Chapter 34: Urban Shenhao System (Chapter Finale)

"Yang Yang, we're just waiting for you. Your eldest uncle is asking when you'll be back so we can go back to our hometown together to pay respects to our ancestors."

Should one call it a mother and daughter sharing a telepathic connection?

Just as she returned to the car, Xie Yang received a call from Ms. Xie.

Over these years, aside from traveling the world with her, Ms. Xie had stayed in Xiaoling County to accompany her elderly parents, making up for the regret of not being able to serve them in their old age earlier in life.

"I'm just about to head back to Xiaoling County."

Xie Yang entered the destination on the display screen.

The latest model of self-driving vehicle produced by her subsidiary company slowly drove away from the center of Nancheng, a new city changing with each passing day.

The self-driving electric car was a project developed by her cousin Xie Xufang and his roommates after their work on drones, and it was only after improvements by the R&D team where Cheng Zhuo worked that this current product was achieved.

It took ten years to finally go into production and hit the market.

After several rounds of refinement, it was now the fifth generation, and the technology was already very mature. Its safety and other assessments were also far ahead of other similar vehicles on the market.

This technology alone had made all the shareholders incredibly wealthy.

After the tech company she invested in became famous, the R&D team led by Xie Xufang became the apple of their peers' eyes; countless companies wanted to offer high salaries to poach them, but they remained unmoved.

Don't ask; asking just means they aren't short on money.

An 8% equity stake was enough for them to receive millions in dividends every year without doing a thing.

What's more, Xie Yang was their benefactor.

Without her appreciation and investment back then, without her unconditional trust and support, they might have been like other classmates: finding a random software development company after graduation, working 996 jobs, wearing plaid shirts and flip-flops, drinking coffee with sleepy eyes to stay awake, and upon reaching thirty-five, becoming balding, greasy middle-aged men facing the constant risk of being laid off.

It can be said that without Xie Yang, there would be no them today, sitting back and enjoying dividends.

"Cousin, where are you? Do you need me to come pick you up?"

People are most easily summoned by thought.

Xie Yang had just thought of Xie Xufang when this old cousin called.

In a few days, it would be the thirtieth anniversary of the relocation and reconstruction of Xie Family Village. The village Cadre had organized a dragon and lion dance troupe for the celebration, and the whole Xie Family planned to go back to take a look and pay respects to their ancestors.

Xie Xufang had also returned with his wife and children.

His mother-in-law was a native of old Haicheng, and at first, upon learning that her daughter had found a boyfriend from the countryside, she was quite disapproving.

Even though Xie Xufang was young and promising, with an annual salary higher than the combined income of their family of three, the old Haicheng natives had an inherent arrogance that looked down on country folk, and they always maintained a condescending sense of distance toward this son-in-law.

Until—they followed their daughter to Xiaoling County.

They saw clean streets that didn't lose out to big cities, spacious squares, three-story-high musical fountains, and rows upon rows of high-rise residences, garden villas, and hot spring villas;

They toured the technical school, famous nationwide for never having to worry about enrollment since its founding, and the Global Library City branch, which had a larger collection than the Shanghai Library;

Because of travel sickness, they experienced a public hospital that possessed top-tier medical equipment and was more high-end than the most prestigious private hospital in Haicheng;

They saw a tech park where multiple well-known tech companies were gathered, and even the things shuttling through the squares and streets cleaning up trash weren't sanitation workers, but intelligent Robots...

They were instantly won over!

Now, her mother-in-law lived in the villa area of Xie Family Village.

Eating purely natural, ecological ingredients and enjoying the convenience of high-tech products;

In her spare time, she would go fishing, dance in the square, or go to the fully-equipped senior activity center to play cards, play chess, or watch 4D movies that hadn't even become popular in most cinemas yet.

If she didn't want to cook, she would just head to the senior Canteen for a cheap, delicious, and nutritious meal.

Now, even if you tried to chase them back to Haicheng, they wouldn't go, and they would often post updates to their social media, tempting their friends and relatives in Haicheng to want to come to Xie Family Village for their retirement.

Conversely, Xie Yang, the founder, didn't spend many days living in Xie Family Village, having spent almost all these years flying around the globe.

There was no helping it; there were too many industries!

Ever since she sent Wu Tianyu to prison with a life sentence, the Shenhao System had been so excited that it spun in circles in her consciousness, wishing it could take out all its stocked Task rewards and give them to her—the kind you get for free without even doing a Task!

Over thirty years, there were so many industries that even she couldn't remember exactly how many there were.

A few years ago, she would still enthusiastically go to various places for inspections, but later, as the industries blossomed everywhere, even if she went to inspect one place every day, she wouldn't repeat a location for three hundred and sixty-five days a year; just thinking about it was exhausting.

Xie "Rich Woman" Yang, whose money was so abundant that she couldn't spend it all in ten lifetimes, let alone one, simply donated it all to the country, keeping only five million for herself.

With things this way, not to mention her cousins who had their own industries, even her Ms. Xie had assets under her name that exceeded hers.

