Chapter 87: Good and Evil

Before he could even finish speaking, the shadow lost its patience, seized Xie Quan by the hand, and forcefully dragged him into the darkness.

"No! Tie Feng, save me!" Xie Quan let out a piercing, terrified shriek that made Tie Feng and the other man shudder.

A second later, his screams abruptly cut off. The shadow vanished, and so did Xie Quan. It all felt like an illusion.

"Heh." A light chuckle broke the dead silence. Tie Feng and his companion stared in absolute terror at Su Mu, whose smiling face reflected in their pupils like the grin of a demon.

Su Mu elegantly pushed up his Tinted Glasses. "I should warn you: I do not accept surrenders. Shadow Summoning!"

Thud!

The luxurious Snakewood Cane tapped lightly against the ground. Darkness surged from the cane's tip like a tide, spreading rapidly to form countless tiny, arcane runes. They rippled outward across the earth with Su Mu at the center, constructing an eerie and mysterious array.

Then came a sight that filled Tie Feng and his companion with sheer terror. From within the massive array, humanoid shadows over two meters tall began emerging one by one.

One, two... ten... a hundred!

A full hundred shadow monsters stepped out of the array, gathering around Su Mu like stars circling the moon.

Looking like an emperor of shadows, Su Mu gave a light wave of his hand, and the monster horde instantly swarmed forward!

"Run!!" Tie Feng roared, his eyes splitting with terror. He spun around and bolted, never having imagined Su Mu was hiding such a trump card. He didn't think it was an Illusion Technique this time—Xie Quan's agonizing screams were still too fresh in his mind.

Su Mu ignored the two fleeing men and simply let out a wry chuckle. "Sigh, I accidentally lied again today. What am I going to do if this becomes a habit?"

The Shadow Legion was an Illusion Technique, of course. Only the shadow that had killed Xie Quan earlier was real. That was Bubai, the good friend he had brought out from the Nightmare World.

There were two restrictions to using Bubai: first, it had to be dark, and second, it could only kill one person at a time.

That was why he had pointed at the sky earlier, making the dark clouds blot it out—it was all just to set the stage for Bubai's grand entrance. Now, all he had to do was wait for Bubai to finish digesting Xie Quan before killing Tie Feng and his companion one by one.

A brilliant Illusion Technique was just like a brilliant lie: it had to be a mix of truth and falsehood, weaving reality and illusion together.

Just then, Yang Dongqing and Jun Wushang ran over. They stared at Su Mu with complicated expressions, looking as if they wanted to say something but couldn't quite find the words.

"Su Mu, are you really an Angel Believer?" Yang Dongqing finally lost his composure and voiced the question burning in his mind.

Su Mu nodded. "Of course. I've been saying all along that I'm a good person. Now that I have the divine statue as my witness, no one can ever slander me again."

"How can you be in the mood for jokes at a time like this?" Yang Dongqing demanded anxiously. "You're an angel, and we're demons! Only one of our sides can make it out alive."

Su Mu patted Yang Dongqing on the shoulder. "Don't worry, I'll take good care of Jasmine for you. You can go in peace."

"You motherfucker!" Yang Dongqing immediately flared up. If both his arms hadn't been broken, he absolutely would have punched Su Mu in the face.

"Hahaha, I'm just joking! Actually, I figured out how to break the curse a long time ago."

"Brother Su, you really have a way?" Jun Wushang asked, his face lighting up with surprise. He truly didn't want to survive by murdering his own colleagues.

"There's a way, but I'll need your cooperation. Oh, right, I almost forgot there's one more." As he spoke, Su Mu reached over and dragged out the Nightmare Apostle, Zhao Yongqiang, who had been cowering and shivering in the corner.

"The truth is, that divine statue doesn't actually divide factions based on good and evil."

"Then what is it based on?" Jun Wushang asked hurriedly. Next to him, Yang Dongqing was still furious, but he had already pricked up his ears to listen.

Su Mu didn't keep them in suspense. He explained, "It's based on inner guilt, or rather, having a clear conscience. As long as you genuinely believe you're in the right, you belong to the Angel Faction!

"Take Yang Dongqing, for example. This guy has killed plenty of people, but he considers stealing fifty thousand bucks to be the worst thing he's ever done. In other words, in his heart, he feels those people deserved to die, but he knows he was in the wrong for stealing the money.

"As for that woman from earlier who wiped out her enemy's entire family? You could hear it in her tone—she believed it was only natural to pay for a life with a life. Since she didn't think she did anything wrong, she was placed in the Angel Faction."

Jun Wushang's eyes widened in sudden realization. "I get it now! Even if I commit atrocities, as long as I don't believe I'm doing evil, I'm part of the Angel Faction!"

"Exactly. Who can truly distinguish right from wrong? From an ant's perspective, all humans are evil. But from God's perspective, no matter how wicked humanity's actions might be, it just looks like a bunch of ants fighting.

"So, God doesn't care whether mortals are good or evil. The only one who truly cares is yourself."

"Then, Brother Su, how do we break the curse?"

"By slaughtering everyone in the opposing faction, of course."

Jun Wushang's expression shifted slightly. "Brother Su, please stop joking around."

Su Mu shook his head. "I'm not joking. This is the only way to break the curse because these are the rules set by gods and demons. Unless you possess enough strength to defeat them, you have no choice but to play by their rules.

"But don't worry. Since it's a game, the rules naturally have loopholes.

"We don't need to butcher each other. All we have to do is shift our factions until we're all on the same side."

"How do we shift our faction?" Jun Wushang asked, looking deeply troubled. "To tell you the truth, I didn't actually feel guilty about skipping out on the bill for that foot massage. Once I earned some cash, I went back and paid number 8. My true guilt comes from failing my Master's teachings. Master told me to shun the temptations of women and devote my heart solely to the Dao, yet I still violated the Dao..."

"That's simple. Open your mind and accept my hypnosis," Su Mu said plainly.

Jun Wushang's face drained of color. "Hypnosis? You're not going to do anything weird to me, are you?"

Su Mu was speechless. "..."

"I'm starting to think this wasn't the first time you've defied your Master's orders, was it? Instead of reading your Daoist scriptures, you've been spending your free time watching porn, haven't you?"

Jun Wushang's ears flushed bright red at those words. Averting his gaze, he muttered, "I only watch it casually."

"Enough. If you trust me, open your mind and don't resist. If you don't trust me, then go join Tie Feng and his buddy. The choice is yours."

Jun Wushang's expression shifted back and forth before he finally gave a stiff nod. "We're both from Bronze Coffin. I refuse to believe Miss Murong would recruit a bad person into the company. I trust you."

Su Mu frowned slightly. He couldn't understand why all his colleagues were such love brains. No, wait—Yang Dongqing was a love brain. Jun Wushang was just a straight-up simp.