Lucy groggily opened her eyes, her pupils full of confusion.
It felt like she had a very long dream, one that was so real yet so fantastical.
Maybe there were still faults over there, but compared to here, it was like paradise. Lucy almost didn’t want to wake up and just wished to stay in that slumber.
Gloria was able to wake up faster than Lucy simply because she had a son, David, here.
She rubbed her eyes, seemingly not fully out of that vivid dreamscape, and the just-woken Lucy had a blank expression, with even a bit of drool at the corner of her mouth.
It took her quite a while, sitting on the opposite sofa, to realize Lin Miao was gesturing at the tablet in his hand.
She found herself asleep with a blanket covering her.
Lucy was first startled, looked down, opened the blanket, and saw that all her clothes were intact, not even her shoes were off, and everything was neat without the slightest sign of disorder, she was instantly disappointed.
This guy did nothing to her while she was asleep, didn’t even open a zipper.
The huge gap in her expectations made Lucy start doubting her own looks and allure, even questioning Lin Miao’s sexual orientation.
But judging from the marks of their past interactions, he should have no issues with his sexual orientation.
Could it be that he doesn’t like my type?
Does he prefer mature women like Gloria?
After last night’s events, Lucy found herself fretting over such things.
Seeing Lucy awake and even looking at him with an odd gaze, Lin Miao put down his tablet and asked curiously,
"What’s with that look? Is something wrong?"
What could Lucy say? Should she question Lin Miao why he didn’t make a move on her?
Though as the saying goes, when a woman acts coy, there’s nothing a man can do, Lucy couldn’t possibly directly ask such things.
Looking out the window, she realized the sky was already turning light, and she had slept the whole night through.
"Did you... stay here all night?"
Lin Miao tossed the tablet on the table, stretched, and his joints cracked noisily.
"I actually wanted to carry you to my car and take you home, but I was afraid the neighbors would get the wrong idea, thinking I was picking up bodies from bars or harming an innocent girl, so I had to wait here until you woke up."
Lucy propped herself up on the sofa, and the blanket and her coat slid off, revealing her skimpy tank top underneath, with her smooth shoulders and collarbone fully exposed.
The old shoulder’s slippery.
She looked at Lin Miao, with a smile that was hard to describe hanging at her lips, the entire vibe filled with allure.
"...You could take me to my home."
"You’re asleep, how would I open your door?"
"A hotel works too..."
She crawled toward Lin Miao along the sofa, rested her head on his lap, and reached out to caress his face.
"I wouldn’t mind, you know."
"But I would, hotels are unsafe, and there might be hidden cameras. I wouldn’t want to see something I shouldn’t on the dark web."
"Personally, I don’t care, but my possessiveness is strong, such a stunt might cost a lot of lives."
This was certified by the system, almost enough to give him a license. Lin Miao wouldn’t believe people in Night City had integrity.
Listening to Lin Miao’s words, Lucy’s hand started to slide down from his face.
Touching his neck, collarbone, and then pausing at his chest, she wrapped her arms around his waist and even turned to bury her face in Lin Miao’s abs.
Having not slept all night, naturally Lin Miao didn’t have time to shower, and having had a bone marrow transplant, his metabolism was faster than ordinary people, so at the moment, he didn’t smell the best.
But Lucy was intoxicated by it, enjoying the current feeling with closed eyes.
Perhaps compared to the world in last night’s dream, she preferred it this way now.
She feared those big companies, but beside Lin Miao, it seemed as if there was nothing to fear.
"Don’t you want to rest a bit?"
With those words, Lucy gave a wicked smile, her hands starting to get bolder, even trying to undo his belt, but Lin Miao quickly grabbed her hands to stop her.
"I want to, but not now, the employees are already at work, I can’t just leave them hanging."
This wasn’t rest, this was intense physical labor.
He rolled his eyes, said with a teasing annoyance,
"And do you think the soundproofing here is good?"
If any inappropriate sounds were made, not only would his renowned reputation among players be ruined, but he might even be erased from the future by some indescribable presence.
Only then did Lucy unwillingly withdraw her hand.
This guy was good at everything, just that his mind was filled with his employees and work, once mentioned, nothing else mattered.
Lin Miao flipped the back of his hand to flick her on the forehead.
"From today on, you’re the company’s hacking mentor, responsible for teaching them hacking experience, Demonic Puppet crafting, ICE firewalls, and anti-hacking combat..."
When the two of them went downstairs, the players were already chatting in the lobby.
The first thing they did every day after logging on was to gather at the office, ready to take on the day’s tasks.
With the passage of time and the continuous rise in the office’s prowess, the players’ activity areas kept expanding as well, no longer confined to Stone Ridge Mountain Town and Grarbage Mountain.
They would start patrolling the surroundings, attacking any Night Wanderer that approached.
In their words, it was jungle fighting.
The Night Wanderer, repeatedly suffering severe losses in a short time, realized these new beings were not to be messed with.
While they haven’t completely given up the thought of attacking the office, without Chaotic Blade Association’s support, a larger scale attack was difficult to launch.
A place where 50 people couldn’t prevail would need at least a three-digit force next time.
So, they had no choice but to withdraw from areas around the town, tightening their lines.
Even many who mixed in Evil Land knew a group of newcomers arrived in Stone Ridge Mountain, causing Night Wanderers significant trouble, even their boss was taken out by them.
And players were thrilled.
Not only did they have daily missions trading supplies with Adcardo, they could even ask Adcardo to help craft some items that the handcraft stations couldn’t produce.
Though they had to pay, of course.
They could also go to the Sunset Motel at ’the edge of the map’, drink at the bar there, and listen to NPCs chat.
The NPC AI here was astonishingly high, interactions were impeccable, although sometimes they tended to answer questions out of context.
For example, the ladies of the night wouldn’t accept player business, would call them losers, and might even call people to beat them up.
After players attempted several borderline acts like streaking, demolishing houses, ambushing NPC merchants, or robbing passersby, they were forcefully logged off by Lin Miao for a half-hour cooldown and thus behaved themselves.
Because they discovered there was a risk of dying even after logging off.
When Shui Yue attacked the arms dealer beside the Sunset Inn in an attempt to replicate a beloved heist mission in the game, he was kicked offline by Lin Miao for half an hour and was in death cooldown when he logged back.
Indeed, within just the half-hour of unconsciousness, his body had been killed by the NPC, and other players couldn’t even retrieve his body in time, not a trace was left.
Shui Yue bled out, his prosthetics lost, offline for three days, howling daily on the forum, making all players with slightly dubious thoughts become well-behaved.
This game was very humanized in some aspects, yet not well-detailed in others—it was unclear if it was bugs or due to fear of harmonization being a deliberate act.
Moreover, besides the players, many others discovered this game as well.
Although they weren’t traditional gamers in the conventional sense, it didn’t stop them from viewing the game through their own perspectives.