Back in the real world, as Qi Yang stepped out of the mist, he hadn’t even taken in his surroundings when an excited voice rang out.

“Brother Qi!” The voice was familiar; it came from Du Yong.

Turning toward the sound, Qi Yang saw Du Yong walking toward him, his eyes shining.

Besides Du Yong, Yuan Yuan was also there. When Yuan Yuan saw Qi Yang come out of the second-round game safely, she also looked very pleased.

But when she noticed that no one else was following Qi Yang as he came out, the smile on Yuan Yuan’s face changed. Not wanting to jump to the worst conclusions, she walked up to Qi Yang and asked cautiously, “Qi-ge, Kang Lian and the others didn’t come out with you?”

Qi Yang met Yuan Yuan’s hopeful gaze. There was no need for lies; those two really had left.

“No.” Qi Yang shook his head slightly.

Yuan Yuan smiled, still a little fanciful: “Aren’t you all in a game? Then maybe they’ll come out in a few days; looks like we’ll have to keep waiting.”

Although Du Yong didn’t know the whole truth either, suddenly, for some reason he had a premonition: the “not” in Qi Yang’s words meant they hadn’t come back with him, not that they weren’t in a game.

Qi Yang stared at Yuan Yuan; he didn’t speak immediately. In his calm eyes, something had already been revealed.

Yuan Yuan turned to look at Du Yong. Du Yong’s expression had changed too—whatever surprise he had a moment ago was gone, replaced by a solemn gravity.

Yuan Yuan took two steps back; she couldn’t accept this fact. She couldn’t believe that someone as clumsy as her could survive in the game—why couldn’t Kang Liang?

“Let’s wait two more days. We’ve already waited two days for you; I think if we wait two more days, they’ll definitely show up.” Yuan Yuan kept saying, as if that could convince herself.

Du Yong couldn’t stand it any longer; he called out Yuan Yuan’s name: “Yuan Yuan.”

“I’m not listening, shut up!” Yuan Yuan suddenly snapped, her nerves raw, her voice sounding hysterical.

She turned her gaze back to Qi Yang, even looking at him with pleading eyes, hoping he wouldn’t tell her the cruel truth.

“It was my fault for not protecting them.” Facing the fragile Yuan Yuan, Qi Yang instinctively shouldered the blame for Kang Lian and the others’ deaths. He didn’t like seeing girls cry, and by now there were already tears in Yuan Yuan’s eyes.

Yuan Yuan’s body trembled violently; the verdict had been delivered, and her hope was shattered.

Yuan Yuan shook her head and laughed, tears streaming down her face.

“Impossible, I don’t believe it, you

are joking with me, aren’t you? Aren’t you!” Yuan Yuan’s voice rose to a shriek as she teetered on the edge of collapse. She thought of Kang Lian’s care for her, and of the days they’d spent back in the living world—sharing a room, sleeping in the same bed. Even though they’d known each other for less than a month in total, she had already come to regard Kang Lian as her best friend, even a kind of spiritual attachment.

Now that Qi Yang had told her Kang Lian had had an accident, Yuan Yuan simply could not accept the fact.

Yuan Yuan choked and cried; she turned and ran out of the room, back to her own room—they had booked a room in this hotel for a whole month.

Only Du Yong and Qi Yang were left in the room. Qi Yang walked over and sat on the sofa; he rubbed his forehead—Yuan Yuan’s shriek had given him a headache.

Du Yong stood to one side. Seeing Qi Yang uncomfortable, he turned and poured a glass of warm water.

“Qi-ge, water.” Du Yong handed the water to Qi Yang.

Qi Yang took it and said thanks.

“You don’t need to blame yourself. I know it’s not your fault — it’s those games, and those inhuman ghosts.” After the two games, Du Yong seemed much more mature; he started to comfort Qi Yang.

Qi Yang kept his gaze lowered. He didn’t feel guilt; from the start he knew he wasn’t the one who killed Kang Lian and the others. If it wasn’t him, why should he carry guilt for a fault that wasn’t his?

He was special, able to make ghosts fear and respect him, but a game is a game. This time they were together, and he could protect them all around, but if they weren’t together, did that mean they would have to face things on their own?

Qi Yang withdrew his hand and took two sips of warm water.

“Go check on Yuan Yuan more often.” Qi Yang asked Du Yong to look after Yuan Yuan, his pregnant husband; to be honest, he didn’t really want to get involved in too many matters or manage too many people.

Du Yong noticed a hint of weariness in Qi Yang’s expression. In this game they had five days, while Qi Yang and the others had seven. Du Yong knew that one extra day meant a lot more threats to life.

“Mm, you don’t need to worry about that. You look tired. Rest in this room, and I’ll come by to wake you for dinner.” Du Yong knew Qi Yang’s personality—Qi Yang preferred quiet—so he gave up the room and let Qi Yang rest.

Qi Yang got up to wash his face, changed into slippers, and went to bed.

Du Yong left the room and went next door to Yuan Yuan’s room; all the reserved rooms were on the same floor and right next to each other.

