077
[Data generation in progress—Dimensional mission completion 100%, points earned: 4000.]
[Next mission in progress—]
After returning to the system space and sending the soul fragments to the management center's storage location, Jiang Huali took the two jade pendants to find Chen Jing.
She and Chen Jing still met at the coffee shop.
Chen Jing had just returned from the mission world. He sat down opposite Jiang Huali and asked, "What's wrong? Have you made progress in your memory?"
“A little.” Jiang Huali took out the jade pendant. “I found this in this mission world.”
"You suspect it's a carrier?"
“Hmm.” Jiang Huali nodded. “I’ve remembered something. This jade pendant may come from my original world.”
"I came to you this time to ask how to confirm whether it is a carrier, and how to return to the original world."
Chen Jing said, "You just came from the management center, right?"
Jiang Huali nodded.
"Go and submit a report. The management center will help you test the power on the jade pendant. If all goes well, it should be able to find your world within three months."
"What if things don't go smoothly?" Jiang Huali asked.
Chen Jing: "If things don't go smoothly, it might not even take three hundred years."
"..."
Chen Jing glanced at Jiang Huali's expression and couldn't help but smile: "The space and time are so vast, finding your little world will depend on luck."
"As for how to trace back, it's still about submitting a report, and the management center will arrange it for you. That's what they handle."
He noticed the hesitation on Jiang Huali's face and said knowingly, "If you're determined to regain your memories, you can go out now and turn left to the management center. If you haven't made up your mind yet..."
He gave a gentle smile and blinked: "Forget the past, working at the Time and Space Bureau isn't so bad."
What do you think?
Jiang Huali pursed her lips: "And what about you?"
Chen Jing: "Hmm?"
Why do you insist on going back to the past?
Upon hearing her words, Chen Jing slowly suppressed his smile.
He took a sip of coffee, savoring its rich bitterness, looked out the window, and after a long while said, "There are always things that people can't let go of, aren't there?"
yes.
Even if it may bring endless pain, peel away the layers of healed wounds, and make people regret their actions.
Humans are such strange creatures.
Jiang Huali carefully put the jade pendant away and said goodbye to Chen Jing.
"Good luck," Chen Jing said.
"Thanks."
As Jiang Huali left the coffee shop, the system transformed into a ball of light and perched on her shoulder.
"Host, shall we go to the management center now?"
Jiang Huali took a deep breath, turned left, and walked towards the gate of the management center.
"yes."
Upon arriving at the management center, I was guided by the front desk staff to the testing area to hand over the jade pendant and then register.
The staff member gave a standard smile and said, "We will notify you as soon as the results are available."
Jiang Huali placed her hand on the table and asked, "Approximately how long will it take?"
The staff member apologized, saying, "I'm sorry, we can't be sure about that either."
Jiang Huali only asked the question once, nodded upon hearing it, and then left.
"Are all the staff at the management center real people?" Jiang Huali asked the system on the way.
The system was holding the electronic ice cream that Jiang Huali had just bought for it at the roadside stall with its thin, slender hands. Upon hearing this, it took a bite before saying, "Most of them aren't, um... the one I just saw at the management center was a robot."
There aren't many employees in the field; places like cafes and roadside stalls are all run by robots.
The electronic ice cream that the system eats is made by robots.
"What makes you different from them?" Jiang Huali asked curiously.
The system finished the ice cream cone in one go and said, "They look like people, but they don't have their own consciousness. We are the opposite."
Jiang Huali nodded; those robots were indeed somewhat cold and impersonal.
One person, one system, just wandered around the field aimlessly.
There's really nothing fun about this field.
Fun things always need people. This place is deserted, with more robots than real people. Although there are many entertainment facilities and shops, it just lacks a human touch.
Jiang Huali is here purely to fulfill the system's wish.
After all, a system isn't really a person, so it wouldn't want to feel human.
When they passed a dessert shop, Jiang Huali decided to go in and buy a dessert.
This store also sells electronic food, and the system happily said it wanted one too.
Electronic food is sold in this realm, specially prepared for the systems. Things they cannot eat in the small world can be obtained here.
Jiang Huali walked into the dessert shop and found that there were other people inside.
This is the second human that Jiang Huali has seen today, besides Chen Jing.
She was a woman wearing a dark green dress, with bright and kind eyes.
She was sitting in the very center of the shop, enjoying her dessert alone.
As soon as Jiang Huali stepped inside, the woman looked up at her.
Jiang Huali and the woman looked at each other.
The other person smiled kindly at her.
Jiang Huali ordered a cake, had the system choose an electronic dessert she liked, and then sat down at the table in front of the woman.
Because its legs were too short, the system sat directly on the edge of the table.
Jiang Huali thought the system was taking up too much space, so she moved it to sit opposite her.
When the dessert arrived, the system couldn't help but devour it, completely immersed in the enjoyment of the food.
