Six Bullets, I Bet It Won't Fire!

Whew!

He took a deep breath, looked at the arrogant youth across from him, and said in a low voice, "Rock-paper-scissors."

Seeing Li You's do-or-die stance, Bai Ye smiled.

That smile made Li You's heart skip a beat, and an ominous feeling rose within him. No way...

The devilish whisper came right on cue. "Not enough."

"Fuck! Five bullets!? What kind of poisonous mushroom has such a brutal aftereffect?"

"That kid Bai Ye is playing for keeps!"

Even the leaders of the East and West Districts were stunned. They had witnessed many Fate Roulette games and had even taken part in them themselves back when they were weaker, but they had never seen anyone insane enough to play Fate Roulette with five bullets.

Five bullets meant near-certain death.

"I can see it now. You're not here to gamble with Fate Roulette—you're here to kill yourself!" Li You believed he had seen through Bai Ye's intentions and was certain the other party had gone mad.

The odds of winning with five bullets were already below sixty percent. That crossed his bottom line.

"If you don't dare gamble, hand over the Forbidden Artifact."

Bai Ye's words made Tan Jie's eyes light up, and he hurriedly echoed, "That's right! If you don't dare gamble, hand over the Forbidden Artifact!"

As soon as the East District leader spoke, his underlings behind him began shouting as well.

Li You looked troubled. King Snake behind him said coldly, "Don't fall for it. This kid wants to scare you into giving up the Forbidden Artifact voluntarily. Keep gambling with him. If you aren't confident, make him shoot first. He isn't a cheat. With five bullets in Fate Roulette, I refuse to believe he can survive!"

The hard object against his back pressed harder and harder. The cold metal muzzle pierced through his floral shirt, its chill making every hair on his body stand on end.

"Fine, I'll gamble with you. But..." Li You had wanted to follow King Snake's suggestion and make Bai Ye shoot first, but he ultimately gave up on the idea. He was not used to placing his fate in someone else's hands. What if Bai Ye's luck was truly absurd, and he survived the first shot? Wouldn't that mean certain death for himself?

He still preferred relying on the Magician's Right Hand he had honed for years to control his own fate.

Li You loaded the fifth bullet. There were thirty seconds left until midnight.

In those final thirty seconds, Bai Ye once again said something shocking. "Not enough."

An uproar broke out!

The crowd instantly exploded into commotion. They even wondered if their ears were broken. Five bullets still weren't enough? A revolver could only hold six bullets. If it was fully loaded and fired, wasn't that guaranteed death!?

Li You stared at him in disbelief. "Do you even hear what you're saying? This isn't gambling at all..."

Before he could finish, he realized that the youth across from him had already risen and come to his side.

The youth extended a hand covered in mud, gently took [Breath of Bones] from his grasp, then picked up the final bullet beneath everyone's stunned gazes.

10, 9, 8, 7...

Bai Ye silently counted down in his heart, his wild black eyes slowly sweeping across the crowd.

"I've never had particularly good luck. I don't think I can keep winning round after round until the Forbidden Artifact acknowledges me. Instead of that... I might as well settle it all in one round."

As he spoke, he loaded the final bullet.

Click!

The cylinder snapped back into place, and the bullet was chambered!

Under everyone's gaze, Bai Ye slowly raised the fully loaded [Breath of Bones] and aimed it at his temple. The dark red veins on the gun began to squirm, like winding little snakes viciously burrowing into the flesh of his hand.

Without exception, everyone present thought he had gone mad. This was not gambling at all. It was... suicide.

The hell do you mean, your luck is bad so you'll settle it in one round? Is that even something a human would say?

Looking at the various people before him, Bai Ye's lips curled upward, carrying the confidence and reckless arrogance unique to youth.

"Six bullets. I bet it won't fire!"

The crowd was utterly stunned. It was the first time they had heard such an obscure statement.

Who the hell told you that Fate Roulette was played like this??

