Ch52 - Sha, Sha, Sha

Xie Xiangyu’s response was even faster than Nan Zhou’s. He immediately released Jiang Fang’s arm, rushed to the balcony, smashed the glass and jumped straight down from the seventh floor!

It turned out he was right about the crisis. Nan Zhou chased behind him. The dagger swung fiercely and silently but the sharp blade only got a trace of blood. 

The weightless feeling of the fall mixed with the cold night wind hit him. Once he was only three or four meters from the ground, Xie Xiangyu’s palm turned and a slender black umbrella appeared out of thin air. The tip of the umbrella pointed straight at the ground, releasing high frequency sound waves.

The silent sound waves hit the ground in a short and violent manner, offsetting most of the impact. His body was pushed up half a meter by the sound waves. This consumption meant the only remaining use of this item was gone.

The moment Xie Xiangyu landed, the black umbrella turned into streamers and disappeared. He used the momentum of the descent to roll and completely disappeared into the night.

Nan Zhou inserted the tip of the dagger between the gap in tiles on the window sill as support and stared at the empty night below for a long time. He thought that they hadn’t guessed wrong. 

Now Xie Xiangyu could also hide his body like Sun Guojing, who had heard the rustling sound six times. It was probably because he only heard it six times that his existence wasn’t completely forgotten or erased.

This further validated their conclusions. This force really determined the order of death according to the sequence of when their role entered Room 403. Therefore, the solution Qi Tianyun proposed yesterday to re-enter 403 within a specific time and disrupt the order of the force should’ve been ineffective.

Why was it ineffective? What went wrong?

After successfully breaking away from their vision, Xie Xiangyu didn’t leave immediately. He crouched on one knee in the darkness, looking up at Nan Zhou. He saw Nan Zhou’s gaze wandering back and forth and judged that he was safe.

Xie Xiangyu was about to get up when he gave a low hiss. He put his hands to the hollows at the back of his knees. One hand was warm. The blade was just a hair’s breadth away from slicing his tendon.

Xie Xiangyu placed his warm palm on his knee and couldn’t suppress his smile. He sat back and muttered to himself, “My dear, this is too cruel.”

Didn’t he just kill Nan Zhou once? Why be so bothered? Previously, he thought it would be bad if Nan Zhou recognized him. Thus, he avoided Nan Zhou everywhere and wanted to get rid of Nan Zhou, so as to reduce his worries for the final victory in this game.

Now he had changed his mind. It really couldn’t be better if Nan Zhou became his teammate. 

Xie Xiangyu felt that he wasn’t doing this on a whim. His own advantages were too prominent. He was the only one who knew Nan Zhou’s secret. Did Jiang Fang know who Nan Zhou was? Would the girl with him know?

Nan Zhou must be lonely. There was no one who understood him, no one who appreciated his talent. Ordinary people like Jiang Fang and Li Yinhang would only restrain his abilities, making him play boring role-plays and play house in a clumsy and lame way. Why force himself to act as an ordinary person? He shouldn’t be an ordinary person.

The excitement made Xie Xiangyu’s body dry and hot. He couldn’t control the arc of his lips. He stared at Nan Zhou deeply until Nan Zhou returned to the dormitory. Even then, he still stared for a long time. He was reluctant to look away, like a dragon looking at his treasure.

*** 

Nan Zhou returned to the dormitory and found Jiang Fang’s upper body still leaning against the table. He was gently moving his shoulders. His posture made his waist look particularly flexible. Nan Zhou approached, the expression on his face indifferent. “Did he hurt you?”

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

“Um.” Jiang Fang shook his head. At the same time, he noticed the residual blood on the tip of the dagger in Nan Zhou’s hand. “…The dagger is pretty fast.”

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The excuse was good. Jinjing University’s management of international students had always been lax and Jiang Fang’s attitude was good. He offered to pay for the glass. Once the teacher confirmed that no one was injured, he told Jiang Fang to pay attention to safety and turned to leave. In this way, the deadly storm was calmed down like this.

Jiang Fang had time to tell the two people what happened. Of course, he selectively skipped the time when he had the upper hand.

Li Yinhang felt cold sweat drip down her back. She thought that in a PVE game, at least people’s hearts would be simple. She forgot that in a ranking competition, it wasn’t surprising for anyone to do anything.

For the first time, she started to rejoice that she was about to hear the sixth rustle. Then her sense of existence would be weakened and Xie Xiangyu might not notice her. Being entangled by this force was troublesome and dangerous but it was even more unreasonable to be entangled by a madman. 

Nan Zhou didn’t care about Xie Xiangyu. He said to Jiang Fang, “Your complexion doesn’t look good.”

Li Yinhang paid special attention to Jiang Fang’s face when she heard these words.

…She didn’t see anything. Jiang Fangs’ skin was ivory white due to being raised in a land of ice and snow. Only his lips were full of blood. Li Yinhang observed closely but she couldn’t see where his complexion was bad.

Jiang Fang answered, “I’m fine.” 

Nan Zhou wondered, “Why didn’t you tell me about your plan?”

