Chapter 27

Alumni

A deep sense of crisis had taken root in Curly Hair's chest. This person was her greatest competition in this instance.

"Curly, the food on his plate looks incredible — and he's had seven or eight bites already and nothing's happened." Ah Ze hadn't taken his eyes off the meat in Chao Musheng's bowl. "I want meat so badly."

"You've been watching him long enough to count exactly how many bites he's taken?" Curly Hair hadn't been genuinely exasperated into almost laughing for a long time. She drew a long breath. "Stop talking. I want some quiet."

This person was her greatest liability in this instance.

"Okay."

Ah Ze thought: the company canteen is pretty noisy to begin with. How quiet does she expect it to get?

Then, not long after — the entire canteen actually went quiet for a moment.

Ah Ze's eyes went wide. Curly Hair was terrifyingly powerful. Words into reality?

Seeing Ah Ze about to open his mouth again, Curly Hair clamped her hand over it and used her eyes to tell him to be still.

She looked toward the group of men and women coming through the door, activated her special skill — and the cold sweat hit her all at once.

Something was wrong. Why were there this many gold-level NPCs in one instance?

Gold-level bosses only appeared occasionally in instances rated A-difficulty or higher. The standard player response to encountering one was to outmaneuver them — avoid direct confrontation at all costs.

She looked at the rest of the staff eating their lunch. Almost every single one was a high-level NPC. Even the cleaners wiping down tables were in the high-danger blue-purple range.

Players scattered among this workforce were grey, soft little things. If these employees turned on them, she was certain not a single player in this room would walk out alive.

This wasn't a company. It was a graveyard that players walked into and couldn't leave.

"Why are the CEO's office elites eating in the employee canteen today?"

"No idea. Probably because the big boss is in the main building."

CEO's office elites.

Curly Hair caught the key phrase from the employees nearby. So these gold-level NPCs were all from the executive suite.

"Curly, why are you sweating so much?" Ah Ze noticed Curly Hair had gone white at the sight of the executive staff, and murmured in her ear: "Don't be scared. My skill — the one I pulled when I entered the infinite world — lets me see NPC disposition toward players. Right now every single one of these employees is showing yellow neutral. They won't attack us unprompted."

His supervisor in customer service had spent an entire hour shouting at him today, and was still showing yellow-leaning-green: neutral with a hint of friendly.

Employees who'd never met them before had even less reason to randomly harm players.

Curly Hair: "..."

Which player just casually tells another player what their skill is?

Could he engage his brain for even five minutes? Develop some basic caution?

She thought about explaining this to him, then decided his intelligence probably wouldn't accommodate it.

Ah Ze, oblivious to Curly Hair's interior monologue, watched the sharply-dressed executives and noticed one of them heading toward Chao Musheng. "Curly — someone's walking over to that guy."

Secretary Liu had a genuine appreciation for Chao Musheng's abilities. Spotting him eating with the technical staff, he made a deliberate detour to their table and handed Chao Musheng his business card. "Xiao Chao — I left in a rush last time, forgot to exchange contact details with you."

"Secretary Liu, you know Xiao Chao?" The team lead glanced at the card and politely invited Liu to sit.

He hadn't really expected the secretary to actually sit down. But he did — right next to Chao Musheng.

"The CEO and I attended the Jinghua anniversary celebration last time, and Xiao Chao was our host." Secretary Liu smiled and took a sip of his drink. "He made such a strong impression — I was worried he might not want to do a summer internship with us, so I called the school twice."

The team lead understood immediately. Secretary Liu had come down to give Xiao Chao some visible backing — making sure the technical department knew this one had friends in high places.

"So Secretary Liu is the talent scout we have to thank." One colleague was delighted. "Lucky you invited Xiao Chao in — I'd been stuck on a problem for a week, and he sorted it out today."

"It was luck." Chao Musheng deflected modestly. "I've only been here half a day and I've already learned a huge amount. You're all the backbone of Kunlun's technical work."

Please stop, this is embarrassing.

"Xiao Chao, no need to be modest—"

"And Xiao Chao, modest or not, you're not getting out of the work the art department just handed over." The colleague's eyes drifted back to Chao Musheng's head.

Such dense hair.

