Stop Eyeing My Pretty Caretaker - Chapter 29

Chapter 29

The air remained frozen for a long time.

Jian Chen felt a bit awkward.

He had gambled on the idea of exposing his identity as a transmigrator to see if Bennett was his Bennett. If Bennett wasn’t that little robot from Earth, this would have turned into a massive embarrassment.

Jian Chen scratched his head, unsure if he had made himself clear. He tentatively asked, “Bennett?”

“…”

“?”

Jian Chen thought he was seeing things.

Bennett just stared at him.

Suddenly, tears rolled down his cheeks.

Jian Chen: “!!!”

Completely caught off guard by this reaction, Jian Chen panicked. He reached out to wipe the robot’s face with his fingertips, but the tears were like a broken dam; no matter how much he wiped, fresh, warm tears kept falling.

“Um, Bennett…”

Jian Chen worried that a synthetic body might be different from a human’s—if he kept crying like this, would his system run out of water?

His voice tinged with panic, Jian Chen croaked, “Why are you crying?”

Crying?

Bennett reached out to touch his own cheek, then looked at his hand. He finally realized that tears had filled his eyes; no wonder his vision had blurred. He had thought he was malfunctioning.

It turned out the little robot hadn’t even realized he was crying.

Presumably, in the world of robots, they never shed tears.

Jian Chen pursed his lips. His guess felt like it was only one step away from the truth.

No, he was already certain.

Jian Chen couldn’t help but reach out. His hand brushed against Bennett’s dark scarf. Because this scarf clashed so much with the robot’s current sophisticated appearance, it had been bothering him.

Jian Chen looked closer, and a ridiculous thought flashed through his mind.

No way…

Incredulous and uncertain, Jian Chen asked, “Is that… the red Christmas scarf?”

Bennett visibly froze.

His instinct was to pull away to protect it; his programming strictly forbade anyone from touching this scarf. But before the action could execute, the robot realized: the person in front of him was Jian Chen.

Slowly, Bennett lowered his hand.

He nodded. “Yes.”

Jian Chen found it miraculous. Back on Earth, this would have been unimaginable. “Did you use some kind of preservative? Normally, no matter what it’s made of, a scarf would have decomposed and vanished after thousands of years.”

At a loss but answering earnestly, Bennett said, “I used resin, ecological water, and Everlasting leaves. I mixed them, ground them down, soaked the scarf, washed it, and dried it…”

Bennett didn’t finish.

Because he felt himself being hugged.

The robot’s voice stopped abruptly as his train of thought broke.

It was the complete opposite of their time on Earth. Back then, the little robot only reached Jian Chen’s waist. Now, Bennett’s frame was significantly larger than Jian Chen’s. As he held Bennett, Jian Chen realized he couldn’t quite wrap his arms all the way around him.

Fine, he admitted it: the kid had grown up.

As Bennett described how he preserved the scarf, Jian Chen’s mind conjured an image of a tiny robot scouring the world for materials, pouring them into a small bowl, and using a stone pestle to grind—stirring and stirring.

Just the thought of it made his heart melt.

This was his little robot.

The robot who had waited thousands of years for him. The robot who remembered every tiny detail. The robot who wouldn’t throw away a Christmas scarf even after it had faded and frayed.

Jian Chen wrapped his arms around Bennett’s neck. Feeling the robot’s stiff confusion, he gently rubbed the back of his head.

Bennett’s eyelashes fluttered involuntarily—a natural physical manifestation of a robot’s system crashing.

The youth whispered, “I never thought you’d grow up, so I was a bit startled.”

He sighed softly.

“Our little robot has grown so big.”

Jian Chen’s voice was low, audible only to the robot:

“I’m sorry, Bennett. You must have been angry with me, right? …Back then, when I ordered you into the stasis pod.”

Jian Chen’s voice grew heavy:

“You must have been so unwilling.”

“…”

Bennett’s pupils dilated slightly.

Then, he closed his eyes.

An unfamiliar soreness surged through his nose and forehead, spreading across his face. He was being washed away and submerged by this strange, irrepressible, and violent emotion.

Even though Bennett’s expression remained calm, his internal core had already collapsed, nearly spiraling out of control.

Bennett believed Jian Chen must have bypassed a central circuit and touched his neural pathways; otherwise, as a synthetic android, he shouldn’t be crying uncontrollably like this.

Jian Chen felt a tightening around his waist.

The robot was hugging him back.

Bennett’s tears pitter-pattered down. With his eyes downcast and his mechanical voice trembling with emotion, he spoke word by word:

“…I didn’t want to follow orders.”

Bennett struggled to finish:

“I only wanted to save Mr. Jian Chen.”

