TBR CH181
Roland flipped over his phone, the countdown on it having just reached zero.
He rubbed his eyes slightly, put down his book, and casually swiped twice on the screen. A dark page instantly unfolded, still bearing the last words left by the Black Book, the color like ink mixed with gold dust.
“Finding one person in an entire vast world is like looking for a needle in a haystack.”
The World Consciousness’s last attempt to infiltrate the game system had failed just yesterday. Kriesmeier had not given the Black Book a satisfactory reply; in his eyes, Roland’s hand still held a string of flickering light points.
The somewhat frustrated Black Book eventually accepted the Archmage’s suggestion, becoming an application on his phone—at least making it portable.
Progress in Abyss also needed to wait.
The elf fruit ripened only once a year, and there were still seven full days until this year’s elven ritual.
Roland understood that he had to seize the opportunity to deal with the Child of Fortune, Bai Shi—no, the system behind him was as cautious as he had expected. Although the golden-haired hero’s message clearly indicated wavering, he ultimately did not finalize his decision on the spot.
He had to be patient.
Just like a hunter carefully peering at his prey in the jungle, what Roland had to do was even more complex.
All he did was use the hunter’s shadow to peek at the prey’s false illusion. He and the prey were not truly in the jungle, nor could they fight in close combat using primitive methods. This was an age that valued science.
“Unless he exposes himself,”
Roland did not sigh too early. He spent a great deal of time learning the knowledge of this world and firmly believed that there were no unsolvable mysteries. Abyss Continent was originally a game constructed from data, but ever since its characters—including himself—developed self-awareness, it was no longer just a string of code.
That is to say, it was impossible to hack into the system to obtain the opponent’s user information.
But that didn’t mean there was nothing he could do.
The pen made only a faint scratching sound as it glided across the white paper, much quieter than the papyrus on the Mirar Continent. The Archmage from another world casually wrote a series of numbers on the paper. These seemingly random numbers, as if familiar to him by heart, covered half a page, remembered as clearly as a complex spell.
“…What is this?”
The Black Book was a little shocked.
“These are all the activity records of the account ‘Bai Mingchen’ over the past seven days,”
Roland pressed his knuckle against the filled scratch paper, gently pushing it outwards,
“Including the specific times of login and logout, and the duration of each login. The sample size is too small, and there are still unclear areas in the data. I calculated the average and median of each data set, of course, after excluding extreme values—isn’t it quite scientific?”
The Black Book almost wrote down “Who taught you this,” but it wisely swallowed the question.
The Archmage continued to summarize: “Even though these data are as tangled as a knotted rope, you can still find a thread to reveal the other party’s identity.” Just like a cat can easily unravel a ball of yarn.
“Like, for example?”
Roland shook his head. He pressed a finger to his lips, his amber eyes sparkling under the indoor light. “The conclusion is undecided. Making rash judgments could be misleading. Moreover, this can at most determine his approximate area—considering time zones—and his general identity. I must think more, give me a little more time, just a little more time.”
His voice grew hoarse, and he coughed twice, pouring himself a glass of cold water.
“Don’t be too anxious,”
The Black Book paused subtly, then the random golden script carefully floated onto the phone screen. “Although trying hard is good, you shouldn’t exhaust yourself. You’re basically working day and night to find a solution. I thought after meeting the Demon King, you should give yourself some rest time.”
“That’s just something that can be solved with a vigor potion.”
Roland said calmly.
“But there are no potions in the real world.”
This time, the Black Book unusually found room to retort. “Whether in the game or in reality, you only have this one body. If you wear it out, you might not be able to return…”
The Archmage’s expression changed subtly.
He did not allow himself to show fatigue, although he was basically awake all night, watching Kriesmeier close his eyes unknowingly holding the black cat on the screen, vast black wings engulfing the entire screen, while studying the secrets of the so-called two worlds under dim light. But the more he did so, the more a sharp premonition arose.
Roland chewed on the Black Book’s abrupt stop,
“—Go on.”
“I didn’t mean that, I just misspoke. Please don’t take it to heart,”
The Black Book said carefully, even the text on the screen became much neater. A golden glimmer slightly touched the Archmage’s fingertips on the screen. “If, just if, if the worst-case scenario existed, you should still consider the future. Actually, I don’t have… I don’t have absolute certainty.”
To the Black Book’s surprise, Roland’s expression barely fluctuated, as if he had long anticipated this.