Under everyone's shocked gazes, Bai Ye's finger descended toward the trigger.

Women and children in the crowd covered their ears in fear. Others instinctively dodged aside, afraid of getting splattered with blood.

3...

2...

1!!

The countdown ended, and the midnight bell rang!

Dong!

Within the endless night, in a dimension invisible to everyone else, a massive and magnificent golden clock face emerged beneath Bai Ye's feet and rapidly spread across the ground.

He stood alone atop the enormous clock face, like a traveler abandoned by time.

At the same time, the surrounding crowd, trees, buildings, and even the sky seemed to vanish entirely, as though a god had swept away all existence with one wave of a hand, leaving behind only golden clock faces of varying sizes.

They were the physical manifestations of all things' time.

The hands on the golden clock faces of these people and objects all pointed to 12:00!

Only... the massive golden clock face beneath Bai Ye's feet displayed—12:01.

This was his own time, one minute ahead of this world.

Feeling his power return, Bai Ye activated his ability without hesitation.

Time... stop!!

Buzz!

An eerie fluctuation of time rang out.

The world had been paused.

The once-noisy plaza instantly fell silent. Everyone froze in place like statues, and the terror in Li You's eyes across from him solidified.

Even the secondhand smoke exhaled from his nostrils stopped spreading, hanging motionless in midair.

In this absolutely frozen world, the only one who could move was... Bai Ye!

The youth who had just performed a miracle swiftly opened the cylinder of [Breath of Bones] the instant time stopped and began digging out bullets at lightning speed.

"Come on, come on, come on!! Don't waste time! Time is life!"

Ever since learning that he only had one minute a day, he had become especially precious about time, because he had done the math.

One minute a day meant 365 minutes a year! That was six hours and five minutes. Counting it as six hours a year, ten years only amounted to sixty hours. His current body was sixteen years old. In the era of the Great Cataclysm, living to fifty already meant smoke rising from one's ancestral graves. Even if that smoke really did rise and he lived to fifty-six, that was only forty years. Forty years could accumulate 240 hours.

And 240 hours was... ten days!!

When Bai Ye calculated that the full extent of his lifetime's ability amounted to merely ten days, he truly understood what it meant for time to be life.

Perhaps because his hands were too dirty, and because he had not trimmed his nails for a long time, he tried digging at it several times but still could not get the bullet out.

"Damn hand! Dig it out already!!"

At that moment, cold sweat broke out on his forehead.

He had not panicked when facing the danger-filled era of the Great Cataclysm.

He had not panicked when facing a life-or-death Fate Roulette gamble.

But now, the very thought that several seconds had already passed made him genuinely panic.

What was slipping away was not time. It was his life!

Fortunately, on his fourth attempt, he finally dug the bullet out.

Whew!

Bai Ye let out a long breath and hurriedly slipped the bullet into his pocket.

He had removed only one bullet—the one that was about to be fired. That way, the shot would be a blank.

After finishing everything, he wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and began setting up his pose.

He pressed the revolver against his temple again, quickly adjusted his state of mind, and the previous smile returned to his face. Only after ensuring that the curve of his smile was exactly the same as before did he release the time stop.

Release!

Buzz!

The eerie temporal fluctuation dissipated, and time began flowing through the entire world once more. No one knew that time had ever stopped. Everyone's attention remained fixed on Bai Ye.

In their eyes, Bai Ye pulled the trigger with a calm smile, the powerful confidence radiating from within him making people stare.

The revolver, where metallic texture intertwined with the feel of flesh and blood, had its trigger gradually drawn back. The trigger pulled the hammer backward and compressed the hammer spring. The instant the trigger reached the end, the hammer shot forward under the force of the spring.

It slammed viciously into the firing pin on the gun!

Click!

A crisp sound rang out. There was no smoke, no flash, and no... bullet!

There was nothing at all. Only the youth's unchanged smile remained.