Free Web NovelChapter 203: Chapter 7: The Person Crucial to Bai Wu
A pristine white coat, a smile more comforting than the winter sun. As a doctor, Mr. Bai’s demeanor was comparable to that of a celebrity.
When he suddenly appeared in front of Bai Wu, it left Bai Wu completely stunned.
How should one describe Mr. Bai?
Bai Wu recalled the neighbors’ opinions: his father was an almost perfect person—appearance, wealth, character—all impeccable in the eyes of those who knew him. freewebnoveℓ.com
Everyone wanted to be Dr. Bai, everyone envied Bai Wu.
Except for Bai Wu himself.
In his youth, he too had thought about bringing his father to disgrace, but from an early age, he had learned to weigh pros and cons and later found that such actions had more drawbacks than benefits.
Sometimes Bai Wu felt bewildered, hoping in his heart that Mr. Bai really was the man everyone spoke of.
"It seems you’ve adapted quite well in this world, made quite a few friends. Have you met a girl you like? Do you want to talk about it? I can help you screen them."
"I’m quite popular with women, you know."
Bai Wu didn’t speak.
He had a bellyful of doubts that prevented him from moving, but he hadn’t forgotten the hints his eyes provided.
Especially the notes that emerged in his sight had already clued him in to what this was.
[The Bridge of the Dead, also known as the Bridge of Rebirth. The malevolent spirits here occasionally indulge in mimicking the obsessions they had when alive. They have but one goal: to pry open your mouth; you’d best forget you have the ability to speak. Actually, passing through this area is simple—rush through, disregarding everything.
But~ absence of negative emotions doesn’t mean the absence of all emotion. Perhaps the so-called lack of negative emotions is only because you haven’t encountered anything specific. Some games’ rules are simple, yet so hard to follow~]
Bloody horror, the threat of death, terrifying monsters, supernatural beings and ghouls, and the ugliness of human nature...
These things can trigger all sorts of negative emotions in people, but they have no effect on Bai Wu.
Even in memories, facing the person he least wanted to deal with, Bai Wu had long been able to remain calm... at least that’s what he believed.
But when true obsessions emerged, there was still an extremely subtle fluctuation in his heart.
"Not talking? Did I not realize our relationship was so bad? Hahaha, I’m already dead, you know. Are you afraid of me?"
Bai Wu forcibly calmed himself and ignored the apparition of his father. While this wasn’t easy for him, it wasn’t difficult anymore either.
Only this malevolent spirit was more formidable than he had anticipated.
"Don’t you want to get the answers from me?"
"Don’t you want to know about your mother, or why I treated you the way I did?"
His steps halted again.
Bai Wu turned around and glared fiercely at Mr. Bai.
This man, seemingly radiating light, was clearly just an illusion, but Bai Wu still desperately wanted to know the answers to these questions.
He took a deep breath, turned his head, and continued on his way.
Without any hindrance.
These entities referred to as "The Undead" by the eyes appeared to be just a form of energy; they were nowhere near as exaggerated as portrayed in movies and TV shows.
As long as one adhered to the rule of keeping silent, they could not physically obstruct anything.
But they could continually disturb one’s mind.
"Death is just the beginning of the next journey, and you seem to be well-suited for it. You must be thinking that I’m just a malevolent spirit, an unreal ’impersonator’."
"I’m just constantly enticing you to talk; you must be thinking that I don’t actually know the answers to these questions, right?"
"That’s indeed one of my intentions, but I’m not ignorant, oh no, my abilities are more exaggerated than you might imagine."
"Child, do you really not wish to communicate with me? After you leave this place, it will be the last time you see me, even if you hate me, you should know... why I deliberately made you hate me, right?"
Bai Wu’s footsteps came to a halt once again.
"Enough!"
He didn’t vocalize these thoughts; they were only in his mind. Even his facial expression remained unchanged, with only a hint of red infiltrating the whites of his eyes.
"I must quickly think of something else."
"What are Lin Wurou and the others doing? What is Yin Shuang doing? Will they be able to get through smoothly?"
The voice of Mr. Bai once again started to interfere:
"Come, let’s catch up after so long. In fact, speaking up won’t really cause any trouble."
Bai Wu resumed his strides, beginning to calculate the countless possibilities of the future, including the surveillance by the Order Faction, and the changes in Cain’s exploratory journey after his infiltration.
