Chapter 40

Translated by boilpoil Edited by boilpoil

Bai Lianhua and Shi Cangyuan actually met quite late, after Shi Cangyuan has already been forced to hand over the pilotship of ‘Dicarus.’

It was when Shi Cangyuan who has been exiled from Olympus completely abandoned himself, and rented a run-down shopfront becoming a nameless mecha repairer, spending his days lazing about.

Originally, with his talents, he should still have dazzled people and garnered a grand reputation even in the field of mecha repairing. Unfortunately, though, Shi Cangyuan’s passion has been completely cooled off. He has become temperamental, quiet and withdrawn. He never greets customers, and if it were not for him doing his job well, he probably wouldn’t even be able to make a living.

Shi Cangyuan didn’t care himself either. He’s become as lively as a corpse.

Bai Lianhua thought it was already a bit late for him to intervene in the antagonist’s life. Yet according to the system, it chose this period of time for a reason——If he didn’t intervene exactly when the antagonist was at the bottom of his misery and starting lifting him up from there, then how would he manage to arrange the timing to heal his psychological trauma and become the white lotus in his heart that never wilts, always blooms as pure as snow inside?

Bai Lianhua was… sceptical of that position to say the least. He was still an obedient, ‘good’ host that listened to the system back then though, so he followed the system’s arrangements regardless.

And then, Bai Lianhua who ‘happened’ to come across Shi Cangyuan’s shop accidentally discovered the brilliant talents of Shi Cangyuan. Over time, then, he became a regular at his shop. You could even say, since their first meeting, Shi Cangyuan’s monthly income mostly comprised of contributions from Bai Lianhua.

Bai Lianhua’s character setting then was someone with the psychic strength but not the physical strength. While he’s essentially trash when it comes to personally piloting a mecha, but he’s still really interested in all things mecha, and enjoys spending time modding mechas as a hobby, even if every single time he’d fail and look miserable.

Lucky for him, he discovered Shi Cangyuan, practically a saviour from the Heavens sent to save his creations.

No matter what sort of ‘unconventional’ idea he’d had before, or even if he’d managed to turn his mecha into a twister, Shi Cangyuan could always revert all his impressive handiwork and offer mods that are actually effective and suitable for him.

So, Bai Lianhua ended up going to Shi Cangyuan’s little shop more and more, so much so that even Shi Cangyuan had to worry if the guy would manage to end up forfeiting all his assets to him, or with his wrong and absurd way of modding, getting killed someday with his little frail body smashed in by a berserk mecha.

Shi Cangyuan, at first, awkwardly interpreted this worry as him worrying over losing a rich, long-term customer that might end up with him losing his livelihood… Still, no matter the reasons, he was always persuading Bai Lianhua to tone it down a bit, and leave the professional work to professionals – like him.

They’ve came to known each other for a long time then. That’s when Bai Lianhua appeared to notice and thus ask Shi Cangyuan, why did such a genius like him decide to live out his days pathetically?

Shi Cangyuan always remained silent to this, until one day Bai Lianhua suddenly said to him, “I saw your identity, you were the previous pilot of the number one mecha… I’m sorry. I didn’t want to pry into your secrets.”

Shi Cangyuan didn’t get angry. He himself knew best how much he’d exposed over time in his interactions with Bai Lianhua. In fact, that Bai Lianhua had only figured this out now already proved how carefree how he was.

Though, for some reason, Shi Cangyuan couldn’t hold his inner zeal in… It’s been three years. He long thought the incident had become but a scar in his memories, but he didn’t expect that, in front of Bai Lianhua, he wanted to personally tear apart this rotten delusion that’s disguised as a healed wound in front of him.

Shi Cangyuan can’t help but blow the cover on everything to Bai Lianhua, including the truth on him passing on ‘Dicarus,’ and all his disillusionment and hopelessness.

——When he calmed down, even Shi Cangyuan thought he would not believe him, or perhaps even because of the background of the betrayer, to start distancing himself from someone like him who’s crossed him before.

And he regretted it.

Yet, Bai Lianhua said, “I believe you.”

“I will help you.”

Shi Cangyuan was the one that didn’t believe him instead, “how would you help me?”

And then Bai Lianhua, with a soft smile but a firm tone, says, “I feel that I am exactly the right person to help you.”

Here, it would be prudent to mention the grand identity the system had forged for him in this world——Other than his character setting of being an unreliable mecha modder, Bai Lianhua’s real job is a researcher of flora. Because of his excellent academic capability, he was also participating in a key research that investigated the mysterious light ray that is emanated from the unidentified plant of a bygone era rediscovered in the empire. He was even one of the core researchers in that investigation.

Yes, that mysterious light ray that caused Shi Cangyuan to suffer a genetic collapse and lose his ability to pilot a mecha, happened to be the target of research of the group of researchers that Bai Lianhua is in.

——Thanks to this, the two people actually have a more interesting connection outside of their real-life interaction.

