Chapter 60 Chapter 60 She Hid All the Pain
Si Qi's bracelet screen suddenly went dark. She stared blankly at the dimming light. What words had upset Si Ruxu? She had suddenly hung up the phone.
But not long after, Si Qi discovered that the scene in front of him was wrong. It was not the meeting room of Luo Fenghe's base, and there was no shadow of Luo Fenghe nearby.
She looked up and saw a few familiar lines of text on the sky.
Remaining number: Unknown.
Time remaining: Unknown.
Survival conditions: Unknown.
The fourth major crackdown had finally arrived. Si Qi looked at the three lines of text, the number of people unknown. She didn't know why, but she always felt like she was the only one involved in this major crackdown.
Was it specifically targeting her, or did he want to tell her something?
Si Qi could only wait.
This space was strange, or rather, familiar. She had seen it before in Si Ruxu's memories. It was the outer layer of Si Ruxu's memory space she had entered last time through Fu Jiatu's ability.
It was very dark, with only a few faint light balls floating not far away. The difference was that these light balls seemed to be only for lighting, and the ground was not as sticky as Si Ruxu remembered.
It is clean and lifeless.
Si Qi rubbed her tired eyes. Now that things had come to this, she decided to go to sleep. Ever since she started hunting down Fu Jiatu, she hadn't had a good night's sleep in ages.
It just so happened that this space was quiet and there was no one she didn't want to see. Even if she died, it wouldn't be so painful.
Well, good night.
At this moment when she didn't know if she would wake up later, she said to herself softly.
…
She woke up. When she woke up, her whole body was buzzing. She looked down at the little girl sleeping soundly in her arms.
The child was probably only six or seven years old. Her hair was loose and messy, stuck to her face. Her cheeks were rosy, as if she had slept for a long time. Her eyelashes were long and thick, and her skin was as delicate as a piece of jade.
Si Qi was stunned, unable to find anything to hold his hands, and could only stare at the child in confusion.
Whose child was this? How could there be a child here? Had the massacre gone so far as to involve ordinary children? But how could a child in the apocalypse be so beautiful and delicate? How could they just fall asleep in a stranger's arms?
She closed her eyes weakly, it would be better if she didn't wake up.
Perhaps it was because she had slept enough, or perhaps it was because Si Qi's breathing changes were a little too much, the little girl's thick eyelashes trembled, and she opened a pair of big, beautiful, amber eyes.
She had just woken up, and there was a thin layer of mist under her eyes, looking at her hazily.
Si Qi met those familiar eyes and was dazed for a moment.
She opened her mouth for a long time before speaking in an obscure way.
"Is your mommy's name Si Ruxu?"
Si Ruxu couldn't possibly give birth to a child who looked so much like her. They were practically cut from the same mold.
The little girl shook her head, her amber eyes blinking: "Mom, over there." She pointed to a ball of light shining not far away.
Her voice was pleasant and soft, but not fluent, as if she had never communicated with people her own age.
Si Qi looked at the surrounding environment and suddenly felt that it was good enough that the child could learn to speak.
Her eyes fell on the ball of light. For some reason, she felt an inexplicable hostility in it. This hostility was especially clear when the child hugged her thighs.
She squatted down and looked into the girl's amber eyes. An absurd idea formed in her mind. Could this child be Si Ruxu who only had one human period?
Then she, should she be here? Isn't it a bit disturbing to them mother and daughter?
But when she took a few steps back, little Si Ruxu would chase her, his short legs making a few gurgling noises, but he didn't cry, he just followed her.
The ball of light flickered a few times in dissatisfaction, but did not come over. After chasing for a few rounds, Si Qi stopped and squatted down helplessly.
"Forget it, maybe I'm the only one of my kind you'll ever meet in your life."
It's too lonely here, even an adult can't stand it, let alone a child.
His first child, who had been trapped in chaos all his life.
She sat on the ground, and the child climbed onto her body as if he was familiar with her. Si Qi reached out and held her in his arms. The child smelled sweet and soft, and it was very comfortable to hold her.
"Have you been here alone this whole time?"
"Also, Mom." Little Si Ruxu tilted her head and answered seriously.
"Oh~ and mommy."
"And you." The child said this fluently and looked at her with bright eyes.
"Me? Have you seen me before?" Si Qi pinched her chubby fingers with amusement. He really wanted to take a picture to show Si Ruxu, who used to say that her hands were fleshy and soft every day.
"You used to be... a ball of light, just like your mother, and then suddenly, you became like this." Si Qi sorted out his thoughts from her intermittent words.
