茶杯狐 -CUPFOX

Xia Libing looked at the cake that suddenly appeared on the plate in front of her, not showing any surprise either, and took the cake.

She held the cake in her hand and observed it carefully, clearly realizing that the cake “co-manifested” by Xiang Kun was somewhat different from the one she “co-manifested”.

After observing it for over a minute, Xia Libing slowly brought the cake to her mouth.

Of course, just like Xiang Kun, she also couldn’t “taste” the cake.

After the cake disappeared, Xia Libing, in her usual composed demeanor, asked Xiang Kun, “Is there anything else?”

Then, a pork knuckle with crispy skin appeared on the plate, which disappeared after a minute. Xia Libing asked again, “Is there anything else?”

Xiang Kun shook his head, “No more.”

Xia Libing seemed lost in thought.

Xiang Kun, taking the initiative, asked, “Do you know what’s going on?”

Xia Libing replied seriously, “I’ve done the same thing in my dreams.”

“How did you do it in your dream?” Xiang Kun continued to ask. He knew that how Old Xia “co-manifested” those two things in the dream and how to “co-manifest” in reality is highly related.

With a pat, Xia Libing slapped her right hand on the table. When she raised her hand, three one-yuan coins were left on the table. She moved the coins and placed them in a row, “I did it with these.”

As she finished, Xia Libing lifted her head to look at Xiang Kun across the table. Although her expression hadn’t changed much, Xiang Kun could sense what she wanted to express: These coins are from you, you explain.

Xiang Kun looked at the three coins, nodded, and smiled, “Indeed, these coins are a bit special. But I’ve given these coins to many people. Nana and Xiao Pingguo have them too. However, only you could use them to conjure up a Napoleon Cake and a crispy pork knuckle. Old Xia, have you ever thought, why is that?”

Xia Libing didn’t speak, her right index finger lightly tapped on those three coins one by one. It seemed as if she were contemplating or trying to outlast Xiang Kun in patience.

Xiang Kun said again, “Old Xia, do you have a bit of a problem with empathic abilities and emotional cognition?”

Xia Libing counter questioned, “After you lost your job, did you experience anything unusual that brought about a huge change?”

Xiang Kun nodded, “Indeed, something did happen.” He touched his head and said, “I became bald…”

He could sense that Xia Libing was open to discussing her own situation.

However, just like him, Xia Libing was also trying to probe the other’s situation before deciding how much to reveal about her own.

So naturally, the two’s conversation turned into a continuous probing.

But Xiang Kun wasn’t worried, there was plenty of time today, and based on Old Xia’s attitude, he felt quite certain that he could break through in their conversation before the night’s meal. At worst, he could reveal some more crucial information first.

What he didn’t expect was, plans are always inferior to changes.

Just as Xia Libing was about to open her mouth to say something, Xiang Kun’s phone started vibrating.

He glanced at the phone’s incoming call display, his eyebrows instantly furrowed – the call was from his mom.

He knew very well that his mother was wholeheartedly convinced that he was pursuing Old Xia, and considering that she knew he was having lunch with Old Xia, she would only call if something serious had happened.

Picking up, Xiang Kun indeed heard his mom’s somewhat anxious voice, tinged with a hint of cry, “Kun, your dad fell. We are now at the First Affiliated Hospital of the Medical University. Come here as soon as you’re done with your meal.”

“I will go now… mom, keep calm, where did dad fall from, what’s his condition right now?”

“He finished eating, wanted to go out for a walk, and fell down the stairs as soon as he went out the door. I heard the noise and rushed out. His face was covered in blood and he couldn’t move… I didn’t dare move him and quickly called the hospital…”

“Mom, is dad conscious now?”

“He’s conscious, he told me not to tell you first… we’re in the emergency room, we’ll talk when you come over.”

“I understand, mom. I’ll be there as soon as possible.”

While Xiang Kun was talking on the phone, his tone and facial expressions didn’t change much. He even deliberately kept his voice low to comfort his anxious mother. In his mind, he was swiftly evaluating his dad’s condition, judging from his mom’s tone, condition, and the details provided.

However, in reality, as Xiang Kun heard his mom’s first sentence, feelings of anxiety, tension, concern, and even some inexplicable anger welled up within him.

After ending the call with his mom, Xiang Kun quickly regained his emotional balance, realizing the reason – he was angry with himself.

He had always paid attention to his parents’ health conditions. By establishing cognitive models through infrared thermographic vision mode and other sensing modes, he believed he could detect any health issues of his parents in advance, enabling them to receive timely treatment. Surprisingly, his father had fallen down the stairs, an accident that could be very dangerous for someone already in their sixties. For Xiang Kun, it felt like he had let an oversight happen in something he thought he had under control.

However, Xiang Kun quickly realized that his anger stemmed from his overestimation of his own abilities. It was a display of arrogance. He couldn’t predict all circumstances completely, accidents could never be wholly foreseen, and many factors were beyond his control.

