Chapter 508 – Return – Extra 7: A Voice from Another World – Ning Sitong (21)
Ning Sitong had always believed that she was a happy person. She had a carefree childhood, went to school and came home with her best girlfriends, and was always showered with love and care by her parents.
Until the day of her eighteenth birthday.
That day became the turning point of her life—and the beginning of her nightmare.
She had been holding a birthday party at home and invited many friends over to celebrate. But the moment they finished singing “Happy Birthday” and she blew out the candles, the word “light” would forever disappear from her world.
A strange man suddenly broke into the house. His entire body was wrapped in bandages, leaving only one murky eye exposed. Wielding a large machete, he swung it at her friends and parents.
Everyone scattered in terror.
As the screams gradually died down, the smell of blood in the air grew stronger and stronger. Ning Sitong and another girl hid inside a wardrobe, too frightened to make a sound.
Eventually, the entire downstairs fell silent.
Then a foul smell drifted over.
They covered their mouths and peered through a narrow crack in the wardrobe door. The bandaged monster walked past them, a bloodstained machete in one hand and a severed arm in the other.
Ning Sitong clamped both hands tightly over her mouth, desperately preventing herself from screaming.
The severed hand was wearing a wedding ring, and its fingernails were painted pink.
It was her mother’s arm.
Mom…
The bandaged man didn’t notice them. After walking away, he suddenly turned around and passed the wardrobe again before finally leaving the room.
As his footsteps gradually faded into the distance, the girl hiding with Ning Sitong let out a sigh of relief.
“Thank goodness that bandaged monster is gone.”
“Sitong, should we leave?” the girl whispered.
Ning Sitong’s face was streaked with tears, completely consumed by the grief of losing her parents.
“Sitong, say something!” The girl anxiously shook her.
Suddenly, the wardrobe door flew open.
The bandaged monster had returned.
He grabbed the girl by the hair and dragged her out of the wardrobe.
“Ah—no!”
“Sitong—!”
“Please, no! Ah—!”
The bandaged monster raised his machete and brought it down.
Red splattered across the wall and sprayed onto Ning Sitong’s face.
“Ahhh! Who are you?! Who are you?!” Ning Sitong screamed in despair.
This person had broken into her home and killed her parents and friends. She knew she would be next.
The bandaged monster let out a sinister, “Hehehehe,” as he gripped the machete and slowly advanced toward Ning Sitong.
He raised the blade and swung down.
At the critical moment, a man suddenly appeared beside Ning Sitong.
The bandaged monster hadn’t expected such a sudden change. His machete missed its intended target, while the man screamed and collapsed.
Ning Sitong seized the opportunity to run out of the room.
Every time the bandaged man was about to catch up with her, she would silently pray for someone to come and save her.
And every time, someone would actually appear and take the blow for her.
After the bandaged man had taken down several people, Ning Sitong realized that she might possess some kind of special ability.
She silently wished for someone who could actually fight back.
And sure enough, a man with considerable combat ability appeared.
Unlike the previous people, who had simply appeared to be killed, this man reacted quickly after freezing for only a second. He kicked the bandaged man away, grabbed Ning Sitong, and ran with her.
The man had no idea why he had appeared there. All he knew was that he had suddenly found himself in the middle of a massacre, with only an unfamiliar young girl beside him. The girl looked miserable and disheveled, and his instincts told him that she wasn’t on the bandaged monster’s side. So he grabbed her and immediately turned to run.
If he could save one person, he would save one. He had no idea what was happening, and having another companion would at least help him understand the situation.
The two of them ran out into the street, which was shrouded in smoke. They had intended to call the police, but the bandaged man appeared in front of them as if he could teleport, blocking their path.
They had no choice but to change direction and run again.
But no matter where they went, they couldn’t shake the bandaged man. They ran for almost the entire night until they finally collapsed in the street, completely exhausted.
The bandaged man approached them with a sinister laugh.
Within their field of vision appeared a pair of feet wrapped in bandages. The exposed toes were blackened and swollen, with pus oozing from them. The sight was utterly disgusting.
In the end, the bandaged man killed the man but spared Ning Sitong.
He had also discovered Ning Sitong’s ability and realized that keeping her alive would serve a greater purpose.
