The Traitors

That's a ghost.

Luo Jue stared blankly at the young man who was even more elusive than her, momentarily forgetting what she was going to say next.

The sky was gray due to pollution, yet it shone with a faint white light. The familiar yet unfamiliar face had changed somewhat compared to before, and the faint ghostly aura surrounding the young man was mingled with the air, making him difficult to see clearly.

Ghostly aura is the easiest thing to evoke fear.

But the young man smiled, personally smoothing away the fear, leaving only a touch of friendliness.

"Long time no see." Yu Xing greeted the stunned Luo Jue, then glanced at Luo Qishan, who was now on alert behind her.

"Yu Xing!" Luo Jue finally snapped out of her daze, her face showing shock. She spoke with a tone that was three parts joy, two parts confusion, and five parts wariness, "How did you get here! Weren't you dead?!"

She took out a new yellow talisman from an angle she thought Yu Xing couldn't see, and was about to lean closer to test it when Luo Qishan grabbed her.

"I remember you." Luo Qishan remained composed. "At the last family gathering, you were addressed as 'Xing'."

"Then you have a good memory." Yu Xing seemed not to have caught the implication in his words and went along with the compliment.

Luo Qishan became even more vigilant, placing his hand on Luo Jue's shoulder in a protective stance. "This instance doesn't have a deducer named Xing. Where did you come from?"

Yu Xing said, "It came from a van heading towards the base."

Luo Jue: "..."

Luo Qishan: "... Heh, answer my question."

Yu Xing shrugged; what he said was the absolute truth.

Of course, this answer couldn't satisfy Luo Qishan. He was just teasing him, but he couldn't go too far, since he still needed to find these two kids to cooperate with.

Turning to look at the chicks scurrying about, startled by the ghostly aura, he stared at the fluffy creatures and became slightly more serious. "For some unspeakable reasons, I joined this Yugi midway through. As for the rumor that I died... that's just a rumor. I've been alive and well all along."

"But you haven't contacted me for a year!" Luo Jue secretly glanced at the face she couldn't forget, then obediently stayed beside Luo Qishan and didn't come any closer. "There have been so many things happening this year, you couldn't have kept it all to yourself, could you? Where have you been?"

"Whether it's the Broken Mirror Squad's collective actions or the Absurdity System's activities, Zhao Mou is in charge." Luo Qishan also used this point to question him, "No matter how you look at it, your sudden appearance in front of us is very suspicious."

"Then what could I be, a virus from the base?" Yu Xing said calmly. "Even if it doesn't make sense, you'd have to find a more plausible explanation before you start to suspect me."

He and the Luo siblings looked at each other in bewilderment, and the two people opposite them fell silent.

Five minutes later, the three appeared in the rest area of the breeding area.

There are many people in the livestock breeding area, so there's no need to constantly watch over the animals. People also need to use the toilet, so some simple rooms have been built around the area for them to rest.

At this time, most people were near the livestock pens, and since they had deliberately chosen the corner rest area, finally, no survivors were watching them talk with curious eyes anymore.

"So, you had an accident during that event and got trapped in the instance, only finding a way to escape a few days ago?" Luo Qishan asked again with a serious expression, seemingly trying to discern whether Yu Xing was lying through his eyes.

Yu Xing's gaze was completely sincere, revealing no flaws—even though he only told the beginning and the end truthfully, and the middle part was pure fabrication.

He told Luo Qishan that he was trapped underwater on Dead Silent Island and it took him a year to break free. After the Absurdity System detected him, it teleported him to his nearest teammate, Zhao Yijiu, who was currently performing a simulation.

Because the Absurdity System's control over the real world is far less than its control over the instance, this is the only way to do it. Only after clearing this instance can his deducer identity be restored.

In contrast, he said he was more curious about what actually happened in reality that led to the sudden emergence of so many desperate scenario-based deducers.

"Didn't your teammates tell you?" Luo Qishan looked at him suspiciously.

Yu Xing sat on the hard bench in the lounge, spreading her hands. "I didn't have time to ask. A lot has happened since I came in. I only have this much free time now after I gained the female commander's trust."

In fact, he had many opportunities to ask Zhao Yijiu.

However, he felt this was not a good time, as every question he asked was a reminder to Zhao Yijiu that he had been missing for a year.

Secondly, Zhao Yijiu is not a talkative person, so it might be difficult for her to clearly explain the key points.

Yu Xing originally planned to go out and ask Zhao Mou, but the Luo family probably knew quite a bit, so she might as well take this opportunity to make "allies" while figuring things out.

Luo Qishan was still considering when Luo Jue tugged at his sleeve. "I think it's believable. Even if his appearance was abrupt, the Broken Mirror Squad and we're not enemies, so he has no reason to harm us."

Luo Qishan frowned, staring at his looks-obsessed friend, before finally saying, "Then you tell him."

