Chapter 155: The Secret From Twenty Years Ago

"I'll bring the people who hurt you and got away with it to justice. As for this photo, I'm returning it to you."

Guo Junjie reached out to take the photo, but before his fingers could even graze it, his hand began to dissipate.

A trace of helplessness washed over his handsome face. He looked at me and said, "Five years ago, there was someone just like you. He held a strange phone and tried to stop the Buddha's plan. But he failed—and he failed miserably."

"Someone like me?"

"That's right. Because I noticed how shockingly similar the two of you were, I treated you differently."

"Do you know his name?"

"He used to be a student at Xinhu High School. There's probably information on him in the school archives. You can't deal with the Two-Faced Buddha alone. Finding him might give you a sliver of hope."

Guo Junjie's gaze landed on the family photo. A complex emotion flashed in his eyes. He opened his mouth, but ultimately said nothing, his body completely dissipating like fluttering scraps of paper.

The black rain stopped. The world spun, and the terrifying Xinhu High School Laboratory Building shattered like a mirror.

When Huang Xue and I opened our eyes again, a desolate, empty city lay before us.

The cigarette between my fingertips hadn't even burned out, yet everything around us had completely transformed.

"It's gone?" Huang Xue still hadn't figured out what just happened. The situation had shifted, everything changing in the blink of an eye.

"Yes, it's all over." The Primal Destiny Divine Fiends had been thoroughly annihilated and the Nightmare broken. This was Huang Xue's original Dream Realm.

I walked over to Zichou's corpse. The talismans on his body had all been destroyed and rendered useless. After rummaging through his things, I only found an Octagonal Token.

Zimao had managed to break through the Dream Realm and escape because of this treasure. I hefted it in my hand. "It's heavy. It probably isn't made of iron."

Just as I was about to put it in my pocket, a faint light suddenly shone from my palm. The family photo of the Primal Destiny Divine Fiends vanished from my hand, and two vigorous, ancient characters surfaced on one corner of the Octagonal Token—Yuan Chen.

'What's going on? Why can this Octagonal Token absorb items related to the divine fiends?' I examined it repeatedly. The eight corners probably corresponded exactly to the Eight Characters Divine Fiends. 'Could the Two-Faced Buddha be collecting the divine fiends just to light up this token?'

I had a nagging feeling that the token wasn't an ordinary object, but with too few clues to make any deductions, I could only put it away and ask Blind Liu about it once I got out.

After searching around and finding nothing else, I called Huang Xue over to discuss our next step.

For this dream entry, the Underworld Live Show had issued two optional tasks: ensure Huang Xue's survival, and discover the whereabouts of that ancient painting from twenty years ago.

"We've escaped the Nightmare now, but this is your Middle Dream Layer. If you want to return to the Shallow Dream Layer and wake up, we still need to find your memory node."

"I know. Follow me. I still remember the general location of the old house." Huang Xue wore a knowing expression. "But then again, is this really my Dream Realm? Will some other demon or monster suddenly jump out?"

She was overly suspicious and paranoid, unwilling to get too close to me but also too afraid to stray far.

"Relax, we should have wiped them all out."

"Should?" Huang Xue clutched her forehead. "You'd better check again. I probably won't dare to sleep alone for the next few days."

"You can find someone to keep you company. Doesn't Jingying Sanatorium have a lot of nurses on duty?"

"Don't even mention nurses to me!" Huang Xue puffed up like an angry alley cat. "Just thinking about that scene will give me nightmares for days. You know what? That nurse's head spun completely around, and her neck stretched out this long!"

She waved her hands, bearing her fangs and brandishing her claws as she described the situation. I smiled faintly. This kind of energetic, lively conversation was something Huang Xue had almost never experienced in real life.

The Dream Realm could reflect a person's feelings about the real world. A positive and optimistic person's dream would be full of color, while a depressed, unhappy person's dream would be just like Huang Xue's—empty and desolate.

Crossing the entire city, Huang Xue and I arrived in front of a dilapidated residential building in the Old Town District.

"You actually lived in a place like this?" The small building before us maintained the architectural style of twenty years ago. It was low and rundown with peeling dark yellow walls. There was a row of public water taps in the courtyard, and several bicycles were parked neatly at the bottom of the building.

Seeing the familiar architecture, Huang Xue's reaction was even more exaggerated than mine. "It really hasn't changed at all! It's exactly the same as twenty years ago."

Like a child who hadn't grown up, she ran over to the bicycles and rang their bells one by one, finally stopping at the very last bike.

"What's wrong?" I walked over curiously. The bike next to Huang Xue didn't look any different from the rest; a lot of the paint was scraped off, and the seat had a tear in it.

"This is Huang Boyuan's bike." Seeing the object made Huang Xue think of the person, and many dust-covered memories surged into her mind. "The burden of the whole family fell on him alone. Through the dead of winter and the heat of summer, he would ride this bike, rushing all over the place."

