Chapter Seventeen: Rewards

“Uh… alright!” At a loss for a rebuttal to Gu Mengyan’s words, Chen Hao found his confidence wavering. The way she put it, he almost believed he’d truly been dreaming. Yet that dream had felt so real… and why couldn’t he remember what he’d said to Gu Mengyan after working overtime? Why was there no trace of that memory in his mind?

Damn! Could it really be, as she said, that he’d overworked himself into a state of nervous confusion?

As the thought crossed Chen Hao’s mind, his expression grew more and more miserable. What a mess! To be honest, when he’d first entered that dream, he’d actually felt rather excited. It was like the thrill people felt when virtual reality games first became popular.

Imagine—an NPC developing self-awareness! That would be a revolutionary discovery! What would it mean? It would mean that lifeless entities could develop consciousness. Such a phenomenon wouldn’t just be a milestone for technology, but a major event for biology and literature as well.

Just think of it—a program with self-awareness, one that didn’t need to eat, sleep, or excrete, that could work twenty-four hours a day without the slightest fatigue. What kind of concept was that?

And their existence didn’t depend on any physical form. They were merely lines of code, able to reside in the virtual world, on a portable hard drive, or even a flash drive. As long as the code persisted, they would never die. In a sense, wasn’t that a new species, one superior to humanity?

Consider it from another angle: if humans could understand how these self-aware programs came into being and existed, then research might enable humanity to do the same someday. Imagine a future where people didn’t need to eat, sleep, or worry about aging or illness. Even in death, technology could transfer one’s consciousness to another vessel. In some ways, that would be a form of rebirth.

Even if, due to costs and technical limits, such methods couldn’t be widely adopted, they could still be used in medicine. For those suffering from terminal illnesses or victims of accidents, it would be a true blessing. With such technology, patients could be given new, healthy bodies, allowing them to continue living—a tremendous boon for the country and the people.

Of course, whether such things violated the laws of nature was beyond Chen Hao’s concern. To be blunt, didn’t the medical profession itself defy nature’s order?

There was an old saying in Chen Hao’s country: “Doctors are those who defy fate.” It was no exaggeration. A skilled doctor could accomplish things that seemed impossible, even bringing the dead back to life—saving those whom everyone thought were doomed.

Didn’t their work go against the natural order? In a way, they had taken over God’s role. Ironically, though their profession was dedicated to saving lives, many theologians refused to accept it. In their eyes, doctors were overstepping their bounds, interfering with the work of the divine, and deserved divine punishment.

Chen Hao had always scoffed at such things—gods, fate, destiny—all just other people’s opinions. To him, existence was its own justification. If gods truly existed, why didn’t they save those who shouldn’t die? Why didn’t they stop wars? Why did so many pray, yet never receive a response?

Even if gods did exist, Chen Hao figured, to them, humans were probably no different from ants are to people. If an ant considered humans gods and prayed to them, would humans even care?

Not only would humans not care, they probably couldn’t even understand what the ant was saying. Worse yet, some cruel person might just step on the praying ant without a second thought. The ants that kept their distance from humans, on the other hand, might be spared.

Returning to Vivian, the self-aware NPC sister—if her existence was real, it absolutely ruled out any divine intervention. Electronic programs were invented by humans and had nothing to do with gods. Vivian’s self-awareness was a natural evolution, completely separated from the divine—a blow that would shake theologians and creationists to their core, perhaps even driving their beliefs into extinction.

These thoughts aside, Chen Hao’s real concern was much simpler: he was just curious and wanted to know more.

But before he could ask Vivian anything specific, he was yanked back to reality. There, he was greeted by Gu Mengyan’s ridicule and denial, which made him doubt his own wild notions. It was truly deflating and disappointing.

“Sigh…” Chen Hao looked at Gu Mengyan with resigned exasperation. “You… you always hit me with a blow when I’m at my most excited. Did I owe you something in a past life?”

