My Romance Game Updated – Chapter 70
by Little PandaClearing the Air
Mu Ning’s words were heartless, but they were the cold, hard reality. It was just…
“Then why did you come to the beach looking for me!” And risk such danger to actively attack the octopus monster! If she hadn’t reacted fast enough back then, Mu Ning would have been… just a hair’s breadth away from…
No. Just thinking of that massive octopus tentacle smashing down toward Mu Ning made Ren Chenxi’s heart pound fiercely again. But Mu Ning’s answer made her already chaotic heartbeat race even faster and wilder.
“Because you are different from them.”
I can leave everyone else in danger, but you—you are the only one I cannot leave behind!
“I…” Ren Chenxi’s voice was choked up. She wanted so badly to mock Mu Ning just like before. What is this supposed to mean? Ren Muhui is dead, who the tm are you pretending to be deeply in love for! But the moment she thought of Mu Ning’s slender back as she unflinchingly attacked the octopus monster, the words wouldn’t come. After a long while, she could only weakly squeeze out a single sentence: “Because I’m Ren Muhui’s meimei, right?”
Mu Ning did not answer immediately. She simply glanced at the invisible Ren Chenxi in the air and sighed softly. “Where Chen Gu and the others hunt, there are no 8th-order mutated beasts.”
“…” So I’m different from them because I dare to actively court death1! Ren Chenxi snorted lightly in displeasure, yet at the same time, she felt inexplicably relieved.
Hearing Ren Chenxi’s soft snort, the corners of Mu Ning’s lips curled up. “The place where Chen Gu and the others hunt is just a little further out from the base’s perimeter. It was actually quite fast for me to walk back to the base…”
“Y-you walked back to the base?” Ren Chenxi’s eyes widened in surprise. She had thought… she had thought that Mu Ning, who commanded absolute obedience from her underlings and never cared about others’ feelings, would have driven the bus back to the base herself, or… found someone to drive her back. Who would have thought…
“Mm. I’m a 5th-order esper; walking back was not dangerous. I wanted to head back to the base first to see if you were home. But no one was on the first floor, nor on the third or fourth. I went to the second floor to ask Sun Jia, and Sun Jia said… said you might be in the bathroom.”
“…”
Fortunately, Mu Ning didn’t give Ren Chenxi any time to be embarrassed. She continued, “No one was in the bathroom, so I guessed you might have gone to the beach. I borrowed a car that still had gasoline from one of Qi Sheng’s trusted aides and drove out to the South Sea beach. Sure enough, I saw you on the sand, happily shoveling up mutated seafood.”
“…You were there while I was shoveling seafood?” Then how come I didn’t spot you on the mini-map at all?
“Mm. Seeing you having so much fun shoveling, and looking so at ease, I didn’t go over to disturb you. Until… the mutated octopus monster appeared.”
Ren Chenxi remembered now. When she had been shoveling seafood on the beach, her attention had been entirely focused on the red dots. She must have completely overlooked when a green dot representing Mu Ning had suddenly appeared. But wait—if Mu Ning had been there from the start, she must have seen her turn invisible. So why did she still foolishly attack the octopus monster? Right! It was precisely because of Mu Ning’s attack that she had given up on running away, ultimately forcing her to use up all her SR-rank and SSR-rank cards! Mu Ning had brought it upon herself, losing 10% of her HP and ending up so exhausted that she was paralyzed on the sand without an ounce of strength.
This crazy woman!!!
Ren Chenxi snorted again, rebuking her coldly. “You said you were there from the start, so you definitely saw me turn invisible to run away! You should have just let me escape! Why did you go and attack that octopus monster!”
“I… I just thought that you really wanted the mutated octopus’s crystal core…”
“Just because I wanted the crystal core, you went to kill the octopus? That was an 8th-order octopus! And you’re only at the 5th-order! You’re really so crazy you don’t even care about your own life!!!”
No sound came from Mu Ning in the air for a long time. Ren Chenxi even felt that Mu Ning’s breathing had grown much lighter.
Could it be… had her words been too harsh? Had she hurt this person? And then, being both exhausted and heartbroken, this person had simply passed out? Was there really a need for this! Think about the past—you said plenty of harsh things to me! Yet every day, didn’t I still… shamelessly chase after you and continue making a fool of myself2!
Awkwardly, Ren Chenxi wanted to ask what was wrong with her. But right at the moment she prepared to speak, Mu Ning’s voice finally rang out.
“I’m not crazy. At that moment, my mind was filled with only one thought. If I killed that mutated octopus and helped you get its crystal core, then… would you forgive me? Forgive my past contradictions, forgive my self-deception, forgive me for… hurting you time and time again?”
“Wh… what!” Mu Ning’s words instantly made Ren Chenxi tense up all over. “What nonsense are you talking about? I am Ren Chenxi! Not Ren Muhui! If there is forgiveness you need to ask for, go find Ren Muhui and ask him for it!”
As Ren Chenxi spoke that last sentence, her voice suddenly grew sharp.
Hearing the resistance and anger in Ren Chenxi’s voice, Mu Ning fell silent for a moment before letting out a soft sigh. “So you still refuse to forgive me, right?”
“You…”
“Ren Chenxi, in your eyes, I must be a heartless, ruthless iceberg, right? But no matter how heartless or ruthless I am, I still have a brain to think with! From the moment you saw Tantan, your act was already full of holes! Did you really think those clumsy lies of yours could fool me?”
Mu Ning’s faint sigh and her weak questioning were like a dull knife, carving back and forth across Ren Chenxi’s chest. Although it wouldn’t leave new wounds on her already shattered heart, the blunt ache was painfully real.
