Chapter 173 The Fifth Day After the God's Departure (10) "I knew you were crazy..."
Xie Tan realized that those who truly want to leave will not linger. Even if he were compared to a wandering ghost, ghosts should be in hell, where a bowl of Meng Po soup would allow them to pass through to the next life, or they would be reduced to ashes. Why would they linger in the human world?
He lingered in search of something. He had been searching for something all along.
He wanted to erase his pheromones, to get rid of the monster name that was attached to him, and to live like ordinary people... All these feelings of disgust and longing had one source.
He longs for love.
In the original world, his father wouldn't give him love, and no one else would either. Only when he couldn't sleep at night, or when he was in too much pain, would he occasionally fantasize about his blank mother, fantasizing that she loved him.
And now, his mother is right in front of him, holding him, telling him she loves him and that he deserves all the love.
The fantasy came true.
Warm liquid filled his eyes, his vision blurred, like a dream. Afraid of waking up, he blinked desperately, trying to squeeze out the liquid.
The liquid ran down his face and landed on his palm. He looked down.
ah.
Water has overflowed.
"Mom, I love you too." Xie Tan hugged the woman, buried his face in her arms, and let himself cry.
At 19, he acted like a child for the first time.
Xie Yi patted his back and gently coaxed him, singing a lullaby. Xie Tan felt as if he had fallen asleep in her arms, and the weariness that had been lingering melted away in her gentle wings.
It seems like it can fill the 19-year gap.
After the feeling of oxygen deprivation subsided from crying, Xie Tan realized what he had done, and belatedly blushed. He dared not look up in her arms.
He's so old, how could he cry like this in front of his mother?
"Wow, it really looks like a kitten!"
Hearing Xie Yi's teasing words, Xie Tan became even more embarrassed and mumbled, "Mom..."
"Haha, what's wrong with that? Kittens are so cute! You're the kitten, so I'm the mommy kitten. I'm getting such an adorable title by following my son's coattails. Oh my god, it's so cute!" Xie Yi excitedly hugged him and pressed her cheek against his.
"Mom can see it too?"
"Of course! I'm the comic's author, how could I not know?"
"Oh, right..." Xie Tan was a little dizzy.
Xie Yi screamed again, hugging him tightly and rubbing against him: "So cute, no wonder I gave birth to you!"
Xie Tan blushed and let her mother stick the stickers on her face.
"That was the first one I saw in the comic..."
"That one is for the general public, but the wish is only for you. The system will only capture your wish; it's always waiting." She laughed. "I told you, this wish belongs only to you. Have you thought it through, Tan Tan?"
Xie Tan: "I've made up my mind."
"You won't regret it?"
"No," Xie Tan said without hesitation, "but this wish is very selfish."
He didn't dare look her in the eyes.
He knew what she wished for: that everyone could have a happy ending.
But... he only wanted to grasp what he could grasp.
His sacrifice for everyone is the interpretation of other characters and forums, not him as a person. If you put his loved ones and the whole world on a scale and forced him to choose one, he would choose the former.
“My initial wish was freedom, and I didn’t care about the end of the world, remember? We are the same. I’ve just seen a lot of tragedies, so I hope to see a happy ending, but that’s my expectation, and I should be the one to realize it, not carry it on your shoulders. Your wish is your wish, and if I had to choose one, I would choose the ending where you are happy.”
Xie Yi finished speaking with a smile, then extended her index finger, becoming much more serious: "You know you're in a bad situation right now, right? Based on my understanding of Xiao Lin, your existence is more than 'out of control' to her than that old bastard Su Huang and my cheap brother. She wants to eliminate the source, but she hasn't let those two off the hook either."
She pointed around: "You're in the mirror. She's going to destroy the mirror. When the mirror breaks, you'll be gone, but you might not be alive. Are you really sure?"
Are you prepared to abandon your initial wish, regardless of your own safety, and make this wish for someone else?
Xie Tan was overwhelmed by the information that Lu Jinzhao was in danger, and then he saw Xie Yi, finally realizing that something was wrong with Jiang Linji's words.
But he was concerned about something else.
As expected, the shattering of the smoke mirror was because someone wanted to destroy it, but the cult leader failed to do so; it was Jiang Linji who did it.
No, absolutely not, this is the only one that won't do.
"I've made up my mind," Xie Tan said. "My wish is...!"
...
Xu Jinbo was at the police station retrieving documents when he stood by the window for a long time, not responding even when the documents were handed to him.
