Chapter 480 - 421: The End of Chaisi’s Good Luck

Chapter 480: Chapter 421: The End of Chaisi’s Good Luck

"Rules," which had only existed in text and as concepts, were now fluttering down from the night sky.

Rule after rule, mixed in with the rain, their origins from countless scenarios, traps, and Nests unknown. They were all scattered and incomplete, like pieces from innumerable puzzle boxes poured out at once.

Whenever his gaze swept across the curtain of rain, and that rain contained a rule, text would automatically appear in his mind:

"...Just like how you can only smoke in a smoking area, every human activity can only be performed in its corresponding area! Want to talk? Please step into the ’Speaking Zone.’ Want to walk? Please enter the ’Walking Zone.’ Hmm? What’s that? After leaving the Walking Zone, you can’t walk anymore, so how are you supposed to get to the Speaking Zone? Well, that’s where you’ll have to get creative, hahahaha!"

There were long-winded rules, and naturally, there were short ones too.

"Do not emit light."

"Anyone who has been in a relationship or on a date in the past year will have 10 points deducted from their limb score."

"Within five minutes of seeing this rule, if you fail to discover the subsequent rule, you will be randomly transformed into a ’debuff’ sprayer, firing at least five types of negative status effects at all teammates and companions around you."

’...What?’

Chaisi had just frozen in shock when he heard Uncle Kai ask, "Do these rules still work after they fall out of a Nest?"

"Of course," Damian said with a smile.

At least several hundred, maybe even a thousand rules were falling from the sky, all fragmented pieces from countless sources. ’God knows where the next part of that "debuff" rule is?’

’No, this is no time to panic.’

Chaisi clenched his jaw, the muscles in his face twitching as he forcibly severed all emotion.

He knew Damian’s attention was constantly on him, but he couldn’t spare him a thought right now. Chaisi strained his vision, scanning back and forth across the sky, through the gloom between the buildings, and over the countless raindrops about to hit the ground.

In the space of a few frantic seconds, hundreds, thousands of rules erupted in his mind at once. Chaisi felt as if his consciousness had become a soggy paper towel trying to hold a heavy brick; it instantly gave way. He let out a muffled grunt, lost his footing, and nearly collapsed.

He fell to his knees, his vision blackening in waves. It didn’t feel like he was breathing so much as being stabbed in the lungs with a needle.

"No need to rush. They only truly take effect when they land in the Human World," Damian said in a leisurely tone. "Look, a few have already landed among us."

A rule was resting on Chebri’s shoulder, and the rain that carried it had soaked his jacket.

"Please pay rent by the hour," the rule read.

It was completely out of context. It didn’t say what the rent was for, nor what form the payment should take.

Haiper suddenly screamed and stumbled back several steps, crashing into a wall that had once been part of the underground parking garage.

A rule had landed right by her feet, softly illuminating a one-meter radius around it. "If someone calls your name, you must not, under any circumstances, respond."

"Don’t look up. Don’t look at me. Just listen,"

Kai Luonan said to his wife in a low, heavy voice. "That glowing area must be the rule’s area of effect. It’s no use backing away now; you were already standing inside it when it activated. From now on, remember this: you have to obey this rule. No matter who calls you, especially if they use your name, don’t look up and don’t make a sound. Pretend you didn’t hear them. Understand? Don’t even make a sound to show you understand."

Haiper stared intently at the patch of softly glowing floor in front of her, her eyes completely bloodshot.

"There are still more rules," Damian said. "Ah, the wind is blowing them all over the place... How many have landed here with us?"

Kai Luonan suddenly spun around—Chaisi’s heart leaped into his throat—and in the next instant, he narrowly dodged a rule that fell right past him.

"Remain upright. You must ensure everything is upright. You must dedicate your efforts to uprightness. If any object is horizontal for more than three seconds, the ’Great Uprighting’ will commence."

That rule stood perfectly upright on the ground, motionless.

But thankfully, because it was upright, its area of effect was only the fist-sized spot where it touched the ground. It was easy to avoid.

Chaisi wiped the rain from his face. For a moment, his despair was so overwhelming it bordered on numbness.

’Have the Nests really entered the Human World?’

’Impossible. It’s impossible. A Nest can’t... There’s no way it’s this easy, for one person to connect a Nest to the Human World. Damian has so many tricks up his sleeve; he must have carefully staged this whole scene—’

’Impossible, impossible—’

"Brother Chaisi," someone called out from a distance.

’Impossible.’

"Brother Chaisi!"

Chaisi dazedly raised his head toward the voice. ’The area affected by Haiper’s rule is far away from me,’ he thought blankly. ’It’s okay for me to respond if someone calls me...’

"Brother Chaisi," the speaker was Sha Xue. Her face was pale as she pointed from a distance at his hand, which was dangling near the ground. "Your... what’s your rule?"

For half a second, Chaisi didn’t understand what she meant.

He looked down at his hand, his movements almost wooden.

"Only during"... "at the time"... "screening"

Three rule fragments, each only a few words long, clung to his hand, looking utterly lifeless.

It took another half-second for Chaisi to gradually understand. He started to raise his hand to touch his face, then froze.