This sudden emotional reaction made Xiang Kun realize that, unconsciously, due to his superior sensory abilities and the powers provided by various evolutions and mutations, his desire for control and confidence had been continually growing, in turn, affecting his judgement and emotions.

Adjusting his emotions and self-discovery happened in an instant. It seemed like Xiang Kun didn’t pause at all after answering the phone, instantly getting up to bid farewell to Xia Libing, “Old Xia, my dad fell down the stairs and is now in the hospital, I need to rush over. We’ll discuss the ‘cake’ matter another time.”

However, Xiang Kun noticed that Xia Libing looked a bit lost. Then a memory suddenly flashed in his mind, the state of Xia Libing when he was on the phone.

Although his attention was entirely focused on his mom’s words and his dad’s injury earlier, by now, the collection of various sensory information from his surroundings had become instinctive. Therefore, even though he wasn’t paying attention to it before, he was still able to capture Xia Libing’s reaction and state.

On reflection, he realized that the emotional state he entered briefly, even though it was fleeting, it was strong. It’s highly likely that his ability of “Emotional Assimilation” had been activated momentarily, and Xia Libing was evidently influenced and manifested similar emotions.

Previously in Tongshi Town, when Xiang Kun used the “Twelve Portraits” he carried to indirectly induce emotional influence, everyone else was affected similarly to the effects of “Emotional Assimilation”, but only Xia Libing showed no emotional changes.

At that time, Xiang Kun pondered whether he should try to directly use “Emotional Assimilation” to affect Xia Libing to see if it would work, but an appropriate opportunity never arose.

Unexpectedly, this unintentional display of “Emotional Assimilation” verified his idea – the object induced with emotions, “Twelve Portraits”, was incapable of emotionally influencing Xia Libing only because his “ability” was not powerful enough.

And judging from Xia Libing’s current expression, she seemed surprised and puzzled by her sudden emotional change.

Normally, based on Xiang Kun’s previous experiences of using “Emotional Assimilation” on others, the person influenced by the assimilated emotions wouldn’t notice that they were being influenced. Xia Libing was most likely experiencing this type of emotion for the first time, leading to her current bewildered expression once the emotions dissipated.

“I’ll go with you.” Xia Libing also quickly regained her senses upon hearing his words, picked up the three coins from the table, and put on her jacket.

The two of them hailed a taxi and quickly arrived at the First Affiliated Hospital of Medical University. They made a call and then rushed to the location that Mrs. Xiang had mentioned.

Seeing the expression on his mother’s face and assessing her mood, Xiang Kun breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that his father’s condition must not be severe.

“Luckily, your father is pretty resilient. There’s not too much wrong, just a bit of bruising on his hip, some grazes on his knee, a cut on his head and a minor concussion. He needs to stay in the hospital for observation for a couple of days,” Mrs. Xiang said, looking at Xia Libing, “Oh, Xia, you’re here too, didn’t you get lunch properly?”

“We’ve already eaten our fill, aunty.” After Xiang Kun’s instructions yesterday, Xia Libing stopped pretending to be “obedient” and responded in her usual manner.

After a while, a freshly treated Mr. Xiang was taken to his hospital room, where Xiang Kun promptly checked his father’s health in his own way. He was sure that the issues were mostly muscular, soft tissue bruises?—nothing serious?—and there was likely no internal bleeding in the brain.

Of course, when the doctor said Mr. Xiang needed to stay in the hospital for a couple of days for observation, he didn’t argue. After chatting in the hospital room for a while, he told Xia Libing to go home and rest. After all, she didn’t get much sleep last night due to the dream he induced and the subsequent “Illusion Reality” ability unleashed by Old Xia.

Xia Libing didn’t say much. She said goodbye to Mr. and Mrs. Xiang and left.

As he watched Xia Libing leave, Mr. Xiang, lying in the hospital bed, grumbled to Mrs. Xiang, “I told you I was fine, it was only two flights of stairs, not enough to kill me, you didn’t have to call our son…”

Xiang Kun helplessly said, “Dad, don’t talk like that, especially during the New Year.”

Surprisingly, Mrs. Xiang didn’t argue back. She just scooped up some hot water, and then said to Xiang Kun, “Since your father is fine, you can go out and hang out with Xia later. I can watch over him myself.”

Trying to raise his head from the bed as best he could, Mr. Xiang said, “Yeah, I’m fine. There’s nothing major. Remember, back in the days…”

Of course, Xiang Kun didn’t leave. Instead, he took the opportunity to enter the “Super Sensory State” several times to feel his father’s body’s cognitive information. He tried to find a way to use the magnetic field, generated by “Super-connected Objects,” to treat body tissue injuries, and influence those cognitive information.

Of course, unless he was absolutely confident and had conducted experiments beforehand, he wouldn’t immediately apply this to his father.

