[N1]: So, what do you think? Pretty impressive, right?
[N1]: Are you more in awe of me now, Xiao Zhi? I’m the top Alpha in the whole school.
[Sweet Bunny Sauce]: TD.
[N1]: No way, no way, Xiao Zhi thinks that Omega is impressive, so why can’t you think I’m impressive too?
[N1]: I can be your idol too, Xiao Zhi.
[N1]: flexed bicep emoji
[Sweet Bunny Sauce]: You?
[N1]: Mm-hmm!
[Sweet Bunny Sauce]: TD.
Xie Nanyi’s words sounded like bragging, but Pei Xingzhi knew there wasn’t a single ounce of exaggeration in them.
The reason Xie Nanyi had become such a big name on campus was hardly just because his family was wealthy. There was no shortage of rumors and gossip about him around school, though what students discussed most were all sorts of juicy tidbits. Most assumptions about Xie Nanyi’s identity were pure speculation, he’s the child of this or that board member, he’s the son of this or that CEO, all baseless hearsay with no truth behind it in the end.
As an active member of the student council and the Beta representative of the school, Pei Xingzhi was fairly well-informed compared to most students, but even he only knew that Xie Nanyi had obtained his mech piloting license before reaching adulthood. As for whether he really had SSS-grade pheromones, how would a Beta like him know? Every kind of pheromone smelled equally disgusting to him. Weren’t SSS-grade pheromones and low-grade pheromones all just pheromones? Did they really expect a Beta like him to rank which ones made him feel worse?
That said, Pei Xingzhi had no intention of playing along with Xie Nanyi’s boasting. Getting him all pleased wasn’t going to do Pei Xingzhi any favors, so he deliberately said the opposite.
[Sweet Bunny Sauce]: If we’re talking about special admissions, you should be the one worshipping me. After all, I’m the only one out of a hundred thousand Betas who took the exam to get directly admitted.
[N1]: Whoa, I’m so in awe of you, Xiao Zhi,
[Sweet Bunny Sauce]: It’s only natural to admire me, since I’m this outstanding!
[Sweet Bunny Sauce]: So why is Chu Ling living with me anyway? Shouldn’t a specially admitted Omega like that be assigned a private dorm?
The two went back and forth for a while before Pei Xingzhi remembered why he’d come to talk to Xie Nanyi in the first place. Their conversations were always like this, no matter what purpose they started with, they’d always end up getting carried off by some other topic.
[N1]: Xiao Zhi already knows his name? I’m getting a little upset now!
[N1]: angry.jpg
The moment Xie Nanyi sent the sticker, another emoji popped up on Pei Xingzhi’s virtual screen, accompanied by a very obvious exhaling sound. Pei Xingzhi muted the audio, but Xie Nanyi had upgraded the program, even with the sound off, the breathing noise persisted.
The strange sound made Chu Ling instinctively glance over, then immediately turn back the moment his eyes met Pei Xingzhi’s.
Listening to that noisy racket, Pei Xingzhi felt his temples throbbing. He force-shut down the device, finally putting an end to the irritating sound.
When he turned it back on, Xie Nanyi’s apologetic messages had already come through, along with the source code for the program.
Pei Xingzhi accepted the code without the slightest hesitation, then improved it further before sending it back to him.
Half an hour later, Pei Xingzhi received a new message from Xie Nanyi. He tapped it open and found a sincere apology spanning three full screens.
Pei Xingzhi had no interest in reading the whole thing. He tossed the apology letter into the program he was editing and ran it through, just to enrich his vocabulary database.
Seeing that his apology letter had been accepted, Xie Nanyi grew bolder and asked to resume the video call that had been cut off earlier.
Pei Xingzhi thought back to that “just now” which existed in his previous life, and flatly refused the request without room for argument. Amid Xie Nanyi’s pleading, he decisively logged off. To keep his leisure time from being disturbed, Pei Xingzhi also blocked Xie Nanyi on a whim.
Closing the virtual screen, Pei Xingzhi stretched his body that had been dormant for a day and regained control of it.
Chu Ling was still sitting in his seat fiddling with that little model. Pei Xingzhi leaned over the bed railing and watched for a while. Seeing that the other man showed no sign of stopping, he flopped back onto the bed.
Xie Nanyi refused to answer him, and the person in question was busy. Pei Xingzhi, unable to get the answer he wanted, scratched his head in frustration and could only open the game to distract himself.
This “level” didn’t refer to the level-based game he had edited before, it was the name of this game itself: Levels. Though the name was odd, the game’s visuals were absolutely adorable. The entire game used a chibi art style, not flashy, but plenty cute.
The animation finished loading, and Pei Xingzhi tapped confirm to enter the game interface.
On a cartoon forest backdrop, two little characters huddled together whispering about something. Suddenly, a little wizard-hat character dropped from the sky, and the staff in his hand shot out a beam of light that struck with precision a shell-beast crawling darkly along the ground.
