Chapter 1253: A Thousand Miles of Fate Tied by a Thread
Li Cheng killed the unconscious player. She originally held five cards, plus these four, for a total of nine cards, three of which would be randomly returned to the instance.
After a slightly tense wait, Li Cheng said with some disappointment, "The flower cards were randomly taken away, leaving the exchange cards."
Jiang Zifeng looked at Xu Huo. "Looks like your luck isn't so good today."
Xu Huo smiled indifferently and said to Li Cheng, "Anyway, you have exchange cards in hand. Swap with someone for a black card, and you can guarantee a clear."
Li Cheng hadn't expected that he wouldn't blame her, but would instead let her clear the instance. Her expression showed some emotion—of course, under normal circumstances, this wasn't a big deal, but in the game, there were plenty of people who couldn't stand seeing others do well.
When bad people and bad deeds run rampant, good people and good deeds seem out of place instead.
"I have many cards. Trade with me," Mu Yan said.
The two smoothly exchanged cards, and Li Cheng's first card also became a black card, making her a member of the black side. Currently, black cards were the majority in the room, so clearing the instance was a foregone conclusion.
Besides them, only one unfamiliar player remained. Seeing someone look at him, he quickly spoke up as before, "My first card is also black! I'm on your side!"
"No one's going to kill you, why so nervous?" Jiang Zifeng checked the time. "There are still two hours until the match ends. They're not going to make us wait here, are they? Can't we end the match early?"
Xu Huo wasn't in a hurry to clear the instance. Instead, he first dealt with Liang Shuang's belongings.
They might have gotten off at District 011 by chance, but Liang Shuang would never have followed him and invited him into the instance based solely on Ye Bingxin's divination, unless he was certain it would be profitable.
After entering this poker card room, Liang Shuang hadn't actively revealed his identity. When they met Ye Bingxin earlier, not planning to team up with her could be excused as "they weren't originally companions," but Xu Huo was someone he had actively invited to travel with. Now that they were about to clear the instance, there was no reason to pretend they didn't know each other.
Xu Huo wasn't sure what exactly Liang Shuang was planning, but using the exchange card to try to provoke conflict among Xu Huo, Jiang Zifeng, and Ye Bingxin meant he was playing the role of the mantis stalking the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind.
But if it was just to launch a surprise attack at the last moment, Liang Shuang had no need to take the risk of coming to Rose Castle to find him—this was what puzzled Xu Huo, and of course, it was also something he couldn't ask Liang Shuang about.
Though he had shut his mouth earlier.
He hoped the items he left behind would contain the answer.
Li Cheng brought out all of Liang Shuang's belongings, including the food in the luggage compartment. "You should be able to tell if I'm lying."
She said frankly, "You can use a lie-detection prop too."
Xu Huo said there was no need for such trouble, and instead said, "I need to find a prop first."
With that, he stored all the props into his prop slot and checked their effects one by one.
Liang Shuang had five B-grade props, covering ranged attacks, close combat, and defense. Xu Huo glanced at them and set them aside. Other C-grade and below props weren't worth looking at. He found the special props and flipped through a few before his gaze settled on a prop called "A Thousand Miles of Fate Tied by a Thread."
[A Thousand Miles of Fate Tied by a Thread: As everyone knows, the fate between people is mysterious. When you meet someone with a compatible aura, your luck will also skyrocket. When you meet someone with an opposing aura, just one meeting might bring you bad luck. Unfortunately, not everyone has the ability to discern this special aura, so this prop was created to meet that need.]
[Simply apply the prop to the target of your choice, and a line visible only to you will appear between you. A white line represents good luck, a black line represents bad luck. If the line connecting you is white, congratulations—you and the other person have compatible auras, and acting together will likely increase your gains. If it's black, don't overthink it—stay as far away as possible.]
[But please note, the color of the line is not fixed. Fortune and misfortune are intertwined, and black and white alternating is normal.]
[Note: This prop can only be used on one person once, and both parties must be in the same district.]
Xu Huo looked at the prop—it was a section of translucent fine thread, somewhat like a thicker version of spider silk.
But just from the prop description, it was clear this was a prop that couldn't be used excessively. It could only provide two tendencies—"good" and "bad"—but could only be used on the same person once. That meant once they crossed districts, the prop's judgment results could change without the holder knowing—clearly, Liang Shuang had suffered from this flaw.
Additionally, although most people a person meets daily won't have any interaction, a small portion will have exchanges. Using only black and white to represent the relationship between people was very crude. By what standard was the quality of the interaction measured? How much benefit did the white line represent? When would the bad luck hinted at by the black line manifest? These were all uncontrollable.
Unless you tested the prop on everyone one by one.
Thinking of this, Xu Huo searched the luggage compartment and indeed found a "diary" inside, which specifically recorded the "insights" from using this prop.
To be fair, Liang Shuang was indeed a very meticulous and cautious person. After using "A Thousand Miles of Fate Tied by a Thread" on people of different identities, he made detailed records of the line's state and the final "gains."
In simple terms, the more thoroughly the line changed from translucent to black or white, and the thicker the final color, the more it indicated that "good luck" or "bad luck" would come with huge benefits or risks. The faster the color changed, the shorter the time before the warning result appeared. As for the exact time span, it hadn't been summarized yet, because Liang Shuang once saw a black line on a player and immediately fled, but unexpectedly, they met again a year later, and because of that person, he was dragged into a crisis that nearly killed him.
A thick notebook, all records, even including portraits and basic characteristics of the targets for later reference... Xu Huo's information was on the last page. It not only recorded the train number he was on, but also his boarding and alighting positions, detailed records of the outskirts of Rose Castle, his identity in District 011, and some gossip among the nobles.
Xu Huo calmly read on.
Later, it recorded the effect of "A Thousand Miles of Fate Tied by a Thread" on him. The line's color was a thick, milky white before the two left District 011, with no signs of change—Liang Shuang had also recorded a few instances where the line color changed, but those lines showed signs in a very short time.
It seemed this prop wasn't very reliable either. At least Xu Huo had made a decision the first moment he saw Liang Shuang outside Rose Castle.
However, from the records of Liang Shuang's usage, it seemed to confirm two things: first, any prop had varying degrees of limitation depending on the user's ability; second, it seemed there really were tools in the game that could briefly predict the future.