CH 48

TL: Hua

After making an appointment with the two of them for the next online time, Ji Mingjiang exited the holographic space. When he opened his eyes, it was 4:20 in the afternoon, and Clarice hadn’t come back yet.

The impact of intensively dealing with those ugly and weird creatures has not yet manifested itself in the holographic space, but when Ji Mingjiang returned to the peaceful bedroom, a sense of exhaustion came up belatedly.

The autumn wind, with a hint of berry sweetness, came in through the open window. Ji Mingjiang swam to the side of the French window, and the whole fish lay comfortably on the water.

In the tranquility of the autumn sunset, Ji Mingjiang emptied his mind, allowing his thoughts to sink into his calm spiritual sea.

It wasn’t until a sudden rattle from the doorway woke Ji Mingjiang from his sleepiness that he realized he had fallen asleep floating on the water at some point.

Seeing the figure who opened the door and walked in, Ji Mingjiang froze for a moment before slowly swimming in front of him.

“Mr. Rowlett?”

Looking at the steward who took out the food from the space button and put it on the mermaid table, Ji Mingjiang asked doubtfully while helping clean up, “Where’s Clarice?”

When Rowlett came in, he glanced at the time on the light brain. It was already six o’clock. Clarice was that busy at work today?

Or did he get troubled by the people from the primary beastmen protection center again?

Thinking of this, Ji Mingjiang narrowed his eyes slightly. In tomorrow’s live broadcast, he’s going to expose them.

The old chief steward’s face remained unchanged, and he smiled kindly and said to Ji Mingjiang, who appeared worried, “His Majesty has a lot of work to do recently, so he asked me to bring dinner to you first. He won’t be back until later today.”

Ji Mingjiang didn’t doubt him. After nodding, his attention was quickly drawn to the thick white yam, goji berries, and crucian carp soup with the lid lifted.

“Your Majesty mentioned before that you seem to like the soup made from yams, so I told the kitchen to make some tonight, which happens to be very suitable for drinking in autumn.”

Rowlett was a little emotional when he said this. Who would have thought that His Majesty could even notice the mermaid’s food preference? He would always sneer when he and Oddo persuaded him to match with a mermaid.

Tsk tsk tsk, the ancestral genes of the Clarice family are really powerful.

Seeing Ji Mingjiang flick his tail happily after taking a sip of the soup, Rowlett heaved a sigh of relief and left the room.

After closing the bedroom door, his calm and indifferent expression was replaced by worry in an instant.

After passing through a few corridors, Rowlett came to a door that didn’t fit in with the surroundings. The sound of knocking on the specially made and reinforced door was very dull.

After a few minutes, Leiden’s voice, which was not much different from usual, came from the communication device next to the door.

“Did he notice anything wrong?”

“No, he believed my explanation that you are busy with work and will go back later today.” After answering his question, Rowlett couldn’t help but persuade, “Your Majesty, while you can still control your behavior, why don’t you let Mr. Ji come to give you spiritual counseling? After the last counseling, your spiritual sea is obviously much more stable than before.”

“I have my own considerations, Rowlett.” Leiden had anticipated what he would say and tactfully but resolutely rejected his proposal as soon as Rowlett’s voice fell.

Out of concern that the old chief steward who still treated him as a child would be too worried, Leiden deliberately relaxed his tone a lot, saying: “I know the state of my spiritual sea well; I’m just a little restless today; it can’t be compared to one a year ago. It’s not too late to ask Ji Minjiang to help with spiritual counseling when I get back tonight.”

After some persuasion, Rowlett’s sighing voice and the sound of footsteps gradually receding finally came out of the communication device.

After confirming that there was no sound outside the door, Leiden frowned and closed the communicator.

The pale light shone brightly in the room where he was located, and there was no other decoration except for chairs fixed to the wall with straps. Even after multiple repairs to the wall, some scratches could still be seen in the corners.

Leiden didn’t sit on the chair but leaned his body against the wall, his drooping eyelids covering his increasingly violent gilt eyes.

The black dragon in the spiritual sea wantonly spread its wings and destroyed the luxuriant forest. The other half of the cliff was smashed into gravel, rolling down the mountain. The whole spiritual scene looked like it was about to be destroyed.

