“Boss, I added a little flair just to be cute, hehe…”
Luo Tiantian stuck her tongue out. ‘How did I bring my in-game verbal habits into a real-life stream?’
“To be cute? Fine, I guess. But when I say we’re invading the jungle, we’re invading the jungle. Listen to your boss and be good.”
“Yes, Boss!”
Luo Tiantian resolutely followed Ake as they plunged into the pitch-black enemy jungle.
**[Double Kill!]**
Ake and Yaomei were both sent back to the fountain. Their corpses lay neatly side-by-side in the enemy’s Blue Buff pit.
Sun Shangxiang, the marksman who had been quiet until now, finally couldn’t take it anymore and turned on the team voice chat.
“I (bleep)! Does this jungler even know how to play?! Bringing a deadbeat support along just to feed a double kill! (Bleep) (Bleep)! Yaomei, you’re also (bleep). You followed her into the jungle without vision? (Bleep) (Bleep)! Glued together the whole time, no vision, no pings, and I’ve been ganked seven or eight times in the bottom lane! Are you even playing the (bleep) game?!”
This string of profanity caused even T-Rex Missy to fall silent for a moment.
Luo Tiantian was immediately displeased.
It was fine to curse at her, but cursing at her benefactor was unacceptable. Cutting off someone’s source of income was as good as killing their parents.
“Don’t get upset, Boss. Leave this to me.”
She turned on the global voice chat.
“Oh my, are you that desperate? Did your twenty-four-karat gold dog eyes fail to see your teammates’ icons disappear from the map for three seconds? I’ve mashed the signal button so much it’s practically broken. Is your precious finger stuck to the screen, or did it evaporate along with your meager brain capacity?”
“You’ve been solo-killed three times in your lane and have the lowest economy on the team. Where do you get the nerve to dictate how we play? Oh, I get it. You traded your face for the thickness of your ancestral grave. Unfortunately, you put all the points into your skin instead of your IQ.”
“What’s wrong with me following the jungler’s rhythm? At least she has the guts to make plays. What about you? You can’t even last-hit under your own tower. Your understanding of minion waves is stuck in Bronze, and your awareness is a bottomless pit. You do all your damage via typing, yet you can’t even protect your own parents.”
“Also, is your mouth that foul because you just finished cleaning a sewer and forgot to rinse? You can lose a game, but don’t lose your dignity. I suggest you go back to school and redo your mandatory education to learn how to speak like a human. If you can’t manage that, at least learn how to be as quiet as a chicken so you don’t pollute the environment, okay?”
After a long silence, the other party sputtered in a rage, “You… you (bleep)!”
“Me what? My voice is pleasant, my gameplay is a feast, and I’m a beautiful, kind-hearted sweetheart. What about you? You left your vocal cords at home, you play with your toes, and your awareness relies on mysticism. Your only redeeming quality is your persistence in gifting the enemy team warmth. I suggest you play Cheng Yaojin next time. After all, the name ‘Fiery Axe’ really suits your performance of ‘fiery feeding’ in this game.”
The marksman was silenced completely. It was unclear if he had muted his mic or simply passed out from rage.
He was likely censored by the system.
Shen Xixi burst out laughing.
She hadn’t expected the gaming companion she hired on a whim to have such a silver tongue.
Not bad.
The two games ended quickly. Naturally, they lost both, but T-Rex Missy didn’t seem to care.
“Alright, that’s enough for today. I’ll hire you again when I’m free. Remember to keep that fighting spirit. It’s much more fun than just being soft and submissive.”
“Yes, Boss! Thank you, Boss! I wish you and your beloved a long and happy life together!”
Luo Tiantian instantly switched back to her “good girl” mode, as if the sharp-tongued warrior from moments ago hadn’t been her.
Seeing the 200 yuan successfully deposited into her account, Luo Tiantian rubbed her cheeks, which were slightly flushed from the intense match, and exited the gaming platform.
Only then did she notice several unread messages on her phone from Su Xiao.
Su Xiao: ‘What are you doing?’
Su Xiao: ‘Are you free tomorrow? My mom made some soup and insisted I drink it, but I can’t finish it all. Want me to bring you some? Your boyfriend needs the nutrition, right?’
Su Xiao: ‘(A photo of a thermos)’
Su Xiao: ‘…Why aren’t you replying?’