’I shouldn’t have instinctively wiped the rain from my face just now. Any single drop could contain a rule.’

’When I wiped the rain away, the rule must have been smeared apart with it...? Is that what happened?’

’What did the full rule say?’

’The Nests... The Nests have really entered the Human World.’

Damian seemed to be laughing, but his voice sounded so distant.

Pain, blood loss, and exhaustion were like a gradually thickening fog, beginning to cloud his mind and muffle his hearing.

’Stay sharp... Wake up.’

Enduring the intense pain, Chaisi pulled his phone from his pocket. He had never taken a selfie in his entire life, but he had seen other people do it.

When he woke the phone’s screen, the first thing he saw was a message from Tian Xi.

"Brother Chaisi, I can’t come back to find you right now. Because... because even though I have this phone, I’m still not sure if I’m really me. If someone calling themselves Tian Xi shows up near you, you absolutely must not trust him. Just get rid of him."

’...So the Nests really have entered the Human World.’

Fighting back a strange smile brought on by waves of dizziness, Chaisi opened the front-facing camera and looked at his face.

A part of the rule did indeed remain on his face, but it was meaningless now. When he had wiped it, the fragment had been smeared into a long streak. When he focused on the remnant of the rule, the words that appeared in his mind were also stretched, distorted, and faded, their meaning entirely lost.

Because of a single, reflexive action, he now had no way of knowing what rule he was supposed to be following.

’Perhaps my good luck has finally run out tonight.’

All he wanted to do was laugh.

As Chaisi shoved the phone back into his pocket, his fingers brushed against a cool, smooth, cylindrical object.

He looked up at Damian.

Damian was practically giddy with excitement. He would periodically point to a rule fluttering down from the night sky and order everyone to look. At times, he would deliberately tell a Kai Family Hunter to move, trying to herd them into a rule’s area of effect.

"Dad," Damian said, spreading his hands. "The Nests are here. You have to at least believe that, right?"

Kai Luonan’s expression was grim. After a few seconds, he spoke, his voice nearly a rasp. "...Yes. Are we all doomed?"

"Ordinary people might be doomed, but not you, Dad," Damian said with an almost genuine earnestness. "Not only will you be fine, but you can also obtain the power to change all this—if you make the right choice. Do you want to see what kind of power you’ll get next?"

’Thankfully,’ Chaisi thought, ’I have unusually large hands.’

With one hand, he clutched the broken bones in his side; with the other, he pressed his hand to his mouth, appearing just as he had before, as if trying to stifle a cough.

’This is undoubtedly disrespectful,’ Chaisi thought. ’It’s an offense, a show of disrespect, a transgression, an act of exploitation... ’

’Whatever punishment Uncle Kai decides to mete out later, however angry he gets, I’ll accept it. But right now, I have no other choice.’

"Before we move on to the next step, Damian, I have a difficult favor to ask."

Kai Luonan looked at his son and said in a low voice, "You hate Chaisi, I understand. But those Household Hunters are innocent. Let them leave... This is our family’s business, for our family to handle."

Chaisi slightly loosened the hand over his mouth and looked at Damian.

In his palm, the Mouth Puppet still faintly retained the warmth from his lips.

Damian tilted his head in thought. "Mom, what do you think?"

Haiper flinched. She started to look up, then suddenly remembered she couldn’t respond and quickly bit her lip.

"Oh, come on, I didn’t use your name. No need to be so careful."

Damian waved his hand, seeming a little bored. "I was going to kill them to make Brother Chaisi happy. But since Dad asked, fine, they can go. They don’t have cars anymore, though. Who knows how long they’ll last on foot in this rain of rules."

Chaisi’s heart settled back into his chest, but then he froze for a second.

’Did Damian drop a building on the Kai Family’s cars just to keep Sha Xue and the others from escaping by car?’

Sha Xue and the others knew this opportunity was fleeting. This was no time to linger. The moment Damian finished speaking, they turned to leave.

"Don’t try anything funny," Damian called out as a reminder.

’He probably knew all along that Sha Xue and the others wanted to use an Illusion to treat my injuries.’ ℴ

Chaisi pressed his lips together and shot a meaningful glance toward the road in the distance—the area behind Damian, where the entrance to the underground garage used to be.

The Kai Family’s cars had been crushed, but the Morgan Family SUV he had driven here was still parked by the roadside. Chaisi had never intended to keep it; the keys were still in the ignition.

Sha Xue and the other two seemed to completely ignore his signal, half-walking, half-running as they hurried away from the parking structure.

When Chebri yanked open the door of the SUV, Chaisi finally breathed a sigh of relief.

’Whether a car itself would become an area of effect if it touched a rule was still an unknown—after all, a car is an object, not a location.’

’Judging by the fact that Damian deliberately destroyed the Kai Family’s cars, it must be safer inside a vehicle than outside.’

As the engine roared to life, Damian glanced back, his expression souring.

The SUV shot forward, not wanting to linger for a single second, and sped off into the night.

As the SUV passed by Chaisi’s position, Sha Xue suddenly stuck a pistol out the window, aimed it at him, and fired several shots in rapid succession. BANG! BANG!