But this earth-shattering movement did not appear on Leiden’s face at all. If it weren’t for the fact that his leaked mental power was smashing holes in the surrounding walls one after another, he even looked normal enough to go to another meeting.

This mental riot came too suddenly. Besides, he had just received Ji Mingjiang’s in-depth spiritual counseling not long ago, and judging from his recent stable mood, the mental riot should not have occurred at this time.

A sneer appeared at the corner of Leiden’s mouth.

If he couldn’t even tell that someone was deliberately causing trouble, then he should just give this emperor’s seat to someone else.

Recalling his itinerary for the day, faces and their corresponding names flashed through his mind.

In the end, he singled out an ordinary employee who belonged to the government.

“Menguse Hollimawi…”

An unknown surname, not even a minor nobleman, but Leiden did not ignore his doubts because of this too ordinary background.

In other words, Menguse Hollimawi’s ordinary life experience made his behavior even more abrupt.

After all, where would an ordinary person get a tube of a potion that looks no different from a nutrient solution but whose pungent odor can cause a mental riot?

As for whether it was targeting him alone or the intrigue among the office staff, after today, the test reports of the other people who were present at the time will be placed on his desk, and then he can consider the next move.

But the most important thing right now is to suppress this mental riot.

However, something very unexpected happened to Leiden.

Ji Mingjiang’s spiritual counseling even includes after-sales services!

He was originally prepared to stay in this room until midnight and to go back after the black dragon went crazy and destroyed the forest seventy or eighty times.

Unexpectedly, the forest had just been reborn three times, and the Black Dragon, with a lack of interest, gathered its wings and landed on the cliff. Then it nestled its claws, snorted in displeasure, and fell asleep.

After the spiritual sea returned to calm, the overflowing mental power also automatically returned to Leiden’s side.

Leiden, who felt that the mental riot was not that painful for the first time, was a little taken aback.

Ji Mingjiang really brought him many surprises that he never dared to imagine before.

When he heard the door open again, Ji Mingjiang was watching the discussion about him on the game forum with relish.

In less than half a month, Yu Quanquanquan has shifted from the primary field to the advanced field and now ranks very high on the thousand people list.

The forum opened countless threads because of his starship-like upgrade speed, all of which are speculations about his identity and background, and each one is more outrageous than the last.

When Clarice came to him, he had just read an article guessing that he was a general who had been ostracized by the Federation and then turned to the Empire and put all his energy into the holographic reality game.

There is also a reasonable explanation for his behavior of wearing a cloak all day and not revealing his real name: he doesn’t want to be discovered by others, he doesn’t want to be suspected by the empire and cause diplomatic turmoil again, and so on.

Reasonable and convincing.

This comment was also supported by many people.

If it weren’t for the fact that he was the person in question, Ji Mingjiang would almost have believed the claim.

This conjecture and today’s hot search, #ClariceMermaid# make Ji Mingjiang feel so complicated that he doesn’t know what to say.

“What are you looking at?”

“Someone is making up some ridiculous identity for me…wait!”

Hearing the voice from above his head, Ji Mingjiang first adjusted the floating screen of the light brain to public mode while answering his question, and then he suddenly noticed that there was something wrong with Clarice’s mental power and raised his head.

Then he happened to hit the chin that was hanging above his head as Clarice moved his head down.

“hiss……”

When it hit him, Ji Mingjiang didn’t even react until Clarice made a sound, and then he looked at the other person’s chin with a hint of guilt.

…Help, why is it so red!

Ji Mingjiang watched in horror as Clarice’s jaw became red and swollen rapidly. He trembled and reached out his hand, but as soon as he reached halfway, he was tightly gripped by Clarice, who looked confused and alert.

“What do you want to do?”

Feeling the delicate skin under his grip, Leiden’s first reaction was to worry about what would happen to his wrist, but before he could loosen the grip, the swollen pain in his jaw quickly reminded him of what just happened.

“…Is your head made of some synthetic material?”

Looking at Ji Mingjiang’s innocent face and guilt-ridden eyes, Leiden asked incredulously.

Although his special military jacket was torn when he met Ji Mingjiang on the first day, he really thought it was just a matter of workmanship or the sharp nails of the mermaid at work!

As for tearing up the mecha by hand, it was in the holographic space after all, and tearing up a mecha with another mecha, although it was a bit outrageous, was within his understanding.

