Chapter 1: Chapter 1: Modern Jesus
"So you’re saying that for the twenty-odd years since you were born, you’ve been able to control your dreams at will?"
"That’s right. Ever since I was born, I’ve been killing people in my dreams, committing robberies, orchestrating all kinds of murders, getting into gunfights, robbing banks... or, when I’m bored, hijacking a plane and blowing up a couple of towers at the same time."
"To put it bluntly, if the crimes in my dreams were real and I was arrested..."
The sky was just beginning to lighten, and a drizzle was falling outside.
5:29 AM.
Two men sat at a breakfast stall, speaking as they slurped the savory tofu pudding from their bowls.
"...then every police officer in Jiangsan City would get a mass promotion."
Xu Huo’s voice resounded.
The buzz-cut man beside him was full of admiration, giving him a thumbs-up.
"Dude, you’re awesome!"
"By the way, what’s your name, man? I’m Wang Chao... Never mind, let me slurp down some more of this savory tofu pudding first."
Wang Chao lowered his head, slurping continuously. After a good while, he looked up and spoke while chewing, "So besides being able to kill people in your dreams without breaking the law, what other special Skills do you have?"
"Precognition."
Xu Huo said indistinctly, taking a bite of his flatbread.
"Like what?" Wang Chao asked, puzzled.
"Like..."
Xu Huo chewed his food thoroughly, then swallowed and looked up at him.
"Three..."
"Three? What three?" Wang Chao paused, confusion written all over his face.
"Two..."
"What the hell?"
"One."
Before Wang Chao could ask again, the next second...
"AHHHHHH!!!!!"
A piercing scream that seemed to rip the world apart shattered the morning calm!
In that instant, the entire world seemed to freeze. The raindrops hung suspended in the air. Everyone stopped in their tracks and turned to look toward the center of the intersection.
Wang Chao looked instinctively.
There were four bodies.
Four bloody corpses, nailed to crosses, their heads thrown back to face the sky!
The bodies were stiff and cold, covered in crimson wounds. Their abdomens had been sliced open, and from the gaping holes, intestines, blood, piss, and shit flowed out like water, mixing with the rain and slowly spreading across the ground...
Their hands had been brutally smashed through with iron spikes, leaving tendons, bone, and mangled flesh clearly visible!
The bodies knelt on the ground, the crosses behind them supporting their arched-back torsos. In the gloomy, drizzling weather, they tilted their heads up, eyes vacant and mouths agape, letting the rain fall on them at the intersection.
These were four cold... corpses.
Four Jesuses.
"AHHHHH!!!!"
"BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP!!!"
"Fuck, someone’s been murdered!"
"Call the police, hurry, call the police!!!"
In an instant, the cold, quiet morning erupted into chaos.
Shouts, screams, angry roars, and the blare of car horns mixed with the falling rain, swirling in a cacophony around the four silent bodies.
"CL...ATTER."
At the breakfast stall, Wang Chao was stunned. The chopsticks in his hand fell to the ground and rolled slowly away.
He whipped his head around to look at Xu Huo, his face a picture of disbelief.
Xu Huo met his gaze and broke into a smile.
"Just like that."
5:30 AM.
...
...
「September 1, 2003.」
Xu Huo slowly opened his eyes. He glanced at the alarm clock beside him.
4:01 AM.
[Host: Xu Huo]
[Age: 23]
[Acquired Skills: Killing Skill Level 5, Firearms Level 5, Gambling Skill Level 5, theft Level 5, Murder Level 5...]
(Note: Max level is Level 5)
[Buff-type Skills: None]
[Achievements Unlocked: Blood-Handed Butcher, Bandit, Lawless Madman, Public Enemy of the Police, Unproven Crimes...]
"Mmm~ That was one hell of a satisfying dream."
Xu Huo yawned and waved his hand, dismissing the blue screen that only he could see.
He got up, sat down at his computer, and in one smooth motion, turned it on, typed in his password, opened a webpage, and started typing.
He had been reincarnated in this world for twenty-three years, ever since a Child of the World—a being of immense fortune—had gotten him killed in a freak accident in his past life.
Of course, his life over these twenty-three years had been quite ordinary. An orphan, he had no capital to start a business early, even though he had a Golden Finger...
But his Golden Finger was just a tool that gave him Dream Control.