The veteran detective simply leaned to one side, took out a cigarette, and lit it.
Xu Jinbo smelled the smoke and suddenly came to his senses. After thanking him, he stammered, "Brother Hong, those two children..."
"We haven't found it yet," the veteran detective said calmly.
Half a month has passed since New Year's Day, and nothing has happened. The cult has returned to normal, as if they were just being paranoid and had a dream.
Xu Jinbo comforted himself: "Lu has done so many good deeds, and Xie has helped me and us too. Good people are always protected by heaven. They will be alright, they will definitely be alright..."
His muttering reminded Xue Hong of the families and friends who couldn't accept that the victims were dead. He didn't say anything, but just took two more puffs of his cigarette.
“I’ve been having this dream lately, but it doesn’t feel like a dream. It feels like something I actually experienced. It happened around the time of my internship. I was so stupid back then… I dreamt of a woman who looked a lot like Xie. She saved me.” Xu Jinbo was silent for a while, then smiled bitterly. “Really… I owe them so many lives, how come they’re always the ones in danger? It’s useless guys like me who should be the ones who die.”
“They have their choices. They kicked us out, not to kill us. Alright, get back to what you were doing.” Xue Hong patted his shoulder.
Xu Jinbo nodded silently, hugged the documents, and walked away with his head down.
Xue Hong threw his cigarette butt into the trash can, picked up the small peach wood sword at his waist, and looked at it in the sunlight outside the window.
Since returning to the correct time, the power consumed by the peach wood sword has been fully replenished.
He went to the old teaching building, and the sword hanging in the office was gone.
It was that child who did it.
When they first talked about the sword at the fast food restaurant, he mentioned that the sword's power was not as strong as before and asked Xie Tan what he could do about it. Xie Tan said he didn't know, meaning he was too lazy to care.
Doesn't that make sense?
Isn't this still being managed?
A new red tassel, made of red talismans, hung from the hilt of the sword. It was made by Xia Wujin when he performed a rite for his mother's soul and prayed for the two classmates. He went with them.
If there truly is a God, please bless them.
...
Sun Enze was walking on the ice when his foot slipped and he fell forward. He was caught by someone who suddenly appeared, and his departed spirit finally returned to its place.
"Thank you... Ah, Eun-yoo! Not today either?"
Sun Enze could tell from his expression that he hadn't found Xie Tan today either.
He also became discouraged: "What about the president?"
Sun Enyou pursed his lips: "...He disagrees."
Sun Enze looked at him.
This is his alter ego. He understands him. The president and Sister Xiao Ai keep quiet about it. En You wants to join the cult to get more information. Given En You's concern for Xie Tan, even if the president disagrees, he will still do it.
So Eunwoo said that because of something else, he didn't do it.
"Did the president say something?"
Sun Enyou didn't tell him, and Xi Rui didn't say anything either, but Sun Enyou himself understood.
Xi Rui was implying to him that the danger might be within the sect, and that his going there would only backfire and add more danger to Xie Tan.
"Trust Xie Tan, he's so smart, and there's also Jinzhao..." Sun Enze couldn't continue, he himself was uneasy.
He vaguely sensed that the final showdown they couldn't participate in was far more complicated than they imagined. Even Xie Tan, who was shrewd and resourceful, and even... Lu Jinzhao, who possessed such terrifying power, would be in danger.
"Or perhaps Mr. Su He from the Black Goat family knows something?"
...
"You mean Su He is missing?" Chang Mingai's gaze darkened. She knew that if Xi Rui said that, it wasn't just a simple matter of not finding her. "What are you trying to say?"
Xi Rui propped his legs up on the table, tilted his head back, and swayed back and forth in his chair: "He couldn't leave the ceremony."
"Impossible. The number of people we pieced together is correct. He must have been cleansed as well. You even contacted him after he came out."
“He disappeared after the 31st.” Xi Rui sat up, looking at Chang Mingai with a dark expression. “There’s another one who hasn’t come out either.”
Chang Mingai's expression changed: "Master."
After she came out and learned the truth about the clock hands, she was very confused. Why had the cult leader completely erased her? Wasn't that the cult leader from the "what if" timeline? Or was Xie Tan the cult leader who erased this timeline?
Xi Rui led her to Qi Shiheng, where the witch was deciphering the incomplete prophecy, trying each one, and she actually figured it out.
It turns out that the cult leader is part of the Eye of Observation, which is why he is unique, and he is interconnected with every line.
