Chapter 25

Take twenty-five bites.
“So…”
Ying Tao’s expression turned strange. “Do you actually want to be my dad?”
He Mingye looked at her with eyes dark as deep water, like he was so irritated he almost laughed.
He gave a scoff. “Fine. Say it again. Let me hear it.”
“…”
…
Ying Tao tossed and turned, unable to fall asleep.
The moment she closed her eyes, the face that floated up in her head was He Mingye’s—the kind that drew bees and butterflies without even trying.
Something wasn’t right.
The more she thought about it, the more wrong it felt.
No—seriously. What did he mean back then?
Ying Tao sat up abruptly.
Her head was a pot of mush; no matter how she tried, she couldn’t sort the threads.
This feeling was terrifying.
She was basically about to grow a brain.
Ying Tao was so depressed she could die.
She scrolled through WeChat and couldn’t find a single person suitable to listen to her troubles.
With nothing better to do, she logged into Dream Jianghu again.
If she couldn’t sleep anyway, she might as well grind a few mobs and kill time.
Dream Jianghu had already obtained its publishing number, and the public beta was expected to launch early in the year.
When that happened, the closed beta data would be wiped completely.
Probably because the official launch was getting close, fewer and fewer people were logging in.
She ran two maps in a row doing tasks and didn’t see any other online players.
After playing a bit, she felt bored too.
Back and forth, back and forth—
She ended up at Mingyue Cliff again.
The scenery was the same as ever.
The only difference was that last time, someone had brought her here.
This time, it was only her.
Alone, sitting at the edge of the cliff, night cool as water, the bright moon still hanging high.
Suddenly, the system notification popped:
Your friend [BK] is now online.
Ying Tao froze.
This person hadn’t logged in for almost half a month, right?
She’d thought he’d quit the game.
After all, someone as strong as him might be an internal pro player Tianyi invited, or a big-name streamer, or something.
System testing.
Finding bugs.
Reporting them back to the devs.
That was what beta players were for.
Now that the game was close to launch, his job would be done.
There was no need for him to keep logging on.
So seeing him appear after disappearing for so long—she was surprised.
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: God gamer, you’re here!
[BK]: Yeah.
[BK]: Coords.
Ying Tao curled her lip.
Still the same—few words, straight to the point.
She sent her coordinates.
In Dream Jianghu, the friend system could show your friends’ locations.
You could also teleport to shared coordinates instantly.
That feature wasn’t rare.
What was rare was that it didn’t restrict regions.
Meaning: even if you were in a dungeon, as long as you shared coordinates, a friend could teleport in immediately to help you fight.
In other words, it was basically a hooligan feature.
Some high-difficulty dungeons had strict player-count requirements—
But once the group fight started, it didn’t stop you from calling in outside reinforcements.
Ying Tao watched as the warlock teleported in.
In an instant, Mingyue Cliff had one more figure.
To be honest, the warlock’s character model wasn’t pretty.
A long black robe concealed the figure.
The hood hung low, only a sliver of chin showing.
Plus, according to the official stat sheets,
Warlock was hard to build and not beginner-friendly.
So the moment the beta launched, almost nobody chose it.
But after that Douyu streamer’s gameplay clip went viral—
Because of BK’s operations, the warlock class suddenly lit up with new life.
Only when players really tried building it did they realize the truth:
Warlock was “good” because the person playing it was BK.
His fundamentals were absurdly strong.
Skills like Steal Heaven and Swap Fate, Change Day and Change Life—
He played them to perfection.
[BK]: You came here. Unhappy?
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: ?
Ah…
Ying Tao realized—did BK think she treated this place like a safe harbor?
That whenever she came here, it meant she was in a bad mood?
[BK]: Because of the forum stuff?
Ying Tao paused.
She suddenly remembered the uproar the forum had stirred up these past two days.
It started because during the last group fight, someone recorded the screen and shared it.
The person who posted the video also conveniently put her on blast on the forum.
When she first saw the thread Miao-miao sent her, she’d thought it was unbelievable.
She—an absolute noob—could actually get dragged on a forum one day?
But after she read the post, it was so ridiculous it made her laugh.
Turns out it was that female player who’d been yelling in their group fight.
After getting shut down by her and BK, she got mad and, under the guise of sharing a dungeon guide, turned around and posted a call-out thread about Ying Tao.
And honestly, she was talented.
The title alone was pure bait:
“Exposing how the player ‘One Slash’ uses male identity pretending to be female to cling to BK and leech experience.”
Ying Tao laughed reading it.
She picked a mighty-sounding name, and that made her a catfish?
Where did this stereotype even come from?
Catfish accounts weren’t rare.
Cross-dressing online wasn’t rare either.
