Without a word, Bai Yang pulled me out of the room and shoved me into the hellish outdoors.
I stared at the devastated streets, grabbed my arm, and pinched it hard…
I couldn’t be dreaming, right?
This was a feeling I’d never experienced before… Walking down the street, it felt like everyone in the “Land of the End” had died, and I was the only one left alive.
I’d never realized before that dried blood had the texture of glue—sticky enough to leave strings when stepped on.
The suffocating despair and the stench were even thicker than before.
Dazed, I wandered the streets, and sure enough, it was just as I’d imagined… No living souls in sight, only “Zodiacs” and “Natives.”
The “Natives” seemed liberated, returning to their “normal lives.” I saw young people out for a stroll, a woman carrying a basket shopping in an empty supermarket, and a salaryman on the roadside, arm raised to hail a cab.
Who knew how long his arm had been up—it was already showing signs of drying out.
These people were quiet yet mad.
As for the “Zodiacs,” their faces were numb and lost. They slowly dragged the corpses of “Participants” from their rooms and tossed them onto the streets like trash.
When they saw me, they looked slightly surprised but soon lowered their heads resignedly and continued cleaning their areas.
I carefully considered the situation… It seemed like some uncontrollable catastrophe had struck, killing everyone…
But if this was a “Heavenly Moment,” logically, someone should have survived…
Why was there not a single living soul? Why was I the only one alive?
From the next day onward, all the “Zodiacs” shut themselves indoors, as if they knew no one would come to play their games anymore.
For them, it must have felt like a long-awaited vacation…
Wait, this feeling… Could it be the “Great Reset”?
Brother Sheep once said that once someone collected 3,600 “Tao,” an upper-level “Great Reset” would inevitably occur. Everyone would be killed, their memories wiped, ensuring this place started fresh.
Now… it really did seem like some kind of “Great Reset” had happened.
That meant someone had gathered them all… but who?
A leader of some organization?
After calming down, I figured the most likely culprit was the man who’d won 2,900 “Tao” from Brother Sheep last time.
Turns out I still hadn’t fully grasped Brother Sheep’s intentions. I thought he’d transferred those “Tao” to “Participants” to “prevent the reset,” but it seemed he’d done it to “trigger the reset”…
Maybe, as he’d said himself, he wanted to drastically reduce the popularity of “Paradise Bank.” Now, not only could he achieve that, but he could also claim all the “Tao” in the bank as his own.
After all, no one would remember they’d ever deposited “Tao” there.
Was Bai Yang in urgent need of money lately?
Wait a second… I suddenly frowned…
If this was the “Great Reset”… would Jiang Ruoxue be reset too?
Would she still remember me?
At that thought, I frantically searched the city for her, heading to the areas she frequented, checking the corpses on the ground…
That was when I noticed something odd—every single corpse was lying face-down.
It seemed something had pierced the back of their skulls and exited through their foreheads. That was why they’d all collapsed forward, seemingly caught off guard.
But this made my task even harder—I had to flip nearly every body to identify them.
For an entire day, I sifted through hundreds of fresh corpses, but Jiang Ruoxue wasn’t among them. My hands were stained with countless people’s blood—drying, staining, drying again—now unbearably itchy… But where was Jiang Ruoxue?
Would she forget me completely?
Before sunset, I finished searching the last street and collapsed against a wall, utterly exhausted…
Something felt off… I needed to sort out my thoughts…
True, I hadn’t found Jiang Ruoxue, but I also hadn’t found any of the “Extremists” I remembered.
Maybe I hadn’t searched enough—just a few hundred bodies. I’d have to keep looking. Finally, I understood what “alive or dead, I must see proof” truly meant.
The next day, I headed toward the hotel where “Heaven’s Gate” was based, a location Jiang Ruoxue had once mentioned. Strangely, there wasn’t a single corpse there. Had the entire group gone out?
Soon, in what looked like an office, I found a note with neat handwriting, just three lines:
“To returning comrades: ‘Heaven’s Gate’ has relocated to the school in the west. Please regroup there.”
“School…”
I put the note back and rushed west. If “Heaven’s Gate” had really moved there, Jiang Ruoxue must have gone with them.
When I arrived at the school, I found plenty of corpses… but none I recognized.
I’d never met their leader or seen their core members, though I did spot an exceptionally beautiful girl.
Given her height—over 175 cm—she was likely the one Jiang Ruoxue called “Strong Luck.” Even she hadn’t escaped.
I scoured the entire school but found no trace of Jiang Ruoxue… Not even Auntie Tong’s body.
Slowly, I began to understand…
Bai Yang had once told me: “I’ve always ensured the safety of you and those around you.”
Now I finally grasped what that meant…
“Extremists” seemed to have immunity…
Muttering to myself, I walked out of the school.
No wonder… No wonder “Extremists” were so stable, no wonder we could keep recruiting…
“Extremists” could escape the “Great Reset”… They retained memories longer than anyone else…
But wait—that didn’t make sense!
My mind suddenly froze—if no “Extremist” could die and all escaped the reset… why was there a corpse of me in Bai Yang’s office?!
Why had I died?!
Lost in thought, I barely noticed the soft sound of surprise nearby.
“Huh…?” someone called tentatively, then louder, “Hey, sis!”
I looked up and saw Old Sun standing there.
“Old Sun…?”
“Yeah, it’s me!” He grinned as he walked over. “Knew you were one of us! Any other survivors in there?”
“Uh…” I shook my head. “No one’s alive inside.”
“Then Xiao Jiang isn’t here,” Old Sun said. “Where’s that kid run off to now?”
“Hold on, Old Sun,” I said, still confused. “Have you… been through this before?”
“You gone daft, sis?” He frowned. “You’ve been in ‘Extremists’ longer than me. These ‘Great Resets’ happen every few years—I’m used to it. You’re not?”
Every few years…?
Now I understood… Every time I’d spaced out, I must have skipped past a “Great Reset.”
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