SES Chapter 230

Chapter 230

Like Mu Dai, Yan Hongsand entered the Illusion of the Four Mirages accompanied by a “Fierce Slip.”

Like Cao Yanhua, Yan Hongsand felt that the Fierce Slip was full of nonsense and couldn’t be trusted. But unlike Cao Yanhua, she felt too embarrassed to hit it.

“That Fierce Slip,” she said, “acts all cute and clueless. When it talks to me, it even uses a childlike tone. There’s an old saying in the martial world—you don’t hit someone who’s smiling at you. And its skin is so thick you can’t even scold it away.”

So she let it tag along.

The thing talked nonstop the entire way, like a chatterbox.

“It kept contradicting itself—one minute rushing me along, saying there wasn’t enough time, the next minute telling me to stop and enter the ripple shadows to do something. Honestly, it gave me a headache.”

Sure enough, when it got to Hongsand, the Fierce Slip had a completely different story again. Cao Yanhua was baffled. “So which part is actually true?”

Mu Dai thought for a moment. “The key isn’t whether it’s telling the truth or lying. The Fierce Slip’s goal isn’t to deceive—it’s to throw everything into chaos.”

“It’s like a test with five sections. Everyone has to get their part right for the whole thing to count. If even one person messes up, everyone fails.”

“So along the way, it just says whatever it wants—true or false doesn’t matter. And I think they’ve been communicating with each other this whole time.”

Yan Hongsand said bitterly, “Exactly. No wonder they kept laughing like cats playing with mice. They must be coordinating. Even if you’re on the right path, it doesn’t panic—as long as it leads someone else astray.”

Mu Dai asked her, “What did you change?”

Yan Hongsand suddenly fell silent. After a moment, her eyes slowly reddened.

“Mu Dai… I wanted my parents not to die in that car accident.”

Although her grandfather and uncle had showered her with love growing up, the loss of her parents had always left a knot in her heart.

“I saw the moment before the crash. My dad was driving, and my mom was holding me in the back seat. I couldn’t help it—I went into the ripple shadow. The Fierce Slip told me I could attach myself to my younger self.”

So she did.

“My mom was holding me, Mu Dai. It felt like the first time in my life I’d ever been held by her. It felt so good—she smelled so nice.”

She took a deep, longing breath. “My mom was way prettier than I. Compared to her, I’m completely crooked-looking.”

But in the end, she couldn’t change anything.

“I was too young—barely over a year old. I couldn’t talk. Even after attaching myself to little Hongsand, I couldn’t say anything. So many words stuck in my throat, but all that came out was hysterical crying.”

“My mom kept trying to soothe me. My dad kept turning around, asking if I was hungry or sick. He got distracted… and then the accident happened.”

Yan Hongsand covered her eyes with both hands, sniffing repeatedly, her nose turning red. Mu Dai reached out and gently patted her back. Fine grains of sand fell onto her bare feet—unlike before, even inside the ripple shadows, the hourglass had started leaking sand.

Mu Dai felt uneasy.

After a long while, Yan Hongsand continued, “I was fine. My mom shielded me with her body.”

She had been too young at the time. For years, her memories of her parents had been vague. Whenever she asked her grandfather, he would answer vaguely: it was a car accident, your parents died, you were lucky to survive.

Such plain descriptions were nothing compared to witnessing it firsthand.

Cao Yanhua tried to comfort her. “Hongsand, don’t be sad.”

She wiped her tears. “I’m not sad. I’m actually happy. My mom loved me so much—she risked everything to keep me alive. I think I’m really blessed.”

“But I don’t understand. My parents’ deaths happened long ago. Why does it feel now like my interference caused it?”

“So after that, I didn’t dare do anything else. No matter how much that Fierce Slip nagged me, I just kept moving forward. I didn’t have any regrets, I needed to fix… until—”

Mu Dai gently interrupted, “Until what happened with your uncle?”