Once you've refined one, it's all in the ritual.
The witch said that there was also a judgment hidden inside.
"So Su He is the last word, he is also part of the Eye of Observation, he communicates with his other self in the ritual." Chang Mingai dared not continue, "He was refined, the ritual... the ritual was completed, then what about the two of them?"
Xi Rui didn't speak. He had just come out of the library office and still remembered the Vice Leader's faint smile.
She remains the same as always, a very methodical person.
Jumping into the future only temporarily replaces one's future self to complete the "effect" and fulfill the "cause." For those who are excluded, even if they cannot jump, if they are prepared, their future selves can still devise countermeasures.
But here's the key point: at this point in time, they had no idea of the correct time or what would happen.
Xi Rui, however, believed that the vice leader already knew.
She knew the fifth day before the carnival even arrived.
So even without jumping to the future, she knows what to do.
Indeed, as he said.
In the future timeline, on the new day after the fifth ominous day, Jiang Linji stood downstairs at the club building.
This is the place where the fifth sun god resided during the ceremony.
She reached out her hand.
An obsidian knife fell from the window of the chess club and landed in her palm.
It is the tongue of the fifth sun god in the ritual.
A fully refined "knife".
Jiang Linji gripped the knife and raised his head.
It was noon, but the sky was pitch black.
Behind the thick fog, a faint golden rim appeared; it was a black sun, but it was still not clearly visible.
She was surrounded by raging flames, black fire falling like night, engulfing the entire city, even more grand than the rituals performed on ominous days.
She has always been patient.
She was simply waiting for the moment when the first sun would emerge from behind the fog.
...
Lu Jinzhao opened his eyes in the black sea of fire.
He seemed to melt into the darkness, expressionless, all his dark and mad qualities silently fermenting.
He just stared at the black fog, as if it contained a kaleidoscope with a hundred different views.
Footsteps came from the dark doorway, but he didn't move.
"You're like a madman," said the person who came out of the door. "How many times have you destroyed this place?"
Lu Jinzhao's golden eyes, like those of a wild beast, suddenly fixed on the newcomer, slowly widening in terrifying intensity: "You were separated... He did it."
Su He, her hair disheveled, clutched the burning wishing ribbon: "Yes, the last set of incantations, the ones she left behind, the ones he activated, separated me from the me in the ritual... He, like his mother, drove me out."
His expression was as empty as Lu Jinchao's, a mad emptiness: "You were trapped here, wasn't that his doing too?"
Lu Jinzhao did not react, as if he could no longer understand his words. Only on the fourth day, when the cycle repeated, did he once again use fierce flames to impact the boundary between the cycles.
The flames splashed back onto him, which should have sizzled and left horrible wounds, like black holes burned through – the backlash for his attempt to break the pact. Even the sun god could be burned by his own fire.
But unfortunately, Ah-Tan's wish is that he doesn't get hurt.
So he sat there unharmed, staring blankly at the fog.
“You are the sun god. Once you are complete, you can ignore time and space and do whatever you want, right?” Su He suddenly said. “He is dead.”
Lu Jinzhao suddenly snapped back to reality, disliking his words, and looked at him with extreme coldness, as if he were looking at an ant.
Under his oppressive aura, Su He slammed one knee into the ground. He barely managed to stay upright, his teeth chattering, but his eyes twitched as he said, "I told you you were crazy."
No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't get up, so he simply lay prostrate on the ground, a beam of solar fire appearing in his palm: "So alike...so alike, even gods can be as pathetic as someone like me...but I've had enough of the feeling of being powerless, let me succeed at least once, okay?"
Lu Jinzhao sensed something, and his terrified gaze relaxed.
Su He swallowed the solar fire.
In the cycle, the endless, burning sea of fire resonated with him. He controlled the power, and the fire burned all the way to his heart, where it suddenly exploded.
He was engulfed by black flames.
"Since I am your 'knife,' I should be able to cut the lock here and return the item to its rightful owner."
The person burning in the fire did not utter a single scream; only Su He's sigh could be heard.
"Don't you really care about him? If there's any other way, it's you... Don't be a pathetic wretch like me."
After the fire burned out, a black obsidian knife fell to the ground.
Lu Jinzhao picked up the knife and looked at the fog again, as if trying to find something different.
His expectations were dashed.
Finally, he looked away and made a light cut with the knife.
The knife and the cycle shattered together.
The fourth day has ended.
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