Foolish Game of the Gods Chapter 13

Chapter 13: This Is Fate's Choice

The reason Meteor Fire Rain qualified as a forbidden spell was that its duration was extraordinarily long, long enough to exterminate every living thing within the strike zone and even crater the ground three feet deep.

Under normal circumstances, no spellcaster of any race possessed mental reserves sufficient to sustain such a colossal expenditure of energy.

But Meteor Fire Rain was an exception, because it was not creation, but summoning.

That giant sun on the horizon was real!

This terrifying orb, named [Wrath of Abomination], was originally a subordinate god of [Primordial Chaos], an emissary of [Chaos]. After being imprisoned by [Order] in a certain epoch, it became the supreme power He bestowed upon the Elemental Magistrates who served under Him.

One only needed to crack open the prison door holding [Wrath of Abomination] for a single instant and aim it at a target zone, and the fury suppressed across countless ages would come pouring down.

Only when He sobered from His chaotic frenzy and realized His rampage was merely doing the followers of [Order] a favor would He reluctantly cease, slam the prison door shut, and begin brewing the next cycle of rage.

Wrath of Abomination, subordinate god of [Primordial Chaos], emissary of [Chaos], prisoner of [Order]

All of this was merely to prove one point: Meteor Fire Rain had no mortal solution.

Cheng Shi and the others had sprinted in the three o'clock direction for barely a few minutes before howling meteors began detonating around them in sequence.

They didn't even need to score a direct hit; the splashing magma and streaming fire had already made every step forward impossible.

"No good, this way's blocked! Mage!"

"Time, Rewind!"

The scene was painfully familiar. Time reversed once more.

"1! Run!"

Cao Sansui had barely been flung ashore from the river of time when he felt Chen Chong's grip hauling him forward, sprinting frantically toward the one o'clock direction.

"Wrong, Chen Chong, five o'clock direction!"

Chen Chong's feet stuttered. Without a heartbeat's hesitation, he swung both arms like windmills, whipping the two people in his grip around, and used the momentum to pivot sharply back toward the rear diagonal!

"What's the situation?"

Cao Sansui's face was grim: "We've failed twice."

Xia Wan followed close behind. Cheng Shi frowned inwardly.

He reached out and flipped the die in his hand to another face.

3 face up.

"This way's no good! Smoke's too thick, can't see the path! Assassin, say something, guide us!"

"Assassin? Song Yawen? Fuck, he's dead. Mage, rewind!"

"Time… Rewind…"

"Seven o'clock direction, Chen Chong, reverse!"

Die flipped. 4 face up.

"Xia Wan, watch out!"

"Time… Rewind!"

"Nine o'clock direction, fast!"

Die flipped. 5 face up.

"…"

The reason Time Walkers sat firmly in Tier 0 was that their infinite trial-and-error opportunities within the [Time Battlefield] were one of the keys to their dominance.

But [Time]'s divine power was not an endless free service. When "time" couldn't continue flowing forward on the battlefield for an extended period, as the sovereign of time, He too would throw a tantrum.

A god's sneeze was a mortal's storm.

By the sixth rewind, even as a follower of [Time], Cao Sansui's memories had begun to blur.

"Time, Rewind!!"

"1! Run!"

Cao Sansui's entire body jolted with Chen Chong's sprint. He snapped his eyes open, mind reeling for a moment before he murmured:

"We're starting over…"

Chen Chong's stride faltered. He asked urgently:

"Then what do we do now? Which way?"

Cao Sansui's face was etched with despair: "I remember fragments, remember the moment each person died, but I've forgotten the count… forgotten which direction we were supposed to go."

Chen Chong's heart sank. This situation could only mean one thing: they had already failed many times.

A Time Walker lost within time was tantamount to a death sentence for all of them.

But Chen Chong was not one to admit defeat. He roared and led the group pivoting toward the three o'clock direction.

"Pull yourself together! Identify the paths, cross-reference with the memories in your head, maybe we can find a way out!"

Nangong was equally frantic. Seeing Cao Sansui's eyes still glazed over, she gritted her teeth, drew the ridged dagger, and drove it viciously into her own stomach once more.

A rich flood of healing light immediately poured down over Cao Sansui, snapping his chaotic mind back to crystal clarity.

He looked at Nangong's hopeful gaze and nodded fiercely:

"Fine! I'll recall!"

But just then, Cheng Shi suddenly shouted:

"Wrong, this is the sixth time, eleven o'clock direction, fast, Chen Chong, turn!"

Chen Chong was moving fast, his body well ahead of Xia Wan. He turned his head in astonishment and, before he could even ask a question, saw Xia Wan obediently change course, surging toward the eleven o'clock direction.

Cao Sansui was equally dumbfounded. He couldn't fathom how Cheng Shi knew this was the sixth attempt.

How could a follower of [Birth] stay lucid inside a time labyrinth?

He couldn't.

Cheng Shi was, in the end, just a player. The thing immune to the time labyrinth wasn't him, but the die in his hand.

Chen Chong looked down to see Cao Sansui still gaping, and his face darkened as he acknowledged:

"Fuck it, we follow you!"

He didn't agonize over the decision, or rather, he had no reason to. In Chen Chong's mind, the moment Cheng Shi took over command, it meant he must have formulated a plan to break the deadlock.

After all, the man was 2000 points.

At 2000 points, there were probably no freeloaders.

In truth, Cheng Shi had no idea whether the eleven o'clock direction led out. But he knew every other direction had been tried, and all had failed.

