Inside the hearse steadily chugging forward, the pint-sized version of Old Man Yuan sat with his mouth covered, a look of utter bewilderment and panic on his face as he listened to the conversation between the two strangers.
It wasn’t until the muscular man who had hoisted him out of the crowd learned the shocking news that the hearse driver intended to destroy the world—and unconsciously loosened his grip—that the little boy managed to break free.
He gulped down several breaths of fresh air, then shouted, “You guys aren’t escapees from a mental hospital, are you?! What the hell are you talking about?”
How was the world about to be destroyed?
Could a bunch of young punks like these just casually wipe it out?!
The muscular man jumped in fright at his outburst. He reflexively glanced at the blue-eyed man in the passenger seat before hurriedly reaching out to clamp a hand over the boy’s mouth again. “Shh! Don’t say stupid stuff!”
The little boy was just about to struggle when the brown-haired young man behind the wheel stopped the muscular man’s motion.
“Don’t cover his mouth anymore. Careful, or he’ll end up back in the hospital.”
“Yeah, exactly!” The little boy shot the muscular man a fierce glare. Then realization dawned, and he blurted, “Wait a sec—why’d you say ‘back’?”
Sure, he was a frequent hospital visitor, but how did this guy know? He didn’t even recognize these people!
The brown-haired youth glanced up at the rearview mirror. It clearly reflected the somewhat grave expression on his face, as if he were about to reveal some earth-shattering secret.
“Because I’ve seen you in another timespace,” he said. “That day, you got too worked up and passed out. They rushed you to the hospital.”
The little boy and the muscular man in the backseat both wore identical looks of shock.
“…Huh?”
“Another timespace?!”
Right after that, they heard a tale so outlandish it could have come straight out of a blockbuster movie.
A ceaselessly restarting timespace loop. Everyone else with no memory of it. A rebellious little ball that stored all those timespaces…
When the brown-haired youth finished speaking, a heavy silence settled over the hearse.
The little boy stared at him in a daze. The muscular man gawked with wide, unfocused eyes. The blue-eyed man watched him with a complicated expression.
A moment later, the little boy drew a deep breath and spoke in a feeble voice. “Maybe you should just drop me off at the hospital… A mental ward would work too.”
Everything that had happened today was just too bizarre.
It made him wonder if his old friend’s death had broken his heart to the point where his mind had snapped too.
How had he turned into a kid? And what was this nonsense about time travel?
“You don’t believe me?” The brown-haired youth paused thoughtfully, then tried to prove it. “I know your surname is Yuan. And… your friend was surnamed Zhang.”
The little boy blinked in surprise, then quickly caught on. “Old Zhang’s name was right there on the farewell hall sign. And those turtle bastards were yelling ‘Uncle Yuan’ at me. It’s not exactly a secret that we’re Yuan and Zhang!”
The brown-haired youth didn’t get discouraged. He pressed on. “I know you keep medicine in your jacket pocket. You take it when you get agitated.”
“Oh yeah? Well, this big dummy just tried to shove some down my throat a minute ago. Nearly choked me to death!”
Still fuming, the little boy thought for a second. “But my clothes were slipping off earlier, and the pills fell out of my pocket. Anyone could see them. And I was the one who told him to run back and pick them up.”
The big dummy next to him immediately protested. “Hey, I was nice enough to grab your meds for you, and this is how you repay me—calling me names!”
“…”
The brown-haired youth racked his brain for more proof. “Eight days ago, that afternoon—you and Old Man Zhang were playing Go in Sun Park. You lost that game.”
The little boy went still at those words. He stayed frozen for a good while.
“Eight days ago?” he murmured, sinking into memory. “Before that day, Old Zhang and I played Go in Sun Park almost every single day.”
“And…” His voice dropped to a whisper. “I lost pretty much every time.”
“…”
Yup. Total stinky Go basket. Trash at it, but loved playing anyway.
Yu Bai felt a twinge of despair.
He gave up trying to convince the kid version of Old Man Yuan about the other timespace. Steel resolve in his eyes, he turned to the man beside him instead. “Can you read the timespaces stored inside the Doom Orb?”
Social suicide be damned. At least Xie Wufang could back him up—maybe even provide harder evidence than just words.
Feeling like he was the only one who remembered everything was driving him nuts.
But those gray-blue eyes, tinged with apology, gave him the answer he dreaded.
“It’s still in sealed mode.”
…Damn rebellious Doom Orb.
After Xie Wufang spoke, he gazed at the calm, expressionless profile of the man beside him. Then, out of nowhere, he said, “Sorry.”
