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Chapter 140: Chapter 58: The Two Chess Players

"In the Inner World, there’s a certain organization. They were Ghost Hunters in life, but after turning into ghosts, they somehow managed to keep their minds intact. Even I don’t know how.

"Their leader is a deadly fellow named Xu Yuan. I’ve never fought him head-on, but I’ve calculated our respective strengths. We’re worthy opponents, a true clash of equals.

"All in all, I’d give it a seventy-thirty split. The fight would be over in three minutes, and I’d be the one cutting him into seven pieces."

Old Man Sun’s tone was still quite relaxed as he spoke of Xu Yuan.

Gao Tian already knew all this.

Back at the Divine Tree, Xu Yuan had admitted it himself: the only person he feared in all of Shanghai was Old Man Sun. He claimed he could kill all the other Ghost Hunters combined in a single day.

"But since turning into a ghost, he has never once set foot in Shanghai. If this long wait drags on, the one who loses will definitely be me, this eighty-nine-year-old codger."

On the other end of the line, Old Man Sun’s nicotine addiction was clearly getting the better of him; he took a drag every few sentences.

"Because I’m a man, and he’s a ghost.

"I’ll grow old and weak. One day, my body will reach its limit, and I’ll leave this world.

"Birth, old age, sickness, and death—that’s the law of nature. And I’ve made my peace with it.

"But Xu Yuan is different. He’ll never die. In fact, his power will only grow stronger as more people in this world die.

"Time is not on our side.

"In all of Shanghai, besides me, no one is a match for Xu Yuan. The day I die, Xu Yuan will descend upon Shanghai and slaughter every last Ghost Hunter in the Spirit Disaster Bureau."

Then, Old Man Sun revealed his true purpose.

"This war absolutely cannot drag on. Everything must be settled while I’m still alive. While I’m still here.

"Xu Yuan has been patient all these years, lying low in the Inner World, just waiting for me to die. Those guys at the Spirit Disaster Bureau are a bunch of useless cowards. Without me, Xu Yuan can do as he pleases.

"There’s no sense in guarding against a thief for a thousand days.

"So this time, I’ve decided to give Xu Yuan an opportunity. I’ll let him pick the battlefield. I’ll let him mold all of Shanghai into whatever form he desires.

"Once Xu Yuan thinks the time is ripe and dares to enter Shanghai, I’ll find him, beat him to death with my staff, and this whole game will be over."

This was Old Man Sun’s plan.

Xu Yuan planned to unleash three S-Level ghosts in Shanghai to wear Old Man Sun down to his death.

But Old Man Sun was worried that if he dealt with one of the S-Level ghosts prematurely, Xu Yuan would just retreat back into the Inner World and lose his nerve to come to Shanghai.

’So what if I let your Rainy Woman reach her peak? What if I let you gather enough support to feel confident enough to enter Shanghai?’

In Old Man Sun’s eyes, the battle was that simple: Xu Yuan shows his face, and he takes him out with one swing of his staff. Job done.

Old Man Sun thought time was on Xu Yuan’s side, but in reality, Xu Yuan was also running out of time.

The future Xu Yuan had seen through his Ghost Eye showed humanity’s extinction compressed to within the next twenty years.

Xu Yuan had to take over Shanghai immediately to advance his own world-saving plan. He could no longer afford to wait leisurely for Old Man Sun to die of old age.

Defeating Old Man Sun head-on was now an unavoidable necessity.

Both men were in a race against death.

"What about the rest of Shanghai?

"With you gone, it will become a hunting ground for S-Level ghosts."

Old Man Sun replied,

"Shanghai can be rebuilt if it’s destroyed.

"If I die of old age before I deal with Xu Yuan, then everyone will die."

He stated an objective fact, his voice calm and cruel.

"When this farce in Shanghai ends depends entirely on when Xu Yuan decides to show himself.

"The moment Xu Yuan shows his face, I’ll find him. It’ll only take a few minutes, and this whole charade will be over.

"If Xu Yuan never shows, then I’ll just keep waiting. I’ll quietly wait for this farce to play itself out.

"Even if everyone in this city dies."

’But what if Xu Yuan never shows up?’

’No.’

’Xu Yuan will definitely appear.’

Because just as Old Man Sun was waiting for Xu Yuan, Xu Yuan was also searching for Old Man Sun.

The two of them were like two great beasts in a forest. No matter how fate twisted and turned, their meeting was inevitable.

Before hanging up, Old Man Sun offered a word of reassurance.

"Shadow Headquarters has already prepared the Supernatural Artifact needed to deal with the Rainy Woman.

"The moment Xu Yuan is taken down, they will handle the Rainy Woman.

"Anyway, before the final battle, I hope you kids can get out on the streets of Shanghai and deal with as many supernatural incidents as you can. Slow this city’s destruction down, just a little.

"You’re a smart kid. You know what I mean.

"I’m hanging up."

BEEP. BEEP. BEEP. An endless dial tone.

This game of chess between two titans was a catastrophe for the ordinary people of Shanghai.