He ran his thumb across each face of the die in his hand, then silently flipped it to 6.

Six times. This was the sixth time.

If he needed to count further, he'd have to start flipping it vertically too…

Xia Wan ran fast with Cheng Shi on her back. Under the effects of continuous healing and her Hunter talents, her long legs ate up the ground in sweeping strides, crossing the sea of fire as though it were flat ground.

But her heavy expression told Cheng Shi she didn't think much of this path.

"Cheng Shi, are you sure it's this direction?"

Cheng Shi shook his head honestly:

"Not sure."

"Then why…"

Cheng Shi flashed a brilliant smile: "This is Fate's choice!"

Xia Wan's eyes widened, pupils contracting. She was about to ask something when a meteor trailing splashing fire crashed down directly overhead.

"Boom…"

"…"

Before Cheng Shi closed his eyes, he squeezed the die in his hand and cursed viciously:

"Fuck."

"…Time… Rewind!"

Everyone returned to the origin once more. The same familiar scene. Chen Chong charged toward the one o'clock direction without hesitation.

Cao Sansui was still dazed, Nangong still tense, Song Yawen still leading the pack.

Only Cheng Shi stared at the 6 on the die in silence.

No way out. All six directions had been tried. No path to survival.

An inexplicable irritability welled up in his chest, but his hands weren't idle. His thumb flicked the die high into the air, then darted out to snatch it as it tumbled back down.

Xia Wan noticed the movement behind her and asked gravely between strides:

"What's wrong?"

Cheng Shi opened his palm, saw the 1 face up, and sighed as though accepting his fate.

"We've failed six times, but Fate's guidance does point to the one o'clock direction."

Xia Wan's emotions churned into chaos. For a moment she didn't know whether to grieve over the six failures or rejoice at Cheng Shi's so-called "Fate's guidance."

"So you're saying the one o'clock direction is right?"

She seemed to be starting to trust Cheng Shi unconditionally.

Cheng Shi clicked his tongue and grumbled:

"But I can't shake the feeling that Fate is a bitch!"

Xia Wan's eyes went wide. She shot Cheng Shi an incredulous backward glance.

That sentence, before the descent of the gods, would have been completely unremarkable. But after the gods descended…

How to put this? There existed a deity whose divine name was precisely [Fate].

"Fuck it. I'd sooner believe I'm Qin Shi Huang than trust in Fate. Xia Wan, reverse, seven o'clock!"

Cheng Shi chose the direction that defied Fate.

He shouted the command loud enough for Chen Chong to hear.

Like Xia Wan, Chen Chong had plenty of doubts, but he didn't hesitate for even a fraction of a second. He whipped around and followed Xia Wan's pivot, running back.

They hadn't gone far when Cao Sansui realized this path closely matched a fragment in his memory.

Which meant they had failed in this direction before.

If nothing unexpected happened, three seconds from now, a meteor would land to Xia Wan's right front, blasting a massive crater in the ground.

Both Xia Wan and Cheng Shi would lose their footing and tumble in.

And then, he would rewind time once more.

The flame of hope in Cao Sansui's heart sputtered and nearly died. He counted down the seconds, waiting to lose himself in the river of time again.

"Time… Rewind… Huh? Huh huh huh???"

Actually…

Nothing happened.

Cao Sansui watched Xia Wan ahead striding boldly through the sea of fire and smoke, escaping into the distance, his face frozen in astonishment.

How was this possible?

The meteor that should have fallen, according to his memory, never appeared. Not only that, but every meteor across the entire seven o'clock direction failed to descend.

The sky ahead suddenly cleared. At the visible altitude, not a single meteor remained. Even the fires avoided this place.

This absurd scene, set against the apocalyptic canvas of raining fire, looked as though someone had taken an eraser and, following the seven o'clock position, rubbed out a strip of pure, unblemished white.

Perhaps this white line was nothing more than a casual afterthought to the "painter." But for Cheng Shi and his five companions trapped inside the canvas, it was a lifeline as real as real could be!

The group accelerated through shock and terror, sprinting along the corridor of clear sky, desperately fleeing outward. After nearly an hour of gritted-teeth endurance, they finally escaped the Meteor Fire Rain's strike zone.

The moment they burst free, the erased canvas of fire rain filled itself back in.

Cao Sansui checked the pocket watch in his hand. Exactly six hours had passed. He closed the [Time Battlefield] at the next hour mark, and a force of temporal flow dissipated from all of them.

The process of that final rewind was vaguely imprinted upon the river of time.

Everyone looked back at the path they'd survived by. Meteors fell like rain, fire erupted like magma, exactly as before. No sign of life anywhere!

"This is…"

"How is that possible!?"

"Why was there a path to survival??"

"A miracle… this is a miracle…"

Everyone was dumbfounded. They gaped at Cheng Shi, faces inscribed with shock and incomprehension.

"What kind of… item is that? Can that even be called an item?"

"Brother Cheng, don't tell me you're actually 2400?"

"You…"

Xia Wan most of all. She was the only one who knew how Cheng Shi had made the decision, choosing the seven o'clock direction and leading them out of the sea of fire.

"Why?" she thought to herself, but never dared voice the question aloud. "Just because Cheng Shi called [Fate] a bitch?"

Cheng Shi stared at the streaming fire cascading from the horizon, his own mind struggling to keep up.

"Second time…"

He murmured silently within.

"Could I really have some kind of hidden talent? And the activation phrase is: 'Fate is a bitch'?"