691 The City

 

When Han Fei’s blood fell on the hilt, the souls trapped inside roared! The arms reached out to grab Rest in Peace with Han Fei. The blade made by humanity pierced through Malice. The nightmare dissipated, and curses rampaged. Han Fei was like the scariest ghost in the dark, but he also held the brightest light in the city.

Han Fei’s shoulder was injured by the female student, and his chest was hit by Fu Sheng. Han Fei didn’t care. He wouldn’t let go of the knife again.

“Do you think you are worthy of this knife?” Han Fei’s red eyes looked at F’s eyes under the mask. The black box owners of different eras glared at each other.

The wails in Rest in Peace turned into roars. When Han Fei held that knife, everyone present inside the hilt seemed to find the reason for their existence. They were there to protect the last torch in the winter, to bring all the souls out of the cryptic world, to bring them to see the tomorrow that had never appeared in their future.

This blade was not a black blade used to trap Malice. It was a blade that even F wanted to claim as his own. It was Han Fei’s blade!

Just like how it was at the meat-packing factory, the beauty of humanity’s soul stood together with Han Fei. They were fearless and would continue to press forward even if it meant their death. Humanity wasn’t sharp, but they were willing to turn into the blade for Han Fei.

With the roars of every beautiful soul inside the hilt, the warm blade cut through Malice’s waist!

Fu Sheng’s hands couldn’t stop these souls. The butcher knife had started to go out of control. After killing Malice, the souls turned backward. F knew he couldn’t hold onto Rest in Peace. He immediately abandoned it and chose to unite with the black Malice.

The brilliant light slashed through F’s mask. The blade finally stopped on the female student’s neck. Even after 99 deaths, Han Fei didn’t want to kill the girl. He was not a murderer, neither was his blade.

“The girl loves you so much, but you turned her into something like this? It looks like the changes I made inside the last altar are just illusions. This is the ice-cold truth.” Han Fei took a deep breath. “I know the things you’ve once experienced. I can guess why you turn out like this, and I know what to do now.”

He raised his blade at F.

“You represent the past. No matter what I do in the altar world, it can’t change your personality. Then, those horrible memories should be buried. Leave the future to me. I can’t guarantee that I can be the best, but I should be better than you.”

F, who united with Malice, stopped not far away. His bones cracked, and his body kept shifting, but he didn’t seem to feel the pain. F looked at Han Fei silently until the white mask cracked.

It was a handsome face under the mask. His skin was abnormally pale. Perhaps it was because he had been consuming medicine nonstop.

“Is this how you looked like when you were my age?” This was the first time Han Fei saw Fu Sheng like this. The face under the mask was very young, about 20 plus. “Actually, I don’t get it. The girl accompanies you daily. When you were tortured by the people at school, the girl accompanied you unconditionally. Why would you have the heart to turn her into something like this? Don’t you… know that she likes you?”

The white mask fell to the ground and shattered into pieces.

“I can see the future. If I don’t separate the cryptic world, the whole city will be assimilated.” F allowed the ghost to consume his body. His voice was still calm. “The human world will become hell. The days will become shorter and the nights longer. Everyone will die in madness, and death will become common.”

“Is that why you chose to destroy the path to the cryptic world?”

“I will become the theme park’s new manager. After the separation, I will enter the other world alone and destroy it.” F was like a young medical intern, and he wanted to save everyone on his own.

“No wonder no one in the living world remembers you. You’ve sealed yourself up in the cryptic world.”

“That’s right. That is what I need to do.” Most of F’s body had been consumed by the ghost, but he still retained his rationality. This appeared to be his trump card. “You asked me about the train earlier, but you got one thing wrong. I never wanted to sacrifice anyone because I was on the tracks too. I wasn’t the train driver, and I couldn’t control fate! The choice I had to make was whether to save the endless people on the left track or the few of us on the right.”

Malice munched on F’s heart. His face slowly resembled F. “Soon, you’ll see. With Dream’s ritual, the cryptic world will overlap with this city. If you can insist on your choice after seeing all the tragedies, then I have nothing to say.”

“I get it now. You want to use this method to let me see the consequence of not separating the cryptic world, right?” Han Fei’s stance was different from Fu Sheng's. He had opened both sides of the black box. That was both murder and salvation. A person like that could open a new path and channel all the accumulated despair into the human world.

“Do not risk it with everyone’s future. Between the real world and the cryptic world, one is destined to be ruined. Even the Unmentionables can’t take on both worlds at the same time.” The black Malice slithered on F’s neck. Just as it was about to consume F fully, F pressed on his heart. Malice seemed to feel something. It crawled back into F’s body unwillingly. After he left behind the last warning, he stared at Han Fei for a long time before he also retreated. Using his body to feed the ghost was a bad idea, and it had many severe consequences, so he had to leave as soon as possible. He was no match for Han Fei and Xu Qin currently. After possessing that butcher’s knife, he knew how powerful it was.

When Fu Sheng departed, the female student instantly disappeared. Part of the players, including Thousand Nights, left with F. F still had some charm. F wanted to kill Han Fei before he could reach Stage Eight, but he was too late. The plan had failed.

“Shall we give chase?” Qiang Wei climbed up from the ground. “Is that man really a player? How come I have no impression of his face at all?”