Plenty of streamers even made female accounts on purpose, pretended to be girls, used voice changers, and went fishing for fun.
But dragging BK into it made everything different.
Dream Jianghu was about to launch.
To attract players, the marketing had gone all-in.
BK, as a high-energy top player, had become a promotional hook.
Many gamers came because they were impressed by his skill.
Unfortunately, a god gamer was still a god gamer:
He appeared and vanished like a ghost, arrogant as hell.
Normal players couldn’t even get close to him.
Even when he joined group fights, he had fixed teammates and didn’t talk to outsiders.
So now, hearing someone was leeching off him—
And even “pretending to be a girl to trick him”—
The gossip crowd exploded.
The moment his name got attached, the forum—which used to be for normal socializing and sharing grinding tips—instantly became a melon field.
“What’s going on?”
“Huh? Pretending to be a girl means One Slash is a catfish?”
“How did she leech? OP, hurry up and explain.”
The thread was posted by the ID Bright Lantern Three Thousand.
She played the victim on the forum.
After sharing the edited group-fight video, she wrote:
“Honestly we camped this boss all day. Who knew BK and One Slash would join.”
“Everyone did their job, and it was really hard.”
“We finally got it to low HP. Since One Slash is an assassin, we were worried she couldn’t survive the boss’s big hit, so we didn’t let her pull aggro.”
“But One Slash suddenly blinked in and stole the kill.”
“I’m not saying she shouldn’t take experience, but it’s really gross when someone just freeloads.”
The clip had been cut and stitched to hell.
In the assembled footage, she barely did anything.
She looked like she was just AFK leeching.
Group fights were like group projects.
What everyone hated most was the freeloader who did nothing but still wanted to split rewards at the end.
With Bright Lantern Three Thousand’s twisted narrative—
And with some of the players from that group fight jumping out to “testify”—
A “leeching” label got slapped onto Ying Tao.
Most people believed it, and there really were plenty cursing her out.
But a small number were suspicious.
“Leeching is definitely something that gets you hated, but BK didn’t say anything. This feels weird.”
“Thanks. Don’t treat players like idiots. The person involved didn’t even post. You’re the one sticking your nose in.”
“You’ve said all this, but where’s the proof One Slash is a catfish? How do you know she’s a dude pretending to be a girl?”
There weren’t many doubts.
Then a player who claimed he’d been fooled by her before jumped out—
And the thread went silent.
That player said:
“I can testify—One Slash is definitely a catfish account.”
“When beta first opened, I knew her.”
“We even bound as a CP. I helped her grind levels a lot.”
“Later it extended into real life. We added each other on WeChat.”
“At first we were just friends. Then One Slash started flirting with me.”
“She sent me private photos and said she liked me, said she’d come find me.”
“I got stupid and believed her, bought her gear, spent money on her—almost twenty thousand total.”
“Then she started disappearing.”
“One day she accidentally sent me a voice message—it was a man’s voice.”
“Maybe she realized she was exposed. She deleted me.”
“When I got back on the game, she’d changed the password, deleted me, unbound the CP.”
“Only then did I realize I’d probably gotten catfished.”
Once it involved online fraud, the nature of the thread changed.
“Holy shit, twenty grand is enough for a case. Dude, did you report it?”
“You believed a woman who ‘fell into your lap’? Tian Dao players really are dumb, rich, and easy.”
“Probably a pig-butchering scam aimed at lonely nerds. Those photos you got were likely stolen.”
…
Reading that thread, Ying Tao was so pissed she almost exploded.
Miao-miao DM’d her:
“Isn’t this guy disgusting? When did you ever send him photos or flirt with him?”
“He was just a power-leveling guy you hired to grind your account. How did it turn into him ‘grinding for you for free’ and ‘spending money on you’?”
Ying Tao had almost forgotten the whole thing.
Now that he popped out again, the unpleasant memories came flooding back.
She did know that “Tian Dao player.”
Back then, Shen Minglin had given her a closed-beta account.
But she was the kind of person who fished for three days and dried the net for two.
She had no perseverance.
So she posted on the forum looking for a power-leveling helper.
This guy had volunteered.
After they agreed on the price, she gave him the account and password.
At first she’d been pretty satisfied.
He didn’t talk much, and he grinded enthusiastically.
So sometimes she’d give him small tips.
But slowly things started to go wrong.
Her WeChat didn’t have special privacy categories, so basically all her friends could see what she posted.
At the time, their club’s short drama was about to go online. She helped promote it.
She hadn’t expected the guy to assume she was a small influencer—
And then, step by step, he guessed her WeChat password.
After her WeChat got kicked offline, she saw an “off-site login” alert—
And saw that someone had used her account to send that power-leveling account a ton of photos she’d posted in Moments half a year ago.
