After sending off Tian Tian and the other two, Qi Xia was left standing alone in the hallway.
Though scattered “Participants” still passed by occasionally, Qi Xia now seemed like just one of the many—unnoticed, insignificant.
He turned his head once more to glance at the illusory figure of the White Sheep before retreating into his room, shutting the door behind him, and sitting back down in the center.
The timing wasn’t right yet. All he could do was wait.
As expected, when Qi Xia lifted his head again, the White Sheep was already leaning casually against the doorframe.
Like a relentless nightmare, he was impossible to shake off.
“What an annoying ghost…”
The White Sheep let out a cold chuckle at the remark, then stepped forward and took a seat in front of Qi Xia.
“Do you think I *want* to appear?” he retorted. “I’ve already done everything I needed to do. It was supposed to be my retirement, yet here I am, conjured up over and over by your imagination. Why don’t you just admit defeat? I’ll take care of the rest.”
Qi Xia rubbed his temples, feeling the situation teetering once more toward the edge of chaos.
If the White Sheep’s phantom was indeed a product of his own mind, then every word spoken was a reflection of his subconscious. Did this mean he was actually considering retreat?
“My thoughts are a mess,” Qi Xia admitted. “But you should know what I’m thinking…”
“Of course.” The White Sheep nodded. “You believe it doesn’t matter if you die, as long as someone makes it to the end.”
“But things have changed…” Qi Xia said. “Something unexpected is happening.”
The White Sheep pondered for half a second before shaking his head. “Even the grandest towers develop tiny cracks.”
“Will it collapse?” Qi Xia pressed.
“What if it does?” The White Sheep stared at him. “Your goal isn’t to make this tower stand for a thousand years—it only needs to exist for one moment.”
“Right…” Qi Xia murmured, lowering his head. “As long as the tower is built, as long as I can touch the sky for just an instant… that’s enough…”
“Then can you *stop* summoning me?” the White Sheep said flatly. “Am I really your trump card?”
“I…”
Qi Xia fell silent. As always, his mind was juggling countless thoughts, but an uneasy premonition kept disrupting his focus.
“Just thousands of faceless people…” The White Sheep smirked. “If you don’t say anything… who’d even notice?”
“Yeah…” Qi Xia nodded. “If I don’t say anything…”
“Didn’t we kill them all with our own hands?” The White Sheep stood, then bent down, his face inches from Qi Xia’s. “Did you ever really think of them as *people*?”
A faint crease formed between Qi Xia’s brows as his thoughts spiraled further into disarray.
“We slaughtered them day and night… took so long just to bury all the bodies…” the White Sheep continued. “How many days did that take?”
“Wait…” Qi Xia pressed a hand to his forehead, then raised cold eyes to meet the White Sheep’s. “What are you doing?”
“We buried them to cover up the lie, didn’t we?” the White Sheep pressed. “Why are you hesitating now?”
Qi Xia felt the White Sheep was deliberately undermining his resolve—but how? He was just a figment of his imagination.
What good would his collapse do?
Did the White Sheep truly intend to resurrect in the midst of this chaos?
“They’ll dig them up eventually… won’t they?” the White Sheep pressed. “You used those faceless people, killed them, and buried them in dark alleys… How could no one notice? This place is full of madmen. How can you predict what they’ll do?”
“Are you even trying to comfort me…?” Qi Xia frowned. “Did I kill them just out of selfishness…?”
“Didn’t you?” The White Sheep leaned closer, whispering into his ear. “Are you going to tell me they *wanted* to die?”
“Those… things,” Qi Xia corrected himself. “Like you said, they weren’t people.”
“I’m asking—did *you* ever see them as people?” The White Sheep straightened, fixing him with an inscrutable gaze. “You killed the faceless to save those with faces… Since when was salvation determined by whether someone has eyes or a mouth?”
“I…”
“Who’s been with you longer?” the White Sheep pressed. “How did you lose sight of what really matters?”
Qi Xia noticed the White Sheep’s form shifting—not into something solid, but surrounded by faint wisps of crimson energy.
The unmistakable aura of the “Land of Finality.”
Perhaps this figure had never been the White Sheep at all, but the suppressed “Evil of the End” lurking in his heart.
He was Qi Xia—but not entirely.
Just how many had he killed for this path?
No… there was a flaw. Some weren’t just killed by him—but by the White Sheep too.
“White Sheep…” Qi Xia spoke after a long silence. “Back when you became a ‘Human-level’ Arbiter, you couldn’t even recognize Yan Zhichun… Yet here you are, mocking me for losing sight of what matters.”
The White Sheep chuckled. “Yan Zhichun… If it were you, could *you* have recognized her? It had been so long… How many years was it again?”
He stroked his chin, then muttered a single word—
“Eternity.”
“Yeah… it’s been an ‘Eternity,'” the White Sheep said with a laugh. “After experiencing ‘Eternity,’ I could still recognize her face—that’s how deeply Yan Zhichun left her mark on me. No one else could’ve remembered an old acquaintance under those circumstances… right?”
“What a grand ‘Eternity,'” Qi Xia said. “But that ‘Eternity’ wasn’t just yours—I lived through it too.”
“That ‘Eternity’ changed us. It turned the White Tiger into an old man. It taught us how to fight the Celestial Dragon…” The White Sheep’s voice grew colder. “Yet the faceless ones who stood by you—you never even saw them as human. That’s what makes you so heartless.”
Qi Xia’s mind plunged deeper into chaos.
Far down the hallway, Yan Zhichun, Chu Tianqiu, and Qin Dingdong abruptly halted.
The scene before them seemed to shift—subtly, almost imperceptibly. But none of them were ordinary. They sensed the anomaly instantly.
Perhaps someone’s position had changed. Perhaps expressions had twisted without warning. But this “train” no longer felt the same as before.
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