Second: Forward or Back

In the cold corridor, the corpses emanated a silent malice.

Yu Xing rubbed his temples, gave the corpse, which was clearly trying to attract his attention, a slight middle finger, and walked past without looking to the side.

His figure disappeared into the darkness, silence enveloped him, and then the corpse suddenly turned its head.

Yu Xing encountered the corpse five times. The fourth and fifth times, the corpse was still leaning against the corridor, but for some reason, the head was facing the front of the corridor.

Children began to appear in the murals.

The young boys and girls, with innocent expressions, leaned over low tables, silently writing their lessons with calligraphy brushes in hand, a scene that was lively and adorable through spring, summer, autumn, and winter.

The sickness of the elderly and the maturity of the young men and women have nothing to do with children. The murals and reliefs become more and more crowded, destroying the beauty of the artwork and leaving only layers of fragmentation.

Finally, the baby appeared.

The chubby human cub was held in the old man's arms, its big eyes filled with hope and curiosity about the world.

Their tiny, lotus-root-like arms emerged from their swaddling clothes and waved in the air.

Yu Xing seemed to hear the cries of a baby.

He shook his head, knowing that this was a hallucination that was likely to occur in a claustrophobic space.

There's no need to pay attention to it.

As he was about to pass by the corpse for the fifth time, something in the universe finally couldn't hold back any longer.

"Ring ring..."

The wind chimes tinkled pleasantly, and a dull, hoarse human voice came from the corpse's mouth.

Are you really going to leave like this?

Yu Xing raised an eyebrow, turned to look at the corpse, and said jokingly, "I thought you were going to stay silent forever. After all, you've been following us all this way, and you could have kept following us from here on out, right?"

"Maybe I'll go crazy from being so terrified of you that I can't shake off no matter what I do~"

These words sounded somewhat sarcastic, and the corpse probably understood this, so it didn't continue in the same vein.

The corpse's mouth remained still, and the voice, emanating from an unknown organ, was somewhat serene, unlike the corpse itself speaking. Rather, it seemed to be a higher being using the corpse to communicate with Yu Xing.

Life is short; a few decades pass, and the best years are spent.

[You've already figured it out, Yu Xing?]

The voice called out Yu Xing's name directly, solemn as a deity, deep and resonant as a great bell.

[Old age, middle-aged anxieties, youthful disappointments, and childhood struggles—a person's life is a constant struggle between gaining and losing; even a newborn baby cannot escape fear.]

From the moment we are born, we are moving closer to death; death is, and it is also, the end.

Yu Xing listened to "her" speak with his arms crossed, and chuckled softly when he heard this part.

The Yin Yang Corridor does indeed possess a certain divine quality. He didn't initially feel much when looking at the murals, but he later discovered it.

The theme of the mural is not "a family," but "an individual."

From old age to near death, to middle age, to youth and adolescence, and back to infancy, this is a retrospective of a person's life.

Fate has yin and yang, and people have birth and death. The murals in the corridor are trying to tell a story—a story about life, death, and destiny.

Of course, the murals couldn't have been placed here for no reason. Every time the corpse appeared, the murals would regress to a previous stage. Now it was an infant, and it was time to reveal the true nature of the murals.

"What do you want to say?" Yu Xing stopped looking at the corpse and looked up into the void. He knew that what was truly speaking to him must be "up there."

I need you to make a choice.

The voice said.

[Life is death, and death is life; the Yin Yang Corridor is not without end. You have reached the end. Now, the choice is yours: to move forward or to turn back.]

The yellow talisman fluttered in the wind, and suddenly a chilling wind arose, without any source, as if it were blowing from the underworld.

Yu Xing smiled, "Looking back, the murals are the most direct clues. Going forward means getting older, going backward means getting younger. If I choose to turn back..."

"I will definitely become a dying old man."

The voice did not comment on this.

"It seems that any normal person would choose to keep moving forward." Yu Xing raised her hand, stroking the texture of the mural's reliefs. "But—"

"Life is death, and death is life; life and death are a cycle. At least the old man is still alive, but if I move forward, what awaits me after infancy?"

A baby is a newborn.

Before rebirth, there is only death.

Death lies ahead.

So, your choice is to go back?

The voice seemed to sigh almost imperceptibly.

[If that's the case, then let's move on.]

"No," Yu Xing suddenly rebelled, "My choice is to move forward."

[...]

Silence fell over the enclosed corridor for a moment.

Some people are truly impossible to reason with. One second they're deducing that moving forward means certain death, and the next they're choosing to move forward anyway.

Yu Xing didn't care what "she" thought, and took a step forward.

The voice didn't stop him; it only asked, somewhat surprised, after he had taken a few steps.

[Why?]