“I know,”
He blinked almost indifferently, this time sounding like he was talking to himself. “Even you have never made me a promise. I’ve long guessed that there’s always a possibility I’ll stay here forever. At most, sometimes I wonder if things will really turn out this badly. That thought is also foolish, because so far, progress is zero.”
The Black Book was startled: “How could you guess—”
“Has no one told you before?”
Roland’s voice became a little lighter, even making a joke. But his amber eyes remained icy. “Though it’s the World Consciousness, it doesn’t seem very intelligent. And I am very intelligent, so you can’t hide it from me.”
If crossing worlds were such an easy thing, then according to the system’s arrangements, the destructive Demon King Kriesmeier wouldn’t have been needed to swing his scythe in the end. The problem was that the world in Abyss was connected to the real world as a subordinate by the system, and thus the world woven from data was able to grow self-awareness and gradually develop into its current form.
To make the two worlds independent and crush the system’s conspiracy, their connection had to be completely severed.
To bring Roland home, two worlds had to be torn apart simultaneously, opening a passable road. But in that case, the chaotic power system would inevitably cause most life to suffer catastrophic destruction, and the system would also escape.
This was inherently contradictory.
The phone screen flickered twice, the cursor dimming and brightening. For a long time, the World Consciousness still couldn’t pick out a suitable sentence, and the too-long idle time caused the electronic product to automatically enter screen-off mode. Roland, at this point, instead softened his expression reassuringly, and pressed the screen back on.
“Alright,” he paused, and said gently, “I don’t blame you. If it weren’t for you, I would have been completely obliterated long ago, and wouldn’t be talking to you here now. On the contrary, I’m very grateful to you. I’ve always thought fear of death was foolish, because everything must perish one day. The study of death is what’s necessary.”
“Do you still think that way now?”
Since Roland had changed the subject without a trace, the Black Book followed his lead and asked.
“Now I have an opportunity, at least I believe there’s still an opportunity, so I will strive towards this goal at all costs. Even if the World Consciousness deems it impossible, even if my reason tells me it’s almost unattainable, doesn’t that prove… that I’ve regretted it?”
Roland seemed to smile, and also to sigh.
He retorted, though he didn’t know whom he was refuting: “I suddenly can’t bear to die. And then I see Kriesmeier across the screen. If I die here, I won’t even have my bones to be with him.”
“…I wonder, what would I do if I left him alone?”
Kriesmeier walked down the elven corridor, the hanging wisteria and other green plants seemingly cautiously keeping their distance from him. The plants of the Elf Forest had spirits; they instinctively knew what to seek and what to avoid. And the Demon King was indifferent to their fear.
He simply walked straight to a door. When he stood before it, he was unsure of the polite way to proceed. Humans seemed to request entry by knocking. Kriesmeier’s fingertips gathered dark magic; he usually used more direct methods. The Demon King looked at the black cat in his arms and said softly:
“Roland.”
The black cat stared at him with bright yellow eyes, silent.
Roland had already reported that he would temporarily leave the screen at this time each day, but he never turned off the game, so that at least the black cat could stay by the Demon King’s side. The Demon King’s fingers gently circled the black cat’s neck. The black cat seemed startled, its ears perked up sharply, its fur bristled alertly, and its fluffy body struggled in his hands.
This was also proof that the Archmage was not controlling the black cat.
When Roland left the computer, the black cat would operate according to the system’s pre-programmed behavior: it would become nervous when encountering danger, and run away when feeling anxious. Kriesmeier’s fingers, gently resting on the black cat’s neck, tightened. The black cat, wanting to escape, was completely confined. In this process, the Demon King gained a sense of almost satisfaction.
A morbid satisfaction. For an Abyss demon, it was a perfectly legitimate satisfaction.
As Kriesmeier was thinking this, the door in front of him suddenly opened. The person within, upon opening the door, immediately saw Kriesmeier’s dark golden eyes, and suppressed the urge to scream in the fear of being targeted by a predator.
He seemed to have expected the Demon King’s visit, maintaining his composure with effort, and quietly invited the Demon King in.
When Kriesmeier sat on the elven chair, he once again retracted his wings. Noticing the gaze of the old man opposite him involuntarily lingering on the broken horn on his head, this elven elder apparently also served as a physician in his race, with a unique judgment for all kinds of wounds.
