This Is My Planet - Chapter 119 - Chapter 119 – The Meaning of Games
Seeing Xiao Jiu’s smile, Xia Guixuan’s first words were, “You look a bit like Deputy Marshal Gongsun. Are you from the Gongsun family? His sister? A distant cousin or a close one?”
Xiao Jiu maintained her smile. “I knew you might figure it out. I guess you could call me a distant cousin. I’m from a branch that can’t compare to the main line.”
She hadn’t planned to hide this, openly using her identity as Gongsun Jiu’s sister could actually cover up. Ling Moxue and Yan Wuyue might recognize her from the video, but if they investigated, she could easily deflect their suspicions.
Xia Guixuan also found it quite normal and chuckled, “Hmm, you’ve got quite a background. I heard the Gongsun family is the top family in Great Xia.”
“It’s just so-so. Every family has its decline. If it weren’t for Gongsun Jiu, the Gongsun family would probably be half buried by now. There’s nothing extraordinary about it.” Xiao Jiu sneered, “The cycle of prosperity and decline spares no one.”
Xia Guixuan wasn’t particularly interested in delving into family matters and just smiled, “Your response is not quick enough. The Donglin battle has been over for two or three hours. I thought I’d receive your greetings as soon as I came back.”
“Hey, are you too narcissistic? Why should I greet you as soon as you come back? Do I have nothing else to do?”
“It’s only natural to greet a comrade returning from battle, isn’t it?” Xia Guixuan smiled. “Unless you don’t consider me a comrade.”
“Hmm…” Xiao Jiu thought about it and realized he was right. She said, “Due to the deputy marshal’s intentional lure of the enemy, the destruction of the Donglin defenses was severe, so it took us a long time to calculate the material requirements and reconstruction plans. I only asked you after we finished.”
“So, did you also go with the army?”
“No, but I’ve finished my work. Do you want to play the game?”
Xia Guixuan looked at the sky and smiled, “Forget it, I’m not in the mood for games right now, and you have other things to do. How about tomorrow?”
Xiao Jiu acted coquettishly, “Come on, just play for a bit. I have some secrets to show you.”
Xiao Jiu did this on purpose.
In theory, Gongsun Jiu was in the Donglin battle zone and wouldn’t have access to any game pods, and the Yin family’s game company hadn’t extended its network to other planets. So as long as she logged into the game, Xia Guixuan wouldn’t suspect that she was actually Gongsun Jiu.
In fact, she had already secretly sneaked into the capital city.
Of course, the main purpose was to deceive others and make them think that Gongsun Jiu was still in Donglin, but in fact she had other plans.
And also to hide it from Xia Guixuan. She always felt uneasy under his gaze, afraid he would see something.
But this performance was wasted on a blind man; Xia Guixuan really didn’t suspect that she and Gongsun Jiu were the same person. Seeing her rare coquettishness, he chuckled. “Let’s just chat in the game, no need for competitive matches.”
Xiao Jiu ended the call happily.
A few minutes later, the two appeared together in Xiao Jiu’s private Room 404.
During the eye contact, Xiao Jiu’s face turned a bit red, as if she had just realized that they had logged off here last time, and it had happened multiple times.
This kind of intimacy was actually a bit excessive. Usually, only couples would act this way because this was a private room. Besides boyfriends and girlfriends, who would repeatedly log on and off here?
Of course, for her, it was a bit special…
In the game, she was a bit more indulgent than usual, far more than most people.
Because “it’s just a game”.
“Have a seat.” Xiao Jiu pulled Xia Guixuan to sit on the sofa together and said with a smile, “This time, the rewards didn’t include you, but the deputy marshal told me privately that you were actually the main contributor. It seems a bit unfair to you…”
Xia Guixuan chuckled. “Gongsun Jiu already told me. I don’t want that kind of reward anyway. I asked him to give it to Yan Wuyue, but I don’t know if he did?”
Xiao Jiu’s smile disappeared in an instant. “What’s the relationship between you and Yan Wuyue?”
“Uh…” Xia Guixuan wondered, “Are you dissatisfied on behalf of your brother, or for yourself?”
Xiao Jiu was stunned for a moment and then grunted without saying anything.
Of course, it was for herself.
But even in the game, she and him were just “teammates,” at most, she was a girl being carried by him. Others might see it as ambiguous, but in reality, they were just friends. Who had the right to dictate who someone befriended in real life…
She felt a bit aggrieved as she sniffled and muttered, “Apart from attributing the credit for negotiating with the divine descendants to Yan Wuyue, there was nothing else I could do. Everything else is plain for all to see, so I couldn’t just add credits randomly. Only this mission, which most people don’t understand what happened…”
“Well, that’s okay. I thought he wouldn’t even give that to Yan Wuyue. Now that you’ve done this, why are you still acting like you’re sorry to me?”
“You think it’s only natural, but I think it’s unfair to you. Can’t I?”
“Ha…” Xia Guixuan laughed, “Why, you still want to compensate me privately?”
Xiao Jiu’s cheeks were slightly red, and she actually thought so.
Xia Guixuan’s situation was extremely special, and he himself hadn’t intended to receive any reward, so he skipped it. However, from the perspective of the deputy marshal, this amounted to recognition without reward, and it was even recognition of the main contribution without reward, which really went against Gongsun Jiu’s principles of leading troops. No matter how you looked at it, it felt off.
