Chapter 102: Villains Die from Talking Too Much

Chapter 102: The Villain Dies from Talking Too Much

Mottled bloodstains dotted the vast snowy ground, standing out like a crimson trail, pointing the way for the players.

Several flashlight beams wavered slightly with the group's steps, their light dispelling the darkness and illuminating a crooked path drawn by the bloodstains, snaking along the cliff face of the mountain.

"There's blood, but no footprints at all. That's odd..."

With a sigh, Eurus tried stepping along the bloodstains for a few paces.

Willowy, her shoulders weren’t particularly broad, but as she walked along the blood trail, her shoulder kept scraping against the cliffside, nearly colliding with the icicles hanging overhead.

Eurus grimaced, rubbing her sore shoulder, and exclaimed incredulously, "Why would whatever left these bloodstains move in such an unnatural way?"

Instead of taking the wide-open path, it had clung to the jagged, icy cliffside—defying all human logic.

Unless...

The scholar pondered aloud, "I have a theory. What if whatever it was didn’t walk upright on two legs like a human?"

As the others considered this, he continued, "The lack of footprints might mean 'it' never walked on the snow at all—maybe 'it' crawled along the cliffside like a spider, dragging some bloody prey..."

"I can’t see clearly right now. Can someone get closer to the cliff and check for me?"

Eurus raised her flashlight toward the cliff and responded, "Let me check."

Just as she focused her gaze, Yi Fengchu’s deadpan narration interrupted:

"Enlightened by her companion, player Eurus had an epiphany and shifted her gaze from the ground to the cliff above, intending to carefully inspect for signs of movement."

"Will she spot anything? Please roll the dice within one minute."

Eurus fell silent for a moment before objecting, "Wait, my eyes are fine! How could I miss something right in front of me?"

Refusing to back down, she squinted and scanned the rock face a few more times.

She was certain her vision and observational skills were sharp, yet at this moment, her thoughts felt clouded in thick fog—every detail in her field of vision was clear, yet her brain couldn’t process or comprehend them.

It was like the helplessness of a dyslexic person facing an incomprehensible page of gibberish.

Yi Fengchu chuckled mentally to the group, answering Eurus’ doubt: "Don't be so sure."

"I told you, in this mountain, anything is possible... Everything is decided by the almighty dice."

Eurus pursed her lips, thinking to herself: *More like everything is decided by this NPC who’s temporarily replaced the system and controls the dice.*

What a deceptively approachable "wolf in sheep's clothing."

Overruled, Eurus obediently rolled the dice.

Fortunately, Lady Luck smiled this time—she rolled a "5," passing the check.

Yi Fengchu continued his flat narration, stating without inflection: "Upon closer inspection, player Eurus came through and found a clue."

"On the thin layer of ice covering the cliff, four faint, shallow gouges could be seen. These marks were positioned over two meters above the ground, winding between clusters of hanging icicles, stretching into the distance in long, narrow lines..."

Once the dice roll succeeded, the fog in Eurus’ mind instantly cleared. Staring at the tell-tale scrape marks, she frowned in thought.

She could almost picture it—some unknown, bloodthirsty creature clinging tightly to the cliff, undulating its sinuous limbs as it scuttled through the night like a giant spider...

No, wait. Not a spider. Its movements were more like an octopus with fewer tentacles, or—

A snake?

Eurus suddenly made the connection to the common serpent.

Chen Hui’s reaction was the most direct. He recoiled half a step and clicked his tongue. "What manner of creature are we even tracking?"

Even someone as fearless as Chen Hui felt a chill run down his spine in the biting predawn wind.

The group continued following the blood trail, walking for about ten more minutes before it vanished abruptly at the base of a near-vertical cliff.

Lena looked up and concluded, "It must’ve climbed up here, crossing over the ridge to the other side."

The unknown creature could scale cliffs with ease, but the players couldn’t.

The cliff towered forbiddingly high. From below, the ridge looked like a towering wall piercing straight into the night sky, stretching beyond the reach of their flashlights.

