Chapter 253

Chapter 253: Chapter 250: "Unexpected, isn’t it!The High Tower Invitation took effect, and the white shield rose, causing the next bullet, already aimed at his head, to fall to the ground.

Clutching the iron rod in his hand, Su Ming’an infused all of his pathetic 200 Mana Points from the Bright State into it and unleashed a Spatial Vibration at the white creature charging at him.

"Boom—!"

Spatial ripples emerged, and although they were not violent, the creature’s movement froze in midair for a moment.

The next moment, the iron rod, covered in Su Ming’an’s own blood, was thrown with precision and penetrated the neck of the creature still in midair, bursting into a firework of blood.

Barely able to get up and struggling to catch his breath, Su Ming’an immediately administered the last Strengthener to himself, sending out a High Tower Invitation to the last creature.

He dared not leave any gap; another bullet from Xia Luoyang and he would be a goner.

Even in this exhausted and critically wounded state, he had to send out the invitation immediately as he faced the last creature that broke through the defenses.

Agony spread like wildfire throughout his body, burning him everywhere, as he clenched his teeth to prevent biting his tongue from the pain. His right chest and shoulder sent waves of intense pain.

...The physical pain this battle brought him was more profound than any before.

Ming’an occupied a strategic position at the bridgehead, using kicks to clear many enemies. Several white creatures didn’t breach his defenses but were neatly kicked off the cliff.

If the river hadn’t swept away those bodies, the bottom of the cliff would probably be blanketed in a layer of white, like snow.

There were about eleven or twelve white creatures on the iron lock bridge, and three had broken through the lines to charge at Su Ming’an himself—two were killed, and now there was one left. S~eaʀᴄh the Novёlƒire.n(e)t website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

He looked up to see the last white creature, still bounding towards him.

The iron rod was stuck in the neck of another corpse, leaving him without a weapon in hand.

He raised his hand, trying to muster the strength to stand, but suddenly coughed up a mouthful of blood. Xia Luoyang’s shot had hit his lung.

His vision darkened gradually.

Losing blood continuously, his Health Points were still over four hundred, but the Strengthener couldn’t stop the through-and-through wound in his right chest.

His Spirit Points slowly slipped away, and he started to hear eerie, ghostly sounds, with darkness closing in on his vision.

The white creature, standing like a steadfast tombstone in the curtain of rain.

In its hands, it raised a shining blue stun baton.

"Swish!"

At the bridgehead, freed from the predicament, Ming’an swung his sword, and the rope bridge snapped.

The white creature that was about to pounce suddenly tilted, the rope bridge swaying violently, its hanging end plummetting down.

"Crash—Crash—"

Padlocks collided, wooden planks shattered, and the breaking sounds gradually blended with the patter of the rain.

As wind and rain slanted, the creatures lost their footing, many of them falling like large chunks of white stones.

Xia Luoyang stood in the middle of the bridge, maintaining the shooting stance.

"I still failed, huh," he laughed softly, not moving an inch, without any intent of charging forward to fight to the death.

In fact, he couldn’t make it across from this distance.

While being protected by the white creatures, their bodies also blocked his path, preventing him from getting through.

Originally, in Xia Luoyang’s eyes, as long as he could kill Su Ming’an, he would win this round.

Once Su Ming’an, as Yang Xia, was dead, he would succeed, even if the other’s Clone remained alive.

But when that bullet hit Su Ming’an’s right chest and didn’t kill him, Xia Luoyang knew it was over.

He had finished.

The bridge had collapsed, the planks shattered.

Xia Luoyang stood on the rapidly tilting bridge, holding a gun.

The view before him shook violently, and he was falling down with the bridge; he could even feel the river water below, like a ferocious beast waiting to devour life.

The dampness slapped his face, his finger pulled the trigger and then relaxed.

Just now, Su Ming’an’s incessant final High Tower Invitation had caused Xia Luoyang’s plan to take advantage of the situation to fail.

Apart from Ming’an, he now couldn’t kill anyone else.

"Really... not giving any chance at all," Xia Luoyang sighed.

"Do you want me to save you?" Ming stood on the other side of the cliff, supporting himself with the Sword of Yarman, covered in blood after the intense battle.

"Aren’t you going to help your main body? He’s right behind you," Xia Luoyang said with a smile.