“Who says you didn’t?” Gu Mengyan replied with a triumphant grin. “You owed me too much before, so in this life, you’re here to pay your debt! For the rest of this life, you’ll be my loyal servant—unless I say otherwise, you’re not going anywhere!”

Her words might have made others think twice, but Chen Hao took it as nothing more than friendly banter, the kind that passed between close friends or siblings.

“Alright!” Gu Mengyan clapped him on the shoulder, then, in a teasing gesture, guided Chen Hao’s hand to her waist. “Don’t look so glum! You’re getting to put your arm around my slender waist—count yourself lucky!”

“Pfft!” Chen Hao scoffed, spitting to the side. “As if!”

“Seeing you so down, I decided to give you a reward to cheer you up!” Gu Mengyan declared, her tone mysterious.

“A reward? I’d be happy enough not to be tormented by you,” Chen Hao muttered with disdain.

“Hmph! Just you wait—when we get home, you’ll see for yourself! Anyway, it’s getting late, let’s go! I’ve been looking after you for two days, and I haven’t had a single good meal—all takeout! Tonight, you have to treat me to something delicious as compensation!”

“Uh…” Chen Hao was at a loss. “Don’t tell me your so-called reward is just me buying you dinner? And I just woke up from a coma—don’t you know I shouldn’t eat anything too rich right now?”

“I know!” Gu Mengyan nodded briskly. “I never said you had to eat—it’s me who’s eating! I’ll have the delicacies, you can just sip your porridge and watch. Think of it as building character! Oh, and I’m the guest, but you’re paying.”

“…When my dad brought you home for the first time, I should’ve smothered you with a pillow while you slept,” Chen Hao gritted out through clenched teeth.

…

In a high-end Western restaurant, at a table by the window, a young man and woman sat together. They’d arrived in a luxury sports car—he handsome, she beautiful. In others’ eyes, they looked every bit the wealthy couple, the kind that made people envious.

Yet their plain attire made them stand out awkwardly in such a posh setting. Even more striking, the pretty girl’s table was piled high with gourmet dishes, and she was devouring them as if she’d been starving for a week—like a reincarnated glutton.

Opposite her, the young man had only a bowl of tomato soup, gazing at her with a gloomy, exasperated look.

Everyone in the restaurant—including the waitstaff—couldn’t help but feel some sympathy for the guy. Anyone with a girlfriend like that would be at their wit’s end. When ordering, the girl had loudly told the waiter to bring the guy only a plain soup, then proceeded to order a mountain of dishes for herself.

Naturally, the two were Chen Hao and Gu Mengyan, just as they’d left the derelict building. Though Chen Hao complained non-stop, in the end, he still brought Gu Mengyan to this fancy restaurant for a feast.

Like any brother, he found it hard to refuse a “reasonable” request from his sister—the word “request” here definitely deserved quotation marks.

“So… are you full yet?” Chen Hao asked impatiently. “It’s not that I begrudge you the money, but at this rate, I’ll have to send you straight to the hospital, or maybe call the funeral home—then notify Mom and Dad to attend your…”

Smack! Before he could finish, Gu Mengyan hurled a chicken bone she’d just picked clean right at his face. “Such poor manners! Haven’t you heard, ‘One doesn’t speak at the table or in bed’? Especially when you interrupt a great beauty during her meal—that’s a crime! Now go stand in the corner and reflect on your actions!”

Chen Hao pursed his lips and ignored her, propping his head on his hand and staring at her in bored silence.

After a while, Gu Mengyan finally polished off the last of her food. She signaled to the waiter, “Waiter, bring me a slice of cake—the best, most expensive one you have. And the bill—give it to him.”

The waiter’s lips twitched, but he nodded and went to fetch the cake. Only then did Gu Mengyan fish an envelope from her purse and push it across the table to Chen Hao. “Go on, open it! This is your reward—I promise you’ll like it…”