Volume 9 – Chapter 18: The Strongest Cage (Part 2)

“I have already failed.” Lan Kai suddenly gave a wry smile.

Xin Yue was startled. After a moment of silence, she said, “Is it because of Xiao Rou?”
Lan Kai sighed, “A few days ago, she had cut her veins in the room, and the blood ran all over the floor. Fortunately, I came in time.”

“Then now, she…”

Lan Kai said, “She’s awake. She woke up early this morning. I can’t leave today, so I can’t visit her. But when I could leave, I was hesitant to see her. Xin Yue. Do you know? Xiao Rou and I seem like we have unresolved issues in our previous life. We have been arguing all this life, and we never made up. I don’t know how to make her smile. Do you think I am a failure?”

Xin Yue grasped Lan Kai’s palm and said softly, “You have done well enough, and it will be too harsh if you do anymore… It has been so long, can you still not let it go?”

“Let it go? How can I let it go?” Lan Kai opened his eyes and looked at the face that was close by. She was not beautiful, ordinary but comfortable on the eyes, “If it was you, can you let it go? Can you act as if you don’t know?”
“I probably can’t accept it either.” Xin Yue also gave a wry smile.

Lan Kai looked at the lamp above his head idiotically, and muttered to himself, “Sometimes I don’t understand why things have progressed to this point. One actually tried to commit suicide, the… the other hated me like I’m an enemy! Did I do something wrong? I didn’t! They are wrong! They shouldn’t! They shouldn’t! Lan Xiu is my tormentor. Sometimes I think – if my Dad didn’t bring him back that day, if he didn’t exist…”

Xin Yue whispered, “You aren’t someone who blames the past.”

Lan Kai shook his head, closed his eyes, turned his body after a long time, and buried his head in Xin Yue’s arms. This woman knew this man was crying here.
But there was no sound.

“Tomorrow, I will accompany you to see Xiao Rou.”

Lan Kai took a deep breath, “Aren’t you afraid that she will trouble you?”

Xin Yue shook her head, “As long as you are not afraid, I am not afraid.”
With that said, Xin Yue helped Lan Kai to sit up, “Let’s drop this matter first. I’ll take you back. You can’t be in this state until tomorrow.”

Lan Kai was drunk, but took Xin Yue’s hand, domineering but gentle, “Don’t go anywhere tonight, just stay with me here.”

…

At the lakeside in the dark, a staggering figure came.

Qian Xiu’s hazy eyes saw a familiar figure at the small bridge beside the lake – the little mage that was fishing.
Holding the wooden stake at the edge of the wooden bridge, Qian Xiu approached step by step, and finally reached behind the little mage, and said with a faint voice, “Why are you still at level four after so long? Is there something wrong?”

The little mage turned his head and said casually, “It seems that fishing does not increase experience points.”

Qian Xiu frowned… That’s a flush of alcohol invading his brain, very uncomfortable. He leaned on the stakes, his legs seemed to be slippery, and he sat on the ground with a puff. He just lay down like this, “You… did you fish from morning to now?”

The little mage smiled and said, “That’s not the case. I have been fishing during the day, so I switched to night. I’m trying to see if I can catch it at night. Didn’t you say that you won’t come here again?”

Qian Xiu pressed his forehead and said, “I noticed that I have nowhere to go… Even if I came to this place, there is still nowhere to go… I’m like a trapped monkey.”

He looked at the little mage, “Do you have a place to go?”

“Me?” The little mage looked at the bait in the basket and smiled slightly, “There are three left, so I will go back after finishing it. So I won’t bother you for too long, but if you are still unwilling, it’s not a problem for me to leave now.”
Qian Xiu shook his head and drank by himself.

For a while, after watching the little mage put the third bait on and threw it out, Qian Xiu suddenly asked, “LQ, do you have any relatives?”

“Yes.” The little mage whispered, “They’re almost home by now.”

“Will you… love your relatives?”

“Will you not love your relatives?” asked the little mage rhetorically.

“Love?” Qian Xiu lowered his head complexly, then suddenly raised his head, pointing to himself and said, “Do you know, I directly angered my biological father to death… He is old and has a bad heart. However, he was angered to death in front of me.”
Qian Xiu stretched out his fingers, pointed at his eyes, and widened his eyes, “Just like me now, he looked at me… looked at me, then fell.”

He laughed and opened his hands as if he wanted to hug something. In the end, his voice seemed silent and lifeless, “Then I don’t have a father anymore.”

“This…” The little mage nodded and took back the thread of the fishing rod. The last bait still yielded nothing.

“Do you know? I regretted for the first time in my life, and felt that I was wrong for the first time… No, no, I knew from the beginning that I was wrong.” Qian Xiu slammed his head against the stake. “Why can’t I die? I think it’s because God feels that the punishment isn’t enough for me. It wants me… to live like a waste.”

“That’s why there’s the problem of the monkey at the isolated island?” The little mage rolled the fishing line skillfully and glanced at Qian Xiu.
“Maybe.” Qian Xiu looked at the night sky of this fantasy world.

The little mage who had already collected the tools picked up the basket and stood up. He walked by Qian Xiu’s side, and suddenly said, “Later, I thought about this topic again. If another monkey is thrown on the island, will the trapped monkey come out?”

Qian Xiu said in a daze, “Who would be so free, threw one… and came another…”

The little mage had gone far and then disappeared. Qian Xiu’s eyes were tired and fell asleep on the bridge again.
…

When Qian Xiu woke up, the night had passed.

He pressed his forehead and found himself on this small bridge again. Last night, he seemed to have encountered the fishing guy again.

Qian Xiu didn’t know what was said last night. He only felt a headache; he had no memory… He suddenly felt nauseated, and he vomited right here.

It seems that I drank too much.

After a while, Qian Xiu got up with difficulty… Why am I sober again? Where can I go now?

The player, Milk God Xiao Bao, used the full blast speaker, “Boss! Come and save me!! I am maliciously PK-ed! Help!! They said they would kill me every time they see me and kill me until I reach back to level zero! Please come!”
Qian Xiu couldn’t help but frown.