Chapter 1205: His Son

Foolish Game of the Gods

When Li Wufang saw that Tao Yi remained silent for a long time, he seemed to understand something.

After a pause, he said a quiet "Thank you" and turned to leave.

After he was gone, Tao Yi still stood in place, deep in her memories. At some point, Hong Lin appeared behind her. Gazing in the direction Li Wufang had departed, her expression was complicated:

"It was the person who gave you the lottery ticket, wasn't it?

Li Wufang is his son?"

Tao Yi startled awake, staring at her best friend in shock: "Baldy, you knew?"

Hong Lin smiled — though the smile carried more emotions than could be counted.

"Mm. I've known for a long time, but you didn't want to talk about it, so I never asked.

You, you little fox, thought you'd pulled it off seamlessly. But you forgot that in the old world, there was something called surveillance cameras.

Anyone who finds a winning lottery ticket mysteriously tucked into their clothes is going to be suspicious — let alone two people who'd spent years in business and had already seen every dirty trick in the book.

At first, they thought someone was trying to set them up. It wasn't until they checked the footage and spotted you sneaking around.

I didn't know about any of this originally. It was much later, one night when I hadn't fallen asleep yet, that I happened to overhear them talking.

They were worried you'd gone down a dark path to raise the money, but at the same time they couldn't believe that even the darkest path could produce six million in half a year...

So they hired someone to investigate. Eventually, they traced it back to the man who gave you the chip."

"!!!"

Tao Yi was stunned. She seized Hong Lin's hand: "You found out who he is?"

The intensity of her reaction actually startled Hong Lin. She shook her head:

"No. I asked, but they wouldn't tell me.

Mom said that regardless of the man's motives, you weren't harmed, and I survived because of it... Since the benefactor didn't want anyone to know, the matter would end there.

They paid to erase every trace. The year after the company was saved, they donated the entire sum — every last cent.

I never told you any of this because I was afraid you'd feel bad about them investigating you. That's all."

"Mm."

Tao Yi murmured a soft acknowledgment. She wrestled with herself for a moment, then decided to tell her best friend the "truth" about this matter.

She wasn't sure her guess was correct, but if it was, then the Destined Ones... might have been connected by the threads of [Fate] even before the Faith Game descended.

"He's not Li Wufang's father."

Hong Lin was visibly relieved, since she had only been guessing: "Good. Otherwise, I wouldn't know how to face that teammate."

"He's Cheng Shi's father."

"Oh, so he's—

?????

Whose?!"

Big Cat's fur practically stood on end. She grabbed Tao Yi's hand right back, both eyes wide as saucers: "Whose father did you just say?!"

Tao Yi pressed her lips together and repeated those two words.

"Cheng Shi's."

"!!!"

Hong Lin stopped breathing. She seemed unable to believe what she had heard; her mind went completely blank for a long time. It wasn't until her expression had twisted into something almost unrecognizable that she finally recovered enough to confirm the little fox wasn't messing with her.

The benefactor who had saved her entire family really was Cheng Shi's father.

She didn't doubt for a moment whether the man's age matched Cheng Shi's, because she knew Cheng Shi was an adopted orphan.

'So even before the game descended, he was already guiding me onto [Fate]'s path?'

Hong Lin stared at her best friend in astonishment. After a long pause, her expression suddenly shifted to something far more colorful, and her tone grew strange:

"Is that why you have your eye on him — because of his father?"

Tao Yi averted her gaze, turning her head aside, and shook it: "I'm repaying his father's kindness."

"By offering yourself?"

"Could you please be serious?"

"Ha — you want me to be serious now?

Where was your seriousness when your head was full of the Fate Weaver?"

"..." Tao Yi pressed her lips together and said nothing.

Hong Lin was burning with curiosity. She desperately wanted to know how the little fox had confirmed the connection between Cheng Shi and that man. Tao Yi didn't hide it any longer. Since the truth was already out, she laid everything bare.

When Hong Lin heard that the man had told Tao Yi to repay his son, she gave her a peculiar look and asked:

"You didn't add that part yourself, did you?

Let's not forget — you've become a Screenwriter now. Is that really how the 'script' in your memory goes, hmm?"

Tao Yi fell silent.

She had indeed told a "lie." The original "script" wasn't quite like that. But she hadn't altered the "script" — she had merely omitted part of it.

That night, as the two silhouettes grew smaller and smaller in the rain, she had still vaguely caught the whispered words carried back by the cold wind.

"Since when do you have a son? I never heard about this."

"A son, my foot. I was lying to her. What kind of charity just throws money and leaves nothing to hold onto? Give her something to aim for, and the kid might make it a little further.

Besides, a girl who sits on the ground bawling and has nothing but garbage in her head doesn't deserve my son anyway."

"So where's this son of yours?"

"...How do you not understand? I was speaking hypothetically. Hypothetically, do you get it?!

I can't explain anything to you. Shut up, or I'm cutting off next month's deposit."

"I don't want money. I want a son."

"...You're insane."

...

The perspective shifted to the other side. At this very moment, his son was standing beside the Steps of Chaos, patiently waiting for Li Wufang's arrival.

Kataro stood quietly at Lord Ultraman's side, the picture of devotion.

Cheng Shi wasn't really curious about what Li Wufang had stayed at the meeting grounds to do. What he was curious about was where the [Chaos] inside the temple had gone.

The Fun God had vanished.

When he had first ended the meeting and returned to the Rest Area, Cheng Shi had planned to see his Benefactor first — to discuss the matter of "true and false [Fate]" and feel out whether it was yet another one of Its schemes.

But the Fun God gave no response.

Cheng Shi didn't give up. He tried every method he knew to reach his Benefactor — [Truth], [Chaos], even [Time]... If he hadn't been afraid that pushing the blasphemy too far would earn him a scolding from [Fate], he would have nearly crushed the dice in his hand.

Fortunately, though the Fun God hadn't responded, Kataro was still faithfully manning the temple. So Cheng Shi had come to the [Chaos] temple ahead of time, waiting quietly for his meeting with [Order].

He told Kataro that he would soon bring an [Order] follower to visit [Order] in its prison, and asked him to make preparations.

When Kataro learned of this, he opened his mouth, wanting to ask: 'Does the Benefactor know about this?'

But on second thought, he swallowed both the question and the words of dissuasion he had been about to offer.

Whether Lord Cheng Shi's actions were right or wrong, Kataro adhered to one single principle: when the Benefactor was absent, Lord Cheng Shi's word was divine decree.

Such was Kataro's path of devotion — and the very foundation of his survival in this era.

Praise [Void]. Praise the Benefactor. Praise Lord Cheng Shi.

...