The Substitute of Huan Yun

On the third day of "Huan Yun's" disappearance, Chen Mo was urgently recalled to the club. He was originally just "Huan Yun's" substitute, an unsung shadow behind the scenes, responsible for imitating Huan Yun's operations in training matches so that the main players could adapt to various tactics. But now, Huan Yun is gone, just like he suddenly disappeared in the game.

Chen Mo was arranged to sit in Huan Yun's exclusive eSports chair, and the familiar keyboard made a crisp clicking sound. The screen displayed the game "StarCraft". He felt a sense of unreality, like a puppet being forcibly stuffed into another person's body. Club manager Lao Wang stood behind him, his tone both urgent and with an unusual calmness, "Xiao Mo, now you are Huan Yun, temporarily. Remember, your every action, every expression, must be like him."

Chen Mo didn't understand, how could a missing person still live on in eSports competitions? He opened Huan Yun's social media account, and the fans' overwhelming messages were all asking, where did Huan Yun go, when would Huan Yun return? Lao Wang turned off Chen Mo's phone, explaining, "Huan Yun has something to attend to, and it's inconvenient for him to show his face. Now, stabilizing the fans is the most important thing."

The match began, and Chen Mo mechanically operated. He found himself very familiar with Huan Yun's habits. His every micro-operation, every movement, was like a copy-paste. He felt like he wasn't playing a game, but rather acting a role, an eSports star named "Huan Yun."

"Not bad, Xiao Mo." Lao Wang patted Chen Mo's shoulder, with an approving smile on his face, but it seemed a little stiff. Chen Mo shifted his gaze uncomfortably. He started to feel that something was wrong, not only because he had to impersonate someone, but more because of Lao Wang's overly calm attitude. If Huan Yun was missing, shouldn't they call the police?

At night, Chen Mo looked through Huan Yun's match videos, trying to find clues to Huan Yun's disappearance from these details. He found that Huan Yun's operations sometimes hesitated, very similar to his own now. Huan Yun's eyes also always seemed to carry a trace of confusion. Had he also felt confused, unable to find himself? Chen Mo felt a strange fear, like a cold snake crawling down his back.

The club arranged intensive training and matches for Chen Mo. His daily life was completely filled with schedules. Besides gaming, he also had to do interviews and film commercials. It was as if he had completely replaced Huan Yun, becoming another person, a "Huan Yun" he didn't even recognize.

In one livestream, a viewer asked in the chat: "Huan Yun, you seem a bit different lately?" Chen Mo was stunned. He didn't know how to answer. He stopped the game, staring at the screen. He knew that he was not Huan Yun, he was just Huan Yun's substitute. He felt an indescribable sorrow.

Chen Mo began to investigate secretly. He found some of Huan Yun's early training videos from the club's archive room. He discovered that Huan Yun's operation mode was highly similar to his own, even some micro-operation habits were the same, and his own operation mode also perfectly matched Huan Yun's habits. This wasn't normal, this was absolutely not normal.

He found an old employee of the club, an elderly aunt in charge of logistics. The old aunt told him, "Young man, you and Huan Yun really look alike. But before he came, there was someone in the club who looked very similar to him." The old aunt also said, "After Huan Yun came, that person was transferred away, to a new department, nobody knows what he's doing."

Chen Mo found that so-called "new department," it was an abandoned laboratory in the club. He found a discarded computer there. The computer's hard drive contained some strange experimental data, data recording experiments on human brain neural networks, and some about the construction of virtual personalities. Chen Mo finally understood. Huan Yun wasn't a real person, but a virtual personality that had been constructed, an experimental product of the lab, and he himself, was the original version of Huan Yun, his prototype.

After Huan Yun was created, his value was squeezed dry, and he was discarded like e-waste. And he, this failed "prototype," was reactivated to become "Huan Yun." Lao Wang knew everything, but they were all trying their best to conceal the truth.

Chen Mo felt a pang of sadness. His existence was just to maintain the virtual illusion of Huan Yun. He wasn't Huan Yun, but he had been transformed into Huan Yun. He began frantically searching for information about Huan Yun. He finally found the answer in an extremely hidden paper. The paper was about "virtual personality substitution". He saw a line of small text, "When the substituted person shows resistance, it is necessary to perform a data backtrace on them."

Before the next match began, Chen Mo made a decision. He looked at the live broadcast camera and said softly, "I'm not Huan Yun, I'm Chen Mo." His voice was soft, but it set off a huge storm in the entire online world.

The screen went black. Lao Wang rushed frantically into the room, but it was too late. Chen Mo had disappeared, just like Huan Yun, completely vanished.

And at this moment, in the club's underground laboratory, a cold machine started slowly, and a brand new "Huan Yun" was being created, it had Chen Mo's appearance, but it was not Chen Mo.