Chapter 290

There is no such thing as a free lunch in this world, it's just that mine is slightly more expensive.

(But promising to add one chapter and actually adding two, isn't that also a kind of 【Deception】?)

4 chapters and 10,000 words today, the fun is doubled!

I am a 【Deception】 believer! Hands on hips!

Praise 【Deception】, there will absolutely not be a next time, it's too tiring...)

Cheng Shi, who was just starting his job, felt at ease after receiving Lao Jia's instructions. He signed the contract quickly and then chose a time in advance to prepare to go home and give Lao Jia a surprise.

But he didn't give a surprise; instead, he harvested a heart full of fear.

Lao Jia was gone. The neighbors buried him, and it was paid for by Sun Yi next door. Under the promise of a huge sum of money, no one had told Cheng Shi about this.

On the day Cheng Shi returned home, he didn't find Lao Jia; he only saw a letter written by Lao Jia's own hand placed on the table that was missing a corner.

On the envelope of the letter, two words were written in a crooked hand: Cheng Shi.

The Cheng of Cheng Jia, the Shi of Honest.

When Cheng Shi saw it, his whole body froze.

He knew that Lao Jia couldn't even write his own name in this life. In the dozen or so years he had been studying, he had only learned to write these two characters. Although they looked like a dog's scrawl, in his eyes, they were better-looking than any font.

This was the name he had chosen for himself.

And when he saw his own name written by Lao Jia on a letter, he guessed the meaning of this letter.

His hands suddenly began to tremble.

This was clearly a thin piece of paper, but in his eyes, it weighed more than a thousand catties. He tried several times but couldn't pick up the letter.

It wasn't until his tears couldn't be held back that he forced his trembling hands to press down on the envelope and pulled the letter paper inside out against the tabletop.

This was an A4 sheet of paper folded several times. When unfolded, it only had four words written on it: Live well.

It was printed, too.

Cheng Shi only took one look before his tears fell like a collapsing rain.

He rushed out of the door, shouting "Old man" everywhere. As he shouted, it turned into "Dad," and as he shouted more, it turned into "Cheng Jia." It wasn't until his heart-wrenching cries made the eyes of the surrounding neighbors red that an aunt finally couldn't bear it and pointed him in a direction.

Cheng Shi ran wildly along this path, ran into a cemetery, and before long, discovered the old man's grave.

The tombstone was empty without a single word, which fit Lao Jia's temperament, but Cheng Shi knew this wasn't the funeral arrangement he had made for himself; it must have been Sun Yi who helped set it up.

As for Sun Yi... her grave was right next to the old man's. No one knew how she had passed, and no one knew if she had truly passed. In any case, she still chose to be neighbors with the old man.

Cheng Shi knelt before the grave and wailed loudly. Jiang Wu Mei stood far behind him, his heart filled with mixed emotions.

What a pathetic person, deceived by lies since infancy, and even when his most beloved father died, he was still deceived by lies, kept in the dark.

Lao Jia undoubtedly wanted Cheng Shi to learn well. In the latter half of his life, he told lies for over a decade and acted for over a decade, cultivating Cheng Shi into an honest, good person, but in the end, he used the most painful lie to break Cheng Shi's psychological defenses.

No wonder this Fate Weaver could outwit Zhen Yi...

Fate witnessed his misfortune, and lies ran through his "entire life."

To be able to hold on until the 【Faith Game】 descended and become a high-scoring player in the game under such circumstances was truly not easy.

Oh right, Lao Jia told him to live well; that was probably his motivation.

Jiang Wu Mei looked at Cheng Shi, who had cried until he fainted, and felt somewhat at a loss. He seemed to have never witnessed such a vivid dream, nor had he ever felt such a poignant memory. After the night, it was as if all this had happened right beside him, as if he were that Cheng Shi who had been deceived from beginning to end.

The witnessing was over; it was time to leave.

He rubbed his face, his expression dazed as he walked toward the outside of the cemetery, but as he walked, he found that this cemetery seemed a bit strange. How could the names on these tombstones be so... eerie?

Jiang Wu Mei frowned and turned his head to look to his side, only to see a short epitaph written on the tombstone beside his leg:

"Chen Han, Dream-Peering Ranger, 1394."

?

Jiang Wu Mei was startled, thinking his eyes were playing tricks on him. He rubbed his eyes and looked again, only to see the characters clearly carved there, not like an illusion.

He panicked a little, took a few more steps forward, and saw the tombstone in front written with:

"Wei Fengming, Dream-Peering Ranger, 1517."

His heart skipped a beat, his eyes widened in disbelief, and then he nervously scanned his surroundings, but he didn't find anyone else present, except for Cheng Shi, who had fainted in front of Lao Jia's grave.

Jiang Wu Mei keenly sensed a crisis. Although he didn't know where this crisis came from, his reason told him he had to leave here first, so he ran frantically toward the outside of the cemetery.

