Who Was Saying Goodbye to Whom at the Farewell Ceremony?

The short-haired woman and Xu Kai divided up the work. They still had to keep watch until two in the morning.

Although they were certain that the Stone Statue Weird wouldn't attack twice in a short span of time, both the short-haired woman and Xu Kai remained on high alert.

The Eternal Candle stopped flickering and burned steadily, soon dwindling to a finger's length.

"We need to change the candle. Are there any around here?"

Seeing this, the short-haired woman immediately began searching the area. She believed the game would always leave them a glimmer of hope. As she searched, she suddenly found a cardboard box beside the coffin. She opened it and found it packed full of candles. They were marked as being specifically for eternal flames and neatly arranged inside the box.

The short-haired woman couldn't see any difference between them, but the Eternal Candle in front of the coffin was nearly burned out. She had no choice but to pick one at random and bring it over, lighting it from the old candle's flame.

The new candle gave off a strong smoky smell. When Xu Kai smelled it, he immediately went over to the short-haired woman, took the new candle away, and blew it out.

"What's wrong? Why did you blow it out?"

"There's something wrong with this candle. Get another one."

"There's no time. It should be fine."

The short-haired woman spoke with certainty.

The game's wording often had loopholes, and besides, this was something the master of ceremonies had said, not something the game had said directly. The master of ceremonies had only said to keep the candle flame from going out; he hadn't specified that the candles had to be identical. Master Xu was simply too nervous.

The short-haired woman had already used her Talent twice, leaving her with one last chance. She wanted to save that use for when a crisis arose.

But Xu Kai didn't agree. The heavy smoke had struck him as wrong, so he ignored the short-haired woman and took the candle back. He walked straight to the box and carefully sensed it with his Weird Energy. Unfortunately, he couldn't find any difference either, but he still took out another candle and handed it to the short-haired woman.

The short-haired woman looked at the identical candle, rolled her eyes, and said:

"Master, I'm starting to wonder whether I'm the one keeping vigil or you are. Why are you being so careful? If the deceased had led an upright life, I'd suspect you were his illegitimate son."

"Heh."

With that, she lit the candle and placed it beside the original one.

In the time it had taken them, only a tiny bit of the original candle remained. Now it burned away completely, leaving nothing behind.

The new candle burned, and Xu Kai saw no change. Just as he was about to breathe a sigh of relief, the lights everywhere else in the Crematorium suddenly went out.

Thump, thump, thump.

The familiar footsteps sounded, and Xu Kai smiled helplessly.

The short-haired woman was wondering in alarm why the lights had gone out. Hearing Xu Kai laugh, she asked in confusion, "Master Xu, what are you laughing at?"

"I'm laughing at that asshole boss of mine. Why'd he have to saddle me with this hellish job? There's no way to guard against it, and before I can even find the cause, I'm about to die."

"?"

The short-haired woman didn't immediately understand Xu Kai's veiled words, but she soon did. A towering bluish-gray Weird figure appeared before them and suddenly raised a hand. The entire Funeral Hall shattered and vanished.

The seventy-second rewind.

Xu Kai woke again. They had already divided up the work, with the short-haired woman and Xu Kai keeping watch for the first half of the night. The gale and Weird Energy had already passed.

Xu Kai stayed put and calmly watched the Eternal Candle burn down.

He couldn't find the cause. Only JK could counter it, so he had to wake JK again.

Around one o'clock, the Eternal Candle was nearly burned out. Before the short-haired woman could speak, Xu Kai walked straight over to JK and shook him awake.

As soon as JK woke, he instinctively used a man's voice and said, "

What is it? Is something happening?"

"Yeah, the Eternal Candle is about to burn out. My gut tells me you'd be better at picking a candle."

"R-really? Just now..."

JK snapped fully awake, realizing he hadn't been putting on his voice. He hurriedly switched it back on and probed Xu Kai's reaction, but Xu Kai remained completely unmoved.

Looks like he's not someone I can easily take advantage of.

JK thought to himself as he sat up, preparing to do as Xu Kai had said.