Luo Jue was one of the people who made a rapid leap into the Despair level this year, and she was the most qualified to do so.

The little girl with pigtails finally approached Yu Xing and said, "It was after that event—"

Smack

A yellow talisman was pasted on Yu Xing's forehead.

The talisman was gently lifted by Yu Xing's breath, Yu Xing's eyes held a half-smile, seemingly unaffected.

Luo Jue chuckled dryly, "That's called being cautious, huh? Caution."

She removed the ineffective talisman, and it was clearly much easier than before; even Luo Qishan's expression had softened considerably.

The Luo family members are exceptionally gifted, having practiced magic since childhood. They are particularly sensitive to the aura of ghosts; others cannot see the ghostly energy on Yu Xing, but they can.

They were Yu Xing uneasy if they didn't verify it this way.

"Hehe, I'll tell you again." Luo Jue cleared her throat.

A year ago, in that bet between the Absurdity System and the experience system, the experience system won.

The problem is that the Absurdity System lost somewhat unjustly; all five Yugi instances malfunctioned.

The Deducer won the Dead Silent Island instance, but due to the existence of the Ghost Tree, many loopholes appeared and many uncontrollable things happened. Several testers quit on their own. With the destruction of Dead Silent Island, the Absurdity System could not even find anything.

Of the remaining four instances, in one instance, everyone, whether a deducer or a tester, went crazy, resulting in complete chaos; in the other three instances, for some unknown reason, the senior members of the deducers—such as the Lingren, the Widow Investigation Team, and the Research Institute —as if they had agreed beforehand, collectively "betrayed" the team.

Yu Xing to hear this. "Treason?"

"Yes, none of them fought properly in PvP. Instead, they did a lot of things in the dungeons that... displeased the Absurdity System." Luo Jue recalled that time, licking her lips. "I only heard that those big shots seemed to have reached some kind of tacit agreement, and they all suddenly 'betrayed' each other midway through, as if they had all discovered something at the same time."

Because of their perfunctory attitude towards the task, the Absurdity System naturally lost. The cost of losing was predictable. After the event ended, the Absurdity System had a lot of energy taken away by the Experience Master System and fell into a month of silence. During that month, many people thought that there would be no more Absurd Deduction Game.

But a month later, the Absurdity System reappeared, even more insane than before.

It seemed extremely angry and disappointed with its predictors, and after distributing all the promised rewards, the predictors were plunged into hell.

The Absurdity System began to compress the rest time of the deducers, forcing them to complete a Yugi once a week. All items that could be used to purchase rest time were removed from the store. The live deduction programs were updated and iterated, becoming more cruel and bloody. Under these circumstances, large numbers of deducers died, while those who survived were quickly promoted.

Everyone finally remembered that this was a Yugi system fraught with death. When the system stopped being "merciful" and stopped putting on a show, it was the players who would suffer.

"Even now... most of us still don't know why the big shots betrayed us during that event." Luo Jue blinked. "Some people harbored resentment and sought revenge against those top divination masters, but all their efforts were in vain, or they died... Countless died at the hands of the Lingren."

Over time, no one dared to ask. That strange "tacit understanding" of betrayal became a taboo. People could talk about it among themselves, but not in front of the top leaders.

Even if many people advance to the Despair level, there is still a gap between them and those original big shots.

"If it was Lingren at the level of a performer who caused the loss of the bet, shouldn't they pay the price? Didn't the system punish them?" Yu Xing seized on the loophole and asked rhetorically.

"They've been punished, haven't they?" This time it was Luo Qishan who spoke up. After listening for a while, he finally couldn't help but say, "They were punished the moment the silence was lifted. Several 'traitors' died... but we don't know the details of the punishment. Those top experts who survived are even more formidable than before."

Now, the number of people at the Despair level is increasing, while the total number of users is decreasing sharply. Everyone knows that the Absurdity System is probably going to covet the power of the Experience Master System again.

But doubts persisted. Luo Qishan even wondered—what if, just like before, they received some kind of information and were forced to betray their cause?

The scariest thing isn't the high frequency of Yugi.

Rather, it was the reason that even top experts betrayed the Absurdity System.

This "reason" hangs like a knife over the neck of every researcher; if it isn't removed, it could be fatal at any moment.

At this time, Yu Xing's sudden appearance... seemed very strange.

Luo Qishan stared at Yu Xing's face, not asking if her disappearance was related to that "reason," because judging from the questions Yu Xing asked, she seemed unaware of the situation.

Even if he knew, he pretended not to know and made his stance clear. Asking him wouldn't make a difference; he knew Yu Xing wouldn't tell.

"So, let's assume none of us lied," Luo Qishan said. "You came to us to end the Yugi quickly and save your life from the Lingren, right?"

The conflict between the Broken Mirror Squad and Single Prism was common knowledge throughout the year.

Remember the domain name when watching Absurd Deduction Game: