Dead!
Dead!
Dead!
Fear and chill nearly swallowed Ye Cang’s sanity whole.
Only survival instinct remained, driving him to grab the only thing within reach that could be called a weapon—a commonplace fountain pen from the IPC.
The moment his fingers gripped the pen, he felt as though he were holding a sharp blade.
That sliver of security rekindled his logic, allowing him to see the single slender path to survival amidst this hopeless, fatal trap!
He violently shoved aside the unhinged “March 7th,” snatched the *Death Diary* from the tottering zombie “Himeko,” and wrote two words at the bottom of the page dated “April 26th” as fast as humanly possible: “Elation” This answered the first question.
The reason he didn’t write “Aha” was that calling an Aeon’s true name directly invited Its gaze.
Perhaps in the boundless cosmos, those supreme beings embodying the peaks of Paths wouldn’t notice an ordinary person over a single sentence.
But right now, Ye Cang was separated from the “corrupted Aha” by only a single train car wall.
Even if the entity were deaf, it would notice his existence.
Having written those two words, Ye Cang stared in horror at his own arm.
His skin had begun to rot, his flesh dripping down like thick jelly.
A sickening stench billowed up—a foulness far worse than the filthiest sewer in the dirtiest city on Earth could ever breed!
The stench seeped deep into flesh, marrow, and soul alike!
Was this the sinister contamination?
Was this…
Scarlet Rot?
Despite the agonizing pain, he knew that if he stopped now, the next loop would inevitably repeat the same disastrous outcome!
Gritting his teeth, he gripped the pen with all his strength and heavily wrote the answer to the second question on the page: “Praying to an Aeon” If [Cang] wanted to break the cycle of the 25th, he had to kill his driven-mad self.
But killing his driven-mad self would trigger the *Death Diary*’s time rewind—an endless loop.
Thus, he had to borrow an external force to shatter it, and the simplest way to borrow such power was…
praying to an Aeon.
Would praying to an Aeon guarantee a response?
Of course not!
Living beings in the universe were as plentiful as dust; ordinary people could pray until their voices failed and never gain an Aeon’s gaze—unless, in the eyes of the Aeon, the suppliant was far from ordinary!
[Cang], as an Emanator of an Aeon, possessed enough status to draw an Aeon’s notice.
But status alone wasn’t enough.
If an Emanator of another Aeon prayed to you, would you respond unconditionally?
Of course not—so Feite must have used a method to amplify his prayer, along with a bargaining chip to tempt the Aeon into action.
The method was likely something similar to a blood ritual circle for “potion” blessings, while the bargaining chip…
Destruction, Nihility, Finality, Harmony…
putting aside those Aeons who would definitely ignore him, Aha, the Aeon of Elation, actually became the most likely candidate to respond.
As for Fuli, the Aeon of Remembrance—until Ye Cang figured out whether his Remembrance loss was caused by Fuli, he believed [Cang], the original owner of this body, would never take such a risk on an Aeon’s whim.
Then—after summoning Aha with the sacrificial ritual, what happened aboard the Astral Express?
Where did [Cang] go?
And why had he transmigrated?
Had the sinister contamination been contained?
Clearly, there was no time left to ponder these questions.
Every remaining second had to be dedicated to the final question: After [Cang] drank the Potion of Abundance and completed the ritual, what was the blessing of the [Abundance]?
What was it?
Ye Cang’s vision blurred, his face pale.
Unbeknownst to him, the hand clutching the pen had been reduced to bare, gleaming bone.
Sloughed flesh dissolved into viscous scarlet fluid pooling on the table.
Yet despite this, not a single drop of crimson stained the pages of the *Death Diary*.
He opened his mouth.
His teeth tumbled out, and a rotting tongue crawling with maggots slipped from his oral cavity.
But…
fortunately, he could no longer make a sound, nor could he feel any pain.
What was it?
This question rested on two established facts— First, [Cang] drank the Potion of Abundance, completed the sacrificial ritual, and received the blessing of Yaoshi, the Aeon of Abundance.
Second, Yaoshi’s blessing was vital for breaking the cycle of the 25th, and even held immense significance for the present “Aha”!
In fact, the answer to this question was the sole path to survival in this fatal trap!
What was it?
Longevity?
Resurrection?
Extraordinary healing powers?
Immortality?
No, no, no.
None of those powers were of any use in breaking the cycle of the 25th.
For a nearly maddened [Cang], they would only serve as an even greater shackle…
Wait.
Ye Cang snapped his head up to look at “March 7th” beside him.
The pink-haired girl was watching him too, her eyes curved in a smile.
Did Aha seem to have regained sanity, or had the previous farce just been Him feigning madness?
“Have you figured out the answer?” The girl parted her lips.
Ye Cang instinctively thought she would ask that question, but what met him instead was her bell-like laughter: “Hahaha…
Say, do you believe in miracles?” *Nonsense, how could I not?* *Who didn’t believe they could turn into light as a kid?* He wanted to crack a dumb joke, but his jaw had already dropped off.
His larynx and spine were exposed to the air, capable of emitting nothing more than meaningless gasps of air.
An ordinary person in this state would have kicked the bucket long ago, yet he could still feel the strong, steady thumping of his heart.
This freakish, zombie-like vitality validated his final conjecture, completing a perfect closed loop of all his deductions.
What else could Yaoshi’s blessing be?
It was bodily “Immortality.” Just how powerful was this authority of “Immortality”?
Even after Aha slaughtered the insane [Cang] until his bones were pulverized and his soul scattered, his body could still fully reshape itself—and house Ye Cang’s soul after his transmigration.
However, he no longer had the strength to write down the answer to this final question.
With all his muscles and internal organs dissolved, he had become a skeleton with nothing left but a beating heart.
He was dying.
He could see nothing, hear nothing.
The world was pitch-black, terrifyingly quiet—just as quiet as that pitch-black, starless night in his childhood when the young boy ran and cried alone in the forest.
Though desperate and helpless back then, compared to now, he couldn’t even cry.
And so, he couldn’t help thinking— Some say that people go to heaven after death, while others say the wicked fall to hell.
But only now—at the precise moment a human truly dies, when perception and consciousness as a human are about to fade—did he clearly realize the ultimate answer to that question— At the end of death, there is nothing.
Therefore— Before death, all living beings are equal.
Therefore— Death is eternal.