Yan Hongsand bit her lip. “I didn’t want my uncle to die. He might be reckless and lazy, and he nearly squandered the family fortune—but he’s always been good to me.”

She did everything she could to stop Yan Jiuxiao from going to Wuzhu Village, and even confronted her grandfather. “We’ll find a way to pay off his debts—even if we have to sell the house and land. Grandpa, don’t touch that cursed treasure well in the Four Villages—it harms innocent people. I can’t even sleep thinking about it. After all these years, can you really sleep peacefully?”

Before her grandfather could react, she stormed out, slammed the door, crossed the ripple shadow, and returned to the corridor.

Then something horrifying happened. The next ripple shadow—and the next—were completely different from her memories. Zheng Mingshan never brought Mu Dai to her door, and there was no exhausting journey to Wuzhu Village.

She realized it was a chain reaction. Without her uncle’s disappearance, her grandfather would never have hired bodyguards through Zheng Mingshan. She would never have met Mu Dai—unless…

Looking back, the ripple shadows she had already passed were fading into darkness. Acting quickly, she made a split-second decision and rushed back through a ripple shadow into the old house.

She said, “If the mountain won’t come to me, I’ll go to the mountain. If you won’t come find me, I’ll find you. I remembered this bar in Lijiang, so I bought a ticket and came.”

At Gather and Part by Fate, she asked about Mu Dai. Uncle Zhang told her, “That’s our young boss lady. She’s out right now, but she should be back in a couple of days.”

Since waiting was the safest option, Yan Hongsand immediately said, “Uncle, let me work here. I don’t need to pay—I’ll even pay you if I have to.”

…

Mu Dai asked Cao Yanhua to bring paper and a pen so they could map out the key points together. While waiting, she glanced out the window—the snow peaks of Jade Dragon Snow Mountain were no longer visible.

A strange unease flickered through her mind, but she had no time to dwell on it—the pen and paper were already in front of her.

Yan Hongsand said helplessly, “Mu Dai, can we really figure this out? I’m terrible at analysis.”

Back when the five of them acted together, she was used to letting Luo Ren or Yi Wansan think. All those complicated twists and turns—she didn’t bother listening, and even if she did, she’d end up confused.

Mu Dai said, “Hongsand, we have to think. Luo Ren and Yi Wansan still haven’t come out, you know.”

Yan Hongsand fell silent. Cao Yanhua, however, felt confident. “Three cobblers make a Zhuge Liang. Are we worse than cobblers?”

Mu Dai drew a pentagon on the paper, labeling its five edges metal, wood, water, fire, and earth. From each edge, she drew a corridor leading toward the center, marking a triangle in the middle.

“Based on the structure of the Four Mirages, we all started outside and walked inward through corridors. So I think the ‘endpoint’ the Fierce Slip mentioned is this central triangle.”

Cao Yanhua squinted at the drawing. “Master, are we at the endpoint now?”

Mu Dai said, “I think the endpoint isn’t about location—or even time.”

She explained, “The Four Mirages is an illusion belonging to the five of us. At first, we were separated. If we never met, we might wander endlessly through countless possibilities. But after Cao Yanhua and I met, the corridor suddenly had no path forward or back. No path means the end—our personal illusions had reached their conclusion.”

Cao Yanhua nodded vigorously. Before meeting Mu Dai, he had nearly forgotten their ropeway encounter. But after they met, they could enter and exit ripple shadows together with clear awareness—it really did feel like the illusion had ended.

So the endpoint wasn’t about distance or time—it was about understanding oneself.

Yan Hongsand realized, “So, since I found you guys, I’ve reached the endpoint too?”

Mu Dai nodded, pointing at the three hourglasses floating in midair. “After entering this ripple shadow, our hourglasses started leaking sand. Xiao Qi said that when the sand runs out, it marks the moment our real-world time stops. I think that’s when the exit door will appear.”

That would be where illusion and reality meet.

Yan Hongsand gasped—their hourglasses had only a thin layer of sand left, steadily draining.

