Miss, Your Nose Has Fallen Off, Please Pick It Up, the Loyal and Righteous Mrs. Du

The Shen family mansion.

Inside the Eldest Miss's room.

It was inexplicably quiet. You could hear a pin drop, and even the sound of breathing was distinctly clear. After leaving the place of a certain evil obasan, the Eldest Miss did not return to school. Instead, she came back to her own room at home. It was already very late, and heading back to school would only be an unnecessary hassle.

Shen Qinghan had a rather indifferent personality. She didn't like to act privileged or demand special treatment at school, but she wasn't so stubborn as to ignore the convenient resources available to her.

Just like now. When she could clearly cut down on commute time to get more rest, why bother rushing back to the school apartment to sleep?

Shen Qinghan hated stupid people and stupid things...

It had been this way since she was a child. Even without her innate personality flaws, Shen Qinghan still wouldn't have many friends. To her, the IQ of the people around her was simply too low; talking to them felt like trying to converse with paramecia.

And what was there to study about paramecia?

Abandoning the comfortable bed at home—which saved time and improved her sleep quality—just to run all the way back to school to sleep was undoubtedly an incredibly foolish thing to do. Naturally, Shen Qinghan would never do it.

According to her usual routine, Shen Qinghan should be lying in bed reading a book right now, followed by a glass of hot milk before going to sleep. But now... the hot milk had been drunk, the glass washed and put away, and though she was lying in bed, she didn't feel the slightest bit sleepy.

So... where was the problem?

Shen Qinghan lay in bed, her eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling as if pondering something.

After a long while.

Click!

With the crisp sound of a switch, the darkened room lit up once again. Shen Qinghan sat up from her bed, her gaze locking onto an inconspicuous corner of the room where a giant radish plushie sat.

After staring at it for a moment, she narrowed her eyes as if having made a decision. Shen Qinghan pulled her phone out from under her pillow and opened the Green Bubble messaging app.

Before her eyes was an absurdly minimalist interface. There were no pop-up ads, only the most basic payment notifications and a painfully short list of contacts that could be taken in at a single glance.

Evil Obasan, Dad, Grandpa, Grandma...

The entire contact list added up to less than ten people. It was worth mentioning that Mrs. Du's chat had been set to "Do Not Disturb," and the 99+ messages from her were all unread.

In response to the constant harassment from a certain inherently evil obasan, the Eldest Miss had turned off notifications long ago. If possible... she would have gone through the entire process of blocking and deleting her by now.

Oh wait, she had actually done that before. But the very next day, that certain inherently evil obasan launched a "sonic attack," screaming at the top of her lungs and guilt-tripping her, crying out things like, "Boohoo... I'm your mama, how could you treat me like this, boohoo..." and other similar nonsense.

For the sake of some peace and quiet, the Eldest Miss eventually compromised. She added the person back and then silently turned on the Do Not Disturb mode.

Aside from the few times she failed to keep an eye on her phone, allowing that inherently evil obasan to launch a sneak attack, snatch the device, turn off the Do Not Disturb mode, and resume the continuous harassment, things were generally fine.

As for the other contacts... it was all just standard greetings, polite small talk during holidays, red envelopes, and the like.

It couldn't be helped. Shen Qinghan had an innate personality defect. Everyone in the Du and Shen families knew this, and no one dared to force the Eldest Miss to do anything against her will. Otherwise, if she ran away, they wouldn't even have a place to cry about it.

Her family had discovered this issue when she was very young, but unfortunately, it was never resolved. They had taken her to see doctors, and even brought in Taoist priests and Catholic fathers.

They suspected that someone had tampered with their descendant, or perhaps she had been entangled by some evil spirit.

The result... the doctors concluded that the child's IQ was simply too high, to the point where she somewhat despised the babies around her age.

The two families: "..."

The Taoist priests and the fathers came to the conclusion that everything was completely normal. There was no evil spirit possession or demonic entanglement whatsoever.

Oh, by the way, when the Eldest Miss was being carried around for these "consultations," she wore a look of "coldness"—no, wait, it should be described as "cold but adorable," since she was so tiny and incredibly cute when she was little.

When she was hungry, she would climb up on her own to find food... Of course, this was also a survival skill she was forced to develop to avoid starving to death due to Mrs. Du's carelessness.

In short... she was extremely cute.

Just imagine: a soft, sweet-smelling, miniature version of the Eldest Miss, acting all cold yet adorable, with a pacifier in her mouth, looking at you with a "you're an idiot" expression... Oh, my God, that is just too satisfying!

Hey, what a coincidence, Mrs. Du thought the exact same thing! She always loved to hug her and plant a couple of fierce smooches on her. This habit hadn't changed even to this day, and she would still launch "sneak attacks" on the Eldest Miss from time to time!