Brother Li, sitting on Chao Musheng's other side, draped an arm over his shoulder. "Boss — today's Xiao Chao's first day in the department. Shouldn't you be taking him out for a welcome dinner?"

The others chimed in: "He's even Xiao Chao's senior, it would be wrong not to."

Watching the technical department claim Chao Musheng as one of their own within half a day, Secretary Liu felt he might be somewhat surplus to requirements here.

"Fine — barbecue after work tonight, my treat." The team lead looked at Secretary Liu. "Secretary Liu, you're welcome to join."

Secretary Liu's feelings were complicated — at least someone had remembered he was sitting here. "I'm afraid I have other plans this evening. Enjoy yourselves."

"Such a shame." The team lead smiled broadly.

Thank goodness. Who wanted to eat dinner with someone from the CEO's office?

After the meal, Chao Musheng walked Secretary Liu out of the canteen. "Thank you for today, Secretary Liu."

The entire executive suite had come down to the employee canteen, and only Secretary Liu had made the specific trip over to sit with the technical team. Even Chao Musheng could tell this had been deliberate.

"Don't mention it — you're a talent I personally invited to this company. Of course I'd come check on you your first day. Only natural." Secretary Liu pointed at his phone. "Add my contact when you get back. If anyone gives you a hard time, come to me directly."

"Thank you, Brother Liu." Chao Musheng grinned. "Actually, I might not even need to. If I let it slip that Secretary Liu from the CEO's office is like a big brother to me — who'd dare cause me trouble?"

Secretary Liu laughed. "It's not just me — the boss is paying attention too. This morning, after he left your office, he asked me to quietly check in and see if you were settling in alright."

Chao Musheng was genuinely surprised. He looked at Secretary Liu's smiling face. "Please pass on my thanks to Mr. Xu. That allergy cream he gave me worked wonderfully."

Was the reason Mr. Xu hadn't spoken to him directly during the department visit — so colleagues wouldn't suspect he'd gotten in through connections? And he'd arranged for Secretary Liu to check on him instead?

He hadn't expected Mr. Xu to be so considerate. To think this carefully about a student he'd only met once.

He saw Secretary Liu off and turned back to find someone lurking by the canteen door, craning their neck.

"Hey." Ah Ze, caught, plastered on a smile and shuffled up to Chao Musheng. "You're incredible. You actually got someone from the CEO's office to come over and be nice to you. How do you do it?"

Chao Musheng blinked.

How could a person be this direct?

Noticing the rest of the executive group emerging as well, Ah Ze grabbed Chao Musheng's arm and pulled him into the shadowy corner of a nearby fire escape stairwell, then dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "Bro, do you have some kind of special—"

Shh. Shh. Shh.

A faint rustling sound moved through the silent stairwell. Ah Ze went rigid, staring down the staircase, and said in a trembling voice: "B— bro. You go first."

Chao Musheng clapped his hands together. The sound-activated light clicked on.

He looked at the cleaning lady sweeping the landing below. Then he looked at Ah Ze, whose legs were shaking. "Next time you're scared of the dark in a fire stairwell, just stamp your foot — no need to save the company's electricity bill."

Ah Ze: "..."

Oh. A yellow-name cleaner. Not a stairwell apparition.

In the light now, Ah Ze could read the badge on Chao Musheng's chest.

Name: Chao Musheng. Department: Technical Department, Game Team Three. Employee ID: 001015.

Wait.

The blood drained from Ah Ze's face until it was brighter than the overhead light. Why did Chao Musheng have an employee ID number?

Every player's badge had the word "Intern" where the ID number should be. No numerical code at all.

This absurdly good-looking Chao Musheng — was he a player, or an NPC native to this instance?

Seeing the other person had gone completely white, Chao Musheng sighed and dragged the rigid Ah Ze out of the stairwell.

Scared of the dark and still runs into corners. Lots of nerve, no common sense.

"Xiao Chao." The Team Three colleagues spotted Chao Musheng emerging from the fire exit with an unfamiliar young man. "Who's this?"

Being stared at by a group of yellow-name NPCs on top of being already terrified, Ah Ze didn't dare make a sound.

"An intern who joined the company with me today." Chao Musheng kept it simple.

