Only a few seconds passed.
Then Theresa jerked her lips away as though she'd touched a live wire.
She snapped upright, one hand clamped hard over her own mouth.
That adorable bun-cheeked face went so red it looked ready to bleed, and even the tips of her ears were venting steam.
She stared down at Su Yu, still fast asleep on her knees, utterly unaware of what had just happened, her chest heaving.
"Th-this was just practice!"
Theresa glared fixedly at the empty air beside her, conducting a frantic session of self-hypnosis that fooled precisely no one.
Obviously, this brand of "self-hypnosis" was the classic ostrich burying its head in the sand.
"That's right! It was only advance practice so that the next time I have to act like his girlfriend in front of Sirin, I won't make a fool of myself!"
"Mm! Absolutely nothing but pure, innocent practice!!!"
Right. Practice so innocent it went mouth to mouth.
Theresa didn't get up.
She stayed where she was, letting Su Yu pillow his head on her numb thigh, slipping her fingers back into his hair and combing through it even more slowly than before.
Behind his closed eyes, Su Yu's mind sank into a darkness with no bottom to it.
No dreams. No Honkai countdown clock ticking away at the edge of his thoughts. None of the suffocating maneuvering between one faction and the next.
It was a darkness of absolute quiet.
And just as his consciousness was about to lose itself entirely in that stillness -
Deep in the dark, a faint but warm red glow kindled.
A single illusory crimson feather spun down and settled gently onto the surface of his sea of consciousness, sending out ring after ring of golden ripples.
"Theresa is right. Su Yu, you've been holding your nerves far too tight lately." An ethereal, tranquil voice, one that sounded as if it had crossed a very long span of years, spoke quietly inside his mind.
It was Fenghuang - or rather, the consciousness of Fu Hua, dwelling within Yu Ducheng.
Three straight weeks, shuttling nonstop between the brutal training at the Starfire Furnace and the endless tangle of business at miHoYo Studio.
Even with his second-stage Genetic Lock open, his body carrying a terrifying recovery rate far beyond any ordinary person's, that doomsday countdown hung over his head like a sword of Damocles - and his mind and spirit were worn down to nothing.
Fenghuang's voice ran like a clear spring across the parched wasteland of his psyche.
"For now, think about nothing at all. Rest. I'll do what I can, and use Yu Ducheng's power to smooth out the creases in your soul."
The crimson feather gave off a soft radiance that wrapped his consciousness completely.
"And don't worry about missing tonight's training at the Starfire base. When the time comes, I'll wake you, right on schedule."
With that reassuring promise, the last of the tension bled out of Su Yu's spirit.
His awareness sank into a gentle ocean, and all the exhaustion, anxiety and panic he'd stockpiled over these long days dissolved, piece by piece, in that crimson halo.
When Yu Ducheng's power eased Su Yu up out of that deep sleep, the sky beyond the window had already taken on a heavy orange-red dusk.
The hour hand of the wall clock pointed squarely at the six.
Su Yu opened his eyes slowly, his vision sharpening out of the blur.
The first thing he saw was that delicate bun-cheeked face hovering barely a hand's width away, wearing an expression of shy concern.
And he found himself looking straight into Theresa's clear blue eyes.
"You're awake?" Theresa asked softly.
"Mm..."
Su Yu breathed in the scent hanging in the air, neroli blossom mixed with black tea.
"Did you get a bit of rest? Do you feel better?"
"Thank you, Theresa."
He braced both hands on the sofa and slowly sat up.
Drawing a deep breath, he realized with some astonishment that he had slept on Theresa's knees for nearly four hours straight.
Even more incredible - between Yu Ducheng's deep healing and the blessing of Theresa's lap pillow, his head had never felt so clear in his life.
That neuralgia, like a steel wire being yanked back and forth through his skull, had vanished without a trace. Brain and spirit alike had somehow been restored to peak condition.
"I feel so much lighter. Like someone lifted a mountain off me," Su Yu said, and he meant every word.
Theresa sat beside him, discreetly kneading her thigh with those small white-lace-gloved hands, since the limb had gone numb from long service as a pillow.