“Why apologize?” Yu Bai gripped the steering wheel, eyes fixed on the flashing red light of the road ahead. “It’s not like it’s your fault the thing sealed itself up.”
“Not for that.” Xie Wufang’s voice brimmed with genuine regret. “I thought you’d visited a bunch of different timespaces before.
“I had no idea it was the same loop repeating over and over, trapping you—and that no one else remembered.”
He spoke earnestly. “Those must have been incredibly lonely days.”
Yu Bai kept staring at the traffic light ahead.
“Nope.” His expression stayed neutral, his tone light and breezy. “I had a blast.”
Humans were way better at lying than non-humans.
Yu Bai had indeed savored that endless, fantastical summer vacation. He’d racked up plenty of happy memories.
But it was a world where only he kept his memories. Everything reset after exactly twenty-two hours, fifty-seven minutes, and fourteen seconds.
No matter how much he loved a day or an experience, it all ground to a halt at noon the next day. Once the timer ran out, poof—gone, like it never happened.
Of course, there had been lonely, painful moments too.
On days when those feelings crept in, Yu Bai would bolt to the apartment complex, grab Xie Wufang—who was just about to step into the elevator—and drag him toward the nearby river. “Let’s go straight to hell together, Xie Wufang! This is all your fault!”
The man he’d pulled along never fought back. Instead, he’d ask, “How do you know my name?”
Yu Bai never answered. He’d just curve his lips into a smile and repeat, “See you tomorrow, Xie Wufang.”
In the bone-chilling river water, that gray-blue figure gleamed like the richest gem imaginable. Together, they sank into the serene, endless dark.
And later…
He’d learned how to swim.
Just like he’d learned to drive.
The thought made Yu Bai chuckle. He repeated himself. “I really was happy. For real.”
The flashing red light ahead shifted to yellow, then to a clear green.
The brief pause ended. The car rolled forward once more.
Xie Wufang said nothing.
From the backseat, Yan Jing let out an inexplicable sigh.
“I suddenly feel kinda sad.” He shot the little boy beside him a glare. “This is all your fault. Why won’t you believe what Little Bai’s saying?”
“What’d you say?!” The little boy jolted in shock. “Something this insane—you actually buy it?”
“Of course I do!” Yan Jing replied matter-of-factly. “Little Bai wouldn’t lie to me about something this big. He’s been acting weird since last night. Now it all makes sense.”
He grumbled under his breath, then couldn’t resist chewing out the boy some more. “Little Bai explained the whole thing to you, and you still don’t believe him? So damn suspicious. What would it take to convince you?”
The kid version of Old Man Yuan gaped, utterly tongue-tied. “Huh? What… wha-what? Huh?”
Even worse, he actually started feeling a little guilty, like he was the one being unreasonable!
His mind in total chaos, he clutched his head and pretended to swoon, desperately dodging reality.
“Ow… my head’s spinning so bad…”
He sighed like an old codger, squinting slyly at the two men up front and the road ahead.
Suddenly, his face paled. His eyes flew wide as he whipped toward the muscular man beside him. “Wait—you said earlier that Little Bai… er, your friend here—he couldn’t drive before, right?”
Yan Jing nodded. “Yeah. Little Bai was too scared to even learn before. But look at him go now! Time loops aren’t totally useless, huh…”
“He doesn’t have a license?!”
“Nope. Even if he got one during a loop, it wouldn’t count in this world. Hey, why are there so many—”
The two locked eyes, their breaths catching.
Yu Bai, focused on driving, caught on fast too. He slammed the brakes and wrenched the wheel hard.
Traffic crawled ahead, practically gridlocked.
At the intersection stood several traffic cops in glaring fluorescent green vests, checking vehicles one by one for drunk driving.
Yan Jing clapped his hands over his face in horror. “Little Bai, turn around! Floor it! We’re done for if they pull us over—you’ve got no license!”
The little boy shrieked too. “Cops at this junction are the worst! They always hassle me even when I’m on my geezer cart—nearly fined me once! Get outta here, kid!”
“I’m turning, I’m turning—hang on!”
The tires screeched across the pavement, carving a long skid mark. In this supposedly dull, predictable world, Yu Bai inexplicably recaptured the thrill of speeding down a mountain road from one of his loops.
The sleek black hearse drifted into a sharp U-turn on the wide, spotless road, then rocketed off in the opposite direction at breakneck speed, drawing stares of astonishment from the windows of passing cars.
Yan Jing, in the back seat, couldn’t help but blurt out a curse. “Fuck, that was badass!”