Around four in the afternoon, Xiang Kun suddenly received a call from Xia Libing.

“I’m returning your bag, come down to the parking lot and pick it up,” Xia Libing said on the phone.

“Alright.” After Xiang Kun agreed, he let his parents know before heading down to the hospital’s parking lot.

He didn’t ask why Old Xia didn’t just come up to his room. He knew the bag Old Xia was referring to was the one he had brought for Old Xia with Yang Zhen Er’s new clothes the night before. Under normal circumstances, even if Old Xia wanted to return the bag, she wouldn’t make a special trip at this time and even call him down to meet her.

The only possibility was that Old Xia had something to tell him that wasn’t appropriate to say in the ward, and returning the bag was just an excuse.

When he got to the parking lot, Xiang Kun quickly located a white Camry through the “super-connected” coins on Old Xia. Seeing him approach, Old Xia waved from the car window.

Xiang Kun walked over, opened the car door and took the passenger’s seat, looking puzzled, “This is my first time seeing you drive?”

“This is my third time since I got my license. I borrowed it from Aunt Three,” Xia Libing gave a brief explanation and took a bag from the back seat to hand it to Xiang Kun.

As soon as the bag was in his hand, Xiang Kun noticed it was filled with something, and it seemed pretty heavy.

However, before he could guess, Xia Libing straightforwardly spoke, “There are some things inside for you to look at.”

Xiang Kun tentatively asked, “Shall I take it home to look?”

Xia Libing said, “Look over here.”

Xiang Kun finally understood why Old Xia had driven over– he was trying to create a private place for their “confidential talk”.

Xiang Kun unzipped his backpack and took out everything inside.

There was a tablet computer, a document box, and a black leather-bound notebook.

Xiang Kun looked up at Old Xia, and the latter motioned to the tablet, indicating for him to start there: “Everything about my condition is in there.”

So Xiang Kun turned on the tablet and, under the guidance of Old Xia, opened a PDF document.

At a glance, Xiang Kun knew what it was – it contained Old Xia’s medical records and various related treatment materials.

At the beginning, Xiang Kun flipped through the documents slowly, feigning a normal reading speed, but soon he started to browse the PDF at a fast pace, no longer hiding his quick reading ability. That’s because he now knew all about Old Xia’s situation and understood that Old Xia was revealing all her secrets to him.

After reading most of the document, he quickly realized that the reason Old Xia suddenly changed her tactics, revealing all her cards and secrets, was largely related to the “Emotional Assimilation” he had unintentionally triggered when he received a call from his mother at noon.

Many parts of the document were narrated in the tone of Old Xia’s parents, clearly these materials should have belonged to the doctor who had treated Old Xia before.

According to her parents, when Old Xia was just born, she was not different from other children. She cried less than other babies, only when she was hungry or needed a diaper change. General physical examinations showed that Old Xia was a very healthy baby without any abnormalities.

Even when she was just over three months old, she had already mastered the pronunciation of many sentences, learning faster than most children. This made her parents delightfully happy; they felt their daughter was very intelligent.

Not only was she intelligent, Old Xia even learned to walk much faster than other children. She was able to stand on her own by leaning against the wall at an early age, and could soon toddle around, exhibiting strong physical strength and balance.

But as time went by and Old Xia grew older, her parents began to feel more and more that something was wrong.

Their daughter was simply “too well-behaved”; she never had any “mischievous” moments. After she learned to express herself with simple words, she never cried again. No matter how her parents tried to amuse her, she never laughed. The most expression she would show was to stare at them with wide eyes, the same way she looked at everything around her.

Initially, Old Xia had many toys, all kinds of toys. But it wasn’t long before all these toys were taken apart by Old Xia.

And she didn’t dismantle them violently as other kids would do by tearing them apart or smashing them. Instead, she would find the weak points of the toys and methodically disassemble them.

For example, the cloth dolls and stuffed animals were invariably disassembled by her with nail scissors, cutting the stitches bit by bit. She would then pull them apart from the edges, and even the cut threads would be collected by her and neatly arranged.

The plastic toys were also always dismantled into individual parts, neatly organized.

When Old Xia one day picked up a screwdriver and tried to dismantle the TV, her parents finally realized there was something wrong, and started taking her to see some experts in child psychology and behavior.

But after various checks and tests, all sorts of diagnoses were made on Old Xia, none of which completely agreed with each other. Many experts and doctors believed that there was nothing wrong with Old Xia, and that the parents simply needed to interact and guide her more.

Since there was nothing wrong with Old Xia’s body and brain, her parents didn’t dare to let her take medications randomly or receive any radical treatments. So all they could do was to be even more careful, never leave her alone, prevent her from disassembling anything that could be dangerous, spend more time playing with her, and watch animations or play games with her.

It wasn’t until Old Xia started kindergarten and a few incidents happened that her parents realized they had to seek more professional help and treatment for their daughter.