Genius Playground

Driven by curiosity, Wang Hao also bent down, resting his hands on his knees to examine the pattern on the stone wall.

"Why don’t you search for it online?"

Hmm.

That was indeed a good idea.

If he had seen this logo in an anime or a movie, he would surely find some clues online.

Jiang Ran took out his phone and started searching for related elements.

The result...

Nothing.

He couldn’t find any similar information, not even a single trace.

This was very strange.

This was his first time in Qin Feng’s hometown, a place that should have been completely unrelated to him.

If there was some way that he, Qin Feng, or even the other children in the village had all seen this Ferris wheel logo... the only possibility was a widely circulated anime, movie, or game.

But why wasn’t there a single trace of it online?

"Forget it."

Jiang Ran shook his head.

Memory was a nebulous thing; the more distant a memory, the more unreliable it tended to be. Instead of getting hung up on this, it was better to ask more villagers about Qin Feng’s whereabouts.

"Let’s go walk around the village."

Jiang Ran stood up and looked at Wang Hao.

"They say old people are forgetful. That old man was getting on in years, so let’s try asking some other people in the village."

"OK."

Wang Hao made a gesture.

"When we were coming in, I saw a bunch of aunties gossiping at the village entrance. That’s the real CIA intelligence center. Let’s go talk to them!"

VROOOM—

The old Jetta sped along the highway, its German internal combustion engine letting out a noisy yet reliable roar.

Wang Hao focused on driving.

Jiang Ran, meanwhile, was slouched in the passenger seat, thinking about everything related to Qin Feng.

After leaving the ruins of Qin Feng’s home, the two of them questioned many of the old men and women in the village. They all knew the Qin family and told many stories about Qin Feng’s childhood.

But that was all.

Regarding the death of Qin Feng’s father, Qin Yongxiao, the disappearance of Qin Feng and his mother, and the fire that destroyed the house... everyone’s story was basically the same. They hadn’t gotten any useful information.

Jiang Ran had originally thought this world line change was a simple matter, nothing more than Qin Feng playing a trick on him to save his father.

But he never expected that as his investigation deepened, the matter would become increasingly baffling, a tangled web of countless threads.

No clues, no leads, no answers.

Nothing at all.

A dead end.

Suddenly, Jiang Ran once again recalled the baffling Ferris wheel pattern.

He found a pen and paper in the center console’s armrest box and, stroke by stroke, drew the pattern carved on the courtyard wall—

First, a large ring, with eight small circles evenly distributed around its outer edge.

Each small circle was divided in two, with the lower half shaded black.

He then added a triangular stand at the bottom, and a flat, stick-figure drawing of a Ferris wheel appeared on the paper.

Finally, in the center of the Ferris wheel, there was a large eye with a wide, round pupil.

Seeing the pattern from the stone wall drawn on paper like this made it seem even more abstract and unsettling.

"What exactly happened ten years ago?"

He held up the piece of paper to the crimson sky, as if seeing Qin Feng’s silhouette against the setting sun.

"Qin Feng..."

’Just how many secrets are you hiding?’

...

「The next day.」

Jiang Ran and Wang Hao took the high-speed train back.

It was time to hurry up and get back to business.

The trip back to Hang City for the May Day holiday had been, for all intents and purposes, a complete waste of time.

He would have been better off staying at the school library to study circuitry and fix the Positron Cannon sooner.

As soon as he got back to school, Jiang Ran headed straight for the library.

Although the academic atmosphere at their vocational college wasn’t strong, the library had a full range of all the necessary books.

To study an old, obsolete product like a CRT picture tube, books were more period-appropriate and useful than information found online.

*Structure and Working Principles of CRT Picture Tubes*, *The Complete Guide to Television Repair*, *A Detailed Explanation of Electron Beams and Beam Convergers*, *Electronic Circuits and Fabrication*...

Jiang Ran checked out the relevant books, carried them to a desk by the window, and began to immerse himself in his studies.

He hadn’t even been sitting for half an hour when Nan Xiuxiu arrived, her long pink hair dazzling as it swayed.

Today she was wearing denim hot pants and a white T-shirt. In the sunlight, her skin was shockingly pale.

Wang Hao’s previous assessment had been right: only someone pretty, with a good figure and skin as white as snow, could pull off waist-length pink hair.

But Jiang Ran had no desire to appreciate the sight.

He just found it strange.

’It’s the May Day holiday, a rare break. Isn’t Nan Xiuxiu going out to have fun? Why is she hanging around school?’

’And besides...’

’Just three days ago, they had argued in the cafeteria, and Nan Xiuxiu had gotten so angry she’d slammed the table and stormed off.’