Looking at these messages, Luo Tiantian felt a bit conflicted.
She thought of the Si Mother in the game who was willing to sacrifice herself for her daughter, and then she thought of Su Xiao’s awkward attitude whenever she mentioned her own mother.
Luo Tiantian thought it over and replied:
“I was busy just now. Thank you and your mother for the kind offer. But, Su Xiao, your mother is actually very good to you. Why are you always so cold to her?”
As soon as she hit send, Luo Tiantian felt a twinge of regret. It felt like she was overstepping her bounds.
However, she truly didn’t understand. As an orphan who had lost her parents at a young age, she couldn’t imagine having a mother’s care and choosing to push it away.
After a long while, Su Xiao replied. Her message was much shorter than usual:
“I know she’s good to me.”
Several minutes later, another message arrived:
“But sometimes, hearing her voice or seeing her face just makes me uncontrollably irritable. She asks about school, who I’m hanging out with, what I want to do in the future… Every sentence feels like an interrogation. I just can’t talk to her normally. Once she starts asking about my life, I find it incredibly annoying. I know I’m wrong, but I can’t change it.”
The lines were filled with deep-seated contradictions.
Luo Tiantian looked at the screen, unable to fully relate.
To her, even this controlling type of care was a luxury.
In the end, she only replied with one sentence: “At least she’s still trying to care for you, trying to be a bit gentler? Maybe try to endure it, even just a little, while you still have the chance.”
On Su Xiao’s end, the “typing…” status appeared for a long time. Finally, she only sent back a single: “Yeah.”
The conversation seemed to end there.
Luo Tiantian didn’t even know why she was saying these things to a girl she had just met a few times.
Perhaps it was because the other party had no guard against her. Su Xiao had even brought her into her home and then went off to play games, leaving Luo Tiantian to her own devices.
At least in Luo Tiantian’s eyes, while the side Su Xiao showed her was a bit too casual—even a little eccentric—she didn’t seem like a bad person.
***
Su Xiao tossed her phone onto the bed and collapsed backward into the blankets.
Why was she so cold to her mother?
Many people had asked that question. Relatives, teachers, and even heartless people like Shen Xixi would occasionally mention, “Your mom treats you well enough.” She always brushed them off with excuses like “she’s annoying,” “she controls too much,” or “it’s a generation gap.”
But when Luo Tiantian—someone who had inexplicably caught her attention the moment they met—asked the question, Su Xiao felt like those shallow reasons weren’t enough.
‘Try to be gentler? Endure it?’
Su Xiao closed her eyes.
She was afraid of the dark.
She was afraid of ghosts.
A child’s imagination is magnified in silence and solitude. The folds of a curtain look like hiding figures; the gap in a closet door feels like it hides eyes. There are no footsteps in the hallway, yet they seem to echo faintly at midnight. Strange clicking sounds come from the ceiling.
The nanny would be in the next room, snoring loudly enough to wake the dead, but she could never be shaken awake.
At the very least, if she could just hold out until she was exhausted, sleep would make it go away.
But all of that paled in comparison to what happened after that one event.
After the car accident.
Since then, nightmares had become a more terrifying fixture than the night itself.
They were no longer the vague, fearful fantasies of childhood, but a tangible Ghost Dream.
She would wake up within the dream to find herself lying in her own familiar bed, and then *they* would come.
Sometimes it was a floating white figure; sometimes it was a shadow with a blurred face; sometimes it was something formless that she could only sense as a freezing presence.
The worst part was the sensation of being touched, or even bitten.
A cold, slimy sensation would crawl up her calf, like something wet was slithering over her. A sudden, inexplicable sting would flare on her arm, as if she were being gnawed on by tiny, sharp teeth. A heavy weight would press down on her neck—suffocating, icy.
The intense dread and terror were overwhelming, but what made her truly desperate was the fact that in those nightmares, she couldn’t move. She couldn’t even scream.
She could only watch as those things approached, feeling that freezing contact.
Nighttime was scary and full of dread, but what was even more terrifying was falling asleep.
“Mom, can you come back and sleep with me?”
“Alright, alright. There are no ghosts. Just sleep peacefully…”
The young Su Xiao would leave the lights on, staring blankly at the ceiling.
Every time she was about to fall asleep, her whole body would jerk.
She would wait until she reached the absolute limit of exhaustion before finally sinking into the nightmare.