In order to survive, Ning Sitong had no choice but to submit to the bandaged man and summon all kinds of people for him.
At first, watching the people from different dimensions whom she summoned being intimidated and tortured by the bandaged man tormented Ning Sitong deeply. She didn’t want to continue serving him and even considered taking her own life.
But then she thought of her parents and the hatred she carried for their killer. Amid her pain and inner torment, she had no choice but to abandon the idea.
She could barely sleep day or night and was plagued by nightmares. But as time passed, she witnessed more and more of the dark side of the “players” trapped in the bandaged man’s horrifying game.
People would betray their teammates just to stay alive, push others in front of them to take the blow, and do whatever it took to survive.
Eventually, she became numb to it all.
Humans… when it comes to staying alive, they can practically abandon every moral boundary.
Ning Sitong gave a mocking smile.
Then she thought of herself.
Wasn’t she the same?
The bandaged man was her enemy, yet in order to survive, she still worked for him, becoming an accomplice in his slaughter of others. At her core, she was no different from those players who betrayed and sacrificed their teammates just to stay alive.
Day after day, the cycle repeated itself.
The players she summoned all behaved differently. Some were cruel, while others were kind. Some could ruthlessly kill their own teammates, while others were willing to sacrifice themselves for their companions.
But so what?
They were all merely characters in the bandaged man’s game.
And the mastermind behind it all was hiding in the shadows, happily watching everything unfold.
Gradually, Ning Sitong figured out how to increase her own strength. She hoped that one day she would become strong enough to take revenge.
But then she discovered that the bandaged man’s strength was increasing even faster—and to a far greater extent—than hers.
When she realized this, tears streamed down her face.
Perhaps this was how her life would be from now on.
Living a life worse than death, forever surrounded by killing and sin.
Until one day, while summoning another player, Ning Sitong noticed that one of them was different.
His entire body was glowing with a faint golden light.
This was also one of her special abilities. Whenever someone with a special ability appeared, a certain glow would surround their body.
She had summoned people like this before, but their light had never been as beautiful as this man’s, and their abilities had never been particularly impressive.
When Ning Sitong saw Wen Junnan, her heart began pounding.
It wasn’t because she fell in love with him at first sight because of his handsome appearance. Rather, her instincts told her that the key to breaking free from the bandaged man’s control lay with this person. He might even be the key to helping her take revenge.
Ning Sitong began approaching Wen Junnan. Using the tricks she had learned, she acted weak and put on a pitiful expression in front of him to gain his sympathy. She had learned this tactic from one of the people who had been summoned in the past. Humans naturally sympathized with the weak, and this trick had always worked.
But she never expected it to fail spectacularly with Wen Junnan.
Not only did he refuse to help her, but he was also completely unmoved, as cold-hearted as stone.
It’s not like I’m unattractive. She had been treated quite well by the male players in the past. So why didn’t this trick work on someone like Wen Junnan?
It wasn’t until she saw the cute young man who appeared beside Wen Junnan that she finally understood.
It’s not that there’s anything wrong with me. Wen Junnan just likes that type.
Ning Sitong was a smart woman. Knowing that she could no longer rely on her old tricks, she changed her strategy and took the friendship route instead.
Not everyone would stab a friend in the back just to save themselves. She trusted her ability to judge people, and Wen Junnan didn’t seem like that kind of person. If she could become his close friend, she believed he would help her.
Moreover, she had discovered that staying near Wen Junnan seemed to accelerate the rate at which her strength increased.
Could it be because of that golden light? Ning Sitong thought belatedly.
Once enough players had been summoned, a new round of the game began.
The first game was the Midnight Mirror Game.
As expected, Wen Junnan did not disappoint her. Not only did he complete the game perfectly, but he even rescued his teammates. At the moment danger erupted, Ning Sitong saw the golden light surrounding Wen Junnan become even brighter.
This only strengthened her determination to stay by his side.
She deliberately tried to become friends with Wen Junnan, dropping subtle hints to him. The latter was smart enough to understand them immediately. Any other player with a decent level of intelligence should have been able to understand her hints too, but unfortunately, none of them could compare to Wen Junnan.
The young man was named Bai Tang.
He didn’t seem to have been summoned by her, but when morning came and the players returned to their respective dimensions, Bai Tang disappeared as well.
