Ch29 - Ring.

Edited by kat, Noks, and yuuki

It was very obvious that Mo Chen was afraid of something.

In the dark, without any light, he became so afraid that he couldn’t even stand up. After the light came back on, he looked much better, so Wen Xi naturally thought that Mo Chen was afraid of the dark.

However, a mere fear of the dark wouldn’t produce such a strong reaction.

At the moment, Mo Chen was still a little short of breath, and he looked like a drowning man who had just been dragged out of water.

Mo Chen took a deep breath and finally recovered his voice, and then responded lightly to Wen Xi, “A little bit.”

——Are you afraid of the dark?

——A little bit.

You had such a big reaction, and you want to tell me you’re a little bit scared?!

Wen Xi gave Mo Chen a look that clearly stated “I haven’t studied much, but don’t lie to me,” but in the end he didn’t actually say anything. After bending down to pick up Mo Chen’s bag, he naturally hooked arms with Mo Chen and said, “Let’s go ba.”

Mo Chen was stunned for a moment. He looked down and stared at Wen Xi’s arm hooked around his. Before he could react, he was led away by Wen Xi into walking forward a few steps. He suddenly stopped and said, “Wait, let me wash my hands.”

“Oh…” Wen Xi wasn’t quite reassured as he let him go. Seeing that he was able to go and wash his hands in the sink normally, he realized that Mo Chen had already recovered and secretly let out a sigh of relief.

After Mo Chen washed his hands, he finally realized something and asked, “You’re not going to use the bathroom?”

Wen Xi replied, “No.”

Mo Chen asked, “Then what did you come to the bathroom for?”

“I came to find you ah,” Wen Xi blurted out. Originally, he would have added, “The power went out, and I was worried about you,” but after hesitating for a moment, he decided not to say it since the current atmosphere wasn’t appropriate for such jokes.

However, what he didn’t know was that those four words, “came to find you ah,” stabilized Mo Chen’s mood a lot, and made him feel very relieved.

Although he was acting as though nothing had happened, in fact, he was still afraid of the sudden darkness from just before.

The moment everything went dark, the despair of “No matter how hard I try, I can’t escape,” wrapped him up in a flash. He had lost control of his breathing, heartbeat, and body in an instant.

If Wen Xi hadn’t opened the door and let that faint light enter his world, he might have already fainted by now.

After he finished washing his hands, he turned around and stared fixedly at Wen Xi for awhile.

Wen Xi felt a little uneasy after being stared at for so long and hesitantly said, “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing… Let’s go ba,” Mo Chen said, taking the lead to turn around and leave the bathroom.

Although Wen Xi still had some doubts, he didn’t think too much about them, and followed him back to the private room.

What he didn’t know was that the reason why Mo Chen had stared at him just now was because he was waiting for him to reach out and help him the way he had done just before—hooking their arms to walk together.

However, once Wen Xi saw that Mo Chen could walk by himself, he no longer thought to do that.

Mo Chen also knew this, so although he felt that it was a pity, he didn’t say anything.

Soon after the two returned to the private room, the dishes began to arrive one after another.

Mo Chen poured a drink for Wen Xi, and then chatted with him while eating.

Everything was back on track, as if nothing had happened previously.

However, Wen Xi knew that Mo Chen’s episode from just now couldn’t have just been his imagination.

He hesitated for a long time, but still couldn’t help but ask, “Do your teammates know that you’re afraid of the dark?”

After hearing his question, Mo Chen paused, and his chopsticks, with which he was reaching out to grab some food, froze in midair.

He didn’t expect that Wen Xi still hadn’t forgotten about what had just happened even after they had been chatting for such a long time.

Knowing that Wen Xi was worried about him, he sighed and replied, “They know. You can rest assured, my teammates are all very good people, and they won’t let me be in any kind of… place where I feel uncomfortable. Today just counts as an unexpected situation.”

Wen Xi didn’t miss the meaning behind his words—He talked about places that would make him uncomfortable, and not about dark places specifically. So, what Mo Chen was afraid of wasn’t darkness, but a certain environment?

It couldn’t be… claustrophobia?

Wen Xi didn’t know if he should ask any further. He was very worried about Mo Chen, but he also felt that his relationship with Mo Chen still wasn’t that good enough that he could get to the bottom of the matter.

However, Mo Chen looked more reliable than he did, so he should be able to take care of himself?