However, his body, which had been strengthened since he mutated towards the black dragon, was forcibly knocked out with a large red mark?

“Cough.” Hearing this accusing question, Ji Mingjiang turned his wrist a little uncomfortably and said, “You let go of me first; I will pay attention to it later. I just want to confirm that your jaw is not broken ……”

“It’s not that serious.”

Leaving this sentence behind, Leiden let go of his wrist, got up, and went to the side to find the medical kit.

Although this wasn’t really an injury, he still needed to see some people tomorrow, so it would be safer to take some medicine.

Seeing that Clarice didn’t care about it, Ji Mingjiang touched the top of his head, which didn’t feel any pain, and lay down by the pool.

“Don’t try to change the subject; what’s the matter with your mental power?”

When he walked to him just now, the leaked mental power was almost entangled with him. Although he could feel that the state of the mental power was very stable and had no tendency to attack, it did not mean that Clarice’s spiritual sea was now in a healthy state.

The figure who was bending over to look for medicine on the opposite side obviously froze. How could Ji Mingjiang not understand when he saw this?

“You weren’t dealing with any work tonight, were you? You didn’t look for me when you had a mental riot and suffered through it all by yourself?”

Upon hearing this resolute questioning, Leiden stood up helplessly and turned his head to look at Ji Mingjiang, who was clearly unhappy.

The mermaid’s tail made a clattering sound on the water surface, as if telling him that if he dared to go over, the tail dared to slap him in the face.

Ji Mingjiang noticed that Clarice silently took a step back, and a question mark slowly popped up above his head.

Is this emperor a three-year-old child? He didn’t follow the doctor’s orders and didn’t take his body seriously. When facing him, who was equivalent to a doctor, his first reaction was to run back? ? ?

Because of his heart disease, Ji Mingjiang, who listened to the doctor’s advice no matter how much he longed for outdoor sports, was very puzzled.

It was probably through Ji Mingjiang’s eyes that he realized the inadequacy of his behavior. Leiden sighed and walked to Ji Mingjiang with the ointment in his hand.

“You’re responsible for the injuries; can you apply some medicine for me?”

A tube of green, packaged ointment was stuffed into his hand. Looking at Clarice sitting cross-legged in front of him and his chin, which was getting more and more red and swollen with time, Ji Mingjiang clicked his tongue unhappily and swung his tail forward.

The semi-transparent ointment with a hint of plant fragrance was squeezed onto the mermaid’s fingers, and the fingers that had just been lifted out of the water carried some cold vapor. Ji Mingjiang put his two fingers together very rudely and then wiped them heavily on Clarice’s jaw.

“I think you should thank me for grinding my nails lately.”

If it weren’t for the fact that the mermaid’s nails, which could be used as a murderous weapon, had been patiently ground into a short, rounded curve by him, there would be a few more injuries on Clarice’s chin.

The effect of the ointment was immediate, and not long after it was applied, the original redness and swelling subsided a lot. Ji Mingjiang took the wet tissue handed over by Clarice and wiped his hands. “So what’s going on? You picked me up just to let me do spiritual counseling for you, and now you’re leaving me aside when something really happens?”

As he said that, the mental power that he released when applying ointment for Clarice just now was poking at the blocked mental barrier with dissatisfaction, but he didn’t dare to use too much force for fear of breaking the barrier again.

Feeling the mental power that sometimes spreads into a pool of water lying on his mental barrier and sometimes turns into a few tentacles whipping the mental barrier to express his dissatisfaction, knowing that if he can’t give a reasonable explanation, Ji Mingjiang definitely won’t let it go. Leiden had no choice but to say what he had guessed just now.

In the end, he pushed Ji Mingjiang’s mental power that was wandering outside, saying, “Take your mental power back first; I plan to keep it in this state and see the reactions of those people at the meeting tomorrow morning.”

Although he didn’t think that the man behind the scenes who could instigate Menguse Hollimawi would be so impatient, it would be a good thing to use this to find out about a few people with impure thoughts.

After hearing this explanation, Ji Mingjiang was still a little dissatisfied with Clarice’s behavior of not caring about his mental state, but since his mental power was still within the controllable range, he had to withdraw his still somewhat reluctant mental power.

