Chapter 138: Birds of a Feather

"Ugh......" Chen Hao truly had no idea what he ought to say at this moment. He had heard of and even seen homosexuals before, but bisexuals...... this was the first time Chen Hao had ever encountered one. Actually, Chen Hao could barely manage to understand the psychological workings of homosexuality. But bisexuality? Even if he wracked his brain, Chen Hao could not figure out how such a mindset operated. For the very first time, Chen Hao felt a genuine surge of curiosity welling up from the bottom of his heart toward Zhuge Xue.

"The reason I said my action just now was intentional is simply because I don't quite understand: if you are a normal man, how could you have had zero reaction under circumstances like that? You must remember that the person lying in your arms was me! Me! A peerless beauty! And I happen to know that the killing intent of female homosexuality and the like on males should be even greater than on ordinary people. I was even starting to suspect whether you might be a homosexual just like me. From the very beginning when we first met, your expression toward me shifted very rapidly. Aside from an initial flash of surprise, you adjusted almost immediately. Moreover, during our subsequent conversation, you never once stole a glance at me. You need to know that among the people I've interacted with in the past, even men without any ulterior motives toward me would inevitably steal a couple of looks at me during our dialogue, just like big guy Guo Yunhai. Even though he already has someone in his heart—that tomboy you mentioned, Dong Xin—he still looks at me that way. But you didn't display that kind of look from start to finish. Don't look down on me just because I'm not skilled in martial arts like you people. Having run a teahouse business for all these years, reading faces and understanding a person in a short amount of time is something I believe I am no worse at than you. You aren't the hypocritical type who deliberately puts on a hypocritical front of a gentleman in front of others. You truly have an open and clear mind, and you simply don't care that much about me. From my perspective, a person like you could only fall into three possibilities: first, your aesthetic perception is flawed, or you haven't been enlightened at all, having no idea what a beauty is or what a beauty implies. Second, just like the big guy, you already have someone special in your heart, and you love him or her deeply. In your mind, he or she is your everything, and there is no room left in your eyes for anyone else, which is why you turn up your nose at me and remain entirely unfazed even after taking advantage of me. Third, you might just be a homosexual who simply doesn't like women at all. Or perhaps, considering how I pinched you, I suspect you might have a physiological problem! So, which of the above categories do you actually fall into?"

Chen Hao smiled bitterly and shook his head. "Actually, what you said and your analysis make a lot of sense, but you didn't hit the nail on the head."

Seeing that Zhuge Xue was about to speak again, Chen Hao made a gesture for her to be quiet. "Hear me out first! I'm not saying your analysis is wrong. In fact, if I were in your shoes, I would have arrived at the exact same deductions as you did. Furthermore, I can give you a very definite answer: I am neither homosexual, nor am I unenlightened. I indeed already have someone special that I love. However, that was not the reason why I didn't have any reaction when I was previously taking advantage of you...... cough, cough! When I was doing that! Just like how I didn't secretly observe you earlier in your teahouse, both of these instances happened for entirely different reasons, and that reason is not included among the three possibilities you listed."

"Oh? It's not included? Then what other reason could there be?"

Chen Hao tilted his head slightly. "Actually, it's very simple. Whether we were back in your teahouse or just a moment ago, my mind was completely captivated by other very important matters, and I temporarily had no spare capacity to consider anything else. This is simply a habit I developed back when I was studying martial arts and working."

"Oh!" Zhuge Xue nodded, though it was unclear whether she truly understood Chen Hao's meaning. At any rate, she seemed to have no intention at this moment of continuing to dwell on the issue of Chen Hao's attitude toward her. Instead, she turned around and began examining their surrounding environment.

"The distraction you mentioned—was it because of the place we are currently in?" Zhuge Xue asked. "Aren't you finding it strange how we somehow ended up here from the teahouse?"

"Well......" Chen Hao hesitated, his response somewhat ambiguous. After re-examining the surrounding environment, Chen Hao had basically confirmed that this place was indeed within the game world. He was currently debating whether or not he should reveal the truth to Zhuge Xue. After all, he and Zhuge Xue had only met today, and that through Guo Yunhai's connection. The two of them couldn't even really be considered friends, yet...... if they weren't friends, how should those ambiguous actions of theirs from earlier be explained? Cough, cough! Well! Even if they were friends, how on earth was he supposed to explain such an absurd matter to her? Besides, Guo Yunhai hadn't appeared in the game world along with them. That must have had something to do with him pulling Zhuge Xue when she tripped earlier. Since Guo Yunhai hadn't entered the game with them, he must have witnessed the two of them inexplicably fainting in the real world. How was he going to explain this to him later?

