For a moment, Sui Cannong's heart seemed to halt.
Hold on, what did he mean when he said that he "I won't have a need for any more in the future"? What kind of person would ever say something like this? Sui Cannong felt within himself a sudden chill within his limbs. His hands and feet ached with cold sweat suddenly- carrying within them a faint quiver. There was no apparent logical explanation that could be applied to such speech. This was not making sense.
What circumstance would a situation warrant a person to say "I won't have a need for any more in the future"? May it be that these words were genuine, and they were said sincerely because the materials truly did not matter anymore? Or... was this a case of one believing that they had no future at all? Had he been anticipating departure from life?
Due to the fact that Sui Cannong had been afk for too long; Ji Ling had begun to express confusion from the other side of his screen.
"Mr. Sui?" He called out, tentatively.
This caused Sui Cannong to snap out of his daze, responding with a short noise of acknowledgement. He was aware that it wasn't appropriate to deny Ji Ling's goodwill for any longer. Thus he clicked 'accept' on the incoming gift. Ore was immediately deposited into his account.
In a subdued tone he said a quiet, "thank you."
Ji Ling responded only with, "you're welcome."
Upon confirming that Sui Cannong had collected his gift; Ji Ling was noticeably more at ease. He no longer said anything, instead opting to playing around with his newly gained Petit butterfly. Petit butterfly was moved around by his joystick to continue his silent reading within the garden of Sui Cannong.
To him, the shiny new ores in his inventory may as well be mountains of explosives.
"Mr. Ji, when you do so much for me, I feel a bit guilty." Sui Cannong worded his sentences delicately, "please tell me... is it that... you have any difficulties in your life? Is there any way I could help make things better?"
Sui Cannong noticed that Ji Ling's in-game avatar had stopped its motions of chopping at a tree. However, Ji Ling's reply came plainly as it did the last time,
"No."
Sui Cannong had his doubts this time. Additionally, he was also aware that his motives would be too obvious if he were to continue to inquire.
He thought about it for a moment, then said, "you know, everyone has worries of their own. I'm no exception. I too have had many troubles recently." Sui Cannong saw that once again Ji Ling's chopping had slowed to a stop. Ji Ling asked, "What troubles?"
"For example...... I've yet to decide on science fair topics for any of my three science classes." Sui Cannong exhaled, full of resignation. "These grade ten children are quite the handful. They insisted on doing a project related to hatching eggs, and they didn't want to be eggs. They held Sui Yingjun in their arms and studied for a whole class, trying to figure out how to make him lay eggs."
"The issue is that Sui Yingjun is male, and there's one of him and three classes worth of students. Despite that, I can't bring myself to tell everyone that they can't do the oology lab." Sui Cannong paused, then added belatedly, "Oh, by the way, Sui Yingjun is my–"
"Your turtle." Ji Ling's voice transmitted through the phone, "you've mentioned this to me."
