Later, he participated in the competition that changed his life and won the gold medal. He gained Song Tao's appreciation, who supported him in starting a company and joined as a partner to help with its operation. Song Tao became Li Li's most reliable friend, partner, and even brother, treating him like family.
You naturally got to know Song Tao through Li Li. Neither you nor Li Li expected that Song Tao would fall in love with you at first sight. Since you and Li Li had been dating for several years without any results, you changed your mind and became Song Tao's wife.
However, you still frequently appeared around Li Li, and your old feelings had not faded away. Perhaps you had some intimate interactions, which Song Tao eventually discovered. As a result, the brothers turned against each other, and Song Tao decided to sever your relationship. Therefore, he left X Game Company and took you away from Li Li...
After listening to Xu Yan's "story," Wang Anjing was stunned for a long time. These things evoked some of her past memories, but they were somewhat distorted.
"You think this is a cliché story, right?" Wang Anjing said with a wry smile. She was actually quite pretty, with light but unique makeup, exuding the gentle charm of a mature woman, like a soothing mountain stream, making people feel calm and comfortable.
Xu Yan was slightly surprised, "You didn't interrupt me."
She deliberately embellished the story with clichéd plots, expecting Wang Anjing to interrupt and correct her, but unexpectedly, she let herself continue making things up.
Xu Yan knew that the story she made up had some plausibility, but when applied to someone like Li Li, it became less plausible. Although they were just online friends, they had communicated for ten years, so Xu Yan couldn't say she completely understood Li Li, but she knew him fairly well. She knew that there was always someone in Li Li's heart, and that person was the root of his depression, anxiety, and pain.
It seems highly likely that this person is Wang Anjing, who is already married, so she was specifically asked to come and search for Li Li's will together.
But Wang Anjing's behavior left Xu Yan puzzled for a moment, and she felt that she had underestimated Wang Anjing.
Wang Anjing said calmly, "I didn't interrupt you because your story was very interesting."
"Wonderful?" Xu Yan raised an eyebrow.
Wang Anjing added, "Song Tao did indeed have a fight with Li Li, and the reason for the fight was indeed me. Your story is not distorted." She looked at Song Tao with pity in her eyes.
Xu Yan was in a predicament.
Wang Anjing stood up, found the cardboard box containing Li Li's photo frame, and took out one of the photos. "I'm not in the photos he left behind."
Xu Yan was taken aback; it seemed to be true. Had Li Li really taken Wang Anjing away? Was his love for Wang Anjing so profound that he no longer wanted to look at her?
“Song Tao believes that Li Li left the key code of the Metaverse game in his will, which is why he’s in such a hurry to find it,” Wang Anjing said calmly. She held up a photo of Li Li and Song Tao and touched Li Li’s face with her fingertip. “Li Li committed suicide due to depression. After receiving the news, Song Tao searched through almost everything he left in the company and even hired technicians to hack into his computer and accounts in an attempt to find the key code. This is the foundation of the Metaverse game and the core secret of the entire company. Only Li Li knew this line of code.”
Xu Yan tapped the headset twice. "Zhou Luming, did you hear that? There's a high chance there's code in the will. You need to find the will first."
Zhou Luming pretended not to hear Xu Yan and Wang Anjing's conversation and feigned ignorance, saying, "Okay, but Mr. Xu, since the will is so important, why did you let Song Tao in to fight me for it?"
Xu Yan said, "I believe you can find the will first."
"This is my first time playing this game. Luckily, the university auditorium is right in the starting village. If I wanted to leave the village, any monster could easily take me down," Zhou Luming said.
She and Song Tao arrived at the university auditorium almost one after the other. Just as Song Tao had described, it looked like a pure and flawless ivory tower. A building similar to a library was right in front of them, with some flowers planted at the entrance and a florist wearing a straw hat pruning the flowerbeds.
Butterflies fluttered about, and birds sang sweetly amidst the fragrant flowers.
A statue stands at the entrance, but the person on it is not Li Li, but Alan Mathison Turing, the father of computer science.
Zhou Luming stared at Turing's bronze statue, wondering why Li Li had chosen to place it in his game world.
“It’s Turing, the founder of artificial intelligence.” Xu Yan also seemed to be thinking, perhaps Li Li had a deeper meaning in putting Turing here.
"Song Tao has already gone in, should I go in too?" Zhou Luming asked.
"Let's go in and see what he's doing." Xu Yan tapped his fingers lightly on the table, his eyes fixed on one spot, seemingly deep in thought.
