Chapter 394: The Golden Age
"You're saying..." Qi Xia frowned at Chen Junnan. "Your memories only go up to yesterday."
"Yeah." Chen Junnan nodded. "After I came out, I realized it was already evening. I thought I'd been sleepwalking or had amnesia, but who knew that when I got back to the classroom, I'd see another me..."
Qi Xia knew the rest.
Based on what was known so far, there had been two Chen Junnans that day.
One of them went to fight the Earth-level participant as planned, while the other inexplicably appeared in Chu Tianqiu's basement.
If that was the case... the Chen Junnan who fought the Earth-level had died like a discarded pawn in the classroom.
Qi Xia felt a slight headache coming on and could only rub his brow.
Yeah... which Chen Junnan was the one in front of him?
Was there any difference between him and the previous Chen Junnan?
For such a long time, the only gap between these two was a single day's worth of memory.
"This ability sounds just like 'Endless Cycle'..." Qi Xia muttered quietly. "How did Chu Tianqiu activate it...?"
"What...?" Chen Junnan and Qiao Jiajin both asked in confusion.
After a moment, Chen Junnan tentatively ventured, "Are you saying I was... created by Chu Tianqiu using 'Endless Cycle'? Isn't that your 'Echo'?"
Qi Xia didn't answer. He just kept rubbing his brow.
This was definitely worth examining closely.
If Chu Tianqiu could activate 'Endless Cycle', theoretically he could do far more than this. Why would he only resurrect Chen Junnan?
After a while, Qi Xia said in a deep voice, "I can confirm that I don't have an 'Echo' right now, so I'm not the one who activated this ability... Among everyone present, the only person who could have done something this insane is Chu Tianqiu."
Hearing Qi Xia's deduction, Chen Junnan also fell silent, head bowed.
Unfortunately, he hadn't been on the scene the moment Chu Tianqiu activated this 'Echo'. What exactly had happened back then?
"Chen Junnan, your memories go further back. I want to ask you—what exactly is Chu Tianqiu's 'Echo'?"
"Him?" Chen Junnan snorted coldly. "I always thought the guy was an 'Unfortunate', but it turns out he really does have an 'Echo'. Only, the trigger condition for his 'Echo' is extremely useless. He has to wait until the tenth day, when he sees everyone starting to dissipate, before it activates..."
"Hold on." Qi Xia interrupted him. "I have a question."
"What?"
"Two people have already told me that Chu Tianqiu's 'Echo' trigger is 'Witness the End'. I want to know—how exactly did you find that out?"
"Isn't it simple?" Chen Junnan said. "If that punk lives until the tenth day, he'll retain his memories in the next cycle. If he dies at any other time, we have to reintroduce ourselves to him next time. So his 'trigger' naturally ends up being staying alive until the last day, which means we sometimes have to protect him. Besides, even he himself said his trigger is 'Witness the End'."
Qi Xia felt there might be a paradox here.
If Chu Tianqiu had only retained two years of memories, he shouldn't have gone this insane. This clearly exceeded the normal range.
Plenty of people had been driven mad by the "Land of the End," but going insane in just two years was extremely rare.
Yun Yao had retained two years of memories. She wasn't crazy.
All the members of the "Cat" team had retained two years of memories. They weren't crazy either.
Did that mean their psychological resilience was stronger than Chu Tianqiu's?
"I feel like Chu Tianqiu has been planning something for a very long time..." Qi Xia sensed a chilling possibility. "He didn't lose his memory, and he's always known me..."
"What?" Chen Junnan froze.
"Isn't there a possibility..." Qi Xia continued, "that Chu Tianqiu wasn't lying, but 'Witness the End' doesn't refer to witnessing the 'Day of the End'—it refers to witnessing the 'Land of the End'."
"Huh...?" Chen Junnan paused, then narrowed his eyes in thought. "If that's the case... wouldn't he start 'echoing' the moment he arrives? Does he also know me?"
Qiao Jiajin was stunned for a moment, then asked, "Does he know me?"
Neither of them answered him. They both bowed their heads, lost in thought. If Chu Tianqiu's 'Echo' trigger really was 'Witness the End', he would have retained far too many memories.
Zheng Yingxiong had been listening to their conversation without understanding most of it. Bored, he lifted his nose and sniffed Chen Junnan's scent, then frowned and muttered to himself, "The fresh scent of 'Scapegoat'..."
As he spoke, he raised a hand to wipe the nosebleed trickling from his nostril.
The atmosphere remained silent for a long time. Finally, Qi Xia looked up and said, "Chen Junnan, tell me about it."
"What?"
"Your 'original memory'."
Chen Junnan thought for a moment, then said, "Old Qi, there's nothing to hide about this. I can tell you, but once you hear it, you'll know that aside from letting you know a few more people, it's completely useless."
Under Chen Junnan's narration, that long-buried memory finally surfaced.
His memories began ten years ago.
Back then, the "Land of the End" wasn't obviously different from now, except the sky wasn't as dark red.
Above their heads still hung a yellowish-brown sun, its surface streaked with black lines spreading from the outer edges inward. The air was filled with a nauseating stench of decay; just half a day here was enough for the smell to seep into your bones.
Four enormous bells stood at the four corners of the city, displaying the present "Echoes" for everyone to see.
And the two most common lines on the screen were simply "Scapegoat" and "Calamity."
"Actually, that kid Han Yimo was pretty decent," Chen Junnan said to Qi Xia and Qiao Jiajin. "But he spread a nasty rumor about a girl, and I've always held a grudge against him."
According to Chen Junnan, Han Yimo hadn't gone mad yet.
He was always worried about the girl he'd slandered. Every time Han Yimo died, he would return to the real world and try to find a way to make amends with her.
Unfortunately, that incident had ruined the girl's life. She would never forgive him.
In her eyes, she had only rejected Han Yimo once—but Han Yimo clearly remembered being rejected countless times. That had gradually changed his mentality.
"Old Qi, there were two 'Unfortunates' among our nine people," Chen Junnan continued. "Out of all the rooms, the proportion of 'Echo' users in ours was already quite high."
Later, under the leadership of Qi Xia, Chen Junnan, and Qiao Jiajin, they continuously participated in games and eventually became the most famous room in the "Land of the End."
Because Chen Junnan's and Han Yimo's "Echoes" were extremely easy to trigger, both of them could retain memories for a long time. Combined with Qi Xia's meticulous planning, all seven people in the room awakened their "Echoes."
They were:
Qiao Jiajin, "Destroy All Laws"—can destroy anyone's "Echo" through belief and subconscious will.
Li Shangwu, "Pocketing"—can take out objects that his subconscious believes to exist.
Han Yimo, "Calamity"—can summon disasters that his subconscious believes in and that can actually happen.
Chen Junnan, "Scapegoat"—can transfer others' misfortunes through subconscious will, actively taking a death in their place.
Zhang Cenze, "Soul Transfer"—can transfer the souls of living beings through belief.
Tiantian, "Ingenuity"—can create or fabricate precise items she understands, using her subconscious.
Zhao Haibo, "Dissociation"—can disintegrate inanimate objects through subconscious will.
"What a powerful team that was...?" Chen Junnan said with a bitter smile. "In most of the rooms we encountered, 'Echo' users were very rare. Having four or five was already considered a top-tier team. But we had a full seven."