Chapter 925: The Oddball Chen Junnan
The days that followed became tense once more. I continued participating in various games as usual, training the intensity of my "Echo" through rigorous practice.
I found that dealing with Xiaoxiao was extremely difficult, so I could only hand her over to someone like Lao Sun, who was a social butterfly. Lao Sun lived up to expectations—he became friends with Xiaoxiao that very same day.
For a rare moment, I managed to extricate myself and had more time to handle my own affairs. But I soon noticed a bizarre problem. Zhou Mo kept saying that more and more strong individuals were appearing here, yet strangely, I hadn't encountered a single one.
For instance, nothing happened while I was following Xiaoxiao, but the moment I handed her over to Lao Sun, I heard that she was fairly and squarely killed by someone in a game.
That day, the giant bell continuously received massive "Echoes." I wasn't far away and rushed over to check. The display screen clearly showed "Heaven Moves" and "Breaks All Laws."
These two lines of large characters overshadowed all the others. I could barely make out Xiaoxiao's "Frame," Lao Sun's "Original," and Luo Eleven's "Oblivion" among them. In the corner, "Calamity" and others were also present—the scene was quite lively.
Jiang Ruoxue told me that Xiaoxiao had lost to someone I'd never heard of in a one-on-one fight, and later, in an "Echo" battle, Zhang Shan punched straight through her chest.
She lost thoroughly.
How strange... Were these strong individuals avoiding me? Why was it that I frequented the games but never encountered any formidable characters?
Just as I was about to ask Zhou Mo for a detailed list of the strong participants, I met an oddball in the Earth Serpent's game.
Chen Junnan.
Yes, "oddball" is the only word I can use to describe him.
Initially, I thought he was just someone I'd never heard of. But as it turned out, he was none other than "Scapegoat," whose name had always been up on the screen outside.
How could that be called "never heard of"? It was practically "thunderous in my ears," and yet I never knew where he was.
This guy always appeared briefly on the first day of the ten-day cycle, then vanished like a flash in the pan. But now, "Scapegoat" had stopped disappearing... Chen Junnan was starting to make his mark.
Thinking about the timing... wasn't this right after Brother Goat left?
White Goat... Chen Junnan... the sudden emergence of various powerful "participants"...
But I just couldn't figure out what White Goat had done to cause the "participants" here to start slowly rising only after he left.
I was too curious about Chen Junnan. I had never heard the name "Chen Junnan" anywhere else... yet he was unforgettable.
I suspect that anyone who has met Chen Junnan, even if they couldn't remember his name, would definitely remember his personality.
Chen Junnan absolutely had that ability.
An ordinary "participant," whose "Echo" was the non-lethal "Scapegoat," chose to directly gamble his life with a notoriously cunning "Earth Serpent," with no strategy, no teammates, and no understanding of the game rules.
Even if I trained for eight lifetimes, I couldn't have been that impulsive.
No tactics, no knowledge of the rules, and no idea how to kill the Earth Serpent—almost all his plans relied on flashes of inspiration... Would anyone actually do that?
But not only did he do it, he actually gambled the Earth Serpent to death.
It seemed just as Zhou Mo had said—more and more interesting people were appearing here.
Thanks to Chen Junnan, I entered "Heaven's Gate" for the first time as a visitor, and I finally got to see Chu Tianqiu.
According to Yun Yao, although Chu Tianqiu could retain his memories for a long time, he rarely managed to activate his "Echo." This time, I wanted to see his abilities. If he lacked a bit of despair, I wouldn't mind killing him once.
But I never expected that after arriving at "Heaven's Gate," I would experience something that completely overturned my understanding of the world.
That was the complete collapse of Chu Tianqiu's image in my mind. A person like him wasn't even worth my effort to kill.
He was nothing like the "Benevolent King" the outside world claimed him to be. He was a thorough and utter "Madman."
Chu Tianqiu's madness far surpassed my imagination. Not only were his thoughts insane, but he also carried an aura very similar to Qinglong's.
That day, he activated some bizarre "Echo" before my eyes, pulling the dying Chen Junnan back from the gates of hell.
From the result, Chu Tianqiu saved the dying Chen Junnan. But from the process, the situation was extremely complex and eerie. At that time, the severely injured Chen Junnan wasn't dead yet, but a new Chen Junnan had already been reborn with partial memories.
Two identical people stood before me. If there was any difference, it was that the new Chen Junnan was missing one day's worth of memories compared to the dead Chen Junnan.
I had never imagined Chu Tianqiu's "Echo" could be so domineering. After all, every "Echo" here seemed to follow certain rules. Many abilities, no matter how unbelievable they appeared, were actually reasonable upon closer thought. But an "Echo" that could directly copy or create a person defied any rules.
At that moment, I seemed to have discovered a clue...
Wait a minute... What if the new Chen Junnan had never seen the old Chen Junnan and simply reborn on a strange street? What would happen then?
I mean... from the perspective of the new Chen Junnan alone, he wouldn't know why he was there, and his memories wouldn't connect with what came before.
Wouldn't it feel like... a sudden daze?
An image of my body lying on the floor of White Goat's office flashed through my mind.
Although Chen Junnan and I were complete strangers, we had absolutely experienced the exact same situation.
Yes... from this perspective, everything could actually be connected.
But there was one clue I still couldn't understand: Chen Junnan's rebirth came from Chu Tianqiu, while my daze came from White Goat. I was very clear that White Goat and Chu Tianqiu were completely different people in terms of personality and appearance. So how could they achieve the same effect?
I had a feeling... once I figured out this logical relationship, all the truth would surface.
With that in mind, could it be that Brother Goat and Chu Tianqiu had some form of cooperation?
Although I couldn't know everything Brother Goat had done, I was aware that during the seven years he had been a "Zodiac," Chu Tianqiu had never come to see him, and Brother Goat had never mentioned Chu Tianqiu.
By now, I had roughly figured out the reason for the chaos in my life.
First, White Goat used some rare method to "modify" me. Whether it was my life, my memories, or my abilities, they would undergo slight changes according to his demands. This caused a rift in my perception of myself.
Second, White Goat had "revived" me many times. Every time I revived, I would lose at least one day's worth of memories. The most direct evidence was that I never remembered the "Great Reshuffling," but Lao Sun and the others did.