Add to that the slippery ice coating its surface, with precious few handholds—players whose Abilities were restricted by the dice dared not attempt the climb.

"Need me to step in?"

Sensing his chance to contribute, Chen Hui rolled his shoulders eagerly.

Lena hesitated. "That’s exactly why we... Ugh."

Had the earth-manipulating Ability belonged to Eurus or the scholar, the group might’ve considered taking the shortcut to save time. But with Chen Hui’s history of erratic behavior...

Aside from Chen Hui himself, the others doubted his competence and luck.

Moreover, Lena still remembered his disturbing antics by the campfire—suddenly pressing his face close to hers—and remained wary. Handing route control to him was out of the question.

What if he had another episode mid-climb?

"No need to trouble yourself," the scholar tactfully declined. "Since we’ve confirmed the direction, let’s stick to the normal trail. It’ll... avoid unnecessary dangers."

Chen Hui nodded blankly, completely oblivious to the fact that *he* was the "unnecessary risk" in question.

The players took the long way along the hiking trail, circling the main mountain like clockwork. Time slipped away with every step.

Unnoticed, the first blush of dawn touched the distant peaks, brushing the black horizon with soft orange-pink hues.

The sun rose, its rays growing from faint to scorching, igniting a blazing orb that slowly shifted from the east toward the zenith.

During this time, the group only paused briefly twice, their weariness growing.

Their initial campsite had been nearly diagonal to the fourth sub-peak, separated by the entire main mountain. The path they now took was far longer than their ascent, looping around in a wide detour.

Who could’ve guessed the dungeon’s key location would be on that remote, inconspicuous minor peak to the northeast?

As they drew closer to the sub-peak, Yi Fengchu called for dice rolls more frequently, triggering shifts in weather and time.

From his perspective, intangible time folded like thin paper in this area, twisting into different shapes and transforming the snowy expanse into a vast, labyrinthine maze of temporal pathways.

To the players, however, it manifested as fleeting glimpses of past and future—phantoms from various points in time flickering like candle flames.

They saw unfamiliar tourists, their figures as ephemeral as mirages, appearing briefly before vanishing again.

They also witnessed the legendary mountaineering team, its members counting frantically in the snowstorm, always ending up with more heads than there should’ve been, before fleeing downhill in panic.

But more often than not, what appeared within their line of sight were familiar figures of Zhang's father—

One Zhang's father was neurotically curled up in a corner, clutching his head.

Two Zhang's fathers sat on a rock, their faces filled with despair.

Three Zhang's fathers were drawing incomprehensible symbols on the snow's surface.

Four Zhang's fathers wandered aimlessly along the mountain path.

And five, six, seven...

They shared the same face, their figures overlapping and swarming, densely filling the snowy expanse, sobbing, shrieking, mumbling to themselves...

The players finally understood what the last line in the notebook—"There are many versions of me wandering the mountain"—meant.

"—This is practically mental pollution."

Eurus covered her eyes in pain. "After staring for too long, I can barely recognize his face anymore. It feels both familiar and alien..."

"Can we see someone other than Zhang's father?"

"..."

Yi Fengchu fell silent for a moment before responding enigmatically, "As you wish."

Eurus: ?

She had only said it casually—there was no need to be so accommodating!

A sudden sense of foreboding rose in her heart. As the players continued forward, the scene before them indeed changed.

Alongside the living, wandering Zhang's fathers, they now saw decapitated corpses.

The severed necks were a mess of mangled flesh, as if torn apart by a blunt saw or ripped off by some beast.

Some of the corpses were still fresh, tendrils of steam escaping from exposed windpipes, turning milky white in the cold wind—as if these headless bodies were still breathing.

Blood-scented air surged from the depths of their lungs, and the howling wind seemed to mimic their hissing sighs...

Based on the corpses' clothing, the players could easily tell: these were all Zhang's father's bodies.

"But," Scholar frowned, "how can the same person die multiple times across different time periods?"

Lena crouched beside one of the corpses and pointed at the wristwatch. "The answer is here."

By now, Scholar's vision had been restored. He leaned in and noticed the second hand circling endlessly, while the minute and hour hands remained frozen in place.

