Chapter 446 - 58 - A great disaster

Chen wiped his face clean and went back to sit beside Skyy. The image of Wang Xiao killing himself still lingered in his mind, refusing to disappear no matter how hard he tried to push it away.

It was a cruel world they lived in. Weakness of the body could be changed, healed, or even overcome, but weakness of the mind was different.

Wang Xiao had been tormented by guilt for almost twenty years. Even after being turned human again, perhaps it had been too late for him. He was still a man carrying the weight of everything he had done, and one day, that guilt might have crushed him anyway.

It was better this way.

At least, that was what Chen told himself.

He lowered his gaze and stared at his trembling fingers, letting out a quiet sigh. He still wasn't sure whether he truly believed those words.

Right then, Trexa let out a soft squeak. Yawning, she finally woke from her deep sleep and rolled toward him. Chen's expression softened immediately as he reached down and gently rubbed her little belly. Her tiny back legs trembled as she wriggled beneath his hand.

"You little cutie. Why didn't you wake up when I called for you?" Chen whispered, gently pinching her hind legs. "You know he almost died."

Trexa suddenly shot upright, peering at Chen before turning her eyes toward Skyy, who was still sound asleep.

"Squeak?"

Her little voice sounded inside Chen's mind.

What happened?

"He got bitten," Chen said quietly, lowering his head. "But he's fine now. He seems to have healed on his own."

"Oh, that's good." Trexa immediately moved closer to Skyy. She placed her tiny paws against his face and began licking his cheeks affectionately. "I like him."

"Trexa…" Chen pulled her gently away from his face and held her close. "Skyy says that he's from space. That he lived in a lunar colony. It's hard to believe, but do you have anything to do with him being here?"

Trexa simply raised her little paws as if the answer were obvious. "I was just having fun traveling when I was captured. I was taken to this big house in the sky, and I met him there. Skyy is sweet, so I wanted to bring him with me here." She happily rubbed herself against Chen's hand.

Chen raised a brow.

"So what he said is true? He's really from the future?"

"Yeah."

Trexa confirmed it without hesitation.

Skyy really was from the future. A future Chen had never seen and had never even heard of. Yet the thought of it only made more questions rise in his mind. His brows slowly drew together as he remembered everything Skyy had told him.

"He said he was made to breed," Chen murmured. "That he… he was abused up there."

"It was bad," Trexa said casually. "I think human rights have gone down the drain in the future."

She suddenly scampered away from him and ran over to Wang Xiao's body, glancing down at him with innocent curiosity.

"What happened to him?"

"He killed himself."

"Sad."

Trexa didn't dwell on it for long. She simply turned around and ran back toward Chen, climbing against him again.

"In the future, humans don't seem to exist a lot," she continued. "The lands were scarred. It looked like a great fire had burned everything. There was nothing. I couldn't even find a blade of grass to eat."

Chen's expression slowly changed.

He stared at Trexa, the strange words settling heavily in his mind. The future Skyy had come from wasn't simply more advanced than their world. From what Trexa described, it sounded as though humanity had nearly destroyed itself.

"What could have happened?" Chen mumbled to himself, his mind already trying to piece together Trexa's strange description of the future.

Trexa, however, seemed completely unconcerned by the seriousness of his question. She simply rolled onto her back and stretched her tiny paws.

"I don't know. A big rock went boom!" she said casually. "It came from the sky. People were crying and running everywhere. It was bad, so I left that timeline as soon as I could."

Chen's head snapped toward her.

"Wait, wait…" He quickly pulled her closer. "You said something came from the sky and everything burned?"

Trexa wriggled impatiently in his hands.

"Yes. Now can you rub my belly? It's itchy."

"Trexa, please!" Chen urged, barely able to contain his frustration. "Tell me in detail. Was it a meteor?"

The little rat stood on her hind legs and peered up at him, her expression completely serious.

"Only if you rub my belly."

Chen stared at her for a moment, gritting his teeth.

"Okay, okay, fine. I'll rub your belly." He sighed and turned her over, gently rubbing the soft fur on her stomach. "Now can you tell me?"

"Yeah." Trexa relaxed immediately beneath his fingers. "A big rock fell from the sky and everything burned. I ran away quickly, otherwise I would have died too." She let out a dramatic little sigh, then kicked one of his fingers with her hind leg. "Down a bit."

Chen's jaw tightened, but he obediently moved his fingers lower.

"When did that happen?" he asked, continuing to rub her belly. "Which year?"

"Oh, I don't know that." Trexa answered without the slightest bit of concern. "I was just traveling randomly."

Chen's hand paused for a moment.

Of course she didn't know.

Trexa had never been concerned with years or dates. She traveled wherever she pleased, jumping between timelines without caring about what year she had entered. To her, the future was simply another place she had visited.

But to Chen, this was different.

He looked down at her, his thoughts becoming increasingly tangled. Skyy had told him he came from the future, and Trexa had now confirmed that he really had. Yet the more Chen learned about that future, the less familiar it sounded. Humans were scarce, the land had been burned, and some enormous object had fallen from the sky.

He couldn't help wondering what had happened to the world he knew.

Trexa, completely unaware of the storm of questions running through Chen's head, closed her eyes contentedly.

"That's nice," she murmured. "A little more to the left."

Chen looked down at her in disbelief.

"You really know how to ruin a serious moment."

Trexa's ears twitched.

"Squeak."