Did I Succeed in Redeeming the Villain Today? - Chapter 56

Chapter 56: “When Did You Come Out Of The Inner World?”

The girl’s head was light, her dark hair cascading down her shoulders like a waterfall.

But Lu Ning could not become the cliff that supported that waterfall. Facing the person who had proactively leaned against her in her peripheral vision, she froze instantly.

Mu Qiuyu’s action came without warning, leaving Lu Ning with nowhere to turn. She thought she should maintain a proper distance from Mu Qiuyu, but the shoulder she wanted to withdraw felt as if it were pinned down by a thousand pounds, unable to move.

Heat wrapped in the scent of coffee spread and diffused in this small area. Within this settled bitterness, Lu Ning felt the exhaustion radiating from Mu Qiuyu. Whether for herself or for those innocent, wrongly killed kittens, Mu Qiuyu had worked hard these past two days.

Lu Ning gradually calmed down from her helplessness, thinking that she should just let Mu Qiuyu lean on her. It was rare to see her make any request of her, especially a request like this.

She really is still a child, Lu Ning thought. She raised her pinned arm and stroked Mu Qiuyu’s head: “You’ve worked hard.”

The palm that had just been clutching the controller still held a trace of sweat, and it landed warmly on the top of Mu Qiuyu’s head.

The eyes Mu Qiuyu used to stare at the glass window paused for a moment. Like a child who had rarely received a reward, a tiny bit of warmth made her feel satisfied.

The late spring/early summer sunlight was genial and gentle, good-naturedly toyed with by the cypress trees on the sidewalk, spilling over the two people sitting by the window.

Lu Ning consented to Mu Qiuyu’s “docking,” and neither of them deliberately sought out a topic to discuss. They just sat by the window, soaking in the sun. It was so quiet—a silence that made one want to extend this moment infinitely.

And it was in this peace that Lu Ning, for some reason, looking at the tree shadows swayed by the wind outside, inexplicably thought of that white forest in Mu Qiuyu’s inner world.

She wondered if the Mu Qiuyu in the inner world had decided on her name yet. Every time she thought of her, she had to add the five words “in the inner world”—it was so tiring.

“Are you playing a game?”

Just as Lu Ning was about to steal a sigh, Mu Qiuyu’s voice came right against her ear. A current swept across Lu Ning’s earlobe, and the person who had been relaxing immediately snapped her gaze back.

Lu Ning looked at her computer screen, which was showing a paused game, and nodded to Mu Qiuyu: “Yes.”

Ever since she first turned her database into a computer, Lu Ning had wanted to show off to Mu Qiuyu. She couldn’t wait to introduce it: “This is my database. It has all kinds of games inside.”

“What is this one you’re playing?” Mu Qiuyu looked at the paused interface. The pixel style didn’t look like a game from this era.

“Super Mario,” Lu Ning blurted out, her gaze looking at Mu Qiuyu with a hint of surprise. “It’s a world-famous game. You don’t know it?”

Mu Qiuyu’s gaze faltered. But she quickly regained her usual calm and shook her head indifferently: “I’ve never played it.”

Unlike her own excited voice, Mu Qiuyu’s tone was cold, sounding distant and… lonely.

Lu Ning then realized that someone like Mu Qiuyu likely never had the chance to play such games. After all, the world she grew up in was different from that of an ordinary child; she probably didn’t have time for such things.

“It’s very fun, you should try,” Lu Ning thought. She eagerly pushed the computer toward Mu Qiuyu and stuffed the controller she had set aside into Mu Qiuyu’s hands.

“This is jump, this is squat, pushing this forward is to go ahead, pulling back is to retreat…” Lu Ning explained simply, wanting to help her make up for the childhood she missed outside the story.

Listening to Lu Ning’s explanation, a moment of clarity appeared in Mu Qiuyu’s eyes as she looked at the controller. Then, following Lu Ning’s instructions, she pushed the joystick toward the other side of the screen—until she saw an ill-intentioned little turtle on the path.

Lu Ning watched from the side, somewhat expectant to see how this gaming novice would handle the turtle. Then, she saw Mu Qiuyu jump down from the ledge. The little pixel character clearly had no expression, yet it carried a sense of heroic sacrifice. Without hesitation, she accelerated and crashed right into the turtle.

“?!…”

Lu Ning’s eyes widened. After seeing Mario get knocked dead by the turtle, she fell silent. She didn’t understand why Mu Qiuyu would charge straight at it. It was as if she did it on purpose.

After this thought flashed through Lu Ning’s mind, Mu Qiuyu, holding the controller with both hands, turned her head calmly to look at her, reporting an obvious fact: “I died.”

“Yes, very…” Lu Ning looked at the flashing Mario pixels and squeezed out two words: “Tragic.”

Mu Qiuyu didn’t react to this evaluation. She faced her seemingly comical death very calmly and said to Lu Ning: “I think you could play with me once. That way, it’ll be easier for me to understand.”

Lu Ning thought Mu Qiuyu had a point. Rather than dryly explaining the rules, it was better to show her. Once interest was piqued, it would be easier to learn.

“Okay,” Lu Ning agreed, reaching out to take the controller from Mu Qiuyu’s hand.

But Mu Qiuyu did not let go. She pinned Lu Ning’s reaching hand into her palm and turned back to ask her: “Aren’t you going to play with me? How can you do that if you take it? Wouldn’t that just be me watching you play?”

Lu Ning hadn’t expected Mu Qiuyu to come out with that suddenly. She looked at her hand being held by Mu Qiuyu, feeling an inexplicable dilemma. Did she want her to hold Mu Qiuyu’s hand while playing the game?