"My main body hasn’t called for me, so I don’t need to go," Ming said without turning his head, a gentle smile on his bloodstained face: "Xia Luoyang... If you could explain the whole story in detail, perhaps the main body could let you go."

Xia Luoyang’s hands moved slightly, and Ming instantly became alert.

But unexpectedly, Xia Luoyang moved his hands, only to throw the pitch-black pistol out.

The pistol traced an arc before plummeting into the river, disappearing from sight.

On the collapsing suspension bridge, Xia Luoyang lit a cigarette.

Rain slapped his face, his soaked mask hanging by his ear, the orange glow of the light at the end of the cigarette giving off a bit of warmth.

He took a deep drag, exhaled a ring of smoke, his form shaking violently in the wind and rain.

"Anyway, congratulations to you all," Xia Luoyang said with a smile: "This time, you’ve escaped."

He grasped the chains amidst the violent shaking, concerned only with smoking the cigarette in his hand, as if he didn’t care about anything around him.

"It’s a strange thing," Xia Luoyang said: "Some people have talent, have ability, yet they choose to confine themselves at the most brilliant moment... time and again exploring their past, to save someone who has already confined themselves. Is it meaningful? — Even I, who performed the surgery for Yang Xia, still haven’t figured it out to this day."

Ming blinked, remembering the words Xia Luoyang said.

These were key clues, crucial clues to defeating the boss; he couldn’t miss a single word.

The suspension bridge was falling rapidly, the chains snapping one after the other, and the white creatures, like dumplings, were falling into the turbulent river.

Under the ravages of nature, these terrifying creatures stirred up a bit of splash and then disappeared with the river water beneath the cliff.

"Yang Xia... he had already moved beyond the past and achieved everything, yet he still kept looking back," Xia Luoyang sighed: "Facing the abyss of the past directly... What courage it takes, I want to help him too, but I can’t escape the confines of these barriers either—this small world that revolves around one person and resets over and over, ridiculous, truly absurd..."

The supporting tripod couldn’t bear the pressure anymore, and the bridge finally completely detached from it.

"Boom—!"

The bridge deck sank violently, the broken end slapped the water, splashing it up, instantly submerging the lower half of Xia Luoyang, who was grasping the chains.

The white creatures had sunk completely, and Xia Luoyang clung to a chain in the middle section of the iron bridge, cigarette in hand.

In the last moment before being submerged, he flicked his fingers to knock the ashes from the cigarette, as if that was the most ordinary action.

Then, he turned his head and showed a smile to the youth on the cliff.

Clean, pure, like the smile of a college student who had just entered society.

"This time, I wish you success," Xia Luoyang said with a smile.

"Boom—!"

The chain completely snapped, the surge of water rose, his figure completely submerged.

In the midst of a dim curtain of rain, Ming could only see the pieces of wood floating on the river, gradually torn to shreds by the surging waters.

[Additional Clues:

"Luoyang, you clearly already escaped from the past, so why did you come back?"

"During one cycle of reincarnation, the me who had awakened a sense of self suddenly realized."

"I couldn’t fathom why you came back—but I want to help you."

"This time, I performed surgery on you, helping you avoid Dong Xue’s diagnosis, wanting to help you, to help you end this endlessly recurring world, is also to help myself."

"Even though I ultimately couldn’t break free from the constraints of my identity, struggling so absurdly, wanting to kill you yet wanting to let you go."

"...I just don’t want to see despair anymore."

"Withered husks, wandering ghosts, we parasite here, like a dried-up sapling seeking a sliver of space for survival, like fish in stagnant water gasping for the last bit of air."

"You are not a quintessential weakling, the past you never bore the sin known as naivety."

"So desperately struggling, humbly desiring to live... us."

"I wish that this time, you can successfully save your former self."]

[Wandering Night Walk (Purple Grade):

Attack Power: 30~45

Durability: 25/25

Magazine Capacity: 5/5

Equipment Requirement: Strength Points 30 and above, Basic Gunmanship lv.1

(A special reward obtained by the player for the first time when they defeated Xia Luoyang on their own, it empowers those who dare to challenge authority with the spirit to rise.)

Special Skill : After charging for 3~8 seconds, the shot is fired, the bullet will gradually grow in size during its flight, causing explosive + high level piercing effect to enemies, this shot will always be a critical hit, when the bullet hits a vital point of the enemy, an instant death judgment will be made.

This shot will be automatically calibrated. Cooldown Time one minute.

