Chapter 60: The Drifting Bottle You’ve Never Seen

"Yezi, are you still using that OO of yours?" During the break, a few of Liu Chuanye’s classmates gathered around him and asked.

"Yeah!" Liu Chuanye nodded.

"Oh, come on, what’s so great about that app? All of us are on QQ, but you went off to OO. Aren’t we still buddies or what?" The classmates spoke with obvious displeasure. "Don’t forget, you were the one who got us all into QQ in the first place, and now you’re the one ditching it? What’s up with that?"

They weren’t bullying Liu Chuanye; on the contrary, these were his close friends. The trouble was, they almost never found him on QQ anymore. Eventually, they discovered he was now using some chat program called OO.

"Yezi, does this mean you’re never using QQ again, just OO from now on?" one friend asked.

"Of course not!" Liu Chuanye quickly denied it. "I use OO just because the OO Farm is pretty entertaining. I just plant some vegetables there every day, that’s all—it’s just a little pastime! You guys are my real friends. Since you’re all on QQ, of course I’ll still mainly use QQ. How about we all chat on QQ again tonight?"

"Deal, see you there!" The group laughed, then scattered.

Liu Chuanye let out a sigh of relief, but what he’d said was the truth. Even though he’d been using OO a lot lately, deep down, QQ was still his mainstay, while OO was just a tempting snack. Give up QQ and make OO his main chat app? Impossible, never!

If it weren’t for He Anrong sneaking into his farm every day to steal his vegetables, Liu Chuanye would have uninstalled OO long ago.

—

"Guys, I’m back—let’s chat!" That night, Liu Chuanye hurried through planting and harvesting his crops, making sure to leave some for He Anrong to pilfer, then ignored OO entirely. He logged into Coralbug QQ, which he hadn’t touched in over a week, ready to find his friends for a chat.

But after sending out a round of messages, no one replied. Not a single response all evening! By the next morning, Liu Chuanye was full of resentment. He hunted down his friends, only to find their faces didn’t look quite right either.

But it wasn’t resentment on their faces—it was a pair of dark, heavy circles under each of their eyes.

"What were you all up to last night, not replying to my messages? Were you out burgling houses?" Liu Chuanye asked grumpily.

"No, I was drifting all night, until eleven!"

"Same here, I was drifting—chatted until midnight!"

"Heh, you guys are amateurs. I drifted until two in the morning. Compared to me, you’re all nothing!" they chimed in, each sounding thrilled.

"Tch, so how many girls did you drift with?"

"Not that many, just over thirty!"

"And how many made it past twenty messages? How much charm did you rack up?"

"Um… about ten or so."

"You drifted with thirty girls and only got ten charm points? That’s pathetic! I only drifted with eighteen, but fifteen of them reached twenty messages!"

"No way, look at you—how could you have reached twenty messages with so many girls?"

"If you don’t believe me, check my charm points. We all registered our OO accounts together, and I’ve already got fifteen charm points. That can’t be faked!"

"Then you must have drifted with more than thirty girls!"

"Enough, stop arguing! None of you can compare to me!" The friend who’d chatted until midnight snorted.

"Why, you got twenty charm points or something?"

"No, I’ve only got one," he shook his head.

"Then what are you bragging about?" the other two retorted in unison.

"But I chatted with one girl, from six in the evening until midnight!" He beamed, his face full of pride and bliss. "You might not believe it, but I think I’ve met the one destined for me. Our interests, our opinions, even basketball—we’re perfectly in sync."

"After twenty exchanges, we switched to chatting directly on 00. We couldn’t run out of things to talk about. If my mom hadn’t stormed into the net café, I’d probably still be chatting with her now. We’ve already agreed, as soon as school’s out this afternoon, I’m heading home to chat with her again!"

"And she’s just in Jiujiang, not far from Nanchang. We’ve even made plans to meet up in Jiujiang next weekend!"

"Gulp!" The other two swallowed hard, their faces written all over with envy, jealousy, and longing.

"Wait, what on earth are you all talking about? I can’t understand a word you’re saying!" Liu Chuanye, who’d been unable to get a word in, finally couldn’t take it anymore and cut them off.

"We’re talking about online chatting—can’t you tell?"

"I know that much, but you keep saying ‘drifting’ this and ‘drifting’ that. I didn’t realize you were chatting! Besides, weren’t you all offline last night? I messaged you all night and no one replied!" Liu Chuanye complained.

"Uh… which app were you messaging us on?"

"Of course I was on QQ!"

"Well, there’s your answer. We were all drifting on OO—you’d only have found us if you were a ghost! You didn’t even add us as friends on OO!"

"You were on OO?" Liu Chuanye was stunned. Weren’t they the ones who’d come running to scold him for not chatting on QQ yesterday? How did they all end up on OO overnight?

"Yezi, don’t tell me you don’t know about OO’s new Drifting Bottle feature!"

"I think I heard something about it," Liu Chuanye recalled. When he’d logged into OO the day before, there’d been a pop-up about the Drifting Bottle system, but he hadn’t paid attention and just closed it.

"Wow, you’re an OO veteran, and you’re behind us newbies!"

"Exactly! Try the Drifting Bottle tonight and you’ll see. It’s freaking genius—QQ can’t compare! I hereby declare I’ll love OO for life, QQ can just get lost!"

"What… what… what on earth is happening?" Liu Chuanye felt as though he didn’t recognize the world anymore.

He later found out that the three of them had gone to a net café and noticed someone nearby playing with OO’s new Drifting Bottle feature, having a blast.

After that, they were hooked. They stayed at the net café, skipped dinner, didn’t go home, and were utterly consumed.

So that night, back home, Liu Chuanye logged into OO again. He discovered the Drifting Bottle button right next to OO Farm, just as prominent.

Curious, Liu Chuanye clicked the Drifting Bottle button. A message popped up:

"Hello, lonely stranger. I am a Drifting Bottle. I will carry your loneliness far away, where it will be picked up by another lonely stranger of the opposite sex. Let me bear the conversation between two lonely souls.

Please note: Each Drifting Bottle will be picked up by a stranger of the opposite sex who is also launching a Drifting Bottle at the same time. The two can then converse through the bottle.

Messages must be at least 10 characters, no more than 100. Only after one party has responded by launching a bottle can the other reply.

Once a bottle has been picked up, you must reply within one minute, or the bottle shatters and the conversation ends.

You can’t start a new Drifting Bottle conversation while one is ongoing.

If you run out of things to say, you can break the bottle and end the conversation at once.

During Drifting Bottle chats, all personal information and account names are hidden. After 20 exchanges, the system will automatically add both parties as friends, and you may then chat directly on 00.

Charm points will increase: after 20 exchanges via Drifting Bottle, one charm point is automatically awarded, visible to all players.

The Drifting Bottle feature is currently in beta; usage is unlimited for now. When it officially launches, there will be restrictions. For details, see the official release announcement."