Chapter 494 - 435: Mai Mingle · Sniper

Chapter 494: Chapter 435: Mai Mingle · Sniper

December 6, 2026, 2:37 AM.

Mai Mingle lowered her head. The light from her phone screen flooded her eyes, filling her vision and her mind with a vast, snowy white. The world was deathly silent.

For a moment, she couldn’t move.

It was as if by staring at the time, by monitoring it, she could make it freeze. Then she wouldn’t have to think about the darkness quietly awaiting her at the end of her life.

2:38 AM. The time jumped forward a minute. It felt like it had landed on her nerves, jolting Mai Mingle with a sudden pang of pain.

Only 21 hours and 22 minutes remaining.

That was all the time Mai Mingle had left in this world.

She had only just managed to get a glimpse of this brand new, chaotic, indifferent, and bizarre world before she was to be swept into darkness forever, to cease to exist for all time.

Ivan hadn’t lied, of course. He had no reason to.

He had left after dropping that final sentence, and Mai Mingle didn’t even get the chance to ask him, "Why are you doing this?"

’Even if I had asked, what would be the point?’

Mai Mingle’s hand, limp and trembling, slowly put the phone back in her pocket. She still hadn’t even fully figured out how to use a smartphone.

She turned her head. The street was empty. In the sky above, Cynthia had never existed.

Mai Mingle stood on a street in Blackmoor City that had never been so silent and desolate, standing all alone in a vast, pitch-black, distorted world.

Whether she looked twenty-eight or eighty-six, the truth had never changed: she had always been standing alone in the narrow, desolate solitude at the end of her life.

No one may be born alone, but everyone must die alone.

No matter how many people surround your deathbed, you can only walk into the night by yourself.

But... even so, Mai Mingle still longed for someone to hold her hand and frantically ask her, "What do we do?" Just to fill the endless, suffocating, all-consuming silence between heaven and earth.

2:39 AM.

She slowly wiped her face, got back in the car, and sat there in a daze.

She originally thought she had over twenty days left. In that time, she’d had high hopes of finding the Time Illusion. Maybe she could even gather everyone’s Illusions and save Blackmoor City, Brianna, herself... and everyone else who needed saving.

But now, it seemed impossible.

Mai Mingle didn’t even have a clue about the Time Illusion. No matter how many times she checked her phone, it remained stubbornly silent.

The last notification from the Nest had told her she would receive a message about the Time Illusion within 72 hours. Who could have thought that she wouldn’t even have 72 hours left to wait?

Minute by minute, time was abandoning her. Minute by minute, it was erasing her.

She thought blankly for a long while before remembering that she had been on her way to find the Host and Chaisi.

’What can I do in 21 hours?’

’In 21 hours, will Chaisi, Brianna, Jin Xueli, and Fu Tailan all trust me enough to give me their target Illusions?’

Mai Mingle shook her head, let out a laugh, and started the car.

’Of course not. The answer is obvious.’

Still, she kept moving forward. It was what she had set out to do, so she might as well finish it before her life came to an end. Besides, she could see Chaisi and say goodbye.

After that, she would drive to the hospital, find Hai Luwei and Emily, and just sit with the two kids without telling them anything.

Meeting one’s end in a hospital was how it ended for most people anyway. Her fate wasn’t that tragic in comparison.

It’s just that she couldn’t accept it. She just couldn’t.

There were still so many places she wanted to see, so many new things she wanted to learn about. The world was still full of ivy, kittens, hot tea, and sunsets...

So much time, all wasted.

Mai Mingle slowly stopped the car, bent over, and pressed her forehead against the steering wheel.

She still had a young body, and with it, all the strength to feel pain. She cried softly for a while, but only allowed herself that one moment.

She didn’t have time to waste on crying.

Mai Mingle raised her head and wiped her face messily. Just then, with a sharp, ear-piercing SCREECH of tires on pavement, an SUV suddenly shot out onto the road ahead. Mai Mingle had just started in alarm when she saw a figure inside the SUV leaning out the window, firing several shots—BANG! BANG!—toward an empty lot.

The SUV sped past her, and in that instant, Mai Mingle’s eyes met Sha Xue’s.

Sha Xue was deathly pale. Her face glistened with sweat and tears, her fear and hope seeming to freeze in that one moment as they passed each other.

"Sha Xue?"

Mai Mingle had only just cried out her name when the other car tore through the night, rushing into the distance and vanishing in the blink of an eye.

It was as if they were afraid that if they were any slower, they’d never be able to leave at all.

Sha Xue had been holding a gun. ’Who was she shooting at? Is Chaisi in her car, or is he nearby?’

Brianna had said to look for a nightclub called "Temptation" around here, but as Mai Mingle looked around, all she saw were ordinary buildings and a conspicuously empty lot up ahead.

...In a place where every inch of land was precious, where buildings were packed so tightly there was hardly room to stand, there was suddenly a huge, empty lot.

Mai Mingle was about to drive over, but after a moment’s thought, she turned the car around.

