Ding! Dong! Ding! Dong!
The alarm clock on the bedside table was blaring with a shrill, relentless cry, as if it wouldn't stop until its mission was accomplished.
"Is it time already?"
From a modest, unremarkable mattress, a young man with a slender frame abruptly sat up. His face was a canvas of conflicting emotions—terror, astonishment, disbelief, and confusion, each emotion more complex than the last. The changes in his expression were almost as dramatic as a Sichuan opera mask change, shifting from one to another with astonishing speed.
"No, this can't be right. Why am I here? Was everything before just a dream? It must have been. The date, yes, the date."
A look of shock flashed across the young man's face as he hurriedly glanced at the calendar displayed on the alarm clock.
"September 20, 2019."
"How could it be the 20th? Did I travel back three days, or was everything before just a dream?" The young man's complexion alternated between pale and flushed as he murmured to himself. His name was Yi Tianxing.
Yi Tianxing had originally been an orphan, abandoned by his parents when he was five years old. He was taken in by the Tianfu Orphanage under mysterious circumstances. From a very young age, he claimed to see ghosts and spirits that others couldn't perceive. Innocent and unfiltered, his tales of seeing blood-covered uncles and otherworldly beings while walking down the street were too bizarre for anyone to believe. No matter how one looked at it, he didn't seem like a normal child.
After being diagnosed with mental issues at a psychiatric hospital, even his own parents found his incessant ramblings unbearable and ultimately abandoned him, sending him to the orphanage. For the first few years, his birth parents would occasionally visit in secret, but after they had a new child—a boy—they never came to see him again.
By the time Yi Tianxing was six or seven, he had grown more aware of the world around him. Witnessing the fear and disgust in others' eyes whenever they looked at him, he became increasingly silent and reclusive, never mentioning his ability to see ghosts again. To all appearances, he behaved like any other normal child.
At the age of eight, Yi Tianxing was adopted by a kind couple, Zhao Haifeng and Huang Yu. They had a daughter named Zhao Ziyang, who was seven years old. Due to certain reasons, they couldn't have more children after Ziyang, so they decided to adopt Yi Tianxing.
The adoptive parents treated Yi Tianxing as if he were their own flesh and blood, sharing all the good things in life equally with him and their daughter. Under their care, Yi Tianxing's once icy heart began to warm, and he developed a deep bond with Zhao Ziyang, treating her like a sister. He truly regarded Zhao Haifeng and Huang Yu as his real parents, long burying thoughts of his biological parents deep within his heart.
Now twenty-three, Yi Tianxing had graduated from university and entered the workforce. On the surface, he led a normal life, but secretly, he ran a business dealing with exorcisms and ghost hunting. Born with extraordinary eyes that could see both the living and the dead, he possessed a pair of innate Yin-Yang Eyes.
Although he never mentioned his special ability to his family or friends after leaving the orphanage, as he grew older, these Yin-Yang Eyes became even more powerful. Not only could they see the unseen, but they also granted him a mystical power known as the Yin-Yang Lock. Currently, he could only manifest two such locks, but Yi Tianxing had tested their strength; they were incredibly potent, especially against malevolent spirits. Once locked, the spirits were rendered powerless, unable to resist. Over the years, Yi Tianxing had earned a reputation as a master, and he was far from lacking in wealth.
Life seemed to be going smoothly, filled with meaning and excitement. However, the events he had recently experienced left him with an overwhelming sense of fear.
"Indeed, it is three days ago."
Yi Tianxing switched on the television, and to his astonishment, the news playing was the same report he had watched exactly three days prior. Every detail in his home, from the placement of objects to the arrangement of furniture, matched his memory of how it was three days ago, without a single discrepancy.
Swish!
As he pulled back the curtains, the bustling street outside came into view, with the wail of fire engines reverberating through the air. A shop nearby was engulfed in roaring flames—a scene that Yi Tianxing had already witnessed in his memories.
All these occurrences confirmed one thing: he had indeed returned to three days before. The difference between those three days and the events that followed was like the divide between heaven and hell.
"What were those things? Was it truly the end of the world? Monsters, skeletons, zombies, undead spirits, insects, and beasts." Yi Tianxing gazed at the pedestrians outside, but his vision seemed to pierce through the river of time, seeing into the future. His mind replayed the scenes he had experienced just three days later.
On the morning of September 23, 2019, as Yi Tianxing stood on the rooftop of a skyscraper, watching the sunrise, something inexplicable happened. In an instant, the sun, which had just begun to rise, was swallowed by an eerie shadow, plunging the world into darkness. Immediately after, the sky was filled with thunder and lightning, and cracks began to appear seemingly out of nowhere, spreading densely across the Earth.
The sight of these cracks tearing through the fabric of reality was apocalyptic. From within them, countless monsters surged forth—strange beasts, insects, undead, skeletons, and more, pouring out like rain. They attacked indiscriminately, wreaking havoc in the cities, causing mass casualties and destruction in the blink of an eye. The chaos was overwhelming, the terror beyond description, far surpassing any imagined doomsday scenario.
Moreover, from the cracks, various beams of divine light shot out, spreading across the globe like meteors. These beams, each containing unknown entities, rained down upon the world, their purpose and origin shrouded in mystery.
The return to this day meant that Yi Tianxing had a second chance. Armed with the knowledge of what was to come, he now faced the daunting task of preparing for the unimaginable horrors that lay ahead.