Jiang Ran had thought she would at least stay mad for a few days, giving him some peace and quiet.

’How did she manage to placate herself so quickly?’

’Doesn’t this woman hold a grudge at all?’

"This is for you."

Nan Xiuxiu placed a cup of coffee on the table and sat down next to him.

"Wang Hao said you were here."

’That traitor, Wang Hao...’

Jiang Ran looked at the coffee in front of him.

It seemed to be Nan Xiuxiu’s peace offering.

He didn’t say anything.

He went back to his book.

For the next few days, he spent all his time in the library.

He studied diligently, took meticulous notes, and researched everything about the obsolete technology of CRT picture tubes.

Whenever Nan Xiuxiu had free time, she would come and sit beside Jiang Ran.

She never read a book for even a second.

She came here either to play on her phone or watch TV shows, and every time she came, she would bring Jiang Ran some milk tea, coffee, or snacks.

DING.

A WeChat notification sounded. Jiang Ran realized his phone wasn’t on silent and quickly picked it up.

He saw it was a message from Xu Yan.

[Xu Yan: Jiang Ran, we worked day and night to finish filming and editing the short film. Thankfully, we submitted it to the film festival just before the deadline. Do you want to see a preview copy? Give me an email address and I can send it to you.]

Oh.

He had been so busy lately that he had completely forgotten about it.

To be honest, Jiang Ran was completely focused on his work and was in no mood to watch it.

But saying that would be too much of a downer.

[Jiang Ran: Okay, I’ll send you my email address right now. I hope you win an award at the festival. Looking forward to good news!]

After replying with his email address, Jiang Ran set his phone to silent and placed it back on the desk.

Beside him, Nan Xiuxiu glanced over.

She took off her headphones and looked at Jiang Ran.

"I think we need to talk."

"Talk about what?" Jiang Ran didn’t look up.

"I’m not saying you have to be with me every day, but we’re a couple, and we’re in the honeymoon phase of our relationship. Shouldn’t we go on a date once in a while, get a meal, go shopping, or something?"

"I still have to study," Jiang Ran said, continuing to take notes.

"..."

Nan Xiuxiu bit her lower lip, her slender eyebrows trembling.

"Jiang Ran, you’ve changed."

"How have I changed?"

"The old you wouldn’t study like this."

Nan Xiuxiu said seriously,

"I’ve never seen you read a book before. You don’t even listen in class, you just space out. Why are you acting like a completely different person now?"

"How can I get by without studying?"

Jiang Ran turned a page in his book.

"We’re already in a vocational college, so we’re starting from a low point. If I don’t study hard, what am I going to do after graduation?"

"As long as you have money, it’s fine," Nan Xiuxiu said dismissively.

Jiang Ran stopped what he was doing and looked up.

"Is your family very rich?"

"They’re okay, I guess. I think my family is pretty well-off."

"If you’re so rich, why are you in a vocational college?"

Jiang Ran couldn’t help but laugh.

"If your dad was really rich, he should have sent you to an international high school and then abroad to get a bullshit degree. Or, at the very least, you could have taken the art student track; getting into a bachelor’s program would have been a piece of cake."

"But I don’t like any of that."

Nan Xiuxiu said, twisting the ends of her hair,

"I don’t like the idea of going abroad, and I don’t like singing or painting. My parents said I can go to school wherever I want and do whatever I want in the future. They support me unconditionally."

"Right, right, right."

There was no point arguing with someone on a completely different wavelength. Jiang Ran couldn’t be bothered to debate with her.

"You’re so willful."

He picked up his pen and continued writing.

"You have a good family and good parents, so you don’t have to worry about your future life or career."

"But we’re not the same. You have the luxury of being willful. We don’t."

SWOOSH—

The pen was snatched from his hand.

Jiang Ran felt his right hand go empty, a black line of ink left behind on his palm.

"What are you doing?" he said, looking up at Nan Xiuxiu.

Nan Xiuxiu gripped the pen in her right hand, glaring at him.

"You call this being willful?"

"Is it not?" Jiang Ran retorted.

"There are a lot of things in this world I don’t like. There are movies I don’t like to watch, books I don’t like to read, things I don’t like to do, and people I don’t like."

Her voice was serious.

"My life is finite, my time and energy are finite, and the number of things I can like is also finite."

"I truly don’t understand—why should I do things that I don’t like?"

She looked directly into Jiang Ran’s eyes, her own filled with a sense of unfamiliarity.

"I haven’t hurt anyone, I haven’t broken any laws or gone against my conscience. So why is it that in your eyes..."

"...is choosing to live the life I want a form of willfulness?"