Chapter 562: At Least

Qi Xia and the strange woman named Xu Liunian beside him had been driving for some time now.

To be honest, Xu Liunian’s driving skills weren’t the best. Though she was doing her best to avoid the black lines scattered across the road, some nearly invisible ones still scraped against the car, leaving the already battered vehicle even more scarred.

Throughout the journey, Qi Xia had glanced at her several times, noticing that her eyes no longer held even a trace of the will to survive. Instead, they were filled with a deep, unfathomable sorrow.

“Xu Liunian, you said you wanted to destroy this place…” Qi Xia murmured. “I don’t understand the logic here. What’s the necessary connection between ‘destroying this place’ and ‘saving me’?”

“Maybe I need to save you first before I can destroy it?” Xu Liunian chuckled.

“Me… destroy this place?” Qi Xia frowned slightly. “That doesn’t mean anything to me. I still have unfinished business here, and the person I’m looking for hasn’t been found. If I had to choose, I’d rather protect this place.”

“You don’t need to keep searching,” Xu Liunian interrupted. “‘Yu Nian’an’ doesn’t exist.”

The moment the name “Yu Nian’an” left her lips, Qi Xia’s expression darkened instantly.

If Qi Xia remembered correctly, this was the first time since arriving in the “Land of the End” that someone had mentioned “Yu Nian’an” without him bringing it up first.

Yet the words that followed were still painful.

**Yu Nian’an doesn’t exist.**

“Wait.” Qi Xia’s eyes turned icy. He had already exposed Xu Liunian’s lies more than once.

“What?”

“Whether Yu Nian’an exists or not… why go out of your way to tell me?” Qi Xia turned to face her. “You dodged all the dangers during the chaotic ‘Pegasus Hour,’ drove straight to me, and then announced that ‘Yu Nian’an’ doesn’t exist. Isn’t your method and motive a bit too deliberate?”

Xu Liunian pressed her lips together. She knew lying to Qi Xia was an incredibly difficult task, but she had barely begun—and already, she was on the verge of failure.

“Qi Xia, I want you to break completely.” Xu Liunian gripped the steering wheel, her face expressionless. “So I have no choice but to tell you here—‘Yu Nian’an’ is a fabrication. Every time you’ve seen her, it was the product of an ‘Echo.’ Sometimes me, sometimes Li Xiangling, sometimes you yourself, or any other ‘Echo’ that could achieve the same effect. None of it was real.”

Qi Xia’s pupils contracted sharply at her words, and a faint ringing noise began to fill his ears. “Xu Liunian… you’ve been playing me?”

“Yes, I played you.” Xu Liunian nodded. “Whether it was your first ‘Echo’ or your second, I was the one pulling the strings.”

Qi Xia slowly straightened in his seat, leaning back against the soft cushion of the passenger side. His gaze was terrifying.

“Xu… Liunian…” His voice was barely recognizable, each syllable laced with something dark.

Xu Liunian swallowed hard. The air inside the car had grown thick with a suffocating sense of danger, all radiating from the man beside her.

“You’re telling me you’ve been toying with the most important thing in my life… over and over?” Qi Xia asked again.

Whether it was due to Xu Liunian’s trembling hands or some unseen force at work, the taxi suddenly began to swerve erratically on the road, weaving like a snake. It took her several attempts to steady the car.

“So what…?” Beads of sweat dotted Xu Liunian’s forehead, her lips pressed tightly together.

The air inside the car was thinning, making it hard to breathe.

The stifling scent of the vehicle mixed with the oppressive atmosphere, casting an ominous shadow over everything.

Xu Liunian felt as though she was awakening a true monster.

But throughout history, those called “monsters” had always lacked reason. What about Qi Xia?

His reaction was far more terrifying than she had expected—because he remained unnervingly calm.

He didn’t descend into madness. Instead, he merely masked the killing intent in his eyes and spoke in an eerily composed voice: “Even though you’ve laid your cards on the table, I still don’t believe you. I don’t believe you could have fooled me with ‘Yu Nian’an.’ You’re not that clever, and I’m not that stupid.”

“Is that so…?” Xu Liunian let out a bitter laugh before slowly closing her eyes. “Then, Qi Xia, how about this?”

In the span of a single blink, Xu Liunian transformed completely into Yu Nian’an.

She wore a white dress, the strands of hair by her ears fluttering in the wind from the open window.

The scent of pine-scented laundry detergent and lily-of-the-valley shampoo pierced through the putrid stench of the “Land of the End,” crashing into Qi Xia’s senses like a shard of glass.

Yu Nian’an gripped the steering wheel, her eyes filled with sorrow as she stared at the horizon ahead.

Even someone as formidable as Qi Xia found his mind utterly blank.

“Xia, do you know?” Xu Liunian—now Yu Nian’an—spoke softly. “There are many paths in this world—”

“Stop…” Qi Xia cut her off, but his composure was already crumbling, replaced by raw agony.

“Xia, I bought your favorite peanuts.” Yu Nian’an’s voice was laced with sadness. “Come home with me?”

She had all of “Yu Nian’an’s” memories. Even if there were flaws in her act, they were enough to be fatal.

“Don’t… say another word…”

Qi Xia felt his entire world collapsing. The one he longed for, the deepest and most painful obsession in his heart—she wasn’t just nonexistent. She was a role played by someone else.

She was just a character.

“Xu— No…” Qi Xia wanted to kill the woman before him right then and there, but every time he looked at her face, his resolve wavered. “…An.”

Even if she was fake, she had been real once.

“Do you believe me now?” the driver asked. “I am Yu Nian’an. I always have been. Whether in your dreams or your memories, it was always me.”

As if possessed, Qi Xia reached out, his fingers trembling as they neared Yu Nian’an’s cheek. This might have been the only time outside of a dream that he could touch a “real” Yu Nian’an.

But just before his fingertips made contact, a ghostly whisper echoed in his ears.

**”The person outside the door isn’t me.”**

Those five words struck him like lightning, freezing him in place. His fingers hovered midair.

“What…?” He scanned the surroundings, but Xu Liunian—now Yu Nian’an—hadn’t spoken. Yet Yu Nian’an’s voice lingered in his mind.

“Xia… the person outside the door… isn’t me.”