At his words, she tilted her chin up proudly, her whole face glowing with smugness. "See! I told you so. Even if... even if I am a little older than you, your Auntie is very good at taking care of people! Convinced now?"
Watching her fish so adorably for praise, Su Yu laughed under his breath and played along. "Mm-hmm. Auntie's absolutely right."
"D-don't you start copying Kiana and calling me Auntie..."
Theresa's cheeks flushed a strange shade, and her gaze skittered away.
For reasons she couldn't articulate, being called Auntie by a young man she had just secretly kissed stirred up a bizarre, face-scorching sense of moral guilt.
She hurried to change the subject. "So... are you going back to work again?"
"Yeah." Su Yu stood and rolled his neck, drawing a crisp series of pops. "Anti-Entropy Entertainment still has a few rush projects to hand over. I need to head out now."
Theresa looked at his straight-backed silhouette, her two small hands twisting together without her noticing.
"Th-that is, Su Yu..."
"Hm? What is it?"
Theresa bit her lip, worked up her courage, and patted her thigh in its white thigh-high stocking, her face as red as an overripe tomato.
"If... if you ever feel tired again, you can... you can come find me anytime!" She forced her gaze aside, feigning composure. "I-I'm very confident in my lap pillow, you know..."
Su Yu glanced down at those slender, perfectly proportioned legs, remembering that reassuring softness, and the corner of his mouth curved.
"Mm. It really was comfortable. Full marks."
"Ahem! R-right? Of course!"
That piece of blunt praise wiped her hard-won composure straight back to zero. She scrambled to her feet and nearly tripped over herself.
"Anyway! That's your exclusive reward from Auntie, so you'd better accept it with a grateful heart - ahem!"
Red-faced, she started shoving him toward the door. "Weren't you going to work? Go on, go on! I have to change in a minute, and I've got a Magic Girl Teriri livestream to run later! Shoo!"
Su Yu walked out of the office with a lightness in his step he hadn't felt in ages.
The moment he passed through the open-plan work area outside -
Two gazes with the sheer presence of searchlights locked onto him and refused to let go.
On the left was Lin Zhaoyu.
The dignified head disciple of the Tai Xu Sword Sect still had that "hundred-billion capital injection" financial report clenched tight in her hand.
The look she gave Su Yu was complicated beyond description - heartbroken, faintly exasperated, as though she genuinely feared that her ideologically upright Eldest Senior Brother had already been bought out wholesale by evil capitalists with money and beauty, and was about to be carried off to Schicksal as a live-in son-in-law.
On the right was Nuwa.
This veteran otaku shut-in was sprawled shamelessly across her gaming chair.
She pushed up her glasses until the lenses flashed and shot Su Yu a look that said, plain as day, "Not bad, kid. What a blessing."
Su Yu selectively ignored both drama queens.
But he'd barely taken two steps before he spotted Kevin, who had returned to the studio at some point.
This Kaslana with his signature head of white hair was leaning against the doorframe of the break room, staring coldly at Su Yu with an expression too complicated to name.
Kevin walked over without a word.
Then, with no warning at all, his right arm came up - a straight punch tearing through the air with a shrill whistle, aimed dead at Su Yu's face!
Smack.
A dull, muted sound.
Su Yu hadn't shifted an inch. He'd simply raised his left hand and caught that heavy, driving fist square in his palm.
After all, the Su Yu of today was a long way from the scrawny weakling who once couldn't have wrestled a chicken into submission.
Opening the second-stage Genetic Lock had torn a vast gulf between him and Kevin, who so far had only unlocked the first-stage Genetic Lock.
On top of that, all this time at the Starfire base he'd been ground and tormented by every inhuman method that scheming maid Rita could devise.
Kevin's probing punch posed no threat to him whatsoever.
"Su Yu." Kevin slowly drew his fist back and delivered, with a perfectly flat face, a line lethal enough to kill a man socially on the spot. "I treated you like a brother I'd take a bullet for. And you want to become my Auntie's husband?"
"Kevin, you can eat whatever you like, but you can't say whatever you like."
