Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

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Chapter 130

Beside the inn, in front of the statue, a yellow light quickly swept past Zhou Qian’s eyes, and he noticed many players had disappeared, clearly indicating he had been sent to another timeline.

Along with him, Bai Zhou and Yun Xiangrong were also transported.

When the incident occurred, the players were actually all gathered in one direction. Based on the previous range covered by the eyes of the three heads on the statue, even if they were to be sent to different timelines, all players were supposed to be together.

However, the sudden rotation of the statue heads and pupils broke the original pattern, managing to lock onto different players more precisely and sending them to different timelines. This seemed a bit unfair.

Zhou Qian could guess why Bai Zhou was sent with him—probably because the two were too close at the time, making it difficult for the statue’s “gaze” to separate them. However, why Yun Xiangrong appeared here warranted further consideration.

After all, besides Bai Zhou, He Xiaowei and Hidden Blade were the closest to Zhou Qian, yet neither of them came along.

Turning his head, when Zhou Qian saw the temple, he found his answer—Difu could read the guard and hostility among the deserters. She deliberately placed two or several people with hostility towards each other together, obviously to further lead them to “curse” and kill each other through curses.

After a brief moment of daze, Yun Xiangrong looked around and then took a step towards the temple. At the same moment, sensing that Bai Zhou beside him seemed to be making a move, Zhou Qian timely held his hand. Though he was looking at Bai Zhou, the words were clearly meant for Yun Xiangrong. “She wouldn’t dare. Her speed of running there is definitely not as fast as your sword.”

After Zhou Qian said this, Yun Xiangrong’s gaze turned over, and the two briefly made eye contact. At this moment, both faced the same question—how to continue the act in such an instance, under the watchful eyes of the gamblers?

The power of Goddess Difu would grow positively with the increase of negative factors like lies and betrayals.

This meant if Zhou Qian and the others continued to lie and act, it would further strengthen Difu’s power, thereby increasing the difficulty of clearing the instance.

With Difu’s true form being a golden bird and already in a state that couldn’t be killed, if her power was further strengthened, what the conditions for clearing the game would be, and how to achieve them, became even more elusive.

Glancing at Yun Xiangrong, Zhou Qian said, “Us killing each other will only make Difu stronger. Let’s cooperate for now. I guess you don’t want to perish together with me. Besides, with Bai Zhou by my side, you can’t kill me.”

Yun Xiangrong, seemingly frustrated, stopped and frowned without saying anything.

Zhou Qian no longer paid her any attention, instead turning to Bai Zhou. “Finding a way to clear the level together is more important. What do you think? How can we eliminate her power without killing Difu?”

Bai Zhou said, “Difu’s true form is a golden bird, born from the utmost evil of the world and has lived for many years. Her power is too strong, and we can’t confront her directly. We can only think of roundabout ways.”

Glancing at the statues, he continued, “What we need to do now is, first, find a way to use such a magical instrument to return to our true timeline; second, find a way to lock up the temple with the chains that once bound Difu.”

“Then let’s go into the temple and take a look.”

As Zhou Qian walked towards the temple, he looked back at Yun Xiangrong. “You don’t have to come in. I’m afraid you’ll curse me in the chaos. You keep watch here. ‘Yellow light’ represents the future, but we don’t know at which point in the future we’ve been brought. Beware of accidents. We need someone to keep watch here.”

After speaking, Zhou Qian and Bai Zhou walked into the temple together.

Using a private chat item, Zhou Qian said to Bai Zhou, “Actually, I’m quite lazy to act with her. It’s meaningless. In my view, the Peach Blossom Legion wouldn’t believe she would truly betray.”

Bai Zhou replied, “Then you need to consider the significance of the Peach Blossom Legion sending her under these circumstances.”

“Yes, so I’m cooperating, am I not?”

Zhou Qian blinked, picked up a flashlight, and shone it down the corridor.

The stone walls on both sides of the corridor were still inscribed with various curse inscriptions. Although Zhou Qian didn’t have time to read and remember all the inscriptions during his first visit to the temple, he still had a deep impression of many inscriptions.

Now, the same inscriptions were carved in the same places. It seemed he indeed entered the same temple. However, according to Difu, this temple exists in many different timelines simultaneously.

Perhaps the chaotic phenomenon would end once Difu was locked up again—the temple and the goddess would no longer be able to travel through various timelines.

But soon Zhou Qian noticed an anomaly—the corridor had become wider and longer than his first visit.

Shining the flashlight forward, Zhou Qian quickly shared this discovery with Bai Zhou.

Near the end of the corridor, he asked Bai Zhou to stop and then slowed down, taking steps towards the temple entrance. Each step Zhou Qian took was deliberately even, and he found that from the point he asked Bai Zhou to stop at the temple entrance, he took ten steps.

Thinking of something, Zhou Qian, from ten steps away in the dark corridor, looked at Bai Zhou’s perfect features with the faint light from the flashlight and suddenly said, “Zhou Ge, I have something to tell you—”

“Actually, I later inquired. The class beauty next door never sent you a love letter. But why did you receive one? Because I sent it to you.”

Bai Zhou looked at him. “?”

Zhou Qian: “I drew a ghost face on the letter. Actually, I just wanted to see if you would open the love letter. If you really opened it, found it strange, wanted to discuss with me, who was a brother to you at the time, or even wanted to ask the class beauty next door why she drew a ghost face for you, it meant you were interested in her.”

Hearing this, Bai Zhou smiled faintly.

After a while, he asked Zhou Qian, “So, is there anything else?”

“Anything else? What else… let me think,” Zhou Qian laughed, walked back to Bai Zhou from the temple entrance, and then looked at him meaningfully. “I took only nine and a half steps when I walked back from there.”

Between them was a distance of ten steps. With each lie dispelled, the distance between them grew closer as the temple shrank.

This situation created a mystical image—

As if the long years that had stretched between them could indeed be gradually erased. In this imagery, Bai Zhou’s gaze towards Zhou Qian gradually deepened.

Then he looked deeply at Zhou Qian and said, “Hmm, try admitting something else.”

Zhou Qian sighed in feigned helplessness. “This instance really isn’t suited for someone like me. I can only speak the truth in front of you. For others… let Difu’s power increase then.”

Smiling at Bai Zhou, Zhou Qian turned around, his back to him, and said, “Zhou Ge, you’re really overthinking some things. I truly like you. How can liking someone be compared to liking food and drink? I’m actually quite loyal. Don’t disbelieve.”

At that moment, Bai Zhou’s body stiffened for a moment. After a while, he seemed to be able to move again and immediately reached out to grab Zhou Qian’s hand.

But Zhou Qian deliberately withdrew his hand, took a few steps forward, then turned back and made a stop gesture to Bai Zhou, “Hey, the experiment isn’t over yet. Don’t move.”

Bai Zhou really didn’t move. Zhou Qian raised his eyebrows at him, then turned around and continued forward. Step by step, he walked back to the temple entrance and said, “This time it’s only nine steps. So you see—”

Turning back, Zhou Qian smiled at Bai Zhou. “I didn’t lie to you, Zhou Ge. What I just said was the truth.”

The golden light seeping out of the temple outlined a golden ray along Zhou Qian’s body.

He stood in the backlight, and his expression should have been hard to see. But at that moment, Bai Zhou felt his smile was more brilliant than the most beautiful clouds in the sky.

Zhou Qian always had the most eye-catching ability.

Bai Zhou had felt this way the first time he saw him, even though they were both so young at the time.

Following the path Zhou Qian had walked, Bai Zhou stepped forward, gripping his hand tightly. After a moment of eye contact, Zhou Qian didn’t delay further, pulling him into the temple.

In the center of the temple, the golden statue of the goddess was still there, with the chain at her feet still in an open state. Zhou Qian walked up to the statue, squatted down to pick up the chain, and tried to lock it back onto the goddess’s ankle, but he found he couldn’t do it. Every time he locked it, it would spring open after a moment.

“There must be clues we haven’t found yet.” Zhou Qian looked up at Bai Zhou. “We need to find the magic, spell, or perhaps a key to lock the goddess up again.”

“Yeah. Actually, we could go back to the village and have another look around,” Bai Zhou suggested, lifting a flashlight to scan the various inscriptions around them.

“Did you manage to read all of these before?”

“No, we didn’t have the chance before the temple disappeared,” Zhou Qian replied. “We can indeed take another look together now.”

A moment later, the sound of Yun Xiangrong’s voice came from the direction of the corridor.

Zhou Qian and Bai Zhou exchanged glances. To prevent the temple from disappearing again, Zhou Qian took out an item—a remarkably large eyeball, almost the size of an adult’s palm, with extremely dark pupils, looking quite eerie.

[Item: Memory Eyeball]

[Function: More powerful than a camera and video recorder. Who is the king of memories? It’s this! It can record everything it sees.]

[Note: Not a consumable item but can only be used once a day, with up to three memories retrievable per day.]

[Level: S; Extremely Rare]

With this eyeball, Zhou Qian quickly made a round around the temple, then left with Bai Zhou.

As they passed through the corridor, Zhou Qian let the eyeball record the inscriptions on the walls while he called out, “Yun Xiangrong? Did you find anything?”

Yun Xiangrong’s voice came from the direction of the corridor exit. “There’s some activity in the direction of the square.”

……

A minute later, Zhou Qian, Bai Zhou, and Yun Xiangrong headed towards the square together.

They were already familiar with the route from the statue and inn to the square.

Not long after setting out, Zhou Qian noticed something unusual—a massive red light was emanating from the direction of the square, almost turning the sky red.

As Zhou Qian wondered if this was related to the Red God Amei, he heard Bai Zhou say, “It’s Alayne’s power.”

“Alayne?” Zhou Qian knew Bai Zhou said this because, as a player with Rank God hearing, he could hear specific voices from the square.

The previous suspicions about Alayne resurfaced, and sure enough, Zhou Qian heard Bai Zhou say, “She’s punishing all the villagers. We need to be careful.”

Afterward, the three didn’t continue towards the square but instead turned to climb the hillside next to them. They found a hidden spot halfway up the hill, concealed by rocks, and looked down at the square.

From this position, they could clearly see what was happening on the square. Zhou Qian couldn’t hear what Alayne and the others were saying clearly, so Bai Zhou relayed it to him.

On the vast square, a huge lotus flower bloomed in mid-air, the red light coloring the ground and even the night sky, like the red clouds spread across the sky.

Alayne sat on the red lotus, overlooking everyone, like a god watching over mortals from above the clouds.

She appeared to be only about thirteen or fourteen years old at this time. Her features were still youthful, but her eyes showed a maturity beyond her years. In front of her, hundreds of villagers all knelt down, including Ab and even her biological father.

Ab was leading everyone in begging Amei.

They kept kowtowing to her, as if worshiping a god, regardless of bleeding from their heads. “Please, don’t kill us!”

“Yes, spare me!”

“You grew up before our eyes!”

“You’re a descendant of the four major families. You can’t commit such a heinous act!”

Alayne didn’t even glance at the people, coldly saying, “When Brother Qi Yunsi died, when my mother was driven to death by you… even when my biological father betrayed me, asking me to die for the entire village, you weren’t saying this. I’ve been forced into this by you all.”

“Lord Ab, didn’t you say that the oracle indicated that I was the hope for saving Nameless Village?”

“I think I’m fulfilling the oracle now. Killing you evildoers, Nameless Village will be clean from now on! Only when you all die, there is a possibility for this place to recover its light and hope!”

From behind a rock halfway up the hill, looking down at the scenes on the square, Zhou Qian said to Bai Zhou, “So, the role played by Qi Yunsi also had its purpose.”

Bai Zhou nodded. “The history of Nameless Village doesn’t include our presence. So, you didn’t steal the little girl Alayne’s handkerchief, and I didn’t stand guard for Alayne.”

Zhou Qian added, “Right, considering Alayne and Qi Yunsi were so close, we can boldly assume… that night it was actually Qi Yunsi who participated in the vigil for her and died.”

“That night, perhaps, was the first step of Alayne’s hatred towards Nameless Village.”

In the real history, during the year Alayne was eight, on the eve of the Samhain festival, the square traditionally held a “Drop the Handkerchief” game.

Despite the Sun-Moon alliance, Alayne’s family, the Sun Family, lost.

As a result, Alayne had to stand guard.

Although there was no incident of Zhou Qian stealing her handkerchief, she might still have made a mistake that led to her family’s loss, and she was severely punished by her family.

Furthermore, that night, Qi Yunsi stood guard for her and never returned, dying at the hands of the Red God. That year’s Samhain festival became a nightmare for Alayne, the starting point of her hatred for Nameless Village.

The players’ presence in this part of history indeed affected the course of events in a short time—Bai Zhou stood guard for Alayne, so Qi Yunsi didn’t die at the hands of the Red God.

However, what had happened couldn’t be changed.

The more than thirty people standing guard that night couldn’t find Bai Zhou and failed to solve the “1 or 31” proposition given by the Red God. Thus, some turned back to the village, attacked Qi Yunsi, who lived alone, intending to bring his body to the Red God.

 With Qi Yunsi’s death, the remaining 31 no longer had to fight over who would be the sacrificial offering that night.

Village Chief Ab probably knew who the real culprit was, or which family had conspired to do it.

As the village chief, he had to minimize the losses of the four major families; he couldn’t push out another, or several, murderers from the families. So, he blamed the “deserters”.

Now, although the players temporarily affected the course of events, in the long run, everything still followed the original trajectory of history.

All logic formed a closed loop.

Qi Yunsi still died, and his body was still sacrificed to the Red God.

History really didn’t change by a single detail.

Two years later, Alayne was ten.

That year, many details related to the Samhain festival were accidentally overheard by Bai Zhou while fulfilling the “night watch” task.

From what he heard, Ab tricked Alayne into going up the mountain alone to see the Red God, intending to sacrifice her to the Red God, trading her life for everyone else’s.

Somehow, Alayne’s mother told Ab about the lotus on her body. At that time, Alayne almost thought her mother had also betrayed her.

As for Ab’s reason for sacrificing Alayne, it probably wasn’t due to any oracle; that was just a pretext he made up. The real reason behind it most likely had to do with the Red God—Red God Amei specifically demanded the death of someone with a lotus on their body.

Alayne, of course, didn’t want to die and escaped the village chief’s clutches.

The village chief ordered people to guard all the paths down the mountain, intending to drive her into the Red God’s territory and ultimately sacrifice her to death.

Bai Zhou had no way of knowing what happened after that.

It wasn’t until now that he confirmed that Alayne hadn’t died that night.

Everything that happened that night probably constituted the second step of Alayne’s hatred towards Nameless Village.

Now, based on what Alayne said on the square, her mother also died.

So, this might have formed the third step—she eventually reached a level of power beyond everyone’s reach through her talent. Now, filled with hatred, she decided to kill all the villagers.

Zhou Qian squinted at the square and said, “Alayne was betrayed by Nameless Village that raised her, betrayed by her family, betrayed by her father… Such a person like her is very likely to attract the Prayer Temple of the Goddess of Prayers…”

“Could she have cursed someone there?”

Bai Zhou replied, “Yes, that information should be crucial. Let’s use that eyeball to search.”

“Right. Zhou Ge, you keep listening to the information from the square. I’ll search,” Zhou Qian said. “The temple can appear in various timelines, but the information it records must be synchronous. If Amei’s curse is there, then there must also be records.”

…..

On the other side.

Qi Liuxing was understandably a bit panicked when he discovered his teammates had disappeared, but upon turning around and seeing Ke Yuxiao, he immediately felt much more at ease. “We’ve traveled through time and space.”

Ke Yuxiao nodded. “Yeah. Let’s first go check out the Prayer Temple together, then explore the village.”

Qi Liuxing readily agreed to his suggestion, and the two proceeded to do something similar to what Zhou Qian and his group were doing. They first entered the temple, meticulously examined all the inscriptions they could, and also tried to relock the chain on the goddess statue’s ankle. Upon finding that they couldn’t, they left the temple to look for clues in the village instead.

Not long after leaving the temple, as they were discussing which direction to go first, they faintly heard voices coming from the direction of the graveyard on the hill.

The two exchanged glances, instantly understanding each other without needing to speak, then took out their weapons and headed towards the source of the voices.

Along the way, Ke Yuxiao whispered to Qi Liuxing, “I have an idea.”

“What kind of idea?” Qi Liuxing asked him.

Ke Yuxiao replied, “Negative emotions like lies, betrayal, and hatred will make the goddess stronger. I agree with what Zhou Qian said.”

“Then, think about it. Why were we placed in the same group?”

Qi Liuxing thought for a moment and said, “It’s probably because we stood the closest to each other. We were observed by the same color of eyeball on the statue.”

“Right. People who have the best relationship naturally stand closer together and then are sent to the same timeline,” Ke Yuxiao said. “But think about it. For the goddess to feed, or to become stronger, she needs to absorb negative emotions. However, in reality, when people who have good relationships are together, how could they possibly harbor hatred, betrayal, or even curse each other through the temple?”

“Under these circumstances, the goddess couldn’t achieve her goal. So, what’s the purpose of her actions? Why would she send the two of us to the same timeline?”

“If I were her… to achieve the purpose of absorbing negative emotions, I would only be able to deliberately create some traps that cause two close people to misunderstand, doubt, and then hate each other,” Qi Liuxing said.

“Exactly. That’s what I’m thinking—”

Having said that, Ke Yuxiao looked at Qi Liuxing with concern.

Not knowing what the future holds, only the moonlight tonight was gentle, casting a particularly soft glow on Ke Yuxiao’s face.

In this gentle tone, he said to Qi Liuxing, “Perhaps the Goddess Difu will create many illusions and mirages. In these illusions, we might betray or even hurt each other.”

“Xiao Qi, if you see me doing something like that, please don’t believe it could ever be real.”

Hearing this, Qi Liuxing smiled at Ke Yuxiao and responded naturally, “Of course, I wouldn’t believe it. If such an illusion really appeared, I would never fall for it. You’ve saved me so many times. You’re the last person in this world who would harm me. I will always trust you.”

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<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

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Chapter 129

The starlight fell on Zhou Qian’s fingertips as he removed his mask, as well as on the corners of Bai Zhou’s eyes and eyebrows.

Smiling, Zhou Qian finished speaking only to find Bai Zhou’s expression cold, and his gaze seemed to carry a hint of disapproval.

Before Bai Zhou could speak, Zhou Qian quickly grabbed his hand, laughing in his usual tone. “My God has arrived. Let’s escape quickly.”

Bai Zhou: “……”

After a deep look at him, Bai Zhou didn’t say anything. He grabbed Zhou Qian’s hand with his left and pulled him behind him, holding the Breaking Dawn in his right hand, and then looked at the crowd.

The player closest to Zhou Qian and Bai Zhou was He Xiaowei.

He Xiaowei was in a dire situation, showing signs of defeat under the attack of three people. Just as their daggers were about to stab into him, he closed his eyes in despair.

Unexpectedly, death didn’t come. When He Xiaowei opened his eyes, he saw the daggers in their hands had turned around and were instead plunged into their own chests!

Overjoyed, He Xiaowei guessed what had happened and turned his head to see Zhou Qian. “Qian’er! Was that your doing? [Bone Nightmare]? Eh—”

After saying this, he looked at Bai Zhou. “Holy shit. Boss, when did you get back?”

Zhou Qian shook his head without speaking but seriously looked behind him.

Realizing something might be happening behind him, He Xiaowei quickly turned around and saw that the three men on the ground had quickly stood up again, and the blood on their chests had disappeared.

In an instant, they picked up their weapons and charged at He Xiaowei again, more ferocious than before.

While defending himself with his qin, He Xiaowei glanced around and saw that the situation was equally grim for the other players!

Not far away, Qi Liuxing and Ke Yuxiao were bloodied amidst a sea of corpses.

These corpses were rising from the ground again. After a large amount of mana consumption by Qi and Ke, these people revived with full health and charged at them again, becoming several times more ferocious!

The situation was similar for Hidden Blade.

He had just cut down ten people. Now, after these ten people revived, they charged at him regardless of how many cuts they received, as if they weren’t afraid of death at all.

The situation was also extremely dangerous for the two girls.

They grouped together to fend off enemies. Yin Jiujiu continuously tanked the villagers while Yun Xiangrong controlled a flute, commanding countless catkins to kill the attackers.

