Come Again

The moment he kicked the door open, he saw tobacco leaves casually piled and dried in the yard, messy tools, and dust flying everywhere. The color of yellow earth seemed to cover everything.

But he didn't see any enemies.

He only saw a withered woman trying her best to hide two little girls behind her, her eyes wide open, staring blankly at Huai Shi.

Her eyes were filled with fear.

"S-sorry..." he swallowed, "Wrong place."

Just as he was about to turn, he was kicked aside by a teammate. Immediately after, he heard the roar of an automatic rifle, a series of loud bangs, and faint screams.

And the sound of blood spraying.

He didn't even have time to look back.

Someone in the distance seemed to be shouting something, something flew through the air, followed by another loud explosion.

In the end, there was no sound at all.

Complete silence.

Only a sharp ringing in his ears.

An RPG from somewhere had blown everything into ruins.

Huai Shi instinctively got down on the ground and crawled forward. Someone pulled him up and yelled something into his ear, but he couldn't hear it. He just kept pulling the trigger wildly towards the front, following the commands of the captains.

He didn't even realize the magazine was empty.

Then he saw bodies, bodies, bodies, bodies, bodies...

Women, children, elderly people, and more children, tall or short, fat or thin... some whole, some shattered.

The whole process was too fast, too fast for him to react.

He hadn't even found the enemies the instructor mentioned, and the battle seemed to be over. Then, he was dragged to the plaza by his furious teammates and beaten.

In the midst of severe dizziness and confusion, the instructor walked up. The middle-aged man with a mustache looked down at him for a long time before beckoning behind him.

Someone dragged two struggling enemies forward.

Immediately after, Huai Shi was helped up by the instructor. The instructor gently patted the dust off him, placed his service pistol into Huai Shi's hand, and pointed at the screaming children on the ground, saying something.

Huai Shi didn't hear clearly. He looked around blankly, seeing the cold faces of his teammates.

He saw the messy corpses being dragged to the plaza and piled into a mountain.

The blood pooled in one place and formed a river.

The instructor said something, which Huai Shi still didn't hear clearly. So, his teammates slowly raised their guns and aimed them at him. He froze.

The instructor spoke to him one last time.

This time, Huai Shi finally heard it clearly. He said, "Fire."

Instinctively, Huai Shi pulled the trigger at the enemies.

Once, twice, thrice, four times...

Soon, the magazine was empty. The two enemies on the ground turned into a bloody mess and stopped moving. Only blood bubbles continuously emerged from the bullet wounds, soaking the dim yellow earth into black.

At the very last moment, Huai Shi finally saw his own face, reflected from the corpses.

From the vacant eyes of the two little girls.

Huai Shi opened his eyes in his room.

Huai Shi began to convulse violently, Huai Shi roared something at Crow, and then Huai Shi started to vomit.

Bending over, he lay on the ground, vomiting until tears almost streamed down his face.

First, he felt fear, then pain, then regret, and finally, only anger and disgust remained, a deep anger and disgust towards himself.

He had actually fired.

At two little girls who had no ability to resist...

"Damn it..."

He wearily covered his face, unable to hold back tears, "Damn it..."

Even when burning Red Glove to death, he hadn't felt the slightest tremor. But in this illusory record, he felt such profound fear of death and an immense revulsion towards the act of killing.

There were no enemies there at all, only an old man who had lost his son in the war, a woman who had lost her husband, and children who had lost their father...

It was just a meaningless massacre.

He had actually fired.

Even though he knew it was just a record, and that nothing would happen even if he were killed, he still fired... at two children who couldn't even be considered enemies.

Because of fear, fright, confusion, or... weakness.

What had that guy, Red Glove, done before!

And what had he done?

"It seems I was too eager for quick success, and my choice of practical combat training wasn't quite right," Crow said sympathetically, looking at him. "This is my fault, not yours. Let's rest for tonight, and tomorrow I'll adjust the new..."

"No, give me just a few minutes—"

Huai Shi interrupted her. "Just a few minutes is fine."

Silence fell.

Soon, he finally calmed down, got up, and went to the restroom. He wiped the snot and drool from his face and returned to the hall.

He said calmly, "Let's do it again."

"Are you sure?" Crow asked suspiciously.

"Again."

Huai Shi repeated, "Again."

After a long while, Crow seemed to understand something and started to laugh.

She said, "Okay."

The Event Branch point settled, and darkness descended.

Huai Shi opened his eyes and smelled the scent of dry dust. A scorching wind blew in from outside the window. The instructor issued orders from the co-pilot seat:

"Kill them all. Leave none alive."

Huai Shi nodded and said, "Okay."

Then he raised his gun, aimed at the driver's seat, and pulled the trigger.

Amidst the roar, sparks flew from the muzzle.

The driver died, his body a bloody mess splattered across the shattered windshield. The car lurched violently and rolled over.

Huai Shi felt the wind rush past him. In the violent tumble, it seemed a group of people lunged at him, but they were quickly subdued and pinned to the ground by his teammates.

The rear door opened.

