Chapter 10

As it turned out, eating right after a PE class really did work up an appetite.

The hunger buff from physical exertion, combined with a meal that perfectly suited his tastes, meant Li Zhuo, who normally ate just one bowl of rice, unknowingly downed two.

The perfectly cooked rice was paired with generous servings of sweet and sour chicken breast, braised ribs with green beans, cold-tossed vermicelli, a light soup with tofu, century egg, and greens, and a tiny side of broccoli.

Teacher Mo, who claimed he had already eaten, remained as he always was—beaming as he watched Li Zhuo eat, as if the sight of him eating was some kind of pleasing, beautiful scenery.

After the meal, the fruit was washed strawberries.

Gazing at the strawberries cleaned and neatly laid out before him, then at the scattered leftovers on the table, Li Zhuo felt, for the first time, that he was getting tired just from eating.

When Teacher Mo refused to let him clear the table yet again, Li Zhuo immediately brought up the matter of paying for his meals once more.

This time, Mo Liang couldn’t feign ignorance, nor could he let time kill the topic. He searched the System, but his strategy guide had no entry for this situation either.

Left with no other choice, he began to communicate.

“I don’t need it. It would make me very sad if you did this…” He spoke like a foreigner just learning the language. “It is my wish to feed you, I like to feed you. It’s not for any other reason…”

In Mo Liang’s understanding, paying for food only happened in places of business that sought profit. That was an act meant to erase the feelings and relationship between two people.

His child wanted to erase their feelings? He would absolutely not allow it!!

He felt immensely sad, but still recited the lines the System gave him.

“…If you do this, Teacher will be heartbroken.”

Li Zhuo didn’t quite understand how offering a little money for food would break his teacher’s heart, but he wasn’t stubbornly unreasonable either, so he began to express his own thoughts.

“Then let’s compromise. I want to do something, something I can help with. If I just come here to eat every day, push my bowl away, and leave, I’ll feel guilty…”

Teacher Mo seemed to be genuinely pondering this.

“…I’d like to clear the table, wash the dishes and chopsticks, it’s very simple for me…”

This time, Teacher Mo didn’t need to think. He said with utter seriousness, “You want to enter the kitchen? No. It’s very dangerous in there. The objects inside will hurt you.”

Li Zhuo’s brain short-circuited for a second.

“For example?”

Teacher Mo looked at him with a gaze one might use on a mischievous child, carrying a hint of helplessness as he began to explain just how dangerous a kitchen was.

The more Li Zhuo listened, the more bewildered his expression became.

“…Why on earth would I play with a knife for no reason? Why would I use my hand to touch a flame, to pull at a pot of boiling soup, or to touch scalding hot oil?”

“There’s nothing wrong with my brain. I won’t be climbing up and down in the kitchen, nor will I stick my fingers into the garbage disposal in the kitchen sink…”

Li Zhuo really wanted to ask, in Teacher Mo’s eyes, did he truly lack this much common sense? Was this a joke?

But as he entered the kitchen with Teacher Mo watching his every move with intense anxiety, Li Zhuo discovered… Teacher Mo was completely serious.

He just stacked the bowls and took them to the kitchen, just washed a single bowl under the tap, and Teacher Mo looked at him as if he’d done something astonishing.

“…Alright, Teacher Mo, no more praise.”

The young man in his blue and white school uniform stood in front of the sink, briskly rolling up his sleeves to reveal a section of slender wrist, rinsing the suds off the bowls and chopsticks with practiced, swift efficiency.

He was young; just standing there, one could smell the scent of youth radiating from him. His face was so tender it seemed like you could squeeze water out of it. Flustered by the childlike praise, the tips of his snow-white ears, half-hidden by his hair, were tinged a thin red.

“Teacher Mo…”

“Stop teasing me.”

“I’m not a child.”

After lunch was the midday break. Logically, Li Zhuo was supposed to return to his classroom to rest, but Teacher Mo simply said, “I’ll just let your Head Teacher know. You’re still on school grounds anyway, not out in the streets, right?”

He also added, “Besides, what kind of rest can you even get in the classroom? Sitting on a bench leaning over a desk is so uncomfortable. At my place, you can sleep on the bed or the sofa.”

The sun outside grew increasingly harsh, but the indoor temperature was just right. Full from his meal, Li Zhuo lay on the extended chaise of the L-shaped sofa, slowly relaxing his eye muscles.

That midday rest was the most comfortable sleep he’d ever had.

There was just one tiny problem. That noon, his appetite had indeed been ferociously good, and he’d unknowingly eaten quite a lot. It wasn’t until he returned to the classroom that he felt a bit of stomach discomfort. One trip to the restroom and he was mostly fine.

The root cause was simply his previously irregular diet. Long-term hunger had weakened his digestive functions and slowed peristalsis. Pair that with intense midday exercise and an excessive amount of food that far surpassed his current digestive capacity, and it had led to food stagnation, causing a bit of abdominal pain.

He didn’t think anything of it at all, and was completely unaware that a pair of deep, strange eyes was watching him intently, not missing the slightest subtle shift in his expression.

