Chapter 739: Either Natural Disaster or Man-Made Calamity
(To be revised later) Using the brief time of the nursery rhyme, he attempted to attack the room. Staying in the room meant only waiting for death; perhaps he could go out. However, the result was unexpected—the moment he broke the window, he still "died."
Having tried this far, Xu Huo felt that his direction was wrong. No matter what method he used, "death" could not be skipped. That meant the mother and child in the house were fated to die—it was a fact. So what was the point of this scene replay?
"The doll is playing in the living room."
"Mom is cooking in the kitchen."
"Dad is on his way home."
"Ding-dong! Ding-dong! The doorbell rings!"
"Dad forgot his keys!"
"The doll goes to open the door, hits her head on the cabinet."
"Mom goes to open the door, bumps her belly on the knife."
"Dad comes home and opens the door, and he lies down beside the doll and Mom too!"
The nursery rhyme sang again. Xu Huo instantly appeared at the door and directly twisted the doorknob. Of course, the result was no surprise—he returned to the sofa.
In the nursery rhyme, the mother and child, the protagonists, were dead, but the father who returned from outside was not necessarily so. Was this an imagined cycle or a regret for the past?
"Tap!" At that moment, a glass bead suddenly fell to the floor and slowly rolled to his feet. Following the direction from which the bead rolled, he noticed that the area above the second-floor staircase was no longer pitch black but lit up with light.
Unsure of where the trigger point was, Xu Huo chose to go upstairs.
The second floor was a study room with no desk. The only chair faced away from the staircase, its back blocking the person sitting on it. Only the right armrest held the hand of a middle-aged man.
"They are all dead," the middle-aged man spoke before Xu Huo entered the study.
After waiting two seconds, Xu Huo said, "I wanted to save them too, but I didn't succeed."
"How I wish time could flow backward," the middle-aged man continued. "If I hadn't lost my temper that day over a young team member's mistake, I wouldn't have called a short meeting before leaving work."
"If I hadn't called that short meeting, I wouldn't have run into a leader coming for an inspection and been dragged out for drinks."
"If I hadn't drunk, I wouldn't have had to choose public transportation because I couldn't drive, and I wouldn't have gotten caught up in an unexpected argument."
"If I hadn't gotten caught up in that argument, I wouldn't have been pulled in to testify, and I wouldn't have repeated my statement over and over because I was slurring my words."
"If I hadn't wasted time giving my statement, I wouldn't have been five minutes late getting home."
"If I hadn't been those five minutes late, they might still be alive."
It was the simplest of narratives, but every word was soaked in regret. Beneath the calm lay a daily, knife-like pain, so much so that every detail, every choice, even every step was filled with remorse.
If that was the case, then the existence of this illusion was still the creator's attempt to save his wife and child. Unfortunately, time could not flow backward...
As this thought flashed through his mind, Xu Huo suddenly froze. He looked at the hand and said, "If you can't change the facts at the moment of the tragedy, perhaps you can save them before that—if only time could flow backward."
The middle-aged man stopped repeating his words and then vanished from the chair.
Xu Huo quickly walked over and turned the chair around. On the cushion was actually a vial of potion!
*
Of course, he grabbed nothing. He returned to reality from the illusion, still standing before that solitary chair, but the words "Please Sit" on the armrest had disappeared.
"So from the moment I entered this basement, I fell into an illusion."
Xu Huo checked the small, cramped room, but no real potion appeared.
He was somewhat disappointed. When he entered the illusion, he thought it might be a "clue" left by Dr. Wu, given that its design felt out of place with the Museum City. But the potion that appeared on the chair was just an ordinary Evolution Potion—useless even if it were real.
After going around in such a big circle, the result was just a common Evolution Agent... It left him a bit frustrated.
Returning to the ground floor, he had just stepped out from under the office desk when he ran head-on into Long Aotian, who was entering. Long Aotian was badly injured, his head, chest, and abdomen all wrapped in bandages, and his nose was crooked.
Seeing Xu Huo suddenly, he first showed caution, then smiled. "Running into you here—my luck is great!"
He said that, but he didn't move a step closer; instead, he was observing the doorway.
"How did you end up like this?" Xu Huo asked directly.
"Got beaten up," Long Aotian said, instinctively touching his crooked nose. "Too bad I just got this fake nose—cost me a lot of White Notes."
Xu Huo couldn't help but give him another look.
"That's normal, isn't it? Everyone loves beauty, and players are in a high-risk profession for disfigurement." Long Aotian sighed. "I'll have to spend money to fix my face again when I get back."
"But those guys didn't get off easy either. I made every one of them bleed!"
Given how badly he was beaten, Xu Huo doubted the truth of his words. He didn't press further and instead asked, "What about Liu Chengyi?"
"We split up and ran. Who knows where he went?" Long Aotian said as he walked toward the door, pulling out a cigarette and putting it in his mouth. He patted himself down and turned back: "Do you have..."
Before he could finish, Xu Huo, who was already standing behind him, cleanly slit his throat.
This "Long Aotian" clutched his spurting throat, fell to the ground, and turned into a puppet. At the same time, someone outside the venue quickly ran past.
Xu Huo chased them to the entrance of the Styx Ferry, but as soon as he entered, he was surrounded by several players.
These faces were ones he hadn't seen yesterday.
Checking the time—it was already two in the afternoon—he knew these people were new arrivals today. "Are you Ticket Players?"
The group grinned at him. "Be smart. Are you handing over your items, or do we send you off on your way?"
Xu Huo watched them tighten the encirclement. "You've been in instances for more than a day, and you're still talking in your sleep?"
As he spoke, the "Crimson Sword" cut a plane through the air, its faint light extending straight ahead until it stopped at a Defense Item.
The next second, he appeared in front of the opponent, but just as he raised his hand, the man teleported to the left and said to his companions, "Everyone be careful—this kid can destroy items. Don't get too close!"
In an instant, Xu Huo mentally listed several prime suspects who might have sold out his item's traits, but that didn't matter now. He casually threw a few smoke bombs, put on the "Oxygen Supply," and began rapidly darting through the corridor.
These players all had items and traits to protect themselves. Even if they couldn't see clearly, they could still hear movement. The "Compressed Air" isolated others' traits but also hindered his own actions, so fast movement was Xu Huo's advantage in a one-versus-many situation. Using the "Silent Figure" and the "Orb of Murmurs" simultaneously, he killed two people in just half a minute.
But only one actually died; the other turned into a puppet when it fell.