As if... this watch was forever trapped within a single minute, never progressing forward or backward.

Lena gazed at the headless corpse with faint sorrow and explained:

"A normal person's fate is a continuous, unbroken line—'past' determines 'present,' and 'present' influences 'future.' But Zhang's father's fate is like a line cut into countless fragments, each stitched end-to-end, endlessly looping within a single minute."

"Simply put, some immense power has toyed with time, splitting each minute of Zhang's father into independent, incomplete fragments..."

"That's why Zhang's father can't leave the mountain, survives without food or water, and remains unnoticed by ordinary tourists—because every 'he' exists only within a single minute."

"He doesn't share the same space-time as the outside world, so no interaction is possible."

To grant life to each fragmented minute—such an uncanny and colossal power was almost unimaginable!

After hearing the explanation, the players instantly understood the sorrow in Lena's eyes.

Zhang's father, forever wandering the mountain, was like a prisoner trapped in a narrow sliver of time—alive, yet unable to move...

"Time in this mountain is like transparent amber preserving a specimen."

Eurus murmured, "Zhang's father's wish did come true—he won't die, won't age, eternally frozen in time. But is this living death... really worth it?"

Eurus added this information to the System Panel, and the quest progress immediately jumped from 75% to 85%.

"Almost there."

She wasn't taken aback. She could roughly guess the remaining missing details:

First, why were some versions of Zhang's father beheaded?

Did the "head" hold some special significance or purpose, driving the killer to tear it off while discarding the rest of the body?

Second, who was the killer?

If it was Zhang's father himself, what kind of transformation had he undergone to become that creature crawling spider-like along the cliffs?

Third...

Her eyes flickering, Eurus suddenly turned to Yi Fengchu. "Mr. Yi, what exactly was Zhang's father's wish to you back then?"

Yi Fengchu chuckled softly and countered, "Why ask me? Are you certain I was the one he pleaded with?"

"..."

Eurus wasn't certain, of course. She merely felt that Yi Fengchu's manifested abilities aligned too closely with the mountain's anomalies.

If the mountain was under the dominion of some divine being, she could only think of Yi Fengchu...

As Eurus remained silent, Yi Fengchu gently admonished her, "See? You're not sure either. You're just trying to fish for more information from me with vague words."

Glancing at Eurus' identity details, he sighed meaningfully. "Is this how all ability users in your field operate?"

Eurus' heart clenched.

He already knew her true Ability?!

So he had simply been humoring her until she dared to use her word games on him—only then did he issue a warning...

Despite Yi Fengchu not taking direct action, Eurus felt an oppressive weight, as if all her secrets were laid bare before him.

This pressure far surpassed mere brute force.

This time, it was just a veiled warning—but what if there was a next time?

The thought flashed through her mind before she suppressed it. She didn't dare dwell on it, much less risk her life testing the unknown.

Eurus glanced at the other players' expressions, deducing that Yi Fengchu had exposed her Ability in a "private channel" with her. She sighed in relief before promptly declaring, "Please forgive my rudeness. From now on, I shall act only by your will."

Yi Fengchu showed no intention of pressing the matter, merely cautioned, "Cutting corners won't achieve your goals here. I suggest you focus on the clues within the instance."

After all, even he wasn't entirely sure what his power had done to Zhang's father...

He was also planning to use these players to easily dig up the truth he wanted.

Yi Fengchu hoped these players would remain focused on working for him, being diligent investigators, rather than daring to scheme against him.

In the following stretch of the journey, Eurus grew visibly quieter.

This prompted Lena to frequently glance at her, remarking, "What's going on? You're being unusually quiet..."

Eurus smiled: *Quiet as can be.*

Just then, the players suddenly heard Yi Fengchu gave a surprised "Huh?"

Perhaps a lingering effect of the dice rolls, the moment they heard his voice, their hearts jumped to their throats. They held their breaths nervously, awaiting what would come next.

The sound of dice being casually fiddled with followed, as if the mysterious NPC was thinking something over before saying:

"In places unseen by you, strange things are happening."