“Tomorrow, if you feel that there’s something wrong with your spiritual sea, call me immediately.” Ji Mingjiang said this while setting a special notification for any message from Clarice. In this way, even if he was playing games in holographic space, he could come back in time.

Leiden watched him lower his head and seriously tinker with the light brain. The golden eyes that were a bit annoyed at the mention of this matter softened, but he didn’t take this sentence too seriously.

after all……

His eyes looked at the fish tail swaying underwater.

Even if Ji Mingjiang found out, he couldn’t rush there immediately. He couldn’t really use his tail to jump all the way from the room to the outside, right?

Sensing the gaze fixed on his tail, Ji Mingjiang withdrew from the light brain and looked up. “What are you thinking?”

He always feels like Clarice is thinking about something very offensive again.

Don’t blame him for being too suspicious. Who told Clarice to look at him with this look last time? What he said was…

“Did you jump with your tail?”

Heh, just thinking about it makes the fish’s tail have the urge to hit people.

“Nothing.”

Leiden quickly shook his head and cleared the thoughts from his mind. He had not forgotten that when he asked Ji Mingjiang the other day, he immediately received a splash of water.

“You better be.”

Seeing the figure of Clarice going to wash up, Ji Mingjiang muttered in a low voice.

After a series of unexpected events, the bedroom lights finally went out. Ji Mingjiang lay on the surface of the water; his tail made waves of gentle water, and the bright moonlight outside the window shone on the silver hair of the mermaid, making the dreary night a little more relaxed and comfortable.

But why does he always feel like he’s forgotten something?

Before the eyelids sank shut, a flash of doubt crossed Ji Mingjiang’s mind, but it was quickly overwhelmed by the sleepiness that came up.

It wasn’t until the next morning, when Ji Mingjiang turned on his light brain with a half-yawn and looked at the message sent to him by the primary beastmen protection center, that he suddenly realized what he had forgotten yesterday.

He forgot to tell Clarice about his general live broadcast plan!

What to do……

Ji Mingjiang looked at the warm greetings from the primary beastmen protection center; his eyes were fascinated.

Should he fulfill his promise to continue the live broadcast today and have Clarice report again, or should he just skip the live broadcast and play the game?

Although the appointment time with Lin Nan and the others is in the afternoon, that doesn’t mean that he can’t play by himself in the morning!

Judging from what Clarice said last night, his meeting this morning should be very important, and even if it’s not that significant, receiving an investigation call from the protection center in front of a group of people who secretly want to see him make a fool of himself isn’t nice.

Sudden Heartache.jpg

But if it’s not live…

After calming down from his preoccupied mood, Ji Mingjiang thought carefully about what he said yesterday and the reactions of those audiences who were too imaginative, and regretfully realized that his idea would probably only fall through.

Unwilling to give up, Ji Mingjiang opened the Starblog account he applied for last night. Although this account is quite new, under the two huge gimmicks, Mermaid and Emperor, his followers reached nearly one million in one night, which is a lot compared to some celebrities fans.

And this sudden increase in popularity has also brought a high level of attention.

With only one blog post that came with the system after successful registration, the number of discussions has exceeded ten million. Ji Mingjiang can simply classify these messages into three categories at a glance.

In addition to the praise that he is smart and good-looking and another kind of shocking remark that His Majesty brought back a mermaid, there was more of a heated argument on the topic of whether or not Clarice had mistreated him.

At the end of the argument, a large number of people expressed that they would continue this topic after seeing his state during the live broadcast tomorrow.

“Sure enough, I still have to live broadcast as usual.”

After sighing, Ji Mingjiang resignedly opened the chat box between himself and the primary beastmen protection center.

“Yuquanquanquan: Is anyone there?”

“Primary Beastmen Protection Center: Yes! Are you in some kind of trouble? His Majesty mistreated you, didn’t he? I know that his appearance yesterday was just a disguise. Don’t worry, we’ll take the guard team to the palace, and we definitely won’t let you continue to live this kind of fearful life anymore!”

Before Ji Mingjiang finished his next sentence, he was dazzled by the string of news from the opposite side.

He knew every word, but how could he not understand what it meant when it was combined? Did he type out a lengthy accusation against Clarice without realizing it, send it, and then delete it?

Calm down, Ji Mingjiang; you have to calm down.