As the revived villagers charged at them in waves, each wave would fall to the catkins, only for the next wave to immediately follow, recklessly.

Yin Jiujiu was running low on mana and health. When another wave charged at Yun Xiangrong, she tried to pour out more alcohol from her gourd, but there was hardly any left.

Unable to tank anymore, the aggro immediately shifted back to the DPS, and the mass of people directly bypassed Yin Jiujiu and charged at Yun Xiangrong!

The villagers’ behavior was naturally related to what they had witnessed.

Initially cautious, seeing their companions die and then revive gave them boundless courage—since they could revive, why fear death?!

Thus, after several rounds of revival, all villagers became tougher to deal with, effectively forming a death squad of several hundred people!

“Everyone, come behind me.”

It was Bai Zhou who spoke.

Releasing Zhou Qian’s hand, Bai Zhou stepped forward, holding the blade with both hands towards the crowd.

Hearing Bai Zhou’s words, the other players fought while retreating towards Zhou Qian, inevitably leading all the enemies to him.

Bai Zhou held his long sword horizontally, the blade shining snow-white under the moonlight. Leaping into the air, he faced hundreds of villagers. After a brief moment of gathering strength, a mist emerged from the blade, astonishingly condensing into a huge, semi-transparent white dragon in the air!

Seeing this, Hidden Blade couldn’t help but exclaim excitedly, “Holy shit, this is the Boss’ signature move [White Dragon Slash] from when he ascended to godhood! When I saw it back then, I felt like my swordsmanship was nothing!”

“Is that why you call him White Dragon?”

Zhou Qian said, squinting at the air. Where the sword qi condensed, the white dragon had almost taken a physical form, its beauty surpassing the color of snow and moonlight.

This sword qi condensed white dragon, almost a hundred people long, briefly circled in the air. Its long tail swept out, and a powerful murderous intent descended from the sky, sweeping towards the hundreds of villagers.

Wherever the sword qi passed, the ground was upheaved, plants were blown away, and all the villagers were ground to dust! All the sounds of combat disappeared at that moment.

After a moment, the white dragon vanished into thin air.

Bai Zhou, with the sword in hand, landed without a drop of sweat on his forehead.

The players were almost breathless, probably stunned by the scene before them.

Glancing at everyone’s expressions, Hidden Blade couldn’t help but boast about his idol. “See, I told you the Boss is awesome! And that’s even when his power is heavily suppressed. Zhou Qian, I still can’t figure out—”

Hidden Blade looked at Zhou Qian incredulously. “I still can’t figure out why you refused to be his apprentice!”

At this moment, He Xiaowei winked at Hidden Blade and said, “Master, that’s not right. They don’t want to be master and apprentice. They want to be lovers. No wonder—”

He patted Zhou Qian’s shoulder. “I was wondering what kind of person could catch Qian’er’s eye. Now I see! Wait…”

Realizing something, He Xiaowei suddenly widened his eyes at Bai Zhou. “This scene seems familiar… Ah, the dragon from ‘Last Wish’—it was you? Holy shit! Then I…”

Did I just spill the beans about that dragon kissing Zhou Qian?

Fuck. Am I going to get retaliated against!

Zhou Qian tapped He Xiaowei’s head and then told everyone, “These villagers are just meant to deplete our mana. The real danger in this instance is still ahead. Everyone, be very careful later.”

“Now that the villagers have turned to dust, their revival will be much slower. Let’s take this opportunity to head to the village entrance!”

Turning around, grabbing Bai Zhou’s arm, Zhou Qian walked with him at the forefront.

Along the way, they quickly shared their experiences through private chat.

Zhou Qian briefly told Bai Zhou about his side of things, and Bai Zhou did the same. In the end, he said, “Besides that bird, I also found out about a story.”

“What story?” Zhou Qian asked.

“It’s related to the queen of the Kingdom of Words. She’s also a Red God, but her rebellion wasn’t here. It was in the royal city,” Bai Zhou said.

Zhou Qian pondered. “The queen became a Red God, causing disaster in the royal city; Amei became a Red God, causing disaster in Nameless Village. These two stories are very similar. Amei did this because Nameless Village wronged her. On the queen’s side… did the king betray her?”

“Yes,” Bai Zhou said. “According to the story I learned at the Red God Inn, the king of the Kingdom of Words fell in love with another woman and was so infatuated that he wanted to demote the queen to a commoner. This happened a long time ago when the Sun, Moon, Star, and Cloud families were the king’s guards.”

Zhou Qian felt he had guessed something and asked for the key detail. “What’s that woman’s name?”

Bai Zhou said, “Tartar.”

Zhou Qian immediately responded, “I knew it… She didn’t even change her name.”

Bai Zhou continued, “After being abandoned by her husband, the queen went to the Temple of the Goddess of Prayers. She cursed three things: first, that her husband would suffer from an incurable disease; second, that the Kingdom of Words would face war, and the Sun, Moon, Star, and Cloud families, who helped the king hide the truth, would all be severely injured and never serve as guards again; third, that she herself would become a Red God after death.”

“To fulfill these three curses, she was willing to sacrifice her life to the Goddess Difu.”

“In the other world, ordinary ghosts have a chance to return to the human realm. But once one becomes a Red God, they can only remain a ghost forever. The queen made such a resolute choice probably for the same reason as Amei; they both wanted to retain their memories of this life and see the downfall of those who betrayed them with their own eyes. It’s quite ironic—”

Zhou Qian said, “The queen’s husband found a mistress, so she went to the temple to curse her husband, but she wouldn’t know that the god she pleaded with… was actually that ‘mistress’.”

In Zhou Qian’s perspective, he had only heard the villagers’ version of the past story: Amei, the ugly woman, sacrificed her parents’ lives for beauty, using magic to obtain her looks; afterwards, she married the king of the Land of Silence but had an affair with a man named Beilan from the four major families.

Beilan was taken to another realm by a Red God, and in her eagerness to see him, Amei stole the golden feathers, forcibly opened the space between two realms, leading to the Land of Silence crusade, putting numerous people of the Kingdom of Words in danger, bringing shame to the four major families, who were expelled from the royal city and lived by farming in the borderlands.

From Bai Zhou, Zhou Qian learned the other side of the story.

Amei married the king of the Land of Silence because, during a war between the two countries, the Kingdom of Words lost, and all the skilled warriors from the four families were injured and, for some reason, their wounds couldn’t heal. At the same time, the king also contracted an incurable disease, putting the Kingdom of Words in a dire situation.

Under these circumstances, they coerced Amei to use her beauty to seduce the king of the Land of Silence, in hopes of stealing the golden feathers with healing powers from him, to save the kingdom from its doomed fate.

Amei successfully stole the golden feathers and healed everyone but was then accused of “stealing the national treasure of the Land of Silence to save her lover that she had an affair with.”

The ones who betrayed her were her homeland and the Kingdom of Words that raised her.

Walking side by side in the night, Zhou Qian said, “So, in the real story, the man named Beilan was actually Amei’s childhood sweetheart. At that time, the four major families were still in the royal city. And you said that after the queen became a Red God, she caused trouble in the royal city…”

“So, Beilan might also have been sacrificed for the greater good for the Kingdom of Words. Yet, he and Amei became the targets of everyone’s curses.”

A pair of lovers, in order to save the Kingdom of Words, one married into the Land of Silence to steal the national treasure, while the other died in the fight against the Red God.

However, to clear their own names and eliminate unfavorable rumors, the king of the Kingdom of Words and the four major families blamed everything on this couple, creating a lie that their affair led to all the tragedies.

Thinking of this, Zhou Qian looked towards the pyramid-shaped temple near the graves, saying, “The story stops here, but it’s still not clear enough. Until you found the hidden story of Tartar.”

With the hidden story Bai Zhou found, the missing piece of the whole story was finally filled.

Why the Land of Silence suddenly attacked the Kingdom of Words, why the king fell ill, why the royal city and the families of Sun, Moon, Star, and Cloud were harassed by the Red God, leading to the subsequent story of Amei stealing the golden feathers from the Land of Silence, now finally had a clearer answer—because of Tartar.

The Goddess Difu, disguised as the beautiful woman Tartar, seduced the king of the Kingdom of Words, forcing him to demote the queen to a commoner. In her anguish, the queen went to the temple to curse the king and the four families protecting him, and after her death, she became a Red God, returning to the royal city every Samhain, bringing various disturbances.

In order to protect the royal city and the four major families, the young man Beilan died at the hands of the Red God the queen became.

Amei, in her quest to heal everyone, went to the Land of Silence and took the golden feathers with magical healing abilities…

The Goddess Difu was the real cause of the trouble.

Continuing to stare at the temple, Zhou Qian’s gaze became sharp. “Red God Amei was grateful to Difu because the goddess fulfilled her curse. Amei wanted the entire village to die. To achieve her wish, she would continue to worship the goddess in the other world. So, the golden bird statue is—”

Bai Zhou took over, “Yes, I agree with you. Difu’s true form is a bird.”

“So, the golden feather…” Zhou Qian said, “is likely given to the king of the Land of Silence by her. With this, the story becomes more complete.”

Difu gave the healing feather to the Land of Silence, then seduced the king of the Kingdom of Words, leading to his wife’s curse and the series of events like Amei stealing the feathers…

What exactly did she want to achieve?

Zhou Qian pondered, “Behind her orchestrating these events, one of the purposes is easy to guess. It was because of the theft of the golden feathers that the king of the Land of Silence prayed for her to cast a curse. In return, the king helped her break her shackles.”

“Actually, before this point in time, she had already been capable of transforming into Tartar to seduce the King of the Kingdom of Words. So… we all misunderstood the meaning of ‘freedom’ before.”

“The locked statue of the goddess in the temple is just a metaphor, misleading us about the meaning of ‘freedom’. The true meaning of moving the temple doesn’t refer to whether the goddess can move freely, but to the constraints related to time and space. Her previous lack of freedom merely meant she couldn’t travel through time at will.”

“Indeed, I agree.” Bai Zhou nodded. “Because of the key sent by the King of the Land of Silence, Difu gained freedom. Since then, she has been able to move freely across different times and spaces. Such ability greatly enhanced her power, allowing her to cause even greater chaos.”

“This is also why she was able to send us ‘deserters’ from the future to here.”

“Exactly. The truth of the matter is just as I had guessed,” Zhou Qian said. “Especially what you just mentioned—that Amei had explicitly mentioned to you—history cannot be changed. We must have been sent back from the ‘future’.”

“The channel that brought us here should be the statue with three heads. It must be the goddess’ magical instrument. So, if we want to return to the normal timeline, it’s mostly likely through that statue. The decision to go to the village entrance was correct. We need to find if there’s any mechanism on that statue.”

On the real timeline, everything that was supposed to happen had already occurred, including Red God Amei achieving her ultimate wish—all the people in Nameless Village died.

The people of Nameless Village died. The deserters from the Land of Silence were brought over by Difu, told they could find ways to subsist here, like farming, mining, and so on.

But when they actually arrived, they didn’t live peaceful lives. Instead, they were sent into “history” by the statue.

Which villagers would die during the Samhain festival had already happened in history; it was all predetermined.

The actions of these “future” deserters wouldn’t change any villager’s fate. As for their own fates, they didn’t belong to the history related to Nameless Village. So, once they broke the prohibitions, they would still die.

After a while, all the players arrived in front of the statue.

Zhou Qian circled the statue, focusing on its eyeballs. Seeing him get very close to the statue, even reaching out to touch it, He Xiaowei couldn’t help but warn, “Qian’er, be careful of any traps.”

“The only trap and risk is that it will take us to different times and spaces, spreading us apart,” Zhou Qian said. “However, this isn’t a risk that can be avoided by not getting close to it. The range its eyes can illuminate is very wide, covering the entire instance map, and even its eyes might rotate.”

“That makes sense. Wait, look over there—”

He Xiaowei raised his voice, pointing in the direction of the graveyard.

Zhou Qian’s gaze left the statue and followed the direction pointed by He Xiaowei, only to see the pyramid-shaped temple flicker once and then suddenly disappear.

But then it suddenly appeared very close to the players. The players all looked over, seeing its doors open on their own.

A woman walked out of the deep corridor with the door open. Tartar had previously disguised herself as an inconspicuous middle-aged woman in front of the players.

But the woman who walked out this time had flawless beauty—quite different from the middle-aged woman before—but her face still retained a few familiar expressions, allowing people to recognize her as Tartar without a doubt.

This was indeed the true form of Goddess Difu.

Difu smiled at the players. “You came here supposedly to help the villagers, yet they deceived you into being sacrificed. You did nothing, yet the villagers slandered you as murderers… How does it feel, to be wrapped in lies and betrayal? Isn’t it awful?”

“You can punish them. Just go into the temple and curse them. Your hatred is sufficient. The power needed for the curse is also sufficient. They will die.”

Zhou Qian stepped forward, lazily looking at Difu. “They will die, but not because of our curse, but because of Amei’s curse. And that was your plan, wasn’t it?”

Beside him, He Xiaowei couldn’t help but ask in a low voice, “What do you mean? She-she’s the mastermind, isn’t she?”

“Everything started with the betrayal of the King of the Kingdom of Words towards his wife, all orchestrated by Difu. The golden feathers were just a huge lure she gave. Healing powers?” Zhou Qian’s gaze was coldly fixed on Difu. “It’s the root of all evil. It’s clearly meant to kill everyone.”

He Xiaowei asked, “What’s her purpose…?”

Zhou Qian replied, “She has already told us her purpose. I guess the Prayer Temple moves automatically. It smells the scent of evil emotions like hatred, betrayal, lies, and then it moves towards that scent, appearing there, waiting for people to go in and curse.”

“With the key brought by the King of the Land of Silence, Difu obtained complete freedom, henceforth, the Prayer Temple could move between different places and even travel through time freely.”

“Difu, I’m afraid, feeds on negative factors like lies and betrayal, becoming increasingly powerful.”

“But what if there are no lies or betrayals?” He Xiaowei asked.

“If there are no lies, she creates lies. If there’s no betrayal, she creates betrayal.”

Zhou Qian coldly said to Difu, “When we deserters arrived at Nameless Village, the people here were already killed. You had no new food to use. You could only forcibly create food.”

“But what conflicts could we have just by farming and mining? How could strong negative emotions for you to devour be born?”

“You could only bring us to the past—the past filled with killing and betrayal in Nameless Village.”

“You let us participate in the Samhain festival, let us be betrayed by the villagers, let us be treated as murderers… just to make us produce negative emotions, and then devour these emotions. Even now, you come with the Prayer Temple, wanting to see us kill each other, right?”

With a slight sigh, Difu softly began, “I have wandered the world for thousands of years, listening to all sins, absorbing all sins. But I actually did it for your sake. The more evil I eat, the less evil remains in this world.”

At this point, Difu smiled again, her smile tinged with bitterness and undisguised mockery.

She continued, “Along the way, I’ve tasted the utmost evil of humanity. You’ll never understand how heavy my burden is. You only need to know one thing… The evil thoughts of humans lie within your hearts. For instance—”

“I indeed appeared before the King of the Kingdom of Words. But him falling in love with me and betraying his wife were his choices. The evil within his bones led him to make those choices.”

“And another example. I indeed sent the feathers to the King of the Land of Silence and showed its healing powers… but what happened later was far beyond my expectations. Turning the heroic figure Amei into a sinner for eternity, even making her a horse for ten years… those weren’t my deeds. When I sent the feathers, I only wanted to deceive him to unlock my constraints. I never imagined humans could be so evil. Of course, thanks to this… I’ve become more and more powerful.”

“I was born from lies and betrayal, entirely forged from the evil thoughts of you humans. So, instead of seeing me as evil, it’s more accurate to say that humans themselves are evil.”

At this point, Difu suddenly smiled, raising her hand towards the direction of the statue, her gaze becoming profound.

She continued in a bewitching tone, “Humans will never disappoint me. I just do something… and you start killing each other. Now let’s see. What surprise can you few deserters give me— the negative elements related to evil thoughts on you are already sufficient to truly open the temple. No matter where you go, the temple will be with you.”

“Please, enter the temple… As long as you curse your teammate inside, the curse will certainly come true.”

Hearing this, Zhou Qian immediately turned back to look at the statue.

The statue quickly started rotating! At the same time, the three pairs of pupils on the three heads began to display red, yellow, and blue colors. Then the pupils also started rotating, directly shooting small beams of light at the players.

Thus, no matter how close the players stood, they could be observed by the different colored pupils!

“I was right. We’ll be separated.” Zhou Qian hurriedly told everyone, “First, do not randomly kill Difu—she is a bird. If we kill her, we’ll die directly for violating the prohibition!”

“Second, she feeds on betrayal and lies. All these negative factors will only make her stronger. So, no matter what you see, hold on to your heart. Otherwise, she’ll only become harder to defeat.”

“Third, whoever dares to curse a teammate in the temple, even if you survive, the first thing I’ll do after leaving the instance is to get rid of you!”

Beside him, Qi Liuxing felt his eyes struck by a red light. The moment the red light flashed, it stimulated him to instinctively close his eyes. He quickly reopened them within half a second and found his surroundings had completely changed.

Difu was gone, and so were most of his teammates.

He turned back, only to see the Prayer Temple and Ke Yuxiao standing beside the temple.

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

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Chapter 128

Semi-Open Instance No. 3. This was the main base of the Peach Blossom Legion. Peach blossoms bloomed all over the mountains and fields. In the central area of the map stood a rather luxurious large palace.

At that moment, seven floors below the palace, unlike the warm embrace of spring outside, the place was covered in frost from the ceiling, walls, to the ground.

At the center of the hall, a bed was piled up with snow and ice.

On the bed lay a man. His skin was frozen to a snow-white, almost transparent hue, with distinctly frozen eyelashes, suggesting he must have been a very handsome man.

He lay there, his eyes tightly closed, with no breath escaping from his mouth or nose, clearly looking as though he had been dead for a long time.

Next to him sat a man and a woman. It was Priest and the Peach Blossom God, Xie Huaying.

Priest was intently staring at a tablet, while Xie Huaying seemed less interested, only occasionally glancing over and then musing, “The territory of instance No. 3 has expanded. It seems Master is recovering well. Despite being dead for so long, his spiritual power has still been well-maintained.”

“So when can you resurrect him?” Priest asked.

“Of course, it’s in the plan. Just in these next few days,” Xie Huaying replied.

“Resurrecting such a powerful person isn’t easy. After resurrecting him this time, you will turn into a peach blossom, and I will have to keep planting you,” Priest said. “I will water you on time.”

“Thank you. Actually, when I think about it… I’m quite content with this,” Xie Huaying said with a smile.

Priest asked her, “Oh? Turning into the nurturing soil for flowers?”

“For me, there is never eternal death,” Xie Huaying stated, her eyes revealing a trace of melancholy. “I will dissipate my spiritual power, vitality, skill points, and even my physical body will undergo actual death in reality. But here, I will turn into a peach blossom. When it blooms again, I can come back to life.”

“I have lived longer than many. I have already lived too long.”

“I’ve always wanted to ask you something.” Priest looked at Xie Huaying and adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose. “Was your name given by Master? He is called Xie Huai, and you are called Xie Huaying. Did he consider you as his daughter?”

“Rather than saying I am his daughter, it’s more accurate to say I am his other life, or… I am a medicine he created for himself. I was created for the purpose of saving him at all costs when he dies. That is the meaning of my existence,” Xie Huaying explained.

“Do you feel wronged?” Priest asked.

“If I only had one life, perhaps I would. But I will never die,” Xie Huaying said, her lips curving into a smile, amused by the thought.

“You’re right. Ha—”Priest laughed. “Each being exists in its own way. It was narrow-minded of me to judge your feelings by conventional wisdom.”

“I know you’re asking because you’re worried I might develop feelings for Master. You think too much, but I don’t mind. Instead, I’m relieved that Master has someone like you to help him.” Xie Huaying shook her head. “Of course, I don’t hold any grudges against Master. I was personally created by him. Although—”

She looked toward the frozen corpse of Xie Huai, and Priest interjected, “You mean to say, although Master actually betrayed his own master, right?”

“The situation is certainly different,” Xie Huaying said. “Master was good to me. But it wasn’t the same with Shao Chuan towards Master. Shao Chuan told Master more than once that he had created a monster. He said he would kill this monster.”