"Please make a secret roll—meaning the criteria and results will not be disclosed, but the outcome will majorly affect the subsequent development of the scenario."

Instinct told the players that this new mechanic would have crazy consequences on their progress, demanding utmost caution.

For a moment, their heads spun with wild guesses before unanimously turning their gazes toward Lena...

Lena sighed, with a look that said, *What would you all do without me?* She spread her hands and said, "I'll handle the roll!"

...

As it turned out, Zhang Ming couldn't take a scare to save his life.

After locking eyes with the lizard-like creature clinging to the cave ceiling, Zhang Ming let out a blood-curdling scream, his eyes rolling back as he passed out cold again.

When he awoke again, he found himself trussed up with a bloody climbing rope in front of a roaring fire. The intense heat burned his cheeks bright red, and above the flames hung a way-too-familiar pot, bubbling with boiling water.

The creature crouched beside him, its freakishly long limbs tracing over his body as if deciding where to make the first cut.

Zhang Ming almost stopped breathing in terror, but he managed to stay conscious, forcing a smile that looked more like a wince. His voice trembled as he spoke, "H-Hey, pops... why are you tying me up?"

"It's been so many years since we last saw each other—shouldn’t we sit down and have a proper chat...?"

The creature turned its head, the flickering firelight illuminating its face.

It had no features—no eyes, nose, or mouth—just a smooth, flat, grayish-white oval surface, like a smoothed-out plaster cast.

Upon closer inspection, Zhang Ming realized its face was covered in fine, pale-gray scales, tightly interlocked. But when it opened its "mouth," the scales peeled back in rings, revealing a bottomless black void.

...What the fuck was this thing?

Could it really be his father—a regular human—transformed into *this*?!

Under Zhang Ming’s horrified gaze, the creature opened its mouth, its unknown vocal organs vibrating to produce a raspy, ancient voice: "Xiao Ming, don’t be afraid. Soon, we’ll become one and leave this terrible mountain together."

"Your flesh and my soul will become one forever, never to part again..."

Even with some mental preparation, Zhang Ming couldn’t suppress the twitching of his face. His breaths came in ragged gasps from sheer terror as he stammered, "M-My flesh? Become one? What—what does that mean?"

The creature ignored his question. Its limb hovered inches from Zhang Ming’s neck, then traced down his spine, as if simulating a cutting motion.

Mumbling like in a dream, it replied, "Don’t be afraid, Xiao Ming. It won’t hurt. I’ve tried this many times—"

"First, we dig a hole here," the creature lightly tapped a vertebra at the base of Zhang Ming’s neck, completely ignoring his terror, "then pour boiling water inside. After that, we slice down the spine, and the skin will slip right off."

"Then we sever the head, and I’ll move into your body, stealing your fate to escape this place..."

As it spoke, the creature let out a series of creepy, hissing laughter.

The laughter swirled with the icy drafts, mingling with the cave’s flames and throwing creepy, dancing shadows.

Zhang Ming watched in horror as the tip of the creature’s limb split open, revealing rows of shark-like teeth that reached for him...

He froze in terror, his limbs going numb, certain he was about to die that very day.

But in the depths of his despair, Zhang Ming suddenly heard a crisp sound—like the rolling of something hard and angular.

It tumbled rhythmically, as if God had tossed a die into the world, stirring a storm of fate.

"..."

The creature’s movements abruptly halted.

In that fleeting moment, a sudden need to spill its guts surged within it.

This impulse drowned out its murderous intent, compelling it to sit down and share its past with its prey, mere inches away.

After a pause, the creature suddenly retracted its limbs and sat across from Zhang Ming. "Do you want to know what I’ve endured all these years?"

Zhang Ming wasn’t particularly eager to know, nor did he understand why the creature’s sudden need to talk had surfaced at such a critical moment. Didn’t it know the saying, *Villains die from talking too much*?

But right now, the more the creature spoke, the more time he bought for himself!

So Zhang Ming nodded frantically, putting on a shaky smile. "Yes! Absolutely! Take your time..."