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Su Ximu, who had originally been deep in sleep, vaguely heard someone talking to him.
The voice was somewhat familiar, yet also somewhat strange.
The boy, whose face had been serene before, frowned slightly. His long, upturned eyelashes trembled as he tried his best to open his eyes.
The moment his hazy consciousness gathered and Su Ximu truly opened his eyes the next second, what entered his vision was a face that matched the voice—equally familiar, yet somewhat strange.
Su Wuzi was good-looking. Otherwise, back then when he was still little and not familiar with his brothers, Su Ximu wouldn’t have snuggled up to him right away.
After all, to be honest, most kids were still very much drawn to good looks.
Of course, this also had a lot to do with the fact that the first time the little guy cried his heart out, it was this brother who picked him up.
In the Wasteland World, perhaps due to the personal tastes of some managers in District 13, the clothes distributed to Outer District residents were all oversized white robes.
In the little head of Su Ximu back then, this brother—aside from not smiling—looked a lot like the angel from the music box his dad had bought him before.
The eldest brother and the youngest brother were good-looking too, but they resembled the angels from another music box who wielded weapons.
He had explained the meaning of little angels to his brothers.
Little angels were all pretty, powerful, and loved by everyone.
Then, the brother picked him up and seriously told him that he was the little angel. Because he was pretty, powerful, and everyone’s favorite.
Now…
Su Ximu blinked his eyes. Their gazes met as he looked into that familiar pair of eyes.
This pair of eyes used to crinkle with unpracticed joy when happy, always mixed with a hint of bewilderment.
Now, those eyes had shed the bewilderment of youth and were filled with a gentle smile that nearly overflowed.
He gazed at the boy in his arms—the most precious treasure in this world, no, in his long life.
After a moment of daze, Su Ximu opened his mouth. From the lip shape, it seemed to be a sound that required curling the tongue.
But soon, just like when he was little, he reached out and hugged back.
“Second Brother,” he called.
Then, he called again, “Brother.”
Su Wuzi raised his hand and gently stroked the back of the boy’s head, responding with a soft, “Mm.”
“Brother’s here.”
Su Ximu felt a bit disoriented now. One moment, he recalled exactly how he had gotten sick as a child, truly gaining all the memories from age four to nineteen.
The next moment, he felt like he had simply closed his eyes to sleep alongside his brothers—the eldest, second, and third—only to wake up and find that his brothers had all grown up.
He instinctively felt something was off, but before he could think deeply, his worry for his eldest brother and third brother took over.
He fully came to his senses and sat up with his second brother, looking at the desert that matched his memories so closely, along with the factory in the desert.
The people who had been left behind by his brothers—wailing endlessly, probably dead—had all vanished.
Su Ximu looked down at himself. The white robe that had once fit him perfectly still fit just as well, and it was impeccably clean.
He whipped his head around with a swish.
He still remembered his brother telling him not to look back.
But now, he should be able to look back, right?
The first figure he sought behind him was his eldest brother’s.
Because before closing his eyes, he hadn’t seen the eldest brother.
About ten steps back, he finally spotted his eldest brother’s figure.
Perhaps because he had seen him many times before, he recognized the eldest brother easily.
His eldest brother hadn’t woken up yet. He wore a clean white robe identical to Su Ximu’s.
Not far from the eldest brother, the third brother lay quietly, his hand still stretched forward.
He and his second brother had woken up, so why hadn’t the eldest and third brothers?
Su Ximu thought of this and hurried forward. He first called out to his eldest brother, then to the third brother, and finally turned to his second brother in plea, “Second Brother, what’s wrong with Eldest Brother and Third Brother? Why haven’t they woken up yet?”
Su Wuzi looked at the two lying on the ground, squatted down, and stared at them for a good while.
Su Ximu also squatted nearby, not making a sound for fear of disturbing his second brother.
After staring like this for a dozen seconds or so, he heard his second brother say, “It’s nothing. They just don’t want to wake up themselves. Once we’re home, Xiao Xi, just call out to them a few more times, and it’ll be fine.”
Home?
Su Ximu rested his chin on his knees and tilted his head, inexplicably feeling like the word hadn’t appeared in his life for a very long time.
