When the egg woke up, it found itself bound tightly and tossed into a steaming pot.
Tang Li was rolling up her sleeves to knead dough. Bathed in the gentle, warm glow of candlelight, her slender figure looked deceptively like that of a gentle, virtuous maiden—nobody would ever guess she was capable of killing a hundred people in a single day.
"What are you doing?" the egg asked, swimming around in the water.
"Since you won't send me back, I have no choice but to resign myself to staying here. Am I not even allowed to make something to eat when I'm hungry?" Tang Li shot it a sidelong glance.
Hearing her say she resigned herself to her fate, the egg was overjoyed and said smugly, "Good thing you know."
Instead of answering, Tang Li poked it with a pair of chopsticks.
"What are you doing? What are you doing? What are you doing?" Feeling violated, the egg quickly swam away into a corner.
"Actually, I don't really like things boiled in water. It feels tasteless. And if I were to fry it, I wouldn't like it without a dash of black sesame seeds," Tang Li said with a smiling curve of her lips, her meaning crystal clear.
"No, you can't eat me, okay? I'm a hatching egg, not an edible egg. Have you no common sense?" The egg knocked away her chopsticks and shouted angrily.
"Understood. You developed from a fertilized egg, then. May I ask who your parents are?" Tang Li asked with a fake smile.
"I don't have—"
Before the egg could finish, Tang Li interrupted with a knowing look. "Just as I thought. One look at you and I knew you were an unmannered brat, a stinking abductor with no father to beget you and no mother to raise you."
The egg was stunned by her scolding. It tried to retrace its own origin story, but could make neither head nor tail of it. Crawling out of the pot, it looked at her in a sullen huff.
"What on earth will it take for you to help me?"
Tang Li asked with an innocent air, "Why should I help you?"
"Because this mess is your fault," the egg complained with deep grievance.
"Did I beg you to bring me here?" Tang Li couldn't even be bothered to look at it, continuing to roll out her dough on her own.
"Did I ask you to kill people?" The egg raised its voice in indignation.
"If you hadn't brought me here, would I have killed anyone?" Tang Li said, utterly unapologetic.
"That's twisted logic! Just because I brought you here, does that mean you *have* to kill people?" The egg banged heavily on the chopping board.
"Yes. If you don't let me go back, I'll keep killing. As soon as I'm full, I'm going out to find more people to kill." With a loud *thud*, Tang Li slammed a lump of dough onto the board.
"You're completely unreasonable."
"Yes, yes, yes. So you'd better let me go back quickly, or I'll kill you too."
"Are you even a model youth of the new century? What happened to being enterprising, ambitious, and positive? Who goes around killing people over the slightest disagreement?"
"Ha. If you hadn't abducted me, I wouldn't be like this." Tang Li gave it a dismissive, disdainful look.
"Fine, fine, fine, it's all my fault, is that it? The only chance at a remedy now is for you to help me, and then I'll send you back." The egg's tone was utterly helpless, as if it never wanted to speak to her again.
"No. I want to go back right now, and I won't help you." Tang Li flatly and resolutely refused. She had a hunch that this egg was definitely up to no good.
"But you're the one who caused this mess, big sister." The egg was on the verge of tears.
It couldn't understand—it had only arrived a little late, so why had things turned out like this?
"No, first of all, you need to get one thing straight: if you hadn't brought me here, I wouldn't have killed anyone. Okay? Don't try to pin the blame on me; you know very well what wicked deeds you've done." With a single slap, Tang Li batted the egg right back into the boiling water.
She added, "Where I come from, abduction is a capital offense."
"Fine, fine, fine. If you won't help, you won't. Without your help, I won't have the power to send you back either. The two of us can just wear each other out like this. Go ahead and kill all you want, kill as many people as you please—even if you destroy this world, you still won't be going back." Driven to utter despair, the egg threw a temper tantrum.
Watching the sulking egg, Tang Li pondered for a moment before relenting. "I can help you, but you have to send me back first."
"I told you I don't have any power! If I had power, I would have sent you off to wreak havoc in other worlds long ago."
The egg had retreated so deep into its own depression that it started ramming itself against the bottom of the pot.
"What do you need to get your power back?" Tang Li wanted to know if she could boil it through, so she simply slapped the lid on the pot and trapped the egg inside.
"I need to grow up! Help me gather power." Trapped in the pot, the egg muttered to itself in sullen anger.
"Oh, so gathering power is a process, right? Hatching, infancy, youth, maturity, old age." Tang Li narrowed her eyes in deduction.
"Yes."
The egg lacked any enthusiasm in its reply, sounding as though it couldn't be bothered with her.
"To what stage do you need people to help you gather it? Old age?" Tang Li continued to press.
"Youth, of course! If I still needed help after growing up, what difference would I make?"
Tang Li gave a slight nod. "I can help you, but you must send me back the moment you hatch, and you can find someone else to help you after that. Don't give me any of that nonsense about lacking the power to send me back—don't think I didn't catch that you'll have power the moment you hatch."
The egg pondered at the bottom of the pot, while Tang Li patiently awaited its reply.
"Very well." Harboring a wicked scheme to trick her, the egg suppressed its inner joy and feigned calm as it agreed.
"Hah. Don't even think about dragging me back here after you send me home, or I'll make you regret the consequences." Tang Li's voice carried a chilling threat.
The egg stiffened all over, surprised that she had seen right through its intentions, and hastily cowered. "I wouldn't dare, I wouldn't dare."
Tang Li went back to making her hand-pulled noodles—kneading, rolling, and slicing the dough, every movement exceptionally practiced and smooth.
After slicing the noodles, she lifted the pot lid, fished out the blackened egg inside, changed the water, and brought it to a boil once more.
"Didn't this body of yours reach the Golden Core stage? Why do you still need to eat?" the egg asked, watching her cook with puzzlement.
Tang Li pressed her lips together and couldn't be bothered to answer.
She cooked a whole pot of noodles, which measured out to exactly four servings by bowl.
It was the saltiest bowl of noodles she had ever eaten.
The pot of noodles was reheated several times, and it took her a whole day to finish it.
The egg knew how to read the room and realized she was in a bad mood, so it didn't pester her and instead stayed quietly in the corner to sleep.
When evening came, a cold wind woke it up, and discovering that Tang Li was gone, it hurried out in a frantic panic to find her.
"You can't shake—"
Panting as it climbed to the mountaintop, the egg saw Tang Li sitting beneath a tree and swallowed the taunt it had on the tip of its tongue.
Because Tang Li was wreathed in an aura of sorrow, looking utterly lonely.
"Here, this is for you." The egg handed her a palm-sized piece of eggshell.
Tang Li stared at it for a moment before asking, "Why?"
The egg tossed the shell into her lap. "Just take it. Consider it an apology gift from me."
Sitting down beside Tang Li, the egg said with a trace of melancholy, "When I placed the commission with the system star, I never expected them to grab just anyone, let alone a baleful star like you. The busier things get, the more chaotic they become."
Tang Li quietly listened to its rambling. On the surface she looked listless, but in her mind she was reviewing whether she had ever encountered a system.
Two seconds later, it dawned on her: the system must have malfunctioned and grabbed the wrong person. The electric current inside her body explained everything.
If she said or did anything out of character, she would be punished. But because of the system malfunction, the electricity that was supposed to punish her had instead become her weapon. As long as she didn't overload it, those currents couldn't harm her.
And those bullet comments—now that she had killed the protagonists, the storyline had strayed off course, and she had smashed the plot to pieces, the bullet comments had vanished along with it.