The scenery outside the window rushed past in streaks, snowy mountains stretching endlessly on both sides. As the moment of their pre-planned “train derailment” drew closer and closer, the nobles finally panicked.
At this point, walking toward the first-class carriage was no different from walking straight into death.
“D–Don’t joke around! We were just talking casually, who would actually go confront those esteemed gentlemen? Don’t take it seriously!”
The NPC nobles flailed clumsily, trying to grab onto anything for balance, only to be pinned firmly in place, one on the left by Wen Sheng, one on the right by Zuo Yi, forced forward like prisoners being escorted to execution.
Wen Sheng didn’t even raise his eyelids, his hand pressing down on a noble’s shoulder as unmovable as stone. “Sorry but I’m the kind of person who takes things seriously.”
The ever-careless Zuo Yi, who always carried an air of languid indifference, also shed her usual weariness. Her gaze sharpened like a cold blade, a cigarette clamped at the corner of her lips and her high-top boots struck the floor with a forceful rhythm that radiated the aura of a mafia boss.
She tilted her head, studying the nobles whose terror was growing ever more palpable and let out a disdainful chuckle. “Scared, aren’t you? You left them to die in that carriage forever yet now you’re trapped here by their hatred as well, forced to repeat this loop over and over again without escape but soon, this mutual torment will finally come to an end.”
“Tell me, after dying countless times at the bottom of that cliff across innumerable cycles, how much do you think they hate you?”
The moment her voice fell, the nobles, who had moments ago still appeared human, with normal breathing and heartbeat, began rotting right before their eyes. Chunks of flesh fell off bone, barely clinging to the once-living bodies. Their screams turned shrill, no longer sounding human at all.
“Aaah! Train attendants! Ticket inspector!”
“We paid you! We paid you so much money! You promised to let us live, hurry, execute these two worthless commoners who don’t know their place!”
“As expected, these nobles have absolutely no combat ability,” Wen Sheng said, unsurprised, his gaze calm. “No wonder they tried so hard to lure players into killing themselves instead of acting personally.”
From the nearby staff break room came the sickening sound of nails raking across a door. Something seemed to be crawling up from the floor, scraping its claws against the wooden panels before pushing the door open.
The train attendants emerged in staggering motions like half-rotted corpses. They turned toward the nobles and displayed a distorted, sinister grin, one that still carried a hint of pathetic flattery.
Their shriveled, hollow throats echoed like damp tunnels, every breath seeping out with a cold, sticky chill. “But of course, dear guests. Serving you is our greatest honor.”
Zuo Yi took a long drag of her cigarette, then pulled it from her lips and casually stabbed it straight into the eye of an NPC who had tried taking the chance to escape. The burning ash seared into his socket and he immediately let out an agonized scream.
At that exact moment, another attendant swung down a three-inch-long claw. Zuo Yi smoothly shoved the screaming NPC forward with a push, sending him stumbling directly into the blow.
What shocked them was that the attendant clearly had enough time to stop yet chose not to. Without hesitation, its claw pierced straight through the skull of the very “customer” it had been trying to flatter just moments prior.
The dying NPC let out a final wail. “Why… You people were born to serve us…”
Zuo Yi froze only briefly before a spark of realization flashed through her eyes.
These attendants, too, had been trapped here eternally because of the nobles’ scheme. They would never reach the end of their journey.
Did they really feel no resentment toward the ones who caused their endless suffering? Most likely, it was simply the rules of the instance that forced them to maintain their façade of servility, right up until the moment the pretense shattered.
Wen Sheng teleported repeatedly, appearing behind the monsters with each step and stabbing with swift, precise strikes, his silhouette moving so fast it left afterimages. Zuo Yi spared him a sidelong glance. “Why don’t you just teleport the knife directly into their heads?”
Wen Sheng shrugged helplessly. “I only brought one knife and my ability requires physical contact to activate.”
In other words, he could send the knife away but he could not retrieve it afterward.
“Next time you leave home, remember to strap a few dozen knives to your body.”
Perhaps his honest answer amused her, because the corner of Zuo Yi’s lips lifted, a rare hint of laughter warming her tone.
Flesh and bone burst through the air as they fought their way toward the carriage door, only to see that the chains connecting the two carriages were gradually fading, dissolving like snow disappearing under sunlight.
With a piercing metallic screech, the two carriages suddenly separated, a significant distance opening between them and that distance continued to grow.
“How can this be?” Zuo Yi murmured, stunned. “We clearly stopped their plan…”
Halfway through speaking, realization struck her hard. Her face darkened and she fell abruptly silent.
It was a loop.
