AUS Chapter 5: The Sleeping Liu Jiang

The stool beneath me didn’t end up flying out, and of course, the person standing at the door wasn’t Liu Jiang.

Noticing my reaction, the Liu Jiang beside me turned his head, then quickly walked to the door, leaning against it as he asked, “Sis, you’re here? Why didn’t you say anything?”

The “Liu Jiang” outside spoke, addressing me directly. “Just came to check out the new guy.”

Snapping back to reality and looking closely, she did resemble the future Liu Jiang in some ways, but not entirely. She wasn’t as tall as him, though her facial features were similar, just with a slightly rounder face. Compared to Liu Jiang’s frequent mischievous grins, her expression could only be described as world-weary.

According to Liu Jiang, this was his sister.

I hurriedly stood up and nodded in greeting. She merely sized me up, didn’t introduce herself, and waved a hand behind her. “Finish up and come downstairs. Dinner’s ready.”

With that, she left without looking back. Liu Jiang, still holding the door, started explaining to me. “My cousin, my uncle’s daughter. Her name’s Liu Sisi.”

His explanation jogged my memory. I didn’t recall her face, but I remembered her name, which clashed strikingly with her appearance. Wait, it seemed like she looked different every time she showed up.

Before heading downstairs, Liu Jiang added another explanation. “She’s a blogger, always trying out makeup and stuff.”

This family was truly a collection of colorful characters: a band-playing brother, a beauty-blogging sister, grandparents who happily managed a house full of kids, and me, the supposed mental case brought home on the first day of meeting.

At the large round table, Liu Jiang’s grandmother set a children’s bowl in front of me, the kind with handles on both sides.

With a kind smile, she explained, “We’ve got one extra person today, and we’re short on bowls. This’ll have to do.”

It was hard to tell if this was intentional or not, so I just said, “Thank you, Grandma.”

While I tried to discreetly examine the children’s bowl, the rowdy teenage boys from upstairs took their seats. The table wasn’t big enough, so some of them brought stools and ate in the kitchen.

Before digging in, Liu Jiang tapped his glass with a spoon, delivering a pre-meal summary speech. “Let’s welcome our new consultant—Yang Pingsheng!”

Cheers erupted around the table, followed by clinking glasses and a mess of plates and bowls.

I picked up a piece of braised pork rib nearest to me, hesitating before taking a bite. The perfectly caramelized sauce coated the tender, melt-in-your-mouth rib. It was delicious. Just like the vanilla soda earlier, I could eat and drink in this simulated world.

During the meal, I didn’t talk much with the others. Only Liu Jiang chatted with me now and then, probably worried I’d feel awkward. He even served me food a few times.

Midway through, Liu Sisi quietly took a seat. The dyed wolf-tail hairstyle turned out to be a wig; her real hair was a bob with neat bangs. Now she looked less like Liu Jiang.

By the time I finished an entire bowl of rice from the children’s bowl, the rehearsal had wrapped up. The kids, whose names I hadn’t yet memorized, said their goodbyes, leaving just me and Liu Jiang.

My excuse was that my parents would be home late, so I could stick around a bit longer.

In reality, my parents hadn’t moved with me to Number Twenty High School. They lived in the city, renting me a flat nearby and hiring a part-time housekeeper who left after cooking. When I got home, I’d likely have to deal with a cold spread of three dishes and a soup in the dining room.

Liu Jiang didn’t treat me like an outsider. After we helped his grandparents carry the dishes to the sink, he took me to his room.

This was the place I was most familiar with, since my sneaky nighttime visits always led straight to his room.

But when he actually opened the door, I felt unexpectedly awkward.

The room was just as I remembered, only lacking the traces of his adulthood. Now it was filled with teenage flair: walls plastered with band posters, a bubbling lava lamp in the corner, a bass guitar propped by the bed, and a vertical CD rack next to it.

He gave me a tour, then flopped onto his soft, sprawling bed, patting the spot beside him. I didn’t hold back, sitting down and pulling an album from the CD rack.

He asked, “So your condition—does it only flare up when you’re triggered by something?”

The album was Queen’s, the iconic Bohemian Rhapsody.

As the melody questioning reality versus fantasy echoed in my mind, I lay back, calmly replying, “Yeah, it happens when I’m triggered.”

He lay on his back, deep in thought, his gaze shifting toward me. “So what kind of trigger are we talking about? Does it have to do with your experiences?”

I blinked, suddenly knowing how to answer.

