Chapter 25: Fragile Brothers

Of course, for the current Luo Shang, dealing with Shen Changqing was as simple as stepping on an ant.

Or should he just kill him, then find a necromancer to raise the corpse and have it act out a scene opposite him? That way, he wouldn’t have to feel disgusted every time he laid eyes on the man.

Luo Shang gave the matter serious thought.

He harbored no killing intent toward Su Mingyao. Though Su Mingyao had once topped Luo Shang’s list of most hated people, his experiences in the Reincarnation Space soon knocked that top spot down to second place, then third and fourth, until it fell clean out of the top hundred.

In the end, Luo Shang had redirected some of his hatred for the Native World’s prescribed fate to prop up the ranking. But after more than three hundred years, he let it all go, releasing his grudge against Su Mingyao entirely.

After all, Su Mingyao hadn’t actually done anything. He had simply shown up and claimed the care and love that once belonged to Su Shang.

These days, Luo Shang no longer cared about such things. He had far better people to cherish now—his eternal partner and lover Ke Yanjin, the teammates in his Reincarnation Space squad to whom he entrusted his life, and the friends he had made while tackling missions together.

His concerns had shifted away from whether his family loved him or whether Shen Changqing loved him. Instead, they now centered on whether his abilities still had room to grow, whether Ke Yanjin’s mental state remained stable, whether his squad members’ lives were secure, and so on.

At this point, Luo Shang could barely even recall those people’s faces. Why would he care who their affections ultimately fell upon?

Besides, pulling off something like that would be as easy as taking a drink of water. He wouldn’t even need to swallow his pride and curry favor with anyone. The Native World was a backwater with scant spiritual energy, leaving its inhabitants with little mental resistance. A sprinkle of succubus scale powder on his skin would be enough to leave them all besotted and unconsciously biased in his favor.

If he truly wanted revenge on Su Mingyao and everyone else here—if he wanted them drowning in regret and resentment—stealing away love and attention would be far too roundabout. All he’d have to do was rip out their souls and toss them into his Zero Swamp Prison to stew for thousands or even billions of years. Or he could sell them off to the devils of the Abyss, who had a whole arsenal of soul-tormenting techniques guaranteed to leave their victims writhing in agony for centuries, hating the very fact that they had ever been born.

But none of that was necessary.

If Luo Shang had really wanted to settle things with Su Mingyao and reclaim that long-lost affection, he wouldn’t have waited until now to return. He could have taken a vacation back centuries ago for his revenge.

There was only one reason Luo Shang had shown up here: to minimize the fate-related hazards clinging to him, to lock in that fate line for good, and then head back to the Reincarnation Space to resume his life of freely traversing the Myriad Worlds.

The fact remained: ever since entering the Reincarnation Space, he and Su Mingyao were no longer running on the same track.

Luo Shang’s pursuits were freedom, longevity, and transcendence. He had returned to follow the plot only so he could go even further down his path.

Su Mingyao, on the other hand, was still trapped in that tiny patch of ground—the remote Native World—struggling through a lifetime of social entanglements. He might gain all the worldly love he could want, but he would never touch true “freedom.”

Luo Shang actually felt a touch of pity for him.

After all, Su Mingyao had never even soared freely through the stratosphere.

Anyone who had experienced it once would understand. Humanity’s deep, millennia-spanning yearning for flight had driven them to invent airplanes. But airplanes were nothing more than steel machines rattling along fixed routes—nothing like the joy of flying under your own power!

Even low-level players would shell out for a wizard’s broom just to zip around for fun.

In truth, Luo Shang held no real killing intent toward him. He had long since forgiven himself—and Su Mingyao as well.

Su Mingyao harbored a subtle, complicated mix of feelings toward him. And Luo Shang felt much the same toward Su Mingyao, didn’t he?

He would sooner destroy the world than lose face in front of the man. That, too, was a sign of caring.

Back then, their identities had been swapped, and with them, their fates. That twist of misfortune had entangled their lives for the first half.