Everything happening on the train was repeating the original chain of events.
So even though no one had tampered with the chains this time, they still vanished at the same predetermined moment, exactly as in the original tragedy.
No wonder such a simple C-rank instance had remained uncleared for so long, no one had ever managed a perfect ending, no one had ever truly ended it.
Because in theory, the method to clear this instance simply did not exist.
Unless, unless they could return to many years ago, to the very first time this catastrophe occurred and alter the flow of fate at its origin.
“At this point in time, how are we supposed to change a destiny from years ago?”
Zuo Yi’s expression grew darker as she stared ahead, her mind racing through every possible method of salvaging the situation but every answer she arrived at was the same, nothing.
Such overwhelming power, one capable of swimming upstream against the long river of time, was not something mere players like them could ever possess.
Wen Sheng’s first instinct was to grab Zuo Yi’s sleeve, ready to teleport at any moment. The dark bruise-like shadows under his eyes deepened with exhaustion and he let out a quiet sigh. “Looks like this instance is beyond what we’re able to resolve.”
The only thing they could still do… was protect their own lives and leave the instance alive.
And at the very least, Wen Sheng could report the dungeon’s intel back to the Bureau of Anomaly Management. That alone counted as some kind of gain.
Just as the atmosphere had sunk into a taut, breathless stillness, the door of the carriage across from them suddenly swung open.
A black-haired, blue-eyed young man stood leisurely behind it. He bent on one knee and in his open palm, a faint, illusory chain slowly materialized.
The chain drifted outward toward the gap between the two train cars, linking them firmly together. As the intangible turned solid, it felt like fantasy descending into reality, like someone had pressed the reverse button on the scene of the chain’s disappearance just moments ago.
Almost in the same second, the train screeched into a sharp turn yet this time, no car was flung off the cliff and no one was forced to pay with their life just to keep some self-proclaimed “superior” being alive.
“Hurry and get over here.” Yi Fengchu lifted his eyes at them, urging quietly.
The two of them, frozen for an instant, snapped back to awareness.
Wen Sheng reached out and tapped the sleeve of Zuo Yi’s coat, teleporting the both of them instantly to Chu Fu’s side. His expression was complicated and he offered a sincere, wholehearted word of thanks.
“You… you’re a Constructor?” Zuo Yi whispered, stunned beyond belief, her expression dazed as if she had just seen the sun rise from the west.
In the Divine Amusement Park, Constructors stood at the absolute top of the player food chain.
Most of them moved with the tacit permission or arrangement of some deity and their psychic domains came with very strict requirements, whether manipulating reality or illusion, they had to at least appear capable of creating something out of nothing.
Thus, Constructors were exceedingly rare, so rare that most people only regarded them as myth.
Unlike the struggling players fighting for survival inside the dungeons or the recorders and adjudicators who served the gods with unwavering diligence, Constructors were the ones who created the dungeons.
It was said that every Constructor possessed at minimum the ability to create an entire city on their own. In the eyes of most people, such power was already indistinguishable from divinity.
As an official ability-user, Wen Sheng’s thoughts ran in a different direction.
Based on the intel they had gathered, their world had only recently joined the Divine Amusement Park. So far, even adjudicators were extremely rare. Which meant that Mr. Chu Fu most likely came from another world…
If so, what purpose did he have showing up here?
And was there a divine will behind him?
After an entire day and night of preparation, Yi Fengchu had arrived thoroughly armed with a persona. He had already aligned himself with the role.
In this moment, he immersed himself fully in his fabricated identity, a faint, sick thrill rushing through every vein in his body, the idea that he could make everyone wholeheartedly believe he was someone else. Wasn’t that, in its own way, a beautifully crafted prank?
Caught within this indescribable pleasure, Yi Fengchu almost deceived even himself. The fictional past he created fluttered before him like pages rustling in a breeze:
【It felt as if he truly had once been a devout follower favored by some mysterious deity, that he had once possessed overwhelming power and a tangled past, only to fall out of alignment with that god and depart from their protection…】
“Constructor… no one has called me that in a very long time.”
At Zuo Yi’s question, a touch of nostalgia flickered through Chu Fu’s eyes. His bright blue irises didn’t quite focus on anything, drifting instead toward some distant, unreachable point, as though he were looking at a faraway past. “But those matters are long gone and not worth bringing up.”
“Right now, I’m nothing more than an ordinary player.” He paused, then held up two fingers. “A mere level-two ability-user.”
Wen Sheng was at a complete loss for words and chose to remain silent.
After what Chu Fu had just done, who would believe such nonsense?
Since when has “ordinary” set such a ridiculous standard?
