Pop-up Warfare in Cyberspace
The passages of the data maze are composed of marriage value reports of various worlds. Xiaodou stepped on the data of the milk tea cup in the seventh volume of the campus chapter, and the blind date file of the school hunk (Lin Shen’s previous life) suddenly popped up in the report: "Name: Lin Shen, Compatibility: 99% with the Lucky Rat - failed due to hair loss allergy." Her pixel tail was wrapped with the fragments of the mechanical cat energy chip (foreshadowing in the third volume), and the chip projected the surveillance footage of Lin Shen in the real clinic: he was sighing at a can of code can marked "No. 001".
"Sister, stop looking!" Laotie 666 used code to generate a Northeastern flowered coat slide. "Every brick in this maze is a memory of the blind dates you've chewed on!"
Before he finished speaking, the wall suddenly cracked, revealing footage from the first volume of the demon world's food wars: the fox demon Bai Yan holding up an osmanthus cake, while in the background, the image of Xiaodou, in his Sky-Swallowing Rat form, nibbled on it. Xiaodou's pixelated ears burned as he heard Lin Shen's chuckle from deep within the maze: "Xiaodou, every failed blind date brings me closer to you."
Past life encounter in milk tea pop-up window
A pink pop-up advertising a milk tea ad suddenly appeared in front of him. Xiaodou instinctively nibbled at the border and was unexpectedly sucked into a virtual scene from the campus arc. A schoolboy (Lin Shen's past life) in his school uniform sat in a milk tea shop. An AI assistant was analyzing "how to use code to defeat mice." Code branches flashed on the screen: "Feed osmanthus cake → trigger favorability +10"; "Use anti-linting spray → favorability -100."
“So he’s known me for a long time…” Xiaodou’s pixelated body passed through the shadow of the school hunk and touched the mechanical cat keychain in his pocket (a foreshadowing of the GM in Volume 11). The keychain suddenly played the electronic meow of a mechanical cat, “Meow~ No. 001, 98 blind date KPIs left, keep going!”
"Warning! Illegal data intrusion detected!"
The pop-up advertisement turned into the Firewall Knight's lightsaber. Xiaodou fled in a hurry, but ran into the territory of the "God of Pop-up Ads" - the screen was full of "Click to receive unlimited cat food" and "9.9 free shipping Cthulhu slime" advertisements, and the boss was picking his teeth with the sword tassel from the world of immortal cultivation (foreshadowed in the fifth volume).
The demonic attack of the Northeastern dialect virus
"Any unauthorized intruder will become my advertising material!"
The God of Advertising waved his arm, and a pop-up window from the "Singles' Protection Association" popped up, with Xiaodou's pixelated body stuck to the "Click to Get a Blind Date" button. Laotie 666 suddenly activated the "Northeastern Dialect Virus," and all the pop-up ads instantly turned into Errenzhuan skits:
- Cthulhu slime ad: "Slimy as a god, stewing spareribs is better than frying them~" (with tentacle dance scene)
- Infinite cat food pop-up: "Cat food is fragrant, cat food is sweet, eating it can make you live for ten thousand years~" (Black Cat Sheriff Northeastern version dubbing)
Green smoke came out of the CPU of the God of Advertising: "This, this doesn't fit the cool setting of cyberpunk!" His code body began to freeze, dropping the fragments of the mechanical cat's energy chip (a foreshadowing of the third volume). The timestamp on the fragments showed "August 12, 2025 03:14" - the moment when Lin Shen modified the code in the real clinic.
The Secret History of the Rat Tribe in the Data Graveyard
Taking advantage of the boss's system freeze, Xiaodou sneaks into the "Concept Rat King's Data Graveyard." The tombstones bear her claw marks and the code combination "L·S." The latest tombstone reads: "Concept Rat King Xiaodou, fallen in love with the Guardian, reincarnation code sealed." She gnaws at the interstellar nanorobot code (a foreshadowing of Volume 2) on the edge of the tombstone, and a vision of her past life emerges:
The Mechanical Knight (Lin Shen) kneels in the ruins and embeds the Mechanical Heart Core (foreshadowed in Volume 11) into Xiaodou's rat-like body: "Use my code in exchange for your thousands of reincarnations."
Lin Shen in reality uttered these words simultaneously, his voice echoing from every corner of the data maze: "Xiaodou, what you've chewed through isn't the timeline, it's the love letter I wrote to you."
A love letter to medical record codes
Laotie 666 used code to repair Xiaodou's pixelated body, but discovered that her tail's progress bar was frozen at "Memory Loading 99%." On the door at the end of the cemetery, the truth about "Lin Shen = Guardian No. 001" was spelled out using the marriage value codes of various worlds. The key to the real-life clinic hung on the doorknob, and the keychain was a mechanical cat gear pendant (a foreshadowing of Volume 3).
"Shall we go?" A pop-up window popped up on Laotie666's app interface asking, "Do you want to start the final confession?" "Your master (the mechanical cat) said there's a fool behind the door who's been waiting for you for seven hundred years."
Xiaodou's pixelated claws pressed towards the door handle, but the moment she touched it, the codes in her body vibrated violently - her conceptual Rat King form was about to awaken, and Lin Shen's mechanical heart was beating faster for her in the real world.
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