“Goodness, it was broken off by force,”
The elven elder couldn’t help but say, then realized, “…Please forgive me, I’m too accustomed to looking at things with a professional eye. Since we haven’t reached the point of armed conflict, I have absolutely no intention of offending you, Monarch from the Abyss. You came here today to ask about Saint Roland, didn’t you?”
“You’re very familiar with him.” The Demon King neither confirmed nor denied.
Indeed. The elven elder was several centuries old. Even for an elf, this age inevitably led towards eventual demise. In his lifetime, he had seen many incredible things, and Roland was absolutely the most peculiar and unique among all his observations.
“I have met the Archmage twice,”
He carefully chose his words: “The first time he was very young, not even a mage apprentice. And the second time, as you probably know, was during the Dark Elf rebellion. At that time, his power was already very strong. Even though the Elf Forest’s barrier primarily relied on the Mother Tree’s natural energy, the ability to conceive and implement that idea must be considered a kind of madness. But the Archmage succeeded.”
The elder watched Kriesmeier’s eyes as he slowly spoke.
He suddenly felt that the Demon King’s aura was somewhat different. As he, like an elder, began to recount Roland’s story, the Demon King’s hostility strangely subsided. He held the black cat in his arms, his silver-gray hair chillingly brushing the back of the chair, reminiscent of the wondrous fables about power hidden in demon hair.
“When he was young,”
Kriesmeier said, then realized he was too eager, exposing certain emotions so starkly.
The Demon’s fingers instantly tightened on the back of the chair, abruptly cutting off his voice, sharp and pointed nails silently scratching the wood of the chair. But Kriesmeier still restrained himself, almost forcefully controlling his desire, and urgently raised his eyes.
The elder paused.
Close call, looking at such a Demon King, he almost showed his benevolent smile reserved for younger elves.
The elven elder was somewhat startled by his own presumptuous thought, the wrinkles on his face unable to smooth out, tightly pulling back the corners of his mouth. Yet, he still couldn’t help but think: the Demon King’s manner of inquiring about Roland was, in any case, somewhat similar to a young girl in love trying to understand her lover’s thoughts…
No, no, no, how could he have such an offensive thought?
The elven elder immediately turned serious, choosing his words carefully: “The first time I met the Archmage was not in the Elf Forest. At that time, the Archmage was not like he is now; rather, he was completely different. I don’t know if you’re aware, but his hair was golden then, not a metallic hue, but a color similar to platinum.”
“That,” the Demon King slowly said, “I know.”
Although the way he knew wasn’t very tender, but rather Roland had accidentally triggered a magic-nullifying system set up in the Demon Palace, causing his dark hair ends to instantly lose their color, and Kriesmeier had even made some mocking comments about this hair color at the time.
However, the elven elder was not privy to the inside story.
He looked at Kriesmeier in front of him, and unconsciously his heart had progressed to a somewhat relieved state. What else was there to not understand? To persuade the elves, Roland had sincerely told them a love story of falling in love at first sight with the Demon King and pledging their lives to each other. And now it seemed, they truly understood each other, even being a little touching.
“Then you should understand why the Archmage detested his original hair color,”
The elven elder said with emotion, “That was a long, long time ago. I heard you and the Archmage have been staying in the Demon King’s castle. You should occasionally come out and walk around. The Mirar Continent needs Mage Roland Xavier; he will be welcomed wherever he goes—hmm, I mean, perhaps you just need to get used to it.”
Kriesmeier was actually completely unaware of the reasons the elder spoke of.
Roland had never mentioned such things to him. Kriesmeier suddenly felt the flames of fury surge up according to his instincts. In the elder’s words, the scenes that flashed in his mind were how he had confined, killed, extracted Roland’s bloody ribs, and dyed his pale lips with impatiens. At that time, his hair should have been its original color.
Then these thoughts faded like a tide.
Kriesmeier thought, dead men don’t speak.
—I should ask him myself.
Partners in love always overlook many things. Roland would sometimes gently pat the Demon King’s wings, then earnestly ask him about his past. Kriesmeier had no interest in any past, and usually had no habit of mourning his deceased brothers and father, but if Roland asked, he would answer.
Though whenever the other party smiled and said he really wanted to understand him, an indescribable emotion would surge within.
Kriesmeier was different from all other beings. He was incredibly powerful, and thus beautiful. He probably had a past that was too painful to recall, but he had overcome that past, and stood on those bones, disdaining all those who had once harmed him, and the events that had occurred.