While the group chatted, the rapidly moving train finally pulled into the terminal station.
“The terminal… we’ve reached the terminal…”
Inside the first-class carriage, the NPCs, who had all been frozen like wooden dolls with blank, lifeless expressions, suddenly began to stir. A wave of excitement rippled through the cabin.
Someone pressed their face against the window, staring feverishly at the station outside. Others snatched up their luggage like real passengers, scrambling impatiently toward the door.
The moment the doors opened, they surged out like a tidal wave and although every one of them gradually turned transparent the instant they stepped off the train, fading away like melting snow, their expressions were filled with pure joy. The dull emptiness in their eyes slowly brimmed with light.
How could they not be happy?
This was the terminal station they had died for, over and over, countless times yet had never once reached.
“I’ve always adored a quote from human artists: ‘A tragedy is tearing something beautiful into pieces for people to see.’ But the reverse is true as well. I also enjoy stitching those broken fragments back together… weaving them into an unexpected, perfect ending.”
Chu Fu sighed. His voice dropped so low it was nearly inaudible. “…I will prove it, eventually. That He was wrong. The play He wrote for fate is utterly abysmal.”
His murmuring was almost swallowed by the wind. If Wen Sheng hadn’t been standing so close, he likely wouldn’t have heard it at all.
After hesitating for a long moment, Wen Sheng finally chose information over courtesy and spoke up, thick-skinned: “If I may ask… what did you mean by ‘the play written for fate’?”
When Chu Fu glanced his way, Wen Sheng instantly lost his nerve. “My apologies. If you find the question rude, please feel free to ignore, ”
Chu Fu looked at him for a long, deep moment. Then he shifted his gaze away, staring out at the snow-covered plains beyond the window as he sighed. “I had assumed His reputation among you players would be far from insignificant. Across the mythologies of countless civilizations, deities who command fate, who see the past and future, have always been held in reverence, have they not?”
Fate… the future…
A spark flashed through Wen Sheng’s mind. “All beings’ fate… the Narrator…?”
He didn’t even finish the thought before Chu Fu shot him a furious, cutting glare, one filled with unmistakable warning. “Are you trying to catch His attention by saying His name out loud?”
Perhaps it was Wen Sheng’s reckless impulsiveness, perhaps it simply irritated him but the previously calm and almost good-natured Chu Fu suddenly lost all interest.
His expression dulled with boredom; he didn’t even bother offering a farewell to the other two. He simply turned on his heel, striding out the train’s main doors and exiting the dungeon.
Seeing Chu Fu leave, Zuo Yi had no intention of lingering either. She pulled a cigarette from her pack, intending to light it.
Passing by Wen Sheng, she remembered at least the brief camaraderie of their cooperation and gave him a cool, indifferent nod. “See you.”
And with that, she vanished as well.
Wen Sheng was the last to leave the dungeon, his steps heavy.
He had to go back and file the report again…
And that deity who presided over fate, what exactly was He planning?
✦ ✧ ✦
Nycreth
[Translator]
☕ A LITTLE SOMETHING FOR THE TRANSLATOR
A coffee would be extremely convenient right about now. Just saying.
☕ BUY THEM A COFFEE →
✧ (づ｡•ㅅ•｡)づ ☕ ✧
✦ thank you for reading ✦
