茶杯狐 -CUPFOX

Xiang Kun did not evade Old Xia’s gaze. He looked at her closely, observing every subtle change in her expression and her eyes. He collected sensory information from her body and even sensed the “brush-written lyrics” and “black circle graffiti” that should be in her bag at this moment.

Yet he still could not detect any emotional changes from Old Xia. All he could tell was that she was observing him as well.

Their eye contact lasted only two seconds. Xia Libing swallowed the biscuit she had been chewing and said, “I hardly ever dream.”

“Hardly ever dream means you have dreamt, although rarely?” Xiang Kun replied with a curious expression, half-seriously and half-jokingly, “I am somewhat curious now, Old Xia. What are your dreams like? Can you tell me?”

He conjectured that the reason his two “emotionally infused” items were unable to stir Old Xia’s dreams, was likely because Old Xia lacked certain emotions and thus could not be stimulated by his special “emotional infusion” ability.

He wished to investigate, see what kind of dreams she had, infer the emotional type of her dream, and then create targeted “emotionally infused” items.

It was like sending a message to an “endpoint” using QQ or WeChat, but with no response, as if casting a stone into the sea. The “endpoint” didn’t have these communication apps installed. So, to successfully send messages and instructions, besides trying each “communication app” one by one, the only other strategy was to investigate what “communication apps” the “endpoint” had installed.

Xia Libing did not answer immediately, she wiped her mouth with a paper towel, pulled out her phone, and showed him a video: “Is this you?”

Xiang Kun took the phone with a puzzled look, but his surprise turned to stunned shock when he saw what was playing – a news video that Xia Libing had saved.

The news segment reported on a recent series of highway accidents. After the accident, a passenger wearing a red knitted hat was very active at the scene, helping injured passengers to safety. There was also surveillance footage from inside the bus. The moment the bus began to lean heavily, the man in the knitted hat seemed to instinctively hold a young boy flung from his seat, protecting him with his own body.

The footage from the bus surveillance was of poor quality and due to the heavy shaking after the accident, the footage was lost quickly. Even though the news showed the scene in slow motion, they could only see Xiang Kun holding the young boy.

Subsequent interviews with survivors praised the nameless “hero” who did not leave his name.

“Why are you showing me this?” Xiang Kun asked, his question somewhat rhetorical. His surface reaction was just right, seemingly puzzled.

Xia Libing straightforwardly asked: “The one who rescued people, it was you, wasn’t it?”

How did she recognize me? How could she recognize me?!

The footage in the news report was mostly taken by passengers in passing cars parked in the emergency lane, using their phones. Given the distance and the limited light at night, plus Xiang Kun’s effort to keep out of the camera’s reach, wearing a hat and dressing differently than the norm, he wasn’t too worried about being identified.

But unexpectedly, Xia Libing had recognized him?

Initially, Xiang Kun planned to deny it, after all, even if Old Xia guessed that it was him based on some conclusions, she had no concrete evidence to prove her guess.

However, Xiang Kun reconsidered. After all, there was nothing shameful about what he had done. He did not want to be identified because he was worried that people would notice him and find out some abnormalities in his behavior during the accident. But that incident happened a long time ago. Knowing the person was him, given Old Xia’s character, she would definitely not blab about it.

Moreover, he doubted that even if he denied Old Xia’s guess, she’d believe him. Maybe she’d even suspect he was deliberately hiding something, lying, which wouldn’t be conducive to his exploration of her emotional issues.

“It was indeed me.” Although he had contemplated and weighed his options in his mind, the process was actually quite swift. At least from the outside, it seemed like he answered almost instantly after Xia Libing raised the question.

“How did you recognize me from this vague video where my face is not even visible?” Xiang Kun asked curiously.

Xia Libing took the phone, moved the video progress bar a little, pointed to the clip showing Xiang Kun carrying a young boy briskly along the roadside and said, “Your walking posture and power exertion are very similar to yours, and the head-to-body ratio, and proportions of the limbs to the body are exactly the same as yours.”

Is that possible?

Xiang Kun was astonished. The things he mentioned could be instantly determined by his unaided eye. If Tang Baona, Xia Libing, Xi Cheng, Chang Bin, and other people familiar to him were also in the video, even if their faces weren’t visible, only their body movements were visible, he would still be able to quickly recognize them.

But that’s him. The brains of most people do not have his level of processing ability or concentration to carry out extensive data collection and processing all the time?

He immediately realized that Old Xia must have been observing him extensively in day-to-day life and had a very clear, systematic understanding of his movements, posture, body proportions, and power exertion methods. Thus, when she saw the news video, she had a sense of familiarity and further observation and comparison made her more and more certain.