Pei Xingzhi tapped the screen to retract the staff and casually swiped the shell-beast’s reward into his bag.
Seeing him come online, the two whispering characters immediately crowded over, chattering at him about everything that had happened while he was away.
[Kurokuro]: Waaah, peipei you’re finally online!
[Black Meow is not a cat]: peipei, why were you offline so long! Do you know how rough we’ve had it while you were gone! It’s only been three days, but that Pumpkin Party guy almost beat me into quitting the game,
[peipei]: What happened, did that Pumpkin Party come after you guys again?
[Black Meow is not a cat]: He came to challenge you one-on-one, but couldn’t find you, so he beat us up instead.
Pei Xingzhi looked at the shabbily dressed swordsman and priest on the screen and, with a pang of reluctance, opened his bag and tossed them two pieces of gear.
[peipei]: Didn’t I tell you guys before, when I’m not around, stay away from him. If he comes looking, run. If you really can’t get away, just log off on the spot.
[Kurokuro]: We couldn’t outrun him. He just froze us in place and beat us up.
[peipei]: “…”
The trouble was his own doing. Pei Xingzhi had no choice. As the big brother of the group, how could he watch his two underlings walk around with empty bags? He could only grit his teeth and share a bit of the materials he’d painstakingly collected.
[peipei]: I’ve sent you the speed talismans. Next time you see him, run faster.
[Black Meow is not a cat]: peipei I love you, but Kuro, I feel like I’m forgetting something?
[Kurokuro]: I think I remember forgetting something too.
[Black Meow is not a cat]: I remember now! Pumpkin Party said he’d be tracking us, the moment peipei logs on, he’ll come straight for us!
The moment Black Cat’s message went out, a flash of blue light appeared not far away. Before the group could even see what was happening, an elf with white hair and green eyes materialized in front of them.
[Pumpkin Party]: Long time no see, peipei.
Pei Xingzhi gritted his teeth at the elf on his screen, wishing he could crawl right through the monitor and punch him in the face. He swung his fists left and right at the screen, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t reach the real body behind the elf.
[peipei]：What do you want!
[Pumpkin Party]: Came to beat you up. What else would I want?
Pumpkin Party wasted no time, without a moment’s hesitation, he hurled a pitch-black object. Pei Xingzhi reacted quickly, immediately maneuvering his wizard out of the way. The swordsman and priest beside him weren’t so lucky; before they could dodge, they were engulfed in a cloud of black mist.
Pei Xingzhi dodged the elf’s chain of attacks, then moved his wizard’s staff. A magic circle suddenly appeared beneath the black mist, slowly devouring it. Two bare, bald little figures reappeared beside the others.
[KuroKuro]/[Black Meow is not a Cat]: My armor!
Their armor had been completely melted away, and with it, their hearts. Without even saying goodbye to Pei Xingzhi, they logged off.
With the two gone, only Pei Xingzhi and Pumpkin Party remained. Pumpkin Party, convinced he’d won a glorious 1v3, sent out celebratory emotes above his head.
Pei Xingzhi stared at the exquisitely modeled character across from him and felt an inexplicable sense of déjà vu, that smug, punchable look on his face was oddly familiar.
Before he could stop himself, Pei Xingzhi hit a skill and struck the elf. The elf hopped once, then suddenly dropped to one knee and pulled out a flower, offering it to the wizard.
A prompt popped up on Pei Xingzhi’s screen: “Do you accept player [Pumpkin Party]’s gift of ‘Friendship Flower’?”” Pei Xingzhi had no idea what he was playing at, he’d clearly used a normal attack, so why was this guy suddenly activating the friend-request mode?
The two of them schemed against each other far too often on a daily basis. Pei Xingzhi assumed this was some kind of probe, so he refused to back down and accepted the “Friendship Flower.”
A halo of light circled above both their heads, and colorful petals scattered between them. The elf wrapped his arms around the wizard and spun him around, pink bubbles swirling endlessly around the two of them.
[World]: Congratulations! Player [peipei] has accepted player [Pumpkin Party]’s “Friendship Flower” and become the 3,589th pair of sworn friends on this server. May your friendship last forever, never to be parted.
The moment the announcement went out, the world channel exploded.
The game was already a niche title to begin with, and with the terrible new-player experience, it barely attracted any fresh blood, it survived entirely on the loyalty of veteran players. Over time, certain players became famous across the entire server.
Peipei and Pumpkin Party were exactly the kind of hot topics the world channel loved to discuss.
Besides both ranking in the top ten, the bigger reason was that they were sworn enemies.
How much of enemies, you ask?
Peipei and Pumpkin Party were always hot topics of discussion in the game world.
Besides the fact that both of them were firmly in the top ten of the rankings, the bigger reason was that the two of them were mortal enemies.
How much of enemies were they?
