What It's Like Being a Vampire

Xiang Kun has roughly introduced all of his abilities, and briefly explained his guiding thoughts and exploration process for each ability.

Naturally, he mentioned the other mutant creatures he has encountered.

Starting from the Giant Owl, he then skipped directly to the mutated spider in Qinling Uninhabited Area, without mentioning Guo Tianxiang.

Old Xia occasionally asked questions, focusing on Xiang Kun’s various abilities and other mutants. However, she was primarily interested in the objective facts and data, rarely asking about Xiang Kun’s subjective judgments or feelings.

Some of these data were ones that Xiang Kun had been recording and measuring himself, while some were not something he could accurately provide.

It was evident that Old Xia was comparing the past and the present while listening to his story, as well as the timeline. She occasionally pointed out discrepancies with what he was saying, such as:

“If eating makes you vomit, why do I often see you eating normally, albeit in smaller amounts?”

Xiang Kun pulled out two stones that he used to suppress vomiting, which had established a “super sensory contact”, and introduced the relevant principles and his thoughts.

Hearing this, Old Xia looked at the two stones and nodded thoughtfully: “That’s quite imaginative.”

Xiang Kun calmly accepted Old Xia’s compliment, skipping over the process of how he got the idea from exploring the Giant Owl’s nest and discovering certain stones.

Old Xia accurately pointed out a crucial point: “The information about the ‘mutant creatures’ has been suppressed?”

Even though she didn’t immediately search for the information described by Xiang Kun on the internet, she knew that if the information about these creatures was indeed public, it would be widely known given the speed of information dissemination on the internet.

Xiang Kun nodded and after weighing it up, he began to talk about the information posted by a netizen named “Kasumi of August” that he found online, and then led to his strategic confrontation with Guo Tianxiang and Mijoe.

When talking about his final showdown with Guo Tianxiang, he only emphasized Guo Tianxiang’s ability to “Project Self Fear through Direct Eye Contact,” and then his process of analyzing and sorting through the things Guo Tianxiang left behind and certain memory fragments.

He didn’t say how he dealt with Guo Tianxiang specifically, but he knew that with the premise of dealing with the Giant Owl and the mutated spider that he previously mentioned, Old Xia would understand.

However, Old Xia did not have any particular reaction and merely asked in detail about the nature of the illusions created by Guo Tianxiang, seemingly comparing them to the cake and pork knuckle she co-manifested.

When Xiang Kun initially contemplated revealing his situation to Old Xia, he only imagined disclosing part of his physiological characteristics, focusing primarily on “Super-connected Objects” and “Emotion Infused Objects”, hoping that Old Xia could assist him in researching and analyzing the special connections behind these abilities, as well as how to apply and enhance them – taking into consideration the effect of the “Illusion Reality” power, he knew that there was vast potential in the system that Old Xia had created using his abilities.

However, after reading Old Xia’s notebook and seeing her various speculations and judgments about him, Xiang Kun realized that merely disclosing those things would not be sufficient.

Hence, he decided to only mention the Giant Owl and the mutated spider in regard to other “mutant creatures” while avoiding the topics of Guo Tianxiang and “Divine Technology” for the time being, planning to talk about them slowly later on.

But during his earlier explanation to Old Xia, in response to her reactions and the “Behavior Guidelines” noted in her notebook, Xiang Kun once again adjusted his strategy. He prepared to tell Old Xia about Guo Tianxiang, Divine Technology, and other mutant creatures he had learned about through other channels – such as the supposedly mutated wolf mentioned by his old classmate Xie Jun during Chang Bin’s wedding.

Essentially, apart from Alice’s existence, Xiang Kun revealed all the information about his mutation to Old Xia without reservation.

His previous trust in Old Xia, his belief that Old Xia’s observation and inquiry about him were harmless, was based on his relationship with her, Yang Zhen’er, and Nana, as well as Old Xia’s consistent behavior.

But that trust only meant that he did not maintain a guarded or distant attitude towards her due to her observation and inquiry.

The real reason he decided to trust Old Xia and finally disclosed his mutation was, besides her voluntarily showing him her medical records and related information, also an important point that Old Xia had established a connection with multiple of his “Super-connected Objects” and “Emotion Infused Objects”, just as Xiao Pingguo and Liu Shiling did. She was now also part of his “Super sensory system” or “Super sensory network”.

In other words, from a certain perspective, Old Xia could also be considered a person with “special abilities”, and her abilities stemmed from Xiang Kun.

From a property perspective, they were, to some extent, the same kind of people.