He also wondered what the Xie Family was ultimately planning. freeweɓnovel.cѳm
His brain suddenly started to think about many things all at the same time.
His steps quickened, and eventually, Bai Wu heard a sigh.
"So resolute... Although I indeed don’t know the answers to those questions, I can sense that you are a very special person..."
Mr. Bai disappeared, and when Bai Wu looked back, all he saw was a pitch-black shadow, similar to those of the students in the Mirror World.
But with this shadow, you could see the eyes.
His eyes carried blessings and helplessness:
"Go ahead, the road is long, and do not speak... Knowing of your growth, your father would be very comforted."
Many black arms stretched out from the mud, grasping firmly onto the shadow’s legs and dragging it into the depths of the mire.
Bai Wu hadn’t expected this.
He had encountered a powerful The Undead who, at a glance, could see one’s obsessions. But this Undead itself was not evil...
After failing to tempt him to speak, it seemed to glimpse something else and bestowed its blessings upon him.
Bai Wu continued on his way, with growing doubts about the island in his heart.
What kind of place was this? Renowned for dispelling all of life’s suffering—a lie—what was the real truth?
The scene shifted once more.
He arrived again at this vibrant island, seven hundred years in the past.
This time, however, Bai Wu stood beneath a rocky mountain over ten meters tall. At the top of the rock, there was a girl with glasses, a braided ponytail, and a school uniform.
"What exactly did my parents bring me into this world for?"
This question was naturally directed at Bai Wu.
If not answered well, it was clear the girl would jump from the top of the rock.
Bai Wu paid it no mind, just as he had mentioned before, the regrets of others could only be listened to as stories.
He could save Hong Yin, save Yan Jiu, save Jiang Yimi and Bai Xiaoyu, but only when it was within his ability.
At the moment, Bai Wu couldn’t save this girl, especially since he was very clear that she had been dead for seven hundred years.
His eyes gleaned a note that informed him about the child’s life.
[Her academic performance was excellent, and she was the kind of child that teachers and neighbors alike admired with envy. She never went against her parents’ wishes and helped with all sorts of household chores at home.
She didn’t suffer scolding or torment from her parents, but she did feel a disparity. She had a younger brother who skipped class every day, got into trouble, fought and brawled, stayed out at internet cafes all night, and even accrued high-interest debt at a young age.
Yet, her parents were never as good to her as they were to her brother. It seemed like she wasn’t a victim of domestic violence or bullying. But when Doomsday came, her parents’ actions left her with persistent obsessions inside—delicious food was saved for her brother, warm clothes were reserved for him, while she, the older sister, was responsible for the tiring work of scavenging supplies.
The phrase ’don’t lament scarcity but rather inequity’ can also be applied to how parents treat their children. Over the years, she began to feel depressed. She came to this island seeking release. Your answer could free her, but the cost would be very heavy, and you could find a better way.]
So seeking release... means suicide?
Bai Wu looked at the girl on the rocks and slowly shook his head.
He could imagine that, perhaps for seven hundred years, she had been reliving this death, her parents’ favoritism towards her brother, their scant attention towards her, leaving her unable to find release.
"If only having my brother was enough, I don’t need to be alive; I’m just an unnecessary existence," the girl’s voice sounded hollow.
Children of this age are prone to dwell on things, building up all sorts of emotional knots.
Yet, in the end, Bai Wu didn’t speak. His destination was not here. Although he hoped the girl could untangle her emotional knot, deep down Bai Wu was always able to prioritize things.
Shortly after he took a step forward, he heard a dull sound.
Seven hundred years ago, on an island that emerged amidst the apocalypse, known to sweep away all the sorrows of life, a girl ended her own life.
Bai Wu recalled the man searching for a camera previously and suddenly thought... perhaps this was an island where people continually took their own lives.
The so-called sweeping away of all life’s sorrows was really just seeking death.
But humans, when faced with death, always have many fears. In his view, this girl and the previous man were not desperate enough to seek death.
"Could it be... they didn’t know that the so-called sweeping away of life’s sorrows meant suicide? Did they come to this island truly hoping for redemption? So, suicide... might be the result of some kind of inducement?"
In the Club area of the Coconut Grove and the Diamond area of the Yellow Line Grass, Bai Wu had yet to see too many clues.