Thinking like this, Wen Xi didn’t ask anything else in the end.

However, he was even more firmly determined to play professionally, and hated that he couldn’t just break into the top 10 of the overseas servers overnight, sign with CLM, and fight alongside Mo Chen.

After lunch, Mo Chen didn’t send Wen Xi directly home, but instead went to a jewelry store.

Wen Xi: ???

What man would take another man into a jewelry store?!

Fortunately, Wen Xi’s figured it out very quickly—Oh, did they happen to pass by it ba? It should have nothing to do with him… Did Mo Chen want to buy his girlfriend something?

So why did he follow him in?

Wen Xi hesitated and slowed down, helplessly watching Mo Chen approach the counter. He took out a small strip of paper from his bag and handed it to the little Jiejie behind the counter, saying, “I’m here to fetch the ring I ordered before.”

The little Jiejie took the strip of paper and looked at it. She spoke to Mo Chen with a slight smile, “Okay Mr. Mo, please wait a moment.”

After speaking, she handed Mo Chen a small box.

Mo Chen thanked her, and then right under the little Jiejie’s surprised gaze, stuffed the box at Wen Xi, who was behind him.

Wen Xi: ???

Uh, did he want him to help hold it for a bit?

Wen Xi took the box in a daze, and was surprised at how it felt lighter than he expected.

He hadn’t even figured out what had happened when he heard Mo Chen say, “You helped me today, so this can count as a token of my gratitude.”

“Ah?” Wen Xi looked up to meet Mo Chen’s gaze in disbelief, thinking that he had heard wrong.

Before he realized what Mo Chen had said, Wen Xi had seriously suspected that he had ordered a ring for someone else, but then had randomly turned around and given it to him.

After all, it was impossible to order and receive a ring on the same day ah!

Today’s event was obviously an accident, but the gift had been prepared in advance. No matter how you thought about it, it was too strange ba!

Besides, who would use a ring as a token of appreciation?!

Mo Chen didn’t mind Wen Xi’s surprise and asked with a smile, “You’re not going to open it and take a look?”

Wen Xi was stunned for a moment and instinctively looked down at the box in his hand.

Right oh, he hadn’t opened it yet. How could he be sure that there must be a ring in it?

Wen Xi hesitantly opened the box—Okay, it was a ring.

It was just that the shape of this ring was inexplicably strange?

Wen Xi looked at it carefully for a long time, before finally realizing—it was Mac! The shape of this ring spelled out Mac!

And these three linked letters weren’t just typed out in a random font, because this was Mac’s autograph, the one that he wrote with his own hand!

Wen Xi took the ring out of the box and looked at it carefully for a long time. Only after a while did he remember Mo Chen’s existence. He raised his head doubtfully and asked him, “Why are you giving me a ring you ordered in the shape of your signature?”

Mo Chen blinked innocently and said, “Aren’t you my fan? I thought you’d really like this gift.”

“How did you know I am…” Wen Xi spoke halfway, then thought of the livestream a few days ago. The video of him and Ruby praising Mac had been shared everywhere, so it couldn’t be that Mo Chen had also seen it?!

Thinking of this possibility, Wen Xi felt a little embarrassed, and instinctively shifted his head away to avoid Mo Chen’s gaze.

He still hadn’t realized what was going on when the ring in his hands was suddenly taken away by Mo Chen.

“Eh?!” Wen Xi subconsciously turned and wanted to snatch it back. He asked, “What are you doing?”

Mo Chen had just wanted to help him put it on, but after seeing his reaction, he raised his eyebrows and thought it was rather funny. He deliberately said, “If you don’t want it, then give it back to me.”

“I want it!” Wen Xi didn’t even think about it before he blurted that out, but after remembering the little Jiejie behind the counter, he glanced over at her awkwardly.

The little Jiejie looked down at the bill and pretended not to see or hear anything.

Mo Chen didn’t care about these details. He took Wen Xi’s hand with a smile and slid the customized ring onto his left ring finger, asking him, “Do you like it? This gift?”

Wen Xi lifted the hand wearing the ring and looked at it silently. He asked, “Why didn’t you just directly send me a piece of paper with your signature on it?”

“There’s no sincerity in that,” Mo Chen replied, “I’ve told you before, you’re special to me, so my signature for you should of course be a bit more special.”

“I didn’t ask you for one…” Wen Xi murmured.