But he felt his brother was right. Wealth Avenue, Su Family Villa—that was his home.
Just like the many tin shacks they had lived in before, each one was his home. Because he had lived there with his eldest brother, second brother, and third brother.
“Mm!”
“Brother, let’s go home. Bring Eldest Brother and Third Brother with us.”
“But, but Brother, can the two of us carry Eldest Brother and Third Brother?”
“We can.”
“Xiao Xi, you can help. Just make sure they don’t get bumped when I move them.”
“Okay, I’ll watch carefully!”
“And I can help carry them too.”
In the silent world, even the sand stood still.
Until these questions and answers sounded, the two awakened brothers carried away the two still asleep, kicking up dust as they moved.
With an invisible barrier rippling, the two slowly walked across the sand, carrying the other two and leaving a long trail of footprints before vanishing together from this world that should have been destroyed long ago.
For convenience, after returning home and refusing the butler’s help, Su Wuzi carried Xiao Xi along as they settled the eldest brother and the third brother together in a spacious guest room.
The guest room was conveniently not far from Su Ximu’s bedroom.
Watching his eldest brother and third brother still sleeping soundly after being jostled all the way, the boy sat on the edge of the bed, still uneasy. He couldn’t help but ask, “Second Brother, do we really not need to call a doctor for Eldest Brother and Third Brother?”
“What if they’re sick? They just look like they’re sleeping.”
Su Wuzi’s lips curved upward in a slightly mischievous arc.
He smiled at his seemingly worried little brother, leaned down close to Su Jianglou lying on the left side of the big bed, and said in a moderate voice, “Your Everlasting Flower—I’m going to throw it out right now.”
The next second, Su Jianglou—who had been sleeping like the dead—bolted upright. It took a good while before his tensed muscles relaxed again.
Su Ximu, watching from the side, widened his eyes.
Su Wuzi continued, “And the painting—I’m tearing it up.”
This time, Su Jianglou reacted even more fiercely. He thrashed on the bed, nearly waking up.
Having had his fun, Su Wuzi glanced at Xiao Xi sitting on the other side of the bed, then at the eldest brother lying beside him.
From the third brother’s reaction, Su Ximu inferred that he and the eldest brother were indeed fine.
But upon receiving his second brother’s gaze, he first shook his head immediately.
However, soon enough—without waiting for another invitation from his second brother—he couldn’t hold back. He pursed his lips and tentatively whispered to the eldest brother lying beside him, “Eldest Brother, if you don’t wake up soon, all the money will be earned away by other companies.”
As soon as the words fell, Su Xuanxiao showed no reaction. Even in sleep, his face remained stern, as if nothing could move him.
Company matters didn’t work?
Su Ximu thought for a moment and tried again, “Eldest Brother, when are you going to wake up? Second Brother’s birthday is coming up soon, and so is mine. It’s been so long since you’ve celebrated with me…
Even if it’s not a birthday celebration, I just want to be with you all.”
At this point, he didn’t know why, but his mood grew a bit downcast. He lowered his head and fiddled with his fingers.
Su Wuzi could see that the eldest brother’s hand had slowly clenched into a fist by now.
But for him at the moment, this wasn’t the most pressing matter.
Su Wuzi ignored Su Jianglou, who was frowning in his sleep from the threats, circled to the other side, and squatted down. “Xiao Xi, wait here for me a bit, okay? Second Brother has something for you.”
Having been down only for a short while, the emotionally resilient Su Ximu perked up at these words and nodded immediately. “Okay.”
He was a bit curious about what his second brother wanted to give him.
Su Wuzi came and went quickly. Less than two minutes after leaving, he returned to the guest room.
In his hand was a wooden box of moderate size.
Su Ximu found the wooden box in his second brother’s hand somewhat familiar. After thinking for a moment, he remembered that during the last Grand Performance as a trainee, his eldest brother had given him a small box just like this.
He stood up and watched as his second brother placed the box on the bedside table and opened it.
The things inside made his chest feel stuffy first, then achingly full.
The contents of the box were simple: a few small flowers that had turned the color of withered leaves, a few shiny little stones, a few white little stones, and even an empty small medicine bottle.