Since he couldn’t reward openly, Xiao Jiu thought to herself, how about rewarding privately?
Of course, private rewards couldn’t possibly be in the identity of Gongsun Jiu.
And then, after a bit of a quarrel with him, she almost got into an argument. In reality, there was no need to apologize for this, because neither of them was at fault. In the game, however, the identities didn’t matter, so apologizing and calling him Big Brother Tai Kang wouldn’t matter; once they left the game, they wouldn’t know each other.
Unconsciously twisting her clothes’ hem, Xiao Jiu’s fingers twisted like braids, and she spoke softly, like a mosquito’s buzz, “Privately rewarding you should be fine. How would you like to be rewarded…”
“Hey, are you serious? That’s something Gongsun Jiu owes. Why should you reward me? Did he ask you to do this? Because he saw our game video and knew we were close? Does he think this is some feudal aristocratic family, and he’s the patriarch, while you, as a lowly daughter, are treated like an object?”
Xiao Jiu blinked her eyes in surprise at his refusal, but deep down, she felt a bit happy.
He’s sticking up for me?
Xia Guixuan became increasingly dissatisfied as he spoke. “I don’t care what Gongsun Jiu is thinking. Winning people’s hearts doesn’t happen like this. What does he take you for?”
Xiao Jiu laughed out loud, and the tension she had from twisting her clothes’ hem disappeared. Instead, she shook his arm and said, “No, this is just something I thought of myself. Why would he tell me such details… If we talk about Gongsun Jiu owing you, it’s not entirely true. It’s the Great Xia that owes you. As a citizen of the Great Xia, can’t I thank you myself?”
“Don’t put yourself on such a high pedestal, representing Great Xia to thank me…” Xia Guixuan chuckled, “This sense of ownership is really… Is it because you’re from the Gongsun family, treating Great Xia as your own?”
Xiao Jiu didn’t want to hear any of this. She huffed, “If you don’t want it, fine. I’m not as big as Yan Wuyue, okay.”
Xia Guixuan naturally knew she was just using an excuse to get closer to him. If he took advantage of the situation, it probably wouldn’t be a problem to take a bite. However, after interacting with Yan Wuyue, Yin Xiaoruo, and Xiao Jiu one after another in a single day, Xia Guixuan really felt that something was off with himself. So, he intentionally changed the subject.
Seeing Xiao Jiu pouting, he said, “You… before you were Hua Mulan who was not happy about your female body, look at what you have become now?”
Xiao Jiu snorted coldly. “It’s all because of you. Every time I wanted to fight, you protected me like a delicate flower. You wouldn’t even let me get injured. How can I shine the cold light on iron armor like this? Anyway, this account is ruined, so whatever.”
Xia Guixuan couldn’t help but laugh. “Yes, yes, it’s all my fault.”
“Without Hua Mulan, I’m just a girl, Xiao Jiu. If you’re not interested, forget it.” Xiao Jiu rolled her eyes with a sigh that seemed to say she was putting her heart out there, only to have it go unappreciated. Then she disdainfully moved a few inches away from him. “You’re such a stubborn man, just like Gongsun Jiu. You hide things in your heart and deceive yourself.”
“Gongsun Jiu… deceiving himself?”
“Of course, do you think he really enjoys standing so stiff with that poker face?”
“Hmm…” Xia Guixuan looked at the ceiling in a daze, deceiving himself… Gongsun Jiu did, and maybe he did too. Perhaps they both know this deep down, yet they can’t change it, and it’s unclear whether they’re doing it for themselves or for others to see.
Indeed, they were two of a kind.
Xia Guixuan pondered this for a while and eventually turned it into this statement: “Self-discipline is a good thing.”
Xiao Jiu rolled her eyes again, “Yes, yes, a good thing. That’s the whole point of games existing.”
Xia Guixuan paused for a moment and then chuckled, “That actually makes some sense.”
Xiao Jiu sneered, “No matter how much sense it makes, right now this girl is unhappy, so whatever you want, you’re not getting it.”
“Alright.” Xia Guixuan didn’t want anything anyway and simply changed the subject. “You said you had a secret to show me. Is this it?”
“…” Xiao Jiu suddenly remembered that the reason she had called him into the game wasn’t for this, and she looked a bit embarrassed, “Hold on a second.”
Then, she fumbled around her body, and from some unknown place, she pulled out a set of documents strangely. “These are some additional data I snuck in through a backdoor interface in the military’s game. Even if someone is monitoring private rooms intentionally, they can’t see anything.”
“Once I log out, I’ll erase any traces, and it’ll be like it never existed. This is way more secure than communicating via our wristwatches. Those things are a bit dodgy; after all, the Great Xia Telecom Company isn’t in the hands of the Gongsun family…”
Xia Guixuan squinted his eyes, “Is this the classified file I asked Gongsun Jiu for?”
“Yes.”
“You seem to have a pretty good relationship with him if he lets you pull something like this off.”
“Of course,” Xiao Jiu whispered, “After all, we’re practically family. I’ve read the file too, and honestly, these so-called top-secret files feel a bit fake. Take a look, and then we can discuss it.”
Xia Guixuan glanced through it quickly and understood everything.
In reality, the so-called internal conflict between humans and divine descendants was not special at all. In fact, it was more of a cliché story that was somewhat predictable and bordered on mundane.