Retirement After Beating the Infinite Game

After three years, Xie Lian finally escaped that godforsaken place. He took his clearance reward, settled down, and planned to give up on everything, become a lazy couch potato, and enjoy a peaceful retirement. If only real life were that wonderful. One sunny morning, Xie Lian was carrying a bag of groceries home when he stepped into the elevator and saw someone familiar. No, not someone. A familiar ghost. The ghost was hunched into a ball, black energy billowing around it, looking pitiful and ingratiating. “Boss, please spare me, ” Xie Lian: (polite smile) (steps on it) * When the hidden side of the world, the inner world, fell into turmoil, the outer world could hardly remain untouched. But Xie Lian couldn't understand it. The inner world had remained stable the whole time he was there, so how had things gotten so chaotic just a year after he left? Even the System, which had once vowed in no uncertain terms never to see Xie Lian again, was now begging him to come back and help. Xie Lian, already enjoying his retirement, gave the System a familiar smile that sent a chill down its spine. “Brought back out of retirement? No, I refuse.” He had given up half his life during those three years. By any measure, he had given the world far more than he had gotten in return. “You can't keep shearing the same sheep forever. Find someone else.” The System was practically on its knees. But Xie Lian was the someone else it had found! * The boundary between the inner and outer worlds was dissolving. Countless entities from the inner world's game instances wanted to escape and invade reality. In that strange, unpredictable world, some feared him and some hated him; some revered him, others coveted him. But they were all kept beyond the barrier between worlds, unable to disturb Xie Lian's peaceful life. The only exception was the “teammate” Xie Lian had personally buried in the deepest part of the inner world. Somehow able to cross freely between the two worlds, he had followed Xie Lian out. Now he stood in the living room of Xie Lian's home, dripping with rainwater that did not belong to this world. His face was exactly the same, but Xie Lian took one look and declared him an impostor. Xie Lian: “My partner isn't this promiscuous. I want a refund.” The ex: “...Ha.” * Just because your partner died doesn't mean you stopped loving them. Retired infinite-game veteran bottom × nonhuman ex-husband top The ex who died eight hundred years ago, his teammate, has crawled out of the grave. Coming soon: The world we live in is not the only one. “Anomalies” could happen around any of us at any moment. Remember: observe the “entities” around you carefully, but don't let them realize you've noticed them. Especially when they wear the face you know best and call your name with tender familiarity... * That's Not My Younger Brother Fang Chi could swear it was an accident. But when he faced his younger brother lying in a pool of blood, all he did was sit helplessly on the sofa, making no attempt to do anything as he quietly waited for his brother's breathing to stop. Fang Chi thought it was all over, but it was only the beginning of a nightmare. When Fang Chi woke from a deep sleep, his younger brother was just coming out of his room. In a strange, slurred voice, he said: “Bro, I'm hungry.” Fang Chi thought he was going mad. Otherwise, how could someone he had killed countless times be standing right in front of him, perfectly fine? Fang Chi tried again and again, but his brother always reappeared the next morning, watching him with eyes that grew more unfamiliar by the day and smiling more and more like someone else. Black sand washed over Fang Chi's nose and mouth, pressing intimately against him from the outside in. His whole body sank into it as the quicksand swallowed him. * Monster Keeper Xiang Yan works at a secret laboratory, spending every day in a grueling, sunless grind. His only comfort is the little monster he raised himself. It's well-behaved and clingy, rubbing against his palm every day to ask for a cuddle. It grows bigger and bigger, and becomes more and more attached to him. It won't let anyone else touch it. Watching the little monster under his care grow up fills Xiang Yan with a feeling he can't describe. It's just that the creature is far too attached to him, to the point that it's affecting his work. Xiang Yan has no choice but to isolate it on its own. He simply thinks the kid is a little too possessive. Until one day, he notices more and more inexplicable marks appearing on his body. The weight crawling on top of him at night isn't a dream. The little monster pins him beneath it, its sticky, panting breaths washing over his face. All he can tell is that the little monster seems to be in heat... * The Bionic Lover Lu Yisheng is intensely avoidant. After developing a crush on someone, instead of confessing, he chooses to stay away and buys himself an AI companion. With enough code and a rich enough selection of plugins, it can seem even more like him than the real person. Lu Yisheng is quite happy with his AI companion. The only problem is that it still doesn't look enough like him. Maybe if he adds more data... For the first time, Lu Yisheng gets to teach a “life” from scratch, like a creator. He shapes every movement and every habit with his own hands. Every word it says comes from his code, and every thought follows his will. Lu Yisheng is very pleased to control everything about it, though at times he feels like a creep with an unhealthy need for control. The only problem is that lately it keeps watching him at night, staring for the whole night without a break. Its eyes don't blink in the darkness, as if waiting for something. Who's really in control of whom? Lu Yisheng doesn't know. But now, he can't live without it... * This work consists of three short stories about nonhumans. In all of them, the top is nonhuman and the bottom is human. The stories and characters are fictional. Don't apply them to real life; they're all made up by the author. 【Cosmic disclaimer: There are too many elements and too many spoilers, so no content warnings are provided.】 Theme: Protecting the world is everyone's responsibility.