Jian Chen felt as if his heart had vibrated.

His breath hitched, and quickly, his eyes began to burn.

He hugged Bennett tightly, warm tears sliding down his own face. He whispered, “I know.”

For Jian Chen, the time he spent unconscious or “dead” was but a flash. Before he lost consciousness, the last things he saw were Dun Dun and the little robot. When he opened his eyes again, everything was gone. Though he hadn’t felt the passage of time, it had truly stripped away everything he held dear.

Yet the little robot had waited through the long ages, guarding aimlessly for thousands of years, finally finding his master.

It was something beyond imagination.

In such a touching moment, Jian Chen couldn’t help but break the atmosphere slightly.

He patted Bennett’s arm and coughed. “Um… Bennett, you’re a synthetic now, and you’re quite strong. My lower back… is about to herniate.”

Bennett froze and immediately loosened his grip.

But he didn’t end the hug right away.

After the tears came pure joy.

Bennett seemed incredibly happy. He picked Jian Chen up and started spinning him around.

Jian Chen, his vision blurring: “…Cough.”

Even a spinning top would have sighed at the sight.

Night

Jian Chen walked to the second floor and entered his bedroom from memory.

The layout and decor had a very “Old Earth” style: a large bed, a wardrobe, and an attached bathroom. Nothing particularly unusual.

Jian Chen took a quick shower, dried his hair, and flopped onto the bed.

The tumultuous, roller-coaster day was finally, officially over.

Jian Chen rolled over. His physical exhaustion began to ease, but his mind was a mess.

After dying, he had actually transmigrated to the Interstellar Era.

In this era, “fluffies” ruled the world, and humans were an endangered species. He had ended up on Planet Moli, met his butler Bennett, managed not to be sold to a zoo, jumped off a third-story balcony, and incidentally found his lost little robot.

Vast amounts of information crowded his brain. Jian Chen’s thoughts drifted as he stared at the plain white ceiling.

Thousands of years had passed; landscapes and people had surely changed beyond recognition. As a lonely transmigrator, Jian Chen wouldn’t have been surprised if he were meant to grow old and die alone.

In a suffocatingly new environment where he felt like the only person from Old Earth, suddenly finding a little robot who was like family… the feeling was indescribable to anyone who hadn’t lived it.

He thought that Bennett was a gift from the heavens.

The night air, carrying the quiet scent of the forest, drifted into Jian Chen’s room.

This was the first time in three years that Jian Chen had slept in a strange place. Of course, there was no Dun Dun, and no Ye Siting.

Jian Chen wrapped the blanket a little tighter.

Even if it was just for the little robot, he had to survive.

He finally had a reason to live.

The Next Day

Morning light crept onto the edge of the bed.

Jian Chen opened his eyes groggily. After struggling for a bit, he sat up, only to lie back down a moment later.

He had a vague memory of Bennett calling him once.

Jian Chen didn’t have a habit of sleeping in, but Bennett’s presence made him feel like it was okay to linger for a bit.

After all, the little robot would never let him be late.

Jian Chen thought that today he should perhaps tour the zoo, see its current state, and then plan his next moves.

Before long, Bennett appeared and placed a change of clothes by the bed. “Good morning, Mr. Jian Chen.”

Jian Chen felt a dazed illusion that he had returned to thousands of years ago.

Though now, only the two of them remained.

His nose flared with a hint of sadness. Jian Chen hesitated, then asked the question he was most afraid of and couldn’t bear to know.

“Bennett.”

“What happened to… Ye Siting and Dun Dun?”

“They…” Jian Chen paused. He suddenly wavered, unsure if he truly wanted to know.

He quickly changed the subject: “Bennett, how did you get out of the stasis pod?”

Bennett replied, “Mr. Ye Siting opened the stasis pod.”

“After waking me up, he asked for my opinion,” Bennett recalled the scene. “To continue sleeping or to wake up—I was to choose for myself.”

The mere mention of Ye Siting’s name caused an indescribable feeling to well up in Jian Chen’s heart.

“I said,” Bennett continued, “I want to wake up and wait for Mr. Jian Chen.”

“He didn’t say anything. He permitted me to leave, and then he closed the stasis pod.”

Jian Chen was stunned. “…He closed the stasis pod?”

Bennett nodded.

Jian Chen’s hands trembled slightly. “Does that mean Dun Dun stayed in stasis!?”

The little robot nodded again. “That is correct.”

“Then he…” Jian Chen’s speech became clumsy due to extreme shock. “Is the stasis pod still there?”

Bennett nodded once more. “Yes, it is.”

Jian Chen: “Where?”

The little robot said: “Right in our backyard.”