaps coming here to his side was a mistake... No, who knows what the future holds...'
'Maybe there can be a future where everyone is happy.' The purple-haired girl prayed silently in her heart.
Shirou saw BB-chan into the subway entrance. Watching her descend on the escalator until she disappeared from sight, he turned and walked toward the other station entrance they had agreed upon.
At 2:05 PM, a girl with tea-pink hair came running toward him with a lively smile, the bun on her head swaying from side to side as she ran.
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