Priest smirked, looking through his glasses at the frozen corpse in front of him. “But I see Shao Chuan didn’t learn his lesson, eh? The Master he created is a monster. Wouldn’t the Bai Zhou he created also be a monster?”

“According to your plan… Bai Zhou’s time is also coming soon, isn’t it?”

At this point, Xie Huaying glanced down at the tablet in Priest’s hands. “The instances that ordinary players participate in are much more interesting than ours. Hmm… A little game of finding the murderer. Quite intriguing. What do you think about the conversation between Yun Xiangrong and Zhou Qian? Have they really fallen out?”

Priest said, “Their pointing out a murderer here has no meaning. Because even if they don’t point out anyone, the village chief wouldn’t let them go. They will fight against the NPCs no matter what, so Yun Xiangrong is just acting. Zhou Qian is actually putting on a show. If Zhou Qian really wants to deal with someone, will he use this trick?”

Xie Huaying: “Is it possible that Zhou Qian really thought she had defected, but just didn’t want to deal with her? As you said, identifying her as the murderer is meaningless. But he still did it, maybe just as a childish way to vent his anger? He seems like someone who enjoys playing around.”

“The Zhou Qian you see is just on the surface. He acts naughty but is smarter and more ruthless than anyone.” Priest said, “I think now, no one understands Zhou Qian better than I do.”

“If Zhou Qian and Yun Xiangrong are both putting on an act… You know she can’t possibly betray Zhou Qian and the others; what’s the point of sending her over?” Xie Huaying asked. “Actually, I think after I demonstrated the resurrection technique, she trusted me. Besides… wait ten or eighteen years, or even a few decades if luck isn’t on our side, and when I have my next life, I really can help her resurrect Gao Shan.”

Priest said, “Yun Xiangrong came to the Peach Blossom Legion to gather intelligence and work with Zhou Qian from the inside to avenge Gao Shan. Knowing her plan, I simply kept her here to use her against Zhou Qian.”

“When she first decided to come, it was probably a decision made on impulse. Gao Shan had just died, and she was eager for revenge and wouldn’t listen to Zhou Qian’s persuasion. But I guess she must have regretted it by now, realizing she was irrational—she doesn’t understand what this game is about, and doesn’t understand the Peach Blossom Legion. How dare she come?”

“The few words she said in the instance was to deceive Situ Qing, but how could she deceive me? How could she truly gain our trust?”

Xie Huaying nodded. “Mm. After she realized, she should have left. She should have gone directly to Zhou Qian. You didn’t stop her. She was free.”

“Of course, she is free, but why didn’t she leave in the end?” Priest said.

Xie Huaying asked, “Yeah, why?”

“Of course, because you played a role,” Priest answered.

Glancing at Xie Huaying, Priest further explained, “‘Girls, they always put love above everything. If she values resurrecting her lover more than the teammates she meets by chance in the instance, it’s very normal. So, when she found out that the Peach Blossom God really has the power to resurrect, from pretending to defect and being a spy, to truly betraying Zhou Qian and becoming one of us, it was only natural—”

“Seeing that we sent you to demonstrate the resurrection technique to her, she guessed we would think this way.”

“So, our sending her to the ‘Red God instance’ in her eyes, is the final test we set for her. As long as she passes the test, she can truly gain my trust, gain the trust of the Peach Blossom Legion.”

Xie Huaying nodded with realization. “Mm. I understand. She thought that by showing her the resurrection technique and sending her to the instance, we were actually trying to win her over. Initially, she thought there was no chance she could earn our trust and was ready to give up.”

“You saw her hesitation and guessed she might no longer want to be a ‘spy’, so you took these next two steps. This way, she felt she had a chance to gain our trust, so she continued being a ‘spy’.”

“Yes.” Priest laughed. “Of course, I can’t appear too calculating in front of her. Otherwise, she might not have been deceived. Including this time in Blue Harbor City, why did the Peach Blossom Legion decide to kill Zhou Qian through a bounty? Isn’t it also to hide our strength, to hide our true purpose?”

Xie Huaying exhaled, then patted her chest. “Fortunately, I’m not your enemy. You are too terrifying. I don’t know how Master managed to win you over in the first place.”

Priest didn’t respond to that.

Xie Huaying then asked him, “So, what is the real purpose behind your move with Yun Xiangrong?”

Upon hearing this, Priest’s eyes behind his glasses seemed profoundly deep. He said, “Zhou Qian’s upbringing has made him trust no one. But he was lucky. The people he met in this game have been good so far. That’s why he temporarily trusts Yun Xiangrong is still on his side.”

“But all this will end soon. How can you completely destroy a person? Of course, by erasing all the trust he has painstakingly picked up. Of course, by… shattering the beliefs he has rebuilt. Then, we can easily defeat him, even win without a fight.”

“So, let’s start with Zhou Qian. Hypnosis and brain control, through experiments on Yin Jiujiu. I’m confident.”

……

In the game.

Nameless Village, in the central square.

Zhou Qian’s hands were bound by a semi-transparent rope, and the more he tried to break free, the tighter the rope bound him. Not only that, but it also grew longer and quickly climbed up Zhou Qian’s shoulders, neck, back, and down to his thighs and ankles, completely binding his body.

This rope must be some kind of magical item, specifically used to deal with people of the Land of Silence bloodline.

Zhou Qian was tightly bound. His face briefly turned pale before getting congested, and his eyes became a little bloodshot and his cheeks flushed. At the same time, his collar was grasped by Ab’s hands, making him look extremely pitiful.

In such a predicament, facing Ab’s fierce gaze, Zhou Qian just smiled and said, “The one who will die isn’t me, but you. I’ve seen your tombstone in the graveyard. Not just yours, but almost the entire village’s. What despicable things did you do to cause the whole village to die?”

“Stop talking nonsense!” Ab extended his hand.

“Where did that statue at the village entrance come from?” Zhou Qian suddenly asked.

“What are you talking about?” Ab asked.

“Haven’t you guys ever seen the future here? Or let me change the question, have you ever seen some hallucinations or something? Like seeing another version of yourself?” Zhou Qian threw several questions in a row.

Ab seemed truly unaware of what Zhou Qian was talking about, giving him a strange look before stopping talking. He continued to hold Zhou Qian’s neck with one hand, while the other hand drew a dagger and stabbed towards his neck.

Suddenly, the sound of a qin string struck up. Invisible sound waves surged out, striking Ab’s wrist hard.

Feeling pain, Ab released the dagger that dropped to the ground. Zhou Qian seized the opportunity to sit down on the ground, kicking the dagger far away with a strong push of his legs.

Temporarily avoiding the killing intent, Zhou Qian did fall a bit painfully. His feet and wrists were bound together, so he had to use both feet to jump up, relying on his waist’s strength to stand up again.

“Hmph, just a dying struggle!” Ab sneered, and his subordinates immediately rushed over with weapons.

In an instant, He Xiaowei and other players were surrounded.

Yin Jiujiu took out the gourd from her waist, drank a few big gulps, and her HP and damage resistance tripled. She was surrounded by a semi-transparent barrier of alcohol vapor, taking the lead in front of everyone to block. “I’ll tank them. You do the damage!”

After saying that, with a single step, countless streams of alcohol vapor burst out from her, attacking the village chief and the seven weapon-wielding subordinates.

In an instant, the village chief, who had just taken out another machete to kill Zhou Qian, and the seven villagers who rushed towards different players were all forced to inhale the alcohol vapor, immediately shifting their aggression towards Yin Jiujiu, forming a circle and attacking her involuntarily!

The weapons, such as knives, spears, swords, and halberds, all stopped half an inch from Yin Jiujiu before hitting her, as if they hit an invisible barrier.

Yin Jiujiu was surrounded by layers of alcohol vapor like a golden bell barrier and could block all killing intent outside.

Taking a deep breath, she shouted to her teammates, “Hurry up! I can’t hold on for too long!”

Seeing this, Qi Liuxing gripped his long sword tightly, looking at Ke Yuxiao beside him.

Ke Yuxiao nodded at him, held the short flute in his hand, flipped it with one hand, and put it to his mouth to play.

Suddenly, the swordsman’s long sword sounded without a scabbard, and a strong sword intent immediately gathered on the blade.

Qi Liuxing leaped into the air, his movements as fast as if he himself had turned into a sword. The sword’s momentum quickly formed, and several sword qi immediately attacked the direction of the eight NPCs.

The fierceness of the sword qi and the strong killing intent contained within, made even Yin Jiujiu, who was facing away from Qi Liuxing, feel a bit fearful. She couldn’t help but shout, “Aim carefully! Don’t hit me!”

As soon as her words fell, Yin Jiujiu saw a star appear above the heads of seven NPCs.

Immediately, each star turned into a sword light, stabbing fiercely at those seven people, causing them to be disarmed and seriously injured on the ground.

The seven sword lights didn’t disappear but gathered into an even more powerful sword light, all stabbing towards Ab!

“Lord Ab, be careful!”

“My Lord, be careful!”

A few people ran over from a distance, trying to pull Ab away. But the sword light was so tyrannical that it cut across, causing them all to fall to the ground. Unable to get up, they all clutched their chests and vomited blood continuously.

Seeing this, Zhou Qian smiled, looked at his teammates with a somewhat gratified look, and said, “Not bad—”

“Qian’er, be careful!” Suddenly, He Xiaowei shouted out.

But Hidden Blade was obviously faster. A blade light grazed Zhou Qian’s ear, and the sound of three people falling to the ground in shock came from behind him.

Seeing this, He Xiaowei let out a sigh of relief, then turned to Yin Jiujiu with a bit of surprise. Despite being shielded by alcohol vapor, Yin Jiujiu still lost 10% of her health. He Xiaowei then held the seven-stringed qin and plucked the strings. The sound waves carrying healing power instantly sprinkled on the female warrior Yin Jiujiu, almost immediately restoring her to full health.

Considering these people might be birds, the players didn’t use their killing moves.

However, suddenly, Village Chief Ab jumped up, reciting a magic spell out loud.

Instantly, the ropes binding Zhou Qian began to move, tightening around his neck more and more, almost suffocating him!

Seeing this, Qi Liuxing didn’t hesitate for a second. He immediately thrust his sword into the village chief’s back. Ab was killed by a single sword and fell to the ground. Glancing down at Ab’s corpse, Zhou Qian turned to Qi Liuxing thoughtfully. “Xiao Qi, aren’t you afraid—”

Qi Liuxing twisted awkwardly, then just nodded lightly and coldly said, “You’re welcome.”

Zhou Qian smiled at him and asked, “Putting on airs again?”

“No. I just…” Qi Liuxing said, “I wasn’t brave enough to save you without fear of death. I just thought they weren’t birds. Birds are related to the Land of Silence, right? But the Kingdom of Words is their enemy. Besides…”

“Besides, if something were to happen, you could still save me with the Tick Tock Clock.”

After a brief exchange, more people rushed over.

Perhaps the villagers couldn’t directly conclude that the players were the murderers without them making a move before.

But now, displaying such formidable abilities, in the villagers’ eyes, it seemed certain that they were responsible for quietly killing Qi Yunsi, a young man with great potential.

Qi Yunsi and Ab were dead, and the fate of the others injured was still uncertain. All these tragedies were caused by these deserters from the Land of Silence. They weren’t their kind, so their hearts must be different. This was a saying that was indeed true. To prevent being killed, the only option was to strike first!

With this mindset, influenced by the external enemy, the four great families of Sun, Moon, Star, and Cloud had no choice but to unite and attack the people in the square.

Suddenly, the players faced a combined attack from hundreds of people!

A chaotic battle began.

Yin Jiujiu acted again, transforming into a tank by drinking again, barely trying to pull aggro; Ke Yuxiao provided team buffs, mainly supporting Qi Liuxing to enhance his sword’s attack value, but also brought considerable benefits to other attackers; as for offense, they relied on the Hidden Blade, Qi Liuxing, and Yun Xiangrong, with Yun Xiangrong mainly attacking from a distance, and Hidden Blade and Qi Liuxing switching between close and long-range attacks, maximizing the efficiency of the sword coordination in a short time.

He Xiaowei played the healer. He carried Zhou Qian on his back while chasing after teammates everywhere, trying his best to keep everyone’s health at a stable ratio.

While Zhou Qian was being carried around the square by He Xiaowei, he also took the opportunity to give commands—

“Xiao Qi, three o’clock direction, hidden weapon.”

“Hidden Blade, that powerful elder’s right leg seems injured. Focus on his right leg!”

“There’s someone with incredible speed using a bow and arrow. He’s well-hidden. Everyone, be careful.”

It took about ten minutes for the players to kill thirty people.

But this was far from enough, as they were facing hundreds of villagers!

To make matters worse, suddenly, a bizarre incident occurred: among these thirty people, some started to rise from the dead, climbing up from the ground—Village Chief Ab was among them!

Carried by He Xiaowei, Zhou Qian quickly surveyed the situation as they passed by—27 of the resurrected people in total, with 3 not resurrected, all from the Cloud family.

Could it be…

In a flash, Zhou Qian realized something and immediately shouted, “Everyone, change the strategy. Don’t waste mana on killing them anymore, prioritize retreating and escape towards the entrance of the village, to the statue with three heads.”

He Xiaowei dodged a flying knife and counterattacked the attacker with a wave of sound from his qin. Then he asked Zhou Qian, “Why? What’s happening?”

“History cannot be changed,” Zhou Qian said. “If we don’t come here, the Cloud family would still lose the handkerchief toss this year, and then someone in their family would die.”

“30 people have been resurrected, but three from the Cloud family are exceptions. These three who haven’t been resurrected were now just killed by us. But in the history that had happened, they were supposed to be killed by the Red God, as they were the night watchers in the normal timeline!”

“That means…” In a flash, He Xiaowei thought of something but couldn’t fully grasp it.

Zhou Qian continued, “That means, out of the hundreds we killed, at most 32 will truly die. This is because, in ‘history’ this year, they were eaten by the Red God, which is the limit of people the Red God can kill annually.”

“But all the others will keep dying and resurrecting until they reach the year they are supposed to die. In short, those who shouldn’t die tonight will keep being resurrected infinitely, but our mana is limited. When the time comes—”

His gaze drifted to the suddenly appearing Temple of Prayers not far away, and his eyes turned exceptionally cold as he thought of the now-missing face of Innkeeper Tartar.

“Don’t wait for the real boss to show up when we’re out of mana, or we’ll just be sitting ducks.”

No sooner had Zhou Qian finished speaking than he was violently thrown out.

It was He Xiaowei, who, caught off guard, was hit by an arrow in the knee and fell to the ground. The distant archer who successfully ambushed moved on to the next target; meanwhile, three villagers using close-range attacks approached and subdued He Xiaowei, causing his qin to fall heavily to the ground, producing a sudden cacophony of noise.

Just as Zhou Qian fell, he was quickly lifted up again.

Looking up, Zhou Qian saw a person with a bloodied face from a forehead wound—remarkably, it was the resurrected Ab.

Ab, looking coldly at Zhou Qian, recited that ancient spell again.

Instantly, Zhou Qian felt the restlessness in the Rib of God in his bag.

It was Gao Shan sensing his danger, eager to come to his aid.

“No, you’re still supposed to be mad at me. The gamblers are watching,” Zhou Qian stopped him with his mind.

He couldn’t hear Gao Shan’s voice but felt the Rib of God become more agitated.

It was probably Gao Shan expressing disapproval—What are you doing? Your face is turning purple. You’re about to be strangled to death by the increasingly tight rope, and you’re still worried about acting? You want me to save you! Life is much more important than putting on a show for gamblers!

Zhou Qian ignored the Rib of God and looked fearlessly at Ab in front of him.

He was already feeling suffocated.

It was the sensation of carbon monoxide poisoning. His health was dropping below 10%.

He saw a world of dazzling colors, entering a realm of illusion and reality…

He couldn’t differentiate between reality and illusion, and then a dragon appeared before him.

Zhou Qian smiled.

At the critical moment, a sharp blade light descended from the sky.

In the next instant, Ab’s body was split into two halves.

Someone, bathed in blood, took the suffocating Zhou Qian into their arms. With a slight movement of the blade light, the ropes that countless teammates couldn’t untie for Zhou Qian were turned into dust by the invincible blade.

“I knew you would come.”

In the night, Zhou Qian spoke softly.

Leaning on Bai Zhou’s shoulder, his eyes still carried a bit of the dizziness from suffocation.

Raising his hand, he touched the ghost mask on Bai Zhou’s face and said, “Zhou Ge, this doesn’t suit you. It covers your beautiful eyes.”

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 127

Tartar Inn.

In the hall, Amei drank bowl after bowl of meat soup and finally asked Tartar, “I feel like someone is listening to our conversation.”

“It doesn’t matter much, does it?” Tartar said with a smile. “Under the effect of the curse magic, what’s meant to happen, will happen. No one can change history.”

Red God Amei was taken aback. “It’s a pity I’m not like you, able to stand outside of time and see all this.”

Tartar simply said, “The power of the gods is great, but so is the burden they carry.”

“You’re right. I don’t need to care so much. It’s just… I’m not quite sure why you’re sheltering them.” Amei asked, “Why would you bring deserters here?”

“I listen to the curses in the human world, so of course, I need a human identity. And as a human, I always need money. It’s all just business,” Tartar said to Amei. “But what about you? What do you think of them?”

“I don’t know anymore,” Amei said. “You know, my lover was executed. Before his head was to be chopped off and hung on the city wall, I begged someone to let me see him. Thanks to the help of these ‘deserters’, I was able to see his intact corpse for the last time…”

“I’m grateful to them, but I also warned them of the prohibitions. I’ve done enough. Although they can’t change what’s going to happen here, they came to Nameless Village and helped the villagers… If they continue, they will also become my enemies.”

Tartar nodded. “Understood.”

At this moment, there was suddenly a noise in the distance.

“Someone’s dead!”

“Dead?!”

“Trouble, trouble!”

Tartar was surprised. “Ah, what’s going on?”

Amei, however, smiled. “We otherworlders didn’t do it. But here, death isn’t strange. Humans love to kill each other, especially those from the four major families. They love to lie and betray the most.”

It seemed that Amei was happy whenever someone died in the village. After saying this, she quickly ate several larger bowls of meat. “It’s so delicious. The food in the human world is much tastier than in the other world. Thank you.”

Just as Amei finished eating several bowls of meat and drained the soup, there was a knock on the door. “Are you all there? Come out quickly! Something happened!”

Amei and Tartar looked at each other. Amei said, “What a buzzkill,” resentfully, and then walked through the walls, leaving the inn in another direction.

Tartar went forward and opened the door.

At this moment, the players upstairs heard the people outside saying, “Someone’s dead. Everyone comes out to see. Tartar, you’re there, right?”

Tartar yawned lazily, and when she spoke, it was in a human voice. “It’s so dangerous outside. Who would dare to go out?”

The people outside said, “Don’t worry. The white dogs have been guarding outside, saying the otherworlders have quickly finished the offerings in the square and left!”

“What’s the deal with the dead person?” Tartar asked.

Then, sounds of weapons being drawn came from outside.

The voice outside became more alert. “This is a human-caused disaster, not the otherworlders’ doing!”

“How so?” Tartar asked again.

The person said, “The murder weapon is a special scimitar. It’s a weapon unique to the Land of Silence. So the murderer must be one of the deserters. Tartar, if you’re not one of them, you’d better open the door and hand them over!!!”

1:20 AM.

All the villagers were called back to the square.

Midnight was the arrival of the Samhain festival, and the time around it was considered the most dangerous.

Now that the most dangerous time had passed, the offerings on the square had been consumed, the otherworlders had left, and the level of danger had significantly decreased. According to past patterns, after 1 AM, only a few scattered otherworlders might still wander around, but if everyone gathered together, there was nothing to fear.

Thus, under the call of Village Chief Ab, everyone gathered again.

On the square, everyone’s expression was solemn.

But now it wasn’t because they were wary of ghosts, but of the murderer.

The village chief’s seven men stood out, wielding various weapons to form a circle.

Encircled within were the seven players, except for Bai Zhou.

As for the so-called victim, he was lying near the center of the square.

He was a very young man, dressed in a ghost costume with spots of animal blood on it, looking very bloody and terrifying.

But now the blood on his chest was no longer animal blood but real blood flowing from his heart.

The man was a member of the Moon Family, Qi Yunsi.