She made a U-turn and parked in a block adjacent to the empty lot.

In this block was a century-old department store. A small, semicircular balcony wrapped around the second floor. The last time Mai Mingle had seen it, more than twenty years ago, the small balcony was still red.

Now, the small white balcony was already adorned with Christmas decorations.

Mai Mingle climbed onto the roof of her car, used the first-floor windows as handholds, and with great difficulty, managed to climb high enough to grab the balcony railing.

She hadn’t been much of a climber even in her youth. With a machine gun on her back and the rain making everything slippery and hard to grip, she nearly slipped and fell several times. She finally managed to drape herself over the railing, hanging there inelegantly, but could still feel her skin burning under her clothes, likely scraped up in many places.

Panting for breath, Mai Mingle tumbled onto the balcony, crushing the festive Christmas lights and decorations under her.

She picked herself up, adjusted the machine gun on her back, and walked along the balcony to the far end.

It was almost like stepping into a private box on the second floor of a theater. Across a narrow street, the empty lot that shouldn’t have been there lay spread out plainly before Mai Mingle’s eyes—

’Wait, is that a residential building that’s fallen upside down and been smashed to pieces? Did it fall from the Nest?’

’Is that strange young man with the dark golden hair the Host?’

As for the older man, Mai Mingle recognized him at a glance. It was Kai Luonan.

Chaisi had just taken a step forward, shielding his adoptive father behind him, as if to use his own body as a human shield against the young man with dark golden hair.

The Host was furious, his voice loud and shrill. Even from across the narrow street, Mai Mingle could hear him clearly—

"Dad, you don’t really think I wouldn’t dare to move against you, do you? I know, the ’Rumor’ Illusion is in your mouth..."

’Wait, in Kai Luonan’s mouth?’

’Chaisi gave all the target Illusions to Kai Luonan?’

Mai Mingle had only met Kai Luonan once, when they worked together to rescue Chaisi from the Black Abyss Belt.

Back then, Kai Luonan had stayed up all night to save Chaisi, not sleeping a wink, talking until his voice grew hoarse. Afterward, he had insisted on rewarding Mai Mingle generously... By all accounts, he was a decent man.

Mai Mingle respected him, but she didn’t trust him.

As for why, there was no reason. She didn’t understand it herself.

Snatches of the conversation from the people in the empty lot drifted over on the night wind, and she barely managed to catch the gist of it. At one point, Chaisi seemed to lose his temper and was about to charge forward to attack, but Kai Luonan stopped him.

Kai Luonan said a few words in a low voice that she couldn’t make out, but the next moment, the Host erupted with a piercing roar of fury.

"Do you think I’m still the twelve-year-old me? Do you think I’m still that little kid who revered and worshipped you, who didn’t understand anything? I’m telling you, Kai Luonan, you can fool outsiders, but you can’t fool me! I saw through to your true colors long ago—"

’Is this really the same Host who once saved my life and showed me the starry sky of the Nest?’

Mai Mingle suddenly remembered the thick, cloying hatred in the Host’s voice.

...Then again.

The one who saved her that night was the adult Host. Tonight, however, it was the twelve-year-old Damian.

’How could he not be filled with hate?’

He had probably fantasized countless times in the Nest about how his parents, upon discovering the truth of his death, would be heartbroken and furious, how they would avenge him, and how they would drive Chaisi into a miserable fate...

Damian had never imagined that his father, after knowing everything, would still raise the person who had killed him.

If Mai Mingle were a betting woman, she’d wager that Damian was appearing tonight, before his parents and Chaisi, for one reason only: revenge.

Mai Mingle certainly didn’t want to spend the last hours of her life watching a child from the past, now a Resident, carry out his revenge. She just wanted to talk with Chaisi for a few minutes. Why couldn’t she even get that chance?

She glanced at the time on her phone. Less than 21 hours left.

She glanced at the empty lot.

Facing this ball of madness that was a mix of a twelve-year-old boy and a Resident, Kai Luonan showed no fear.

He even pulled Chaisi aside, walked forward himself, took out a gun, and showed it to Damian.

’What is he doing?’

He really just showed it to him. There wasn’t even a hint of a threat.

’It’s as if he were just saying, Look, I have a gun here.’

Mai Mingle watched from afar. It was just an ordinary pistol, not even an Illusion, it seemed. And yet, along with her curiosity and confusion, a dark, hazy unease began to rise within her.

She swallowed.

Her palms were slick with sweat. She didn’t know why, nor did she know who the target was, but she gently set up her machine gun on the balcony, aiming it at the empty lot.

If... if someone was going to die tonight, right before her eyes, she couldn’t just turn and walk away.

The night wind seemed to want her to hear Kai Luonan’s next words as well.

"For you," Kai Luonan said slowly and deliberately, "this gun of mine is more powerful than all the strength you possess."

"What the hell are you talking about—"

Damian stopped abruptly. He slowly raised his head and stared at Kai Luonan.