178: Chapter 178 Chen Shuyin is getting anxious: Then what am I?

Chenxing Technology, underground core laboratory.

This is the place with the highest technological value on the entire Earth, and a holy land in the hearts of countless scientists. Usually, only rational data and cold logic flow here.

But today, the air here is sour enough to make one's teeth ache.

"Clang!"

A crisp sound, the sound of an expensive alloy experimental board being slammed onto the table.

Jiang Chen had just pushed the door open when he was startled by the loud noise and shrank his neck. He glanced at Academician Chen Shuyin, who was standing with her back to him in front of the console, and his heart skipped a beat.

Something was wrong.

This silhouette, the murderous aura was too heavy.

"Um... Old Chen."

Jiang Chen tentatively moved forward two steps, a ingratiating smile on his face, "I heard the secondary gun cooling system optimization for the 'luan bird' is finished? I came to take a look..."

"Look at what?"

Academician Chen Shuyin turned around abruptly.

She wasn't wearing her iconic rimless glasses today, and her eyes, usually cold and rational, were now red like a rabbit's. Her eyes were filled with tears, stubbornly refusing to fall, which made it all the more heartbreaking to watch.

"Jiang Chen, do you think I'm very stupid?"

Her voice had a distinct nasal tone, along with a trace of irrepressible grievance.

"Huh? Where is this coming from?"

Jiang Chen was stunned, "You are the smartest woman in all of humanity, who dares to call you stupid? I'll be the first to sew their mouth shut!"

"Then tell me!"

Academician Chen Shuyin rushed over in a few steps, cornering Jiang Chen against the wall. She tilted her head up, staring fixedly into Jiang Chen's eyes, like a little girl whose candy had been stolen:

"Why is the whole company spreading rumors that Jiang Qianqian calls that violent maniac 'sister-in-law'?"

"And she says it so naturally! So affectionately!"

"What about me? What am I?"

Academician Chen Shuyin pointed at her own nose, her emotions finally spiraling out of control:

"I accompanied you to start the business, ate instant noodles with you in the basement, helped you build the spaceship, and even to help you cover your lies, I acted like a shrew in front of the world's media!"

"I gave my pride, my reserve, and all my time to Chenxing Technology, to you!"

"And what was the result?"

"That Wasteland woman who only knows how to kill and fight, and can't even solve a system of linear equations, becomes the 'sister-in-law' as soon as she arrives?"

"Then what am I? Your long-term laborer? Your technical consultant? Or just a... tool person you keep in the laboratory?"

This series of questions, like a machine gun, left Jiang Chen dizzy.

He looked at the woman before him who had given everything for him.

She had lost weight.

In order to keep up with the progress of the "Nantianmen Project", she had barely slept well this month. Her once-fitting lab coat now looked loose on her.

Jiang Chen's heart felt like it had been pricked hard by a needle.

That's right.

He had grown accustomed to Academician Chen Shuyin's rationality, accustomed to her strength, but forgot that she was also a woman, who could also be jealous, who could also feel wronged.

"Old Chen..."

Jiang Chen sighed and did not argue.

He reached out and gently wiped a teardrop falling from the corner of her eye, his movements incredibly tender.

"I'm sorry."

"I neglected your feelings."

Academician Chen Shuyin turned her head away, trying to dodge his hand, but Jiang Chen domineeringly cupped her face.

"That title, it's just that girl Qianqian calling out nonsense, it can't be taken seriously."

Jiang Chen looked into her eyes, his tone unprecedentedly serious:

"In front of Jiang Wanqiu, I am the Father God, a faith that needs to be maintained at all times."

"But in front of you..."

"I am Jiang Chen. I am an ordinary man with countless flaws, one who needs you to clean up my messes, and who needs you to use your wisdom to patch up loopholes."

"You can be without her, but you cannot be without me, right?" Academician Chen Shuyin sniffled, a hint of expectation in her eyes.

"Of course."

Jiang Chen smiled, a bit roguishly, yet exceptionally sincere:

"Without her, at most I would just be missing a fighter."

"But if I didn't have you, this whole operation would have fallen apart long ago, and this spaceship would explode the moment it took off. You are my brain, my backbone."

"Tell me, which is more important, the brain or the fighter?"

This speech, although it sounded a bit like something a scumbag would say, was the sweetest love talk for the STEM-girl Academician Chen Shuyin.

The brain.

The indispensable core.

"I suppose you know how to talk..."

Academician Chen Shuyin broke into a smile through her tears, two flushes of red appearing on her cheeks. She reached out and punched Jiang Chen's chest, "I'll forgive you this time. But..."

She bit her lip, her eyes becoming somewhat hazy, her body leaning forward slightly, as if wanting to demand some more practical comfort:

"To compensate for my emotional distress, tonight..."

"You have to work overtime with me. You are not allowed to leave."

The atmosphere instantly changed from tense to pink-hued ambiguity.

Jiang Chen looked at the pretty face inches away, smelling the pleasant, cold fragrance on her, and his Adam's apple bobbed.

Overtime?

The serious kind?

If it's not the serious kind... that wouldn't be impossible either.

Just as the distance between the two was getting closer and closer, and something office-romance-like was about to happen.

"Beep—! Beep—! Beep—!"

A sharp, piercing, and even mournful alarm sound exploded in the laboratory without warning.

It wasn't the laboratory's alarm.

The source of the sound was that... cross-dimensional communicator in Jiang Chen's pocket used specifically to contact Jiang Wanqiu!

That frequency was not a normal call request.

That was—[Highest Level SOS Distress Signal]!

The ambiguous atmosphere was instantly shattered.

Jiang Chen's face changed drastically; he pushed Academician Chen Shuyin away and pulled out the communicator.

Academician Chen Shuyin also instantly regained her scientific calm, quickly stepping back, and looked at the device in Jiang Chen's hand: "What's going on? That violent woman... did something happen to her?"

Jiang Chen didn't answer.

He stared fixedly at the blood-red code on the screen, his heart skipping a beat.

Although Jiang Wanqiu was reckless and prone to jealousy, she was definitely not someone who would easily call for help. In the Wasteland, she was the invincible Empress, the War God sweeping across the wilderness.

The only thing that could make her send this kind of distress signal... was one possibility.

That is—the sky has collapsed.

"Quick! Connect the holographic projection!"

Jiang Chen roared at the console, his voice filled with an unprecedented sense of anxiety and rage: "Something huge has happened!"