In his dreams, he could be the master of the entire world or a madman engaged in urban warfare with the police.
Or do something as mundane as building bombs to blow up two buildings.
Besides Dream Control and another function for writing plots, Xu Huo hadn’t seen any other uses for the system.
So far, it was only for dreaming.
It was as if the system could only be used for dreaming.
"New book... publish..."
Xu Huo pressed a few keys, a smile appearing on his face as he looked at the publish button on the webpage.
[Chapter 1, Modern Jesus] (Published)
This was a web novel site, Zhongdian Novel Net.
When he could control his dreams, there was a chance they could replace reality as the place he was attached to. Therefore, he needed a few anchors to reality, like a job and a few friends.
Being a novel author was one of his jobs. As for what he wrote about...
Naturally, it was the scenes from his dreams.
His Golden Finger was called [Detective Writer]. Besides being able to learn Skills on his own in his dreams,
he could also gain [Buff Skills] by writing his dream plots into reality. But unfortunately, despite writing countless plots, he still hadn’t obtained any of these so-called Skills.
By now, Xu Huo simply treated it as a job that brought in a decent income.
After all, the stuff he wrote... Let’s just put it this way: what other authors wrote wasn’t believable. What Xu Huo wrote didn’t seem like fiction.
*PING*
The computer made a notification sound. Xu Huo moved the mouse and clicked on the comments.
[ChewABubblegum: Wait, hold on a sec... this ain’t right. Bro, where the hell are you writing this from?]
[DeadFlashlight: Something’s not right. How can you describe all the marks on the body so clearly? Dude, is this a novel or a police report?]
[LovesBoneSoup: Last time I read his stuff about robbery and murder, I already felt something was off. It was written a little too realistically... This can’t be an autobiography, can it?!]
[MadmanNotMad: C’mon, bro. If things are really this bad, we should just turn ourselves in. Maybe we can get a lighter sentence.]
[...]
A smile appeared on Xu Huo’s face as he watched these comments pop up like bamboo shoots after a spring rain.
Daily quest: Terrify readers (1/1)
’How can dreaming be a crime? What’s wrong with doing whatever I want in a dream?’
Xu Huo smiled, then shut down the computer and headed out.
He didn’t think that doing whatever he pleased in his dreams made him a criminal. Even if it did, dream crimes should be handled by dream police. What did that have to do with reality?
’Besides... "Criminal?" Only those who get caught are criminals. I’m just dreaming. If I haven’t been caught, what right do you have to call me a criminal?’
Xu Huo pushed the door open, felt a cool breeze, and put on his jacket before heading out.
As soon as he was outside, a fine drizzle hit his face. Xu Huo squinted, feeling a sense of familiarity, but he didn’t dwell on it and continued toward the breakfast stall up ahead.
Jiangsan City was rainy, but this kind of drizzle, so light it didn’t disrupt daily life, was rare.
It was only 5:19 AM.
The sky was just beginning to lighten under a ceiling of dark clouds. The streets were cold and deserted. Pedestrians walked silently on either side, trudging through the mud without any interaction.
Only the plumes of white steam rising from the roadside stalls gave any sign of life.
"Boss, a bowl of tofu pudding."
Sitting under the awning of the breakfast stall, Xu Huo raised his hand to order.
"You got it! The usual?"
The owner, wearing a white apron and white sleeves, looked up with a cheerful smile, his voice warm and friendly from behind a cloud of steam.
"The usual. Savory tofu pudding, a flatbread, and a side of pickles," Xu Huo said.
He had been eating at this shop for a long time—twenty years now, almost every day since he was born.
The owner, with an enthusiastic smile, handed him the tofu pudding, then set down the flatbread and other things, finally placing a saucer of pickles on the table.
"Eat up."
Xu Huo paused for a moment, then began to eat with practiced ease.
The breakfast shop opened very early. Few places were full at five-thirty in the morning, but this one had been in business for decades and cultivated loyal customers, so even around five, business was booming and there was a line.
"Hey man, mind if I share the table?"
A voice suddenly spoke up. Xu Huo looked up to see a man with a buzz cut and remarkably clear eyes walking over, holding a bowl of tofu pudding.
Xu Huo, chewing his food, nodded instinctively. But a moment later, he froze.
"Have we... met somewhere before?"
Looking at the man in front of him, Xu Huo furrowed his brow. He had a strange feeling he’d seen him before.