Since Awei of the Moon Family had won the championship in a rock-paper-scissors contest and successfully escaped after throwing the handkerchief to He Xiaowei, the Moon Family members were exempt from participating in the vigil this year.

The young man from the Moon Family had gone straight home after leaving the square earlier.

About ten minutes ago, his neighbor heard sounds of a fight and screams, went to check on his home, and then saw him lying in a pool of blood.

Worried about the killer continuing their spree, neighbors called upon friends and ventured out together. The most dangerous time of the Saheim festival had passed, giving them the courage to go out in groups.

After circling the victim Qi Yunsi’s house several times without finding any clues about the murderer, they went from door to door to warn that a murderer might be present, while heading towards the square through the village.

Then, near the square, they ran into Village Chief Ab and more than thirty others returning from their night watch.

Upon seeing them, Ab said, “We have seen the Red God. She didn’t ask for sacrifices this year. Look, we all returned safely. It’s wonderful!”

After saying this and noticing no joy on their faces, Ab, puzzled, asked, “What’s wrong?”

They immediately informed Ab about the murder. Ab quickly investigated the victim Qi Yunsi’s home with his men, confirming his death was by human hands, unrelated to supernatural forces. The culprit was one of the deserters.

Speculation about the night’s events was rife among the onlookers in the square. Hidden Blade, leveraging his Rank God player’s acute hearing, pieced together the full account from the chatter and whispered it to those around him.

Then he looked at Zhou Qian with concern, asking, “Apart from the boss, everyone who went out for the night watch has returned. What about the boss? He couldn’t have—”

Zhou Qian shook his head, thoughtfully looking at Ab standing in the square, whose face was eerily illuminated by the ghostly blue light of the Bone Fire, making him appear almost ghostlike.

Zhou Qian whispered, “Of the 32 night watchers, 31 returned. Yet a villager who stayed at home was murdered… Hidden Blade, is there any more information about the victim Qi Yunsi? Like, did anyone in his family see anything when he was killed?”

Hidden Blade replied, “He had no family. Everyone laments their misfortune. His parents died in a night watch mission years ago, leaving him an orphan. Many are mourning the loss of a handsome and skilled young man, dead too soon.”

“So, there were no witnesses to his murder,” Zhou Qian said coldly. “He was the ideal victim.”

“Ideal victim?” He Xiaowei, standing behind Zhou Qian, asked, “What do you mean?”

Before Zhou Qian could answer, he met Village Chief Ab’s distant gaze.

As their eyes locked, Ab turned to address the seven players but was interrupted by a familiar loud cry from the square. The cry came from eight-year-old Alayne, which Zhou Qian had heard before after taking the handkerchief from the little girl.

Following the sound, Zhou Qian saw Alayne running towards the center of the square and kneeling beside Qi Yunsi, crying uncontrollably. It was clear she had a close relationship with Qi Yunsi, and his death overwhelmed her with grief.

Not far away, Ab frowned, stepped forward, and gently consoled her. “Alayne, stop crying for now. I know he was your good friend. The most important thing now is to seek justice for him, right?”

Alayne belonged to the Sun Family, and Qi Yunsi to the Moon Family, both part of the Sun-Moon Alliance. It wasn’t surprising for members of these clans to be friends. Zhou Qian wondered—had they not participated in the handkerchief game, how would the rivalry between the four great families have ended?

If Alayne had lost and Bai Zhou was absent, would she still have gone out for the night watch alone?

After a while, Alayne was led away, and Ab approached the seven players. As he moved, the seven tightened their grip on their weapons.

“At least one of you is the murderer of Qi Yunsi. It would be best if you hand them over,” Ab said. “Otherwise, you will all be considered accomplices.”

Zhou Qian chuckled coldly, looking at Ab. “And if we’re considered accomplices, what then?”

Ab replied, “You won’t be able to leave this place. You will all have to die.”

He Xiaowei whispered to Zhou Qian, “Qian’er, it looks like we’re in for a tough fight. What do you think our chances are against all the villagers?”

Qi Liuxing added solemnly, “Zhou Qian, I have a feeling that the village head might set a trap for us to turn on each other. We can’t fall for it. We must find a way out!”

Indeed, Ab told the seven players, “I need to prepare Qi Yunsi’s funeral and continue the night watch with the others. The most dangerous time of the Samhain festival has passed, but it’s not dawn yet. Until the sun rises, Nameless Village is not completely safe. So, I don’t have time to waste here with you.”

“Please point out the murderer among you within five minutes.”

“Just point at them.”

“A vote to identify the murderer?” Zhou Qian laughed at Ab. “You’re making us play a murder mystery game? Five minutes isn’t enough for discussion.”

“I said, there’s at least one murderer, potentially more. Qi Yunsi was skilled. You deserters, on your own, couldn’t overcome him. It must have been a joint effort. Therefore—”

Without waiting for a response, Ab declared, “Anyone pointed out will be considered the murderer!”

After announcing this crude “voting rule”, Ab called some men to carry Qi Yunsi away for burial at the graveyard.

Soon, a cart arrived to transport the body, and Ab was seen whispering instructions to the men, as if imparting some precautions.

Zhou Qian glanced at Ab’s actions, then turned back, scanning the crowd before his gaze finally rested on Yun Xiangrong.

He approached her, saying, “The first time we met, we played a game similar to this. That game’s rules were much more complicated than now, but the essence was the same. Last time, we were looking for ‘false believers’; this time, it’s a ‘murderer’.”

In that game, Qi Liuxing also participated. Not only did he participate, but he was also thoroughly deceived by Zhou Qian.

Somehow, though, he ended up helping Zhou Qian all the way until they cleared the game and achieved a hidden accomplishment.

At that moment, Qi Liuxing started to worry and stepped forward to look at Yun Xiangrong, saying, “You blame Zhou Qian… but you might as well blame me. It was my fault for not checking the message in time, not being able to deliver the Tick Tock Clock. I share some responsibility for Gao Shan’s death. I—”

He sighed and continued, “The rule of this game is that anyone accused will be treated as the murderer. But if none of us accuses anyone, then no one will be deemed the murderer! We are not in the same situation as before. Back then, facing those two goddesses, we had no means to resist and had to follow the rules. But against these villagers, we have a chance to fight our way out!”

Looking at Qi Liuxing, Yun Xiangrong said, “Another top-tier Rank God player is unaccounted for, and we only have seven people here. Seven people against a few hundred villagers—how can we fight? They are all trained soldiers, not just ordinary villagers. Even if we still have a Rank God player among us, his abilities are greatly limited. Do I need to remind you of this?”

“Besides, putting that aside, do you remember our fourth prohibition? We are not allowed to kill birds.”

Glancing at the villagers, Yun Xiangrong continued, “This is a world filled with magic, where humans can turn into animals and animals into humans. Have you ever thought about why these villagers can communicate with dogs without obstacles? Is it possible that the ancestors of the Sun, Moon, Stars, and Cloud were birds? In such a case, once we kill them, we would die for violating the prohibition.”

“So, if we really fought, not only would the numbers be against us, but there would also be no fairness. We dare not truly kill them. We have reservations. But they don’t. They can kill us without hesitation.”

“Are you really suggesting accusing Zhou Qian as the murderer?” Qi Liuxing drew his sword, pointing it towards Yun Xiangrong with a threatening posture. “I can’t tell if you’ve been brainwashed by them. You—”

Then, a distinct hand was extended in front of him.

It was Zhou Qian making a gesture to stop him.

Zhou Qian looked at Yun Xiangrong, his face bearing his usual malicious smirk. “If you accuse me, I will certainly accuse you. You like Shan Ge, don’t you? Why would you want to die with me?”

“Don’t provoke me with that kind of talk. Zhou Qian, see, this is how despicable you are—resorting to anything to achieve your goals, not choosing your words carefully. I will always despise people like you.”

“Right after ‘Wish List’ ended, I indeed wanted to kill you for revenge. As for now… I have even more reasons to kill you.”

Yun Xiangrong’s eyes reddened as she continued, “Zhou Qian, I gave you a chance. I asked you for Shan Ge’s soul, but you refused. I asked you to find a way to release him, to let him return to me, but you also refused!”

“You claim you can resurrect Shan Ge, but I can only believe what I see with my own eyes. All I see is you trapping him, making him a slave and a tool serving you!”

“This is your usual style! Zhou Qian, you pretend to be nice to those around you, only wanting to use them. Including that Rank God player by your side. I think it’s the same principle.”

“What you call ‘resurrection’ is without proof. I won’t let Brother Ge become your slave. But the Peach Blossom Legion has a way to resurrect him. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. They promised me that as long as I kill you, they can take your Rib of God and truly resurrect Shan Ge. Even if…”

“Even if they don’t resurrect him. As long as you die, at least Shan Ge’s soul can be freed.”

Having said her piece, Yun Xiangrong seemed to have nothing more to add. She no longer looked at Zhou Qian but directly called out to Village Chief Ab. “Lord Ab, there’s no need to wait for the five minutes to be up. I accuse him as the murderer!”

She pointed directly at Zhou Qian.

“Oh, but in my opinion, she is the murderer.”

Zhou Qian promptly pointed back at Yun Xiangrong.

Both were accused of being the murderer. According to the rules, both were deemed to have killed Qi Yunsi. Ab glanced at both of them, the firelight almost turning his pupils blue.

Then he smiled and looked at the other players. “What about you? Is there anyone else you want to identify?”

Ab looked at Hidden Blade, He Xiaowei, Qi Liuxing, Ke Yuxiao, and Yin Jiujiu, but all five of them solemnly shook their heads.

Ab raised an eyebrow, unsure whether he felt regret or satisfaction.

Then he said, “Then, you five can go back to the inn to rest. I’m sorry you encountered so many troubles upon arriving in the village. But you must believe that you will find happiness in Nameless Village in the future.”

“As for the remaining two murderers—” His tone turned cold again. “Please stay in the square. You will be executed.”

During this time, Zhou Qian didn’t look at Ab but glanced around him.

His gaze paused for a few seconds on Innkeeper Tartar among the onlookers.

Her face showed a mix of regret, pity, and dissatisfaction.

Even though the expression was fleeting, Zhou Qian caught it.

That expression seemed to reveal her evil nature.

At the same moment, a pyramid-shaped building suddenly appeared in the farmland not far away. Its special material shimmered in the night, as if covered in silver light by the stars and moon.

Despite the distance, Zhou Qian recognized it—it was the Temple of Prayers.

How could it suddenly appear here?

Some chaotic thoughts were suddenly clarified in his mind at this moment.

Zhou Qian smiled, withdrew his gaze, and calmly faced Ab’s cold eyes, stepping closer to him.

“What?” Ab asked him.

Zhou Qian loudly said, “My companions will not leave. You want to kill me? It won’t be easy. They will fight with me.”

“Is that so?” Abu threatened, “You do not know our real strength! You have no chance of winning!”

Zhou Qian simply said, “We don’t need to defeat you. We just need to delay time.”

“What do you mean?” Ab frowned.

He Xiaowei, standing behind Zhou Qian, also asked quietly in curiosity, “Yeah, Qian’er, what do you mean?”

Zhou Qian looked at Ab and said, “My friend, oh right, the one who went to keep watch with you. I received a message from him. The number 32 is the limit of people the Red God consumes each year. This means not all 32 people will die. I believe in my friend’s abilities. He won’t die. But he hasn’t come back yet, so I guess…”

“You originally intended to kill my friend, right? But he was too powerful. You couldn’t do it. Maybe you couldn’t find him, or perhaps, you didn’t dare to go to where he was to find him.”

“In this case, you might have to sacrifice someone to the Red God, so you returned to the village, killed a villager, planning to offer him to the Red God, exchanging one person for a year of peace for the entire village.”

Looking at Ab’s face, Zhou Qian smiled and said, “All other villagers have families, except for a man named Qi Yunsi, who lives alone, naturally becoming your best target for persecution.”

“After persecuting him, you needed to exonerate yourselves. The most suitable culprits, of course, were the outsiders who had just arrived here, especially if they had the identity of fleeing from an enemy country.”

“So, we became your scapegoats, Village Chief.”

He Xiaowei couldn’t help but let out a “fuck.”

Zhou Qian narrowed his eyes at Ab. “You sent people to pretend to transport Qi Yunsi’s body to the graveyard, just to deceive the villagers. But what you actually did was take him to the mountain to offer to the Red God, right?”

“Too bad. I was prepared and had people sabotage all of this.”

“Ah, what would happen if you couldn’t sacrifice someone to the Red God on time? What if your conspiracy was exposed?”

As soon as Zhou Qian finished speaking, a semi-transparent rope suddenly appeared in front of him, wrapping around his wrists like a living thing, making it impossible for him to break free no matter how much he struggled.

Then Ab stepped forward, grabbed Zhou Qian’s collar fiercely, and looked at him menacingly, whispering in his ear, “Even if you guessed we had to sacrifice someone, so what? One thing you got wrong, the timing for sacrificing to the Red God isn’t too strict. It can be done before dawn!”

“Before the sun rises, I will surely kill you! So, you can’t escape!”

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 126

Alayne’s voice came through the night, her tone filled with doubt, trouble, and difficulty.

Even to Bai Zhou, her voice sounded very faint, due to the considerable distance between her and him.

After asking Village Chief Ab a question, seemingly reading something from his expression, Alayne immediately asked more intensely, even with a hint of accusation, “I was faster than everyone in this year’s game of Drop the Handkerchief. I shouldn’t be the one keeping watch. I’m the best one! I clearly won the competition! Where exactly are you taking me?”

Then, the somewhat stern voice of Village Chief Ab followed. “You are the one indicated by the oracle. You are our hope!”

“Oracle? What do you mean?” Alayne couldn’t help but ask.

Ab said, “You know, every year we have to sacrifice many people… The sacrificed are far more than the newborns. If this continues, our four great families will be destroyed!”

“I-I know. My mother told me. She said your hair has-has all turned white,” Alayne said. “But what does this have to do with me?”

“You know, I’ve always been looking for a way to defeat the Red God. But even though I’ve racked my brains and spent sleepless nights, I’ve never found a solution,” Ab said. “Fortunately, half a year ago, I and a few workers saw an oracle in the mine. It was written by the gods on a stone—

“One who is born with a lotus possesses the greatest speed. Only they can outrun the Red God and defeat the Red God.”

“Alayne, look. You’re only ten years old and already have such speed… Even those who are deemed most talented by them can’t compare to you. And through your mother, I know you have a lotus on your body, right? So, you are the one hinted at by the oracle—the one who can defeat the Red God!”

For a long time, Alayne didn’t speak again, falling into silence, not knowing what to think.

Ab continued, “Alayne, you are a gift from the heavens to Nameless Village, the hope of the four great families! I beseech you to face the Red God.”

“Beseech?” Alayne said. “This isn’t beseeching. This is coercion. Otherwise, why would there be so many people following us with knives? Besides, even if I am talented, how can I, a human, defeat the Red God? How could I possibly kill her?!”

The girl’s voice became increasingly panicked. “This is a sacrifice. You’re sacrificing me alone. I told my mother, I suspected this wasn’t normal! I told her not to tell others about the lotus on my body. Why would she…”

Alayne’s voice abruptly stopped, replaced by the howling wind—she had run away.

Ab’s tone immediately turned furious. He shouted, “Chase her! Chase her down!”

“But Lord Ab, she’s too fast!”

“No matter, we just need to surround this mountain! That way, to avoid us, she can only run towards the mountaintop. The Red God is at the mountaintop this year!”

“Ha ha, let her run… Let her run directly into the arms of the Red God!”

……

At this moment, all sounds abruptly stopped.

It was as if the distant Ab, Alayne, and all of the village chief’s men had all vanished.

Why would such a phenomenon occur?

Bai Zhou could only attribute it to everything happening in a future timeline.

In this conversation, Ab mentioned that Alayne was already ten years old.

But when Bai Zhou and the other players played the game of Drop the Handkerchief with the little girl, she was only eight.

Thus, the theory about the three heads controlling three directions of time and space was probably true.

Bai Zhou guessed the reason he could hear Ab and Alayne’s conversation was because he heard the voice from another timeline.

The three heads, with Bai Zhou located within the range that one of the heads’ eyes could see.

As for the Ab and Alayne he just heard, they were in the gaze of another head’s eye.

Another head’s eye changed color, illuminating that area with the future scene. Thus, Bai Zhou, who was in the past, could hear the voices of Alayne and Ab in a future timeline.

All sounds stopped abruptly, likely because the statue’s eye changed back, and the future timeline suddenly disappeared.

What Bai Zhou didn’t understand was why Ab, whom he had killed in the present, could be alive in the future.

He even found that the villagers around him weren’t ghosts but were actually people.

When communicating with the Red God Amei, Bai Zhou noticed her voice was very different from humans’.

If it were an ordinary person, they probably wouldn’t understand her at all. That he could comprehend her speech was likely purely because he was a Rank God player.

Yet, the voices of Ab and the other villagers around Bai Zhou sounded exactly like humans.

This indicated they had indeed been resurrected, rather than being so-called “souls returned from the dead”.

Moreover, these resurrected individuals lacked a segment of memory. They were unaware of what Bai Zhou had done to them.

At this moment, Bai Zhou recalled a phrase the Red God Amei had said to him before leaving—”What has happened cannot be changed.”

Thus, perhaps the story of Nameless Village was set in stone. Whatever the players did, it wouldn’t bring any change to the fate of this village. No matter how many times Bai Zhou killed Ab and the others, they would resurrect time and again.

From another perspective, everything happening here was like an animated movie. The three heads on the statue were like three projectors, each looking towards three large areas, projecting different stories for each area. The projectors had different colors, corresponding to different segments of the animation they played.

Players, being in the animation, were subjected to various bans and restrictions. As outsiders, they might die here, but they wouldn’t make any substantial changes to the fate of Nameless Village itself.

In the eyes of the Red God Amei, what was meant to happen had already happened.

Samhain, a period that didn’t exist in time, a season where both space and time plunged into chaos.

Perhaps all the chaos would only cease at the end of Samhain.

Maybe then, the players would discover what the real mission to clear the instance is.

As Bai Zhou was thinking this as he walked, he suddenly noticed that Ab beside him had stopped. He immediately guessed Ab’s intention.

Sure enough, Ab said, “Wait, please stop. We took the wrong way.”

Bai Zhou remained silent.

“Please go this way! We need to go somewhere first!” Village Chief Ab turned around, and seeing Bai Zhou didn’t move, tried to grab him, looking very anxious.

Of course, the place Village Chief Ab wanted to take Bai Zhou to was still in the direction of the altar.

It seemed that the resurrected Ab indeed lacked a segment of memory, so he still wanted to continue taking Bai Zhou to the altar to kill him.

Bai Zhou looked at him and asked, “Samhain has arrived. Aren’t you afraid of wasting time?”

“It’s… already past midnight?” The village chief was stunned for a moment, then said, “Oh, this time, confusion is prone to occur… You see, we all don’t know when we got separated from you! But please follow us! I’ve thought of a strategy to protect all of us!”

Indeed, his excuse was exactly the same as before.

“Why aren’t you moving?”

“Come with me, I’m doing this to save all of us!”

“I’ve thought of a way to get rid of the Red God!”

As Ab was persuading Bai Zhou, he signaled the others with his eyes, probably worrying that Bai Zhou had discovered their conspiracy and was unwilling to go, suggesting to the others that they might have to forcibly take him to the altar.

Seeing Bai Zhou still didn’t move, Ab looked back at him, raising both hands in a gesture to grab his arm.

In the next moment, there was a flash of cold light, and Ab didn’t even feel the pain before his head hit the ground. Along with him, the remaining thirty or so people died again.

Having dealt with them swiftly and violently, Bai Zhou sheathed his Breaking Dawn and continued towards the mountaintop. He moved quickly, as if eager to return to a certain place.

At this point, the players’ tasks had become relatively clear. The game of Drop the Handkerchief divided the players into two groups: “keeping watch” and “going home”.

Both sides likely had important clues, so it was best for the players to split into two teams, participate in both tasks separately, and cooperate in the subsequent game, sharing information without reservation.

Initially, everyone thought that keeping watch was the most dangerous because it meant being sacrificed to the Red God, likely facing her head-on.

But now that Bai Zhou knew the story of the Red God Amei, he suspected that the players, as “deserters from the Land of Silence”, actually helped her, so she had no direct malice towards the deserters and might even hint at the bans to them.

