The illusory scales slowly faded away.
Along with them, the Deathly Silence Rule Inscription on the left pan vanished without a trace.
At the same time, a new item appeared in the Spatial Inventory section of Fate Throat's personal panel.
It was a slowly rotating dark red inscription, within which countless stars seemed to perish and be reborn-the Deathly Silence Rule.
Across the gambling table, Gu Qi's body, frozen like a statue, swayed almost imperceptibly.
He slowly raised his head, his cloudy lone eye fixed on where the scales had vanished, but there was nothing there.
He had staked everything, yet failed to turn things around.
His ruined face, covered by a half-mask, held no expression.
Hope had burned out completely.
He wanted to say something. His cracked lips moved slightly, but no sound emerged.
In his lone eye, where a little light still lingered, the last faint flame belonging to the living flickered violently like a candle in the wind, struggled once, then went out completely.
The light in his eye scattered.
He did not look at Fate Throat again, nor at any of the surrounding faces, whether excited, wistful, or indifferent.
He merely lowered his head slowly and looked at his hands, withered like skeletal claws.
Those hands had once held his people's scepter, had been stained with his enemies' blood, and had trembled as they cradled the cold cheeks of the last cub-now, all of it was gone.
His final hope had shattered along with the Rule Inscription.
"Heh."
The next instant, his already faint signs of life rapidly receded like an ebbing tide.
He remained with his head bowed as the flame of his life quietly went out.
Beneath his tattered black robe, his body lost its final support. His bones rustled like weathered rock flaking