“Never mind.” Han Fei’s curses faded away. He hugged the paper doll and inspected its body. The cracks in the eyes multiplied. Xu Qin couldn’t use her power that often. She had died 99 times with Han Fei. She only had her curses left. If the power of the curses was exhausted, Xu Qin might perish too.

Actually, both Han Fei and F were pushing it. They were both at their limits already.

“I’ve already taken back the thing I want. We’ll slowly start to regain the upper hand.” Han Fei glanced at the chaotic neighborhood. The nightmare had spread. He didn’t know how to handle this. He decided to wait for dawn.

Han Fei examined everyone’s wounds in Room 444. “The Malice uncontrollable by the theme park can provide some hatred for Xu Qin to help her recover. Dream has planted black cocoons in living humans for his resurrection ritual. The thing inside the cocoons can be absorbed by the cat.” Han Fei picked the cat up and carefully observed the tattoo on it. The pattern was very similar to the pattern on Big Sin. “Why would my ghost tattoo turn into a cat?”

“Han Fei, do we need to save the people downstairs?” Qiang Wei asked uncertainly, “A quarter of the city’s police force is here. If something happened to them, I don’t think we can handle the chaos tomorrow on our own.”

“The chaos tomorrow?” Han Fei turned to look at Qiang Wei.

“F saw the future. Someone inside the theme park wanted to seal up the cryptic world. The ghosts will initiate their last resistance. Tonight is the turning point,” Qiang Wei was only second to F among the players. He found out many things from F too.

“You all know that I have a good relationship with the police. Isn’t it normal for me to go and save them?” Han Fei walked down the stairs with Rest in Peace. The other players followed.

Han Fei walked into the victims’ nightmare. He was the source of the nightmare, but he pulled these people out like he was the savior. Perhaps many people still saw him as a fugitive, but at least it sowed some doubts in the police who had been saved by him.

“Han Fei, I’m here!” Xiao Jia, who was hiding under the car, waved at Han Fei. “I managed to delay the police using my driving skills. But the taxi came alive on its own and drove to find you. I couldn’t stop it! I didn’t mean to bring the police here!”

“Thank you for everything.” Han Fei dragged Xiao Jia out from under the taxi. While they aided the police, they didn’t forget to deal with the monsters hiding inside the family compound. Chaos was descending upon the city. They needed to improve themselves as soon as possible.

“I wonder how the city will become after dawn that someone like Fu Sheng would choose to destroy it…”

While Han Fei pondered that, strange phenomena started to happen at different corners of the city.

…

“Husband, why is the sun still so dark when it’s already 7 am? But the weather forecast did stay it’ll rain tonight.” A woman turned around in bed. She noticed her husband was not in the bedroom. The crib was also empty. “Where are they?” She got out of bed with her tired body. She opened the bedroom door and looked out. Her husband’s theme park uniform was left on the couch. She could hear her baby crying.

“Husband, where are you?” Following the crying, the woman slowly pushed open the bathroom door. She saw her husband in a new theme park uniform, squatting inside the bathtub, facing away from her.

“What are you doing?”

“The chaos is coming. Ghosts might appear anywhere. Nowhere is safe! We need to be prepared!” The husband’s voice was mixed with the baby’s crying. “Do we need to prepare some supplies?”

“No. I hear babies can see things adults can’t…” The husband turned around. His bleeding eye sockets had two small eyeballs inside them. “Our home is temporarily safe.”

The scream made a male student passing by look up. “Domestic violence? Shall I call the police?” While he hesitated, he saw his classmate snuck out of the nearby alley. He tossed something inside the trash can.

“Brother Gou, why are you here so early in the morning? I remember your house is on the northern side.” The student waved at his friend. “It’s about to rain. Do you want to share my umbrella?

“You’re my best buddy, so I’ll tell you a secret. Don’t tell anyone else.” Brother Gou said mysteriously, “Yesterday, our class belle said that her dog was very annoying. It liked to lick her hands and face at night.”

“So what?”

“Haha.” Brother Gou laughed and ran out of the alley. Blood was stuck to the bottom of his pants. The male student was confused. He walked to the trash can and opened the black plastic dumped by Brother Gou. It was a dismembered dog inside. “How disgusting!” The student felt like vomiting. He quickly moved away. “Why is everyone acting strangely today? Mom is cooking meat stew early in the morning. When I asked her whether I should go and wake up Dad, she said Dad was already there. Now, my classmate is going around killing dogs. Has something gone wrong with the world?”

The male student couldn’t get it. He was about to leave when the sky started to rain. The student opened the umbrella. He took a few steps when he bumped into a thin man holding a red umbrella. The rim had completely covered the man’s face.

“I’m sorry for bumping into you.” The student walked past the man. “When did the man appear?”

Out of curiosity, the student tried to look under the man’s umbrella. When he saw the face, he was stunned. The man with the red umbrella had no face!

The male student’s heart pounded. He started to run. However, no matter how fast he was, the man in the red umbrella would constantly appear around him.

“What is that thing? Why is it following me?”

After some time, the student finally shook the man off. He held his umbrella and looked carefully around. The man in the red umbrella was indeed gone.

His heart relaxed. He was about to take a breather when he felt something drip on his head.

“Huh? Why is there rain under the umbrella?” The student raised his head, and he found a bleeding man’s face hidden inside his umbrella.

“Have you seen me?”