Just as Chen Hao was agonizing and feeling completely at a loss, Zhuge Xue spoke up first.

"Chen Hao," Zhuge Xue's expression seemed somewhat hesitant. "I want to talk to you about some things. These things might sound a bit difficult for you to understand, or even somewhat science-fictional, but I want you to know that what I am about to say isn't me losing my mind, nor am I intentionally teasing you. Rather, it's a conclusion I've reached after multiple personal experiences! No matter what questions you might have, please wait until I finish my narrative before asking them, and I will do my absolute best to answer your questions."

Chen Hao twitched his ears and raised an eyebrow. Why did these words sound so familiar? This was originally the opening monologue he had planned to deliver to Zhuge Xue, yet she had preemptively spoken them instead. Moreover, Chen Hao clearly heard Zhuge Xue mention something about science fiction. Could it be that Zhuge Xue already knew they were currently inside a game world? And furthermore, had she, just like him, entered the game more than once and discovered this severe issue?

Sure enough, Zhuge Xue's subsequent words aligned entirely with Chen Hao's conjecture. Zhuge Xue was also a player who, just like him, had managed to enter virtual reality on her own before the game's official launch.

"This matter actually has to go back to my college days......" Zhuge Xue gathered her thoughts and began to slowly narrate.

When boiled down, the lengthy narrative was actually quite simple. It was essentially that Zhuge Xue had gone away to college in another city, and because she had dressed and styled herself like a boy since childhood, she had naturally come to love electronic games just like boys do. Naturally, the most famous among these was virtual reality. The major Zhuge Xue chose for her studies was quite similar to Chen Hao's, both belonging to the category of electronic programming. The only difference was that Zhuge Xue did not choose to work for Unreal Company after graduation like Chen Hao did. Instead, upon completing her studies, she simply returned to her second hometown—Crystal—and went back to her village to continue running her family's teahouse.

Although her primary business was running the teahouse, Zhuge Xue actually took on some other freelance work as well. Zhuge Xue was an exceptionally smart girl with stellar grades in her professional field. Moreover, during her school years, she was never satisfied with merely absorbing knowledge from textbooks; instead, in her spare time, she consulted many instructors in programming and electronic information about advanced professional topics. Over time, Zhuge Xue could well be considered a fairly formidable geek. She loved delving into all kinds of cutting-edge electronic information technologies and even helped her instructors complete several difficult research projects.

After her graduation, her instructor had tried every possible way to retain her, hoping she would stay on for a faculty position and pursue further studies. However, Zhuge Xue refused and resolutely returned to her second hometown. It wasn't that Zhuge Xue had no interest in staying at the university; rather, Crystal was her emotional anchor and the beginning of her life. It was the only place where she could find a sense of existence. Living in Crystal made Zhuge Xue feel completely at ease; both the people here and the lifestyle here made her feel immensely comfortable. In the outside metropolis, although the living conditions and environment were quite good, Zhuge Xue always had a persistent sense of unreality and unease.

After that, nothing particularly unusual happened. It was basically identical to Chen Hao's experience: logging into virtual reality to play games whenever she had free time, right up until the massive virus outbreak that caused the game to suspend its operations.

Zhuge Xue certainly wasn't going to take that lying down! Much like many people whose lives, work, and entertainment depended entirely on computers and the internet every day, that period had been exceptionally difficult to endure. Although the virus outbreak was a massive, global-scale event that could not possibly be resolved by an individual's sole efforts, Zhuge Xue considered herself a top-tier electronic network talent, and she privately pondered solutions while editing various software programs in an attempt to resolve the issue. However, that virus was simply not something that could be eradicated easily; at least, Zhuge Xue failed despite trying countless methods.

It wasn't until much later that the virus was completely eliminated by someone. Yet the method of eradication was never made public. According to reports, in order to protect intellectual property rights, information regarding the solution to the virus—and even the identity of the person or organization behind it—remained a heavily guarded secret.

However, as luck would have it, although Zhuge Xue hadn't managed to solve the virus herself, the various software applications she had researched and developed ended up serving an entirely different purpose. Afterwards, she actually managed to log into the internal network of Unreal Company and, in a manner even Zhuge Xue herself hadn't anticipated, she accessed the database of the virtual reality game that was currently undergoing redesign and redevelopment. Furthermore, Zhuge Xue and Chen Hao shared a massive commonality: both of them could enter a game world that should clearly have been offline for internal development without relying on any external hardware devices.

"......" After listening to the end, contrary to Zhuge Xue's expectations, Chen Hao didn't show any overly dramatic reaction. Instead, he simply stated calmly, "Actually, all those circumstances you just described happened to me as well......"