Shen Qinghan never took the initiative to contact anyone, except for... Ye Cheng.

On the phone.

Above the sparse list of contacts, Ye Cheng was pinned at the very top. For no other reason than the fact that Ye Cheng was the only person the Eldest Miss had ever replied to.

Their chat history was still stuck on their last conversation, which ended when Ye Cheng sent an internet meme of a guy holding an iced tea with the caption, "Bro, I'm really gonna elbow you." And then... there was no "and then."

Shen Qinghan hadn't replied.

Looking closely at the timestamp, the message was sent almost two days ago.

Shen Qinghan narrowed her eyes, resting her chin on her pillow as she stared at the phone held in both her hands... She just kept staring at it, as if staring at it for a hundred and eighty days would somehow brew something fresh and delicious out of it!

It seemed... she was waiting for Ye Cheng on the other side of the screen to take the initiative and send a message. Hmm... she was literally trying to communicate via telepathy!

Tap, tap, tap... The Eldest Miss's slender fingers danced across the screen. Character after character appeared, only to be deleted. Then she started tapping again, deleted it again, and tapped some more. After repeating this cycle several times, she finally exited the Green Bubble chat interface and opened a certain search engine.

Tap, tap, tap...

Question: "What should be the first thing you say when chatting with someone on Green Bubble?"

Ding-dong!

The moment the question was submitted, an answer popped up.

Answer: "That depends on your relationship with the person you're messaging. However, the fact that you're even asking this question proves that your relationship can't be too intimate. There's a high probability that it's a simp and their goddess, or perhaps your secret crush..."

Shen Qinghan frowned and decisively exited the page.

Technology was becoming more and more advanced these days. Even search queries were comprehensively answered by AI, which would sometimes spit out remarks with extreme attack power.

As for why the Eldest Miss closed the page, it naturally wasn't because the answer had hit a sore spot. It was because the answer completely missed the mark and had nothing to do with her situation—at least, that was how she saw it.

The Eldest Miss didn't see the "classmate" relationship answer she was looking for, so she closed the results without hesitation.

She began her questioning once again. This time, after pondering for a moment, she started typing away—tap, tap, tap—making her prompt much more precise.

Question: "With a classmate, opposite sex, deskmate sitting on the right, height around 185 cm, weight..."

The Eldest Miss inputted extremely accurate information this time, falling just short of directly typing Ye Cheng's ID details into it, and finally completed her query!

The phone screen started spinning a loading circle. The AI began to think and prepare its answer. The Eldest Miss stared calmly and motionlessly at the screen in front of her, her pitch-black eyes reflecting the endlessly spinning circle...

"The system has crashed due to insufficient computing power. Please top up to unlock the exclusive VIP channel!"

Shen Qinghan: "..."

Faced with such a blatantly obvious "money-grabbing" trick, a normal person's reaction would be to immediately exit and find a free app to continue their previous question. Even an average person wouldn't fall for it, so naturally, the Eldest Miss... paid up!

"Ding!"

"Congratulations on successfully upgrading to the exclusive VIP channel. We will now continue answering your question!"

A crisp electronic prompt sounded. As long as the money was in place, the spinning circle on the phone screen immediately vanished, directly turning into a stream of processed text, providing a precise answer and deduction.

Answer: "Since you are a VIP user, you can choose the tone and attitude of the response."

Shen Qinghan furrowed her brows and checked a few options such as "Real," "Objective," and "Sharp-tongued," and then... the system began to generate its answer with full force.

"Request received. Beginning response..."

"Oh... look at this poor worm, you almost typed in his ID number. Let me see, what is your question? Oh... so you want to chat with your deskmate? What should the first sentence be? Hehe, I suggest you pick up your dignity from the floor!"

"Would a normal person even ask such a question? If you asked me how to increase the success rate of a confession, I might have thought highly of you. But you actually asked me how to start the first sentence? How else would you start it? Of course, you start with, 'Are you there?' Here we go. After all, he isn't that close to you anyway, otherwise you wouldn't be using such a pathetic tone to ask me, an AI bot, how to reply to the first sentence!"

"Given that you might be either an idiot or have a personality disorder, I won't use words that are too harsh or mean. However, my dear premium VIP user, I suggest you..."

Smash!!!

The phone was raised by the Eldest Miss and hurled from the bed, crashing near the doorway. With a loud clatter and a crisp shattering sound, it terrified Mrs. Du, who was eavesdropping outside the door, into scrambling away on her hands and knees.

Oh no, how did Little Hanhan find out!

Mrs. Du wished she could grow two more legs right now, hating herself for not being able to run faster. As a result, the short-haired woman at the end of the corridor witnessed this "magical" scene.

A giant "spider" was scurrying wildly down the enclosed corridor, crawling towards her in an extremely bizarre and rapid manner.

The short-haired woman: "???"

