Players, Please Board the Train

Jiangjiang was indeed trapped.

She had used every item at her disposal, but there were barely any that could open the Mental World, because the one affected was herself. She appeared to be destroying the book tower, but it was entirely possible she wasn’t facing the real Mental World at all, or that she thought she had used the items but actually hadn’t.

Under the influence of mental interference, players sometimes couldn’t distinguish between reality and illusion.

Jiangjiang knew a thing or two about this as well, so she also understood that the longer this dragged on, the more disadvantageous it became for her. Thus, she used an item specifically designed to counter mental power for the second time.

The room did collapse, but it quickly reassembled itself, giving her no chance to escape.

The facts were plain to see: either Xu Huo’s Mental World was more expansive than she had imagined, or his Super Evolution in the mental aspect far surpassed mental Evolvers of the same grade.

Neither scenario boded well for Jiangjiang.

In truth, she had known of Xu Huo long before he had ever known of her. Though she had never seen him before and didn’t know his name or identity, she had vaguely glimpsed his figure when she first began foreseeing deaths.

As she had said, her Death Paintings were scenes she saw through her characteristics, and once seen, they could not be changed. The time of death might shift, but the manner of death would not. She had foreseen her own death scene more than once, and even after confirming that the place of death was Zone 009, she still chose to remain here.

It wasn’t until before Zone 009 merged that she fully saw her own death scene, dying in an art gallery, standing beside her a handsome man, the Xu Huo she had seen at the hotel earlier, not this ugly face he wore now.Jiangjiang was waiting for death, but she wouldn’t actively walk into it. She was a C-level player, and with Xu Huo’s evolution rate, he was at most D-grade. From their previous encounter, he was a combat-type player, more formidable than others of the same grade, but not ridiculously so. As long as the gallery could open, her odds of winning were better than half.

That was how it should have been, but who could have guessed that a combat-type player would complete Super Evolution in the mental aspect and happen to counter her perfectly? Even the gallery, such a fine item, was of little use now.

With a smile, she took out the circular ring item at her waist that could release shockwaves, then unclasped the necklace around her neck and removed the thumb-sized black square from the pendant. As soon as the two items drew close to each other, they began to resonate, and ripple-like shockwaves emanated with a buzzing vibration.

Jiangjiang let go, and the two mutually attracting items floated autonomously in the air, each release of impact force stronger than the last. After several vibrations, the ring and the black square suddenly turned red, and a shockwave shredded the entire floor in one go!

The tower within the Mental World naturally wouldn’t collapse, but countless books flipped through the air, torn to shreds by wave after wave of impact, completely disrupting the interior of the book tower!

At the same time, the two items were like branding irons, shifting from red to brilliant white, gradually becoming blinding!

The moment that thing turned red, Xu Huo realized something was wrong. He pulled Jiangjiang down from the upper floor in an instant, snatched the Paintbrush from her hand, and brought her into Shelter 101. But he hadn’t expected the cramped space to cause even greater tremors. By the time he put the shelter away, the floating ring and square suddenly erupted with intense light, and the final shockwave came crushing down!

Xu Huo immediately activated ”Truth Transcends All,” withdrew his Mental World, and sprinted at top speed, trying to put as much distance between himself and the blast as possible within those three seconds!

However, in less than a second, the two of them were sent flying.

In fact, the moment Xu Huo was struck in the back, he felt slightly relieved. The characteristic had negated the impact force, and the damage he suffered wasn’t severe. Moreover, judging by the speed and force with which they were thrown, as long as they cleared the epicenter of the shockwave, there was no need to activate a dungeon for shelter.

In the blink of an eye, he pulled on a Protective Suit and draped another one over Jiangjiang, barely covering most of her body.

The shockwave lasted for roughly seven seconds. Xu Huo carried Jiangjiang through several paintings consecutively and landed in an art gallery. His injuries weren’t serious, but Jiangjiang vomited blood the moment she hit the ground.

Xu Huo let her lean against the wall, frowning. ”Do you want to die?”

Jiangjiang panted for a while before speaking weakly, ”Can’t you tell?”

”I can. Your injuries aren’t that severe.” Xu Huo retrieved his Protective Suit.

”If you hadn’t shielded me, I’d be dead or close to it...” Jiangjiang struggled to right herself, her head resting against the wall as her eyelids drooped slightly. ”Your face now isn’t good-looking... I want to see the one from a couple of days ago...”

Xu Huo removed the false face.

Jiangjiang looked at him for several seconds before smiling. ”Fate has decreed it so. Kill me...”

The Crimson Sword was resting on her shoulder the very next second. ”Is the death you foresaw like this?”

”It seems so...” Jiangjiang opened her eyes again, as if trying to discern something, but in the end, she said nothing and closed her eyes.

Two seconds later, the weight on her shoulder disappeared.

Xu Huo spoke. ”Foreseeing the future shouldn’t be that difficult in the game either. The Dimensional Rift claims to be a high-dimensional game, and you decided to die just because you saw a glimpse of a scene across time and space?”

Jiangjiang reopened her eyes but didn’t answer his question. Instead, she asked, ”Do you know the paradox of time travel?”

”The grandfather paradox.” Xu Huo said.

In simple terms, a grandson travels back in time to kill his grandfather, which means his father would never be born, and therefore he would never be born. But since he was never born, no one killed his grandfather, so his father would still be born.

”So for the future, anything I do is futile.” Jiangjiang’s tone was calm, clearly having already accepted this fact.

”Time is merely a concept humans invented for convenience of measurement. How can you be certain that time in all spaces moves along a single straight line? If there were other forces that could interfere with this ’timeline,’ then the so-called grandfather paradox wouldn’t exist.” After finishing, Xu Huo asked, ”Have you been to a higher-dimensional time and space?”

”No, but someone has. He failed.” A hint of emotion crept into Jiangjiang’s eyes. ”Not long after he returned, he died exactly as foreseen.”

”But you haven’t died.” Xu Huo said.

Jiangjiang twitched the corner of her mouth. ”Then maybe one day, I’ll die before you.”

”Since you won’t be dying anytime soon, tell me about your teacher.” Xu Huo crouched down to meet her eyes.

Jiangjiang smiled again, with a hint of playfulness. ”But I don’t want to tell you at all. What are you going to do about it?”

Xu Huo’s expression darkened.

The gallery began to change, and Jiangjiang continued, ”Have you ever considered that the person who answered your questions on the bounty platform was me?”

”Come find me in Zone 009 when you have time. Maybe after enough time passes, I’ll be willing to tell you.”

”That paintbrush is a gift to you...”

As her voice faded away, the gallery, along with Jiangjiang herself, vanished from before his eyes. Xu Huo stood amidst the ruins, and without even twitching an eyelid, he kicked away the person flying toward him!