Chapter 904

Intense pain brought Li Huowang back to consciousness, though only slightly. As the anesthesia deepened, the pain he felt gradually diminished.

Li Huowang stumbled backward. Upon hearing Wu Qi's voice, he finally succumbed to unconsciousness and collapsed to the ground.

After an unknown period, Li Huowang slowly regained consciousness. The flickering flashlight beam on the ceiling made him realize he was still in the factory. The quiet surroundings confirmed that everything that had happened there was over.

Li Huowang laboriously reached up and pressed his head, feeling as though his head was about to split open.

"Here, drink some water. Don't be afraid, it's just a side effect. It will disappear soon," Wu Qi said, helping Li Huowang to his feet.

"Is it over? Did we win?" Li Huowang turned his head to look at the scattered corpses nearby.

"No, they escaped," Wu Qi replied. "But Zhao Shuangdian said our objective has been achieved. We should retreat."

"Retreat?" Li Huowang looked at the others in the distance. He saw them siphoning oil from engines and dousing it over the factory's contents. It seemed they intended to burn the place down.

At that moment, many questions surged in Li Huowang's mind, and he wanted to ask Zhao Shuangdian. But it wasn't the right time to ask; even if he did, she probably wouldn't say anything.

Li Huowang stood up and, with Wu Qi's support, retreated towards the underground canal of the karez well. "Since it's over, let's go," he said.

Li Huowang didn't know what everything here represented. He could only deduce from experience that this underground factory was likely an entity similar to Baiyujing, and the people earlier were the overseers of this place.

However, upon reflection, Li Huowang felt something was amiss. "The Child God is clearly very strong, so how could its associated overseers be so weak? Over a hundred good people couldn't even defeat these individuals?"

"Or maybe, I guessed wrong," he mused. "How could they possibly tear Baiyujing apart?" As Li Huowang pondered, he retreated further into the darker canal.

Wu Qi leaned Li Huowang against the wall, then turned to help the others.

Li Huowang shook his head hard and glared at Qing Wanglai, who was rummaging through a freezer.

Before he could unleash his anger, strange noises came from the tunnel to his left. He glared in that direction; something in the darkness was also glaring back at him. People, many of them.

Suddenly, a bright light appeared. An activated flashlight tumbled and landed at Li Huowang's feet, illuminating him brightly. He was now experiencing what Chen Hongyu had earlier.

"Enemy attack!" Li Huowang yelled with all his might, then lunged desperately toward the door. Just then, as Banan Xu flicked a cigarette butt from his hand, the entire factory erupted in fierce flames.

With pursuers behind and fire ahead, Li Huowang and his companions were instantly trapped in a desperate situation.

As Li Huowang picked up the helmet from the ground and put it on, the enemies burst through the iron gate.

They were all Black people. When they, dressed in camouflage, saw the burning factory, their expressions were filled with uncontrollable rage. They all raised their muzzles, aiming at Li Huowang and the others, cursing in an incomprehensible language.

Yet, this was not the most dangerous part. Accompanied by gunshots, ten round grenades were hurled towards Li Huowang and his group.

Watching the black spheres of death flying through the air towards him, Li Huowang's heartbeat immediately slowed by half. "This is it; I'm dead for sure."

Li Huowang hesitated for barely a moment. He quickly rushed forward, pushing off with his feet, grabbed two grenades, and charged towards the enemies.

Seeing Li Huowang holding the grenades, those people clearly panicked. They immediately started shooting at Li Huowang while retreating out the door.

With a "bang," the moment the door slammed shut, Li Huowang looked down at the grenades in his hands, then crashed into the door.

The grenades split open, revealing some yellow contents.

Yet, at this very moment, everything froze. Li Huowang stared blankly at the mooncakes in his hands, unable to fully register what was happening.

"Eat up, don't just stare. These are the results of our fellow patients' hard work," a nursing aide said, gently patting Li Huowang's back.

"Mooncake?" Li Huowang looked around again, taking in the peaceful environment of the recreation area. "White Tower Prison... I'm back. What is going on..."

Li Huowang suddenly thought of something. He picked up the purple sweet potato mooncake in his hand and ate it, biting into a new piece of paper. He unfolded it, and the same words were written on it.

"Slap!" Li Huowang slapped himself hard across the face. The stinging pain made him realize he wasn't dreaming, and he vaguely seemed to understand something.

He forced himself to calm down. He swallowed the note, then walked towards the restroom again. There, he still saw his other self.

Everything that followed was as Li Huowang remembered: the same rubber, the same questioning calls from Yi Donglai.

However, after Li Huowang exited the White Tower with his magnetic card, he unhesitatingly got into Banan Xu's car. "Take me to Zhao Shuangdian! Quickly!"

"Oh, so urgent? I thought you'd go see your girlfriend first." As she kicked her brother, who was holding the steering wheel, on the back, he immediately floored the accelerator.

Soon after, Li Huowang found Zhao Shuangdian again at the Blood Fire Society Tattoo Parlor. "What is going on? What is happening with all of this? Why am I back again?!"

Zhao Shuangdian's face showed a hint of confusion. "I'm sorry, I don't know what you're talking about."

Li Huowang suppressed the unease in his heart. He recounted everything he had experienced, convinced that if anyone could explain all this, it was only her now.

Upon hearing this, a hint of surprise appeared on Zhao Shuangdian's face. "I did intend to recruit you for a counterattack, and I don't know how you got this information," she said. "But what happened afterward isn't right."

"First, the timing. We acted on February 6th, not February 3rd," she explained. "Secondly, according to our calculations, the other elephant's entrance doesn't require a plane; it's at sea, so if we were truly going there, we should have taken a boat."

"This... this is impossible!" Li Huowang took half a step back in utter shock. "No! This isn't right! Something's wrong!"

But then, the shock on Li Huowang's face gradually receded, replaced by confusion. "This isn't the first time. The boat incident was one! The Master's son existed! And... there was another time! What was the second time? I forgot! But there definitely was a second time! This is the third time!"

As he thought, the confusion on Li Huowang's face slowly twisted into a grimace of struggle. He clenched his fists and repeatedly hammered his head with all his strength, attempting to recall some overlooked details.

"El... El..."

Zhao Shuangdian watched Li Huowang with great interest. "The greatest form has no shape," she mused.

Li Huowang vehemently shook his head, desperately denying it. Just then, his eyes suddenly lit up.

"No! That's not it! It's not 'The greatest form has no shape'," he exclaimed. "It's the Grand Sima, 'No past, no future'! I finally understand!!"

"There's no before or after at all! Everything is happening simultaneously! The reason you've changed your plans now isn't because that place doesn't exist, but because we, from another timeline, destroyed it! That factory! That factory was the Sima's projection!"

"We destroyed the factory, so all its time and history vanished! Except for me, who remembers, everyone else has forgotten! Just like the previous two times!"