Genius Playground

’Was this phenomenon a coincidence? Or could it be replicated?’

Jiang Ran immediately picked up his phone, sent five texts to Cheng Mengxue, and another five to Qin Feng.

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP. Five notification sounds.

Qin Feng picked up his phone and looked at Jiang Ran, who was standing just a step away.

”Are you crazy?”

At the same time, Cheng Mengxue sent a questioning message on WeChat, asking why Jiang Ran had sent her five consecutive texts, each containing a number from 1 to 5.

’It seems... I failed.’

Jiang Ran frowned.

Or rather, receiving the texts as expected was the normal, logical outcome.

’Could it be that only the content of that specific text message can travel through time?’

He tried again. He retyped the message, ”Hello, if you find this phone, please contact XXXXXXX. Thank you very much!”, and sent it to both of them, word for word.

BEEP.

Qin Feng’s phone rang again, and Xiaoxue sent a speechless emoji.

At this point, Jiang Ran was out of ideas.

’I thought I’d grasped some kind of ”texting the past” Superpower, that fame and fortune would be within my grasp...’

But as it stood, it seemed to be a completely unreplicable, random event, which made him start to doubt himself.

’Did my memory really fail me?’

’Heatstroke?’

’A daydream?’

’Was I not fully awake?’

’But... it all felt so real...’

”Hey, hey, hey!”

Qin Feng couldn’t take it anymore and nudged him with his elbow.

”If something’s wrong, just say it! Standing here texting like a mute is seriously creepy.”

”If you’re in some kind of trouble, just tell us. We can figure it out together!”

Jiang Ran sighed.

”Let’s meet up with Xiaoxue first.”

”I want to take a good look at her phone.”

...

「Half an hour later, in a corner on the second floor of a milk tea shop.」

Qin Feng looked at Cheng Mengxue.

”Do you believe him?”

”I don’t.” Cheng Mengxue shook her head.

Jiang Ran spread his hands.

”I don’t either. Forget you two, even I don’t believe it’s real.”

”No matter how you look at it, ’a text message from today being sent to three days ago’ is just too ridiculous, too sci-fi.”

”We just tried all sorts of methods, but not a single attempt worked. No texts vanished or were sent to the past... All the messages went through normally.”

”I also wondered if I just got dizzy from the heat, or if there was something wrong with my memory.”

”But! There’s one thing I can’t explain.”

He picked up Cheng Mengxue’s phone, pinching the Rhine Cat Pendant at the bottom.

”Qin Feng, do you know the story behind this Rhine Cat?”

Qin Feng shook his head.

”It looks like some kind of astronaut cat.”

Jiang Ran turned to Cheng Mengxue.

”Xiaoxue, have you ever told us about this particular Rhine Cat?”

”No.”

Cheng Mengxue shook her head as well.

”You two have zero interest in the Rhine Cat. It would’ve been like talking to a brick wall, a total buzzkill.”

Suddenly, she blinked.

”Don’t tell me...”

”Yes, I know.”

Jiang Ran looked at the number on the belly of the Rhine Cat on the pendant.

”This is a collaboration between Rhine Cat and *The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy*. Only 4,200 were ever released. It’s very rare.”

”Wow!”

Cheng Mengxue’s eyes sparkled.

”You actually did your homework on it!”

”No way...”

Jiang Ran waved his hand dismissively.

”You’re the one who told me this fact. Of course, you probably don’t remember it now.”

”While it’s not ironclad proof, you two know me. There’s no way I would’ve looked this up online. I have no interest in the Rhine Cat, and I don’t even think it’s that cute.”

”That’s why I’m saying this might not be so simple. It wasn’t just me daydreaming. It’s possible some kind of temporal Butterfly Effect really happened, and that text really was sent to the past!”

Qin Feng contemplated this for a couple of seconds.

He nodded.

”True, you wouldn’t bother with something so trivial.”

”But more than the time-traveling text and the ’temporal shift’ it caused, I’m curious about something else.”

He looked up, meeting Jiang Ran’s eyes.

”Why are you the only one who remembers the time before the shift?”

”Logically, the two of us were standing together... no, according to you, the *three* of us were standing together, but neither of us has any memory of it.”

...

Jiang Ran fell silent.

For some reason, he recalled the arrogant lines from the movie they were shooting that afternoon:

”Just go back to the past and change everything... and it will all start over.”

”Being omnipotent doesn’t make you a god. Only those who control and manipulate history can be called gods!”

”You can never defeat me within history. Because in this game played across the river of time...”

”I *am* history!”

CLINK.

Jiang Ran set down his milk tea and leaned back against his chair.

”I don’t know.”

He shook his head gently.

”I want to know the answer more than either of you.”

This was the truth, and it was the thing that bothered him the most.

Neither Qin Feng nor Cheng Mengxue had memories from before the timeline changed.

Jiang Ran, on the other hand, was the opposite. He had memories from before the change but lacked memories of the new history created after it. He had to rely on others to fill him in on the many ways things were now different.

The feeling was deeply unsettling, leaving him without any sense of security.

”Still, you really did change history, just like in your script.”

With the tacit understanding they’d built over many years, Qin Feng saw right through Jiang Ran’s thoughts and smiled slightly.

”Three days ago, after Xiaoxue got that text, she dismissed it as a prank, but it made her paranoid about losing her phone.”

”So she kept patting her pocket and checking her phone for no reason, which is why she didn’t lose it while shopping this afternoon.”

Phew...

Cheng Mengxue let out a long breath and giggled.

”In any case, thanks to that weird text message, I didn’t lose my phone or my Rhine Cat! You get major credit for this!”

”Next time something good like this happens, remember to send me some lottery numbers, okay? We could get rich overnight!”

”I wish.”

Jiang Ran didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

’If I really had a Superpower that let me text the past, who wouldn’t want to fix their regrets, seize opportunities, and achieve a perfect life?’

’But right now, I don’t have a single clue.’

’Still... it’s too early to give up.’

’From a physics perspective, if an experiment succeeds once, as long as you figure out the principle behind it, you can definitely succeed a second time.’

”Tomorrow afternoon, same time, let’s try again.”

He looked at his phone screen.

”As I recall, I sent the text at 6:05.”

”It’s highly likely that only a text sent at that exact time can travel through time and reach the past.”

”A desperate man will try anything,” Cheng Mengxue retorted.

”I wouldn’t say that.”

Qin Feng took a sip of his milk tea.

”Many scientific experiments are empirical. Before you understand *why* an experiment works... meticulously replicating every action, every step, and even every superstitious ritual is actually the most effective method.”

...

「The next day, at 6:00 PM.」

The three of them returned to the spot where he had sent the text.

It was on the main path between the library and the cafeteria. Beside it stood a massive transformer box, a good three meters tall. You could hear the BUZZZZ of the electric current if you got close.

Behind the transformer box was the student club building, from which faint sounds of noisy laughter could be heard.

”Yesterday, I was standing in this exact spot when I sent the text.”

Jiang Ran positioned himself precisely, then directed the other two.

”Xiaoxue, come closer, stand next to me. Qin Feng, you stand here, a little to the side. The way my phone was facing... was like this.”

That’s right. They were truly grasping at straws.

But they tried their best to replicate every aspect perfectly.

The text message had already been written, again, word for word.

He had even downloaded a text-spamming app. The moment he pressed send, it would bombard Cheng Mengxue’s phone with one text per second.

Qin Feng raised his wrist, counting down on his watch.

”10 seconds... 5 seconds... 3, 2, 1, send!”

Jiang Ran gazed at the sunset, which looked just as it had the day before, and slammed the send button—