She looked at the large ball of light, which the children called "Mom," and the three smaller balls of light beside it. Little Si Ruxu said that she had transformed from a small ball of light. So, were these small balls of light the channels for the massacre?
If so, then He had been preparing for a massacre long ago, long before the first human appeared. What was the purpose of this? And what was the connection between the massacre and Si Luoheng?
She sighed and ultimately did not ask these questions directly, as the child probably didn't know.
Si Qi had no experience in raising children. She had no brothers or sisters, no relatives or friends, and she didn't have any children of her own. But little Si Ruxu was very well-behaved. Most of the time, he would just stick to her, as long as he could feel her body warmth.
She was so bored that she picked up the child and turned him around to face herself.
"I'm telling you, in your next life, remember to be a good person."
Xiao Si Ruxu looked at her without blinking, then nodded gently.
"Let me give you an example. If you're in a relationship with someone, but you don't like them anymore, you can't just break up with them without a reason. That's not okay."
The child seemed confused, but nodded: "Not separate."
"Then if you have something to say, you should speak up. Don't dwell on it for too long and try to take advantage of other people's feelings. That will make them feel uncomfortable."
Si Qi spoke seriously, and little Si Ruxu also listened carefully, but she didn't know if she could understand.
After a while, Si Qi looked at the child's eyes that seemed to understand but not quite understand, and suddenly chuckled, with an indescribable loneliness in his eyes.
"Forget it, why am I telling you this?"
"Then I hope that you can be happy and less lonely in your next life."
…
The door of the conference room was opened, and the woman came over hurriedly. She connected the instrument in her hand to the chair where Si Qi had sat, and found some traces of the large killing space in the air next to it.
Then connect the large screen in front.
Luo Fenghe was standing next to him, and the call on his bracelet had just ended.
"Yeah, she disappeared while we were chatting. The bracelet was on her hand, so she should have taken it with her." Luo Fenghe repeated what he had said earlier while watching the images flashing on the big screen.
From the time he told Si Ruxu that Si Qi had suddenly disappeared to the time Si Ruxu rushed over, it took only ten minutes. It was originally a twenty-minute drive, but she had cut it in half.
"It's a large-scale massacre, and this time they only brought her along."
Si Luoheng came in from the door of the conference room with a pale face and breathing heavily.
"What’s wrong with you?"
"Car sickness."
Si Ruxu was driving so hard that the car almost flew up, and fortunately the institute's car was durable.
The big screen finally connected to the big sweep. When the three people in the conference room looked at the little girl in Si Qi's arms, they paused unconsciously.
Luo Fenghe glanced at Si Ruxu silently. He had to admit that the little girl looked really like Si Ruxu. What was going on? Did Si Qi pick up Si Ruxu's illegitimate daughter who was wandering around?
My brother is so calm that he is still hugging me and comforting me.
When Si Ruxu looked at Si Qi, her eyes were gentle, yet contained some obvious discomfort. She said that she hoped she would not be so lonely in her next life.
The black space, a flickering ball of light not far away, and a little girl who looked very much like her.
Si Ruxu endured the intense sourness in her heart.
"This is the first human being He created. It should be a retrospective simulation space. Si Qi was teleported there."
"Then this is just a theory. The chances of Si Qi being in danger are low."
"How do you know?"
Luo Fenghe raised his eyes and retorted subconsciously.
"Since Luo Heng said yes, then it must be true. She is the person who knows the most about the massacre besides him." Si Ruxu's voice was very soft.
"You guys go to sleep, I'll stay here."
Luo Fenghe wanted to say something, but he swallowed it back down. He didn't think Si Ruxu would say anything Si Qi wouldn't say.
Moreover, neither of them seems like the type to be reckless because of feelings. (In fact, both of them are crazy)
Si Ruxu was the only one left in the meeting room.
She looked at Si Qi with gentle eyes as he coaxed the child to sleep in a low voice, telling her the story of Snow White and the Queen defeating the evil prince and being together, and the story of the little match girl who was taken in by a soft-hearted woman and grew up well.
The children who had never heard of these stories kept pestering Si Qi to tell them another one. Si Qi patiently adapted the stories she knew and told them to the children one by one.
Until she felt sleepy, she fell asleep in Si Qi's arms.
Si Ruxu stood outside the screen, feeling inexplicably sour. It would have been nice if they had really known each other a long time ago.
When she loved Si Qi the most, she had fantasized that perhaps they would have a daughter in the future, and she would look half like herself and half like Si Qi.
In fact, it would be better if she looked more like Si Qi, because there are no photos of Si Qi when he was a child, and she has never seen what Si Qi looked like when he was a child. But she is so beautiful now, and she must have been a white and soft little ball when she was a child.