Thus, the real danger might instead lie with the players staying in the inn.

The Red God Amei appeared and then disappeared. On this side, the real enemy facing the “keeping watch” players was actually just the continuously resurrecting villagers.

The only crisis they faced was not letting their blood fall on the altar. However, the danger faced by the players at the inn might be the truly dangerous individuals—such as, the innkeeper Tartar.

Aside from Tartar, the Red God Amei likely also went to the inn.

Although she had no direct malice towards the players, that didn’t mean her stance couldn’t change. In summary, Zhou Qian and the others were in a very dangerous situation. So Bai Zhou needed to hurry back to the inn.

However, before returning, he wanted to take advantage of this chaotic time to look for more clues. There must be important information he hadn’t discovered yet.

Every scenario in an instance has a clear design trace, a confirmed pattern.

In this game, risk and reward are always proportional.

Logically speaking, the crisis faced by “keeping watch” players isn’t minor. If someone with a slightly weaker combat strength were to lose even a drop of blood in a fight with the villagers, they could be easily killed.

Bai Zhou was unharmed purely because he was a Rank God player. High risk corresponds to high reward. There must still be important information on the “keeping watch” side.

“1 or 31”—this phrase directly led to Village Chief Ab leading the villagers to kill Bai Zhou.

But from another perspective, considering the game’s design philosophy, they were actually preventing Bai Zhou from going to the place they had agreed with the Red God to play games this year.

Therefore, Bai Zhou was now heading in that direction.

How would the Red God come to the human world? If the two worlds intersect, would her inn come to the human world?

Walking along the mountain path, bathed in the light of the stars and moon, Bai Zhou reached the mountaintop.

In front of him, indeed, appeared a very strange-looking building. Its appearance had some color of raw wood, but the material didn’t seem to be wood. Its strangeness lay in its shape.

Buildings are typically square or round, with designs considering factors like suitability for living, space efficiency, and aesthetics, usually featuring regular shapes.

However, the building Bai Zhou saw defied any regular pattern, looking very unfit for living, with parts jutting out here and a random circle there, devoid of any aesthetic appeal.

If one were to attempt mapping it from an aerial view, it would resemble a raw egg smashed on the ground, resulting in a chaotic, irregular polygon.

Circling halfway around this building from a distance, Bai Zhou found the entrance.

The door was strikingly red, with a sign in red as well, featuring a bizarre, irregular red symbol.

—That was the sign of the Red God’s inn.

At the entrance of the inn were several pots of meat soup. Their aroma wafted over from afar, with a few oddly shaped people eating there.

After a while, someone came out of the inn and said to the people at the door, “Let’s go. Samhain has arrived. We should go to the village for something better. We’re tired of the Red God’s stuff!”

“Oh yes. There’s no concept of time here… I forgot it’s Samhain. Let’s go, let’s go.”

Thus, the ghostly figures left the inn in small groups, heading towards the village below the mountain.

Seeing this, Bai Zhou reached into his pack and pulled out a costume. It was one of the ghost disguises prepared by the innkeeper Tartar for everyone.

Moments later, dressed in a bizarrely shaped horror robe and wearing a skull mask, Bai Zhou stepped towards the Red God’s inn.

As he approached the entrance, Bai Zhou caught a stronger whiff of the meat soup aroma, indeed very different from what innkeeper Tartar cooked.

According to what those few ghosts said, unlike the human world, the other world lacks a conventional concept of time.

This is probably why the delicacies here could be provided to the ghosts incessantly.

But in reality, these foods never appeared or disappeared; they exist perpetually. At the same time, life here simply exists without birth or death. Everything in this place is meaningless. Becoming the Red God, in a sense, is like finding a prison to trap oneself in.

Upon stepping into the inn, Bai Zhou discovered that there were hardly any people around, and even the few remaining were running outside. It was rare for them to go to the human world, so they were probably all in the village by now.

Bai Zhou was able to enter the inn without any obstacles.

The interior of the inn was quite unique as well. In the center, there were two large pools; one contained stewed meat, and the other was filled with alcohol.

As for the ground around, it was covered with various types of blankets for the guests to sit or sleep on.

The Red God’s inn had only this one floor. Unlike typical inns, it had no rooms or even partitions. A pool of meat, a pool of alcohol, and blankets spread all over the floor constituted the entirety of the inn’s facilities, available for people to come in to eat, sleep, or leave at any time.

It was an eternal banquet hosted by beings from another world, the Red God’s banquet.

However, there was a main seat in the inn—

In the eastern direction, there was a luxuriously decorated chair, probably where the Red God usually sat. Only she had the authority to sit in this chair.

In front of the chair, there was a statue.

Surprisingly, many coins were scattered around the statue, as if someone was worshiping it. Or rather, it was like ghosts were enshrining the statue.

Bai Zhou walked up to have a closer look at the statue and found it to be a bird—a golden bird.

“Never kill birds” was the fourth prohibition that players hadn’t yet deciphered.

Who did the bird refer to?

The statue was golden. Was the golden feather stolen by Amei related to it?

If Amei’s sufferings were real and her hatred towards the villagers was genuine, she would probably hate the golden feather just as much.

Then, if the golden feather was indeed related to a golden bird, why would Amei worship its statue in her inn?

---

The author has something to say:

The Red God’s “Hell” has endless delicacies, and animals being the spirits that communicate between two worlds are some concepts from Irish mythology.

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 125

At the entrance of the village, there was a statue composed of three heads.

One faced the square and most of the village houses, another directly faced the inn, and the third one looked in the direction of a fountain, farmland, and graveyard, respectively.

Zhou Qian’s conjecture was that each statue’s eyes, besides their normal limestone color, could display red, blue, and yellow states.

When the statue’s eyes didn’t change color, space-time remained unchanged.

However, when the statue’s eyes did change color, they illuminated the area they were facing in different space-times.

As for why the glass on the second floor of the inn changed color, Zhou Qian initially thought it was related to space-time shifts.

It was possible that the glass was colorless for a period and was redecorated with blue glass by someone in the future.

Players moving in and out of the inn saw the color of the glass change because the eyes of the statue facing the inn changed color, transporting them from the past to the future.

But now Zhou Qian found that the eyes of the head facing the inn had always been colorless.

Thus, he had to discard this possibility.

Since this was a world filled with magic, the color change of the glass was likely related to magic.

The person who changed the color of the glass with magic might have been trying to remind players to avoid prohibitions from the perspective of fire color. Now that the reminder had been given, there was no need to continue changing the color of the glass.

Therefore, unless something unexpected happened, players didn’t need to worry about the color of the glass tonight. They just needed to ensure that the fire in the fireplace was always yellow, as it would never shine through blue glass.

So, for the time being, players neither had to worry about the prohibitions nor fear being possessed by spirits, as the fireplace, always lit with fire, was enough to drive away ordinary spirits from the other world.

With these two problems out of the way, the only concern for players now was the innkeeper Tartar suddenly starting to cook meat soup in the middle of the night.

What exactly is her intention?

During the coming of Samhain, the gates between the worlds open, plunging it into chaos. The Red God could travel from the other world to the human world. However, despite this, they couldn’t communicate directly with people and needed dogs as intermediaries.

Every household in Nameless Village kept a white dog to communicate with the Red God.

Tartar should also understand animal language, but she didn’t have a dog.

There were two possibilities behind this. The first was that she was the Red God herself, and at the same time, she must be a particularly powerful Red God who wasn’t bound by time and could freely travel between the human world and the other world, even outside of Samhain. She could disguise herself as a human without being detected by dogs. Moreover, she could communicate directly with villagers and players without the need for animals like dogs.

Zhou Qian thought this possibility was relatively small because he hadn’t found any clues supporting Tartar was the Red God, nor had he found any descriptions that powerful Red Gods could break many restrictions, such as communicating directly with humans.

Therefore, Zhou Qian leaned more towards the second possibility—

Tartar wasn’t the Red God, but she must have some special identity that allowed her to communicate directly with the Red God, and she was preparing these soups tonight to welcome the Red God’s arrival.

The spirits from the other world enjoyed feasting, and to welcome their arrival and let them leave satisfied and without harming people, the square was prepared with a lot of food offerings in addition to the Bone Fire.

Furthermore, Zhou Qian had received information from Bai Zhou—in the other world, every Red God had an inn where endless food was supplied to the spirits, usually pots of meat.

This suggested that Tartar cooking meat in the middle of the night was likely to entertain the Red God.

Tartar had a special identity, and she was preparing to entertain the Red God tonight. With such a conclusion, Zhou Qian had ample reason to worry about Bai Zhou’s situation—

After all, the Red God was a “great ghost”, equivalent to an official spirit in the hell world understood by Easterners. Their number wouldn’t be large.

Moreover, according to the information previously provided by Bai Zhou, Nameless Village had been troubled by only one Red God for years, who needed to consume humans each year, with an upper limit of 32 and an uncertain lower limit. It was for this reason that Nameless Village held the handkerchief game on the eve of Samhain each year.

Therefore, the Red God plaguing the villagers in Nameless Village was likely just one—the same one Bai Zhou and the others went to meet.

But if this Red God needed to select who to consume this year by playing games with the night watchmen, would they have time to visit the inn as a guest?

With such concerns, Zhou Qian frowned slightly when he discovered he could not contact Bai Zhou.

Beside him, He Xiaowei temporarily interrupted his thoughts. “But what exactly is the identity of the innkeeper? Why does she want to meet the Red God?”

After a moment of silence, Zhou Qian said, “Let’s solve the problem by thinking in groups of three. The present, future, past represent time and space; red, yellow, blue are the three primary colors; regarding humans, ghosts, and gods, we are still missing ‘god’.”

“Human refers to the villagers,” He Xiaowei said. “Although the Red God has ‘god’ in its name, it is actually a great ghost from another world. The Red God is a ghost. So, we have humans, we have ghosts, as for gods…”

Something clicked, and He Xiaowei’s eyes lit up. “Damn, I really feel like I’ve made progress! The only god we’ve seen… is that golden statue in the Temple of the Goddess of Prayers!”

Zhou Qian nodded. “Correct. Difu. If we speculate using the trinity thought process, the innkeeper is likely Difu.”

According to the information found by the players in the temple, Difu was locked in the temple by Vels, the God of Imprisonment, who loved her. There was a chain around the statue’s ankle.

The king of the Land of Silence lost a golden feather, entered the temple to make a wish, and inscribed a curse on a stone tablet. He suspected Amei had stolen the golden feather, wished for its return, and cursed that disaster would befall Amei’s hometown before it was found. If the feather was found, as a reward, he would unlock Difu’s chain.

Judging by the unlocked chain of the statue, the king had found the feather, and the magician Liu Shui used the “Key of Freedom” to release Difu from her bindings.

From then on, the temple became a movable temple.

So… what about the temple’s master, Difu?

Although that golden statue was in the temple, where was her real body or soul?

She likely turned into the innkeeper Tartar and came to Nameless Village.

Realizing the key point, He Xiaowei immediately said, “The Goddess Difu helped fulfill the king’s curse. The king found the golden feather, allowing the magician Liu Shui to restore her freedom…”

“Can we understand that Difu and the Land of Silence are on the same side? If the king and the magician want to kill us with a ban, then the person who has been helping us by hinting at the existence of the ban, definitely cannot be Difu!”

“The one who hinted at the existence of the ban to help us, is not Difu, I agree with this. As for whether she still stands with the Land of Silence now, it’s hard to say. To put it bluntly, the story of the Temple of Prayers is just a transaction. But what can be seen is that Difu’s attitude is quite subtle,” Zhou Qian said. “Difu turned into Tartar, the innkeeper. Someone magically changed the color of her glass. We noticed this, and she definitely did too.”

“If she really was on the king’s side, she could have simply changed the glass back. Once the glass is transparent, the color trick doesn’t work anymore. Any color of fire we light could be seen through the clear glass.”

“Therefore, in my view, it’s still hard to judge her stance.”

“Heh… so, Difu isn’t on the king’s side, and she doesn’t necessarily want to kill us,” He Xiaowei said. “She has no obvious malice towards us.”

“So this means—” Zhou Qian said, “maybe we have a chance to see how she hosts the Red God.”

As he spoke, Zhou Qian walked towards the room’s door. “Let’s go. Call Xiao Qi and the others. Let’s not just stay in the room. If possible, let’s all meet the Red God together.”

He Xiaowei: “Damn, but Tartar said not to go out at night?”

“She told us it’s best to stay in separate rooms and not to wander around at night… She probably just wanted to prevent us from seeing her meeting with the Red God,” Zhou Qian said. “But I must know the content of their conversation. I must meet this Red God.”

“Are you serious, Qian’er?”

As Zhou Qian was already out the door, He Xiaowei immediately followed him into the hallway. “As I understand it, the Red God is the boss we have to fight this time, right? Are you rushing to fight the boss?”

When He Xiaowei said this, Zhou Qian was already knocking on Qi Liuxing’s door.

Qi Liuxing, hearing this, opened the door and looked towards He Xiaowei in the hallway, and immediately said, “Xiaowei Ge, isn’t this just Zhou Qian’s style?”

“What do you mean? You’re going to mess around with him?” He Xiaowei asked.

Zhou Qian, standing in the hallway and having pushed the door wide open, looked towards Qi Liuxing inside the room and, with a meaningful pat on his shoulder, shared the insights and observations from the mountains.

Finally, Zhou Qian said, “So, all the villagers will die in the future, maybe killed by the Red God. Don’t you want to save them? Can you bear to watch them just die like that?”

Qi Liuxing: “I…”

Zhou Qian: “You won’t abandon them, right? You’re not that kind of person.”

Qi Liuxing: “……”

Zhou Qian: “Then come with me to meet the Red God.”

Qi Liuxing: “…………”

He Xiaowei: “Damn, count me in! I suddenly feel fired up, just like when we fought the S army together last time!”

Moments later, everyone except the two girls had gathered in Qi Liuxing’s room.

The door was left ajar, allowing sounds from the hallway and even the downstairs hall to be heard.

This was especially easy for Hidden Blade, given that a Rank God player’s senses were much sharper than those of ordinary people.

At 12:10 AM, it was indeed Hidden Blade who first made a silent gesture to everyone, saying, “Someone’s knocking on the downstairs door. Someone has arrived.”

He Xiaowei quickly perked up his ears and indeed heard some talking.

He could clearly tell that two women were speaking.

However, to his surprise, both voices sounded very strange, almost like static. It was like the noise a radio makes when it’s not tuned to the right frequency—

One female voice said, “Buzz buzz buzz…”

Another female voice said, “Squeak buzz gargle…”

“What the heck is this bird language,” He Xiaowei couldn’t help but blurt out.

Zhou Qian simply said, “Perhaps this is why beings from the other world cannot communicate with humans.”

One of the female voices must belong to the Red God visiting the inn, who was unable to communicate directly with people, leaving the players to hear only static noises coming from her mouth.

The other female voice should belong to the innkeeper Tartar, or rather, Difu, the Goddess of Prayers. It seemed that she wasn’t only capable of communicating with humans but could also communicate with the Red God without any barriers, not needing to use a dog for communication.

If he sent out the little dragon, could it understand their conversation?

Wait. They had a fox here.

Zhou Qian turned his head and looked at Hidden Blade.

Indeed, Hidden Blade wasn’t standing near the door with his ears perked like the other players; instead, he sat far away on the bed’s edge, frowning slightly, appearing to be listening intently. It seemed he indeed understood the conversation between the two women.

“Hey, Hidden Blade, you’re also white. According to this world’s setting, you can communicate with ghosts. How about it—” Zhou Qian whispered to him, “Great Fox Immortal, can you translate?”

Hearing this, Hidden Blade gave Zhou Qian a look that was hard to describe.

Zhou Qian added, “Right, I suddenly remembered, Zhou Ge praised your intuition.”

Hearing this, Hidden Blade blinked a few times, seemingly incredulous. “Did the boss really… praise me?”

“Yes, he did,” Zhou Qian said earnestly. “So, what does your intuition tell you? Which side is Difu on, and which side harbors malice towards the players?”

Hidden Blade thought for a while and said, “I don’t feel any malice from the Red God towards us. As for Difu… my feelings towards her are more chaotic.”

“Chaotic?” Zhou Qian frowned.

“Or perhaps a better word would be… tumultuous?” Hidden Blade said, “In any case, I feel many elements related to evil in her. As for malice towards the players, it’s not particularly noticeable.”

Zhou Qian didn’t continue to inquire but simply asked Hidden Blade to translate again.

Hidden Blade sat calmly on the chair by the bed and truthfully relayed what he had heard.

The senses of Rank God players were far sharper than those of ordinary people. Every sound downstairs was clearly transmitted to his mind through his ears, even automatically forming vivid images.

There were three knocks on the door downstairs.

Then Innkeeper Tartar said, “Please.”

Next, Hidden Blade didn’t directly hear the sound of the door opening, leading to the assumption that the Red God appeared directly inside the room and sat down.

The innkeeper served her a large bowl of meat soup with an iron spoon. “Eat as much as you like. You can also take it over there for them.”

“Thank you for this year as well,” the Red God said.

“There’s no need to be polite. It’s not easy for people to meet each other,” the innkeeper said.

The Red God paused for a moment before continuing, “I’m no longer human now.”

The innkeeper smiled and said, “But you once were.”

The Red God didn’t speak. She merely slurped the meat soup, saying, “The annual slaughter in this village is quite fun. The curse I placed in the Temple of the Goddess of Prayers really worked. Speaking of which… I should thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Listening to the curses of humans, listening to the curses of ghosts… this might just be my fate,” the innkeeper said. “Every god exists for a reason. My purpose is to fulfill your curses, as long as you are devout enough.”

“I’m certainly devout. Otherwise, things might not have gone so smoothly. If it weren’t for the curse… how could I have become a Red God? And how could I have used the power of the Red God to take revenge on these villagers?” the Red God said. “So, I really want to thank you. My power was bestowed upon me by you, the Goddess.”

“I can feel that you went to the temple again,” the innkeeper said. “But I haven’t gone back yet. What is your curse this time?”

The Red God said, “I once cursed myself to become the Red God, forever unable to return to the human world or become human again. Of course, this was because I thoroughly hated humanity. They betrayed me.”

“But over these years… I’ve actually grown tired of it. So, now I directly curse that all the villagers of this Nameless Village will die out.

“I want the four families of Sun, Moon, Star, and Cloud to forever disappear from this world!”

……

On the other side, in the mountains.

After midnight arrived, the moonlight became exceptionally bright.

Bai Zhou stood alone on a mountain path, watching as the thirty or so people he had killed reappeared before him, as if unaware they had been killed by him, continuing to invite him to meet the Red God.

Bai Zhou held the Breaking Dawn Tang sword in his right hand, keeping his composure, pretending not to notice anything, and said to Village Chief Ab, “Okay, lead the way to the Red God.”

Village Chief Ab smiled slightly and indeed led everyone towards the west.

But just a few steps out, Bai Zhou heard a complex set of footsteps coming from further west.

He wasn’t sure if these resurrected people, or rather souls returned to the mortal world behind him, could hear those sounds. However, as a Rank God player, he heard them exceptionally clearly.

One of the voices was Alayne’s, but surprisingly, another was Village Chief Ab’s.

Alayne was heard asking, “Lord Abu, where are you taking me?”

---

The author has something to say:

Because a little angel said they didn’t understand yesterday, I took some extra effort at the beginning to smooth things out for everyone~

Should be okay now, right?

Actually, the story being told now is from Amei’s perspective. She married into the Land of Silence as requested by the king of the Kingdom of Words and the four major families. Her purpose was to steal the golden feather, which she indeed managed to do, healing both the villagers and the king of the Kingdom of Words. However, when the golden feather was lost, the Land of Silence came to retaliate, and the Kingdom of Words pinned all the blame on Amei. Amei was turned into a horse as punishment, and afterwards, she went to the Temple of the Goddess of Prayers to curse herself to become the Red God after death. So, Zhou Qian and the others now believe the innkeeper is the temple’s master, the Goddess Difu.

So now, after Amei died and indeed became the Red God, she believes she was betrayed by the villagers, hence her revenge on the villagers.

Zhou Ge is a dragon, capable of communicating with the Red God, Amei.

