CHAPTER 279: CHAPTER 279: HEAVEN’S CRUEL PLAY

The blast roared downward like heaven’s fury, flame and void entwined into a column of burning judgment. It swallowed the broken ground, the twisted spires, and Boran’s unmoving body in a searing flood of blue-white annihilation.

The sound was deafening.

Wind ripped in all directions. Debris scattered across floating islands. Even the darkness recoiled.

Ruihuang stumbled as the shockwave hit him, grabbing onto the edge of a platform. "Shit! Is he dead?! Tell me that finished him!"

"No..." Meng Nian said, his voice low, watching the smoke rise. "It’s never that easy."

They were right.

Because when the light faded, there was no corpse.

Only ruin with no sign of Boran.

Only a crater burned clean, as if his existence had been scrubbed away by the force.

Qingran stood still, flame flickering down her arms, her breath labored.

But then Tartarus’ Eye above them began to flicker erratically not like it was watching, but glitching.

The ground beneath them rumbled.

[WARNING: DOMAIN CORE—UNSTABLE. SYSTEM STRUCTURE FOLDING.]

[UNAUTHORIZED SYSTEM INTERFERENCE DETECTED.]

[FORCIBLE EJECTION IN—5...]

Qingran’s head snapped up.

"No..."

[4...]

Boran hadn’t died, he’d used her attack.

Used it as the trigger to collapse the domain himself.

A retreat hidden inside a loss.

[3...]

[2...]

All around them, the world began to fall in on itself, chunks of floating land plummeting into endless void, flames curling back into the rift seams, and that eye in the sky? It wasn’t there anymore

It had shattered.

[1...]

Then the world turned inside out.

There was no pain, no sensation, only the feeling of being ripped from one layer of reality and forced into another.

When Qingran’s boots hit solid ground again, it was real stone.

The floor of that twisted chamber where it had all started.

They were back.

She glanced up to see Boran sitting on the bed. He didn’t look banged up or injured. Like everything that had happened was just an illusion.

"I was a fool to underestimate you. Next time I’ll fight you like a true villain. Isn’t he the one you came for? You can take him and leave.."

Qingran stared at him for a moment. "Not only that, you’re not allowed to enter the mind of any of my persons. Just because you watched my fight doesn’t mean you can beat me."

Boran chuckled and shook his head "You were always do confident, even when you we’re powerless. Very well, if that’s what you want, I won’t enter the minds of your people.."

Qingran nodded and turned to Moli, she didn’t need to say anything to her. She turned around and left the room.

Ruihuang who was now carrying Wei Sheng and Meng Nian followed her and left the room.

Down the stairs, past the scared yet curious eyes watching them and outside the building.

She took a deep long breath when she got in and then she clutched her sides.

"Fuck I’m in so much pain.."

-_-

"Well damn...why wouldn’t you be, when you went all out.." Meng Mian muttered. Walking to her side.

"You were so cool! It was absolute cinema.."

-_-

Qingran chuckled and stretched "The villains never die once. He’ll be back and in an even more terrifying way.."

Hours later they appeared at the bunker, Meng Nian bent down to open the heavy, circular door that reveal a step into the bunker.

He got in first and then helped Qingran in before assisting Ruihuang with the body.

As they walked further down the hallway, they met You Song first, then Xu Tianming when they got to the centre all.

Everyone had already gathered for breakfast.

Qingran sighed "Everyone. I come bearing bad news, our brother Wei Sheng is no longer with us."

Rong stood up, looking at Qingran in disbelief. "That’s bullshit! I just saw him this morning.."

Qingran nodded "You’re not wrong, but that Wei Sheng you saw was a copy. Someone had taken Wei Sheng and made a clone of him to infiltrate this place. We found the original Wei Sheng but it was already too late. My apologies."

Rong didn’t move at first. His mouth parted slightly, but no words came. Behind him, others had gone still too, chopsticks held midair, spoons frozen halfway to mouths. A tense silence gripped the center hall.

Then Ruihuang stepped forward.

He shifted the cloth-covered body gently in his arms, walking to a clear patch of ground near the foot of the hall’s central pillar.

Without a word, he knelt and laid the body down.

The thud was soft..

Rong took one shaky step forward. Then another.

He dropped to his knees before the body. Slowly, he reached out and pulled back the cloth from the face.

And there he was.

The real Wei Sheng.

Still, peaceful.

Too peaceful, now that death had taken over him..

Rong stared for a heartbeat.

Then two.

Then...

"Oh Wei Sheng..." His voice cracked like old glass. "Oh, Wei Sheng—no, no—Heavens, you cruel things..."

He hunched forward suddenly, grabbing the limp shoulders, pulling the body half into his arms. "You suffered so much. Through all of it. Every time we made it out, every time we laughed after hell, it was you carrying us. And now..now what? You go first? Again?"

Tears fell freely now. "He never said a word. Never asked for anything. Just... took the blows so no one else had to. Even now he dies in silence. You bastards... you really made him die twice?"

No one corrected him.

They couldn’t.

Because it was true. There were two bodies but it belonged to one man, who had no choice but to die twice.

Even Meng Nian looked away.

Qingran turned to Lingquan in her mind.

[You’re not going to say anything?]

The system’s voice was unusually soft.

[...Sometimes silence is all they deserve.]

Some time after, they buried them both.

Outside the bunker, a short distance into the dead woods where the trees had withered and the dirt had lost its meaning, two graves were dug.

The real Wei Sheng’s body was laid down first, wrapped in the same cloth.

The puppet near-identical, now lifeless and empty was buried beside him.