The Ranger ran very fast, like the wind. The tombstones beside him flashed past his peripheral vision, stretching infinitely backward, but even as the light turned into trails, he could still clearly see the epitaphs written on the rows of tombstones that were left behind, almost connecting into a low city wall.

"Zhu Youyou, Dream-Peering Ranger, 1656."

"Cheng Meng, Dream-Peering Ranger, 1877."

"......"

"Song doomsday, Dream-Peering Ranger, 2204."

"Jiang Wu Mei, Dream-Peering Ranger, 2319."

!!!

Crazy!

The last tombstone with a name actually had his own name on it!

In this absurd dream cemetery, he had actually seen his own grave!!!

Jiang Wu Mei was suddenly enveloped by immense fear. He stopped in his tracks, drew his longbow, and scanned his surroundings with a stiff spine. At this moment, how could he not know that his existence had long been discovered by the owner of the dream?

And the place where he was standing now was precisely at the entrance of the cemetery.

He saw a figure emerge from behind the huge stone pillar at the entrance, eyes red-rimmed, saying to him:

"So annoying, I clearly already let myself forget these, why do you still have to come and trick me into shedding tears?"

Jiang Wu Mei followed the voice and looked, only to see that the figure was none other than Cheng Shi!

But he was not the Cheng Shi in front of Lao Jia's grave, but his own teammate, that Fate Weaver, Cheng Shi!

His eyes widened, his pupils shrank, sirens wailed wildly in his heart, and his mind went blank. A terrifying current of electricity shot from his crown to his heels, leaving him with almost no strength to pull the bowstring.

But the instinct for survival made him move. He didn't make a move, because he still held a glimmer of hope in his heart.

He swallowed his saliva in extreme tension and said word by word:

"I, did not do, anything to harm him."

Cheng Shi's tears were still flowing, but he smiled:

"Yes, Ranger, you are cleaner than any Dream-Peering Ranger lying here.

But I will only ask you one question, just one question:

Will you offer everything you saw tonight to Him?

If you say no, I will let you go."

Hesitation flashed across Jiang Wu Mei's face, and he gritted his teeth and said firmly, "No."

Hmm, a lie.

Very good, very good.

Cheng Shi wiped his tears and smiled indifferently.

"I never like anyone disturbing him, nor do I want him to appear in this disgusting game, and I even less want to reunite with him in some inexplicable way that I didn't foresee. So, I've wronged you, Ranger.

You know, I am a liar; what I say cannot be trusted."

"Boom—"

Before he finished speaking, the sound of thunder had already exploded. He was still that cautious Cheng Shi, who would never leave any opportunity for the enemy at such a moment.

"However, Ranger, I still want to tell you one thing: there is no such thing as a free lunch in this world.

You listened to someone else's story, so naturally, you have to pay the corresponding price.

It's just that my story is slightly more expensive.

It probably happens to be worth one life."

Looking at the Ranger who had been blasted into a charred corpse right in front of him, Cheng Shi raised his hand again, and another shot followed.

"Boom—"

"Goodbye, Ranger, I wish you sweet dreams forever."

With this, the Dream-Peering Ranger died in the dream.

Two claps of thunder passed, and a heavy rain poured down.

It was raining. In this cemetery full of sorrow, a rain began to fall, weeping for the misfortune of fate.

Cheng Shi stared blankly at the ashes at his feet, not knowing what he was thinking of, and shook his head with a laugh.

"Speaking of which, I still have to thank you all. The image of the old man as a father was completed by you Dream-Peering Rangers. Every time one of you came, I felt his love for me deepen by another point."

As he spoke, he raised his head again to look at himself who had collapsed crying in front of the tombstone. The Cheng Shi in the dream woke up, awakened by the rain pouring down from the sky. His tears mixed into the rain, and his cries were covered by the sound of the rain, as if the sadness were no longer there.

But only Cheng Shi knew that he was at his most desperate at this moment, because right now he was thinking, why is even the heavens mocking me?

It was also from that time on that he began to despise fate.

"Sigh, it's all in the past."

Cheng Shi sighed, forced himself to suppress the urge to take another look, and turned to leave.

"Old man, I know you like to play chess, so I found you a new chess partner.

But you have to be careful, he might be very good at memorizing chess records."

As he spoke, his footsteps paused, his voice choked with sobs again.

"Old man, I'm leaving. I'll probably have to forget some things about you again...

But this time I know, so you also envied other people's children for becoming top scholars.

Hmm, top scholar, my brain is too slow, I didn't study well, so becoming a top scholar is probably a bit difficult.

But now, there are no more top scholars anyway..."

As Cheng Shi spoke, he suddenly smiled again. He turned his head once more to look into the distance at the cemetery that was about to dissipate, and with his last drop of tears, he said a final goodbye to Lao Jia.

The tears dripped down, and the dream dissipated.

At the same time, in the main house of the Mushroom-Footed People tribe in the Sighing Forest, Cheng Shi, who had slept peacefully for the night, opened his eyes.

The day had dawned.