"Oh no, Little Hanhan found out, run!!!" The word "fear" was practically written all over Du Wanyi's face. She had never seen their Little Hanhan get so furious that she actually smashed her phone.

Boohoo, I'm going to be beaten to death, boohoo, no, boohoo...

Afraid that she wasn't running fast enough, Du Wanyi hoisted the short-haired woman onto her shoulder and bolted. Her whole body remained as light as a swallow, not making a single sound!

The short-haired woman: "???"

Wait, Family Head, you!

Just like that, she was carried all the way outside the Shen family mansion before Du Wanyi finally stopped. However, she still wore a look of having survived a disaster, wiping the cold sweat from her forehead.

"That was too close, I was almost caught!"

"By the way, Little Lanlan, if Little Hanhan asks later, just say you were the one eavesdropping, okay? Don't mention me..."

Even at a time like this, Du Wanyi didn't forget to shift the blame.

Truly a paragon of loyalty!!!

The short-haired woman: "..."

"Family Head, I... I'm afraid I won't be seeing you anymore after this..." After a moment of silence, the short-haired woman finally spoke.

Du Wanyi felt no guilt whatsoever. Instead, she patted the short-haired woman on the shoulder: "It's fine, the Du family will remember your sacrifice. How about this, I'll buy you a plane ticket to go abroad later. You can lay low out there and come back in eight or ten years. Don't worry, Little Lanlan, I'll take good care of your family, so just go in peace!"

The short-haired woman: "..."

Not even a few minutes later, Du Wanyi's left and right brain started fighting each other again. She paced back and forth in the courtyard, walking in circles.

"This won't do. What Little Hanhan hates the most are liars. If she finds out I lied to her, what if she ignores me from now on? What if she deletes me on Green Bubble? What if she finds someone else to be her mommy..."

Sorrow was written plainly on Du Wanyi's face.

The short-haired woman: "..."

The first two were somewhat normal, but the last one... was that really something a normal person would worry about?

What kind of sane person goes around acknowledging random people as their mommy!

"How about this, Little Lanlan. We will deny this matter to the death. If she asks later, we'll just say it was Da Hei crawling around!" As Du Wanyi spoke, she pulled out a giant spider from her sleeve, the kind that was raised to be plump and chubby.

This was the "Da Hei" Du Wanyi spoke of. If one looked closely, they would realize that this spider named Da Hei looked almost exactly the same as the "Xiao Hei" that had frightened the Eldest Miss before, with the only difference being their size.

Da Hei was Xiao Hei's father. Xiao Hei had been exterminated during the Eldest Miss's massive cleanup before, and now Da Hei was about to die a heroic death, taking the blame for Mrs. Du!

Da Hei: I don't know if I can handle this blame!

The short-haired woman looked at the giant black spider in her Family Head's hand, then looked at the Family Head's serious expression, and fell into silence.

"Family Head, what exactly happened just now?" the short-haired woman couldn't help but ask.

She knew that her Family Head's favorite things were these weird "little animals," but because of their Young Miss, she had no choice but to raise them in secret. Da Hei was her favorite "capable general."

Normally, Du Wanyi treated it like an absolute treasure, but now... she was sending Da Hei out to take the fall.

The short-haired woman: "..."

Just how serious was this matter that it would make their Family Head perform such a painful sacrifice?

Du Wanyi also looked somewhat innocent as she shook her head. "I don't know! I was leaning against the door listening for a while, but I didn't hear what was being said. I only heard the sound of typing. It seemed like she was chatting with someone. I wonder if it was Little Chengcheng..."

Thinking back on it now, Du Wanyi still felt a lingering fear. If she had been caught, that phone probably would have been smashed right onto her forehead. Boohoo, it was too scary.

Indeed, the Eldest Miss suddenly smashing her phone was terrifying. It had triggered such a strong stress response in Mrs. Du that she even started running on walls... unable to resist transforming into a giant spider.

Boohoo...

...

Meanwhile.

Inside the Eldest Miss's room.

Because of the impact from being thrown just now, it must have hit a button or something, because the phone instantly switched into read-aloud mode—and on full speakerphone, no less.

"Someone is getting triggered, I won't say who. Cue the impotent rage. Go ahead, bully a poor little bot. It's fine, beat me up, just like how he ignores you..."

Smash! Smash! Smash!

The young lady limped out of bed, walked over to a chair, hoisted it into the air, and proceeded to viciously batter the phone on the floor with a series of heavy blows.

Out in the hallway, Mrs. Du had just been about to sneak back and assess the situation. She had barely poked her head around the corner when the deafening crashes reached her ears. Shuddering in sheer terror, her little face drained of color. Hitting full sprint, she morphed into a giant spider and once again scrambled wildly along the walls in a frantic escape.

"Oh crap, run!!!"