So he never expected to completely dissect a human in a few short months.
The race he lived in prioritized immediate gratification. They did not reminisce, did not suffer from memories, nor did they crave light and salvation. It was as if, in his life, obsessive possessiveness would only exist once, in the bloody taste on his tongue during a kiss, and in his inability to avert his gaze from those amber pupils.
Roland was well aware of this and did not mind.
“This is the love of an Abyss demon,”
The Archmage said with a smile, “If it were the human kind, it would be much more careful, considering all sorts of trivial little things, getting to know each other from small interactions; but I don’t dislike it this way, Kries. You make me understand what it feels like to be loved wholeheartedly, both madly and passionately.”
If it was truly just like this—
Kriesmeier wanted to understand why he was sitting here at this very moment, even without Roland’s knowledge, yet desperately craved to understand his past. For instance, he didn’t understand why he should hate Roland, and that human should ultimately be killed by him, but instead, he felt an organ between his ribs had grown wings, lightly dictating his actions.
This was clearly the human kind of admiration.
He had been corrupted by humans; Roland had infected him with human bad habits.
Perhaps misunderstanding the Demon King’s expression, or perhaps Kriesmeier was sitting there silently like a large predator, yet there was no prey in front of him, and a faint reflection of the black-haired youth could be seen in his pupils.
The elven elder looked at him with relief, his voice tinged with a faint recollection,
“However, although you already know a lot, I can tell you how I met the Archmage back then. It was during a change of power in the human kingdom. Although the elven race is peaceful, the Queen still dispatched me as an envoy to the kingdom to convey the elven race’s hope for peace. It was at that time that I happened to see a certain golden-haired child…”
The seven-day agreement with the elves was soon to arrive as scheduled.
Before that, the elves also invited Roland and the Demon King to their treasury. The treasury was filled with rare and precious treasures, but Kriesmeier had no interest in them. However, he did hold the black cat and went through each one. The Archmage could always accurately state the origin and specific use of the treasures, but the Demon King didn’t listen at all.
His attention was mainly focused on the black cat, who would excitedly bare its claws whenever it saw something valuable.
However, although Roland was quite interested in the elven treasury, he ultimately politely expressed that he did not need to receive any gifts. He understood that the elves had made a huge sacrifice by allowing him and the Demon King to enter as honored guests, and the freshly picked elf fruit was an even more valuable, priceless treasure.
The elf fruit was invaluable and impossible to find on the market; once picked, it had to be consumed immediately, or its power would rapidly dissipate.
These past few days, the golden-haired hero had been unusually absent from the elven tribe, and Princess Eve also spent most of her time with the Queen in the palace. She would occasionally secretly cry at night, desperately wanting to confide her failed first love to someone, but neither the hero nor the witch she had seen with him were anywhere to be found.
She did, however, occasionally see a black cat scurrying by.
Roland patiently and focusedly awaited the Child of Fortune’s agreement to his suggestion, and on this point, the Archmage was not mistaken. He rarely made mistakes. Therefore, when he finally received a message from “Bai Mingchen,” he earnestly sent him the entire plan.
And this plan was so flawless that even the system couldn’t find fault with it.
Everything was running smoothly. Every night, he would accompany Kriesmeier across the screen, and during the rest of the time, he meticulously conducted his new research—though no longer in the field of magic. He now had to rely on filling his schedule to leave no room for contemplating whether bad things would ultimately happen.
Fortunately, he was adept and methodical.
And the Demon King had basically progressed to the point where he held the black cat everywhere he went. Sometimes, Roland even found it a little funny, because Kriesmeier had initially been a fierce opponent of the black cat. Occasionally, when Roland needed to restart his computer, he would also properly inform Kriesmeier.
After the black cat disappeared, he couldn’t see the Demon King’s expression as he waited for the computer to boot up.
In a flash, it was the last night before the elf fruit ripened. Roland was vaguely slumped over his computer desk, the screen steadily emitting light. In his blurred vision, it was as if Kriesmeier was indeed not far from him. Although logically they were still a world apart, and there was much to do the next day, he still felt at peace.
Until—
Accidents always arrived as scheduled, even for someone like the Archmage.
Suddenly, everything went dark. Roland abruptly opened his eyes in the darkness, all sleepiness gone. Just then, the time on his phone struck exactly midnight. On this day, the elf fruit could ripen at any moment.
And it had to be at this precise moment.
The power went out.
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