He took a deep breath, rolled up his tail fin, and splashed a handful of water on his face. After feeling that his desire to curse had calmed down, Ji Mingjiang casually wiped off the water droplets hanging on his eyelashes and bowed his head to type.

“Yuquanquanquan: ?”

“Yuquanquanquan: You misunderstood; let me say it again: Clarice did not abuse me.”

“Primary Beastmen Protection Center: So that means he was only busy with work and neglected your feelings? Although this situation does not appear to be abusive, it’s also very bad. We will remind and warn His Majesty.”

“…”

“Snapped!”

Ji Mingjiang used his tail to slap the water surface with all his strength, and the warm sunlight refracted a subtle rainbow through the splashing water droplets, but this beautiful scene didn’t wash away Ji Mingjiang’s irritation.

“Yuquanquanquan: Put away your redundant thoughts, and let me say it again for the last time. There is nothing wrong with Clarice. If you can’t understand Interstellar Language, please let another person communicate with me instead.”

This time, before the message from the other side popped up, Ji Mingjiang quickly edited what he was originally going to say and sent it over.

“Yuquanquanquan: If there’s nothing else, I just want to remind you that I will start the live broadcast in a while. Clarice has his own work to deal with and isn’t by my side. It’s something we’ve discussed, and we hope your center won’t meddle too much.”

After speaking, Ji Mingjiang skillfully blocked the message from the Primary Beastmen Protection Center.

Thanks to Bernie Lavender; if it weren’t for him, he might not be so skilled at blocking people. And the consequence of not being skilled is that for just one second, he might have to see another string of words that weren’t typed by humans.

The truth is indeed as Ji Mingjiang expected; not long after he sent that paragraph, the protection center sent back to him a message.

“Original Beastman Protection Center: If this is your true opinion, we naturally won’t say anything more. However, from the perspective of being beneficial to your physical and mental health, we would still recommend that you do not make too many concessions when facing His Majesty Clarice’s demands.”

“Your message has been rejected.”

“Tsk.”

After sending that big string of moralizing words and seeing this pop-up system prompt, Gripa clicked his tongue in displeasure and looked at the light brain screen in front of him with a playful expression.

And after hearing footsteps from behind, the expression that was completely inconsistent with the character he created before was quickly replaced by worry and anger, and the originally straight back collapsed very weakly.

“What’s the matter, Gripa? Suddenly, being all listless, this isn’t like you.”

The head of the operation department of the protection center patted Gripa on the shoulder from behind and asked with great curiosity.

“Let me see, are you in charge of communicating with the matching families of those primary beastmen?” The shoulder under his hand moved, but there was no reply. Shi Yi didn’t care either. He narrowed his eyes and looked at the light brain screen fixed in public mode.

“Blocked?!”

The first thing that caught his eye was the conspicuous line “Your message has been rejected”. Shi Yi’s voice rose sharply, and after seeing who the contact on the other side was, he even needed to hold on to the table with his other hand before he could barely stabilize himself.

“You sent these…” He let go of the hand on Gripa’s shoulder and waved his hand so that Gripa didn’t have to worry about himself. After getting closer, he frowned and read the chat records of the two, and then his tone was a bit puzzled: “Although it may be a bit straightforward, it’s not a big problem.”

If the other party was the match of the primary beastmen, then Gripa’s blunt questioning might be somewhat inappropriate, but this mermaid is obviously communicating with them alone. Will this reminder and worry also offend the other party?

“It’s my fault, manager Shi.” Hearing Shi Yi’s words, a trace of ridicule flashed in Gripa’s eyes, and the moment he looked down, he changed into an expression of self-blame and guilt: “It’s me who didn’t consider Mingjiang’s reliance and trust in His Majesty Clarice. This kind of speech may be discrediting to His Majesty in his eyes. It’s normal that he would feel uncomfortable.”

Hearing what he said, Shi Yi frowned even more, but in the end, he just sighed.

“It’s human nature. You will always be more protective of those close to you. Don’t think too much about it.”

“Yeah!” Gripa was a little disappointed when he didn’t hear what he wanted to hear, but he quickly nodded heavily, and when Shi Yi straightened up, he also straightened his back, saying, “It’s our responsibility to protect the primary beastmen from harm. I will not let these minor setbacks delay my work!”

Shi Yi scratched his head, shocked at how quickly Gripa adjusted his state.

“Well, go for it.”