Chapter 7: Joy Leads to Sorrow

Uncertain how much time had passed, Wang Cheng's consciousness returned to his body

It's all over, this time the money earned is not enough even if spent entirely. I pity myself, just a poor loser who finds even sunlight to be a luxury

He suddenly realized and was in tears.

I have already settled your hospitalization fees," Tor pointed to the medical record and said, "I fear you are not aware of your physical condition. According to the blood test, your blood cells appear to be quite unusual, seemingly overly active, and additionally, the cell membranes also seem to be quite abnormal

The man of Chinese descent spoke as his hand naturally moved to Wang Cheng's neck. As the other person's fingers just touched Wang Cheng, a loud 'bang' echoed in his consciousness, as if it had been pulled out of his body. His soul floated into the air, looking down coldly at the body engaged in a fierce battle in front of the computer screen, as if his own body was still focused intently on playing the game with the man of Chinese descent

The joy of victory made Wang Cheng unable to restrain himself from standing up and cheering, but just as his attention relaxed, suddenly, he felt dizzy and his vision blurred. It was as if his consciousness had jumped into a passage... The terrain of the passage resembled a computer circuit board, with capacitors, resistors, and integrated circuits towering, forming a winding and intricate path. His consciousness was running through this city composed of integrated circuits, capacitors, and resistors.

Before arriving, Wang Cheng had pre-installed several Chinese-translated games from www.hetushu.com on the computer. However, the other party could not understand Chinese and was clearly dissatisfied with the translated games, while Wang Cheng could not understand the English version of the games. After a few minutes of discussion, both parties decided to download a familiar English version of the CS game from the internet

With Yang Yuxiang's promise, Wang Cheng calculated that, after deducting the profits owed to the boss, he could pocket around 30,000 yuan from this deal—this was almost equivalent to more than half a year's income for him. Therefore, regardless of what demands the other party made, he would comply without any hesitation.

After two days and two nights of intense struggle, the various components of the computer have finally been debugged and are now in an optimized state. The competition has also reached a fever pitch, as the Chinese man shed his clothes and entered the fray, shouting and engaging in a fierce battle with Wang Cheng.

"It is not due to hunger that he has fainted," Mr. Tor, a middle-aged man, continued to speak without raising his head as he and the Chinese man sifted through the thick medical records. "I forgot to tell you, Acarredo has a practicing physician's license; he can understand the medical records. Although the equipment here is quite rudimentary, he has identified some issues... However, to conduct further tests, we need to return to my laboratory..."

In shooting games, the confrontation between individuals is far more unpredictable than that between humans and machines. Wang Cheng, who is considered an experienced player in CS, found himself infuriated after being headshot five times in a row by his opponent, who kept shouting, "Faster! Faster... not enough, still not enough." Feeling frustrated despite considering himself a skilled player, Wang Cheng splashed cold water on his face to regain his composure and sat back down to start a new round against his opponent.

At this moment, he heard Thor's voice: "Are you awake? Good. Generally, when people wake up, they are busy opening their eyes and surveying their surroundings. It is quite difficult to observe the environment with one's eyes closed, using only one's senses. Ha, this habit cannot be achieved through training; even the strongest-willed individuals cannot cultivate it, because when a person first awakens, they are in an unconscious state."

As Wang Cheng opened his eyes to the surrounding world, he couldn't help but exclaim in his heart that it was unfortunate—this was a single patient room, and the area was even larger than the apartment Wang Cheng rented. The room was not only furnished but also equipped with various medical monitoring devices. Goodness, it even had a refrigerator and a television; such a hospital room must be very expensive

Wang Cheng struggled to get up from the hospital bed: "No, no, I am aware of my own physical condition. It is merely due to prolonged nervous tension that has caused a brief loss of consciousness... You can rest assured, I am compensated for the work I do for you. My fainting from overexertion while working with books has nothing to do with you."