"Ah — new to customer service." Brother Li checked the badge and, as a courtesy to Chao Musheng, offered a friendly: "Hello."

"Hello." Ah Ze's smile was somewhat structural rather than expressive. He barely breathed. "I — I should get back. Goodbye."

And without waiting for any response, he ran.

AHHHHH.

Why had nobody warned him that people without visible status values could still be instance natives?

"Why did he bolt like that?" Brother Li was baffled.

Chao Musheng didn't mention the dark-and-scared part. "Probably first-day nerves — doesn't want to be late back and give his colleagues a bad impression."

"Ah." Brother Li nodded. "Sounds like customer service runs a tight ship. Don't follow his example, Xiao Chao — technical department's not like that."

The other colleagues agreed emphatically.

Exactly. In technical, they respected ability, not seniority. As long as you could lighten their workload, you were their dearest comrade-in-arms.

*

Secretary Liu returned to his office and found a document on his desk. "Which department sent this up?"

"HR." His colleague glanced at it. "Probably the list of interns who joined today."

Secretary Liu opened it. "Why did customer service take so many interns?"

"Not sure." The colleague frowned. "The previous liaison with HR was Secretary Wang — could be something fell through the cracks when he left?"

"Ah. Him." Secretary Liu closed the folder, his tone landing somewhere between dry and contemptuous. "Then it's not surprising."

A man who'd sell company information to outsiders could generate any size of administrative disaster.

The intercom on the desk buzzed. Secretary Liu walked through to the inner office. "You called, Mr. Xu?"

Mr. Xu: "How's the food in the employee canteen?"

"I went with a few colleagues at lunch to assess — the kitchen isn't cutting corners on ingredients." Secretary Liu, noting his employer's neutral expression, tidied the documents on the desk. "I also happened to run into Xiao Chao in the canteen."

Mr. Xu set down his pen and gestured for him to continue.

"True to form, Xiao Chao had already found his footing." Secretary Liu knew his employer held Chao Musheng in high regard, and added a few details about how he'd gotten on with the technical team. "They liked him so much that the whole group is going out for barbecue tonight to welcome him."

He waited. Mr. Xu said nothing. Wondering if he'd misread his employer's interest, he moved to change the subject and spare himself the awkwardness. "Customer service has taken on more interns than projected. Should I ask HR to look into it?"

Mr. Xu opened his computer and pulled up the intern placement list. His gaze rested on Chao Musheng's name for a few seconds longer than necessary. "Leave it."

"Yes, sir."

Kunlun's evaluation system was rigorous anyway. Getting in didn't guarantee staying.

And even those who didn't stay would have a Kunlun-stamped internship certificate, which was worth something.

"Did Chao Musheng mention any difficulties on his first day?"

At this question, Secretary Liu was briefly silent.

He'd thought he'd misread the situation. Apparently the issue was just that his employer had a very limited range of expressions.

He'd known it. As Mr. Xu's most trusted secretary, he couldn't be wrong about reading him.

Of course the boss found Xiao Chao's abilities as impressive as he did.

"Xiao Chao has adapted well to the company's atmosphere. He also asked me to pass on his thanks — he said the allergy cream you gave him worked very well." His phone chimed softly. Secretary Liu checked it. "Mr. Xu — Xiao Chao has just sent me a friend request."

Mr. Xu glanced at him. "I see."

When Secretary Liu had left, he picked up his phone, navigated with practiced familiarity to a pinned contact at the top of his chat list, and opened the profile.

Dusk at Dawn: First day of work and already getting a happiness bonus — grateful to the boss, wishing the boss prosperity every day!

His mouth curved slightly. He pressed like on the post with deliberate care.

*

After lunch, Kunlun employees had an hour's rest period.

Chao Musheng tilted back in his chair and drifted, hazily, into a dream.

A winding staircase. Green vines trying to push their way in from outside. At the bottom of the dark stairwell, something like a beast, crying.

The vines reached and clawed. The stairs spiraled without end.

Chao Musheng stopped and looked down into the dark. He found a pair of enormous empty sockets looking back.

More precisely: two vast eyes with no irises — only a faint golden light drifting, intermittently, through the hollow space.

"Hss."

The leaves of the green vine were sharp as blades. One caught the back of his hand. He noticed small insects crawling along the stems.

