Chapter 114: The Controlled Puppet

Chapter 114

Of course, whether she was telling the truth was something only Zhi Xia herself knew clearly.

Shen Hongmei sat for a while, as if she had really just come over to give Zhi Xia some jujubes. Her words were very polite, and apart from the sense of aloofness in her eyes and facial expressions that completely belied her words, there was nothing that made people feel the slightest bit uncomfortable.

She got up to take her leave, and even said Zhi Xia could go to the Cultural Work Troupe to find her and play anytime.

Zhi Xia had originally wanted her to take the jujubes back, but she stubbornly refused, so Zhi Xia could only ask her to wait a moment. She emptied out the jujubes in the cloth bag, and put some roasted peanuts in instead.

"Comrade Shen, thank you for the jujubes. These are peanuts I brought from home when I came here. Please try them, they're freshly roasted." After seeing Shen Hongmei to the door, Zhi Xia said.

"Didn't we agree to become good friends from now on? Don't keep calling me Comrade Shen, it feels too distant. Just call me Hongmei, don't I call you Zhi Xia too?" Shen Hongmei reached out to take the cloth bag.

When their fingers inadvertently touched, the dimensional exchange device in the room suddenly lit up and issued a warning. [Detected presence of high tech product, unable to determine good or bad. Please be vigilant, host!!!]

Zhi Xia's expression changed, and the cloth bag in her hand fell to the ground as well.

Shen Hongmei was startled for a moment, but calmly smiled and bent down to pick it up. "Look at me, my hands are so cold they're numb. I can even drop something when picking it up. Don't mind it, Zhi Xia."

"You shouldn't mind, it was my fault for not holding it steady."

Zhi Xia tried her best to keep her voice steady. She watched Shen Hongmei turn and leave before her face sank.

After closing the door, she went into her dimensional space without even returning to her room.

The warning on the dimensional exchange device was still flashing. After studying it for a while, Zhi Xia finally understood its purpose.

Shen Hongmei also had something on her that didn't belong in this world, but she didn't know what it was yet. It could be a dimensional space, or a system. Of course, she couldn't determine if it was good or bad either.

The dimensional exchange device belonged to the side of justice. This could be seen from its trading rules - it only allowed normal, harmless trading and did not permit damage to dimensions. So it also played a supplementary role in stabilizing dimensions.

The device wanted to obtain the object on Shen Hongmei, but there were great difficulties in doing so.

Shen Hongmei thought for a moment and made an excuse that she was busy tomorrow, so wouldn't be coming.

Returning to the dorm and thinking of her sister and brother-in-law's situation, as well as the several children at home, Shen Hongmei felt increasingly uneasy.

"System, spare my sister and brother-in-law, if you still want me to gain favorability for you."

Ever since she was 10 years old, she had inexplicably gained something in her mind called a System. It told her that as long as she bound with it, she wouldn't go hungry anymore, she could go to school, gain talents and abilities, and have her parents' and family's love - as well as beauty and wealth.

No matter which of these, they were huge temptations to Shen Hongmei, who had grown up in the countryside going hungry and cold, with parents who favored sons over daughters.

And the only condition was that she needed to gain favorability from others.

A 10 year old Shen Hongmei was still a child who could be tricked away with two candies, let alone when facing such huge temptations.

After binding with the System, Shen Hongmei did gain many things. She could gain favorability by pleasing others, then use that favorability to get resources from the System - including her so-called talents, beauty...

But very quickly, Shen Hongmei realized that the more favorability someone provided her, the more unlucky they would become.

First it was her younger brother. Because he often secretly gave her candy, the child contributed a lot of favorability and grew increasingly dependent on her.

But what followed was him becoming increasingly irritable and disobedient, with terrible luck. After a huge fight with the family, he ran away stubbornly and lost his life by falling into a pond.

Her playmates, parents, villagers - everyone who had contributed favorability to her and gained benefits from her would slowly change, sometimes in luck, sometimes in body - invisible and intangible...

Shen Hongmei didn't understand it at first, but as everyone around her changed and she grew older and understood more, she started having doubts and conflicts with the System grew greater and greater.

She wanted to dissolve the binding, but it was no longer under her control.

She shut herself in her room to avoid people, but the System's punishments were also very harsh. She couldn't even bear the pain from the electric shocks. She had even thought of ending her own life, but she couldn't even control whether she lived or died anymore.

Later she understood her own position - at best, she was just a puppet controlled by the System.