At the beginning, Wang Cheng could not remember whether he was still standing in front of the computer screen at Soren Capital or had returned to the small room he rented. After a long while, he realized he was lying in bed, and then he caught the distinctive scent of the hospital's Laisuer water. He heard the sound of electrical currents from the machines, and next, he seemed to hear the faint breathing of two people by his bedside—experiencing all of this, Wang Cheng did not open his eyes.

Immediately, Wang Cheng's thoughts accelerated, as if the scenes were replaying, with time retracing from the present to the past: Wang Cheng saw himself starting to debug equipment at Soren Capital, saw himself and Miss Jian moving the machine into Soren Capital... As the speed of the replay increased, in the blink of an eye, Wang Cheng seemed to have returned to the time just after his university graduation

It is unclear how much time has passed, but the score has reached 18 to 19. It seems as though they have fought through the night, and the sky is beginning to brighten. Wang Cheng has finally achieved a rare victory, locking the score at 20 to 18. After exhausting the bullets in his AK47 and without time to change the magazine, he directly drew his pistol and shot the opponent in the head.

Wang Cheng opened his eyes: "It's just a habit... I might have lost track of time while playing games continuously, and I fainted due to excessive hunger https://m.hetushu.com..."

Running such a large-scale game indeed tests the machine's operating speed. Fortunately, Wang Cheng brought a bunch of accessories, allowing for adjustments while the game is running. As soon as any lag is detected, new components can be replaced immediately, and the program is optimized from time to time. This process is quite repetitive and tedious. However, Mr. Thor is very generous; he has promised to purchase Wang Cheng's machine at a 30% premium and is also willing to pay a 30% fee for the adjustments. Because of this, the boss, Yang Yuxiang, advised Wang Cheng that even if the other party needs a week for adjustments, we should stick with it. During this time, Wang Cheng does not need to be distracted by matters in the store.

He sat down as if by instinct, but his body swayed precariously. At that moment, he vaguely felt the mixed-race Chinese opponent supporting him and faintly heard him asking, "What’s wrong?"

However, the speed of time reversal did not stop there—his thoughts continued to uncontrollably race back to the past, until they returned to his mother's womb. Strangely, as a single cell, he... actually remembered his state in the amniotic fluid... And the final image was of a man and a woman in a control room surrounded by electronic transmission equipment, engaged in passionate joy... And the final image was of a man and a woman in a control room surrounded by electronic transmission equipment, engaged in passionate joy

Soon, it will be a complete darkness

It turns out that in order to treat my father, my mother has exhausted the family savings, and many items that used to be in the house have disappeared, not given away, but sold off instead

After several hours of effort, the game was successfully downloaded. However, as soon as the interface opened, Wang Cheng realized that this game was slightly different from the commercially released version of CS. Its scenes were more complex, the graphics were more detailed, and there were more game variables. Wang Cheng recalled with surprise the download website; the game was downloaded by a mixed-race individual of Chinese descent, and he vaguely remembered that the person did not access the official CS website.

The confrontation between both sides lasted for a considerable time, with each side gaining and losing ground, and the score remained tightly contested. During the intense battle, Wang Cheng vaguely felt that Miss Jian had seemingly been present, as if she had handed a resume to Thor, and it also seemed that Miss Jian had briefly paused in front of both their computer screens. However, Wang Cheng's attention was entirely focused on the game, leaving him no time to greet the other party

Consciousness paused briefly here, then quickly rewound. In this instant, Wang Cheng's short life was entirely retraced. In the blink of an eye, he had returned to his childhood, and those once-forgotten fragments of memory surfaced one by one. He saw his mother, who was troubled all day long by his father's illness, and he witnessed many phenomena from his childhood that he could not understand at the time. In this moment, he understood everything.

The skin cell biopsy also indicates that your skin cells exhibit some abnormalities... Additionally, your brain examination reveals that your brain cells also appear to be quite abnormal...