Additionally, during a conversation between Zhou Ge and the Red God, it was mentioned that he believes the one who hinted at the ban to the players (deserters) was likely Amei.

The players became deserters, betraying the Land of Silence, because they helped Amei, so Amei would help them.

That’s all.

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 124

In this world, animals are regarded as spirits that communicate between humans and the other world. Whether it’s the Kingdom of Words or the Land of Silence, people from both countries know how to communicate with animals, only that the former prefer to keep dogs, while the latter favor birds.

Therefore, by logic, Innkeeper Tartar should know how to communicate with dogs. To protect themselves from a possible visit from the Red God, every household values dogs highly and would specially treat them to meat soup before the festival as a reward.

Why doesn’t the inn have dogs? 

Isn’t Tartar afraid of the Red God’s visit?

He Xiaowei whispered immediately, “Could she be the Red God herself?”

Zhou Qian leaned against the head of the bed, yawned, and said, “I don’t know.”

He Xiaowei: “So, what do we do now…”

Zhou Qian said, “Wait.”

“Wait? But what about the issue with the glass color—”

“Didn’t they say it’s best for each of us to have a room? Maybe the fire can only protect within a limited range. So, let’s go back and wait for now. I’ll come to find you if there’s any news. As for the color of the glass, just keep observing for now.”

Sure enough, people began leaving the room one after another shortly after.

Yin Jiujiu took two people’s worth of ore and divided it into two baskets. She didn’t return to her room immediately but knocked on Yun Xiangrong’s door with the baskets in hand.

Yun Xiangrong opened the door, exchanged glances with her, and took one basket.

“Thank you.”

“No thanks,” Yin Jiujiu didn’t leave immediately after speaking but stood in the corridor without moving.

Seeing that she had something to say to her, Yun Xiangrong stepped aside to let her in.

Once the door was closed, Yin Jiujiu looked at Yun Xiangrong and said, “I didn’t have time to say much just now. What I want to tell you now is that I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

Yun Xiangrong replied, “Understood, you’ve made up your mind. You refuse to cooperate with me.”

Yin Jiujiu shook her head, frowning. “It’s not that I refuse to cooperate with you. It’s that I literally don’t understand what you’re saying. I don’t have any revenge to seek. What cooperation? What do we need to cooperate on?”

Yun Xiangrong didn’t respond but looked thoughtfully at Yin Jiujiu. “As far as I know, you were once a gambler. You want to avenge your player.”

Yin Jiujiu had already turned around to reopen the door.

“There’s no such thing. I don’t know where you heard this, but it’s definitely false. Finding suitable teammates in this game is rare. I trust Zhou Qian and the people around him. Your boyfriend, Gao Shan, used to be a tank, and he’s dead. Now, I will mainly play as a tank. I just want to join this team.”

Halfway out the door, Yin Jiujiu’s wrist was grabbed by Yun Xiangrong.

“What else do you want to say?” Yin Jiujiu turned back to look at the cold beauty behind her with tightly knit brows.

Yun Xiangrong asked her, “Do you know Situ Qing?”

Yin Jiujiu narrowed her eyes and shook her head again. “I don’t know her.”

Yun Xiangrong said, “What you said is strange. You refuse to cooperate with me or acknowledge the real reason you came to this instance. There are many ways, but why would you say you have no revenge to seek? Even saying you don’t know Situ Qing at all?”

“Wasn’t your best friend killed by her? In ‘Flower of Evil’, you did everything you could, not caring about the possibility of dying yourself, just to kill her for revenge. Have you forgotten?”

“I really don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Yin Jiujiu gave Yun Xiangrong a strange look and pushed past her to leave.

After Yin Jiujiu left, Yun Xiangrong actually felt somewhat astonished.

She had watched the video playback of Zhou Qian passing ‘Flower of Evil’ with Priest and knew what Yin Jiujiu had done.

Before coming to this instance, Priest told Yun Xiangrong that after investigation, he found that Yin Jiujiu had shifted her hatred and had a new target.

If Yin Jiujiu’s target was Zhou Qian or someone around him, according to Priest, Yun Xiangrong could help her, cooperate with her, or use her. In any case, as long as it served to weaken Zhou Qian’s forces.

Priest understood Yin Jiujiu so well, and with his skills like hypnosis, Yun Xiangrong naturally thought that Yin Jiujiu was Priest’s insider. Her hatred towards people around Zhou Qian was also induced by Priest’s hypnosis.

But Priest was always flawless in his actions. If he really did such a thing to Yin Jiujiu, he shouldn’t have left such a big loophole.

Otherwise, if Zhou Qian and others casually chatted with Yin Jiujiu and she revealed she doesn’t remember Situ Qing or even knows her, they would definitely suspect she was being controlled.

Furthermore, if Yin Jiujiu indeed clearly remembered everything, she wouldn’t have told such a poor lie.

So, in her consciousness and memory now, she indeed went through ‘Flower of Evil’, and knew Zhou Qian, Qi Liuxing, and others who had cleared the instance with her, but she uniquely didn’t know Situ Qing.

Yin Jiujiu’s memory must be incorrect.

However, whoever was behind her, making such a flawed person appear here, was too strange.

What was the purpose of the person controlling her?

And who exactly is that person?

Yun Xiangrong was puzzled.

Being watched by Priest, she was completely unable to inform Zhou Qian of her suspicions at this time and could only continue to move forward.

“Never mind. It’s nothing.” That was all Yun Xiangrong said in the end.

Yin Jiujiu didn’t say anything more, pushing away her hand and leaving.

At this moment, Zhou Qian lay in the room, doing nothing but silently staring outside the window.

The window glass was still blue, making it hard to clearly see what was outside.

The Bone Fire in the fireplace was burning, and because the bones were covered with salt ores, the flame remained yellow and didn’t illuminate the outside through the window.

As for the little dragon, due to excessive energy consumption, it had reverted to a scale and rested inside his backpack.

Zhou Qian and Bai Zhou both wore private chat devices, but the distance between them was obviously beyond the effective range of the devices, preventing instant communication.

After sending the information he had gathered to Bai Zhou through the team system in as concise a manner as possible, all Zhou Qian could do was wait.

The person, or soul, he was waiting for was currently above a graveyard.

It was the place targeted by one of the three skull statues.

This person had a transparent body, invisible to ordinary people.

It was Gao Shan.

He had been busy tonight, first sneaking into various homes to create a bit of ghostly chaos, successfully coaxing out the addresses of Tara and Braga, then, with the little dragon’s help, letting the dogs of those two households escape.

Meanwhile, as Zhou Qian and the others were playing games in the square, chatting with NPCs, and searching for the temple on the mountain, Gao Shan had been observing the changes in the color of the statue’s eyes.

At this moment, according to Zhou Qian’s instructions, he was exploring the graveyard that the players hadn’t yet investigated.

The graveyard was on a small hill and covered a large area.

A cloud passed overhead, dimming the moonlight slightly but still enough to illuminate the tombstones.

As Gao Shan passed in front of them, he could clearly see the inscriptions on each.

Earlier, in order to find the homes of those two key NPCs, Gao Shan had wandered around the village, hearing many villagers’ names.

Now, those names he had heard appeared one by one on the tombstones in front of him—

“Ab”, “Braga”, “Tara”, “Awei”… all were among them.

The night was deep, and the moonlight shone softly, with rows of tombstones neatly arranged.

After roughly counting the number of tombstones in both directions and performing a simple multiplication, Gao Shan realized there were over 400 tombstones.

This meant… it seemed the entire village was dead.

If they were dead, then who had played the handkerchief game with them just before?

Checking the time and with midnight approaching, considering the festival of Samhain might affect him, Gao Shan didn’t have time to think further or check all the tombstones and quickly turned back towards the Tartar Inn.

Moments later, inside the inn on the second floor.

Guessing it was about time, Zhou Qian took out the Rib of God.

Before long, the Rib of God moved slightly.

Seeing this, Zhou Qian took out the dragon scale to summon the little dragon.

The little dragon exhaled a bit of life force, and purple mist spilled out, revealing a human shadow. The shadow slowly condensed into form, allowing the semi-transparent Gao Shan to be seen by Zhou Qian.

Seeing Gao Shan, Zhou Qian quickly sat up and asked, “How did it go?”

Gao Shan, temporarily unable to speak, used paper and pen to write down his observations. At the end, he posed a question: “Does this mean everyone is dead and this place is like hell or another realm? Are we in another world?”

“Not quite,” Zhou Qian shook his head, then asked, “Did the color of the statue’s eyes change?”

Gao Shan nodded and continued writing: “Yes. The statue facing the graveyard had yellow eyes. As for the others, no change. The one facing west still had blue eyes; the one facing this inn had no color.”

Hearing this, Zhou Qian sat on the simple bed and thought for a while, then a smile appeared on his lips. “I understand now.”

Gao Shan gave him a questioning look.

Zhou Qian explained, “That group of statues is made of three skulls. Considering the mythological use of the number three, its associated meanings can be interpreted through the constructs of life or through space and time.”

What Zhou Qian was referring to was the conclusion he and Bai Zhou had discussed before.

Humans, ghosts, gods, are classifications of life forms.

Heaven, earth, hell, are spatial divisions.

Looking at it from a temporal perspective, it’s past, present, future.

Zhou Qian looked at Gao Shan and continued, “Now that we’ve confirmed the statue’s eyes have three colors, red, yellow, blue. Seeing so many dead, logically, yellow corresponds to the future.”

Gao Shan quickly caught on.

—So, if they weren’t in hell but in reality… according to Zhou Qian, the statue opening its yellow eyes saw into the future. Therefore, what he saw in the graveyard was a vision of the future. This meant… nearly the entire village will die one day in the future.

“Right.” Zhou Qian nodded. “What we’re still uncertain about is what the red and blue correspond to. Besides…”

Zhou Qian glanced at the blue glass and smiled. “So, why the glass on the second floor changed color is quite interesting.”

At this moment, there were only three minutes left until midnight. He Xiaowei from next door came knocking.

Zhou Qian opened the door to let him in, hearing him ask, “Qian’er, have you figured anything out?”

“Weren’t you supposed to keep an eye on the glass?” Zhou Qian said, yawning as he closed the door.

He Xiaowei spread his hands. “I’m really too sleepy. What if the glass changes color while I’m asleep? Look, Qian’er, if I die, who’s going to heal you? Who’s going to share their mana with you? Our skills match well.”

Zhou Qian looked at him for a long moment and nodded. “So, when you encounter a problem, you come to me instead of your master?”

He Xiaowei replied, “You know how cold my master is.”

Zhou Qian raised an eyebrow. “Oh, is that the only reason?”

After a three-second pause, He Xiaowei had an epiphany and confidently praised Zhou Qian. “Because you’re awesome! That’s why I came to you.”

Hearing this, Zhou Qian laughed and then shook his head. “You’re still not there yet, Xiaowei Ge.”

He Xiaowei: “…?”

“You can go back to sleep,” Zhou Qian said lightly.

“No way!” He Xiaowei was panicking. “Then, can I sleep in the same room as you?”

Zhou Qian immediately refused. “That won’t do. Zhou Ge will get jealous if he sees. Besides, these small rooms in such a rundown inn are cramped even for one person.”

“…” He Xiaowei said, “Ah, this… No, I’ll sleep on the floor! I absolutely won’t disturb you!”

Zhou Qian narrowed his eyes. “So, you mean you sleep, and I stay up all night watching the glass color?”

“No way.” He Xiaowei waved his hand. “We’ll take turns!”

Zhou Qian stopped teasing him. “Go back to sleep. It’s really nothing. Just make sure there’s enough salt mineral in the fireplace. The glass won’t change color for now.”

“Why?” He Xiaowei couldn’t help but ask.

Zhou Qian glanced outside the window, his expression suddenly becoming somewhat unfathomable.

He said, “From the moment we entered the inn, to the moment we left, the statue directly facing here had no color in its eyes. Thus, the space-time of the inn has not changed.”

“Meaning, the change in the color of the glass on the second floor is unrelated to space-time. Therefore, its change can only be related to magic.”

After a pause, Zhou Qian continued, “We went to the rooftop, and a stone tablet appeared out of nowhere with the third prohibition written on it. We went to the Prayer Temple, and when we left, the fourth prohibition against killing birds appeared on the grass. This clearly shows that someone is hinting at the prohibitions that could kill us.”

He Xiaowei finally got it. “So… the color of the glass, someone changed it to blue!”

“Right,” Zhou Qian said. “Therefore, I need to revise my earlier deduction.”

“The glass turned blue, and the white bone sacrifice just so happened to emit blue light through the blue glass… At first, I thought this was caused by changes in space-time, and the person implementing the prohibitions, namely the magician named Flowing Water, had predicted everything, including that the inn would have blue glass, in order to kill us.”

“But now, it seems that the unexpected change in the color of the glass was actually a hint given to us by someone to make us think of a solution from the perspective of color.”

“Someone has been helping us.”

At this point, Zhou Qian fell silent, continuing to stare out the window as if pondering something.

He Xiaowei also fell into thought.

He decided to start trying to ask less and think more, to see if he could come up with anything on his own.

He had always been go-with-the-flow and had exerted an effort that was neither outstanding nor terrible in instances. But this time, being in the same instance as Qi Liuxing, who was much younger and so hardworking, He Xiaowei felt somewhat ashamed and decided to be stricter with himself.

After all, Zhou Qian was so picky. What if he was abandoned for not making progress?

Both fell into silence for a while until Gao Shan looked towards Zhou Qian, picking up a pen to write: “Zhou Qian, I think… I need to see Yun Xiangrong and tell her about some of our deductions. I want her to have a good night’s sleep tonight.”

His handwriting was rushed, showing his urgency.

“No.” Zhou Qian immediately objected. “Right now, she’s someone who wants to kill me.”

“She won’t!” Gao Shan quickly wrote these words.

Picking up the pen, he seemed to want to write more, but after starting, he stopped, as if reconsidering.

Zhou Qian said, “You left me a dying message once, asking me to persuade her not to go down a path of no return. See, I told you I couldn’t persuade her.”

Gao Shan frowned.

“Anyway, you can’t go.” Zhou Qian was decisive. “She doesn’t trust me at all, nor does she believe that this bone can revive you. She thinks that by letting you live this way, I’m torturing you.”

“If you go see her and the two lovers meet, what if you take her side? You’re sleeping in my weapon. If you wanted to kill me, wouldn’t that be easy? So, you definitely can’t see Yun Xiangrong alone.”

Hearing this, He Xiaowei immediately felt Zhou Qian’s approach was a bit harsh.

Everything that happened in “Last Wish” was still fresh in his memory. How difficult was it for that girl? Now that Gao Shan could appear in this form, what harm could it do to let them meet?

Qian’er is really cruel!

Looking at Zhou Qian, as He Xiaowei was about to speak, he thought better of it and swallowed his words.

No, Qian’er wouldn’t be like this without a reason. Was he plotting something else?

With this thought, He Xiaowei looked back at Gao Shan.

Sure enough, Gao Shan’s expression was off, and suddenly, he turned to run, seemingly determined to see Yun Xiangrong despite everything.

Then, Zhou Qian simply grabbed the Rib of God and used his ability, forcefully pulling him back into the bone.

Sighing softly, Zhou Qian put away the Rib of God and looked at He Xiaowei, appearing somewhat tired. “You see, having a bone spirit is actually quite troublesome. It’s a double-edged sword. I could very well end up killing myself.”

He Xiaowei was taken aback, then felt he had made progress.

Maybe, just maybe, Qian’er was really acting?

“Cough. I’m going back to sleep then. Oh, by the way, that innkeeper—” He Xiaowei stopped at the door to ask, “Have you figured out what she is?”

“She doesn’t keep a dog. Does that mean she doesn’t need such means to communicate with the Red God?” Zhou Qian counter-asked, then said, “If we look at it from this angle, she’s very suspicious.”

“She doesn’t need a dog… She can communicate directly with the Red God…”

He Xiaowei thought for a moment, his eyes widening. “Then she… I got it! Those bone soups should have been at the square, attracting all the ghosts there to feed, satisfying them so they would leave, ensuring our safety! But the innkeeper just cooked some here… Could she be waiting for the Red God?!”

“You’re absolutely right.” Zhou Qian’s expression was more serious than ever. “If she’s waiting for the Red God, it means the Red God will come to the inn tonight. Then… who is the ‘Red God’ that was playing games with us outside?”

Would Bai Zhou be in danger?

Zhou Qian immediately opened the system panel, trying to message Bai Zhou.

At this moment, midnight arrived.

He found that he couldn’t send the message.

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

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Chapter 123

In the game. Inside the semi-open instance of Zone 0.

Apart from a few trees, a patch of green grass, and a small lake, there was nothing here.

A square blanket was spread on the grass in front of the lake, where someone was sitting against a big tree on this blanket, with a few pieces of biscuits in front of them, seemingly in the midst of a picnic.

He looked very leisurely and composed in his demeanor. However, his pale complexion ultimately betrayed a hint of illness.

Besides the food, there was also a tablet on the blanket, displaying scenes of Bai Zhou in “The Red God’s Banquet”.

Suddenly, a drop of blood fell on the grass nearby, and a person with two heads materialized from the blood. It was the Blood Demon.

Following that, a whirlpool appeared in the lake. The whirlpool slowly approached the shore, and a turtle emerged from it. After the turtle swam to the shore, the shell on its back miraculously opened up, and a drowsy girl climbed out and sat on the turtle shell. This newcomer was, of course, the Turtle Fairy.

The Blood Demon and Turtle Fairy respectfully greeted the man on the blanket, then curiously joined him to watch the situation of Bai Zhou in the instance for a while.

After seeing the dialogue between Bai Zhou and the Red God, Xiao Xue yawned out of boredom. “He’s become long-winded.”

Xiao Mo agreed. “Agree. 100% agree.”

Xiao Xue: “NPCs are meant to be killed, just tools for the trials. For Rank God players, the more you kill, the more attributes you gain. Why waste words on NPCs?”

Xiao Mo: “Because of love, he’s become soft. Oh, this damned love.”

Xiao Xue: “You’re sick.”

Xiao Mo: “Is that how you talk to your sister?”

Xiao Xue: “Fuck. I’m your brother!”

“You’re both wrong. The path I take isn’t about killing NPCs…”

As the two were arguing, Turtle Fairy said this, yawned, and then suddenly started bleeding from her nose. Then, with a tilt of her head, she collapsed to the side.

Just before hitting the ground, the man on the blanket put down the tablet and caught her. Holding her wrist, he continuously infused his spiritual power into Turtle Fairy’s body.

This scene somewhat alarmed the Blood Demon, causing both heads to speak in unison. “Master, you’ve only recovered recently. Be careful. Let us do it—”

The one called “Master” by the Blood Demon was indeed the man named Shao Chuan.

Years ago, he had approached a young man daydreaming outside a hospital building, extended a hand, and said, “Hello, my name is Shao Chuan. I’m sorry about your illness. However, it’s not incurable. Would you like to talk more with me?”

At this moment, Shao Chuan, with a serious face, shook his head at the Blood Demon and continued to infuse spiritual power into Turtle Fairy.

After a long while, the girl in the white dress opened her eyes. She rested her hand on the turtle shell and looked dazedly into Shao Chuan’s eyes. “I, I…”

Shao Chuan said, “What did you see? Tell me. It’s okay.”

“The Peach Blossom Legion has already started to move. Blue Harbor City is about to…”

After saying a few words to Shao Chuan, the Blood Demon’s face changed dramatically, while Turtle Fairy started bleeding from all orifices.

Shao Chuan placed two fingers behind Turtle Fairy’s neck, and she gradually fell into a deeper sleep, slowly closing her eyes. Even so, she was still trembling.

Gently patting her shoulder, Shao Chuan said, “Don’t be afraid. According to Taoism, before ascension to godhood through cultivation, one must endure tribulations. It seems the laws of all things are interconnected. The moment has come. I believe he can get through it.”

As for Turtle Fairy, her last words before closing her eyes were, “What I saw… cannot be changed. It’s too terrible. But I can’t change it… I…”

Simultaneously, within the instance “The Red God’s Banquet”.

Amei also said, “Do you know? What has happened, cannot be changed.”

This was after Amei suggested the game was no longer fun.

Bai Zhou looked straight ahead, not looking at her, as if he completely didn’t think Amei would harm them.

