The air conditioner's vanes in the living room swept slowly up and down, sending out wisps of cool air.
Kiana lay sprawled across the sofa, utterly undignified.
That black jacket had been tossed carelessly over the back of the single-seat armchair; she wore only a loose white house T-shirt, its hem rolled up to her waist because of how she'd been sleeping, exposing a small stretch of taut, flat belly.
Chongchong, the heterochromatic white cat, lay sprawled on her stomach, rising and falling with her even breaths, a contented purr rumbling in its throat.
Su Yu had gone to Arc City Tower today to check out a venue, and had sent a message saying he'd be back in the evening.
Bored out of her mind, Kiana stared at the chandelier patterns on the ceiling.
The phone resting on the coffee table suddenly buzzed.
A gray bunny icon flickered on the screen.
Kiana reached out, scooped up the phone, and swiped to answer.
"Bronie."
"Good evening, dark-night hero of Arc City." Bronie's voice came through, accompanied by the clattering of a keyboard. "Didn't interrupt your nap, did I?"
Kiana rubbed her eyes, lifted Chongchong off her stomach and set it aside, then sat up.
"Did you find another Tiger Claw Gang hideout?"
"Way more exciting than that." A crisp pop of bubblegum came from the other end of the line. "Theresa just went to Arc City Tower, and she's officially reached a partnership agreement with that fine Senior Brother of yours, Su Yu, for the studio."
Kiana froze.
Her still-groggy brain snapped wide awake in an instant.
"What's she doing at the studio?" Kiana's voice involuntarily rose a couple of notches. "Doesn't she think I'm that... illegitimate daughter or whatever? If she's run off to find Su Yu, she won't go blabbing about the two of us taking commissions out there for bounty money, will she?"
The moment Su Yu found out she'd been sneaking off to do those dangerous things behind his back, not only would the surprise of buying the graphics card go down the drain — that long-winded guy would absolutely nag her about safety until her ears grew calluses.
"Put your heart back where it belongs." Bronie chuckled softly on the other end. "Big Sister Theresa may have a bizarre thought process, but she keeps her mouth shut tight."
"Right now her head's full of nothing but how to protect 'you, the pitiful niece cast adrift out in the world, deprived of family warmth' — how could she possibly reveal your hand to a dangerous man like Su Yu, that 'suspected accomplice of Siegfried'?"
Kiana let out a long breath.
Her tense shoulders slumped again, and she leaned back, sinking into the soft sofa cushions.
"So what's she actually there for? She can't really be going to be free labor for Su Yu, can she?"
"To keep watch up close, dummy."
Bronie's tone carried the glee of someone who loved watching a spectacle and didn't mind it blowing up.
"I went to enormous lengths, explaining for ages, but she's still firmly convinced that you're the romantic debt Kevin's old man left out in the world back in the day."
"She thinks Su Yu hiding you away in this kind of cramped, run-down old apartment is abuse of a noble bloodline like yours."
Bronie cleared her throat, imitating Theresa's righteous-sounding tone.
"'I must personally join that studio, venture deep into the tiger's den, and dig up the evidence of that old bastard abandoning his wife and child! And while I'm at it, use an Auntie's love to make up for the family warmth little Kiana has been missing for over a decade!'"
Kiana covered her face in despair.
What in the world was all this.
What kind of trashy primetime soap-opera scripts were stuffed inside that white-haired shorty's head? Kevin's old man's illegitimate daughter? The nerve of her to come up with that!
"So."
Kiana squeezed her voice out from between her fingers, her tone full of utterly drained exhaustion.
"So now I not only have to hide from Su Yu that I'm doing vigilante work out there, I also have to pretend I don't know she's a dummy of an elder with a head full of tragic melodrama, and play along with her in this noble-family reunion drama?"
"Correct."
Bronie snapped her fingers.
"We're grasshoppers tied to the same string now."
"You pretend not to know, I pretend not to know, and Theresa thinks we're guarding against Su Yu together with her. Once she's lurked in the studio for a while and finds she can't dig up anything, maybe she'll decide it's no fun and give up on her own."
Kiana irritably scratched at her long white hair.
How had things turned out like this?
All she'd wanted was simply to earn a bit of money to buy a present for the guy who'd taken her in.
How had she, in the blink of an eye, gotten herself trapped in this complicated whirlpool of human relationships that required juggling several layers of pretense at once?
Kevin's old man in this world must really have been cursed with eight generations' worth of bad luck — sitting at home minding his own business, and the blame just fell out of the sky onto him.
"All right, stop pulling that long face." Bronie tapped the Enter key twice on her end. "Look on the bright side — at least your surprise plan is safe. I've still got some code to run over here, so I'll hang up first — remember not to give yourself away in front of Su Yu tonight."
"Yeah, yeah, I know."
Kiana hung up grumpily.
She tossed the phone onto the coffee table, flopped back into the sofa again, and pulled over a nearby cushion to cover her face.
"The Auntie of this world really has way too wild an imagination..."
Meanwhile.
In the Old District, inside a dimly lit underground safe house.
