How Am I Still Alive?-Chapter 1312 - 1298: Light

While working and vacationing at the same time, the shopping activity clearly could not be completed in just one day. Lu Ping’an rented a room in this tourist hotspot, planning to stay for a couple more days.

This job was essentially a way to pass time before the return of the Redemption. At least for Lu Ping’an himself, he was planning to take this opportunity to relax for a rare couple of days.

After all, for Lu, Xia Qin was the most special. He also wanted to know what exactly she had encountered.

"If I hadn’t met Xia Qin, or if one day a different supervisor had been assigned, I might have been strictly monitored or executed before I even matured..."

But Lu Ping’an knew that even if he had really been treated maliciously, unless he was killed on the spot, he was mostly likely to survive.

Just if the malice and surveillance he had initially faced, with Lu Ping’an’s nature of returning trust when given trust and returning malice tenfold when given malice, it’s hard to say what would have happened.

And once "malice" occurred with the officials, with Big Cat seizing the chance to incite, the young Lu Ping’an wouldn’t have minded finding an Evil God to affiliate with.

It could be said that Xia Qin changed the trajectory of Lu Ping’an’s life. Although she had her own agenda, she truly was a "good person", even somewhat saintly, using herself to vouch for Lu Ping’an... Although many people despise saintliness, when you are at a low point, being saved by a saintly figure who goes all out to lend a helping hand is another matter altogether emotionally.

Afterwards, it was also she who kept pushing the lazy Lu Ping’an forward, making him follow a "relatively normal" professional path.

"Xia Qin, for Lu Ping’an, is special..."

Even if Lu himself wouldn’t admit it, but to outsiders, that was the reality.

Of course, back then, the feelings were actually quite innocent, mostly gratitude and trust... For Lu Ping’an, who had his mind filled with negative thoughts, that woman might really be considered a beam of light in the darkness.

As for personal feelings? Although Xia Qin had already visited Lu Ping’an’s parents, at least the younger Lu Ping’an saw Captain Xia more like a silly older sister... somewhat clumsy, straightforward, a bit naive, and cute.

Yes, back then, he regarded this woman while calling her "Older sister", but actually with the attitude and perspective of "looking at a child or younger relative".

After all, with his soul aged beyond his appearance due to experiencing nightmares from two lifetimes... being adept at using his appearance and youthful advantage to gain favor and benefits was perhaps also a reflection of his psychological maturity.

Like many others, he had experienced love, trusted in love, then lost love, and no longer held any expectations for it... The end-of-life days of a terminally ill patient can easily shatter all past beliefs and identities.

Such a person, how could he have carelessly fancied a young woman in her twenties any year.

There was a year when he admired her, liked her, even enjoyed teasing her, but he knew, that wasn’t love, because he might have no love left in him...

"Ouch, it’s a bit tricky, this girl now seems more like a good woman than before..."

Back then, Lu Ping’an might have had a bit of expectation, but not much.

"Let it be, who knows, maybe one day I’ll act on impulse..."

He wouldn’t radically consider love as just a result of pheromones, but neither would he lightly give away his feelings... For someone his "age", even emotional life was mixed with too much rationality.

Unable to expect love, when he saw that familiar yet strange face, he felt inexplicably happy, but also felt like teasing her, to see her get so annoyed that she would stomp her feet.

This feeling was somewhat familiar yet far too strange... perhaps a flavor he had only tasted during the adolescence of his last lifetime.

"Uh, I’m not experiencing adolescence again, am I? Tsk."

Lu was already eighteen years old now... due to the overly exuberant reality of his Life Energy, there was a vague appearance of a younger rejuvenation.

Well, speaking of which, after all, it just means that Lu has also realized his recent anomalies.

He, towards a "matured" Xia Qin, seemed a bit too eager, to the extent that he himself found it odd...

"Just go with the flow."

The words were the same, but this time, Lu Ping’an said them with a smile.

Since there was no immediate work to be done...

"Since no one is pushing us, it’s a holiday from work! Let’s explore and have fun..."

Jiaolong City was indeed a pretty great "tourist city," with fully equipped facilities including coffee shops, hot springs, dance halls, bars, and a shopping street.

Since they had nothing else to do, they played and chatted leisurely, with Xia Qin doing most of the talking—after all, she had experienced too much.

They talked about the past, their lives, concerns about their hometowns, the future of the world, and... what to have for dinner, perhaps trying another hot pot spring.

Xia Qin herself enjoyed the vacation merrily, snacking her way down the street and soaking in hot springs... This change of pace somewhat surprised Lu Ping’an.

"...Is there such thing as a workaholic who dislikes holidays?" Xia Qin, wrapped in a bathrobe and enjoying a massage from a female attendant, said this with dead-fish eyes of a corporate slave.

It seemed that time indeed worked wonders, teaching even workaholics how to slack off.

"At least for now, don’t remind me of Team 3’s work... If I go back now, I probably won’t even be able to handle it. I’ve forgotten so much," she said, her brow furrowing at the thought.

But after so long, the fact that she could still remember her earth job showed that some things hadn’t changed.

"No, if we went back now, Special Service Team Three wouldn’t make you work... With Nuclear Weapons patrolling the streets, the Bureau of Anomaly Management would panic, and even if they made you do clerical work, would you find that appropriate?"

Putting a Rule-level Big Shot to do low-level clerical and logistics work? Isn’t that just insulting?

This only depressed Xia Qin further. She pouted instinctively, feeling annoyed but not knowing what to say... Perhaps for her, that small office and the patrol car were her real work and life.

But times had indeed changed, and in the end, all the woman could do was sigh... She stopped thinking about it and focused on enjoying the hot spring massage, managing to completely cast her worries aside—whether this was maturity or a return to simplicity was hard to say.

Originally, they had planned to go to a bar after dusk...

"Sister Xia, let’s play ranked games!"

"Lu, take me to get some food..."

But, as always, happy days were short-lived. Whether it was Eve’s spiritual intuition being triggered or someone had passed along information secretly, people soon started showing up... And just like that, what followed naturally turned into a "company team-building" event.

Since they were all out, what had been a holiday for two became a whole crowd hitting the streets... Considering this crowd was made of Rule-level individuals, the local big shots must have really been worried about waking up to find the island gone.

During this time, Eve clung to Lu Ping’an tightly, pressing herself close to him.

Considering you could only see it from the courtyard...

"Big Cat... Chris, did your mom say anything?"

"Older sister Chris? Uh, uh, she didn’t say anything, she, she saw nothing..."

See? Lu Ping’an hadn’t even asked that, but this self-incriminating lie was truly child-like.

But seeing the cute way Eve bared her teeth at Xia Qin, he could only sigh and then patted the head of this fully matured "girl," receiving a big sunny smile in return.

"Girl, you’re really cute..."