The reason Xiang Kun decided to disclose all of his information regarding his mutation to Old Xia without reservation was due to the 972 “Behavior Guidelines” he saw in Old Xia’s notebook.

These 972 guidelines actually mirror Old Xia’s behavioral directives and her process of exploring regular emotional cognition. After reading through these 972 guidelines, Xiang Kun basically understood Old Xia’s approach to judging situations and people, as well as her learning methods.

He acknowledged that one of the most important factors in Old Xia’s judgment method was equality.

Since Old Xia was honest with him, he couldn’t hide the things he needed her help with. Given Old Xia’s astute observational skills, it was easy for her to notice the parts he’d omitted. Rather than gradually revealing it over time, it was better to lay it all out openly from the start.

Of course, the specific details and deeper thoughts and discussions would not be able to be fully explored in a short period of time, so Xiangkun had no choice but to simplify.

Just as he was talking about how he found Divine Technology’s research base in QiCheng City based on the details from his dreams, Xiangkun’s phone began to vibrate.

It was his mother. He promptly answered.

“Kun, you’re with Xiao Xia now?” His mother said over the phone, her voice deliberately subdued.

“Yeah, Xiao Xia brought my backpack over. We’re chatting in the parking lot, will be back up soon.” Xiangkun replied.

“Ah, I’m not rushing you. I called to tell you that your father and I have finished dinner in the ward. We didn’t prepare dinner for you, you can go eat with Xia Xia. Ok, that’s it.” His mother finished and promptly hung up.

Xiangkun couldn’t help but chuckle. It was already past six in the evening, and it was dark outside. He and Old Xia had been talking in the car for over two hours.

“That’s the gist of it. Go home and eat first. You don’t have to work tonight, do you? I’ll come to your place later to continue our in-depth discussion. By the way, try not to tell anyone about my situation and avoid leaving too many obvious records that can be traced, for reasons I think you understand.”

Old Xia nodded, “I’ll keep it a secret.” She paused, then extending her right hand, “I’ll help you find the cause of the mutation, you help me find a way to experience various emotions.”

Xiangkun understood her meaning, shook her hand and said with a smile, “Pleasure working with you.”

Xiang Kun was then going to get out of the car with his backpack and notebook, but Old Xia grabbed the notebook before him, “It’s mine.”

Xiangkun joked, “You’re about to fill it up, haven’t you. Chaining to a new one, can you give this one to me?”

Old Xia shook her head and Xiangkun had to let go.

“What about the tablet? Okay, you surely won’t give me this document box either…” Xiangkun said while opening his backpack, taking out his tablet and document box. He knew that Old Xia wouldn’t actually give these to him; it was just a joke, after all, he had already memorised the content.

To his surprise, Old Xia looked at the backpack and said, “Keep the bag as well, I need it.”

“Really? I told my mother I was coming down to get my backpack, I can’t go back empty-handed…” Xiangkun said helplessly, knowing that Old Xia was “counterattacking”.

“She won’t mind.” Old Xia said, “I’ll bring it to you next time.”

Xiangkun thought about it and conceded, it seemed she was right.

However, just as he was about to step out of the car, Old Xia spoke again: “Give me a few more of your coins.”

After the car door was shut again, Xia Libing sat there with six coins Xiangkun had emptied from his pockets and the original three in her hand, deep in thought.

Although Xia Libing did not show much expression or emotional change when Xiangkun first admitted to being a so-called “vampire”, her previous observation and inference had led her to multiple guesses about Xiangkun’s situation.

But in reality, Xiangkun’s situation was far beyond her initial assumptions and his abilities exceeded her imagination. It was like he had just flipped a veil from the world right in front of her, refreshing her cognitive system, to the point where some of the content even made her wonder if she was still dreaming, as if the dream hadn’t finished last night.

However, feeling the nine coins in both of her hands, she gradually matched the various details Xiangkun had described with past observations, which answered all her previous questions.

It let her know that Xiangkun was indeed a “vampire”, a “mutant”, a “superhuman”, and his powers were extremely complex, involving various aspects, and was even constantly evolving.

Plus the previous experience of “Emotional Assimilation” made her very certain that Xiangkun must have a way to help her find the method to possess normal human emotions –– and even if Xiangkun couldn’t find it, she would certainly help him find it.

She put the coins back in her pocket, picked up the notebook, turned to a blank page, and drew a stick figure, annotated it with numbers only she would understand, drew an owl, a spider, another stick figure and connected them with lines.

Just as she was writing and drawing, the phone in the storage cubicle next to her started to vibrate. It turned out to be her third aunt:

“Xiao Bing, where are you? I’m at your door.”