Now, on the big screen, she looked at the big and small two people sleeping in each other's arms, two people so lonely that they had no shadows. Her heart felt sore, as if it had been soaked in lemons for a long time.
She slept very soundly, as if she had been sleeping since she came to this space. She kept feeling inexplicably sleepy. Was there some substance that made her sleep to death here?
When she woke up, the little ball in her arms was gone. Si Qi lowered her eyes with some regret. She actually liked such a well-behaved and soft child very much.
She stood up and stretched her muscles. She had only slept for a short while, but she inexplicably felt as if countless years had passed.
The ball of light in front came closer and flickered. Si Qi reached out and touched it curiously. It had no substance, but even so, it shook its body as if in disgust.
Si Qi laughed dumbly: "Do you hate me so much?"
"Why? Because I kidnapped Si Ruxu?" A ball of light flickered in her eyes, casting mottled shadows. Si Qi looked at him helplessly, "But even if it wasn't me, it would have been someone else, right?"
"Besides, I don't have this kind of relationship with her now, and I won't have it in the future. Can you be less prejudiced against me?"
The ball of light flashed, but ultimately did nothing else.
There were footsteps coming and going around him, and hesitantly walking. Si Qi raised his eyes and saw a woman in a light windbreaker walking towards him with her back to the light, but she passed through Si Qi's body and passed straight past him.
It was Si Ruxu who had grown up. Her face was 90% similar to the one in the end, but she was less fierce and looked softer.
She sat where Si Qi had originally sat, and carefully took out the ball of light in her arms. She gently wiped the gray color off the ball of light.
"I've found a way out. Can I take you out?" Her eyes curved and she spoke more fluently. Si Qi had no memories, but somehow, she always felt that it was Si Ruxu as a child who had been talking to herself at this ball of light for a long time.
Si Ruxu once again placed the small ball of light in her arms, but this time, as soon as she stood up, the map beneath her feet became sticky, with layer after layer of black mucus sticking to her soles. She couldn't move forward.
Si Ruxu's expression changed slightly. She turned around to look at the ball of light that had floated behind her. "Mom..."
"You can't leave." It was a woman's voice, cold and majestic, without much emotion. She was just calmly recounting an unimportant matter, telling Si Ruxu that she couldn't leave.
"But... Mom, why can all the other creatures you created go out, but I am the only one who has to stay in this space..."
The ball of light flickered a few times. "You are different from them. Your existence is unfair to the world, so you can only stay here."
Si Ruxu lowered her eyes, tears gathered on her eyelashes, and finally, overwhelmed by the heavy burden, her eyes fell into the ball of light in her arms, feeling inexplicably hot.
She is trapped here.
From then on, she sat on the ground more often. The sticky ground was just to trap her steps and prevent her clothes from getting dirty.
He would still create some other creatures, which would move around on the land for a few short moments before being placed on the passage leading to the outside. Only she would guard a lifeless ball of light, day after day.
Si Qi sat next to Si Ruxu, but Si Ruxu couldn't see her. She buried her head in her knees and didn't move for a long time.
Si Qi just sat there, as if he had accompanied her through these long and lonely decades. Finally, one day, the white-haired man fell to the ground, and the stickiness on the ground that had remained the same for decades finally disappeared.
In her dying moments, she still held the small ball of light in her palm, the one from which Si Qi had emerged, and whispered softly, "So, it was a dream..."
It must be a dream. She dreamed that someone came to accompany her for a short journey, a journey that tormented her throughout her life.
Si Ruxu's body gradually disappeared from the scene, but Si Qi remained where she was. She stared silently at the light ball that drifted towards her.
"What do you want to tell me?"
This was indeed very different from what Si Qi had imagined. Originally, his only and first child should have spent a pampered and happy life with him by his side.
But in fact, no one noticed that it was only after the death of this so-called first child that the gods decided to give the creature "human" the right to survive on the continent.
She lived an extremely long and lonely life alone.
"So, you feel guilty towards her?" Si Qi couldn't find a second explanation. The heartless and desireless god understood compassion, but what was the price?
After Si Ruxu died, her body turned into the fifth ball of light. This is the fifth major massacre that Si Qi will experience in the future.
Perhaps because Si Ruxu always carried the fourth ball of light with her, the fourth major massacre was all about her.
The god could not answer Si Qi's question, but the scene in front of him changed again. The building in front of him looked like a scholarly family, and it was Si Ruxu's old house.
It just became extremely dilapidated, with mutated plants breaking through the bricks and tiles of the house and growing upwards wantonly.
