Genius Playground

[September 20, 2025. Weather: Overcast.]

Jiang Ran and Chi Xiaoguo are together almost every day.

I used to wonder about their relationship.

A couple...

Or something more than friends, but not quite lovers...

But later, I felt there were no special feelings between them. On the contrary, it felt clean and pure.

Hmm...

It’s hard to say.

To Chi Xiaoguo, and indeed to any girl, Jiang Ran is very charming and attractive.

If Chi Xiaoguo, in her youthful innocence, has feelings for Jiang Ran that go beyond friendship, it’s completely understandable.

But it’s different with Jiang Ran.

His heart holds someone else, and his eyes watch someone else...

Who is this someone else?

Could it, possibly, be me?

I once thought it had to be me, that it could only be me.

But.

Now, I’m not so confident.

The person hidden in Jiang Ran’s heart, the person he watches—

Is me, but not like me; like me, yet not me.

I feel like I don’t understand him as well as I thought I did before.

At the very least, he and Chi Xiaoguo clearly have some secret between them, but he’s unwilling to tell me what it is.

That secret must be in the Film Club.

Sometimes in the morning, sometimes at night, they’re always in the Film Club, plotting something.

This must be crucial.

I’m planning... to go take a look.

...

...

...

The overcast clouds once again obscured the moonlight, plunging the world into darkness.

With her back to the window, Cheng Mengxue bent down, narrowed her eyes, and peered into the barrel of the Positron Cannon.

”It looks... like a giant camera!”

The familiar comparison left Jiang Ran speechless.

It was an indescribable sensation—of intersecting timelines, of chronological cycles, of a closed temporal loop.

On World Line 0, when Cheng Mengxue had seen the Positron Cannon for the first time, she had made the exact same observation, remarking that the device looked identical to a giant camera.

And in truth, it did.

The Positron Cannon itself had been modified from an old, boxy television, which formed a body resembling a camera. The hollow, mirrored cylinder the size of a volleyball attached to the front also looked just like a camera lens.

’It seems only a girl as pure as Cheng Mengxue, who still has the imagination of a child... could make such a wonderfully apt comparison.’

By now, Cheng Mengxue had circled to the other side of the workbench to study the Positron Cannon more closely.

”What’s this machine called?”

”What’s it for?”

Chi Xiaoguo’s lips were pressed into a tight line. She said nothing, her eyes pleading with Jiang Ran for help.

”Oh, this.”

Jiang Ran stepped forward.

”As you can see, it’s just a device that looks like a giant camera. We are the Film Club, after all, so you could say this shape is kind of our club’s emblem.”

”As for what it’s for... ahem, well, even though you’ve seen the surprise we were secretly preparing, how about we save the bigger surprise for the welcome ceremony?”

”After all, how should I put this... this is something President Xiaoguo and I have been preparing for a long time. If we revealed the answer before the welcome ceremony, we’d definitely be a little disappointed.”

”Mhm, mhm, mhm!!”

Chi Xiaoguo turned into a frantic nodding machine.

”Right, right, right! That’s exactly right!”

Oh my god...

She couldn’t help but marvel internally. ’Senior Jiang Ran is way too smart! The way he spins a lie... he’s so smooth, it sounds just like the real thing, totally flawless! Even I, who knows the truth, think his explanation sounds perfectly reasonable!’

”Oh, I see.”

Cheng Mengxue straightened up and giggled.

”Well then, I’ll be sure to look forward to it~ Don’t worry, I’ll keep it a secret from Fang Ze. I really hope the day of the surprise comes soon.”

It was only a few minutes before 11:00 PM. The student dorms were about to have their lights out and doors locked, so they had to hurry back.

Chi Xiaoguo handed the wedding dress Rhine Cat she had found between the sofa cushions to Cheng Mengxue. Then the three of them quickly turned off the lights, locked the door, and left the club activities building.

Chi Xiaoguo immediately broke into a run.

Because what just happened was just too embarrassing!

Utterly mortifying!

She had always thought Jiang Ran’s Suggestion was for her to cooperate and admit that they were in an intimate relationship. That way, wouldn’t it explain why they were meeting secretly in the Film Club every day?

She had already steeled herself, preparing to take the fall as his ”girlfriend”... she’d even thought about how she’d have to use more lies in the future to maintain that first lie...

But who could have guessed!

Senior Jiang Ran had played an even cleverer trick!

Not only had he completely fooled Cheng Mengxue, but he’d almost hooked Chi Xiaoguo herself!

Phew.

Thankfully, her all-or-nothing confession had been half a beat too slow, and she hadn’t managed to say it out loud.

Otherwise, she wouldn’t just be turning tail and fleeing... she’d be looking for a crack in the ground to crawl into!

”W-w-well, Senior Jiang Ran, Sister Mengxue, my dorm is this way, so I’ll head back first!”

After running a few meters away, Chi Xiaoguo realized she should have said goodbye, so she quickly stopped and waved to the two of them.

Jiang Ran nodded, throwing her a look that said, ”We’ll talk about this tomorrow.”

Chi Xiaoguo also squinted, returning a look that said, ”Blah-blah-bleep-bloop-BSOD-reboot-required,” a gaze as intelligible as garbled computer text.

”...”

Staring at the completely unpairable Bluetooth connection and the utterly indecipherable eye-message, Jiang Ran could only wave his hand speechlessly, bidding farewell to his little president.

In that moment, he found himself missing Qin Feng and Wang Hao.

He could communicate with both of them flawlessly through eye contact alone.

With Qin Feng, it was because he was so intelligent that he could easily adjust down to Jiang Ran’s level on any matter; not only could he easily decipher the meaning in Jiang Ran’s gaze, but he also made his own expressions easy for Jiang Ran to understand.