Mu Ning had a habit. Whenever she was reading a book, binge-watching a series, or watching a movie, she would always pause at the intense moments, switch to something else to calm down, and then continue.
After aimlessly scrolling through Xiaohongshu for three minutes, Mu Ning took a deep breath and returned to the chat window.
“morning: Why did you buy me milk tea?”
“X: Standing someone up isn’t very polite.”
The feeling of floating up into the air was, in an instant, yanked back down to the earth’s core by gravity.
She’d better not overestimate the situation. Looking at her and Jing Xuan’s pitifully few interactions from an objective standpoint, she couldn’t arrive at the conclusion she was hoping for.
Most likely, he was just too well-mannered.
“morning: Well then, thanks a lot~”
When she opened the bag, she realized it was fruit tea. Mu Ning politely attached a photo of the straw already inserted into the cup.
Jing Xuan didn’t reply again.
Maybe she had accidentally killed the conversation.
Mu Ning stared blankly at the Four-Star Card storyline submitted by the outsourcing team for half an hour, picked off the purple nail polish she’d painted on out of boredom on Saturday, and drank the fruit tea down until only a third remained.
Then she opened Jing Xuan’s chat window once again.
Like a hungry person who couldn’t possibly stay calm in the same room as a fragrant cake.
Mu Ning had never really been the ambitious type.
Her family wasn’t wealthy, but they were comfortable. Growing up, whenever the latest trendy things came out, if other kids had them, she’d get them too after a few mentions to her parents.
Perhaps because she was reasonably smart, she could maintain a rank around fifteenth in her class without much effort—and at her key high school in her hometown of Chucheng, that was enough to get her into a top-tier 985 university.
Choosing English as her major was also a decision made within boundaries her parents had set; she just picked the one she was relatively interested in—she wouldn’t admit that her original motivation was really just to make it easier to access foreign websites and read fanfiction written by foreign girls.
Working in the gaming industry seemed unconventional to her parents, but to her, it was just going with the flow. If her parents had opposed it to the point of cutting ties, she wouldn’t have been entirely unwilling to compromise.
She hated hassle. If she assessed something and decided the input-output ratio wasn’t worth it, she’d simply give up.
She’d had crushes on other guys before, but after watching her classmates go through the whole cycle of getting together and breaking up, she felt that real-life romance was an absolute pain in the ass. Compared to having fictional crushes in the virtual world, the advantages were negligible and the disadvantages were countless.
At the same time, she had another flaw: if she tested the waters with a guy she liked and he showed the same interest right away, she’d think he was too cheap and lose interest immediately.
Meng Meng had spoken up for those guys before: “Girl, with a face like yours, what kind of saint could last more than two rounds against you?”
And Jing Xuan was the one and only exception in her life so far that she wanted to overcome her tendencies to coast by, avoid hassle, and lose interest easily—to chase after with effort.
She wanted to keep venturing into his universe until she arrived at the final answer to “X.”
“morning: The fruit tea was delicious! Thanks again!”
“morning: I’ll have more energy to grind away at work now”
Twenty minutes later, a reply came.
“X: I was just giving a presentation, my phone was on silent.”
Then he quoted her first message.
“X: Glad you liked it.”
“morning: Actually, I don’t really like apples, so I’d never tried this new flavor before”
“morning: It turned out way better than I expected”
“morning: Except it’s a little sour”
Jing Xuan quoted the first of these three messages and replied: “Noted.”
Then quoted the third: “Sourer than a lemon?”
Heat crept up her cheeks.
Mu Ning’s fingers hovered over the keyboard, frantically losing the ability to form words.
He didn’t look like it, but what if Jing Xuan was a high-level player?
He had a face that had probably been mass-producing shattered teenage hearts since fifth grade. What his luck with women was like—you could figure that out with your toes.
So, was this way of speaking of his—serious on the surface but laced with a faint, elusive hint of “teasing”—a high-level technique honed by a master player?
Mu Ning sidestepped the topic, choosing instead to quote his earlier reply about giving a presentation.
“morning: What presentation?”
“X: An internal training session at Spirit Whale’s studio in Dongcheng.”
“morning: So they invited Teacher Jing to be the keynote speaker?”
“X: Yes.”
“morning: Did you know you have a Baidu encyclopedia entry?”
“X: I know.”
“X: Did you search for me?”
“morning: Anyone who accidentally adds an industry big shot on WeChat would naturally go search them up, right?”
Oath of Eternal Night had official WeChat sticker packs. Mu Ning picked a chibi Valerius acting cute and sent it over.
“X: Any thoughts after reading the entry?”
“morning: My reaction is that you’re only 28.”
“X: Does that mean I look old?”
“morning: It means it’s amazing that someone at 28 could become a producer.”
After a moment, X sent a sticker.
Valerius scratched his head and smiled.
Clearly, she had found his sticker pack from the one she sent and added the whole series.
“X: There’s some luck involved.”
“morning: As the saying goes, luck is also part of one’s ability.”
“morning: Teacher Jing, no need to be modest.”
“X: You can just call me by my name.”
“morning: …Jing Xuan?”
“X: Here.”
Someone passed by behind her, and Mu Ning closed the WeChat chat window at lightning speed.
She grabbed her fruit tea and took a few forceful sips until the straw made an empty sound, but her heart was still racing.
There was still a lot to do in the afternoon; if she kept chatting, she probably wouldn’t be able to work properly.
“morning: I’ll get busy for now~”
“X: Go ahead.”
Mu Ning often cut off conversations with friends when she had something to do, and her close friends were the same way, so no one thought anything of it. Next time they wanted to chat, they’d just send a message and pick up naturally.
