SES Chapter 221 Part 2

There, she talked with Doctor He for a long time.

Doctor He suggested she learn self-hypnosis—to stop fixating on the chaos outside and, at the right times, turn inward. To understand herself, and to understand the other two personalities that had once dominated this body.

How to cure dissociative identity disorder? There was no consensus. Opinions varied. Supposedly, the most effective method was to “kill” the secondary personalities one by one, letting them fade away.

To put it simply, it was like feuding warlords—eventually, the strongest one wipes out all rivals and ascends the throne.

There was another method, though. In Doctor He’s words: grow so strong that no one even dares to harbor thoughts of rebellion. The others surrender on their own.

Mu Dai chose the second way. They were all “herself,” after all—even a bloodless, symbolic “killing” was emotionally hard to accept.

The leopard incident, when Little Pocket was sacrificed, had been unavoidable. Still, it brought a small sense of relief.

But it wasn’t easy after that. Mu Dai No. 2 was defined by coldness—ruthless, rigid, existing almost solely for strength. How could she become even stronger than that?

Sometimes Mu Dai even thought: maybe coexistence was fine.

But strangely enough, later on she continued self-hypnosis on her own—sometimes alone in a room, sometimes before sleep, as long as she wasn’t disturbed. Each time she saw Mu Dai No. 2, she felt that the other self was growing weaker.

Luo Ren was curious. “You can see her?”

“I can. It’s like a special conference hall. At first, there were three chairs, three identical faces. Later, when Little Pocket left, her chair was removed. Only two remained.”

That was her inner world—a top-secret meeting room where they communicated and scrutinized one another.

Luo Ren asked, “Why do you think Mu Dai No. 2 kept getting weaker?”

At first, Mu Dai herself was puzzled. Her temper now was actually gentler. In the beginning, she’d had little patience with people like Wan San or Cao Yanhua, quick to darken her face or throw a punch. Now, she rarely got angry—she grew calmer, steadier.

“Later, I figured it out. True strength probably isn’t rigidity. Fighting until heads crack and blood flows, winning fight after fight—that’s not strength.”

Luo Ren laughed. “Right. Even military strategy says the highest form is breaking plans, and the lowest is attacking cities. When things devolve into bare-knuckled brawling, that’s not clever or strong—just brute force.”

“So, Luo Xiaodao, don’t confront the vicious slips head-on.”

He froze, suddenly sensing depth in her words. “What do you mean?”

“We hate the vicious slips too much right now. We’re obsessed with killing the seventh one, sealing it—like we’ve already rolled up our sleeves to fight, nose to nose with it. When you’re that close, you can’t see any other solution.”

“Maybe you should step back. Put away that hard, aggressive mindset and try a more flexible approach. It wants to kill us, we want to kill it—both sides are fixated on death. If you only stare at that one word, you can’t see any other way out.”

A flexible approach? Something stirred in Luo Ren’s mind.

Some deadlocks need something broken before anything new can be built. The mystic’s “hypothesis” was based on destroying a premise they’d always believed unquestioningly.

He needed to break something—some fixed assumptions, some taken-for-granted ideas.

Step back. Be flexible. Put away the hard edge. Don’t fixate on death. Each phrase spun rapidly through his mind.

Mu Dai continued earnestly, “Cao Fatty and the others are so discouraged, but I’m not. I don’t think there’s such a thing as a dead end in this world. Every problem has a solution. If the road ahead is blocked, you can look up and fly, or look down and dig a tunnel. It just depends on whether you can think of it.”

“Luo Xiaodao, don’t worry. We still have seven days. Maybe we’ll think of something.”

She finished and got no response. Just as she was about to look up at him, Luo Ren suddenly pulled her tight and whispered, “Don’t move. I think… I’m just about to figure something out.”

Early the next morning, Yan Hongsha was woken by the bedside phone ringing. It was Luo Ren, telling her to hurry and get ready—they were eating in a private dining room.

After hanging up, she was baffled. As she got out of bed, she heard the phone ringing in the room across the hall—Wan San and the others must have gotten the call too.

After washing up, the three of them went downstairs together. On the way, Cao Yanhua joked that it was just breakfast—why use a private room? Could it be a last meal?

That comment made Yan Hongsha and Wan San uneasy. When they entered the room, they grew even more nervous. The decor was lavish, with a huge floor-to-ceiling window flooding the space with sunlight.