Xia Libing was not trying to identify a criminal with this video or use it as court evidence. She only needed to confirm it herself, which was enough.

Xiang Kun silently revised his cognitive model of Xia Libing – her level of attention to him was apparently higher than he had previously thought.

“Old Xia, you truly have a keen eye; I didn’t think anyone could recognize me!” Xiang Kun said with a smile.

“The media is looking for you, why didn’t you contact them? It seems like there’s a reward.” Xia Libing asked.

“I wasn’t hurt at that time, so I got off when the ambulance reached the city. I didn’t accept any interviews back then, so there’s no need to expose myself now. You know, I prefer to keep a low profile.”

Seeing that Xia Libing had nearly finished her breakfast, Xiang Kun asked, “It’s your turn to answer, Old Xia, what kind of dreams did you use to have?”

“I won’t tell you,” Xia Libing replied calmly.

“Huh?!” Xiang Kun was stunned. This wasn’t right. When he asked Old Xia about her dreams, she immediately questioned him about the identity in the news video. Wouldn’t it be normal to exchange the answer to that question for the answer to this one?

Old Xia, how could you do this…

Xiang Kun was at a loss for words. Among the people he had interacted with in abundance after the mutation, he found that he could accurately predict most people’s behavior once he had established a cognitive model of them. But Xia Libing proved to be an exception, he had been led astray many times thinking he had understood her intentions.

However, after a brief pause Xia Libing added, “Actually, I don’t remember very well. But it had something to do with eating.”

It was related to eating?

Xiang Kun nodded and thought back to the various scenes since meeting Xia Libing. He had an inkling of what to do next, believing he had figured out the “communication application” installed on Old Xia’s “terminal”.

At this point, his cell phone vibrated a few times. Xiang Kun picked it up and said to Xia Libing with a smile, “Nana and Zhen’er have woken up, they asked me to bring breakfast to their room. Zi Cheng also said he couldn’t sleep because he was hungry, so I’ll take breakfast to them while it’s still warm.”

He stood up with the remaining breakfast bags that Xia Libing had not touched, and walked towards the door. “Get ready, we’re going to the scenic area today. I’m going to wake everyone up now, we’ll leave around nine,” he said.

As the door closed again, Xia Libing reached for her backpack on the table and pulled out a black notebook. She flipped it straight open from the last page and scribbled three words on the paper, split into two lines:

“Dream”.

“Hide”.

Then she emphasized the word “dream” by drawing multiple circles around it.

Xia Libing twirled the pen in her hand, staring at the word on the paper.

Why was Xiang Kun so concerned about whether or not she had dreams, and what her dreams were?

However, his concern about this issue suggested that Xiang Kun had detected her problem. For she had indeed not had any dreams for many years. Maybe Xiang Kun saw her problem from a different angle than she did. After all, she hadn’t really cared whether she dreamed or not.

Then Xia Libing lightly tapped the words “Hide” with her pen tip.

Her realization that the man in the news video was Xiang Kun was actually coincidental.

Once before, when she had come across a video online of a man in a red cotton hat saving people, her first reaction was that this man’s core strength was very powerful. Then, naturally, she thought of Xiang Kun, for among all the people she had met and seen, Xiang Kun had shown the greatest core muscular strength. So, she took a closer look at the video and immediately identified many similarities between the man and Xiang Kun. Then by comparing and observing Xiang Kun’s collected photos and videos, she concluded that the man in the news might be Xiang Kun.

Although Xiang Kun had just confirmed her suspicion, she clearly remembered that when she initially showed him that video, his expression was one of confusion and doubt, as if to say, “this video has nothing to do with me”.

Obviously, Xiang Kun’s initial reaction to the incident was to “hide”.

If he was doing good deeds, why would he need to hide?

Xia Libing speculated that what Xiang Kun intended to hide was either his itinerary at the time or some of his behavior, to prevent it from being associated with him.

Xia Libing thought for a moment and then wrote down two more words:

“Trust”.

Although Xiang Kun’s initial reaction was to conceal, once she directly asked if he was the person in the video, he immediately confirmed it. This showed that he did have a certain level of trust in her, which was different from others.

Perhaps her strategy could be more direct and candid?

Xia Libing took out a coin from her pocket and, almost subconsciously, started to flip it over the back of her hand. Suddenly, she frowned slightly, looking at the coin in her hand.

Was it an illusion? How come Nana’s coin felt more comfortable to flip?