Special Attributes : Wearing this gun at night will automatically reduce the player’s presence, lowering the discovery chance of other people’s detection skills towards the player.

Introduction: "His tombstone remained on the cliff, a tombstone unknown to all."

"—And the people who saw him afterward found him still dazzlingly brilliant."]

The equipment and clues turned into streaks of light and flew behind Ming’an, who glanced at the turbulent Jiang Shui and turned back.

Inside the High Tower Invitation barrier, the white figure was fighting with two cats, one white and one black.

The fat white cat lay over the figure’s face, its claws furiously scratching at a pair of bloodied eyeballs on the claws.

The black cat zigzagged left and right, its fiery red tail swaying back and forth; it seemed somewhat reluctant to approach, merely watching the white cat attack frenziedly, shock apparent in its small eyes.

The white figure seemed to be in pain, its stun baton had fallen to the ground, and its hands flailed wildly, seemingly desperate to pull away the white cat lying on its face.

But quickly, an iron rod pierced its throat.

Su Ming’an, with a hole still open in his chest, gripped the iron rod tightly and thrust it forward, blood squirting out in lines and raining down like a fountain in the rain.

The white monster dropped its arms and its mountain-like body slowly fell.

Su Ming’an let go of the rod.

He took out a Blood Bottle from his backpack and drank it to cling to life, the wound on his right chest already starting to slowly fuse.

Without new injuries to stimulate it, the health bar maintained a stable state, neither rising nor falling.

He found a large tree that could barely shelter him from the rain and sat down. Now that it wasn’t thundering, he wasn’t afraid of being struck dead by lightning.

The rain hitting his wound stung like salt, and he thought about tearing his clothes to bandage the wound as he had been taught in school, but then gave up.

He hardly had the strength to lift his arms; making it to the tree had been his last bit of energy.

His Mentality Points had dropped to 50, but it seemed to stop there. After Xia Luoyang’s death, the Mentality Points no longer decreased.

His vision was filled with dancing black lines and a red vista, and he didn’t even hear the sound of Ming’an approaching.

"What do I need to do?" Ming guessed.

"...Go, go check on Dong Xue," Su Ming’an coughed out.

He truly feared that Dong Xue, not finding the cave, would start running around in panic. He was already somewhat regretting letting Dong Xue and Suzune go.

If those two encountered a wild beast or fell into a gully, they would die unjust deaths, making all his perseverance in vain.

Su Ming’an twisted open another Blood Bottle and drank it down, his Health Points gradually recovering to 700. The bleeding stopped, and his Health Points began to trend upwards.

He moved his right arm, still feeling some pain, guessing that bone fractures wouldn’t heal that easily.

Ming Qi stepped away, and Su Ming’an began to think about the next step in the game.

Now that he had obtained two major clues, all he had to do was wait for his condition to recover, go back to find Dong Xue, and get the remaining clues from her, and he should be able to Perfect Pass.

The pursuers sent by White Sand Paradise had been dealt with by him, the bridge was cut off, and it should now be a safe period.

He once suspected that there was something missing in his previous route; otherwise, it wouldn’t have been this difficult.

He suddenly remembered the moment they left White Sand Paradise, the group saw a car parked on the roadside... Logically, such an object should not appear before them without reason; the car was a good means for escape. If they had had it, the journey would not have been so miserable, and the difficulty would have significantly decreased.

It was only because they lacked the car keys that the group reluctantly gave up.

Car keys.

Su Ming’an faintly felt something was amiss; he had already searched the entire White Sand Paradise, where had he overlooked this detail?

He thought about it and suddenly felt a headache, with a wave of dizziness coming from his body.

His vision started to spin, and he could even see invisible black sludge rushing toward him, the strong mental contamination suddenly smearing over him, making it difficult to breathe.

He felt the mental threat, a replay of losing control over his body seemed imminent, and he immediately started to switch states.

If this continued, he would go insane, and even though the Shadow State was frail, he had to switch; Mentality Points couldn’t be recovered.

The high Mentality Points of the Shadow State were added to him in an instant, and all the hallucinations gradually faded away.

He took a breath and walked toward the place Ming had just passed.

Leaning on the tree trunk, his vision flickering between brightness and darkness, he felt a tingling pain in his somewhat numb neck.

He opened his eyes and saw his vision starting to invert.

In the moment before consciousness vanished, he saw his own body, headless, gradually falling down.