And over the years, Bai Lianhua and his colleagues have already made great progress on the research of that plant that produced the light rays. Bai Lianhua is not allowed to reveal any part of his research, but he can offer him private treatment according to the treatment.

As long as Shi Cangyuan believed in him.

Not even Shi Cangyuan knew what got into him though. He’s already been betrayed before, but he’s still willing to believe in Bai Lianhua for this. He believed that such a coincidence was merely that, and not another trap; that Bai Lianhua really wanted to help him.

When Shi Cangyuan swore that he will not attempt to look further into this, and will only accept the treatment as is without trying to pry into its underlying theory, the two people reach an agreement.

Following Bai Lianhua’s suggestion, Shi Cangyuan closed that shop of his that had no hopes of advancing as a business, and chose to live with his biggest client ever, Bai Lianhua, becoming his so-called private mecha repairer, and while he was at it… also his housekeeper and caretaker.

Since Bai Lianhua was really bad at living, and he’s even old-fashioned and traditional in his daily life, not used to household robots, and likes to do everything himself… As far as Shi Cangyuan saw it, it was an utter and complete disaster.

And Bai Lianhua was in charge of working on a way to repair the genetic collapse of Shi Cangyuan when he’s off work.

The two people interacted like that, managing to reach a sort of harmony even.

——Now that Bai Lianhua is reminded of him being fed various fancy stuff by Shi Cangyuan, he can still feel himself salivating.

It was obvious when Shi Cangyuan just arrived in Bai Lianhua’s house that he is just as bad at cooking as he was, but who could have guessed that once they started living together, Shi Cangyuan actually acted out of character and diligently improved his cooking, basically becoming a master chef by the end.

Seriously. With Shi Cangyuan’s level of cooking that he’d attained, he must have been top-class in this spacefaring world where nutrient mixtures are the norm. If he shows it to the world he would have become famous.

It’s a pity Shi Cangyuan himself clearly has no plans of developing in such a direction.

And Bai Lianhua who’s enjoyed four years’ service by a private master chef also returned the favour his own way, and gradually, he really managed to treat Shi Cangyuan successfully.

It also happened to be the time that the betrayer who used underhanded methods to gain pilotship over ‘Dicarus’ came under fire from the top brass at parliament because of his lack of cooperativeness and leadership. Now that his eight years were up, the top brass who felt he wasn’t suited to continue to operate the number one mecha decided to launch the open competition for the successor of ‘Dicarus’ again.

The betrayer was also unwilling to let go of his pilotship over the number one mecha that he spent so much effort attaining. After negotiations, he changed the rules of the competition to be that he would be defending the ring, and other people had to defeat him to gain pilotship over the number one mecha.

He might not have had the qualities of a leader, but his fighting strength was no joke. So for a while, people thought he’d be able to continue to keep ‘Dicarus’ in his possession for another eight years, and this so-called competition was just for show.

——In fact, in the original timeline, nobody could defeat the betrayer in this competition and therefore he continued to pilot ‘Dicarus,’ until that terrible incident nobody had seen coming occurred later.

Since Bai Lianhua appeared in this world, however, the world’s direction took another turn.

This time, in this competition that everybody thought was fixed, Shi Cangyuan who suddenly reappeared, in front of everyone, slapped the face of the betrayer hard with his own strength and retakes the number one mecha that’s originally his.

And then he submitted his research on mecha structure and its operating system to the empire that he picked back up over the years for free, hoping the top experts in the field of mecha in the empire can find a good solution with everyone’s help that would address these problems he discovered.

So another storm raged over the field of mecha design and manufacture, and Shi Cangyuan ended up attaining both prestige and riches over this. His reputation became unparalleled at this point. Also, the potential risk of ‘Dicarus’ failing irrevocably in the future was averted then.

After the betrayer suddenly fell off the top, he wasn’t as mentally resolute as Shi Cangyuan had been back then. Enraged and terrified, and his extremely self-important pride being besmirched so, he actually went insane over this.

So this time, the one abandoned by his family, ended up being him… Since these big families all had many offsprings. If one candidate were to fail, of course countless others lied in wait.

So Shi Cangyuan also felt that he’d got what he deserved, and decided not to pursue revenge any further. He didn’t waste any more effort or time on scum like him.

So, when he saw Shi Cangyuan take ‘Dicarus’ to the frontlines like he’d hoped, completing a classic series of face-slapping and rising to prominence plotline, Bai Lianhua, who by now had completed his mission and received the familiar notification from the system, after pondering a bit and confirming that he had no more he had to do, under the system’s advice, happily detached from the world and left.

Since the antagonist looked like he’d completely become a winner in life, right? Then the little white lotus that accompanied him through his worst has completed its destiny, and it can finally retreat to the backstages!

——”To appear when the antagonist needed them to be, and disappear if need be when the antagonist no longer needed them to be. This is the discipline a professional white lotus like we must follow.”

… Mm. That, is what the system said.

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