It was simple: JK didn't believe in Xu Kai's intuition; he believed in his own Talent. He just hadn't expected Xu Kai's intuition to be so good that he'd seemingly guessed something about his Talent. This was definitely an elite NPC. Unfortunately, he could only meet him in this one instance.

JK followed Xu Kai's pointing finger to the box and found that it contained almost entirely red candles, with only a small number of white ones.

"Red or white?"

"Hm? There are red ones? No wonder... take a white one."

So that's what happened, Xu Kai thought. The Stone Statue Weird hadn't been inactive; its actions had simply been too subtle. It had quietly changed the color of the red candles.

JK reached deep into the box, took out a white candle, and replaced the Eternal Candle.

After the original candle went out, nothing unusual happened in the Funeral Hall. Everything remained peaceful.

They had finally made it past this hurdle.

That had been close. They had cleared another hurdle, and Xu Kai hadn't expected JK to be so important. Back at the bend, while they were climbing the mountain, JK had been the first to die. If Xu Kai had chosen to act at that point after rewinding, he probably wouldn't have been able to get past this hurdle at all.

Xu Kai gazed gravely at the sky. He couldn't imagine how the other materials survived in the game. Even he, with Death Rewind, had already died more than seventy times.

Memories of death assaulted Xu Kai's mind again and again. Whenever he closed his eyes, all he could recall were scenes of his own death.

He didn't dare sleep, merely resting with his eyes closed. He continued like that until daybreak.

The Crematorium seemed to come back to life. The staff came out one after another and began bustling about, preparing for the farewell ceremony.

JK and Yellow Hair were both in a daze. The wind had continued throughout the second half of the night, keeping JK on high alert the entire time. Now the vigil was finally over. Neither of them could hold on any longer, and they fell straight asleep.

The short-haired woman was exhausted too. Clearly, she hadn't slept at all either. She glanced at Xu Kai and said:

"Master Xu, why do you look so worn out? Were you up all night too?"

"Yeah. When someone's trying to kill you, how can you sleep?"

At the farewell ceremony, the officiant recited the prayers Taoist priests often used. The new master of ceremonies was doing a fairly convincing job. The ceremony soon reached its final step, and the master of ceremonies declared solemnly:

"Everyone, carry the coffin to burial!"

Hearing those words seemed to activate something in the workers. Their eyes began to flicker strangely, and they all turned their gazes toward Xu Kai and the others. The look in their eyes had changed entirely.

"I don't think something's right."

"You don't have to think it. Something's fucking wrong!"

Before Yellow Hair had even finished speaking, the frenzied crowd rushed forward and tried to drag him to the Cremation Workshop!

Many people had come to the farewell ceremony. Xu Kai had thought they were extras provided by the Crematorium, or perhaps they really were the result of the instance being modified, bringing the coffin's relatives here at this point.

He had never imagined that this was the Stone Statue Weird's arrangement, a scheme to drag everyone into the Cremation Workshop.

There was nothing else they could do but resist with all their strength. But their opponents had superior numbers, while there were only four people on their side.

Xu Kai had had enough. He had played his role partly for the game task and partly so he could hide his strength beside the players and deal with any unexpected situations.

But he had already completed that role-playing task, the players were too busy looking after themselves, and now he was facing so many people armed with guns and clubs, trying to carry him into the Cremation Workshop. How the fuck was he supposed to put up with that? These people weren't even Weirds.

He struck back at once. Weird Energy burst from his body, and he carved out an open space in the crowd.

"Why is Master Xu's whole body full of Weird Energy? Is he a Weird?!"

But before everyone could finish expressing their shock, Xu Kai heard the game's voice.

[The role-playing task is an ongoing task. Once you receive a game task, please maintain the role automatically. Current role-playing as the driver has failed. Failure penalty: eradication]

There was a hidden clause too?

Xu Kai's eyes widened. Following Yellow Hair's example, he cursed furiously:

"Game, you're so fucking full of yourself! Your ancestors..."

Before he could finish cursing, the game's chains instantly bound Xu Kai, and he turned to ashes in the blink of an eye.