In a mystical sense, Su Mingyao could even serve as Luo Shang’s stand-in. If someone wanted to curse Luo Shang but couldn’t get their hands on his blood, hair, or some personal belonging, they could simply use Su Mingyao as a proxy in the ritual. Torturing him would send some of the effect rebounding back to Luo Shang—and it would work better than any ordinary voodoo doll.

Luo Shang truly felt no killing intent toward him. But Shen Changqing was a different story.

The man had earned zero goodwill from Luo Shang—in fact, he had racked up negative points. In the original plot, over ninety percent of Su Shang’s misfortunes and his ultimate end had been Shen Changqing’s doing.

Luo Shang, having originated as a player from the Reincarnation Space, was naturally no bleeding heart. Any psychological hurdles about killing had evaporated during his very first game there. His hands were stained with the blood of countless races, so offing Shen Changqing was just a casual afterthought.

He had come back to follow the plot, sure—but that didn’t mean he’d put up with any bullshit.

Ke Yanjin had actually given him some real help… At least the method he’d shared earlier had worked like a charm, Luo Shang mused.

A shred of conscience, but not much.

“System, during today’s ten-minute Spirit Net link, shoot Sophia a message. Ask if she can project over a high-tier corpse manipulation spell scroll,” Luo Shang ordered. “When I get back, I might cut her a deal on a Peach of Immortality.”

“Understood,” the System replied.

Sophia was a necromancer Luo Shang had met in the Reincarnation Space—sort of a friend. They’d teamed up on a few missions, and it had gone smoothly both ways. She’d reached the absolute peak of her craft: becoming a half-lich.

Necromancers’ endgame was transforming into liches—undying vessels that preserved their intellect. Liches could push further, reversing their evolution toward a new form of life to become half-liches, reclaiming “life” itself.

Unlike half-demons or half-elves, who were diluted hybrids weaker than the real deal, half-liches outclassed full liches. It was both a badge of honor and the pinnacle of a necromancer’s lifelong obsession with the boundaries of life and death.

Sophia had been eyeing the Peach of Immortality from the Queen Mother of the West’s Peach Garden that Luo Shang had on hand. She wanted to dissect its life force, figure out the secret to eternal youth and a lifespan matching heaven and earth. Parsing the peach would take her understanding of life to the next level—or so she believed. Problem was, Luo Shang’s price tag was steep, way beyond her normal budget.

Now, though? This was far from normal.

Luo Shang had crunched the numbers. His family’s backwater spot lacked the spiritual energy medium for spells, nerfing their power across the board. To wipe everyone out and puppet the corpses, Sophia would need to drop in personally.

Killing just one person to hijack their body for plot progression? A high-tier scroll would do the trick.

Of course, Shen Changqing wasn’t a must-kill for Luo Shang. If the guy played along without the nonsense from today, they could skip it, save the scroll for Luo Shang’s own use back home.

But if he pulled the same stunt, forcing Luo Shang to pin him down again? Dead. Summon the corpse and puppet it.

“By the way, why hasn’t the progress budged?”

While the System sent the message, Luo Shang checked its display. Still at 5%. Annoying.

System: “Did you forget to release the fixation on Shen Changqing? He’s still stuck there, so the event isn’t done.”

Luo Shang: “Oh. I figured holding it longer wouldn’t hurt. I’d already run through every step destiny demanded.”

With a pang of regret, he tapped the void, lifting the seal on Shen Changqing.

If you crossed players from the Reincarnation Space for real, it was no biggie if you were strong enough. To head off any comeback revenge, they’d grind your bones to dust, scatter your ashes, shred your soul, burn your lair to the ground, and erase you from existence on every spiritual and physical plane.

The real psychos would hunt down and slaughter every parallel version of you across the Myriad Worlds, just to nix any shot at reincarnation.

If you weren’t strong enough to worry about payback… death was probably the mercy.

Luo Shang figured he’d already gone above and beyond with Shen Changqing.

The guy would never want to learn there were thousands—maybe tens of thousands—of ways to break a soul.

