Chapter 679: What Triggered Time's "Discrepancy"?

The path to the mine warehouse was short, but in those precious moments alone, Cheng Shi's mind was working furiously.

With every step, he sorted through everything he'd seen and heard throughout the trial. Previously overlooked details sharpened once more under the weight of his concentrated recall.

When had Li Wufang started to change?

If he treated every small inconsistency as a signal of a "discrepancy's" arrival, then without question, the anomalies had begun before the very first group discussion.

And the first "anomaly" Cheng Shi had personally "witnessed" wasn't actually the Investigator Li Wufang — it was the Truth follower, Assassination Doctor Wang Weijin!

Wang Mou had deliberately concealed his identity from the outset, yet when the Extinguisher triggered the Oblivion disaster, he'd carelessly exposed himself — and afterward openly revealed his real name.

At the time, Cheng Shi had found the shift puzzling but chalked it up to a change of heart. Now, however, things appeared far less simple.

Perhaps before the Oblivion disaster, Wang Mou had already stumbled into Time's trap and become a different "Wang Mou" from another timeline.

Li Wufang, too. At the trial's start, he'd sought Destiny's guidance from the Blind One. Yet during the first group discussion, he'd declared "I don't believe in fate." That was clearly no longer the same person.

The first — yes, the first!

Because Cheng Shi remembered that Qin Xin's change had only manifested after exploring the Shanty Area. So Time's "discrepancies" had likely occurred at least twice — possibly more!

After all, he couldn't be certain how many rounds of "discrepancies" had produced the teammates he was currently seeing. The strongest evidence of this was Li Wufang's attitude changes — Cheng Shi had confirmed that he'd encountered at least three "different" versions of the Investigator.

Which meant that once a player fell into Time's trap, they could continue being affected by "discrepancies" — their identity shifting again and again.

So what was affecting them? And how had they blundered into the trap? That was the critical question. Only by finding the cause could he untangle all the truths hidden within this Time trial.

And there was Qin Xin... had he truly ceased to be the original Qin Xin?

And the Blind One he intended to find — who could say with certainty that she'd never changed?

Cheng Shi's frown deepened. He wasn't simply worried about the Torchbearers' safety — his greater concern was himself.

If Time's trap had been laid from the beginning and the trial's "discrepancies" had already started affecting the players... then what about him?

Was it possible that he, too, had already been affected?

Even knowing he was the Void's favored child, he was certainly not Existence's favored child. If Time was raising the difficulty, could that difficulty have landed on his own head?

Clearly, the "discrepant" Li Wufang hadn't realized that he or his teammates had problems. As an Investigator famed for keen observation, if even he hadn't noticed — then Time's alterations were virtually imperceptible to the affected players. Every discrepancy arrived in absolute silence. So who could guarantee that Cheng Shi hadn't changed?

No one could. Not even Cheng Shi himself.

All he could guarantee was that his consciousness and memories were continuous. That today's experiences contained no gaps. But once a "discrepancy" occurred and different timelines' spacetime collided and entangled — as the affected party, the only thing he could confirm was that his outward sensations felt unchanged. Everything else was beyond his control.

For instance: if he truly had become a "discrepancy," then it meant the original him had already been replaced. And the current him was the one "abandoned by the original timeline," appearing in another spacetime.

In other words, Cheng Shi didn't know whether he was still in the timeline he was supposed to inhabit. He didn't know whether the teammates he faced had "invaded" his timeline through Time's discrepancy, or... whether they belonged to the current timeline all along, and he was the outsider!

And all of this — every last question — required first identifying where Time's trap lay and why the trial's "discrepancies" had occurred before any conclusions could be drawn. And that was what terrified Cheng Shi the most right now.

But no matter how fear bred and spread within his heart, at least under the Door Key's protection, he could still maintain control.

Next, it all came down to whether the Blind One would be the lifeline he was looking for.

With that thought, Cheng Shi's gaze hardened. He shifted his expression in an instant and pushed open the warehouse doors, striding in with an easy smile.

Inside the warehouse where the two Folly followers were conducting their experiment, Qin Xin had long since sensed Cheng Shi's approach. He'd only just left — why was he now walking slowly back?

What had he discovered? Or rather — had he discovered him?

The founding Torchbearer's lips curled into a faint smile. He said nothing, continuing to sit facing the Blind One.

An Mingyu's face was tinged with a quiet melancholy. Her brow was faintly creased, as if turning something over in her mind. And the reason for her expression was clear: just moments ago, after Cheng Shi had left, she and Qin Xin had engaged in a Torchbearer-exclusive "memory exchange."

Rewinding slightly — the moment Cheng Shi and Li Wufang had shut the warehouse door behind them, the Blind One "watched" Wang Mou intently observing the experiment. Then she shifted slightly, turning toward Qin Xin at her side.

Her sealed eyes couldn't see a thing, yet they seemed to emit some mysterious luminescence that made Qin Xin visibly uncomfortable.

But Qin Xin didn't respond. He simply stood with arms folded, utterly silent.

After a long while, the Blind One sighed and said softly: "Don't you have anything you'd like to tell me?"

Qin Xin smiled and shook his head: "Should I?"

"Mm. I see." The Blind One smiled too. "Xin Xin once told me that the best way to break silence is to force someone's hand. I don't know whether our teammate can hear what I'm about to say, but I have to warn you — if you don't want to tell me something, then with my very next words, I'll reveal our identities."

Qin Xin froze, then let out a startled laugh: "You're serious?"

"Torchbearers. You and I — we're both Torchbearers."

"..."

As her words faded, she looked down at Qin Xin's hand. And there — gripped at some unknown point — was a jawbone, polished to a smooth white sheen from years of handling.

"You're... livelier than I expected."

"And you're more silent than I imagined."