An entire row of high-spec monitors gave off a ghostly blue glow, illuminating Bronie's face, clad in tactical goggles.
She casually tossed the modified phone onto the desktop and threw herself backward, sinking into that expensive ergonomic chair.
"Pfft—"
Bronie clutched her stomach with both hands, her shoulders beginning to heave violently and uncontrollably.
She buried her face in the crook of her arm, an irrepressible, intermittent, strange laugh escaping her throat.
What the heck.
This was just too much fun.
Theresa thought she was standing on the same front with her, righteously demanding justice for her "niece."
Kiana thought she was a partner in the same boat, carefully keeping the surprise from Su Yu while also having to deal with Theresa's "maternal love."
But they were all wrong.
Outrageously wrong.
She, Maze City's Hack Bunny, had from beginning to end been collecting the hefty salary Su Yu put out, acting on that man's orders.
Bronie lifted her head and wiped away the tears that had seeped from the corners of her eyes from holding back laughter.
She looked at the green code flickering across the screen, her mouth splitting into an extremely wicked grin brimming with villainous flair.
This "spy-games-within-spy-games" job — drawing three paychecks while watching three factions act out their performances inside the information cocoon she'd woven.
Was truly, truly exhilarating.
When the security door was pushed open, the clock on the wall pointed exactly to half past nine in the evening.
Su Yu shut the door behind him with a backhand and set the plastic bag in his hand — still oozing heat — down on the coffee table.
The packaging rustled with a crackling sound, and the rich, domineering aroma of cumin mixed with chili powder instantly exploded in this air-conditioned, sealed space, brazenly seizing air supremacy over the entire living room.
Kiana, who had been sprawled on the sofa like a salted fish watching TV, twitched her nose hard twice.
She sprang up all at once.
Those heterochromatic eyes were astonishingly bright under the lights, her gaze locking precisely onto the plastic bag on the coffee table; without even putting on her slippers, she scooted over barefoot.
"Honey-glazed chicken wings and pork belly, fresh off the grill from the night market." Su Yu pulled two tissues from the box beside him and handed them over. "Don't just grab them with your bare hands — go get a plate from the kitchen."
Kiana turned a deaf ear.
She deftly untied the tight knot of the plastic bag, grabbed a still-dripping grilled chicken wing with her bare hand, and bit off a big mouthful of meat.
She sat cross-legged on the edge of the sofa, the hem of that oversized white house T-shirt rolled up, barely covering the base of her thighs.
Su Yu pulled over a small stool, sat down across the coffee table, and casually cracked open a can of ice-cold cola.
The carbonated bubbles made a faint fizzing sound at the can's mouth.
Su Yu took a big gulp, his gaze passing through the rising heat of the grilled meat and landing on the white-haired girl across from him, cheeks stuffed full, looking exactly like a hamster guarding its food.
He knew this dummy all too well.
With Kiana's straight-line brain that simply couldn't keep a secret, if he waited until she'd eaten and drunk her fill and came over of her own accord to ask about today's situation at Arc City Tower, it would take fewer than three sentences before she spilled everything about the schemes she'd gotten up to in the Old District with Theresa and Bronie during the day.
To preserve that pitiful bit of pride of hers, and also so that he could then naturally enjoy the show, he had to strike first.
"Eat slower, no one's fighting you for it." Su Yu knocked the cola can against the coffee table, putting on a casual tone. "By the way, guess who I ran into at the studio in Arc City Tower today?"
Kiana's gnawing on the chicken wing paused for half a second.
She didn't even lift her eyelids, mumbling indistinctly, "Who? It can't be that Kevin who does nothing but crunch numbers all day, can it?"
"Magical girl Teriri." Su Yu crooked his index finger and tapped the tabletop, the corner of his mouth curving into an arc full of mischief. "In other words, the Academy Principal of your world, Theresa Apocalypse."
Kiana's cheeks stopped chewing.
She widened her eyes, glistening honey barbecue sauce still smeared on her lips, putting on a perfectly calibrated expression of shock — even hiccuping from being "too surprised."
"What's she doing at the studio?"
"Came to apply as the face of the studio." Su Yu spread his hands, his tone carrying a hint of teasing. "She's a top-tier idol with tens of millions of fans, yet she insisted on throwing herself at our ragtag little outfit to work for free. I've already signed her on."
Su Yu leaned forward, propping his elbows on his knees, watching Kiana with a smiling squint.
"In a few days, once the studio officially opens, you, the CTO, will get to officially join forces with this world's Auntie. When that happens, I really can't wait to see what a marvelous expression shows up on your face."
Kiana forced down the chicken in her mouth and grabbed a tissue to wipe her mouth haphazardly.
"Is — is that so? Then that really is something to look forward to."
She echoed dryly, lowered her head, and picked up another skewer of pork belly.
At an angle Su Yu couldn't see, the corners of Kiana's mouth shot up wildly and uncontrollably, and she nearly failed to hold back her laughter.
It seemed Bronie had been right.
That white-haired shorty Theresa, her head full of primetime tragic melodrama, had indeed kept to their agreement.