Mo Chen repeated, “If you don’t want it, then give it back to me.”

Wen Xi snorted and stuffed his left hand with the ring on it into his pocket.

He still felt that it was strange for men to give rings to each other, even if it was an idol giving it to his fans.

However, he had to admit that after he found out that the ring was Mo Chen’s special signature for him, he was very happy.

He felt that he should let Mo Chen know that he was pleased, so he stopped acting bashful and said seriously, “Thank you. I like it very much.”

“As long as you like it,” Mo Chen said while gently laughing, but in his heart, he was thinking—once you’ve put on my ring, you’re my person now. Don’t imagine that you can go to another team!

The two left the jewelry store one after the other.

Little did they know that after they had just left, the little Jiejie behind the counter posted on her Moments with the expression of an auntie: I’ve run into a real CP AHHHHHH!

*

When Wen Xi finally returned home, the first thing he did was turn on his computer, in preparation to continue practicing with guns and farming more points.

After seeing the ring on his hand, he instinctively wanted to take it off, but after taking it off, he hesitantly put it back on.

He suddenly realized—Huh? Why was it on his left hand’s ring finger? Was there a special meaning?

He was too lazy to check, so decided to forget about it and not worry about that anymore….

Ultimately, in order not to affect his maneuvers, Wen Xi took off the ring and put it back into the box.

Then he put the box in a place where he could see it at any time.

He decided that the next time he was free, he would go buy a red string or something so that he could wear it around his neck.

After staring at the box for a few seconds in a daze again, Wen Xi finally focused back on the computer screen and whole-heartedly started playing the game.

He played all the way until Ai Zhe and Ruby came online.

“Oh, bro, you’re very early today ma?” Ai Zhe was a little surprised on finding Wen Xi online as soon as he came online, and so said, “Don’t tell me that you got up early to practice with guns, and you’ve been training until now.”

Wen Xi raised an eyebrow and replied, “How did you know I got up early to practice with guns?”

He had only told Blue Wolf about this matter oh?

Ai Zhe was stunned for a moment, and only then realized that he had made a slip of the tongue. He responded very calmly, “I heard Wolf Ge say it. We live in the same building and often see each other, so I knew.”

Ruby heard Wen Xi’s comment and helped him ask, “You often see each other, so you also eat all your meals together ba?”

“Once in a while ba,” Ai Zhe’s tone was a bit perfunctory while answering, and it was clear that he didn’t want to continue this topic.

At this moment, his computer screen showed his list of his friends. Seeing Wen Xi’s ID, he clicked on it randomly and looked at his profile. As a result, he was surprised by his points and ranking, and then exclaimed, “Wtf! You’ve become so great, my Xi! Can you explain why your ranking rose by so much all of a sudden?!”

——Wen Xi’s points had already exceeded those of his main account’s!

Wen Xi didn’t intend to hide his desire to play professionally, and he replied, “After watching the league, I suddenly wanted to play professionally, so recently I’ve been farming points.”

“Good luck ah!” Ai Zhe encouraged him, “If it’s you, you really may be able to do it!”

“Ha ha, good luck!” Ruby also said, “I’m looking forward to seeing you use your bow in the professional league ah! It will definitely scare scores of people to death!”

En… His debut probably would frighten a lot of people to death. After all, he could use the bow to such an extent, and so far, besides himself, Wen Xi hadn’t met a second person who could do something like this.

Because Wen Xi’s ranking had gone up, Ai Zhe and Ruby began to team up with him using their main accounts.

The teammate that the three of them matched with was good, but their enemies were also good, so the level of difficulty went up by several grades.

But with Wen Xi there, they managed to take first place pretty much once every three matches, and their ranking in the other two matches also wasn’t too bad.

Not mentioning Ai Zhe and Ruby, even the stream followers in all three of their livestreams could feel it—Wen Xi had gotten stronger, and was serious about playing professionally.

Ai Zhe said, “I feel a little helpless all of a sudden.”

Ruby asked, “Because you’ve regressed too much?”

Ai Zhe said, “…Tch, even if I do count as having regressed, I’m still a bit stronger than you!”

Causing bloodbaths in the rookie concentration camps really had caused a regression in skills.

Ai Zhe, who was now using his main account again, was unable to do as well as he wanted to. He obviously felt that he was not playing as well as he had been before.

