Chapter 206: His Return (2)

A fox leapt out of the bushes, its fur was frayed and then immediately raised up in fear once it saw the two of them. It scurried away from both Li Yang and the floating Panda. 

It wasn't fair for the creature to even notice them in the first place as both the CEO and the creature were good at hiding their presence, the fox continued on and left them.

Thump.

"Twas just a fox." Bao said with a scrunching up of its nose.

It had been nothing then. The CEO didn't ease up on his defenses, but rather kept his guard up just in case. His gaze lingered on the fox until it was completely out of sight. 

As far as he was concerned, Li Yang already encountered his fair share of foxes and another one with a fox bloodline was going to be too much.

Not that Bao and the others from the Heavens would be able to appreciate it that much since they weren't there. 

But it was something that Li Yang kept in his mind. The World Warper was nearly charged to a hundred percent so, even if not right now, then in the future he could—

There was a scream.

"What the fuck was that? There are people in the forest?" The Panda said. 

"Are you sure that they're people—" Li Yang didn't finish his question and simply headed into the direction of the sounds. He couldn't fathom himself being late, whether it was a person in need of saving or someone he needed to kill… he was going to be there.

The man was acquainted once again with a woman's voice and though the idea of legends of supernatural creatures and other monsters lingered in the back of his head, Li Yang still arrived at the scene just in time.

There were two people in the forest like him, except they were dressed in tourist and mountain-hiking apparel. Or at least it would have been two people in the forest—except for the part where one of them was hanging around at the edge of a cliff.

Li Yang didn't realize that they were at a higher elevation.

But there wasn't time to think about it at all. 

A tall brunette woman was grabbing hold of a man and trying to heave him up. Li Yang immediately moved towards them—nearly surprised the woman that she almost accidentally let go of the man—but helped her pull him up to safety.

As he got closer and finally assisted them, he realized that the two people seemed to be in their early fifties. It was an odd situation to find himself immediately meeting people in a place like this, but he supposed that this was a place for people to visit.

It meant that they weren't too far off from society.

Or rather, they might have been far away from the cities, but not necessarily civilization. It could be a sleepy town, or even a quiet village. 

For now, Li Yang allowed the two of them first a moment to recuperate from the situation and gave his distance. Li Yang did it while ignoring the Panda that was floating around his shoulder and complaining underneath its breath.

"Must be great to finally be a hero, huh?" Bao said with a touch of scorn.

Li Yang simply ignored the creature and shifted his gaze on staring beyond the cliff. It was almost as if he had stumbled upon a place where everything was still living in the past without any signs of city lights.

Not too different from Telriah in a sense.

He really started to appreciate nature more. Instead of smoke, Li Yang thought he caught a whiff of the ocean's scent… which meant this area was near the coastal region. The idea as to why he didn't consider running on water—although possible—was the fact of whatever lurked beneath the water.

...which made his thoughts finally think of a certain individual.

Li Yang might have felt guilty if he were to suddenly ring up his family out of nowhere, but Bai Minghua or Narissa was… 

The couple behind him interrupted the man from finishing his thoughts.

"Chuanli!" The woman hugged her husband in relief.

The man returned the woman's affection and did his best to soothe her. Once he was sure that his wife was alright, his gaze landed on Li Yang. "What's your name, son? Are you some kind of forester in this place?"

Their assumption would do him a good favor, but Li Yang shook his head. "No, I was just in the area." Li Yang's grasp of the language in this country wasn't that great, but at least he managed to learn it before during his university days.

Song Chuanli  gazed at him and frowned deeply. "You remind me of someone..."

"Nothing ever good comes out of that statement." Bao remarked and flicked its paw at Li Yang. And at this moment, Li Yang might have agreed with it, except this might be a chance for him to get caught up with the news?

"I was told that I look like my brother."

"Ah, Li Chao Yun!"