The reason behind this was simple—

Why did they become “deserters”? Was it because they had once helped Amei, becoming criminals in the Land of Silence, forced to flee?

The magician Flowing Water had set a ban on them, aiming to kill them.

Thus, it was very likely that Amei was the one giving them hints.

After all, it wasn’t yet midnight, and the festival of Samhain hadn’t officially arrived, meaning the gates between worlds weren’t yet open. However, Amei’s appearance indicated she wasn’t restricted by the gates and had already arrived in this world.

Thus, Bai Zhou simply said, “We are not the targets of your game. The villagers are. You should have already been satisfied with this year’s quota.”

“But do you know?” At that moment, Amei said to Bai Zhou, “In our faith, what has happened, has happened and cannot be changed. So—”

“Maybe everything will start over.”

Under the moonlight, Bai Zhou’s expression remained calm, as if he didn’t take Amei’s words to heart.

He simply lowered his head and sent a message to Zhou Qian. “The true purpose of the golden feather is related to healing and recovery.”

Bai Zhou knew that Zhou Qian would also try to find out the story. The version he found would most likely be the same as what Bai Zhou had heard.

Zhou Qian, being so smart, would surely understand the truth upon seeing this message—

A woman who had saved the four great families, the king, and even the entire Kingdom of Words. Yet, they ruthlessly betrayed her, handed her over to the Land of Silence to preserve their own lives, and fabricated a series of stories to tarnish her reputation, portraying her as a villainess.

However, Bai Zhou’s message wasn’t sent.

The system panel showed he could not contact anyone at the moment.

Glancing at the time on the panel, it displayed exactly midnight—Samhain had arrived.

The voice of Red God Amei echoed from afar and near. “The gates between worlds are open. The moment of chaos has come. This is a segment of time that doesn’t exist. I hope you can get through it smoothly.”

“1 or 31, indeed, I did say that. Kill 31 people, and you survive. I will keep my promise and will not kill you. However, I don’t have much of an appetite tonight and can’t eat that many souls.”

“Young man, there’s something you don’t know. No one dares to kill on the eve of Samhain. Why did they bring you to shed blood, instead of killing you themselves?”

“Now let me tell you. In this chaotic moment, those you kill will all come back as spirits to claim your life!”

“They betrayed you. But you indeed betrayed them too. And I—I detest betrayal the most.”

“When the chaos fades, maybe I’ll take you to my inn in another world.”

“For now, please enjoy this moment of chaos. The feast has just begun.”

Fog rose on the mountain road, and the Red God with her red will-o’-wisps disappeared into the mist.

Immediately afterward, Bai Zhou heard footsteps behind him.

Turning his head, he saw a group of people holding torches slowly approaching.

Before they got close enough for Bai Zhou to see clearly, from their conversation, Bai Zhou already recognized them—they were Village Chief Ab and the villagers.

“Thank you all for your sacrifices.” Ab’s voice was slightly choked. “Nameless Village will always remember your deeds! And I, I will give everything to find a way to counter the Red God! I hope such a tragedy won’t happen again next year!”

Saying this, Ab quickly came up to Bai Zhou.

Behind him were the losers in the game—the Sun Family and the Star Family.

Upon seeing Bai Zhou, their eyes unanimously turned curious.

Ab first asked Bai Zhou, “How come you’re here?”

They seemed completely unaware that they were already dead, let alone that it was Bai Zhou who had killed them.

……

On the other side, the Tartar Inn.

When Zhou Qian and the others returned to the inn from the square, there was still some time left until midnight. Before entering the lobby, Zhou Qian specifically noticed the color of the windows on the second floor and the color of the eyes of the three-skull statue—they were all blue.

Under the guidance of Innkeeper Tartar, each room on the second floor, whether occupied or not, was equipped with items for burning white bone rituals and jack-o’-lanterns.

The players also put on strange costumes and wore ghost masks.

According to Tartar, in case some formidable ghost broke in regardless of the white bone ritual, they might still be able to avoid a disaster by wearing the masks.

After all the preparations were done, the innkeeper instructed the players and then went back downstairs.

Once she left, all the players went to Zhou Qian’s room, except for Yun Xiangrong.

Before going to Zhou Qian, Yin Jiujiu specifically asked her, “Really? Tonight might be very dangerous. You and him… I don’t know what happened between you guys. But now is not the time for revenge. At least, wait until we’ve figured out the conditions for passing the level.”

Yun Xiangrong simply said, “Going to Zhou Qian’s room is just to get the ore. The ore that He Xiaowei and others found contained a large amount of salt. Nothing else. Just help me get a piece. Thanks.”

“But you…” Yin Jiujiu still wanted to persuade.

Yun Xiangrong calmly met her gaze. “Actually, we are the same kind of people.”

Yin Jiujiu frowned. “What do you mean?”

Yun Xiangrong said, “The legion I belong to is very powerful. It can help me find a lot of information. So, of course, I know about you. Your purpose here is actually the same as mine.”

Yin Jiujiu was left stunned, watching Yun Xiangrong’s back as she left the room.

Yun Xiangrong looked at her and continued, “Maybe because of a mistake, or maybe because of greed… we accidentally entered this game. We want the gods to fulfill our wishes. But whether the gods exist or not, and whether our wishes can be fulfilled, nobody knows.”

“At least I have never seen anyone who really got something through this game. So—”

With a bit of choking in her voice, Yun Xiangrong said, “Wanting to revive the people we care about and love, the hope is slim. But avenging them is something we can actually achieve.”

“I have my own revenge to seek. You have yours. So I say, we are the same kind of people. We can cooperate, right? Even if we don’t cooperate, you don’t need to persuade me. Just help me get some ore. I don’t want to see them. Thank you.”

Thus, except for Yun Xiangrong and Bai Zhou, all other players were in Zhou Qian’s room at that moment.

After distributing the ore to everyone, Zhou Qian went to the window and specifically noted the color of the glass again. “There’s one thing we haven’t solved before midnight. How this glass changes color.”

Zhou Qian was worried that the glass might suddenly change color in the dead of night.

The problem he was pondering was also on the minds of the others, and everyone fell silent for a moment.

During this time, He Xiaowei suddenly sniffed like a dog, immediately ran out of the room, and after a while, ran back in, saying, “The innkeeper has started stewing meat soup again!”

Hearing this, Zhou Qian gave He Xiaowei a meaningful look.

He Xiaowei immediately understood, stepped forward to close the door, and then looked at Zhou Qian. “Qian’er, what’s up?”

“Is there something you guys find odd?” Zhou Qian asked.

He Xiaowei: “Hmm? What’s that?”

Zhou Qian: “Every household has a white dog. Why doesn’t the innkeeper have one?”

---

<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

---

Chapter 122

At 11 p.m. sharp, all 32 watchmen were present.

They lined up in an orderly manner, waiting for the next instructions from the village chief.

Many had traces of tears on their faces; from the end of the handkerchief game, leaving the square to return home, to regathering at the square, was their time to say goodbye to their families.

But clearly, not everyone was prepared to die nobly. Many were clenching their fists tightly, showing a reluctant demeanor.

They were unwilling to die, simply lacking the courage and means to resist authority.

Bai Zhou stood quietly at the end of the line, almost silent throughout. His noticeable height made him stand out in the crowd, easily spotted by anyone.

He hardly glanced sideways, as if indifferent to the reactions of those around him.

A moment later, the village chief arrived. He had just started speaking, about to lead everyone to the place where they would play the game with the Red God this year, when suddenly a few barks were heard.

A small white dog entered the crowd, ran around the village chief once, then circled everyone, continuously barking.

Then, from the outskirts of the square, a villager came looking and shouted a few times. “Qiqi, come here! Why did you run over there! Come back! Don’t disturb the village chief’s work!”

Hearing this, the small white dog barked a few more times, then ran back to the person’s side.

The person sighed. The tense expression on his face finally faded, and he quickly took the dog home.

It seemed that “Qiqi” was the name of this white dog.

At first glance, this all looked like a family’s dog had gotten lost, and the owner anxiously came out to search, finally finding it in the square and taking it back home before midnight.

The small white dog came and went, as if nothing had happened.

But if one looked closely at the people in the square, they would notice a subtle change in their expressions—they became calmer, and a few who could not hide it even showed joy in their eyes.

From reluctantly being watchmen to appearing ready to die nobly, their mindset changed silently.

However, Bai Zhou, at the end of the crowd, seemed to have seen nothing.

He appeared to be indifferent to the others and the situation, thus noticing no signs, just following the village chief’s arrangements.

After waiting a while, Village Chief Ab explained a few precautions again and then led the group towards the mountain.

About 15 minutes later, they arrived at an altar.

The altar was circular, with various runes made of stones.

In the center of the altar was an ancient stone tablet, faintly stained with dark blood, as if a tragedy had occurred here.

Village Chief Ab asked everyone to stop here and then addressed the crowd. “This year, I will accompany you to the place where the Red God demands we play the game—”

He was interrupted before he could finish.

“Lord Abu, you cannot go. You are the strongest warrior here. Not everyone can learn the techniques of all four branches. For years, you have been the only one. You must stay alive to protect everyone. Let us handle the game.”

“Yes. Leave it to us.”

“We are willing to sacrifice everything for the village, even our lives!”

At this point, the selected night watchmen showed a righteous determination, and the night atmosphere unknowingly became more tragic.

Not long ago, they were competing desperately in the game to avoid being night watchmen.

But at this moment, they abruptly became heroes willing to die nobly, without regrets.

Hearing their words, Village Chief Ab looked both saddened and moved. Through the torch he held, one could see his eyes were slightly reddened.

Facing everyone, he said, “Don’t worry. To solve this dilemma we face every year, I’ve thought of many ways… As you’ve seen in the past days, I’ve been in contact with a medium from a neighboring village. Now, she has found us a good solution!”

“She has cast a spell on this altar. As long as you drip your blood on the stone in the middle, the spell will protect everyone! If the Red God tries to harm you, it will instead be harmed by the spell!”

“That’s great!”

“Thank you, Lord Ab!”

“You are the hero of our village!”

Ab waved his hands to quiet the crowd, then said, “But let’s not be careless. This is just an attempt. Such an attempt has never been tried before, so I can’t guarantee that we can kill the Red God this way…”

“Please forgive me. For being cautious, I still decided to hold a competition and chose you. If anything happens… I hope you won’t blame me. You are all heroes of Nameless Village. Your names will be recorded and forever praised by future generations!”

After Ab finished speaking, one by one, the villagers went to the stone tablet, took out a knife, cut their index fingers, and pressed their blood against the tablet, in a unified action.

Finally, it was Bai Zhou’s turn.

He approached the stone tablet like everyone else but hesitated to make a move.

The moon was high in the sky.

At this moment, everyone’s gaze was fixed on his back, waiting for him to cut his finger and let the blood drop. So focused were they that they almost held their breath, and the air was filled only with the sounds of the wind and the chirping of insects.

Suddenly, the sound of metal slicing through the air was heard—it was the sound of the Breaking Dawn being drawn.

This Tang sword had no sheath, for it was too sharp, almost guaranteed to draw blood whenever unsheathed. Except for being able to be stored in a space capable of holding it, there was almost no sheath in existence that could withstand its sharpness.

Raising the Tang sword with his right hand, Bai Zhou poised the blade over the tip of his left index finger.

Time seemed to stand still. Illuminated by the light of the torches, everyone behind him was intently watching his finger and the sword poised above it.

Their gazes gradually became greedy and bold, as if they had reached some sort of agreement in silence.

In the next instant, Bai Zhou turned around, facing them with eyes as deep as ancient wells, and finally said, “There’s no need for blood. I have a way to save all of you.”

The villagers were stunned.

Looking at Bai Zhou, Village Chief Ab swallowed hard, then managed a strained smile. “Come on, hurry up, and drip your blood. It’s almost midnight. Only by dripping blood can your safety be assured! Look, we’ve all done it!”

Bai Zhou ignored his words and slightly lifted his chin towards the people standing next to the altar. His gaze settled on a group of people. “You share the same roots and are closest to Alayne. Though you are disappointed in her actions tonight, her talent remains. With continued practice, she will surely help you win victory next year.”

“In such a case, sparing her life tonight is also a way of protecting your family. Do you agree?”

Bai Zhou was addressing the members of the Sun Family, who were part of the handkerchief game and had been positioned on the west circle.

Hearing this, the remaining 15 night watchmen from the Sun Family all looked at him. Then, one of them, who held a slightly higher status, stepped forward and said, “Ah, of course, we agree. We’re grateful to you.”

Another immediately echoed, “Right! We did blame Alayne… It was just because we lost the game and were emotional. But actually, we care about her a lot. Not just that. Essentially, all four major families are one family. We shouldn’t… shouldn’t let a momentary win or loss…”

“You see me as a benefactor, yet insist on me dripping blood?” Bai Zhou asked again.

The members of the Sun Family quickly began to persuade him, “We truly are grateful to you, that’s why we want you to drip blood. Only then can the medium’s spell protect you!”

“Yes! We’re doing this for your own good!”

“We’re considering your safety, benefactor!”

“There’s not much time left. Please hurry and drip your blood!”

Bai Zhou gave a slight nod. “It seems there’s no room for negotiation.”

The village chief sensed something and looked at him. “You, you…”

Bai Zhou didn’t look at him but recalled a message he had seen on the system panel from Zhou Qian not long ago. “The people here can understand animal language and can communicate with dogs.”

Looking up at the village chief, Bai Zhou said, “Why do the people of the Land of Silence dare not easily set foot here? Because there are curses everywhere to deal with them.”

“I am a deserter from the Land of Silence, with the blood of the Land of Silence running through my veins. So, it’s fine if your blood spills here. But if it were mine, I would die, right?”

He, he has seen through our plan?

But how did he see through it?

When everyone gathered in the square, my subordinate left the square, passed the message to a white dog named Qiqi, and then Qiqi relayed the message to everyone. But at that time, he didn’t react at all!

He shouldn’t be able to understand what that dog was saying!

How did he guess…

A myriad of doubts passed through Village Chief Ab’s mind, but at this moment, he no longer had the luxury to consider how Bai Zhou had guessed it. He could only go all out and forcibly take a drop of Bai Zhou’s blood first!

Immediately, Ab raised his voice and instructed others. “Our ancestors have always been the elite of the Kingdom of Words, and our parents were guards of the king. We are skilled in martial arts. Dealing with him together won’t be a problem!

“Everyone, follow my lead! Even if we can’t kill him at once, it doesn’t matter. As long as he sheds a drop of blood here on the altar, he will die from the curse!”

“Charge!”

“Go—”

More than thirty people immediately surrounded the altar, drawing their weapons and aiming at Bai Zhou.

Bai Zhou was instantly surrounded by intense murderous intent, but he just looked at Village Chief Ab and said softly, “No need.”

“No need? No need for what? Stop being stubborn on the brink of death!”

Ab’s eyes were filled with murderous intent, and at his command, everyone raised their weapons and attacked Bai Zhou. In an instant, the altar was filled with the light of blades and swords, almost completely engulfing Bai Zhou’s figure!

But Bai Zhou took a half step back with one leg, slightly bent, and then held his sword in both hands, aiming the blade at Ab, and said, “No need to bother taking my blood—”

“Because to kill you all, I only need one strike.”

As soon as his voice fell, several blades clashed together because Bai Zhou’s figure suddenly disappeared from the spot, catching the villagers off guard and almost causing them to injure each other. In a critical moment, they hastily stopped their momentum, almost stumbling before barely stabilizing.

Sensing something, they all looked up into the sky, and in that instant, the moonlight, blade light, and the firelight around the altar illuminated their terrified eyes—

Bai Zhou rose into the air, wielding his sword to make a circular slash.

At that moment, the blade light was like snow, whiter than the moon in the sky.

Without leaving any room for maneuver, the circular blade light swept down with an unstoppable momentum, covering the entire altar!

“No, don’t…”

“Please spare us…”

“Who are you, really…”

A mix of panicked cries and wails erupted from the crowd, then abruptly stopped at the same moment—the circular blade light came down, and all their necks were sliced with a fine wound, and then they all fell to the ground, ceasing to breathe.

The figure in mid-air vanished into thin air, reappearing on the path to the mountain top.

There was no firelight to illuminate his way, but it didn’t hinder Bai Zhou’s progress as he quickly navigated the mountain paths, moving so fast it was almost impossible to catch him.

However, he hadn’t gone far when suddenly a round of applause came from behind him.

Bai Zhou stopped in his tracks, and in front of him, several strands of dark red firelight appeared. They floated in mid-air and among the grass, rising and falling continuously, like a young girl’s dancing red dress.

But in this world, no one who saw such firelight could still smile—red firelight, that was the symbol of the other world. Their appearance meant the Red God had already arrived!

Glancing at the system panel, it showed there were still three minutes until midnight.

Bai Zhou said, “As expected, even though Samhain has not officially arrived, you can still come to the human world from the other world.”

“Ah, ah, ah—”

A pleasing and somewhat enchanting female voice came from behind him.

But her next words seemed to come from behind a bush in front of him. “Killing so many people, you’re quite cruel.”

“This is exactly what you wanted to see, isn’t it? 1 or 32. These were your very words,” Bai Zhou replied.

“You have good ears. When Ab was discussing with the people, you were so far away…” the Red God said with a laugh. “Yet you heard everything? Hmm… But what you heard doesn’t matter. What matters is whether you understand the meaning. Ah—”

The Red God’s sigh seemed to come from the edge of the sky.

She continued, “The villagers kindly took in you deserters from the enemy country. Your actions now, have you betrayed them? Although I love watching betrayal unfold. However… ugh, you’re really quite cruel!”

“I killed them for self-defense and, secondly… to avenge you.”

“They got what they deserved, right, Red God?” Bai Zhou said, slightly turning to look in a certain direction. “Or should I call you—Amei?”

……

An hour ago.

Bai Zhou had escorted the young girl, Alayne, back to the residence of the Sun Family. When they approached the ancestral hall, they were immediately surrounded.

The other 15 who were supposed to participate in the night vigil weren’t present, having gone back to their homes to say their final goodbyes to their families. Now, surrounding Alayne at the ancestral hall were all the elders of the clan.

The leading elder stepped forward, holding a whip in his hand, and addressed the young girl. “Alayne! You have failed the hopes of the entire clan! Do you admit your punishment? I want you to kneel in front of our ancestors inside the ancestral hall and accept your punishment!”

Alayne instinctively wanted to kneel and beg for mercy, but as she began to bend her knees, she vaguely thought of something and looked at Bai Zhou for help.

Bai Zhou nodded at her and then stepped forward.

Sensing something, the elder said to Bai Zhou, “Young man… We appreciate your help for Alayne, but this is an internal matter of the clan, and we hope you won’t interfere!”

Another person said, “Why appreciate him? If it weren’t for these deserters helping the Cloud Family, we might not have lost.”

The third elder looked at Alayne. His beard was white with age, giving him an imposing demeanor. “Alayne, it’s the people around you who caused your loss. How can you hide behind him! Come out and accept your punishment!”

Bai Zhou, pretending not to hear, took a stick from his bag and held it in his hand, though he didn’t draw his Tang sword.

Pointing the stick at the people, he calmly said, “No one is allowed to punish her.”

His words obviously angered the crowd. The elders immediately took a stance, each drawing a sword, showing they possessed high martial skills, not merely villagers.

“Our clan respects martial prowess,” the leading elder said. “If you want to stand up for Alayne, that’s not impossible. Choose an elder to challenge.”

Bai Zhou lifted the stick in his hand and said calmly, “All of you come at me together.”

“What an arrogant tone!”

“Boss, let’s all go at him! See how powerful he can be!”

“Exactly! Let’s do it!”

All seven elders, who were once guards of the king, indeed all attacked at once. Engaging Bai Zhou, they launched one attack after another, their killing intent growing.

Bai Zhou faced seven opponents, retreating and fighting with ease.

After a quarter of an hour, Bai Zhou was surrounded by the seven, who mercilessly thrust their swords at him.

But not only did they all miss, but before they could react, they were each hit hard on the neck with the stick, subsequently all falling to the ground.

Alayne watched in astonishment.

Bai Zhou didn’t look at her again, simply holding a wooden stick and moving among the people.

He tapped one person on the leg with the stick and said, “You, your right leg’s movement is very slow and clumsy. Have you been seriously injured? Broken a leg before?”

