...

In order to avoid suspicion from his family, Chen Xuan chose to use that day’s recall quota on himself and Lin Qing.

Elorie and Liuli, on the other hand, took a flight back to Paris.

Just as Chen Xuan had guessed, when Little Angel called the Angel Alliance to resolve Liuli’s identity problem, they sent a brand new electronic passport and ID in just an hour.

Elorie was no longer a nobody in the organization, every word she said and every action she took was noticed by others.

What’s more, the Angel Alliance had always wanted to monitor the movements of N21, and was eager for them to use the forged identity. So when Elorie made the request, it was like giving a pillow to someone when they’re sleepy; it would be surprising if the organization didn’t respond with the fastest efficiency.

After seeing them off at the boarding gate, Chen Xuan and Lin Qing found a secluded corner and directly teleported back to the main shop, then returned home through the branch shop.

The moment the signal connected, his phone started beeping nonstop.

Upon checking, he saw dozens of unread messages on WeChat.

"Oh, so popular?" Lin Qing joked, as usual, with the trace of melancholy between her brows now completely gone.

Chen Xuan was also somewhat surprised.

Previously, while running errands in other worlds, even if he didn’t return for ten or fifteen days, his phone never got this busy; at most, there were two or three missed call records, and they were probably from telemarketers.

Upon further inspection, he realized that most of them were chats from the classmate group, many people were taking turns @-ing him, along with a photo: It was the scene when he escorted Su Xingwan out of the hotel. The photo was taken from the lobby, with a close focus that clearly captured Su Xingwan’s profile.

In the photo, she’s talking to him, her expression smiling radiantly.

"Brother Xuan, isn’t this you?!"

"I see the clothes on you and the person in the photo are the same, what’s your relationship?"

"You know such a beauty, I’m so jealous of you!"

Chen Xuan rolled his eyes silently.

Wasn’t this from a few days ago?

Unexpectedly, he was photographed when he was sending someone off, and by chance, it was exactly when Gu Zhaoning walked away. Just looking at the photo, it seemed like they were on a date.

"Who took this?" he typed three words.

Once Chen Xuan spoke, the group chat erupted.

"No idea, we also saw it online."

"A lot of people are asking who the person beside Su Xingwan is, be careful kid, don’t get resented by her fans."

"Yeah, OneHit bar said you took her away, causing chaos in the band."

"Chen Xuan, is this true or false? Did she leave the band because of you?"

Chen Xuan was bewildered, what’s going on?

After searching keywords online, he finally understood the situation.

As it turned out, Su Xingwan posted an update the day she returned, announcing she would leave the band and no longer be the lead singer of OneHit. The news caused quite a stir, with fans speculating about what happened to lead her to this decision. Then someone posted the candid photo online, causing massive ripples throughout the band circle.

"Ha..." After seeing it, Chen Xuan couldn’t help but laugh.

Su Xingwan would leave the band wasn’t surprising at all, during her illness she was constantly questioned by band members and criticized by personal fans, a lot of pressure had already caused cracks between her and the band. Now that she’s recovered, feeling refreshed and recalling the grievances she suffered, it’s a wonder she could endure it!

So this was entirely Su Xingwan’s own choice, and had nothing to do with him.

As for the close and cheerful appearance in the photo... Considering her terminal illness has now been completely cured, wouldn’t she be happy?

Chen Xuan didn’t bother to explain, he simply turned off the group chat.

Upon scrolling up, he discovered there were unread messages from both Gu Zhaoning and Su Xingwan.

The former was the usual report of safe arrival, along with some words of thanks.

The latter was similar, but after discovering the photo incident, she sent several more messages, apologizing while hoping he wouldn’t take the rumors to heart.

Chen Xuan simply replied with an OK emoji.

Unexpectedly, she quickly sent over a voice message, "Great, you finally replied, I was worried something might have happened on your end."

There were indeed issues, but they occurred in another world.

Chen Xuan typed "No, just busy working."

"Alright." Su Xingwan still responded with a voice message, "But you were so busy you didn’t even have the time to check your phone?"

Uh... Why does it sound like she’s slightly complaining?

"Special case, not convenient to use the phone."

To divert the topic, Chen Xuan actively asked, "...Have you really decided to leave the band?"

"Yes, after experiencing this, I want to try a new path." Talking about it, her tone carried a hint of delight.

"Flying solo? That’s not a bad choice."

"No, I want to study medicine."

Cough... Chen Xuan almost choked, isn’t that a completely different path from being a lead singer?

"I know I’m not cut out to be a doctor, but now I’m at least an Ability User, maybe I can contribute to medicine in other ways." Su Xingwan said with a smile, "So I will first attend university and then intern at Ning’s company, please advise me then."

"This is great, now they’re enemies." Lin Qing chimed in.

"Enemies, my foot." Chen Xuan glared at her, "Currently, the Gu Family hasn’t been involved with the Dimensional Limit Mechanism yet."

Not to mention, what waves can two high school students stir up?

By the time they graduate and start working, it’ll be at least four years, who knows what the future will look like then.

"Yeah, if history can change... Dingsheng Pharmaceutical might have new choices and not just be bound tightly to the mechanism." Lin Qing mused.

Chen Xuan couldn’t help but raise his brow, "What are you talking about, isn’t history constantly changing?"

—The world now already has new memories.

That’s what she’d been saying constantly.

If the future is unchangeable,

"Hmm... I was just joking." She bowed her head and laughed lightly, saying no more.

After dinner that evening, Chen Xuan returned to his room to surf the internet, after a while Lin Qing suddenly barged in, exclaiming excitedly, "I figured out what this thing can do!"

Chen Xuan jumped in fright, only reacting after a moment that she was referring to the artifact.

He first closed the door, then gestured for silence.

Lin Qing immediately nodded, indicating she understood.

Only then did Chen Xuan lower his voice and ask, "Let’s not talk about other things first, how did you figure out its capabilities? If you want to do experiments, don’t do them at my house!"

"No, I just connected it to some power to check the chip type. Unexpectedly, it really was an oscillating circuit, and even more incredibly, Lv discovered it could actually use oscillation frequencies to exchange information with the outside world!" She exclaimed excitedly.

"Uh, can you say it in simpler terms?"

"Of course, you can understand it as able to talk! Just as sound is a wave, oscillation is also a wave, a regular fluctuating frequency after modulation and demodulation can carry information, Lv used this method to establish contact with it. Regarding its capabilities, it told me itself!"

"So N959 counts as artificial intelligence?"

"Well... you can understand it as AI but whether it’s artificial is hard to say." Lin Qing shrugged. 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂

Chen Xuan didn’t want to delve deeply, "Okay, what did it say?"

"It said its main function is repair, as long as it has circuits, it can restore them! But now it can’t do it alone, it needs to connect with other repair devices."

"Hmm?" Chen Xuan furrowed his brows, feeling this sentence sounded familiar. Then his eyes widened, looking at Lin Qing in surprise, "No way..."

"You also noticed? The repair shop called ’Atoms and Electrons’ in New Paris City also advertises this! And it’s built on the foundation of the artifact!"

"What a coincidence..." Chen Xuan pondered, "But in that world, the Holy Temple Treasure Vault has already been completely destroyed."

"Then what about before it was destroyed?" Lin Qing asked.

The answer was clear.

If they hadn’t joined the fight against the Demon, the opponent would have had ample time to loot the entire Vault.

Then comes the chilling question, New Paris City is the territory built by surviving humans, why would the artifact looted by demons become one of the facilities benefiting city residents?