She grew anxious. “But Luo Ren and Yi Wansan still haven’t come!”

“That’s true. But Hongsand, you reminded me of something.”

“When you couldn’t freely enter ripple shadows anymore, you bought a ticket from Kunming and came to Lijiang to find us.”

Cao Yanhua instantly caught on. “Master, you mean…”

Mu Dai said firmly, “We find Luo Ren and Yi Wansan—by any means. Posts, missing-person notices, asking Wan Fenghuo for help. We find them and help them reach the end of their illusions.”

After a few seconds, Cao Yanhua slammed the table. “Done!” Then he turned to Yan Hongsand. “Hongsand, help me out.”

There was a computer behind the bar. They even brought down Mu Dai’s personal laptop. On various social networks, big forums, and Weibo, Cao Yanhua typed furiously, drafting missing-person notices with a reward of one million yuan.

Yan Hongsand instinctively objected. “That’s ridiculous—we don’t have a million.”

Cao Yanhua said, “It’s an illusion—what’s wrong with writing ten million? Once we find them, we’ll be back in the real world anyway.”

That made sense.

Mu Dai went to the window and called Wan Fenghuo. The weather was clear, the sunlight bright—on a day with such high visibility, how could the Jade Dragon Snow Peaks be invisible?

When the call connected, she introduced herself and asked for his help, saying all expenses would be charged to Miss Huo Zihong.

Wan Fenghuo replied, “Just names aren’t enough—you need to give me some identifying features.”

Features… Mu Dai’s mind raced.

Luo Ren’s greatest regret in this life was probably his uncle Luo Wenmiao and the comrades he fought beside in the Philippines. If his intervention had succeeded and saved Luo Wenmiao, he might have severed ties with the Fierce Slip and begun forgetting parts of their shared past—but his path in the Philippines would continue. So the most likely scenario was that Luo Ren was in the Philippines.

She said, “For Luo Ren, check two leads. First, Xiaoshang River in Ningxia—ask about Luo Wenmiao or Luo Piting and whether they’re in contact with him. Second, look directly at the Philippines—Mindanao Island. He’s a mercenary…”

Static crackled over the line. Mu Dai stepped outside for a better reception and suddenly felt something missing from her view.

The farthest rooftops of the ancient city—the eaves against the sky—were gone.

Wan Fenghuo seemed to say something, but she wasn’t paying attention. The densely packed houses were disappearing before her eyes, one layer after another.

Signal towers, tall trees, low clouds, distant utility poles—all vanished at a speed visible to the naked eye.

The call dropped. Behind her, Cao Yanhua shouted, “Hey! The internet’s gone—Master, it just cut off…”

His voice stopped abruptly as he saw the scene outside the window.

Where the snow peaks, houses, trees, and clouds disappeared, thick yellow sand billowed like storm clouds—like a sandstorm or a raging gale. Huo Zihong walked past. Mu Dai called out, “Aunt Hong, what’s—”

Huo Zihong turned back with a smile—but yellow sand poured from the curve of her lips. A violent wind shattered the glass and surged inside, blowing her into a scattering pile of sand.

Not just her—the bartender, Uncle Zhang, the tables, the chairs—all dissolved into wind and sand. Mu Dai crouched low, forcing her eyes open against the storm. She faintly saw a glow in midair.

The three hourglasses were empty.

What happens when the sand runs out and the shadow of the sun stops moving?

…

Mu Dai stood amid the cold ruins of Gather and Part by Fate, now nothing but broken tiles and crumbling walls. Mist swirled around her, and distorted, elongated figures laughed eerily within it.

They stood on an isolated platform surrounded by sheer cliffs. Five floating bridges extended outward into the fog.

Yan Hongsand suddenly shivered and nudged Cao Yanhua. “Cao Pangpang… the door!”

It was the bar’s back door. The entire bar had collapsed into ruins—yet that single door stood upright, without frame or support.

As if responding to her words, the door creaked—and slowly opened outward.