Su Wuzi had hidden the candle from back then—which wasn’t fully used up—at the very bottom.
Originally, he had planned for Xiao Xi to gradually come into contact with and accept certain things about this world.
If Xiao Xi instinctively resisted too much, they could just keep living like this—it wouldn’t be impossible.
But now, things had happened suddenly. Su Jianglou had brought Xiao Xi into the dungeon. He could only confirm that Xiao Xi’s general mental state wasn’t bad, but he wasn’t prepared to stimulate him further.
Over these years, he had learned many things. From one human player, he had learned that love came in many forms. Some love seemed intense but actually hurt people. Love also needed to be learned.
He hadn’t finished learning yet. Just recently, he had learned about “respect.”
According to that human player, love with respect was advanced love.
Love had levels, high and low?
Su Wuzi loved few people and loved only one completely. He had no way to verify.
But he thought that advanced things always suited Xiao Xi.
So, in addition to loving Xiao Xi, he would respect him.
Naturally, he couldn’t spy on the oblivious boy constantly under the pretext of concern.
Otherwise, with Su Wuzi’s power, he would have known every detail of Xiao Xi’s affairs long ago.
Su Ximu at this moment had no idea of his second brother’s cautious protectiveness toward him. He looked over each item in the box one by one—every single one was familiar.
These were all his treasures from childhood.
Even the first time he moved with his brothers, he had packed them up in a little bundle to bring along.
Seeing that Xiao Xi recognized these things, Su Wuzi smiled and said, “There weren’t many things in the box originally, so I took some more from Jiang Lou and the eldest brother.”
At this point, there was another moderate commotion from the bed.
The sleeping Su Jianglou hammered the bed with his eyes closed, putting a hole right through the bedboard.
That evening, after moving the eldest brother and third brother to a new room, Su Ximu waved goodnight to his second brother and returned to his own bedroom, hugging the wooden box.
He sat on the sofa in his bedroom, opened the wooden box, looked at the things inside, and seriously pondered some matters.
When the accumulated sense of dissonance reached a certain point, even the most deeply rooted self-suggestion would eventually crack open a gap. It couldn’t be completely forgotten and wiped clean.
Ever since waking up in his second brother’s arms, he had vaguely felt that there were many strange things about his brothers—including himself.
For example, with the genuine memories of his own true experiences as contrast, the segment he had once mistaken for the “Original Host’s” memories now seemed especially fake and shoddy.
For example…
As he dwelled on these examples, Su Ximu’s gaze began to grow dazed again, as if he couldn’t recall what other examples there were.
But actually, there was one thing he had already figured out clearly when his thoughts were fully clear.
As long as his brothers were still his brothers.
As long as he was still himself.
He confirmed these two points.
The rest didn’t really matter.
They were family, and in life, sometimes ignorance was bliss.
In this world, nothing was more worthy of gratitude than losing something and getting it back.
For Su Xuanxiao, Su Wuzi, and Su Jianglou, their little brother was the most important—ranking first in their brief human lives and long weird careers.
And conversely, it was the same for him.
So Su Ximu no longer resisted the vague feeling that welled up again. He sat quietly on the sofa and picked up his treasures to look at them.
The next second, with a clatter—
A slightly rounder little stone rolled out.
Su Ximu immediately set down the wooden box to chase it, following it all the way to the bedside.
The little stone rolled under the bed.
Fortunately, the bed legs were high enough that it was fairly easy to crawl under.
Su Ximu bent down and crawled under the bed himself.
The light under the bed was dim, so Su Ximu groped around. He first touched a piece of paper and grabbed it, then quickly found his little stone.
A few seconds later, he crawled back out from under the bed with the little stone.
He first checked the little stone to make sure it wasn’t damaged. Only then did he notice that he had also grabbed a piece of paper from under the bed.
At first, Su Ximu paid it no mind and wanted to toss it straight into the trash. But just before throwing it away, he suddenly noticed that there were words written on the paper.
Paper with writing on it always made people want to take a look.
Su Ximu was no different.
He walked along while reading the contents of the paper in his hand. After a moment, his entire expression suddenly turned strange.
