Genius Playground

After taking Cheng Mengxue back to her room, Jiang Ran went downstairs, got in the car, and told the designated driver:

"Sir, take us to this barbecue joint. Just follow the GPS."

He and Wang Hao weren’t planning on going home. Instead, they were heading to an old favorite barbecue joint near their homes.

It wasn’t that they hadn’t eaten enough.

Rather, they needed a different venue to discuss what had happened that day...

To debrief.

...

"This Cheng Mengxue is a fake."

They had just sat down at the barbecue joint, not even having ordered yet, when Jiang Ran dropped a bombshell.

"Huh?"

Wang Hao exclaimed in surprise:

"You still think that?! I thought after how cheerful things were, especially with you walking Xiaoxue up to her room, that you’d finally given up on this stupid idea!"

"You’re being completely unreasonable! You grilled Xiaoxue with all those questions. Was there a single one she couldn’t answer?"

"Whether it was about high school, our childhood, or even the day of the car crash that you’d forgotten... didn’t Xiaoxue answer every question perfectly?"

"I really don’t know where you get these crazy suspicions from. As far as I’m concerned, this Xiaoxue couldn’t be more real! She’s exactly the same Xiaoxue I knew in high school!"

"I’m telling you, Jiang Ran, just drop it. Enough is enough. You keep saying this is fake, that is fake... If we’re going by your logic, I’d say you’re the fakest one here!"

Jiang Ran waved his hand dismissively.

"I have proof."

He didn’t waste time arguing with Wang Hao and just laid out his two key pieces of evidence.

First, there was a major discrepancy with Cheng Mengxue’s alcohol tolerance.

Second, that glass bottle that was buried for more than a decade... he’d actually dug it up a long time ago. Cheng Mengxue had no memory of what the letter inside said.

"So what!"

To Jiang Ran’s surprise, Wang Hao was completely unfazed.

"Have you ever even had a drink with Xiaoxue? What makes you so sure she’s a lightweight who gets drunk after one sip?"

"Let me tell you, everyone’s body is different. You can’t just generalize."

"Someone online said that when they’re extremely angry, they can punch through a 30-centimeter-thick steel plate. Can you do that?"

"Cut the crap," Jiang Ran cut him off.

"Xiaoxue is a terrible drinker. Don’t ask how I know. It’s just a fact."

Initially, Jiang Ran hadn’t been opposed to telling Wang Hao everything—about the Positron Cannon, the Time SMS, and the Worldline Jump.

He considered Wang Hao trustworthy and had been planning to find the right moment to tell him everything. It would be good to have an ally on this Worldline 1.

But now, he decided to hold off.

Because it was obvious that Wang Hao had been completely duped by the fake Cheng Mengxue and was now firmly in her corner.

For his own safety, and to keep his most important secret from being exposed, he decided not to lay all his cards on the table with Wang Hao just yet.

"Wang Hao, I know you’re trying to make excuses, saying Xiaoxue must have been drinking a lot in the United States and built up her tolerance..."

"But don’t forget, at dinner, she said it herself—that she’d never had a drink before, that this was her first time. So there’s no way she could have ’built up her tolerance’."

"Not necessarily."

Wang Hao continued to argue:

"Think about the culture in the United States. Who there doesn’t have a drink with dinner? Xiaoxue probably just didn’t want you to get the wrong idea. She might have been afraid you don’t like girls who drink, so she told a little white lie about it being her first time."

"Besides, eating habits in the United States are completely different from those in Dragon Country. Even if she doesn’t *drink*, what about hard seltzers? Or using wine to season food when she cooks a steak? Those are all possibilities!"

"If Xiaoxue had been living in Dragon Country these past two years, I’d believe she’s a lightweight. But she spent two years living and eating in the United States! How can you be so sure different eating habits wouldn’t increase her alcohol tolerance?"

Hmph.

Jiang Ran scoffed.

"Then how do you explain the glass bottle and the letter? Xiaoxue said she couldn’t remember a single thing written in it."

"That’s perfectly normal!"

Wang Hao slapped the table.

"You just said she wrote that letter when she was seven? My God... how could you even ask such a question? Who in the world would remember a letter they wrote when they were seven!"

"Come on, Jiang Ran, prove it to me. Can you recall a single diary entry you wrote or picture you drew when you were seven?"

Jiang Ran sighed.

"How is that the same? Can you compare a special Time Capsule to some random diary entry? Shouldn’t she at least remember *something* about it?"

With that, he leaned back in his chair and looked at Wang Hao in exasperation.

"Wang Hao, you can’t just throw logic out the window and argue for the sake of arguing just to prove this Cheng Mengxue is real."

"You’re the one twisting logic!"

Wang Hao couldn’t hold back any longer and yelled:

"You’re the one who’s become obsessed with proving Xiaoxue is a fake!"

"You’re acting really weird, Jiang Ran. There’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you for the past two days—"

"Why are you so dead set on proving Xiaoxue is a fake?"

His eyes filled with bewilderment, completely unable to wrap his head around it.

"We thought our friend had tragically died. Now it turns out it was all a misunderstanding. She just went to the United States and lived off the grid for two years, and now she’s finally back with us after all this time."

"Isn’t this supposed to be great news? We should be celebrating! This is the kind of amazing news you can’t even celebrate enough, but instead you’re worried about this and that, constantly suspecting Xiaoxue is a fake."

"I just want to ask you, what do you gain if Xiaoxue is a fake? Would that make you happy? Or is it that you never wanted Xiaoxue to be alive in the first place!?"

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