“What…?” Qi Xia’s hand holding the snack froze slightly.
“What?” Earth Tiger cast a disdainful glance at Qi Xia. “You said you wanted to make a deal, but now you won’t even do this small favor for me?”
Qi Xia expressionlessly pocketed the snack and replied, “No, it’s just too late today. It’d be dangerous for us to act now.”
“Then go rest at my game site. There aren’t any ‘ants’ there.” Earth Tiger impatiently pushed Qi Xia aside and strode toward the light gate.
“What about these 2,900 ‘daos’…?”
Earth Tiger stopped, lowered his head in thought, and said, “Leave them with me for now. If you don’t handle this for me, I’ll make sure you regret it for the rest of your life.”
He grabbed the heavy sacks of ‘daos’ with one hand, slung them over his shoulder like a towel, and disappeared into the light gate.
At that moment, the gate abruptly closed.
Before Qi Xia and Qiao Jiajin could react, another light gate appeared in the same spot. The next second, a swarm of shadowy figures crawled out.
Each figure moved on all fours, limbs twisted unnaturally, their mouths emitting eerie rustling sounds, their hollow, eyeless sockets staring blankly.
“Not good…” Qi Xia tugged at Qiao Jiajin. “Let’s go!”
Qiao Jiajin was momentarily stunned by the sight but quickly snapped back to reality, following Qi Xia as they sprinted toward the building.
Once inside Earth Tiger’s game site, they barricaded the door behind them and finally caught their breath.
“Liar… what the hell were those things?” Qiao Jiajin asked, bewildered. “Were those… people?”
“Probably…” Qi Xia replied grimly. “I’ve seen them once before. They don’t attack, but they feel dangerous.”
“Dang it…” Qiao Jiajin exhaled slowly, then changed the subject. “Liar, is it really safe to give all those ‘daos’ to that tiger?”
“For now, it’s the safest option,” Qi Xia mused. “Haven’t you noticed? ‘Daos’ are completely useless to ‘Earth-level’ Zodiacs.”
“What…?” Qiao Jiajin was taken aback.
“Think about the Earth-level games we’ve played. All the Zodiacs are running at a loss—what they collect in fees is far less than the rewards we win.”
Qiao Jiajin stroked his chin, deep in thought, then said seriously, “Liar… I’ve only played one ‘Earth-level’ game.”
“Well…” Qi Xia shook his head. “You just don’t remember. The bear you beat up when we first arrived in the ‘Ending Land’ was an Earth-level game.”
“Oh, right…”
Qi Xia continued, “So I suspect the real purpose of ‘Earth-level’ games isn’t to win ‘daos’ but to lure us in to die. ‘Daos’ mean nothing to them—they don’t care if they lose them.”
“But…” Qiao Jiajin still seemed uncertain. “Isn’t it risky to hand over all our ‘daos’ based on just a guess?”
“Of course it’s risky,” Qi Xia admitted. “But holding onto 2,900 ‘daos’ is risky no matter what I do. The ‘Extreme Path’ would hunt us down for them. Compared to that, entrusting them to an Earth-level Zodiac is the safer choice.”
Qiao Jiajin nodded, then asked, “Then… where do we find that ‘Heavenly Sheep’ you mentioned earlier?”
“I don’t know,” Qi Xia sighed. “Forget ‘Heavenly Sheep’—we can’t even find the ‘Human Rat’ Earth Tiger mentioned.”
“What?” Qiao Jiajin frowned. “He gave us the address. How could we not find it?”
“That child is dead,” Qi Xia said regretfully. “Remember the corpse we saw when we first arrived last time?”
“Dang it… a child?” Qiao Jiajin recalled the scene. “I just remember the body was tiny. That was a kid?”
“Yeah.”
“Who the hell would kill a child?!” Qiao Jiajin sounded furious. “What kind of monster does that…?”
“I did,” Qi Xia stated bluntly.
“Huh…?”
“Back then, I heard that in the ‘Ending Land,’ you could bet your life instead of paying ‘daos’ to play a game. So I tried it in that child’s game.” Qi Xia sighed heavily. “But I didn’t realize… the ‘referees’ here are also ‘participants.’ If I bet my life and won, it meant they lost theirs.”
Qiao Jiajin let out a sorrowful sigh.
How could anyone, unaware of the rules, have known their choices would cost a Zodiac’s life?
“So what do we do now…?” Qiao Jiajin asked. “Seems like that tiger guy doesn’t know yet…”
He glanced at Qi Xia, suspecting he’d probably choose to lie to Earth Tiger.
“I’ll tell him the truth tomorrow,” Qi Xia said. “What I did, I’ll own up to.”
“Dang it… tell him?! What if he tries to kill you?” Qiao Jiajin sounded uneasy. “I don’t think I could last two rounds against him…”
“He won’t,” Qi Xia shook his head. “Zodiacs probably can’t kill on their own, but he’ll be furious. Since I’ve decided to work with him, I might as well try honesty.”
Qi Xia leaned against a corner and sat down. “Fists, get some rest. We’ve got a lot to do tomorrow.”
Still uneasy, Qiao Jiajin nodded and lay down on a wooden plank.
Easier said than done—how could Qi Xia sleep?
The events of the day replayed endlessly in his mind.
Yu Nian’an had killed herself.
Qi Xia wasn’t surprised. In fact, he’d expected it.
He’d originally planned to search for the Heavenly Sheep this cycle, but then a replica of Yu Nian’an appeared. So he changed his plan—he brought her to ‘Paradise Entrance’ instead.
That way, if anything went wrong with the replica, he could openly blame Chu Tianqiu.
He just hadn’t expected it to happen so soon.
These ‘created’ Yu Nian’ans always seemed… off.
Deep down, they knew they were fakes. They doubted themselves, even spiraled into madness.
The ‘knock-knock-knock’ last time and the suicide this time proved it.
So, almost unconsciously, Qi Xia had left behind a fruit knife.
A quiet night, a lonely classroom, the stench of death, a field of corpses—paired with Yu Nian’an’s self-doubt, what better recipe for suicide?
Qi Xia believed he could use this trait to identify the real Yu Nian’an. The real one wouldn’t doubt herself; the fake would.
And then there was…
Qi Xia touched his forehead.
Every time grief threatened to overwhelm him before, a searing pain would follow. But today, watching Yu Nian’an die before his eyes, his head didn’t hurt.
That was definitive proof.
The ‘replica’ had no effect on him.
“Headache…” Qi Xia narrowed his eyes in thought.
The first time he’d felt pain in the ‘Ending Land’ was when the ‘Human Rat’ died.
Logically, he hadn’t even known that child. So why had it hurt?
How could the death of a stranger—a child he’d met once—cause him sorrow?
“Was it because… it was a kid?”
Qi Xia pulled out the snack Earth Tiger had given him and sighed softly.
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