Without waiting for an answer, he continued to the next person, this time tapping on the shoulder. “You broke your shoulder.”

These words were shocking enough.

But Bai Zhou continued. As he walked forward, he mentioned each person’s old injuries. “Were you shot near the heart?”

“Your lungs have issues. You’ve inhaled some kind of poisonous substance.”

“Both of your legs have been broken.”

……

After completing a round, Bai Zhou said, “You are certainly not ordinary villagers. When you joined forces against me earlier, not only was your coordination seamless, but you also knew how to deploy troops and strategize. You must have a military background.”

“Clearly being soldiers, yet you hide your identities and farm in such a place, it seems you have committed crimes.”

“Therefore, it’s best if you tell me your story. Otherwise, even if I don’t kill you, spreading the story of you hiding here will leave you no way out.”

“I am a deserter from the Land of Silence. What about you? Deserters from the Kingdom of Words?”

“Fuck you! We, we are not deserters!” An elder, his face turning red with anger, couldn’t help but retort.

“Then tell me the story,” Bai Zhou said. At this point, he noticed a new message from Zhou Qian on the system panel, his lips curving slightly into a smile. However, when he looked back at the villagers, the smile quickly disappeared.

He continued, “For instance, who is Amei?”

After about ten minutes, Bai Zhou had listened to their story.

The version he first heard was naturally identical to the one Zhou Qian heard.

After hearing the story, Bai Zhou asked, “According to you, all of you elders were guards serving alongside the king of the Kingdom of Words. Then, since there was never a war between the two countries, how did you get such serious injuries? You must have clashed with people from the Land of Silence.”

Hearing this, everyone’s expression changed instantly.

It was a while before the eldest elder spoke up. “We didn’t clash with the Land of Silence, but we did clash with others! There are more countries surrounding the Kingdom of Words. The king has more than one enemy!”

“Why stay silent for so long then?” Bai Zhou asked.

“Because Amei is a criminal! We are truly ashamed to discuss everything she has done! She was unfaithful and unfilial—”

“Enough.”

Bai Zhou suddenly interrupted them, seemingly unwilling to listen any further.

Having been in this game for seven years, he had already heard far too many similar lies.

Glancing towards where the families lived, he noticed that some of the 15 people keeping watch had left, apparently preparing to head to the square. Bai Zhou didn’t want to waste any more time. He grabbed the eldest elder by the shoulder, forcing him to stand up, then pulled out a dagger and pressed it against his throat, speaking in a calm but undeniable tone. “Everyone, follow me to the ancestral hall.”

With the respected elder in Bai Zhou’s grip, the people had no choice but to follow his command and enter the ancestral hall.

Bai Zhou had Alayne close the door behind them, then pressed the dagger closer to the elder’s throat until blood was drawn.

The sight of blood made Bai Zhou appear extremely cold and ruthless.

With eyes that seemed to be tinged with blood, he indifferently looked at the remaining six elders.

“Explain the story of that year within three minutes. Otherwise, he dies after three minutes.”

……

Time returned to the present.

Under the moonlight, a girl in a full red dress appeared on the mountain path in front of Bai Zhou.

The ink-colored grass brushed past her bare, smooth ankles as she stepped forward, bathed in moonlight. Her beauty was otherworldly, more like a heavenly maiden than a spirit from another world.

“They got what they deserved… Ah, you are right about that,” Amei said with a pleasant voice.

As she walked, she lifted her dress with her hands. Her steps were light and graceful, with a hint of absent-minded cuteness in her reminiscence.

“They forced me to part from my lover and forced me to marry far away in the Kingdom of Silence. They made me seduce its king, to steal the golden feathers. All because… the king of the Kingdom of Words was gravely ill, and because the people from the four great families had previously fought against the Land of Silence and lost, suffering heavy injuries.”

“To save this country, I did as they requested. I stole the golden feathers back, healed the king, healed them all.”

“But when the king of the Kingdom of Silence came to settle the score, what did they do? They handed me over.”

Looking at Bai Zhou, Amei said with a smile, “Such heartless scoundrels, handing me over wasn’t enough. They felt guilty inside, afraid of being exposed… and so they concocted a lie for the whole world, making everyone believe I was born malicious, so vain that I would harm even my parents.”

“Of course. I guess there was also some jealousy from women envious of my looks, adding fuel to the fire, making my reputation even more vile…”

“But luckily. I had talent in life, and after death, I could become a Red God. So, how about it? Do you find the game we’re playing amusing?”

“They once betrayed me. Now, of course, I must let them taste the bitterness of betrayal,” Amei said. “I was treated like a horse for ten years. They thought I wasn’t fast enough, whipping me daily while chanting—’Run faster, horse, run faster.’ Now, it’s only natural for me to let them experience the consequences of not being able to run fast.”

Clapping her hands a few times, the Red God Amei said, “Ah, drop the handkerchief. This game is so much fun, isn’t it?”

Her gaze flickered, and she tilted her head to look at Bai Zhou. “But you’ve somewhat spoiled the fun of my game. What do you think should be done about that?”

---

The author has something to say:

Zhou Qian: My Zhou Ge is so cool~

Although the young couple isn’t together, they’re still coordinating well~ Ah heh.

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<<< || Table of Contents || >>>

Author: 木尺素 / Mu Chisu

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

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Chapter 121

Half an hour later, Zhou Qian led a group of players back to the square. Surprisingly, three NPCs hadn’t left yet: Tartar, Brega, and Tara.

Among them, Tartar was the most relaxed, merely yawning out of boredom. She stayed for one reason only—Brega and Tara hadn’t found their dogs yet, and she hadn’t managed to deliver their two portions of bone soup.

“Why not tell the story of the past?”

“If you don’t tell it, they won’t inform you about the whereabouts of your dogs.”

“Yes, I didn’t expect the deserters of the Land of Silence to be so capable. But there’s nothing to be done now. Just tell any story. Let’s get the dogs back first!”

“Even if you can’t find them, can you at least take the soup back? I have things to do back at the inn!”

These were the words Tartar said to the two, overheard by Zhou Qian and his group upon arrival.

As she was speaking, she looked up at the deserters who had returned to the square, finally showing a pleased expression. “You’re back at last! Why did the village chief give me such a tiresome task? Unfortunately, I’m not from here. To stay, I must work tirelessly, serving the villagers. Who else here can cook meat as deliciously as I?”

Zhou Qian smiled and greeted Tartar before turning to look at Brega and Tara. Before heading to the temple, Zhou Qian had asked Tartar about Nameless Village and the two countries.

Unfortunately, as a non-local, Tartar knew little. Then, Zhou Qian planned to use the fact that the dogs hadn’t been found to threaten Brega and Tara. These two were obviously elders of the village, likely knowing many secrets.

However, as Tartar warned, the word “Amei” was taboo here. The moment Zhou Qian hinted at asking about her, the two retreated, running off to search for their dogs again.

The reaction of these two NPCs further confirmed the significance of Amei.

Zhou Qian was about to split up with Hidden Blade and Ke Yuxiao to follow up when he received a message from Qi Liuxing.

Considering the symbolism of the three skulls, the color-changing glass, and the vanishing stone tablet with the third prohibition, and realizing many clues in this instance might be fleeting, Zhou Qian decided to visit the Temple of the Goddess of Prayers first.

Now that they had returned from the temple and the two NPCs were back in the square, from Tartar’s words and their ashen faces, it was clear they hadn’t found their dogs yet.

Their disappointment made Zhou Qian smile, who immediately approached and asked, “You care so much about your dogs, it must be important for tonight. Just like the indispensable fire. I’m curious, how do beings of the other world know every household has a fire?”

To safely spend the night, players must light a fire. Due to the prohibition, players had to play with colors to conceal the fire from being seen outside.

However, if the Red Gods or ghosts from the other world couldn’t see the fire, the players’ color tricks would be useless—the ghost wouldn’t see the fire from outside and might enter the houses to harm people.

The game surely wouldn’t have a no-win scenario, meaning ghosts perceive fire differently. The prohibition likely only prevents villagers from seeing the firelight.

That’s why Zhou Qian raised this question, seeking confirmation before the real Samhain festival.

Tara responded, “The other world beings are so powerful, what don’t they know? They know everything. As long as there’s fire, they won’t enter the houses!”

“Since there’s fire… why the need for dogs?” Zhou Qian asked again. “I heard dogs can communicate with the other world beings, providing warnings against danger. But they’re not essential, right? Since fire can ward off the other world beings, you just need to stay indoors. So why the need for dogs?”

Brega, with a grim face, said, “Because fire only repels ordinary otherworldly beings. They come to this world to consume us. The bone sacrifices in our homes can drive them to this square. You see, besides burning bones, we also burn lots of grains and meat! Thus, being driven to the square and seeing the food we sacrifice, they can be satisfied too! They’ll leave at dawn! Overall, they are easy to deal with! But if the Red God comes… that, that’s dangerous!”

“If the Red God appears, ordinary food won’t suffice. He will demand something extremely precious from us. He wants to trade with us. At such times, we can’t communicate directly with him—only through dogs or some sentient animals.”

Zhou Qian, having received a message from Bai Zhou, naturally understood what the Red God was. It was a simple and crude understanding—it was akin to a powerful ghost or demon from hell.

With this understanding, as Brega explained, it became clear—if the Red God appeared and there was no dog to mediate, the villagers wouldn’t know what the Red God demanded, and failing to satisfy him could lead to their direct demise. However, if there was a dog to relay messages, they could promptly fulfill the Red God’s demands.

Curiously, Zhou Qian asked Brega, “So, people here can talk to animals?”

This was indeed a very magical instance.

“Yes! Every one of us can!” Brega said angrily. “So can you return our dogs to us?”

“No.” Zhou Qian’s expression appeared very innocent. “You haven’t told me the story of Amei yet.”

Brega couldn’t suppress his anger any longer. “You need to understand, you’re deserters! We are the ones sheltering you! Don’t go too far. We can drive you out at any time!”

Zhou Qian looked at the pattern on his clothes. “You’re from the Moon Family. Without our help, you might have been sent to guard the night. And you—” Turning to Tara, he continued, “You’re from the Cloud Family. We are on the same side as you. There’s no need to burn bridges so quickly. At worst, we get driven out, but what about you? Without your dog, you might not survive the night.”

“So, why the hassle? I just want to hear a story. Let’s start with…” Zhou Qian smiled, stared into Brega’s eyes again, and said emphatically, “The ‘Golden Feather’ story.”

Zhou Qian’s mention of the “Golden Feather” seemed to hit a nerve.

In that instant, Brega and Tara, who were from opposing families, made a coordinated movement—they looked at each other and then unconsciously moved a bit closer.

This was like two villagers in internal strife, feeling a common threat against them, instinctively uniting against an external enemy.

“Ah, the Golden Feather is important. Amei’s story is indeed related to it. She stole it, causing the conflict between the two countries, right?” Zhou Qian said with a smile. “So you see, I already know the gist of the story. It’s just the details…”

Hearing this, Tara and Brega exchanged glances again, then both glanced at Tartar.

Zhou Qian, noticing the hint, turned to Tartar and said with a smile, “If you don’t mind, I’ll talk to them first. Thanks for your hospitality. We’ll help you bring these pots back tonight. You don’t have to wait here.”

Hearing this, Tartar readily turned to leave. “Fine. I’m happy to have the help. But you need to come back before 10:30. I have some things to tell you. Otherwise, you’ll face danger tonight!”

Zhou Qian nodded and then turned to Tara and Brega. “Now, can we talk? What exactly is the story? What’s the significance of the Golden Feather? And what did Amei really do?”

“You must swear that you will never tell this story to outsiders! Otherwise, you will turn into a bird and never be able to become human again,” Tara said sternly. “This is our scandal, not to be known by those outside the village!”

“Alright. I swear. I won’t tell outsiders,” Zhou Qian said solemnly. He didn’t show any peculiar expression, but this didn’t mean he hadn’t noticed the peculiar coincidence—why did the oath also involve “birds”?

Without dwelling on the matter of the birds, Zhou Qian quietly waited for the two people in front of him to react. Clearly, this instance was filled with magical elements, and the inhabitants took oaths, prohibitions, and curses very seriously, believing these elements could truly limit one’s actions.

Thus, after Zhou Qian solemnly swore, the expressions on both their faces relaxed considerably, seeming ready to tell the story. Of course, they were only willing to share with Zhou Qian, who had taken the oath. After sending the other players to wait outside the square, Zhou Qian stood alone in the center of the square, finally hearing a complete story.

About sixty or seventy years ago, the Day, Moon, Star, and Cloud Families didn’t reside here; they were all part of the guards of the king from the Kingdom of Words, albeit in different branches. From the beginning, the four branches, each marked by a different symbol, swore to loyally serve the Kingdom of Words’ royal family until death. They were intimately connected with the royal family and even intermarried.

Amei was born into the most prestigious family of the Cloud branch. Her father was the king’s most valued subordinate, and shortly after her birth, she was taken in by the king as an adopted daughter, becoming a princess.

However, it was said she was so ugly that the prince of the Kingdom of Words felt disgusted just by looking at her. Otherwise, based on the relationship between the king and her father, she would be betrothed to the prince instead of just accepting her as an adopted daughter.

Due to her appearance, Amei lived in contempt from a young age. She was indeed pitiable, but what she did later was inexcusable—

She either made a wish to some god or sought the help of an evil magician, and suddenly became beautiful, becoming the most beautiful woman in the Kingdom of Words, but at the cost of her parents’ health.

The moment she became beautiful, her parents’ health declined rapidly, and they died within three months.

Afterward, conflict erupted between the Kingdom of Words and the Land of Silence, and war was imminent.

During the peace talks, the king of the Land of Silence mentioned that he had seen a portrait of Amei, fell in love at first sight, and was willing to marry her to unite the two countries and avoid war.

The king of the Kingdom of Words asked Amei’s wishes, and she gladly agreed. Her decision was not out of consideration for the Kingdom of Words or its people, but because she could no longer stay with her family.

Everyone spoke of her as selfish, heartless, and the direct cause of her parents’ deaths.

When Amei, this disaster, was sent away, the four major guard divisions that knew her true nature were all too happy.

But no one expected the story to end there.

In the wedding procession was a young man named Beilan, born in the Star branch of the guard.

On the way to the wedding, he and Amei fell in love.

For many years afterward, Amei appeared to be a respectful wife to the king of the Land of Silence, but in reality, she was secretly meeting with Beilan.

Beilan quit his job in the guard, left the king his family had served for generations, and became a merchant, traveling between the two countries to meet with Amei.

If not for an accident, perhaps they could have continued like this.

But an accident did occur.

During one of Beilan’s returns to the Kingdom of Words, it happened to be the Samhain festival.

The passage between the worlds was opened, and the Red God came to the human realm. He wanted to experience human life again, so he possessed Beilan’s body, banishing his soul to another realm and turning Beilan into a wandering ghost in that world.

Thanks to a spirit-communicating white dog and villagers who could communicate with the dog, everyone learned of Beilan’s fate. Somehow, Amei heard about it and naturally wanted to bring Beilan back, or at least see him again.

But with the divide between the living and the other world, conversing with a lover in another realm wasn’t easy.

It’s said that Amei was so worried that her hair turned white.

The people of the Kingdom of Words communicate with spirits through white dogs.

As for the people of the Land of Silence, they rely on birds.

Animals are considered spirits by the people of this world, serving as their channel to communicate with other worlds.

It’s said that the king of the Land of Silence had a particularly precious golden feather, which fell from the most powerful bird spirit.

With the help of this feather, one doesn’t need to wait for Samhain to open the passage between worlds to talk to beings from other realms.

Thus, Amei stole the feather from the king to communicate with the other world and find Beilan.

After stealing the feather, Amei dared not stay in the Land of Silence, so she fled back to the Kingdom of Words.

With his most precious golden feather stolen, the king of the Land of Silence waged war in rage.

As the army approached, the Kingdom of Words found Amei, investigated everything, understood the situation, and returned her and the golden feather to the Land of Silence.

The crisis of war between the two countries was averted once again, and Amei returned to the Land of Silence.

Amei, having harmed her parents, was unfilial; rashly stealing the treasure of the Land of Silence, she disregarded provoking the Land of Silence and endangering her people, showing disloyalty. Moreover, as a wife, she was unfaithful by having an affair…

These terrible reputations followed her back to the Land of Silence.

As a result, Amei received the hatred and curses of thousands of people from the Land of Silence.

So, what was the outcome?

What was the fate of this unfaithful, unfilial woman who nearly caused a war between two countries?

Zhou Qian thought this and asked.

Tara replied, “The king of the Land of Silence asked us if he could dispose of Amei as he wished. By then, everyone in both countries knew what Amei had done. There wasn’t anyone who didn’t hate Amei. Our king, her foster father, even said that she could certainly be disposed of by the Land of Silence as they saw fit!”

Brega added, “So later, the king of the Land of Silence had a magician turn her into a horse.”

“A horse?” Zhou Qian was somewhat surprised.

“Yes,” Brega said. “She was assigned to guard the city gates. Whenever distinguished guests visited the king, they could ride her to the palace. The king said, after all, his woman liked being ridden.”

Initially reluctant to talk about Amei, considering her a disgrace, both men became excited when discussing her punishment. Tara couldn’t help but speak up without waiting for Zhou Qian to ask, “Besides being turned into a horse, I heard… the nobles could order her around to carry goods. Sometimes, when they overloaded her and she ran slowly, the nobles would whip her!”

“What a pity. I would have been happy to see that scene. Without this woman, we would still be in the guards, enjoying wealth and honor! But now? We were implicated and considered criminals! We were sent to this remote place… only to farm and mine, never to enjoy wealth and honor again!”

“When we left the royal city, I was 7 years old. I remember there were specially delicious candies there. But since leaving the royal city, I’ve never tasted them again. It’s all because of that woman! She really deserved to die!”

Tara said, “Yes. But compared to being executed, living in disgrace probably suited her better. I heard that many nobles who visited the king rode her, shouting ‘Run, horse, run… run…’ while riding her. Hahaha, that was really too funny.”

“It seems like she died after about ten years.” Brega sighed. “It’s probably from exhaustion. What a pity. She should have suffered a few more years!”

……

After gathering the information he wanted, Zhou Qian left the square.

The ones who came to the square afterward were the 32 people who were to be sacrificed tonight under the guise of a vigil.

The people hadn’t all arrived yet, and the village chief was personally counting the numbers while pacing back and forth, seemingly waiting anxiously for something.

A moment later, a subordinate ran over.

The moonlight revealed his pale, anxious face.

Seeing this, Village Chief Ab sensed something was amiss and asked him, “What’s the situation?”

The subordinate looked around, noticed the people were still far away, and whispered to the chief, “The medium from the neighboring village really helped a lot. She used a secret technique to send her soul to the other world and found the Red God who oversees our land. That Red God leaked his demand for this year!”

“What demand? Speak up!” the chief urged anxiously.

“He said one sentence—” the man swallowed. “1, or 31.”

The chief’s face turned completely dark. “What does that mean? He’ll either take one person or 31?”

“Perhaps that’s what it means. Anyway, that Red God only said one sentence to the medium.”

“Can’t the medium be clearer! How much did we pay her? Just for one sentence? She really is…” The chief couldn’t help saying, “Why can’t we have mediums or magicians who can communicate between the two worlds here!”

“She’s only human, after all; she can’t stay in the other world too long. According to her, finding that Red God was already not easy. Although the Red God is ferocious, the deals he makes with people always come through. He never reneges. So I think…”

He pointed towards a corner of the square.

Following his gaze, Village Chief Ab looked over and naturally saw that person.

It was Bai Zhou.

At that moment, he was quietly leaning against a pile of unlit bones.

The moonlight became a bit brighter, casting his shadow long. The silver moonlight and the ghostly blue of the bone pyre interwove, making his stern face appear even more expressionless.

“You’re thinking of using him?” Village Chief Ab frowned.

“He loves playing the hero, standing vigil for Alayne. Let him do it.” A hint of ruthlessness flashed in the speaker’s eyes.

“But we promised Tartar. She bought him as labor.” The chief frowned. “Tartar knows many people. If our affairs get out…”

“She wants money. We’ll just pay her off. Otherwise—” the man narrowed his eyes. “The medium from the next village… has ways to get rid of her! After all, she’s an outsider!”

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The author has something to say:

Qian Ge! Someone wants to kill your husband!

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