The expressionless instructor walked in and looked down at him.

"Unsatisfactory."

He said, pulling the trigger.

Bang!

Huai Shi's head exploded.

He opened his eyes, gasping for breath, sweat pouring out like water.

Soon, he picked up the warm water on the table and drank it down in one gulp. "Again!"

"Okay," Crow nodded, and darkness descended once more.

"Kill them all. Leave none alive."

He heard the instructor's voice and immediately smiled. He drew a dagger from his boot sheath and lightly slashed across the neck of the teammate to his right. Blood spurted from the severed neck, dyeing the dust dancing in the air a crimson red.

Time seemed to freeze.

In that instant, Huai Shi drew his pistol and fired repeatedly, aiming at his teammates in front, behind, left, and right, pulling the trigger again and again. Mounds of brains exploded.

But soon, he was mowed down again.

"You need to be more strategic," Crow said. "Theoretically, you have the possibility to eliminate them all without taking any damage. But I need to remind you of one thing: what you are reading is Red Glove's record. That means everything that happened, and what everyone did, was based on his subjective judgment at the time. Do you understand?"

"I don't quite understand."

"It's okay, you'll understand soon enough." Crow withdrew her gaze. "Again?"

"Okay!"

Huai Shi opened his eyes again. From inside the vehicle, amidst the instructor's commands, he twisted his body slightly, slowly moving his neck, and checked his equipment.

One combat knife, one pistol, one assault rifle, a bulletproof vest and a walkie-talkie, and several magazines clipped to his tactical vest.

And an iron pomegranate.

Weighing the heavy object in his hand, Huai Shi met the gazes of his teammates and smiled, subtly pulling the ring with his pinky finger.

He quietly counted down.

Three, two, one.

At that exact moment, he leaped forward, crashing into the rear door of the vehicle. He tumbled out of the speeding car and rolled onto the ground, getting pricked all over by the thorns and bushes by the roadside, his hands throbbing with pain.

But soon, he heard the roar behind him.

The transport vehicle, speeding down the road, suddenly jolted as if it had jumped dozens of centimeters off the ground. Immediately after, the metal box seemed to inflate like a balloon, and blood-red fire erupted from the shattered cracks.

Soon, it twisted and deformed in the flames, rolling to a stop.

Huai Shi got up from the ground, gasping for breath under the scorching sun. But soon, he saw it: from the burning wreckage, the twisted metal door suddenly let out a sharp sound.

It was kicked open.

From the co-pilot's seat, the stern-faced instructor slowly emerged, looking down at Huai Shi's stunned expression with cold eyes. Although he appeared to be an ordinary person, with no fluctuations of origin essence or traces of a Holy Mark on him, he had survived the intense explosion without a single hair out of place.

"What happened and what everyone will do are Red Glove's subjective judgments, that's what it means, right?"

Huai Shi couldn't help but laugh, mocking Red Glove, "What kind of psychological trauma do you have towards your instructor?"

Otherwise, how could the obviously ordinary instructor have been unharmed in the grenade explosion?

Did this guy think his instructor was some kind of indestructible Superman?

"I really didn't expect this, 7794."

The instructor looked at him indifferently, slowly twisting his neck, his fingers lightly tapping the handle of the whip tied to his waist, making a sound that made Huai Shi's body tense up instantly.

Tap, tap, tap...

The sound of his fingers tapping the whip was the mark of punishment and penalty.

One torture, two severe injuries, and then no third time.

Having seen his companions whipped to death on the training grounds so many times, Huai Shi felt the residual despair and fear of Red Glove, and his will to resist began to quickly crumble.

The instructor stepped forward, looked down at his trembling opponent, reached out, and pressed down on his head.

Twist.

Crack!

Huai Shi's neck snapped.

Bang!

Huai Shi opened his eyes in anger and punched the table, "Coward!"

He didn't know if he was cursing Red Glove or himself, after all, in countless memories of training, he had deeply understood the instructor's coldness and cruelty.

"It seems you've grasped the limitations of a subjective recorder, haven't you?"

Crow chuckled mysteriously, "One who cannot elevate their perspective beyond their own fear and confusion cannot record everything as an absolute objective observer.

But this is the beauty of recording experiences, it gives you the possibility to surpass the one being recorded."

"How do I do it?" Huai Shi asked.

"It's very simple," Crow said. "Just blow everything up. No matter what happens, no matter what's stopping you, just deal with them all in your own way.

No matter how difficult an arcade game is, there's always a possibility of beating it. A one-credit clear is just the most basic of basics. On the contrary, speedruns and no-hit runs are what we pursue—"

She paused, her smile sly, "How about it? If you feel it's too difficult, do you need a cheat code? As long as it's recorded in the Book of Destiny, it's easy even if you want to modify yourself to be as omnipotent as a god."

"No thanks."

After resting for a while, Huai Shi felt his energy had recovered. He rubbed his throbbing forehead, ready to begin, when he saw Crow holding out a rolled cigarette.

"Since you've got some backbone, I'll give you a free blue potion."