Chapter 113: How Did She Do It? |
"What... what just happened?"
Ai Shiping was stunned.
He hadn't even processed what had just occurred.
He just suddenly felt an overwhelming premonition of death, followed by the sight of the entire building collapsing in a brilliant blaze. Yet, he remained completely unharmed.
It was as if it had all been a hallucination.
The instant the flames surged to the heavens, the world was blanketed by an emerald glow...
"It's quite obvious."
Ming Po leisurely picked his chopsticks back up. "Someone was fighting in the past."
Gao Fan slowly exhaled, his tense body gradually relaxing.
Gao Fan kept a straight face. "A Deceiver of the World might have planted it themselves... or they could have used a proxy."
Ming Po chimed in, "And this explosion clearly didn't kill her—she froze time using a preemptively activated Zhou's Azure Lead chip."
"Time Chips can be activated in advance?"
Ai Shiping felt a spark of inspiration. "I get it... you mean it's like preparing spell slots, inputting different commands into different chips beforehand. That way, as long as you crush the corresponding chip, the effect activates immediately?"
Gao Fan nodded. "Unlike 'returning to the past' or 'leaping through time to learn a skill,' commands like stopping time that forcibly interfere with other Deceivers aren't guaranteed to succeed... A Zhou's Azure Lead time freeze is completely useless against anyone with a Silver of Moon authority level. They wouldn't even need to use a chip."
"That's the main reason for raising one's authority level, right?"
Ming Po spoke slowly, a dim yellow light flickering in the depths of his eyes. "No wonder... according to the Red Queen, Deceivers at the Zhou's Azure Lead level already live quite comfortably. They have an abundance of 'time,' which is tantamount to possessing infinite lifespans and whatever superpowers they desire.
"But if they don't continue to upgrade their authority level, they'll be crushed like bugs by powerhouses at the Silver of Moon or Time Gold levels."
Ming Po's personal time had also just been frozen by the Zhou's Azure Lead chip.
He had merely seen the azure glow freeze the explosion before it abruptly stopped.
Because from that moment onward, Ming Po's personal time had been paused.
This meant that if the Red Queen had any murderous intent toward him, he would already be dead.
"After freezing time, the Red Queen returned to her base."
Ming Po narrowed his eyes, analyzing in a low voice. "She must have tracked down the source of the information leak—she specifically emphasized that they 'weren't very bright.' If it were an enemy, that assessment would be rather ambiguous. They nearly blew her up, so how could that be considered not very bright? It should have been a comment like 'reckless' or 'tired of living.'
"Therefore, I believe an insider must have leaked her whereabouts. That's what led to her being ambushed. Perhaps the information was sold, but I think it's more likely they colluded with an outsider... and it is precisely because of this that the Red Queen referred to them collectively as 'they'."
"They" had "already" been caught "now."
That wasn't speculation, but a certainty.
This indicated she had already caught the mole at that time.
Ming Po continued, "And the fact that she needed to specifically go back to chop off their heads means she wasn't the one who caught them, otherwise she would have executed them directly on the spot."
It was precisely because of this tyrant's suppression that the people who caught the mole didn't dare to deal the killing blow themselves... because they knew this matter had to be handled by the Red Queen personally.
"So..."
Ai Shiping looked thoughtful.
He had sorted out the true timeline. "The original timeline should have been that after returning, she mentioned meeting some 'interesting people.' Then this news was leaked, so someone who had a grudge against her, or a mole colluding with an outsider, traveled back to an even earlier point in the past and planted a time bomb here.
"However, the Red Queen triggered a Zhou's Azure Lead chip with a pre-recorded 'time stop,' safely returned to her base, and found the mole. She then sent someone back to the past to cancel the 'planting the bomb' event, returned here, ended the time stop, and bid us farewell. Therefore... we saw the bomb suddenly disappear?"
After all, the existence of Deceivers of the World superseded the timeline.
So even if the past was changed, because the act of 'returning to the past to change it' occurred after the explosion, the explosion still appeared in their memories.
"I still don't quite understand."
Ai Shiping furrowed his brows and looked at Gao Fan. "Little Fan... why was the Red Queen able to teleport at the end? What kind of chip effect is that? Did she accelerate her own time and travel an hour into the future?"
"Although it can be used like that..."
Gao Fan shook his head, not entirely certain either. "But no matter how a chip is used, the visual effects are the same. The only thing we can be sure of is that 'it was definitely an Hour's Red Copper'."
"It's possible she ended her Manifestation, or perhaps she accelerated her own time, directly traveling an hour into the future. There's also the possibility that she didn't 'walk back' at all. Instead, she used a chip to return directly from the future to the 'exact moment the explosion occurred,' bid us farewell, and then returned... Considering she had already caught those people but hadn't yet chopped off their heads, I think this is the most likely possibility. But in short, any of these explanations are viable."
Because there was only one Material Realm, yet the methods of manipulating time were practically infinite.
Just like killing a person; if you wanted to achieve that goal, there were as many methods as you could imagine. Simple ones, complex ones... but no matter the method, the end result would always converge on the single outcome of 'they died.'
A brief silence fell over the three of them.
To them, the battle just now had truly only taken place in a 'split second.'
Yet, outside of their perception of time, an immense number of events had already transpired.
"...Deceivers of the World are so dangerous."
Ai Shiping leaned back, suddenly losing his appetite for alcohol.
He smiled bitterly, looking rather deflated. "We just came out to have fun... I'm sorry, it's my fault. If I hadn't chosen this place, maybe we wouldn't have gotten dragged into this. Or perhaps... how about I go back to the past and negate the fact that we came out at all? That way, we might not have been targeted."
"It's useless, it's already too late."
Ming Po shook his head, his tone calm and his emotions stable. "The existence of Deceivers of the World supersedes the timeline. Even if we go back, she wouldn't forget that we came into contact with her.
"Moreover, don't forget... the Red Queen said she didn't come here on purpose, but was guided by Luck. She needed to make contact with us, and she did. For us, this obviously isn't a stroke of luck...
"So when the Luck of both sides clashed, it means her Luck had already overwhelmed ours. This is probably how she knows that 'Luck' is an attribute."
"...I'm sorry."
Ai Shiping apologized once more, his mood uncharacteristically downcast.
Ming Po, on the other hand, offered a faint smile. "It's fine. In fact... you could actually say this is a good thing."