When everyone heard she only had five million left, they felt bad that it wasn't enough for her to spend, so whenever they gathered for holidays, they would try every possible way to stuff money into her hands, leaving Xie Yang between laughter and tears.

A fifty-something little old lady, mixed in among a group of babbling toddlers receiving red envelopes and New Year's money—didn't she have a reputation to maintain?

Her elderly aunt, whose teeth were loose and who spoke with a whistle, still said the same thing: "As long as you aren't married, you're still a child. Children should receive red envelopes and New Year's money."

"..."

So it was still the fault of not being married?

"Cousin, how many days can you stay this time? Do you want to stay at the Hot Spring Villa or Meilin Villa? You haven't been to the Hot Spring Villa in a long time, right? It was renovated recently, and the facilities are more convenient. The plum blossoms at Meilin Villa are in full bloom, which is perfect for admiring the flowers and boiling tea..."

Her cousin's chatter pulled back her drifting thoughts.

Over these years, although the funds in her hands hadn't exceeded five million, her housing was blossoming everywhere—either gifted by her cousins or built with investments from her cousin.

Just returning to Xiaoling County for a holiday, she had to agonize for half a day over where to stay.

Others agonized over having nowhere to stay; she agonized over having too many places, all of which were in her favorite style.

"This time..."

Xie Yang was driving on the mountain road, adjusted her headset, and just as she was about to answer, her smart sunglasses flashed red, indicating an infrared ambush ahead—most likely a sniper.

Xie Yang quickly instructed her cousin: "I've run into some trouble. Lock onto my location, contact Cheng Zhuo, and have him hack into my sunglasses' cloud space to hand the surveillance over to the police. If... there is a will of mine in the safe in the study at Meilin Villa, and the password is backed up in the cloud space..."

"Cousin—"

Xie Yang activated the protective devices inside the car; the bulletproof windows and protective gear meant she could have originally dodged it with a few drifts.

However, as luck would have it, a school bus was driving toward her; it was a nearby elementary school organizing a spring outing for the students, and the children were singing the school anthem at the top of their lungs, the cheerful singing drifting for miles.

Looking at the sniper's direction, the infrared rays seen through her sunglasses were already aimed at the school bus tires; clearly, they wanted to use the school bus to intercept her.

If this shot went off, the school bus would at best flip over, and at worst, fall off the cliff.

Xie Yang sighed, slammed on the brakes, quickly adjusted the steering, and accelerated to fly off the winding mountain road, crashing straight into an evergreen pine on the opposite side of the cliff.

The moment the car flew into the air, she saw a pair of familiar eyes filled with insane resentment.

This made her change her mind at the last second.

"Bang—"

"Boom—"

The massive explosion and raging flames stopped the school bus from moving forward.

The teacher on the bus hurriedly called the police.

When the police arrived at the scene, they discovered that the person in the car accident was actually Ms. Xie Yang, whom they had once escorted.

Not far from her car, a scruffy, thin old man lay in a pool of blood, clutching a smuggled sniper rifle.

According to fingerprints, iris scans, and DNA verification, his identity was confirmed to be the escaped prisoner Wu Tianyu.

Seeing Xie Yang's choice to sacrifice her own life in a flash to save a busload of teachers and students, the Main System was speechless for a long time before saying: 【Host, the Saint System was not exaggerating; you truly are a kind-hearted and wonderful person.】

Xie Yang: "..."

The Shenhao System, which was waiting to be sent back to the factory for repairs, was moved to tears:

【Host... sob sob sob... how can you be so great! Why don't you choose me? Once I'm repaired and return, I'll follow you, Host, forever!】

Xie Yang: "..."

The Shenhao System was indeed very satisfying to use at first; with little effort and huge returns, if this could be considered an investment, no other investment in the world would dare claim to have a higher rate of return.

But then again, in the later stages, it gave hundreds of globally limited-edition luxury cars, hundreds of top-tier luxury mansions, distributed tens of billions in cash, and provided batches of luxury cruise ships and private jets... In short, she had become numb to receiving them.

After calming down, she thought about it: this Shenhao System thing is fine for an urban plane, but it seems to have no use if brought to the Immortal World!

So she tactfully expressed: let her consider it further.

The Shenhao System showed a resentful expression: 【Wuwu... Host, you don't love Xiao Hao anymore!】

"Plop—"

It was balled up by the Main System and thrown back to the factory for repairs.

Xie Yang's ears were finally at peace, and she looked back to see a young policewoman solemnly and gently arranging her remains, feeling a thousand emotions:

She had thought she could live a peaceful life until old age in this lifetime, but she hadn't expected to have such a heroic end before dying.

Her contributions while alive and her heroism in death should be enough to leave a significant mark in this world, right?

She could consider this a glorious life and a great death.

However, no matter how much she reflected, she would not be able to see the scene of people mourning her after her death.

She didn't even have time to take one last look at the members of the Xie Family who had rushed to the accident scene and were weeping over her body before she was dragged by the Main System into a passage filled with white mist.

A calm, emotionless electronic voice rang in her ears—

【Ding! A new Task world has been opened; please prepare yourself, Host!】