She really had run off to lurk in the studio, and hadn't leaked even a shred of the farce of their "reunion" in the Old District today to Su Yu.
But the matter of wanting to meet this world's Mama Cecilia probably couldn't be brought up in the current situation — if Su Yu asked how she knew about it, she might just blow her cover.
That could wait a couple of days, anyway — the Sheepdog Plan was about to be wrapped up too.
Chewing hard on the pork belly, Kiana grumbled wantonly to herself.
Hmph, dummy Su Yu.
You think you've got all the intel and are sitting there laughing at me?
Little do you know, at noon today I already met up with Theresa at the entrance of the Xinxin Chess & Card Room.
That white-haired shorty not only took me for the illegitimate daughter of this world's Siegfried, she hugged me and cried her eyes out, snot and tears everywhere, and even formed some absurd "protection alliance" with Bronie.
Kiana lifted her eyelids and stole a glance at Su Yu across from her, holding his cola can with a face that said "I don't know anything," and a surge of indescribable smugness and satisfaction welled up in her heart.
Serves you right — in the past, no matter what dangerous thing you faced, whether it was fighting the Herrscher of the Void or injecting that kind of enhancer that made people want to die from the pain, you hid it all from me and shouldered it alone.
Now the wheel of fortune has turned, and it's time you tasted what it's like to be kept in the dark too!
Kiana's thoughts began to race wildly like a wild dog off its leash.
She had even begun sketching out that gorgeous scene in her mind: once she'd wiped out the Tiger Claw Gang's remaining few hideouts and saved up enough money to buy that most top-of-the-line 4090 graphics card.
She'd slam that huge graphics-card box down on the living room coffee table with a "smack."
Then, right in front of Su Yu, she'd call Theresa and Bronie all over to the house.
In the most arrogant posture, she'd sit on the sofa with her legs crossed and formally announce to Su Yu: Standing before you is the core backbone of Arc City's ace vigilante squad, the terminator of the Tiger Claw Gang, and a wealthy lady who's earned big money with her own two hands — Kiana Kaslana!
By then, that guy Su Yu who did nothing but snark all day would surely be so shocked his jaw would drop to the floor.
He'd look at that expensive graphics card, moved to bitter tears, and might even lunge over to wrap his arms around her thighs, shouting in a trembling voice: "Kiana! You're too good to me! I'll make games for you for the rest of my life!"
At this thought, Kiana couldn't help bursting out with a "pfft" of laughter.
"What are you laughing at?" Su Yu raised an eyebrow, looking at her suspiciously.
"Nothing." Kiana hurriedly straightened her face and, in a way that only drew more attention, took a bite of chicken wing. "These wings are grilled so well — the Stall Owner must have brushed on extra honey today."
Su Yu watched her desperately suppressing her smugness and silently sighed inwardly.
This girl's tail was practically sticking up into the sky.
With those little moves of hers, full of holes, did she really think she could pull the wool over everyone's eyes?
If it weren't for Hack Bunny spying on both ends over there and cleaning up her messes on the side, that "ace vigilante squad" of hers would have disbanded on the spot long ago thanks to its members' wildly overactive imaginations.
Without batting an eye, Su Yu drained the last gulp of cola in the can.
The instant he crushed the can flat, an equally supremely satisfying scene surfaced in his mind.
He was looking forward to the day Kiana gave him the graphics card.
When this dummy slammed the graphics card down on the table and waited smugly for him to weep bitter tears.
He'd unhurriedly take out from the drawer that labor contract bearing Hack Bunny's electronic signature, and then tell her with a smile:
Actually, the route for every fight you went out on was approved by me.
Your partner, the undercover hacker, is an employee on my payroll.
As for that wildly imaginative "Auntie" of yours, I also let her into the studio by going along with the flow.
Su Yu could hardly imagine — when Kiana found out she'd been jumping up and down like a silly fool this whole time.
Only for it all to have been within his field of view — what a magnificently spectacular socially-mortifying expression would appear on that pretty little face.
She'd surely be so ashamed and indignant that she'd claw a three-bedroom apartment out of the floor on the spot, then bury her whole self in the crack of the sofa and refuse to come out for days.
At this thought, Su Yu, too, couldn't help the corners of his mouth shooting up wildly.
Across a coffee table covered in barbecue skewers, the two of them were each immersed in the perfect script they'd woven to socially mortify the other, grinning like two foxes that had just stolen a chicken.
"Meow—"
An extremely disdainful cat's cry interrupted this bizarre atmosphere.
Chongchong, the heterochromatic white cat, jumped down from the back of the sofa.
With elegant cat steps it walked over beside the coffee table, first glancing at the male pooper-scooper across the way grinning with a face full of ripples, then turning back to look at the female pooper-scooper beside it, still gnawing chicken wings and giggling foolishly.
Chongchong flicked its fluffy tail.
It couldn't even be bothered to sniff a small scrap of chicken that had fallen on the table; it simply turned around and strode off toward the bedroom with haughty steps.
Humans, as a species, were really just too hard to understand.
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