Su Yu gripped Kevin's wrist in return and clapped his good brother's shoulder hard, his face a study in world-weary compassion.
"This is all for the sake of this world, riddled with holes as it is. And for you and Kiana. You know the burdens I carry."
Kevin looked at the man in front of him, whose mouth ran like a runaway train and whose passive skill was apparently conning people, and the corner of his usually glacier-still face twitched violently.
"Get lost."
Kevin slapped his hand away without mercy and waved him off in disgust.
"You're heading out to inspect the new recruits at the base, aren't you? Then hurry up and clear out. Stop cluttering up my line of sight. That smug little upstart look of yours is giving me a headache."
"Fine, fine, fine. Little Kevin, your father's off now. Be a good boy and watch the house at the Company."
Su Yu waved cheerfully at Kevin, turned, and stepped into the elevator.
The underground parking garage.
Su Yu settled into the black off-road jeep and had just pushed the key into the ignition.
The phone in his pocket buzzed twice.
He pulled it out. A WeChat message from Kevin had popped up on the screen.
The first one: [Seriously though, Auntie's actually a good person. And with her money and her background, dating her would be no loss for you at all. From here on we can each keep our own titles - you call me foster father, and I'll call you Little Su.]
Su Yu read the message, one eye twitching hard.
His ten fingers flew across the screen.
[Spare me, foster father! I'm only playing along with her act to keep Sirin calm! Bronie will walk you through the details. Keep spreading rumors like this and your beloved eldest son is going to drop dead in the middle of an Arc City street tonight!]
Kevin replied instantly: [Bronie told me the whole story ages ago.]
Su Yu blinked, then sent back a question mark. [Then why were you hauling me up on charges outside the office just now?]
Kevin: [Correct. Hauling you up on charges.]
Staring at the screen, Su Yu could picture with perfect clarity Kevin's dead-fish face as he typed those four words.
He sighed and typed back: [I think it's better if we keep some distance at the Company from now on. I don't want Dr. Mei getting the wrong idea about some improper man-on-man relationship between us. She'd tear me apart with her bare hands.]
The other end went silent for five seconds.
Then Kevin sent a sticker: [a big white cat pointing at the door, get_out.jpg]
Su Yu snorted a laugh and closed the chat with Kevin.
Next he noticed several unread messages from Kiana, pinned at the top.
The gist was that she and the Squad Monitor had finished the motion capture on all the Quantum monsters and were on their way home.
In the last message, Kiana had tacked on a specific instruction:
[Idiot Su Yu, once you finish your inspection at the Starfire base tonight, don't go rushing back. It'll be the middle of the night. Just sleep in the commander's quarters at the base. I'll get myself to work tomorrow, you don't need to pick me up, understand!!]
Looking at that bossy text with all its concern packed underneath, Su Yu felt warmth well up in his chest.
That single-celled Paramecium who was always so one-track-minded, always shouting about saving the world - in her own clumsy way, she had her own particular brand of tenderness.
"Whew -"
Su Yu tossed the phone onto the passenger seat and took hold of the wheel with both hands.
He depressed the clutch and turned the key.
The eight-cylinder engine slumbering under the hood woke with a deep, subwoofer-thick roar.
"All right. Time to move."
Su Yu's eyes sharpened in the dim garage lighting.
The rest and the warmth were over.
The real storm would raise its curtain tomorrow.
Tomorrow the Starfire Furnace Project's month-long special training would reach its final phase - the death examination.
And the day after that, September the seventh, was the ultimate node: the point where the "Internet-Wide Emotion Point Harvesting System" in his head would run its phased settlement, and formally unlock the [Valkyrie Cultivation System] module.
"All this time harvesting Emotion Points, I've had tens of millions of people across the whole internet chasing me down to curse me out, and gotten jerked around by Eden and Theresa and the rest of them until my sanity nearly blew a fuse..."
Su Yu stamped on the accelerator, and the black off-road jeep shot out through the garage gate like an arrow off the string.
"If that damned Sys doesn't cough up a decent pile of gold coins for me on the seventh..."
He glared through gritted teeth at the night ahead, torn open by his headlights.
"Then I really will have to take you properly in hand."
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