I gently patted her soft shoulder. This time, she didn't dodge. "Let's go. Let's head upstairs and take a look."

Huang Xue took the lead, running all the way up to the third floor in one breath. However, when she saw the familiar door, she didn't dare to open it.

"Don't be afraid, we're home." The door was slightly ajar and hadn't been locked. I glanced at Huang Xue and slowly pulled it open.

A heavy, bitter smell of traditional Chinese medicine assaulted our noses. It was the only scent in the small apartment.

"Someone's here?"

Huang Xue and I stood at the door, peering inside. Before long, a gentle, elegant, and beautiful woman walked out from the inner room.

The moment she laid eyes on this woman, Huang Xue nearly cried out. I hurriedly clamped a hand over her mouth.

The woman looked well-educated and reasonable, carrying the gentle grace and charm unique to Southern girls. It was a beauty I had also seen in Huang Lan and Huang Xue.

"What is she doing?"

The woman was holding a painting in her hands. First, she tried to burn it with fire, and then she used scissors to cut it. But no matter how she tried to destroy it, after a short while, the painting would always appear back on the wall, completely intact.

"Why do you bother?" a man's voice suddenly rang out from the corner of the room. His face was blurry. He was dressed like a monk yet also like a Taoist priest—neither fully one nor the other. A Double-Faced Buddha Pendant hung on his chest.

"Get the hell out of my house!"

The woman pointed at the man and cursed. The man didn't talk back, instead advising her with earnest persistence. "You possess a Fate Pattern rarely seen even among a hundred thousand people. Seated high as the Heavenly Yi Noble, your destiny brings noble benefactors. It was originally the fate of someone who would ascend to become a general or a marquis. Why must you be so stubbornly foolish and ruin it on this Dragon-Rabbit marriage union?"

The man's words gave me a jolt. From what he was implying, Huang Boyuan's Fate Pattern wasn't the Heavenly Yi Noble at all. His wife, Wanjun, was the true Heavenly Yi Noble!

"Stop talking! I don't believe in fate, and I could never do something as utterly heartless as murdering my own husband!" The woman held the scissors, her temperament as fierce and unyielding as fire. "Get the hell out of my house! You're not welcome here!"

"Don't be so quick to answer. You've been poisoned with my Life-Falling Toxin; you won't survive past seven days. Moreover, if you refuse, not only will you die, but your newborn daughter won't live long either." The man twirled the prayer beads in his hand. He pointed at an adorable Female Infant in the room. "Her natal star is Yaoguang, the tail of the Big Dipper. She won't live past the age of fifteen."

He seemed entirely confident, certain that the woman would compromise. "Think it over carefully. As long as you kill Huang Boyuan, dip into his blood to leave your name on my painting scroll, and willingly engrave your Heavenly Yi Noble Fate Pattern, not only will I guarantee you wealth and glory, but I will even step in to defy the heavens and change your daughter's fate!"

"Get out! Get out!" The woman's body was very weak. After cursing a few times, she fell into a violent coughing fit. The man wanted to say something else, but right at that moment, the sound of footsteps suddenly echoed from outside the door.

"Who is it?" I turned to look. A younger Huang Boyuan was walking upstairs, sweating profusely and carrying a bundle of traditional Chinese medicine.

He didn't seem to be able to see Huang Xue and me, walking right through us.

"Boyuan, why are you back?" Surprised, the woman brewed a cup of tea for Huang Boyuan. "Did you manage to sell the prescription?"

Huang Boyuan's face was sunburned. He shook his head bitterly. "The other party was a scammer. They never intended to buy my prescription at all."

In the simple and crude little apartment, even the air turned heavy and somewhat suffocating.

"Boyuan, let's stop treating my illness. Save our daughter first." The woman gently squeezed Huang Boyuan's shoulder. "She just arrived in this world and hasn't seen a single shred of its beauty yet."

"Wanjun..." Huang Boyuan grabbed the woman's hand and placed the medicine bundle on the table. "Actually, I came back just to talk to you about this."

He tore open the medicine bundle, revealing chopped-up herbal dregs inside. "This medicine is for unblocking the heart's blood. Just by looking at the ingredients, no one will be able to spot anything unusual."

"What do you mean?"

"One of the medicinal herbs in the prescription is Huang Xue. Huang Xue and Feng Jiu look exactly the same, but their medicinal properties are completely different. I secretly swapped in the Huang Xue. As long as we feed this dose of medicine to our daughter, she will pass away without feeling a trace of pain, and we won't be caught by the police..."

"Slap!"

The sound was so sharp and loud that even I, standing outside the door, clenched my teeth.

Huang Boyuan clutched his red, swollen cheek, his eyes wide as he stared at his normally gentle, water-like wife. "Wanjun..."

"Huang Boyuan, if you are still a man, don't ever say such things again! She is your biological daughter. Don't make me look down on you!"