[You clearly guessed the cycle of life and death, so why did you make this choice?]

Yu Xing continued walking, saying leisurely, "Because—this is a trap."

"The cycle of life and death is just the first layer; it's merely a legend. In reality, a person only has one life, from birth to death, and once it's over, that's it."

"When I entered the corridor, the murals on both sides were very blurry, almost indistinguishable, and incomprehensible. It was only after I first saw the corpse that I saw the old man in the murals."

"So what was the mural that I couldn't understand at first? I guess, after the old man, there's death."

"When I look back, I am taking each step as a voluntary step towards death."

Yu Xing spoke these words, her throat inexplicably itched, as if she had offended something that should not be said aloud.

He twirled the wind chimes. "Of course, most importantly, I recognized the body."

Did you recognize him?

"Hmm, he's just like me, isn't he?"

Yu Xing casually recounted the truth, then touched the goosebumps that had risen on her arm.

The five corpses he saw were all himself.

Although the corpse's face was covered in scabs, the body shape was still recognizable. Due to death, the corpse was much more desiccated, but the skeleton was consistent with his.

Moreover, there is a mole below the left eye in the gap of the scab.

When Yu Xing first passed by the corpse and reached out to test its temperature, he had already seen it up close, and he knew then that he was the one who had hanged himself.

But his calm demeanor truly fooled the Yin Yang Corridor.

"The corpse is on my way here. If I turn back, I will be the corpse." Yu Xing had already passed another corner; the mural was almost finished.

"But I won't look back. I and the corpse will always be separated."

[But death also lies ahead of the infant.]

The voice remained calm; it carried neither kindness nor malice, like that of a dutiful recorder.

Yu Xing laughed out loud, "You already told me what's ahead of the baby. You said the Yin Yang Corridor isn't without end, and I've already reached the end."

After the last corner, a door appeared ahead.

Yu Xing watched the door slowly open in front of him and said easily, "There will be no more murals ahead of the infant stage, because, at the end, the end of life is not death, but the exit."

The door opened silently, and behind it seemed to be an antique-style room.

[You have passed the first test of the Yin Yang Corridor.]

[Then let's keep going.]

Life and death are matters of freedom; those who control their destiny will never be troubled by them. Give it a try, Yu Xing, will you be the one who is recognized?

[You're not the only one facing the challenge in the second part...]

"Oh, you've arrived?"

The door opened completely, Yu Xing saw the person peering through it.

She wore a light blue long robe adorned with tinkling crystal ornaments, her long black hair was tied up in a wolf-hair bun, and her face was as gentle and refined as jade.

Having been missing for some time due to distance and difficulty in communication during the dungeon run, Yi Qing smiled and waved to Yu Xing: "Come in and sit down, I've been waiting for you for a long time."

Yu Xing smirked and stepped inside with an air of nonchalance; the door closed behind him.

The room was small, about the size of one of his bedrooms during the Republican era. In the center was an eight-immortal table, and along the wall was a chaise longue.

The window behind the bed was shrouded in gray, obscuring the outside world, but at least it was much more open than the corridor.

"... You're the first person to directly see the totem and enter the Yin Yang Corridor?" Yu Xing didn't even want to ask how much Yi Qing knew. This old ghost had a behind-the-scenes deal with the system, so he must know everything.

"Yes, besides you, there are two other people on the way. We'll have to wait for them to arrive before the second leg of the journey begins." Yi Qing smiled as she poured Yu Xing a cup of tea. The tea was ice-cold, with a refreshing coolness.

"You arrived later, yet you moved faster than them. Do you know why?"

The Sheqing Ghost floated up, perched on Yu Xing's head, and asked with a grin.

"Zhao Yijiu is traveling with the Lingren; the trials she'll face will definitely be different from mine." Yu Xing waved her hand, shoving Yi Qing away, "Don't pull me away."

"Oh, you're wrong. What the test is isn't important at all. What's important is those two people... they carry more burdens in their hearts than you do."

Yi Qing sat down in an exquisitely carved chair, took a sip of tea, and said, "You left without hesitation because you now understand your own heart. You are no longer confused or hesitant, unlike those two people."

"This has nothing to do with their strength; they each have their own obsessions and weaknesses, so it will take more time."

"The Yin Yang Corridor... and the Yin Yang City behind it, are the most dangerous places I know, bar none. Anyone who comes here is like an ant."

"Ants?" Yu Xing somewhat surprised by Yi Qing's choice of words. Even someone like Lingren... someone with that kind of strength, could be considered an ant?

"In the face of life and death, everyone is equal," Yi Qing said with a smile. "All those who think they are special have simply never seen the real Yin Yang City."

"To put it more simply, Yin Yang City, being a Yugi instance, is so dangerous that even a real-world character couldn't withstand it."