I told him, “Whenever I think of someone I knew in the past, it sets me off.”

The system wouldn’t let me break the fourth wall, but hinting was fine, right?

Like the mechanic-God characters in every post-apocalyptic game, every word I said was laced with profundity.

Profundity, my ass.

I was just milking the situation.

Liu Jiang stopped looking at me. He asked, “Is this person really important to you?”

Important?

We’d never explicitly acknowledged how important we were to each other.

I tossed the album aside, joining him in staring at the ceiling adorned with hanging trinkets. I said, “We never talked about that question, but if I disappeared, he’d look for me. If he disappeared, I’d look for him. We’d always find each other in the end, and everything would turn out fine.”

His voice lowered. “So, right now, it’s him—”

“Yeah,” I understood his subtext, “he’s gone. Missing for a long time.”

In my peripheral vision, I saw him touch the tip of his nose. I continued, “The last time we saw each other, we were fighting. This time, I wanted to apologize first, but I can’t find him.”

I heard him murmur, “But you’ll have a good ending, right?”

I shook my head with a smile. “Not necessarily. I think this time’s different. He might be gone for good.”

Gone.

Dead, lost, missing—whatever it was, he wasn’t waiting for me anymore.

The mood felt a bit heavy. I tried to liven up this high schoolers’ evening hangout.

I quickly added, “It’s not that depressing. Maybe something you did reminded me of him. It’s not a big deal. You two aren’t even that similar.”

My attempt to lighten the mood didn’t get a response from Liu Jiang. I turned to look at him, suddenly realizing we were a bit too close.

The sky outside was about to turn dark. The only light in the room came from the faint glow of the lava lamp. His bed was soft, enveloping my back in its warmth, and even my gaze toward him felt softened.

He asked, “How are we different?”

I said, “You’re not as annoying as he was.”

Liu Jiang suddenly laughed, but it wasn’t a happy laugh. Sure enough, within seconds, his smile faded. Then he abruptly turned his face away from me, grabbed a pillow, buried his face in it, and let out a long, sobbing sigh.

Huh?

I propped myself up to see what he was doing, but all I heard was him muttering a curse. “Damn, that’s too fucking tragic!”

He was cursing about how pathetic I was.

And crying while he did it.

I remembered now—not only was this guy’s compassion overflowing, but his tear threshold was ridiculously low. Maybe the fairy-tale story I’d just spun was too touching. In any case, it had gotten to him.

Different paths, same destination. Though I didn’t throw a punch, he still ended up crying on the first day we met.

At the same time, I recalled something else—when he got emotional like this, it took him a while to calm down.

I gave up on him, grabbing a magazine from beside his pillow and straining my eyes to read by the lava lamp’s dim light. I don’t know how much time passed, but the text in the magazine became impossible to make out, and there was no sound from his side.

I closed the magazine, holding my breath to listen. All I could hear was his faint breathing.

Propping myself up to look closer, I saw he was still clutching the pillow tightly, but his eyes were closed.

He’d fallen asleep.

Seeing him asleep, I suddenly felt a wave of relief. I gently pushed the magazine aside and lay back steadily beside him.

Don’t get me wrong—I had no such thoughts about a sixteen-year-old high schooler, especially since I was sixteen myself in this world, pure as can be.

I just wanted to rest.

The time flow ratio between the virtual world and the outside world was six to one. I’d spent twelve hours here, so it was probably nearing four in the afternoon out there.

I should go.

In the apocalypse, seasonal changes weren’t so distinct. Whether spring or summer, it was all sandstorms. In a few hours, visibility would drop to terrifying levels, and I might not make it home.

But I also wanted to stay.

Whether it was the soft, fluffy duvet behind my head, the faint lilac scent drifting in from the window, or the person beside me breathing evenly, everything was urging me: stay.

If the me outside died, would the me in here disappear?

Or would I stay here, gazing up at the ceiling, growing up again with Liu Jiang, meeting him again in this “correct” way?

Should I leave, or should I stay?

I’d Heard of the “brain in a vat” concept, but our company’s project was clearly far from creating a true world. No matter how real everything I saw felt, it was ultimately just an illusion.

In a swirl of confusion, I closed my eyes.

I actually fell asleep too.

But the sleep was like ice shards on a spring river, briefly swirling through my mind before slipping away. I groggily opened my eyes. The lights in the residential buildings outside had come on. I’d probably dozed for about ten minutes.

The person beside me was still sleeping soundly. I took a deep breath and made a request to the system. “Pull me out.”