Chen Yifei's gaze swept across the first few lines. As he flipped through the pages, he saw many familiar scenes and phrases, as if everything he had experienced in recent days had been compiled into a play and recorded on them.
["It's you." Behind the wooden table, a man in a white coat turned slightly. "Are you here to pick up medicine for your younger brother again? Didn't he transfer to the hospital in the second district?"]
[...]
["Yifei, you're already dead. You shouldn't be here." Chen Tan's eyes were red, and he tightly gripped the ax, speaking in a raspy voice, "Whatever is occupying your body... I will set you free."
A low rumble of thunder flashed across the dark sky...]
[...]
["Don't worry, brother." Chen Muyu said softly, "I'll help you bury him."]
[...]
["Hello, I'm law enforcer Chen Yifei... Are you ready to answer my questions?"]
[...]
[Instead of being a puppet controlled by strings for a lifetime, Chen Yifei would choose death.]
[...]
["Monster... Monster!!" A law enforcer shouted in terror, "He's not human! He's a monster!!"]
[...]
The last line was a descriptive text:
[He stood alone in a sea of blood, with the dagger slipping gently to the ground. As a cold breeze swept past, he fell backward like dead grass.]
Seeing this, Chen Yifei felt a sudden numbness in his scalp.
Although he had long realized that he was being spied on, it was only now that he truly felt the eerie sensation.
The most crucial thing was that Chen Yifei could only see his own scenes. Everything that happened when he was not present was blocked by thick black lines... Even as the "main character," he did not have full access to review this play.
"According to my personal experiences, compiled into a play..." Chen Yifei muttered to himself.
As the last line ended, these sheets automatically bound themselves into a book in the void, landing in Chen Yifei's palm. The text on the cover was particularly eye-catching.
[The First Play]
[Initial Chapter - "Heartless"]
[Leading Role: Chen Yifei]
[Other Cast: Chen Muyu, Han Meng, Chu Muyun, Chen Tan, etc.]
At the same time, in the corner of the stage, a wooden bookcase appeared out of nowhere.
Chen Yifei looked deeply at the play in his hand. After a long time, he stepped towards the bookcase... He placed this play in the leftmost spot on the first shelf, with the title "Heartless" on the spine facing outwards, easily visible.
As Chen Yifei was about to turn around for the second designated draw, a familiar voice sounded in his ear:
[Intermission is over. Please continue the performance.]
The black curtain slowly opened,
Chen Yifei's consciousness detached from the theater and drifted into the void...
...
"Are you awake?"
As Chen Yifei opened his eyes, Chu Muyun's voice came from beside him.
The heater was running in the room. Chu Muyun had already taken off his wool coat, wearing a shirt and waistcoat, sitting quietly in a chair by the window, holding a medical book in his hands and flipping through it.
Before he could utter his next sentence, a short knife flashed like lightning to his throat, and the chilling intent to kill instantly extinguished the lamp!
In the dim room, Chu Muyun's eyelids flicked as he looked at the red-clad figure before him and spoke slowly, "It seems that the Divine Path has indeed influenced your personality... Are you so murderous?"
"You knew that Muyu was fake, yet you pretended to be unaffected and stayed for so many days... What is your purpose?" Chen Yifei's eyes glinted with fierceness.
"I'm a doctor. I came to District Three, of course, to treat you," Chu Muyun closed his book. "If I had any malice towards you, you would have died countless times already."
Chen Yifei stared at Chu Muyun, "How much do you... know?"
"Unfortunately, I know everything," Chu Muyun replied.
"How much is 'everything'?" Chen Yifei asked.
"What do you think?" Chu Muyun's mouth curved up slightly as he leaned slightly towards Chen Yifei. "I'm curious... How did you maintain your sanity after fusing with a 'Cataclysmic' disaster? Or should I say... How were you balanced?"
Upon hearing this, Chen Yifei's pupils contracted sharply.
Since their first meeting, when Chu Muyun tried his best to stay, the other party should have sensed something was wrong.
In the days that followed, he had been observing him, even actively inquiring and probing about Chen Muyu's characteristics... This man wearing silver-wired glasses and looking gentle and refined was the one with the deepest scheming.
But Chen Yifei didn't expect that the other party would expose his identity as a Fusionist and even his rank as an "Audience" right away.
"So... What do you plan to do?" Chen Yifei asked, "Split my brain open to take a look? Hand me over to the law enforcers? Or use this to coerce me into doing something for you?"
"To be honest, I'm very interested in the first option," Chu Muyun helplessly shrugged. "Unfortunately, my superiors don't allow it... As for the second point, that's even more impossible. If I go to the law enforcers' headquarters with you, I'll be the first one caught..."
"Your superiors?" Chen Yifei sharply caught the point, "Aren't you the miracle doctor of Aurora City? Who are your superiors? The hospital director?"
"The miracle doctor is just an identity I fabricated to infiltrate Aurora City," Chu Muyun replied.
"Then what is your real identity?" Chen Yifei asked.
"... Have you heard of the Twilight Society?" Chu Muyun asked.
Chen Yifei shook his head.
"The Twilight Society is a secret society established outside the nine... No, it should be eight human domains now. All members are numbered with playing card faces and secretly infiltrate various human domains for covert activities," Chu Muyun explained.
"It doesn't sound like a just organization," Chen Yifei commented.
"No, we are a just organization," Chu Muyun pushed up his glasses and smiled. "It's just that in the eyes of the world, our justice represents absolute evil..."
"Sorry, I'm not interested in joining a cult," Chen Yifei said.
In his previous life, Chen Yifei had heard countless brainwashing tactics of such cults or pyramid schemes, which merely instilled distorted ideas to control people's thoughts. Even though he was burdened with the "Cataclysmic Disaster" in this life, he had no intention of sinking into depravity.
"That's why I said we're not a cult... It's just that our beliefs conflict with this era," Chu Muyun patiently explained. "Moreover, our salaries are quite high, about ten times that of a law enforcer."
"Ten times?" Chen Yifei looked at him in surprise, then shook his head. "But money doesn't mean much to me... Even if I have money, I need to be alive to spend it."
If it were his previous life, Chen Yifei would surely be tempted by the offer of ten times the salary, but now it was different. His biggest goal now was to get rid of the control of the "Audiences", and everything else was insignificant to him.
"We also have many resources. If you encounter obstacles in ascending the Divine Path, you can seek help from other members," Chu Muyun said.
"Are there many members in your society?" Chen Yifei asked.
"Currently, there are about twenty of us still alive," Chu Muyun replied.
"..."
"Let's talk about our justice instead..."