Ren Chenxi remained silent for a long time—so long that the originally invisible Mu Ning finally revealed her figure as the invisibility buff wore off. Just as Ren Chenxi had imagined, Mu Ning was paralyzed on the sand from excessively consuming her esper ability. Her long hair spread out in a messy tangle, and her upturned palms were covered in bloody streaks. At the same time, dried blood stained the corners of her mouth.
Since Mu Ning’s invisibility buff had faded, Ren Chenxi had naturally revealed her form even earlier.
After finally voicing the words she had kept fiercely suppressed in her heart for so long, a wave of relief washed over Mu Ning. But when the invisible person in the air failed to answer for a long time, her heart clenched tightly once more.
Is she angry again? Is she going to ignore me again? Will she get so mad that she’ll want to leave the base?
Even though she couldn’t see the invisible Ren Chenxi, Mu Ning could only hold her breath and stare fixedly at the shallow depression in the sand. She didn’t dare blink. She was terrified—terrified that if she simply closed her eyes for a second, the person beside her would stand up and leave without a backward glance.
She had already let Ren Muhui leave once; she didn’t want to let Ren Chenxi leave again!
Just as Mu Ning’s eyes grew dry and astringent, stinging fiercely from the sea breeze, the person beside her suddenly appeared. She hadn’t left. She was simply sitting there quietly, completely expressionless. However, the eyes gazing in her direction seemed to be frozen over with a layer of frost.
Regret suddenly seized Mu Ning. She regretted exposing Ren Chenxi’s true identity so quickly. Perhaps she should have taken it slower, waited a bit longer—waited until her relationship with Ren Chenxi had improved a little more…
Her palms were somewhat stiff from the sea wind. Mu Ning carefully twitched her fingers, only to despairingly realize that if Ren Chenxi were to stand up and leave right now, never to return to the base, she possessed absolutely no strength to stop her.
“Ren…”
Mu Ning wanted to open her mouth and take back her previous words. She wanted to say, I’m sorry, I won’t ask anymore, please don’t be angry, okay? However, before Mu Ning could speak, Ren Chenxi’s voice rang out first.
“What is with the blood on your mouth?”
Blood on my mouth? You can see me? The complex mix of remorse and regret swirling in her heart was instantly broken by Ren Chenxi’s sudden question, thoroughly distracting Mu Ning. She struggled to raise her arm, instinctively wanting to touch the corner of her lips, and then realized that her invisibility effect had also vanished.
She can see me now. Then my current wretched state…
Enduring Ren Chenxi’s icy gaze, Mu Ning truly wished she could slap another Invisibility Card on herself. She felt awkward for a moment, but soon, she seemed to discern a tiny trace of worry within Ren Chenxi’s frigid eyes. Right. This person has been worrying about my safety right from the very start, hasn’t she!
The warm, soft sensation of being held by Ren Chenxi just moments ago seemed to return to her palms. Mu Ning tugged at the corners of her lips, softening her voice as she replied pitifully, “Just now, while fighting the 8th-order octopus monster, I accidentally got whipped by its tentacle. So I coughed up a bit of blood…”
Whipped by its tentacle. Coughed up a bit of blood…
Although Mu Ning said it so lightly, Ren Chenxi remembered very clearly how the octopus monster had wildly flailed its giant tentacles when it went berserk. Every single strike against the beach had sent sand flying so high into the air. To be swatted by a tentacle like that…
No wonder her HP had instantly dropped by 10%.
Looking at Mu Ning lying on the sand—so exhausted, so utterly devoid of her usual image, her voice so weak—Ren Chenxi suddenly lost the desire to argue with her. She didn’t want to use that sharp, biting tone to snipe at Mu Ning anymore. This person had risked her life to such an extent just to kill the octopus monster; how could she possibly bring herself to say cruel things to provoke her!
With another helpless sigh, Ren Chenxi shook her head slightly. Then, as if remembering something, she summoned her game panel. Sure enough, Mu Ning’s favorability value toward her—which had originally dropped below 50—had quietly maxed out again at some unknown point. And at the same time, this person’s blackening value had actually dropped from its original 100 down to 50?
No wonder her recent behavior didn’t look like a 100% blackened state at all. But why? Why had the blackening value decreased? Was it because she had appeared, and Mu Ning thought Ren Muhui had returned? Or was it because her own attitude toward Mu Ning had improved later on?
Unconsciously, Ren Chenxi turned her head to look at Mu Ning again. Mu Ning was still lying so pitifully on the sand, blood clinging to the corner of her mouth, a large patch of ink staining her body. Her long hair fluttered up and down in the sea breeze, and those red streaks on her palms remained strikingly harsh to the eye.
Forget it. Doesn’t this person just insist on treating me as Ren Muhui? As long as I make her completely give up that hope and stop seeing me as Ren Muhui, wouldn’t we be able to get along peacefully and amicably in the future?
The author has something to say:
Emmm… In this chapter, our Wooden Goddess is a bit too heavily injured, so she’s not quite suited for playing any kind of games~ Therefore… wishing all you little cuties a Happy International Women’s Day~~~~
Footnotes
- 作死 (zuò sǐ) means 'seeking death' or actively doing something reckless that will lead to disaster.
- 犯贱 (fàn jiàn) literally means 'acting cheap' or 'asking for a snub.' In modern slang, it often refers to willingly subjecting oneself to someone else's coldness or mistreatment out of infatuation, essentially making a fool of oneself for love.
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