The Spirit Net lagged a bit, so Luo Shang waited patiently for Demi-Lich Sophia’s reply. Meanwhile, he pinged his assistant Little Liang to come escort him back to his room for some rest.

~~~

On the other side, once Luo Shang was gone, Su Mingyao finished pumping his fist in glee right there on the spot—then started agonizing. Should he go interact with Shen Changqing?

Still, remembering what Shen Changqing had pulled on Su Shang at the Recognition Banquet in his last life, plus their whole messy history, Su Mingyao decided he had to make contact.

Whether the guy was paralyzed from sheer terror or Su Shang had just spaced on releasing the hold, someone needed to check on him.

Shen Changqing couldn’t just stand around like a statue in the garden forever. Su Shang’s next scene needed him in it.

Hell, even the mom—a total background extra jetting off on a private plane—had gotten yanked back by a freak thunderstorm. That said it all about Su Shang’s ironclad commitment to reliving his past life beat-for-beat. Su Mingyao had no clue why he was so dead set on it, but if Su Shang wanted perfection, they’d deliver—no compromises.

If Changqing had simply frozen up in fear, unable to move, that would have been easy enough to handle. A couple of words of advice, and he could snap him out of it, make him see reason.

But if Changqing stayed pinned in place like this and missed the banquet later, Su Shang might notice his absence, glance up with a Thanos-style finger snap, and mutter, “Oh, right—I forgot to cancel the fixation. World destroyed. Let’s start over.”

And just like that, the rest of them would be hurled back into the Void for company.

God, no—not that!

Su Mingyao couldn’t help thinking Su Shang was even more terrifying than Thanos. After all, Thanos’ snap only erased half the universe’s population. Su Shang? He wiped out entire worlds.

The thought sent a shiver down Su Mingyao’s spine. He shoved through the bushes and hurried over.

One look at Shen Changqing’s pose, and he got it. Shen Changqing hadn’t bolted because fear had paralyzed him—it was that Su Shang had forgotten to release the solidification.

Shen Changqing was locked mid-stride, his face lit with the relief of spotting another person. His right foot hovered a few centimeters off the ground, his left planted firmly.

No normal person could hold that position for minutes, let alone the twenty-plus that Su Mingyao’s chat with Su Shang had dragged on…

Pitiful, sure. But only a little.

“Don’t worry—I’ll get you out of this,” Su Mingyao said first, figuring Shen Changqing’s mind must be in turmoil beneath that frozen exterior.

He reached out and touched Shen Changqing. Nothing.

He pushed. Still nothing.

He kicked hard. Not a twitch.

Now what? Su Mingyao recalled that wheelchair Su Shang had locked into “eternity.”

Had he done the same to Shen Changqing?

This “eternal” business wouldn’t fly! A wheelchair was just an object—you could stash it away. But Shen Changqing was a person. He needed to move, eat, head back to the Shen Family and report in.

How the hell was he supposed to fix this?

It was Su Shang’s screw-up, but Su Mingyao had to clean it up without tipping him off to the anomaly. Otherwise, boom—world-ending reset…

And Su Shang didn’t exactly hold him in high regard. No leverage there. How was he supposed to drop a subtle hint? “Hey, you’ve got a guy solidified out here”?

Maybe Big Bro?

The idea hit Su Mingyao like a lightning bolt. Big Bro carried real weight with Su Shang. Hadn’t the first world destruction been over Big Bro? He only got around to Su Mingyao on round two?

Twenty-plus years of brotherhood, from dragging Big Bro to parent-teacher conferences as kids—surely that counted for something. Big Bro could nudge him gently, no problem!

Su Mingyao fired off a message to Su Bingyao, laying out the whole mess and asking if he could casually probe Su Shang about the solidified guy in the Su Family’s back garden.

Su Bingyao’s reply came lightning-fast—he blocked him on the spot.

Su Mingyao: …

So much for the unbreakable bonds forged adrift in the Void. Turns out their brotherhood was paper-thin—one whiff of Su Shang-related drama, and it crumbled to dust!