Disgusting.

Chao Musheng launched himself three feet into the air, seized by a sudden, sourceless fury. He stomped on the vines with full force.

That wasn't satisfying enough. He found a woodcutting knife on the ground, and in a few efficient strokes reduced the vines to scattered pieces — leaves split cleanly in two — before standing back, satisfied, to regard the mess.

Rude, unpleasant plant. Growing that repulsively and still crawling uninvited into other people's space.

Shameless.

If he had a lighter he would burn the whole revolting thing to ash and scatter the ash to the wind.

Click. A lighter dropped precisely into his hand.

The advantage of his own dream: ask and receive.

He crouched, lit the pile of shredded leaves. They caught immediately despite being wet, and burned clean within moments.

Chao Musheng kicked the ash into the abyss below. He was smiling the smile of a very satisfied villain.

His world, his rules. In dreams, he was king.

*

Somewhere in a distant void, an enormous black sphere — dense with root-like tendrils across its surface — convulsed violently.

[Attacked by unknown force. Multi-instance simultaneous launch in new dimension: failed.]

"IT HURTS—"

*

Chao Musheng opened his eyes and immediately discovered that his neck hurt, his wrists hurt, and essentially everything hurt.

"Classic rookie mistake." His senior walked past with a neck pillow hanging around his own neck. "Recline the chair flat next time, and put a blanket over your stomach."

"I only meant to rest my eyes for a bit. Didn't think I'd actually fall asleep." Chao Musheng rubbed his aching neck, got up, and poured himself some water. "One nap and I feel worse than after a two-kilometer run."

"You'll adjust. Look at us — we can sleep anywhere." The senior touched his somewhat thinning hair and avoided Chao Musheng's eyes. "You're awake, so get back to it. Let's try to get out early tonight."

Technical department: the great equalizer. Male or female, junior or senior — all were beasts of burden here.

Xiao Chao was young. His hair was still full. He'd understand.

With Chao Musheng's help, Game Team Three — which had been working past midnight every night for a week straight — managed to leave before seven o'clock.

Filing out of the building, the team instinctively surrounded him, unwilling to let anyone accidentally bump into their most effective new asset.

Without Xiao Chao, who was going to carry this load?

"Boss — we should have twisted Secretary Liu's arm this afternoon and made him come to the barbecue." Brother Li slung an arm over the team lead's shoulder. "He practically gift-wrapped this talent for Team Three. Not inviting him to dinner is going to haunt us."

Team lead: "..."

You were all very different at lunchtime.

A black car emerged from the parking structure and passed the Team Three group — slowing almost imperceptibly as it reached them. It idled there until the group had crossed to the other side of the road and disappeared into the alley on the left, then drove on.

"Xiao Chao, I'm telling you — the stall looks small, but the food is ten times better than any proper barbecue restaurant." The colleagues led him deeper into the alley. "The owner works fast. Real hidden-master energy."

Chao Musheng looked ahead, at the figure behind the grill — flipping a long row of skewers with practiced efficiency, shaking on seasonings without looking. His expression became complicated. "Senior. The barbecue place you've been talking about — it wouldn't happen to be this one."

The stall owner looked up, ready to call out a greeting to these regular customers — and found an unexpected face among the familiar ones.

"Chao Musheng?"

How do you run into this person at a night market stall?

He had stated this clearly. He did not like good-looking men.

"Wan You." Chao Musheng waved with a smile. "We meet again. What are the odds."

Wan You: "..."

The odds could have been lower, frankly.

He glanced back at the four girls helping with cleanup and greeting customers, then turned around. "Sit down, everyone."

He put the order sheet in Chao Musheng's hands. "Order whatever you want. Forty percent off tonight."

"Thank you, Boss Wan. Very generous." Chao Musheng accepted the menu with a grin and handed it to his senior.

"Xiao Chao — you know the owner?" The senior was surprised.

"We're alumni." Chao Musheng said it warmly.

Wan You's hand paused briefly on the seasoning. He was only auditing — not really enrolled. Alumni was a stretch.

The girls who'd been tidying up came over to take the table, looked at Chao Musheng, and wondered if something had gone wrong with their eyes.

An NPC from the campus instance — how had he ended up somewhere outside the instance?