But after telling Jing Xuan where she was off to, she found it a bit hard to start a new topic.
Mu Ning skipped dinner and worked straight until 8 PM, clocked out, and went to that chicken soup rice place from last time.
After eating at nearby restaurants too often, they all tasted the same. The chicken soup rice wasn’t so good that it stood head and shoulders above the rest.
She sat in the seat Jing Xuan had sat in last time, scanned the QR code to order, and opened his chat.
“morning: Done with work”
The reply came two minutes later.
“X: That was a long time.”
“X: Over six hours.”
As if to say, she hadn’t replied to him for over six hours.
Mu Ning really wanted to screenshot all the chat history and send it to Meng Meng, who had more dating experience, to ask her to evaluate her impression of Jing Xuan.
She felt he was a bit “too good at this.”
“morning: Reviewing copy from the outsourced team”
“X: Are you the copy team lead?”
“morning: No, just a nameless worker”
“morning: Since I’m familiar with Valerius’s character, I handle the distribution and collection of all his related outsourced work”
“X: Your project seems to have been trending a lot recently?”
“morning: Yeah”
“morning: Making a spectacle of ourselves for the competitors”
“X: No.”
“X: I know it’s definitely not your fault.”
“morning: What makes you say that?”
“X: Someone patient enough to trigger over thirty dialogues with an NPC to unlock hidden story content—that person seems like someone who is serious and responsible.”
Mu Ning remembered reading somewhere that the “dirty talk” most suitable for East Asian kids is actually praise.
She could feel it a bit now.
The server brought the food over. Mu Ning took a couple of bites, gave herself a moment to breathe, then picked up her phone again.
“morning: I heard the company at Lingjing East City has a cafeteria. Is that true?”
“X: Yes. Eating right now.”
“morning: You’re eating too?”
“X: Too?”
Mu Ning took a photo of her chicken soup rice and sent it over.
“X: Seems like you really like this place.”
Hesitating between offense and defense, Mu Ning chose to make a slightly subtle offensive move.
“morning: Actually, it’s not so good that I absolutely had to come again this soon”
After a pause much longer than before, Jing Xuan finally replied.
A photo, also of his tray.
On the tray were meat, vegetables, whole grains, a staple, fruit, and yogurt—visibly rich and healthy.
“X: Tried it for you.”
“X: Can’t compare to the chicken soup rice.”
In the past two years, AI had been booming, and many ways of “dating” AI had emerged. If you had programmer friends to help, you could even bypass some restrictions and chat with AI about things not suitable for minors.
Mu Ning had tried the former, but gave up after half an hour out of awkwardness. She didn’t know if it was because she wasn’t good at training it, or because her background in copywriting meant she had stricter requirements for the logic and consistency of a personality presented through text.
A human’s interesting soul is the Tower of Babel that AI cannot reach at this stage.
Of course, future developments were another matter.
This was the first time she experienced that chatting with a man could be this fun, like a back-and-forth game of hitting a ball.
The next day, Mu Ning was busy from morning to night, shuttling between meetings—with the art team, the operations team, and internal copy team meetings. Naturally, she had no time to play “ball games” with Jing Xuan.
After 7 PM, half the office had left. Mu Ning went to the break room to finish her takeout, then returned to her desk and started filling out spreadsheets.
She was working hard every day, so why did the work never end?
A WeChat message notification sounded from her over-ear headphones.
Mu Ning tapped the icon in the bottom right corner.
A red dot marked an unread message from Jing Xuan.
“X: What time does your studio usually get off work?”
“morning: Depends. It gets busier when there’s a version update. We’re about to start the birthday event for Var, so it’s been pretty hectic lately—can’t finish everything before 9.”
“X: Still working overtime at the office?”
“morning: Yeah.”
“X: Then get back to it, I won’t keep you.”
Mu Ning thought about slacking off for a bit, but she also wanted to head home early. After a moment’s consideration, she decided to just power through and finish everything. Once she got home, took a shower, and lay in bed, she could chat with Jing Xuan comfortably.
At 9:30, Mu Ning ran through the copy she’d configured—no errors. She saved her work, fed what she’d done that day to the AI, and had it generate a daily report. After sending it off, she shut down her computer, clocked out, and headed home.
Sometimes she felt that, of the entire day, only the stretch between getting off work and falling asleep truly belonged to her.
But by then, her energy was already drained—she didn’t even have the strength to squander it.
Dragging her weary feet, Mu Ning took the elevator to the first floor and walked out of Building C’s main entrance.
This city didn’t have distinct seasons. Even though it was already autumn, it was still as humid and hot as the height of summer.
Her phone vibrated.
The screen lit up with a notification from Xianyu.
Someone had bought the merchandise she’d listed for sale after quitting the fandom.
She tapped it open, replied to the buyer, “Will ship tomorrow morning,” then turned off the screen, held the phone in her hand, and resumed walking.
“Good morning.”
Mu Ning turned around in surprise.
In front of the bench in the adjoining space between Buildings C and B, Jing Xuan was crouching there, still in his unchanging all-black outfit, his black backpack placed on the bench.
His whole figure seemed to melt into the night.
Two cats were gathered in front of him, nuzzling his hand as they ate whatever he was holding.
Through the darkness, Jing Xuan glanced at her for a moment, then lowered his head again, patiently feeding the rest of what was in his hand. Afterward, he patted his hands and said to the kittens, “The person I’m waiting for is here. I have to go. You two should head back too.”
As if they understood, the cats let out a soft meow.
Jing Xuan stood up, slung his backpack over one shoulder, and walked toward her.