Including group photos with friends, scenery shots, and selfies.
When she saw it, she was so angry she immediately messaged to confront him.
He replied:
“Huh? I thought we were dating.”
“Otherwise why would you trust me enough to give me your password? Your WeChat password is the same as your game password.”
“And you still say you don’t like me? You’re just waiting for me to confess and make it official, right?”
Ying Tao wanted to curse him out.
But what he said next made her scalp go numb.
“I know where you go to school.”
“You’re a student at Nanyi, right?”
“Baby, I want to come to your campus to find you.”
Her hands shook.
After cursing him out, she deleted and blocked him immediately—
And called the police.
But after more than two months, nothing happened.
Only then did she slowly shove it behind her head.
She hadn’t expected him to pop up again recently, haunting her like a ghost, spreading rumors.
She gathered evidence and planned to sue him for defamation—
Only to find the thread had been deleted.
And very quickly, that “Tian Dao player” posted a clarification thread himself:
“Sorry. Everything I said before about One Slash being a catfish account pretending to be a woman to scam money was completely made up.”
“I have no relationship with ‘One Slash’ and don’t know her at all.”
His turnaround was so fast that even Ying Tao, the person involved, didn’t understand it.
She didn’t know why he suddenly admitted fault—
And sobbed like he was begging on his knees.
Ying Tao didn’t respond publicly.
She only stayed suspicious and cautious about the whiplash.
Not long after, his own black history got dug up.
It even trended for a moment.
Turns out he was a repeat offender.
Not only had he harassed her, he’d harassed other female players in other mobile games too.
Completely opposite to what he claimed—
He was the real online scammer.
He used games to rake in money, forming CP relationships with female players to get funds out of them.
As for her…
Miao-miao said:
“I guessed he was trash, but I didn’t think he could be this thoroughly trash. It’s honestly impressive.”
“I bet he found our school’s official site, then found the club info, matched the photos, saw you were pretty, and got disgusting ideas.”
“Good thing he had the intent but not the guts.”
Ying Tao only felt disgusted.
After that, she never dared hire random power-levelers again.
She also rarely added strangers on WeChat.
No power-leveler meant she could only log in herself to clear daily tasks.
It was annoying, but at least it killed time.
Still, she was puzzled.
Why had he suddenly self-destructed?
With that level of shamelessness, she didn’t believe he’d grown a conscience.
It felt more like someone had grabbed his weakness—
And he had no choice but to kneel and beg.
But the original thread was gone, so there was nothing to pursue.
The clarification post still floated on the forum homepage, and she couldn’t be bothered to read it.
Sure, the whole thing had made her a little annoyed.
But it wasn’t enough to ruin her mood.
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: No.
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: But compared to that… so even god gamers read the forum?
The “holy” filter cracked a tiny bit.
So even BK liked gossip off-screen, huh?
He’d been offline half a month, but clearly hadn’t missed any melons.
[BK]: Coincidence.
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: …Oh.
Ying Tao frowned.
Why did that line sound so familiar?
Then she remembered: two hours ago, when He Mingye came to find her, he’d said the same thing.
Could it be…
She couldn’t help shivering.
No way.
BK might be aloof, but he wasn’t nearly as annoying as He Mingye.
Maybe because BK had stood up for her before—
And because a screen separated them, and she didn’t know who he was—
She found herself wanting to vent.
Ying Tao thought for a moment, then decided to lay out her trouble.
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: God gamer, can I ask you something?
[BK]: ?
Ying Tao hesitated. How should she say this?
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: It’s just…
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: If one day you find out that a friend you grew up with has ulterior motives toward you… what do you do?
[BK]: Like what?
…
In a dim room, the man who’d just stepped out of the bathroom had a lean frame of bone and muscle.
Wet droplets slid down from his hair, falling into the straight line of his collarbone.
He lowered his eyes at the phone.
On the game screen, the female character had been idle for a long time, like she’d disconnected.
After waiting, text finally popped up over her head.
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: Like… he keeps wanting to be my dad. Is that normal?
He Mingye let out a cold, irritated laugh through his nose.
His back teeth ground lightly.
[BK]: Not normal.
The other side seemed to “disconnect” again. No response for a long time.
When Ying Tao saw that reply, her heart sank.
She’d been anxious for ages.
In the end, she couldn’t help asking:
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: …
[One Slash and Your Peach Blossoms Bloom All Over the Sky]: From a male perspective, what exactly makes it “not normal”?
He Mingye nearly laughed.
How dense did she have to be to still have no idea?
He lowered his eyes, expression dark, staring at the screen.
The weak phone light traced the sharp edges of his face.
He watched the female character sitting at the cliff edge.
His Adam’s apple rolled slowly.
[BK]: It means…
[BK]: He wants you.