The deaths of tens of thousands of ordinary people were just meaningless numbers, cannon fodder not even worthy of being called pawns in the game between these two titans.

Rationally, Gao Tian knew that Old Man Sun’s choice was the optimal solution.

’To achieve a greater goal, some people’s interests must be sacrificed.’

But accepting it emotionally was another matter entirely.

’Those are tens of millions of lives, not pigs or dogs, not insects.’

’But by that same logic, doesn’t that make Xu Yuan’s world-saving plan more righteous than Old Man Sun’s?’

’Both plans involve sacrificing some for the many, but Xu Yuan’s might actually save the world. As for Old Man Sun... even if he kills Xu Yuan, new, powerful ghosts will just keep appearing.’

’Eventually, it will completely overwhelm humanity, bringing about the apocalypse. The final outcome won’t change.’

’In essence, those two are the same kind of person.’

Gao Tian stood frozen. For the first time in his life, he was wavering, unsure of which side he should be on.

’At this fork in the road of fate, which path should I take...?’

’Wait.’

’The Future Altar.’

’Only the Future Altar can pierce the mists of fate and show me the optimal solution.’

Without a moment’s hesitation, Gao Tian activated the Mirror Ghost and pulled himself into the Mirror World. There, among all his Supernatural Artifacts, he picked up the most mysterious of them all: a red jar.

He hadn’t looked at it in a long time. The skeletal figure inside the jar had walked to its very center. It tilted its hollow skull, looking out of the jar.

This was a highly unusual sight. But with more important matters at hand, Gao Tian had no time to dwell on the Future Altar’s strange transformation.

"Show me the future."

Gray mist slowly billowed from the bottom of the jar, engulfing it completely.

Usually, after the gray mist dispersed, the future would unfold before Gao Tian’s eyes like a slideshow.

But that didn’t happen.

Three minutes passed. Then five. Then ten.

The jar remained filled with a thick, gray fog that showed no sign of dispersing.

Within the mist at the bottom of the jar, sparks occasionally flared, and shadowy silhouettes could be seen collapsing.

It took Gao Tian a long time to realize something—this *was* the future the Altar was showing him. This was the Shanghai of the future, shrouded in the smoke of war, its sky blanketed by an impenetrable aura of death and decay.

Through the haze of war, he could just make out that the buildings on both banks of the Huangpu River had been reduced to rubble. Only a single, sharp silhouette pierced the gray sky, standing defiantly amidst the ashes. For some reason, it had never fallen.

Amidst the corpses and wreckage, a figure slowly pierced the gray mist, ascending into the gloomy sky.

Gao Tian strained his eyes, trying to make out what the shadow spiraling above the ruins of Shanghai looked like.

Its build, its clothes... they were just like his.

Except, a massive steel rebar had pierced straight through its chest, and the bloodstains on its body had long since dried black. Its head was caved in on one side, as if struck by something heavy.

An ordinary person would have been long dead.

Yet the corpse clearly still possessed consciousness. Its body moved, stiff and autonomous. It raised one hand to the sky and pointed the other to the ground. It hung suspended in midair, its posture arrogant and mad, gazing down upon the war-torn ruins and all living things below.

"In all of Heaven and Earth,

"I alone am the Honored One."

The clear voice, like the tolling of a great bell, echoed throughout Shanghai, its resonance reaching Gao Tian clearly even from outside the jar.

...

Without further explanation, the gray mist dissipated, revealing the portrait of Master Yunshan at the bottom of the jar once more.

Gao Tian set down the Future Altar. After committing the bizarre vision to memory, he hastily exited the Mirror World.

As he went downstairs, Gao Tian’s mind was consumed by the vision from the Future Altar.

First, he was almost certain that the broken, rebar-impaled corpse ascending into the sky was himself. A future Gao Tian.

It wasn’t just that the figure’s build was so similar to his own. All the Future Altar’s prophecies so far had unfolded from his, Gao Tian’s, perspective. It wouldn’t randomly switch to a stranger for no reason.

The future "Gao Tian" had been killed in battle.

This wasn’t like the vision at Longshu Temple. Back then, interference from a time loop had caused the Future Altar to glitch out, repeatedly showing him dying in different parallel worlds.

This time, it had shown a single, definitive future: his corpse, dead in that exact way.

’But the question is, why was my corpse still able to fly? Why could it consciously make that gesture—one hand to the sky, one to the ground—and even speak those cryptic words?’

’That pose is the iconic gesture Sakyamuni made at his birth. It symbolizes the arrival of an enlightened one into the world.’

’There’s only one possibility.’

’I was finally pushed to the brink and activated the combo: the Ghost Transformation Spear and the Time Coffin.’

’I turned into a ghost.’

’The vision in the Future Altar wasn’t of the normal me. It was "Gao Tian" in a ghost state.’

’The good news is, the theoretical combo actually worked.’

’The question is, after I "died," what kind of killing pattern, or even what kind of Ghost Realm, did I awaken?’

’What made its worldly debut so... spectacular?’