Jiang Huali took a spoonful of cake and looked up to see an orange ball of light suddenly appear next to the woman opposite her.
That orange orb of light was clearly also a system.
As the system ate, it sat back down next to Jiang Huali, and then it looked up and met the gaze of the orange orb of light.
The system suddenly stopped moving. Jiang Huali noticed something was wrong and asked, "What's wrong?"
The system thought to itself, "Why does that system on the other side look a little familiar?"
Jiang Huali glanced at the small blue light sphere system, then at the orange light sphere opposite her, and her lips twitched.
Aside from color, are there any other differences between these two systems?
The system had a sudden flash of inspiration and realized: "I know, that's number 021!"
No. 021.
The teacher was someone the system hired for Jiang Huali when she was doing her first task.
"Is that number 021?"
“That’s right,” the system confirmed.
It added, "Actually, the system is called 021, and the host of 021 is named Sui Jin."
Although the system and the host have the same number, they usually refer to each other by the number, while the host usually has their own name and is referred to by that name.
For example, Jiang Huali's system is number 166.
As the person and the system were talking, Sui Jin, carrying the orange orb-shaped 021, walked towards them.
Sui Jin stood in front of Jiang Huali, extended her hand to her, and smiled, "You must be Jiang Huali?"
Jiang Huali stood up with some surprise and shook hands with Sui Jin.
Seeing the confusion in Jiang Huali's eyes, Sui Jin said, "My system has recognized you too. Let me formally introduce myself. I am Sui Jin."
"Hello, I am Jiang Huali."
Sui Jin curved her eyebrows slightly: "It seems that this self-introduction is a bit redundant."
"It's a pleasure to meet you here."
After obtaining Jiang Huali's consent, Sui Jin sat down opposite her and ordered another dessert.
The two chatted intermittently for a while.
Sui Jin said that she was an actress in the original world, and after she died of illness, she was bound to the system.
She had worked at the Time and Space Bureau for a long time and was a veteran employee. She was kind and gentle, so when she received the message from Jiang Huali's system, she readily agreed to answer her questions.
Sui Jin asked, "Did you just return here after completing a mission?"
Jiang Huali nodded: "Yes."
Sui Jin understood: "There's nothing fun in the domain. Everyone stays in their own system space and is teleported to the next world soon. Few people come out to explore."
No wonder.
Jiang Huali said, "But you're here."
Sui Jin took a bite of the dessert and squinted her eyes in enjoyment: "I like sweet things, and I come to this dessert shop often."
"Senior, have you been with the Time and Space Bureau for a long time?" Jiang Huali asked.
Upon hearing this, Sui Jin thought for a moment and said, "It has been a long time, so long that I have almost forgotten what my original world was like."
"How many tasks have you completed?" she asked Jiang Huali.
Four.
"Four? Then you should be able to accumulate enough points to revive soon."
"Does reviving require so few points?"
"Hmm... I don't remember exactly, but it wasn't much. Didn't your system tell you that?"
Jiang Huali glanced at the system beside her, whose mouth was full of dessert crumbs: "..."
"Then why doesn't Senior go back?" Jiang Huali originally thought it would take a long time to accumulate enough points for resurrection, but she didn't expect the reality to be completely different from what she thought.
Sui Jin looked at her, her gentle gaze filled with reminiscence: "Perhaps it's because she has no attachments. Only those who have attachments would want to be resurrected."
Jiang Huali fell silent.
It must be said that Jiang Huali felt somewhat bewildered when she first received the two jade pendants and began to guess that they were carriers of something.
Her memories of the time before she was bound to the system have become extremely faint. No matter how hard she tries to remember, she can only recall a few scattered fragments. The first half of her life, as she imagined it, has long since collapsed like a bubble.
Memories of the so-called "original world" are mostly fragmented.
It could be said that she was a person without memory, and a person whose origins were unknown.
She couldn't be sure how she would feel if she went back in time and retrieved her past memories.
Happy, or painful?
At that moment, she suddenly remembered the fragments of her soul in the storage area.
That person... is now her only connection to those distant, hazy past events.
She wasn't without concerns; figuring out where she came from and searching for her lost past and the truth were her concerns.
Just like Chen Jing said, there are always things that people can't let go of.
Because there are still attachments, they cannot let go or discard them; they will be etched into their very bones for a lifetime.
She wanted to be a person with flesh and blood, someone who had a place to come from and a place to return to.
Suddenly enlightened, Jiang Huali picked up a spoon and scooped out the last bite of cake.
Sui Jin finished her dessert, picked up No. 021, and said goodbye to Jiang Huali: "It seems you have other things to do, so—"
She smiled and said, "Looking forward to seeing you again."
Jiang Huali smiled back and said, "See you next time."
She stood up and walked out of the dessert shop with the system. Just then, the sun was setting and the afterglow was beautiful.
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