“I was afraid of being overheard. At that time, Xie Xiangyu was probably by our side.”

Nan Zhou refuted it. “You could’ve secretly written it on the palm of my hand or sent me a text message, but you didn’t do anything.”

Jiang Fang was silent for a moment. “Are you angry?” 

“Yes.” Nan Zhou said, “I admitted my fault to you when I hid that I heard the rustling sound. I want an apology.”

Jiang Fang took back the left arm that was resting on the back of the chair, bent over slightly and solemnly said, “I’m sorry, it was my fault.”

Nan Zhou pursed his lips.

Jiang Fang didn’t hear Nan Zhou’s response for a long time and raised his head. “Was my attitude not sincere enough?” 

Nan Zhou inquired, “What’s wrong with your arm?”

Li Yinhang, “……” Was this big shot an x-ray machine?

Jiang Fang looked at his newly raised left arm and suddenly made an ‘ah’ sound. He smiled. “Is it because my actions weren’t natural enough when I took it back just now?”

Nan Zhou didn’t talk to him again. He grabbed Jiang Fang’s arm and pushed the sleeve of the black sweater up to the elbow. The thick bandage wrapped around the forearm had been hidden by the sleeve. A bit of red appeared on the surface of the bandage, causing Nan Zhou’s eyes to flash slightly. 

Li Yinhang was surprised. “This is—”

The bandage wasn’t tied tightly. Due to the fierce action just now, the bandage had loosened a bit. From the gap, Nan Zhou glimpsed part of the content inside.

It was half of the character ‘Zhou.’ It was done using the Swiss Army knife Nan Zhou gave him. It wasn’t to the degree of minor scarring. It was to the degree in which the skin and flesh were deeply cut and textured.

Nan Zhou murmured, “…You separated from me to do this?” 

Jiang Fang didn’t care much and nodded casually. “Yes, it was part of the reason.”

Nan Zhou didn’t know why but he felt worse. He said softly, “There was no need to carve it. Just write it down.”

Jiang Fang easily shrugged. “How can it just be written? What if that force is strong enough that I can’t see the related information about you that I left behind?”

He raised his left arm. “This will still be good. It will hurt, even if I can’t see it. If it hurts, I will touch it and know you are there.” 

There was a long silence.

Nan Zhou wondered, “Why?”

“Huh?”

Nan Zhou, “……” 

Jiang Fang laughed. He twisted the scorpion braid over his shoulder with his raised left hand. “You told me not to forget you. I promised and this promise will last forever.”

Nan Zhou, “……”

Jiang Fang saw his furrowed brow and softened his tone. “Do I need to apologize for this too?”

Nan Zhou blinked and suddenly felt a bit blocked in his heart. It was like a knot was tied. He raised his hand and rubbed it, but he couldn’t untie it. Rubbing it again, the knot twisted a bit stronger together. 

Nan Zhou silently pulled Jiang Fang’s arm over and looked at the blood-stained bandage. “You know, I didn’t want to ask this.”

Jiang Fang was silent.

…Nan Zhou was right. What he wanted to ask was why Jiang Fang did so much for him.

Jiang Fang really wanted to give his reasons. The funny thing was that he couldn’t say it. Anyone who knew Jiang Fang would laugh if they heard Jiang Fang say this. 

What type of person was Jiang Fang? He was good at using ambiguous, smooth and pleasing words to please everyone and become the focus of the spotlight. Everyone thought he was dissolute, unrestrained and wandering through a world of flowers.

The Joker of an underground casino. Vice-Captain Montoloka of the ice hockey team. Mr Lodoka of the truck company.

Jiang Fang was accustomed to being smooth and slick and eloquent in his words. He seemed to be close to everyone. He could say the most pleasing words that people wanted to hear. Then when he smiled and waved, leaving without nostalgia, the people who considered themselves his ‘friends’ started to look back and found that they had never walked into Jiang Fang’s heart.

Such a Jiang Fang had a serious psychological problem. He couldn’t say straightforward words that exposed his heart. He was always reluctant to hand over his sincerity to anyone. Until… 

After a fierce psychological struggle that wasn’t obvious, Jiang Fang reluctantly gave an answer. “…It is because I want to be your friend.”

Nan Zhou asked, “Do you have many friends?”

Jiang Fang didn’t know why Nan Zhou asked this. He still replied, “It isn’t a small amount but I want you… to be the most special one.”

For Jiang Fang, crossing his psychological barrier took the same effort to cross mountains and seas. As a result, Nan Zhou was silent. He didn’t comment on Jiang Fangs’ remark. He just immersed himself in sorting out the outer edge of Jiang Fang’s arm bandage. 

Jiang Fang repeatedly tried to talk to him, analyzing Xie Xiangyu’s strangeness and why he didn’t blend in among them so he could strike after gaining their full trust. However, Nan Zhou didn’t say a word.

Li Yinhang sat to the side with the sleepy Nanji Star, trying her best to reduce her sense of existence. Still, her current mood could probably be described as this:

…Wow.