That was very difficult to understand.
Because so few people had died in the game, the amount of fear generated was much lower than before. The bandaged man summoned Ning Sitong and questioned her about the reason.
Ning Sitong brushed him off with a vague excuse.
Seeing how obedient she was, and considering that she had done a decent job with her previous assignments, the bandaged man was only half-convinced but ultimately let her leave.
Just before she left, she heard several squirrel-like squeaks.
Amid the piles of garbage in the room, there was a broken cage containing a squirrel.
At that moment, Ning Sitong seemed to see the delicate face of that young man reflected in the squirrel’s face.
“Is there anything else?” The bandaged man wasn’t very patient.
Ning Sitong quickly came back to her senses and answered respectfully, “I’ll leave now.”
That night, she summoned another person to take the place of the player who had died the previous night. She never expected that this person would eventually become her lifelong partner.
Li Tefeng was a big-hearted, carefree guy who was a little slow on the uptake. Ning Sitong had thought he would die during the illusion stage, but somehow, fools really did have good luck. He actually made it through safely.
Afterward, Wen Junnan prepared some food, and she and Li Tefeng went to the kitchen to get some.
“Here~ You take this first. Ladies first.”
Li Tefeng might have looked like a big, somewhat simple-minded guy, but he was actually a very kind person.
Ning Sitong looked down at the bowl of noodles in her hands. It was filled to the brim, with a thick layer of braised meat piled on top.
Meanwhile, Li Tefeng’s bowl contained nothing but noodles and not nearly as much as hers.
Suddenly, her nose began to sting, and her eyes filled with tears.
“Eat more. Look how skinny you are. This game is so dangerous. If you don’t eat enough, you won’t have the strength to run.”
Plop.
A tear fell onto the countertop.
How long had it been since someone had cared about her like this?
It had only been four years, so why did it feel as though several centuries had passed?
“Hey, hey, don’t cry! If you don’t have enough, you can have mine too. I’ll just ask Junnan to make me more when we go back. I’ll give it all to you.”
Li Tefeng hated seeing girls cry, and seeing Ning Sitong cry made him even more flustered. He had no idea what to do with his hands or where to put them.
“I’m fine. I just… miss home.”
Ning Sitong wiped away her tears and tried her best to force a smile, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t make the corners of her lips turn upward.
“If you miss home, then go home—wait, no. We’re in the game, so we can’t go home yet. Once the game is over, we can go home,” Li Tefeng said.
“I don’t have a home anymore.”
“Ah…” Li Tefeng scratched his head. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that.”
“It’s okay. I’m used to living without a home.”
“If you don’t mind, my parents are pretty easy to get along with. You can come over to my house. My parents have always wanted a pretty, smart daughter, just like you. Too bad I’m a guy…”
Women were made of water, and their tears could come at any moment.
Hearing those words, Ning Sitong cried even harder.
Li Tefeng had absolutely no idea what he had said wrong. He hurriedly tried to comfort her, even taking off his jacket to wipe away her tears.
After quite a while, Ning Sitong finally composed herself.
“I’ll remember what you said.”
If I ever get the chance to reach your world and see the sun again.
“Huh? Which part?” He had said so many things. Which one had actually made the girl happy?
When flames shot into the sky, engulfing the house in fire, Ning Sitong smiled as she watched the blazing inferno.
The bandaged man was dead.
She was finally free.
Finally, Mom and Dad, you can rest in peace.
A white light spread outward from the house, enveloping them both.
Ning Sitong wasn’t afraid. She looked at Li Tefeng, who was holding her hand, and felt a pang of regret.
What a shame. I dragged you into this, and now you have to die with me.
When she woke up again, Ning Sitong found herself in an unfamiliar place.
Outside the window, birds were singing and flowers were blooming. She jumped out of bed and opened the dormitory door.
The light from the sky was almost blinding. A gigantic sphere hung high in the center of the sky, radiating both heat and light.
So this is… the sun?
Ning Sitong raised a hand to shield her eyes from the dazzling light.
From inside the dormitory came the sound of Li Tefeng’s deep, rumbling snores.
She walked back into the room and looked at his sleeping face with a smile.
“Idiot.”
The idiot she loved.