Li Yang immediately blinked and said. "My father—"

"Wait—you're not the son who ran away did you? That'd be too much of a coincidence, but this is a nice play to rest in." Song Chuanli started speaking in his own language before he cleared his throat and motioned to the woman he was with. "This is my wife, Angeline Song. Thank you for helping her save my life—we're out in a little vacation here in this nice country as you know, but things started—"

"He told me that he could catch something in this forest." Angeline clicked her tongue. "If you haven't been around then this would have been our last anniversary and our daughter would have to grow up fatherless."

"Haha, you say that as if our daughter is four."

"Well, you can't expect her to take over the family business yet. Can you?"

"That's true." The man rubbed his chin, but finally looked at Li Yang up and down. "Ahem. Did you go off the grid or something? I guess it is really stressful for a young man who didn't take a break at all for the last decade, but now that you've been gone for—"

His wife held a hand over his mouth and gave Li Yang an apologetic grin. "Forgive my husband, he speaks too much. But are you really Li Yang?"

Although he did his best to remember people's names and faces, perhaps it wasn't fair for him to expect the same. Or rather… their suspicions of meeting a guy in the forest was enough to make them wary.

It was surprising that they hadn't exactly run away even if he helped save their life.

"Yes… Yes I am." Li Yang had kept his wallet in his Inventory and eventually reached behind him as if to recover it and then showed it to them. 

"Oh, it really is you!" Song Chuanli's eyes widened. "Hah, I knew I could remember someone by their face. For how long have you been here?"

"Not too long…"

He couldn't exactly just go and say that he illegally arrived here through some private jet or anything like that.  Li Yang didn't want to get into some legal trouble by presenting his identity to any authorities. If anything, that would just probably make whatever Embassy he approached suspicious of how he got here.

Whether they picked up his hesitation to speak, or something else entirely. The couple smiled at him. "Would you like to stay with us for a bit? We've rented a very nice cabin to stay in," Angeline Song said. "That is… if you don't have any other place to stay?"

"Uh, if I could impose on the generosity of the Songs, it would be a favor." Li Yang said. If the two's identities were true as much as his—then he stumbled upon the eccentric but wealthy Song Family.

"What happened to your plan of finding a ferry to sneak on?" Bao asked.

"Have you gotten into what these young kids call cosplay nowadays?" Song Chuanli asked him. "My daughter does it as well… although I think she calls it roleplay."

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Approximately 810km away from Nagasaki.

[ The CEO Is Now Online ]

[ Distance Between The Two Of You Is Now Within System's Parameters ]

[ Energy To Contact Is At Full Refill ]

[ Would You Like To Send A Message? ]

Dismissed.

Bai Minghua quickly dodged the screen, continued on with her performance and kept herself from laughing aloud. After all this time, why now? It had been so much time—she concentrated on getting the lyrics out of her mouth.

The picture perfect and crafted smile was there. The cheers of the people who supported her in this concert and claimed to love her role were present and shouting their hearts out. And yet now that the screen finally came up again and she saw how the messages were...

Seen.

But never heard.

Or never actually replied to.

It was a ridiculous notion that made it difficult to concentrate.

Why had it been her who was ignored? Wasn't it him who wanted her at first and not the other way around? 

When Narissa sent the accidental picture of herself in the jacuzzi and the voice-to-text message by accident before—she was hoping that it came to him in an instant. She had no idea where he was and the screen kept saying that the distance was greater than it was used to. 

But since it never actually came around, or rather, he never responded… she moved on. For the man to suddenly come back into radar now and do a great deal of distracting her? This was infuriating. Bai Minghua thought she'd finally moved past it. 

She even called him the King of Ghosts.

—-—-

Author's Note: Did you get why Li Yang's the King of Ghosts? Since… he practically did ghosting? That wasn't funny, okay. Phew. Anyway, thanks for the comment Lord_Pendragon on a little reminder on the option of contacting our harem member. I may have focused on uh, a certain direction and thought I exhausted all options. I may have been getting excited with the upcoming arc. From now on, I'll try to keep a better track of all the people related to Li Yang and their respective activities. xD