The hotel had clearly been notified in advance. Breakfast was already laid out—Chinese and Western dishes, a table packed full, as elaborate as a formal banquet.

The server closed the door behind them. Luo Ren said to Mu Dai, “Latch it.”

To prevent interruptions? Wan San suddenly recalled the vision he’d seen back at Fengzi Ridge: Mei Huayi Zhao and the others—also five people, also eating. One sickly man had latched the door too, afraid of being disturbed.

Was this going to be some kind of martyrdom rally?

“Let’s eat while we talk,” Luo Ren said.

Wan San refused. “You talk first.”

Fine. Luo Ren didn’t insist. “Last night, after you all fell asleep, Mu Dai and I talked. We talked about sacrifice.”

So it really was about sacrifice. Wan San tensed.

“You tell me—if I really were to kill myself and offer it to the Phoenix Luan Buckle, what exactly would I be sacrificing?”

Wan San stayed silent. Yan Hongsha answered instead. “Your life, obviously. Isn’t that what they say—the most precious thing?”

“Why is life the most precious?”

How were you supposed to answer that? Yan Hongsha was confused. “Isn’t it obvious? Without your life, you have nothing.”

“Exactly. You cherish life because it represents many things—your life journey, love, friendship, family, children, endless possibilities.”

“If you die, what you offer to the Phoenix Luan Buckle is all of that. And more—your blood, and a body that will rot. That’s the power the Phoenix Luan Buckle wants to take from us.”

That seemed right. Yan Hongsha thought about it and nodded.

Luo Ren smiled. “Then I’ll give it all to it.”

After a brief silence, Cao Yanhua panicked. “Brother Luo—didn’t we agree no one was dying?”

“Relax,” Luo Ren said.

“What I give it will be far more than what it wants. I’ll give it a living life, warm blood, a beating heart, and as long a lifespan as possible. If I live, I have a mind, vitality, strength, friends, endless energy. Are those really worth less than a pile of rotting flesh and bones after death?”

Cao Yanhua’s mouth fell open. He began to sense another meaning beneath the words.

Wan San’s eyes lit up.

Luo Ren laughed loudly and, with a casual flick—just like Mei Huayi Zhao in that vision—threw the cloth-wrapped wooden slips and the golden Phoenix Luan Buckle onto the table with a clang.

“I’ve always thought this Phoenix Luan Buckle was way too useless compared to the vicious slips. Then, looking at all this, I suddenly understood.”

He picked up one wooden slip, glanced at it, and suddenly tossed it aside like trash.

Cao Yanhua cried out, “Hey, hey! Brother Luo, we dug those up with great effort—don’t break them!”

He hurried over to pick it up, fussing over it. Mu Dai watched him with a smile, calmly assembling her breakfast wrap—egg, shredded cucumber, pork floss, bacon, a swipe of barbecue sauce—rolling it carefully.

Luo Ren said, “The seven vicious slips refer to seven strands of malevolent energy—not these seven pieces of wood. And likewise, the Phoenix Luan Buckle doesn’t really mean these scraps of bronze.”

Just as Cao Yanhua picked up the slip, clang—another Luan Buckle was tossed down.

Calling them scraps of bronze? These were thousand-year-old artifacts! Tossed around like rubber balls—it made his heart ache.

Wan San stared at Luo Ren. “Then what does the real Phoenix Luan Buckle refer to?”

Luo Ren looked up, meeting each face in turn. He smiled faintly. “Us.”

“These are all symbols. We are the real Phoenix Luan Buckle.”

“Sacrificing to the Phoenix Luan Buckle is like letting the malevolent energy cling to these artifacts—handing power over to pieces of bronze. It works, sure, but doesn’t it feel unwilling? Redundant?”

Cao Yanhua froze mid-wipe, polishing the buckle. Yan Hongsha clenched her napkin, her hands trembling. Only Mu Dai kept eating unhurriedly, squinting at the sunlight now and then as if to say: Nice weather today.

Wan San’s lips were dry. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he asked, “So… how do we seal the vicious slips in the end?”

Luo Ren looked straight at him. “That’s easy.”

“Draw all seven vicious slips into us. The five of us—alive—seal them.”

“We become living, breathing, speaking, long-lived Phoenix Luan Buckles.”