A little spherical Light Orb said flatly,

【Analyzing—】

【Expression analysis result: Pain.】

In a flash, a passage of text leaped into Mo Liang’s mind:

Article 3, Chapter 5, Section 12 of the Complete Scientific Feeding Strategy states that juveniles have no self-control, and caregivers must take care not to allow them to overeat…

Mo Liang stood frozen like a petrified statue. His skin dripped downwards like melting wax, his facial features so distorted it was almost impossible to tell where his eyes were.

“I read that… why… did I forget…”

“He must be so disappointed in me…”

“I hurt… my child…”

“▄▄…▄”

A frequency far beyond the range of human hearing, a special and eerie, shrill sound wave, rippled outward rapidly like circles of water echoing across the entire campus.

His skin softened like wax melting. Slowly, his eyes, nose, and mouth vanished, leaving only a rough outline, as if they hadn’t evolved yet.

Black viscous fluid seeped from the cracks left by the disappearing features, gradually trickling down, then pooling on the floor before it began to erode the computer desk and even the walls.

In a short time, the counseling room that Li Zhuo had seen as so warm was overtaken by a vast, constantly squirming “black ocean” formed from the dense black fluid.

The contaminating particles spreading from Mo Liang’s body and the piercing sound waves made the glowing orb tremble. Were all the civilizations that survived the post-pollution epoch like this?

The System had limited knowledge, only knowing that their lives were immensely long. When emotionally agitated, be it from grief, anger, or joy, they easily triggered similar “outbursts.”

The planet they lived on apparently had some substance that could suppress their emotions, but here… such a primitive, low-dimensional Small World definitely had none.

【S-Stop… stop…】

【Host has already done very well. And it was only a small accident. Let me tell you some good news, Affection hasn’t dropped. In fact, it just went up by another five points…】

【Really, if you don’t believe me, look…】

As if capturing a vital keyword, in almost an instant, the wildly quivering fluid rushed back with shocking speed, competing to squeeze itself back into the now-sharpened skin sack.

In the space of a few breaths, the limp body reinflated like a balloon and slowly stood up again.

Mo Liang picked up his fallen glasses from the floor, wiped them, and put them back on.

His child had called him back to reason.

He opened the editing permissions for that document and began adding a note: 【This clause isn’t rigorous enough. Why wasn’t it made clear what “excessive” means? The juvenile I raise ate just a little more than usual today and soon had an adverse reaction. I am truly a failure of a nurturer!!】

He closed the document, and Mo Liang scanned the rest of today’s recorded entries:

Time: Earth Date 2017.4.3

New Update: Currently, the sample size is too small. The juvenile has not shown a particular preference for any one thing, but he does not seem to like broccoli. This type of vegetable has been added to the shopping blacklist.

[Attachment]

Time: Earth Date 2017.4.3

New Update: The proportion of Appetite Stimulant in use is gradually being reduced. It has now been reduced to a trace amount. It is estimated that by tomorrow morning, its use will be completely discontinued.

Time: Earth Date 2017.4.3

New Update: The juvenile sometimes likes praise and sometimes doesn’t. Must pay attention to the situation and expression.

[Attachment: Micro-Expression Guide for the Juvenile]

Li Zhuo felt that Mo Liang must have some kind of mind-reading ability. Otherwise, there was simply no explaining how, when he had a stomachache during the first period in the afternoon, Teacher Mo had already bought him medicine by the second period.

Among them were digestive aids like stomach-soothing tablets and multi-enzyme tablets, as well as a pack of probiotics. He specifically read the instructions, which said it improved digestive function.

“…Teacher, you…”

Isn’t this way too fast?!

But what he didn’t know was that this speed was only achieved after the System had argued strenuously for him.

“Here, this is warm water.” Teacher Mo didn’t even forget to unscrew the cap before handing it to him. “Your digestion isn’t so good, so eat a bit less for dinner tonight. How about I make something easy to absorb?”

The man’s worry and self-reproach were practically pouring from his eyes, as if Li Zhuo had endured a terrible hardship, suffered a terrible ordeal. In reality, he had just overeaten and had a little stomachache for a moment.

He clearly felt something was off somewhere, but this kind of doubt and vexation was far too niche. If he were to confide in someone else, how would he even describe it?

When others were pouring out all sorts of pain and troubles, he couldn’t exactly go up with a straight face and say, “My problem is that my teacher is too good to me,” could he?

He didn’t even need to think to know he’d get a giant eye-roll in return: “You’re sick, go flaunt your luck elsewhere!”

Under that premise, even when his deskmate had been asking him about Teacher Mo for the past two days, he’d always spoken in vague generalities.

Because of this, his deskmate was under the impression that Teacher Mo was taking him to the teacher’s cafeteria to eat, never for a moment imagining that it was all made by Teacher Mo personally.

If he told anyone this, would anyone even believe him?

So he didn’t plan on saying anything.

But was that really the reason?

Lying on his dorm bed at night, staring at the ceiling, Li Zhuo interrogated himself. Could the real reason be he just didn’t want others to know, because he didn’t want to share this attention that he had finally, with such difficulty, gotten for himself?

—I’m so bad. So selfish.

He thought, ashamed.

But, still…

Ever since being sent to this strange city by his birth parents, ever since transferring to the Experimental High School, for the first time, Li Zhuo found anticipation building for the next day even before the night was over.

What was for breakfast again tomorrow?