This scene caught Wang Anjing's eye. She looked up from Li Li's photo, glanced at Xu Yan for a moment, and smiled, saying, "No wonder you and Li Li have been online friends for ten years. You and he are alike; once you immerse yourselves in your own focused field, you radiate an aura of brilliance, dazzling and captivating, without ever realizing it yourself..."
Author's Note:
This isn't a mystery novel, so there's no rigorous reasoning or analysis. Just enjoy the story and don't worry too much about the underlying logic.
Chapter 6, Page 6
Metaverse game world.
Zhou Luming asked the flower farmer curiously, "Are these sunflowers planted here?"
The flower grower adjusted his straw hat. "These are sunflowers." He picked one and gave it to Zhou Luming. "This is for you."
Zhou Luming accepted it, saying, "Thank you." But what's the use of holding such a big flower? Does this game have a place to store things? Otherwise, it's very inconvenient to keep carrying it like this.
What are the uses of sunflowers? Can they heal me, or can I give them to someone to increase their friendship level?
"They'll ripen after a while," the flower grower said, continuing to water them.
Zhou Luming raised an eyebrow. "And then what happens when you mature?"
"Sunflower seeds will fall down. Find a pot, stir-fry them, and you can get a handful of sunflower seeds. Then you can eat them!" the flower farmer said with a smile.
Zhou Luming: ...
Xu Yan, seeing their conversation, was speechless, just like Zhou Luming. "Song Tao went in, you go in too, don't let him out of your sight."
"Can't you see what he's doing?" Zhou Luming tucked a huge sunflower into his waistband, carrying it like a weapon.
“I only connected to the camera on your body, so I can only see your virtual scene. Song Tao’s vision is controlled by Wang Anjing, and he doesn’t trust me,” Xu Yan explained.
Zhou Luming pushed open the heavy doors of the school auditorium and squeezed in. It was a large auditorium that also served as a basketball court, just like any other university in the real world. In the center was a raised platform, large enough to accommodate a performance by more than ten people. The platform was covered with a red carpet, and in the center was a podium with a microphone.
"Huh? Where's Song Tao?" Zhou Luming asked, puzzled. He looked around but couldn't see Song Tao. Had he disappeared?
Xu Yan said, "He was lying on the ground behind the podium, and I could see the corner of his clothes."
Zhou Luming also looked at the person lying on the ground, and curiously jumped onto the stage to ask him, "What are you looking for while you're lying down?"
Without turning his head, Song Tao said, "Li Li used to hide here. I came to see if he hid anything here."
He was referring to a cabinet under the podium, small enough to fit a not-too-fat person. Li Li was slender and could indeed fit inside.
“Li Li has difficulty walking, so it wouldn’t be easy for him to hide inside,” Zhou Luming said, standing behind with his hands in his pockets. “Why did he hide then?”
That was his moment of glory; he won the gold medal, which led to his meeting with Song Tao and everything that followed.
“He’s not good at communicating with people, especially in front of so many people. In a moment of panic, he found a place to hide.” Song Tao said this with a smile on his face, as if he were recalling the past. “While everyone was looking for him everywhere, I found him under the stage. He was huddled up there, eating a chocolate ball, and even asked me if I wanted some.”
"So he's a socially awkward person." Zhou Luming stroked his chin.
“Come out. It seems you can’t fit in. Let me try,” Zhou Luming said.
To find traces left by Li Li, one must put oneself in his shoes. Song Tao is a middle-aged man who is slightly overweight and a big man; he cannot see things from Li Li's perspective.
So Zhou Luming took his place.
Zhou Luming raised an eyebrow, a faint smile appearing at the corner of his mouth. "He really did write down clues here, look—"
Song Tao: "I can't see it."
Zhou Luming deciphered the handwriting: "Back to where it all began." After a moment's thought, he turned to Song Tao and asked, "Can you think of a place?"
Song Tao said, "Apart from the university auditorium, it can be considered the place where everything started... I can probably guess."
The university auditorium was where Li Li met Song Tao, marking the prologue to their careers, but not the true beginning. The real beginning was where he designed the metaverse game world and wrote his first string of code—and that place was—
Zhou Luming followed closely behind Song Tao, getting into the self-driving car he had bought in the game, and flew through most of the metaverse, including tropical rainforests, deep sea abysses, and mysterious underground worlds...
Everything was an eye-opener for Zhou Luming, leaving her overwhelmed. She even wanted to reach out and touch the large fish swimming around her, or try to avoid the gushing red lava, but it was all in vain. The worst outcome was simply losing health points.