Wasn’t this a bit too ambiguous? And how would that even work? She had never “promoted” a game to someone like this before…

Lu Ning was struggling, but then she felt her hand being pushed into motion. Mu Qiuyu, somehow, had managed to restart the game. The “turtle brother” stood on the other side of the bricks, walking back and forth, waiting to crash into Mario again.

This “delivering a kill” behavior made Lu Ning feel pained. Moreover, she had worked hard to get this far and only had one heart left; she couldn’t afford a single mistake.

“When you meet this turtle, you should jump—” As Lu Ning spoke, she gripped Mu Qiuyu’s hand in return, using her hand to control the character, leaping toward the turtle.

“Then stomp it.”

“Then dodge.”

With a set of brisk maneuvers, the previously overbearing turtle was kicked into its shell by Lu Ning.

“Oh.” Mu Qiuyu looked at the operation on the screen and nodded seriously.

No one noticed that in her peripheral vision was Lu Ning’s arm, which was wrapped around her from behind. This person’s arm was fair and well-proportioned; under the scorching sunlight, one could clearly see the shape of the veins. This was an exquisite shell, a delicate system body transmitting warmth to the back of another person’s hand.

Mu Qiuyu silently savored this warmth and seriously asked about a cliff and a floating platform ahead: “What about this? Do I jump?”

“Yes.” Lu Ning nodded, holding Mu Qiuyu’s hand and pressing the button. The character on the screen leaped across the moment the floating platform drifted by. Precision.

Mu Qiuyu looked, and her eyes suddenly lit up: “Interesting.”

Having been together for so long, Lu Ning had never seen such a vivid expression on Mu Qiuyu’s face. The girl’s eyes were sparkling, her long and thick eyelashes filtering the sunlight into her pupils; those untainted eyes were clean and clear. No one would guess that her current liveliness was merely for a game character jumping onto a platform.

Seeing Mu Qiuyu’s interest in the platforms, Lu Ning led her across several more. As her coordination with Mu Qiuyu improved, they collected more and more coins, and Mario drew closer to the finish line. Familiar monsters bred a wordless chemistry. When they encountered another turtle, Mu Qiuyu was already reacting faster than Lu Ning. She moved the joystick to jump a step ahead of Lu Ning, stomped the turtle, and kicked it far away.

“Not bad,” Lu Ning said, her eyes lighting up as she looked at the hands that had moved out of her control.

“The teacher taught well,” Mu Qiuyu smiled.

“You bet.” Lu Ning candidly accepted the praise with a proud grin.

But then, the smile on her face faltered. A thought suddenly occurred to her: if it were the real Mu Qiuyu, she wouldn’t say such things. Mu Qiuyu was thin-blooded and cold to the bone; her proud head would never bow. So even if she had helped her, she wouldn’t call her “teacher.”

Lu Ning looked at Mu Qiuyu, who was skillfully manipulating Mario to jump onto bricks, her gaze slowly moving with the light and shadow. The sunlight projected her likeness onto the glass in front of them; the person in the window was, of course, exactly like her.

“If I jump on this flag, is the level cleared?”

In her daze, Mu Qiuyu’s voice rang out. Lu Ning snapped back to reality, noticing the flag peaking from the side of the screen: “Yes, jump across this platform.”

“Okay.” Mu Qiuyu nodded, timed her jump, and landed on the moving platform. Her skills were becoming proficient, and she had grasped the game’s patterns. As she moved, she jumped again, hitting a brick above. A hidden gold coin that even Lu Ning had forgotten about lit up brilliantly. Then, the familiar victory music played as Mario climbed the flagpole.

Mu Qiuyu looked at the character standing at the finish line and set down the controller. There was a bit of pride in her eyes as she said to Lu Ning: “Am I good?”

“Good,” Lu Ning nodded.

“Then aren’t you going to give me a reward?” Mu Qiuyu tilted her head, her flat voice saying words that invited imagination. The sluggish wind moved the tree shadows outside; the light and shadow falling before the window became chaotic, causing Mu Qiuyu’s pupils to show a hint of gentleness.

Lu Ning sat there in a daze, unsure if her head was thinking about what reward to give or something else entirely.

The person who asked the question received no response for a long time, so she took the initiative to find her own reward. Mu Qiuyu turned the high stool, facing Lu Ning. A slender shadow imprinted a dusky color in Lu Ning’s peripheral vision. Mu Qiuyu reached out and brushed the hair from the side of Lu Ning’s face.

At first, Lu Ning thought there was something on her head to prompt such an action. But then Mu Qiuyu’s fingers grazed her earlobe, and inch by inch, wiped across the corner of her lips. The girl’s fingers were cold, gently and slowly picking up a bit of milk foam from the corner of her mouth.

She seemed to be just helping Lu Ning clean up, but then she suddenly cupped her chin with one hand while the other lingered, refusing to leave those two lips.

A brief closeness, yet the slow-motion button had been pressed. Lu Ning felt every movement of Mu Qiuyu’s stroke on her lips with exceptional clarity. An unnamed floral fragrance diffused leisurely in the lowered space—light yet rich, unreservedly swirling into Lu Ning’s breath. Her heart beat for this, hazy yet real. She seemed to expect a closer approach.

And so Mu Qiuyu did exactly that.

However, just as that familiar figure leaned in close, Lu Ning suddenly dodged. She gripped Mu Qiuyu’s wrist tightly, looking at the person in front of her—who looked exactly like Mu Qiuyu—with wary eyes: “You aren’t Mu Qiuyu.”

“I am Mu Qiuyu,” the other replied firmly, her eyes unreservedly meeting Lu Ning’s gaze. Under the sunlight, the pupils Lu Ning gazed into were as deep as ever.

Then, as if she had realized something, her wary gaze gradually turned into a realization: “When did you come out of the inner world?”

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