——It used to be him carrying his teammates to fly up in the rankings, but now it was actually Wen Xi who was carrying him to fly.

It seemed that he also needed to find some time to practice with his guns.

*

When Wen Xi ended his livestream, he didn’t exit the game, and continued to farm points in solo matches.

After making up his mind to play professionally, he was really racing against the clock to farm points, and he felt that there weren’t enough hours in a day to do all that he needed to.

However, as though he knew that he would be so desperate, Momo came online during his evening livestream session.

——Yes, Momo! Mac’s side account, after more than half a month, had finally come online again!

After logging on, he almost immediately sent a message to Wen Xi—

Momo: Don’t work so desperately. If you find that your wrist or arm is sore, you must immediately stop and take a good rest.

Seeing this message, Wen Xi felt a little excited.

Clearly he had just met up with Mo Chen at noon, but when he saw the message from Momo, he realized he had missed this version of him, as though he was meeting an old friend whom he had not seen for a long time.

Wency: Mhm, I’ll take care.

Wency: Team up?

While Wen Xi was sending these two messages, he didn’t notice that the barrage in the lower right corner had suddenly started boiling up. It scrolled by so fast that the naked eye couldn’t keep up with it.

God knows how long the MoXi CP fans had been waiting for this day!

[AHHHHHHH Momo!!!]

[He finally came online! This news is so exhilarating that everyone must celebrate and inform the rest of the world!]

[We can see MoXi fighting side by side, slaughtering everything in their path again?!]

However, Mo Chen replied—

Momo: No, I just logged in to see you.

Saying it like that…

Although it meant that he wasn’t teaming up with Wen Xi, these words still provided a lot of fluff for their CP fans.

For a moment, the screen was full of the four letters— [awsl].

Wen Xi shrugged his shoulders helplessly and typed his response.

Wency: Okay, that’s fine. You have a good rest.

Soon after Wen Xi sent this sentence, Mo Chen went offline.

It was obvious that he really had just logged in to see him. To be exact, he came online to remind him not to work too hard and to pay attention to his body.

Wen Xi picked up his cellphone and looked at it. Sure enough, he had received an identical message from Mo Chen a few minutes ago.

Did Mo Chen just specially log into the game to remind him because he hadn’t replied to his first message?

Wen Xi couldn’t help laughing. Blue Wolf, who had been silent the whole time, suddenly opened his mouth, “What’s the situation? Is Momo online? I have to say, he just came online, and you guys are already acting like this?”

Wen Xi let out a “huh?”, not understanding what was going on.

Blue Wolf spoke again, “The number of people in my livestream suddenly dropped by half. I was so scared that I thought I had accidentally turned on the camera…”

Wen Xi was stunned for a moment, before comprehending the Easter Egg in Blue Wolf’s words, and then couldn’t help but start laughing. Only after a long time did he manage to stop laughing and ask, “How shocking do you look?”

“Nonsense, what a handsome wolf I am,” Blue Wolf replied, “It’s just that I haven’t cleaned up my place in awhile, and it’s really messy… I was really scared just now. I actually thought that all of my stream followers were addicted to cleanliness. ”

Wen Xi didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

Blue Wolf said, “Speaking of which, can you two big men not always be this ambiguous?”

Wen Xi raised an eyebrow—do you actually have the qualifications to say that to me oh?

Wen Xi was too lazy to respond to him, and decisively shifted the topic, “Let’s start ba. Today, I’ll still end the livestream an hour or two ahead of time.”

Blue Wolf replied, “Okay.”

Wen Xi asked, “Speaking of which, what’s your rank on the overseas servers now?”

Blue Wolf replied, “A bit more than 60.”

Wen Xi said, “En…. You were a bit more than 60 yesterday too.”

Blue Wolf retorted, “….Don’t mention it anymore.”

Wen Xi looked up at the ceiling.

He felt that whether he could escape from wearing women’s clothing in the overseas servers was something that could yet be determined, but Blue Wolf was already on the road to ruin.

——Let you set up a flag, you deserve it~

—

Juurensha: ….Mo Chen that’s so extra, giving a ring of your signature to someone who you still think you just want as a teammate. (Although maybe he’ll figure out feelings soon????)

Yuu: No, pretty sure he’s already hella bent for Wen Xi OvO

Noks: Xixi’s reaction to it too… It’s mutual denseness with these two for now….

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