But the Bridge of the Dead gave him a faint feeling that the theme of this island was about death.
To rescue these people properly, hope had to be pinned on the pieces of the Doomsday Puzzle.
After a long journey, Bai Wu could finally see the stele.
At the border of the Heart’s Three area and Heart’s Two area, Bai Wu had deduced the map layout before and thus had advised the other two people to walk straight in a diagonal direction at the Club’s Two area.
But just as Bai Wu was about to reach his destination, he heard the sound of a bullet being chambered.
"Finally caught you, huh? Don’t move, I’ll shoot if you do," said a man with a black hood, dressed in a suit and holding a police handgun, aiming it at Bai Wu.
Bai Wu turned around and thought the man’s outfit looked familiar, yet he couldn’t remember where he had seen it before.
He didn’t pay attention, as he had already figured out the pattern of the Bridge of the Dead.
This area housed many souls that may have died by suicide; encountering these people, he would likely experience their death scenes.
But as long as one had no morals and refrained from trying to save them, everything was negotiable.
The most troublesome part was the existence of a type of malevolent spirit within this place that could bring out a person’s obsessions. Not only could these spirits change their form to become a person one couldn’t let go of in their heart, but they could also glimpse into aspects of reality.
This gun-wielding suit-clad robber seemed to be one of those spirits.
But compared with Mr. Bai, this man seemed unimportant.
Bai Wu completely ignored him; leaving aside whether a soul could shoot a gun, even if it could, such a weapon would hardly harm him.
He turned around and walked away cleanly.
"Hey, hey, hey, don’t go. Is your memory that bad? You can’t even remember who I am?"
Bai Wu remained unmoved, but the malicious spirit clearly didn’t want to let him go. The moment Bai Wu took a step, he appeared in front of Bai Wu and pulled the trigger.
Bang!
Innate Force, Enhanced Vision, Prayle’s Eye—they all bestowed Bai Wu with strong dynamic vision.
At that instant, it was as if the air were filled with mist, the bullet causing ripples to spread outward as it headed for him.
At the same time, Bai Wu heard a familiar phrase.
"Goodbye, great detective."
Suddenly, the bullet vanished, and the mist and ripples in the air disappeared along with it.
The bullet did not take Bai Wu’s life; instead, the sound of the gunshot was like the switch of a memory valve being flipped open.
Memories finally surfaced, and Bai Wu remembered seeing this thug wearing a hood.
"Remember now? I told you our fate wasn’t that shallow."
The black hood was removed, and a person who Bai Wu felt was both familiar and unknown appeared.
"It’s really strange. You’ve seen me as a child with the way you look now, but when I grew up, I’ve seen you as a child. We each embarked on different journeys and ultimately couldn’t meet again, but if you’re willing to respond to me, I can answer some of your doubts. Or are you still unable to remember who I am?"
Bai Wu couldn’t imagine why he would encounter such a person here.
The last case of his previous life was a serial murder case, where the pattern of murders committed by the killer was easy to figure out; he only killed people with specific names or nicknames.
These people’s names and nicknames all had one thing in common—they were the names of characters in a certain book.
They happened to resemble the names of characters in some authors’ books and caught the attention of a criminal with a high level of counter-surveillance awareness.
Bai Wu also took a long time before he finally found a clue to this criminal. But when he finally caught the criminal, there was a not-too-big, not-too-small problem.
On the downside, he was taken out with a gunshot by the criminal.
On the upside, his death marked the beginning of a new journey.
"I am not someone insignificant to you, Bai Wu. To be precise, my relationship with you—is crucial."
The dark muzzle was once again aimed at Bai Wu.
This time, the doubts in his mind were even more exaggerated than when he faced his father.
He had always thought that his death was an accident, since chasing murderers was inherently a high-risk job.
Many times, going to the first crime scene was an act courting death.
Memories from the past flooded in suddenly.
Various details from the scene right before his death began to unfold in Bai Wu’s mind.
The black hood, 7.62mm caliber bullets, the chirping of cicadas, creepy eyes, strange laughter—and the glimpse of a tattoo peeking out from under a sleeve cuff.
Between life and death, there was only so much Bai Wu could remember, but now... it was as if he had relived that moment.
"Goodbye, great detective."
After this phrase, the criminal who had killed Bai Wu said another phrase in silent lip-reading.
"Have a pleasant journey."