"We've arrived." Song Tao got out of the driverless car and arrived at a detached townhouse that looked quite ordinary.
"Is this Li Li's home?" Zhou Luming asked as he walked with him.
"This is my former residence, a villa in the suburbs." Song Tao didn't enter the house, but walked to the garage, unlocked the electronic lock, and the roller shutter door rose automatically. There were no luxury cars parked in the garage, but a simple table and several servers flashing lights. On the wall hung a large whiteboard with many incomprehensible characters written on it, as well as a design drawing.
"The place Li Li said started is your garage?" Zhou Luming asked.
"Well, when he first started his business, he said he wanted to find a quiet place, so I arranged this place for him to use as a development and research lab. It was here that he wrote the underlying logic code for the Metaverse game. You could say that this is where the Metaverse was born."
Zhou Luming rolled up his sleeves. "What are we waiting for? Li Li must have left clues here."
Song Tao followed her example and started searching, but suddenly burst out laughing.
"What are you laughing at?" Zhou Luming turned his head and asked.
"We threw him a birthday party here, and his face was covered in cream; it was really funny," Song Tao recalled.
No one had ever thrown a party for Li Li before, and he was overwhelmed with gratitude. He had few friends, his parents were not very capable, and he had no one to confide in about his rich inner world, so his birthday was never celebrated. But Song Tao remembered his birthday, gave him funding and space to conduct research on the metaverse, and it could be said that Song Tao gave him everything.
If Li Li later parted ways with Song Tao because of Wang Anjing's affair, then from this perspective, Zhou Luming was on Song Tao's side. One shouldn't covet a friend's wife, especially someone as good to Li Li as he was. How could he possibly covet Song Tao's wife? Isn't this like the snake in the fable of the farmer and the snake?
Zhou Luming had a poor impression of Li Li.
Xu Yan's calm voice came through the earphones, "Many things cannot be judged by appearances alone; you also need to think about them carefully."
"Can you read my mind?"
“I can deduce something from your expression,” Xu Yan said. “However, Li Li is just our client. Your opinion of him is not important. What is important is to find his will and fulfill his request.”
Zhou Luming raised an eyebrow dismissively, "Okay, I understand."
Wang Anjing suddenly said, "This is also where Lao Song and I met. At the birthday party, Lao Song asked me for his social media account, and we added each other as friends."
Zhou Luming was taken aback and subconsciously looked at Song Tao, but Song Tao did not react and continued to concentrate on searching for clues.
Xu Yan then said, "It seems you've come to the right place."
Zhou Luming searched everywhere but still had no clue. Xu Yan was right; only someone who knew and was familiar with Li Li could find the clues he left behind, and only Song Tao could find his will.
"I noticed that on the board in the background of this photo, there's a model of what looks like a ship?" Zhou Luming squinted, staring intently at an old photo he had pulled out, comparing it to the scene.
"Let me see." Song Tao took the photo, looked at it for a while, and said, "This is indeed a design drawing of a ship. It is currently in a state of component-level segmentation. He once said that he wanted to build a big ship. He has a dream of sailing. But even after the game design was completed, I still haven't seen this ship."
"Since it's a ship, it should be in the sea."
“The ocean of the metaverse is even more vast than reality. Without precise coordinates, we cannot find that ship; it's like looking for a needle in a haystack,” Song Tao said.
After thinking it over carefully, Zhou Luming came up with an idea: "Could we issue a bounty notice and mobilize the power of all players in the world to find this ship?"
Song Tao was slightly tempted, but quickly shook his head and rejected the suggestion. "No, this will cause a riot."
Finding this ship is equivalent to finding Li Li's will. If the will contains key codes, it would be tantamount to leaking trade secrets to players all over the world. Song Tao cannot take such a risk.
Wang Anjing said, "I'll try to find this ship." She is also a computer science major and has the ability in this area.
Xu Yan, a computer illiterate standing to the side, paused for a moment and said, "Zhou Luming, I've seen this ship before, and you've seen it too."
Zhou Luming raised one eyebrow, puzzled, "Huh?"
"Turn the photo upside down, and you'll understand."
Since the photo wasn't in Zhou Luming's hands, she could only tilt her head and try to look at herself upside down. Suddenly, she realized, "This... isn't this the model that's in your house?"
Zhou Luming turned his face away and said in a low voice, "There used to be a large version in Song Tao's office as well."