Whenever one of them joined a guild, the other would chase down and kill every other member of that guild until the guild leader couldn’t take it anymore and kicked them out. Beyond guilds, anyone who hung around near them would also be added to their assassination targets. They killed back and forth until neither of them had anyone left around them.
No one knew what had turned them into such bitter rivals, but everyone knew that wherever Peipei and Pumpkin Party were, a bloodbath was sure to follow.
But now this message was telling them that these two mortal enemies had become best friends?
Was today April Fools’ Day? No matter how you looked at it, this just didn’t seem right.
[88771] (World): Is the game glitching? Someone fix this.
[kanya] (World): Why do I feel chills all over? Is this the end of the world?
[Gate Security] (World): Is the game shutting down?
[Psychiatric Hospital] (World): Did they click the wrong button?
[Don’t Want to Hear It] (World): Friendship Flowers cost 5000 each, who accidentally sends one of those?
The two at the center of the storm were still holding their embrace, the scene as if frozen in that moment forever. The two players staring at this glaring image from behind their virtual screens each wanted to delete their accounts and start over from scratch.
Deleting their accounts was, of course, impossible. Pei Xingzhi took a deep breath and looked out the window. Chu Ling had left the dorm at some point, leaving him alone in the room.
He felt unclean.
[Pumpkin Party]: Wait, you actually accepted it?
The person on the other end didn’t respond, so Xie Nanyi had to break the silence himself. He had meant to dodge Peipei’s skill, but accidentally clicked “send gift” instead. The newest item in his inventory was the Friendship Flower, and the gift went out just like that.
He had assumed Peipei would click “decline,” but never expected the other person to hit “confirm.”
Xie Nanyi switched screens and opened his chat window with Pei Xingzhi. The conversation was still stuck on his last desperate plea. In his input box was a message he hadn’t gotten to send yet.
“Xiao Zhi, are you playing the Levels too? I’m playing it as well, want to add each other as friends?”
Earlier, while working on their project together, he’d noticed a keychain of the boss from the Levels on Pei Xingzhi’s bag, and guessed that he probably played the game too.
He had logged on originally to adjust his in-game avatar. The Levels didn’t use fixed game IDs, only the character models were permanent. Everyone’s appearance was unique, and only by adding someone as a friend could you set a nickname for them.
In other words, as long as Xie Nanyi changed his model, the player known as Pumpkin Party would completely vanish from the game.
His account had too bad a reputation. Anyone who’d played the Levels had heard his name at least a little, so using this avatar to add people was definitely out of the question.
Changing models wasn’t something you could do with a few clicks and some money. Xie Nanyi had gone through considerable trouble to obtain the permission to change his model, but the moment he logged on and saw Peipei online, he forgot all about it and auto-teleported straight to Peipei’s location.
And he’d even gone out of his way to buy the Friendship Flower, only to end up screwing himself over.
[Peipei]: Wasn’t it you who sent it? Who knew you’d actually go through with it!
Pei Xingzhi also felt he was being unfairly wronged. He had thought it was some new trick Pumpkin Party had come up with, but who knew it was actually a real friendship flower.
[Peipei]: Fine, I’ll just pay you back then!
[Pumpkin Party]: Forget it.
Xie Nanyi stared at the wizard across from him. Old grudges and new grievances combined made his hatred for this little wizard surge even higher.
There was no way he could keep using this account anymore. All the effort he’d put into obtaining permissions over the past few days had been a complete waste.
With things having come to this, Xie Nanyi had lost all interest in the game. He directly switched pages and logged off.
The message he’d been about to send to Pei Xingzhi was still stuck in the chat box. Xie Nanyi deleted the text and casually sent an emoji instead, only to receive a notification that he had been blocked.
The wristband on his arm let out a “beep beep” sound. Xie Nanyi irritably pressed down on his wrist, trying to forcibly suppress the discomfort. A burning sensation coursed through his entire body from where the mark was engraved. Assistant Qin stepped forward at the right moment to administer an injection. Xie Nanyi kept his eyes tightly shut without making a sound, only the thin sheen of sweat on his forehead revealing that he wasn’t as relaxed as he appeared.
After the injection was finished, Assistant Qin handed over some pills and advised in a low voice: “Young Master, your emotions are fluctuating a bit too much. You should get some proper rest.”
Xie Nanyi didn’t care much about Assistant Qin’s words. He merely nodded and reopened the virtual screen to check his messages.
Assistant Qin had long grown accustomed to Xie Nanyi’s stubbornness. He was just an assistant, his job was only to assist Xie Nanyi with his tasks. Whether his advice was heeded or not wasn’t his concern.
However…
Assistant Qin’s gaze flickered slightly as he looked at Xie Nanyi, who was focused intently on the screen.
He was rather curious about what kind of magic Pei Xingzhi possessed that could captivate the esteemed Young Master Xie to such a degree.