Si Ruxu's face was pale. She closed the door tightly after coming in from outside. She hugged the things in her arms and hurried into the inner room.
The inner room was originally designed to not allow much light in, and now in the early days of the apocalypse without electricity, it seemed even darker inside.
Inside the room, Si Ruxu's parents, grandparents, and her six- or seven-year-old cousin huddled together dejectedly. Seeing Si Ruxu return, a faint smile crept into their previously gloomy eyes, as if they were happy that she was still alive.
The air was thick and solidified, like a pot of barely flowing porridge, sucking in those trapped inside and making it hard to breathe.
Si Ruxu put down some fever, cold and painkiller medicines in her arms. The medicine box was already in tatters. Si Ruxu raised her eyes, and the blood-stained scars inside were faintly revealed when her hair moved slightly.
"Eat it, you'll be fine tomorrow." She picked up the medicine and found half a bottle of water in a pile of broken bottles, and fed it to everyone in the room one by one.
Si Luoheng's virus provides people in the apocalypse with the ability to survive, but a virus is still a virus after all, and there will always be some parts that Guo Qiang rejects and cannot absorb.
Si Luoheng disappeared after leaving these things and the note. Ironically, Si Ruxu, who had insisted on not touching the potions, awakened her special powers, while the other people who secretly drank the potions began to develop fevers, confusion, pain, and difficulty maintaining normal vital signs the next day.
After feeding several people, Si Ruxu collapsed on the ground weakly, took out a small roll of hemostatic bandage from his pocket, and roughly bandaged his wound.
She was too weak, and she had to fight for her life to get just a little bit of medicine, which no one else could get.
Her thick and long eyelashes drooped, gently covering her eyelids, as if this could hide all her fragility and despair.
…
This is the early days of the apocalypse. Elementalists' bodies are not strengthened, so they can only release weak elements. Their abilities are not much different from those of ordinary people. However, strengthists' bodies are strengthened by their abilities, so their combat power far surpasses others.
Such a huge gap makes the greed in my heart infinitely magnified.
To money, things, and people.
Si Qi couldn't touch Si Ruxu, so she could only watch the end of the world from Si Ruxu's perspective as a bystander.
She once thought that people like Si Ruxu would be well-fed and well-clothed even in the end times, until now.
She saw Si Ruxu arguing with a stray dog on the road for a piece of steamed bun. Like countless ordinary people, he was snatching wild vegetables and expired food thrown out by the power-type mutants.
She also saw that the relatives that Si Ruxu had worked so hard to support fell down day by day before she even opened the door.
So, Si Ruxu looked for food during the day and dragged her dead relatives outside at night. She spent half the night digging a grave and burying them. Then, after the moonlight had completely faded, she sat in front of the inconspicuous grave for the rest of the night.
She didn't cry, but grew more silent day by day. In just one month, the pain in her body seemed to have stretched infinitely, growing so long that it bent the back of this once-proud child.
After having her food snatched away by her former subordinates again, Si Ruxu dragged her bleeding arm. She did not go in, but leaned against the door. There was little light in the inner room, and her body blocked half of it.
The people in the room raised their heads with difficulty, only seeing half of her face and unable to make out her expression. But, inexplicably, it felt three points darker than the room itself.
She didn't say a word, and the people in the inner room didn't have the energy to speak. They just shook their heads and told Si Ruxu not to bother with them and to just stay alive.
Si Ruxu lowered her eyes and stood there all night long.
The next day, she left enough food and disappeared.
Three days later, she came back with some more food.
For the next two months, she went out, came home, and went out again, and no one knew what she did.
But Si Qi, who had been tied to her side, could only see the roars of the zombies, the bleeding wounds, and the dim and moldy house. This was Si Ruxu's life for the past two months.
She killed zombies and took crystal cores like a madman. On the first day, she just sprinkled some medicine on the bloody wounds and treated them as if they were healed. She continued hunting the next day.
Si Qi followed beside her, as if he could smell her warm, bloody breath.
On the night after Si Ruxu finally reached the third level by relying on this risk-free method, Si Qi sat in the moonlight, looking at the woman in front of him who was curled up in a ball and fainted, his eyes filled with complexity.
She thought Si Ruxu was lucky enough.
It turned out that she just quietly hid all her pain.
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The author has something to say: Help, I have heatstroke and a migraine. I struggled to write this chapter. The sudden changes of temperature on the high-speed train will really kill me.
Good night… I’ll try to make up for the 2,000 words I owed yesterday tomorrow, and I’ll send you a red envelope tomorrow morning (sorry I didn’t finish writing 8,000 today) [burst crying][burst crying][burst crying]
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