The little boy patted the pill bottle with his heart still pounding. “That U-turn was pretty slick. Nice driving, kid.”
Xie Wufang, riding shotgun, glanced at the police officer’s figure in the rearview mirror and asked seriously, “Should we pause their time later?”
Yu Bai wrenched the wheel into reverse, veering onto a narrow side street amid the chatter filling his ears. A faint smile crept across his pale face.
“No need,” he said with utter confidence. “I can shake them.”
“Whoa, you say that like a pro,” Yan Jing said, scratching his head. “Feels like you’ve done this before.”
“What the hell have you been up to in those time loops? Gone completely wild?”
The three of them turned to look at Yu Bai in unison.
“I didn’t go wild.”
A slight blush colored the young man’s pale cheeks as he floored the accelerator, his voice soft. “…I’m a law-abiding citizen.”
He had nearly let slip the habits he’d picked up in the loops.
Luckily, only the three of them were there.
A Qiang and the others hadn’t come along today. He’d snuck out of the house last night, evading their watchful eyes.
Twenty minutes later, the black hearse from the funeral parlor pulled into a hidden spot two streets away from their neighborhood.
Yu Bai led the group out of the surveillance-free alley and along a back path to the neighborhood he shared with Xie Wufang.
At the same time, he coached Yan Jing on what to say when calling his parents.
“…Have someone come tow the car and wipe the funeral parlor’s surveillance footage,” Yu Bai instructed. “No one saw or recorded the moment Uncle Yuan turned into a kid. They only saw a child step in for him.”
“So there’s no real proof of rejuvenation, and it happened at a funeral parlor full of ghost stories. Hallucinations or just tall tales make perfect sense, right?”
“Makes total sense. I’ll call right away.”
Yan Jing swallowed the comment about how damn experienced Yu Bai sounded and gave him a sincere thumbs-up.
Yu Bai added, “While you’re at it, ask about Uncle Zhang’s body and if they tried cremating it again afterward. If problems persist, we’ll figure something out. We have to handle Uncle Yuan’s situation anyway.”
“You got it!”
Up ahead, the golden letters spelling “Beautiful Home” gleamed in the sunlight at the neighborhood entrance.
That was right—the name was absurdly optimistic for a quiet complex shunned by residents due to ghost rumors.
The gatekeeper grandpa, hunkered in his booth playing a mobile card game, looked up at the sound of their approach. Spotting the four of them, he eagerly buzzed open the gate.
The brown-haired resident who’d moved in a month ago—with his crew of tough-looking friends—had given him a huge watermelon. Good guy.
The blue-eyed one who’d been there over a week, always coming and going alone, always polite with a thank-you. Good guy too.
The dopey-looking muscle guy was the first one’s friend; he’d shown up a few times.
And a new little boy he’d never seen.
“Whoa, having friends over, huh?”
The gatekeeper grandpa grinned and greeted them warmly. He even crouched down to the boy’s level. “Hey there, little buddy!”
Then he turned to the adults. “What a cute kid.”
But at those words, the expressions of the other three adults shifted subtly.
The little boy, who habitually hunched his back, froze for a second before quickening his pace. Clutching his lower back, he scurried inside like he was fleeing, grumbling irritably under his breath. “Hurry up already—!”
The gatekeeper grandpa watched his hunched figure dart away and remarked, “Kid’s got a fiery temper for his age. Oh, and he’s got a little hunchback thing going on!”
Yu Bai struggled mightily to hold back his laughter, his voice trembling slightly. “Yeah, that little guy’s… always been like that.”
Yan Jing kept his head down, laughing so hard it sounded like a kettle coming to a boil.
The gatekeeper grandpa blinked in confusion. “Huh? What’s so funny?”
The only one not laughing, Xie Wufang, thought for a moment before replying earnestly, “Maybe because you called him ‘little buddy.'”
“Oh!” The gatekeeper grandpa nodded, not quite getting it. “Gotcha. Next time I won’t say ‘little buddy.’ How about ‘little handsome’?”
Xie Wufang pondered again, unsure. “Not sure, but I don’t think he likes nicknames starting with ‘little.'”
“Why not? He is a little kid.”
Xie Wufang answered honestly, “…Sorry, I can’t tell you why.”
Flattered by the exchange, the gatekeeper grandpa waved his hands frantically. “No need to apologize! I was just curious. Don’t let me hold you up—go on in!”
Listening to the conversation, Yu Bai could no longer contain his amusement.
His eyes crinkled into crescents as he gazed into those blue eyes, sparkling in the early summer sunlight. Softly, he urged, “Hey, quit spacing out.”
“—We’re home.”