Du Yongyang knocked on the door; no one came to open it.

Standing outside and not leaving, Du Yong sent a text to Yuan Yuan on his phone to soothe her emotions.

He told her there were still many unknowns in this game, and he had noticed one detail: those ghost NPCs weren’t truly without intelligence; on the contrary, they all possessed it.

Every game produced many NPCs—where would so many be found? Du Yong believed they weren’t mass-produced in some factory. Perhaps those ghosts had once been human. Following that line of reasoning, it was possible the NPCs weren’t confined to a single game; maybe the games were interconnected for them.

These were all Du Yong’s bold speculations, and he was saying them now to reassure Yuan Yuan—he feared that if Yuan Yuan lost control of his emotions and couldn’t make sense of things, he might do something rash.

And Yuan Yuan, upon seeing that information, truly believed it.

She needed that information; even if some part of her knew it was false, she was willing to believe it was real—so that perhaps one day in the future she might meet Kang Lian again.

Yuan Yuan wiped the tears from her face. Her eyes were red, but the look of painful despair she’d worn moments before had already changed—her eyes were unusually bright.

Yuan Yuan walked to the door and pulled it open; Du Yong was leaning just outside. As the door opened his body fell backward, stumbling several steps and nearly collapsing to the ground.

Du Yong turned and saw Yuan Yuan’s eyes shining, and realized that what he’d mentioned in the text message had sunk in. To him it had been a casual guess; if Yuan Yuan took it seriously, there was no real harm. After all, accepting the death of a friend is very difficult for an ordinary person.

Even after telling Yuan Yuan, Du Yong found himself thinking that perhaps there really was a chance it could be true.

Then he thought of himself.

“If someday something happens to me, don’t cry for me. As long as I can become a ghost—even with any limitations—I’ll come to see you and Qi-ge through mountains of knives and seas of fire.” Du Yong hammered a flag into himself.

Yuan Yuan stared at Du Yong, then suddenly laughed out loud: “No need for mountains of knives and seas of fire, just crawl here to see us.” Yuan Yuan’s voice still had a sob, but her emotions had clearly calmed a lot.

“I don’t think I ever told you—I’m not very clever, but often my instincts are spot on. I believe heaven wouldn’t be so cruel.” They had never directly hurt anyone, never taken anyone’s life. Du Yong had always been optimistic, optimistically convinced he would live to a hundred.

Yuan Yuan sniffed, and Du Yong immediately handed her two tissues.

“I believe that too,” Yuan Yuan said, her tone quite firm.

“You really scared me just now,” Du Yong said, sitting down on the living room sofa.

Yuan Yuan apologized to Du Yong

: “I’m sorry…”

Du Yong waved his hand. He glanced out the window; sunlight streamed in, a stark contrast to the game space they had just been in. There the sun was absent, the moon never rose at night, and the entire world lay shrouded in a gray, deathly shadow.

“It’s all over for now. We’re back in the real world. Forget everything that happened in the game for a while. Rest well these days, have some fun. The next game will be a fresh start.” Or perhaps some kind of ending.

Yuan Yuan also sat down. She turned her head to look at Du Yong.

Du Yong shifted his body slightly to the side. “Don’t fall in love with me!”

Yuan Yuan tapped Du Yong’s shoulder with her fist. Du Yong pretended it hurt and let out an “ah.”

“Have you noticed that Qi ge is a bit different than before?” After Yuan Yuan calmed down she thought back to the moment Qi Yang first came out—there was a sort of low pressure around him, a pressure that made you feel slightly suffocated.

“I noticed it. I think it’s because of them leaving,” Du Yong guessed instinctively, since he hadn’t been in the same game and didn’t know exactly what had happened to Qi Yang.

But Yuan Yuan didn’t think so. When Qi Yang mentioned Kang Lian and the others, the flatness in his expression was genuine, not something he was faking.

It was as if this person was getting colder and colder—not cold in body, but cold in his eyes, and the heart inside him was freezing.

Yuan Yuan was a girl, and her observations about feelings were always sharper; she had intended to see whether Du Yong felt the same way, but from what he said, it seemed his perception differed from hers.

The two of them didn’t talk about Qi Yang afterward; they chatted about other things, and when it was time for dinner they went next door together.

Du Yong had taken the key card when he went out, so when they arrived he knocked on the door, then swiped the card and went in. The knock woke Qi Yang, and he sat up.

Du Yong and Yuan Yuan walked in together from outside. Yuan Yuan’s eyes were still red—she had clearly been crying—but her expression was unexpectedly changed; the pain seemed to have disappeared, and instead her eyes were bright and clear.

Qi Yang turned his gaze to Du Yong; apparently Du Yong had told Yuan Yuan something, and it seemed he had gained quite a bit from the last round of the game.

He threw back the covers and got out of bed, putting on his coat.

When Qi Yang walked over, Yuan Yuan murmured a small apology. Qi Yang’s features softened. Yuan Yuan looked up at him, and that feeling came over her again: she could sense little warmth in his eyes. It was as if they weren’t friends at all, merely strangers who happened to know each other.