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ChaptersChapter 1 · Mysterious letterChapter 2 · Divine MessagesChapter 3 · Gamer ForumChapter 4 · Invitation from GodChapter 5 · JudgeChapter 6 · TerminalChapter 7 · Destruction of recordsChapter 8 · Whale Bone Aquarium (1)Chapter 9 · Whale Bone Aquarium (2)Chapter 10 · Whale Bone Aquarium (3)Chapter 11 · Whale Bone Aquarium (4)Chapter 12 · Whale Bone Aquarium (5)Chapter 13 · Whale Bone Aquarium (6)Chapter 14 · Whale Bone Aquarium (7)Chapter 15 · Whale Bone Aquarium (8)Chapter 16 · Whale Bone Aquarium (9)Chapter 17 · Whale Bone Aquarium (10)Chapter 18 · Whale Bone Aquarium (11)Chapter 19 Part 1 · Whale Bone Aquarium (12)Chapter 19 Part 2 · Whale Bone Aquarium (12)Chapter 20 · Interlude: His ApostlesChapter 21 · Echoes in the pupa (1)Chapter 22 · Echoes in the pupa (2)Chapter 23 · Echoes in the Pupa (3)Chapter 24 · Echoes in the Pupa (4)Chapter 25 · Echoes in the Pupa (5)Chapter 26 · Echoes in the Pupa (6)Chapter 27 · Echoes in the Pupa (7)Chapter 28 · Echoes in the Pupa (8)Chapter 29 · Echoes in the Pupa (9)Chapter 30 · Echoes in the Pupa (10)Chapter 31 · Echoes in the Pupa (11)Chapter 32 · Echoes in the Pupa (12)Chapter 33 · Echoes in the Pupa (13)Chapter 34 · Interlude: Investigation by the Bureau of Extraordinary Affairs (1)Chapter 35 · Interlude: Investigation by the Bureau of Extraordinary Affairs (2)Chapter 36 · Interlude: Investigation by the Bureau of Extraordinary Affairs (3)Chapter 37 · Small World: God’s Chessboard (1)Chapter 38 · Small World: God’s Chessboard (2)Chapter 39 · Small World: God’s Chessboard (3)Chapter 40 · Small World: God’s Chessboard (4)Chapter 41 · Advertisement Coming Soon (1)Chapter 42 · Advertisement Coming Soon (2)Chapter 43 · Advertisement Coming Soon (3)Chapter 44 · Advertisement Coming Soon (4)Chapter 45 · Advertisement Coming Soon (5)Chapter 46 · Advertisement Coming Soon (6)Chapter 47 · Advertisement Coming Soon (7)Chapter 48 · Advertisement Coming Soon (8)Chapter 49 · Advertisement Coming Soon (9)Chapter 50 · Advertisement Coming Soon (10)Chapter 51 · Advertisement Coming Soon (11)Chapter 52 · Advertisement Coming Soon (12)Chapter 53 · Advertisement Coming Soon to EndChapter 54 · Interlude – Tonight No One Sleeps (1)Chapter 55 · Interlude – Tonight No One Sleeps (2)Chapter 56 · Interlude – Tonight No One Sleeps (3)Chapter 57 · Interlude – Tonight No One Sleeps (4)Chapter 58 · Childhood Ghost Stories (1)Chapter 59 · Childhood Ghost Stories (2)Chapter 60 · Childhood Ghost Stories (3)Chapter 61 · Childhood Ghost Stories (4)Chapter 62 · Childhood Ghost Stories (5)Chapter 63 · Childhood Ghost Stories (6)Chapter 64 · Childhood Ghost Stories (7)Chapter 65 · Childhood Ghost Stories (8)Chapter 66 · Childhood Ghost Stories (9)Chapter 67 · Childhood Ghost Stories (10)Chapter 68 · Childhood Ghost Stories (11)Chapter 69 · Childhood Ghost Stories (12)Chapter 70 · Childhood Ghost Stories (13)Chapter 71 · Childhood Ghost Stories (14)Chapter 72 · Childhood Ghost Stories (15)Chapter 73 · Childhood Ghost Stories (16)Chapter 74 · Childhood Ghost Stories (17)Chapter 75 · Childhood Ghost Stories (18)Chapter 76 · Childhood Ghost Stories (19)Chapter 77 · Childhood Ghost Stories (20)Chapter 78 · Childhood Ghost Stories (Complete)Chapter 79 · Interlude: His Kingdom (1)Chapter 80 · Interlude: His Kingdom (2)Chapter 81 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (1)Chapter 82 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (2)Chapter 83 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (3)Chapter 84 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (4)Chapter 85 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (5)Chapter 86 · Interlude: An Epic of Faith (Complete)Chapter 87 · Fate casually rolls the dice (1)Chapter 88 · Fate Casually rolls the dice (2)Chapter 89 · Fate Casually rolls the dice (3)Chapter 90 · Fate Casually rolls the dice (4)Chapter 91 · Fate casually tosses the dice (5)Chapter 92 · Fate casually tosses the dice (6)Chapter 93 · Fate casually tosses the dice (7)Chapter 94 · Fate casually tosses the dice (8)Chapter 95 · Fate casually tosses the dice (9)Chapter 96 · Fate casually tosses the dice (10)Chapter 97 · Fate Casually tosses the dice (11)Chapter 98 · Fate casually tosses the dice (12)Chapter 99 · Fate casually tosses the dice (13)Chapter 100 · Fate casually tosses the dice (14)Chapter 101 · Fate casually tosses the dice (15)Chapter 102 · Fate casually tosses the dice (16)Chapter 103 · Fate casually tosses the dice (17)Chapter 104 · Fate casually tosses the dice (18)Chapter 105 · Fate casually tosses the dice (19)Chapter 106 · Fate casually tosses the dice (20)Chapter 107 · Fate casually tosses the dice (21)Chapter 108 · Fate casually tosses the dice (The End)Chapter 109 · Interlude