"Hey, I was thinking the same thing, bro! Have we met? Don’t tell me this is some kind of fate from a past life!" The buzz-cut man sat down. He was a bit of a chatterbox, unable to stop once he started talking.
"You look really familiar to me, too. Super familiar."
The buzz-cut man seemed to have found a kindred spirit and kept talking.
Xu Huo ignored him, frowning as he scanned his surroundings.
Ever since leaving the house today, he’d had a strange sense of deja vu.
The drizzle, the breakfast stall, the food, even this buzz-cut man... it was all like something from...
’Wait...’
Xu Huo fell silent. He straightened up and stared intently at the buzz-cut man.
"What’s your name?"
The buzz-cut man was slurping up the noodles from his tofu pudding. He swallowed, then grinned and said:
"Name’s Wang Chao."
’Wang Chao?’
Xu Huo froze. He took out his phone. The yellow screen lit up, clearly displaying the time.
5:30 AM.
An indescribable feeling of suffocation enveloped Xu Huo.
"You okay, bro?" Wang Chao asked, looking up at Xu Huo with a puzzled expression while still slurping his noodles.
"Three..."
Xu Huo’s dry lips moved.
"Three? What three?" Wang Chao paused, confusion written all over his face.
"Two..."
"What the hell?"
"One."
5:31 AM.
The three numbers fell, but nothing happened.
Wang Chao tilted his head, looking at him with utter confusion.
Xu Huo breathed a sigh of relief. ’Maybe I’m being too sensitive.’
"Boss, the bill."
Xu Huo raised his hand to call the owner over, then pulled out some money to pay.
"Want to get that to go?" the owner asked, looking at the unfinished food on the table.
Wang Chao glanced at his own bowl, then at Xu Huo’s unfinished flatbread and meat patties, and looked up at him as well.
"Forget it. You can have it," Xu Huo said, turning to leave. Chao Zi was overjoyed when he saw the owner move the food over to his side.
"Hey bro, wait up."
Wang Chao quickly called out to stop him.
"What is it?" Xu Huo frowned.
"I noticed something was wrong with your phone earlier. You might not have seen it, bro. Let me fix it for you real quick."
Wang Chao, deeply moved by the gesture of sharing food, took the phone and quickly made an adjustment.
He returned the phone a dozen seconds later.
"What was wrong with my phone?" Xu Huo’s brow furrowed.
"Ah, it’s nothing, just that the time was a few minutes fast."
Wang Chao grinned. "These old phones are like that. If you don’t check them for a couple of days, they’ll either be a few minutes fast or a few minutes slow. Just gotta keep an eye on it."
’A few minutes fast?’
Xu Huo froze.
’If it was a few minutes fast, that means the real time is...’
Before he could finish his thought.
The next moment...
"AHHHHHH!!!!!"
A piercing scream that seemed to rip the world apart shattered the morning calm!
In that instant, the entire world seemed to freeze. The raindrops hung suspended in the air. Everyone stopped in their tracks and turned to look toward the center of the intersection.
Wang Chao looked instinctively.
There were four bodies.
Four bloody corpses, nailed to crosses, their heads thrown back to face the sky!
The bodies were stiff and cold, covered in crimson wounds. Their abdomens had been sliced open, and from the gaping holes, intestines, blood, piss, and shit flowed out like water, mixing with the rain and slowly spreading across the ground, the red light of the traffic signal blending with the blood on the pavement...
Their hands had been brutally smashed through with iron spikes, leaving tendons, bone, and mangled flesh clearly visible!
They were like Jesus nailed to the cross.
At five-thirty in the morning, sanitation workers at the intersection uncovered four Jesuses. A crowd holding umbrellas formed a circle, and car headlights flashed incessantly...
A clamorous din rose up around the bodies.
"AHHHHH!!!!"
"BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP!!!"
"Fuck, someone’s been murdered!"
"Call the police, hurry, call the police!!!"
...
Staring at the scene before him, listening to the din in his ears, Xu Huo suddenly felt as if he were cut off from the world, enveloped in a dreamlike state.
He looked down. His phone was lit, emitting a yellow glow. The fine rain spattered onto the screen, blurring it, but he could still make out the numbers.
5:30 AM.
’The dream... had come true.’
In his daze, a voice sounded in Xu Huo’s ear.
[DING...]
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