“Young man, at this hour, what are you doing going to a place like the Dragon King Temple? It must be closed by now, right?”
Luo City, August 30th, 8 PM, a taxi drove along the road.
The taxi driver curiously glanced at the passenger beside him.
It was a face so handsome that even the taxi driver, who in his youth was known as Luo City's Little White Wolf, felt inferior and couldn't help but exclaim that the Young man was truly handsome.
However, the main reason the taxi driver couldn't help but take a few more glances was because the Young man's expression seemed off.
He had been in this business for so many years and had never seen such a strange person.
The Young man sat there, silent, his eyes fixed straight ahead.
His gaze seemed to be filled with nostalgia, yet also seemed to be staring at something unseen in the darkness.
It made him feel a bit uneasy, so he naturally wanted to strike up a conversation.
Fortunately, at this moment, the Young man turned his head to look at the taxi driver, thought for a moment, and said:
“I'm here to see the scenery. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen Luo City like this!”
Hmm?
The taxi driver looked at the Young man: “Young man, are you not a local of Luo City?”
Clearly, if he had known he wasn't a local, he would have taken a few more detours.
The Young man said: “I am a local, but I’ve been away for a long time.”
He looked at the long streets illuminated by streetlights on both sides, and the distant Mother River flowing under the dark night sky, lost in thought.
In his previous life, during the Era of Terror, the source of Luo City's destruction was right here, from the Luo City Dragon King Temple, the First-Grade Fierce God that struck fear into countless Ghost Controllers across the entire Blue Star: Blood-Eyed Dragon Lord!
All the memories about this place flashed through his mind.
Unfortunately, the driver couldn't discern his reminiscence of the past and interrupted:
“Oh? You don’t look very old. Did you go away for college? Haha, Young men nowadays don't want to come home; they're all focused on running to big cities! If you ask me, our Luo City is still the best!”
Hearing this, the Young man wholeheartedly agreed and nodded: “Indeed!”
It was indeed good. It was one of the first major cities with millions of people to be annihilated in the previous life, with a proliferation of bizarre occurrences that ranked among the top worldwide.
It even had a Fierce God, one of the strongest First-Grade bizarre entities, holding dominion.
Such a Luo City truly had few cities that could compare.
“By the way, how long have you been away from Luo City for college? It’s developed so fast during this time!” The driver was talkative, and it was rare to meet a wanderer returning home, so he couldn't help but become chatty.
The Young man thought for a moment: “It’s been about twenty years.”
The taxi driver's face was covered in black lines. Twenty years?
This Young man looked only twenty-two or twenty-three, probably just graduated from college. So, he was only three years old when he left Luo City, right?
Then why the hell did he look so nostalgic after getting in the car? What was he nostalgic about?
The driver was speechless, even more so when he saw the Young man's serious expression.
Could this Young man have some mental problems?
However, the night was long, and there was still some distance to the Dragon King Temple, so he still asked:
“Then why are you back in Luo City? Are your parents here?”
The Young man shook his head: “I am an orphan. I will settle in Luo City in the future.”
The driver was stunned, glancing at the handsome Young man, but his expression subconsciously softened a bit.
Humans always conjure up some self-righteous, strange sympathy for certain words:
“Then your life hasn’t been easy, has it?”
A hint of weary recollection appeared in the Young man’s eyes.
More than just not easy?
Twenty years of living hand-to-mouth, twenty years of treading on thin ice, he couldn't remember how many times he had brushed with death, how many people around him had betrayed him, died, or sacrificed themselves, leading him to that final step.
That step, where he was about to stand upon the throne.
But at that very last moment, just as he was about to become ‘King Chujiang’, there was a sudden betrayal from behind.
That blow caused his twenty years of effort to go to waste.
Biancheng King Ding Xie…
A cold glint flashed in the Young man’s eyes.
Yet, in the end, he merely smiled, looking out at the boundless night:
“It’s all in the past. The future will be even more interesting.”
“Hey, it’s good to be Young; always so vibrant. Haha, just like my daughter…”
At this point, the taxi driver also showed a happy smile.
With a loving wife and daughter, not rich but able to eat and drink sufficiently, in such an era, happiness was not such a rare thing after all.
Unfortunately, the taxi driver would not understand.
What would happen three days later, at 0:00 on September 3rd, Beijing time?
Countless bizarre entities descended, and the book of life and death appeared beside everyone, judging everyone's life and death.
Humans either died under the bizarre entities or became Ghost Controllers of the Yin Job sequence, struggling to survive.
There were still three days until such an era.
Perhaps, changes had already begun, but as an ordinary person, the taxi driver had not yet noticed it.
The Young man did not continue to speak.
The dim streetlights illuminated his scattered black hair, and he was lost in thought again.
Rebirth, returning to the past, how incredible a thing this was.
But in such an era, even with a second chance at life, he had no absolute confidence that he could go further and more steadily than in his previous life.
Therefore, he had to gamble.
And in all of Luo City, there was no place more suitable to take this gamble than the one he was heading to now.
To gamble on using a human's frail body to control this First-Grade Fierce God-level bizarre entity that might have just been born, which ranked among the top in Dragon Country in his previous life.
‘It's starting again.’
The taxi driver, looking at the Young man whose eyes were lost in thought, not knowing what he was thinking, muttered to himself.
Indeed, this Young man was definitely not normal!
So, the taxi driver pressed the accelerator, and after leaving the main urban area, the speed suddenly soared.
The Dragon King Temple in the distance seemed to finally be appearing.
At this moment, the Young man, on the contrary, was no longer in a hurry:
“Just drive slowly. It’s late at night; safety first.”
This sentence made the taxi driver slightly stunned. Didn't he speak quite well?
Could it be that he was overthinking?
Could this Young man just be drunk? But there was no smell of alcohol.
The taxi driver was somewhat suspicious, a little unsure of the Young man's mental state.
Soon, the Young man's voice sounded again:
“At this hour, after this trip, go back and rest early. It’s not safe at night.”
The taxi driver’s heart warmed.
Indeed, he had been overthinking just now.
This was just a poor child who was a bit melancholic due to being an orphan and probably always wanted to return to his hometown.
Thinking of this, the taxi driver, whether out of guilt or because he was naturally a talkative person, thought for a moment and began to speak again:
“Young man, where are you from? Where have you lived all these years?”
Where was he from?
A hint of recollection flashed in the Young man’s eyes.
There, there were bizarre Fierce Gods ready to devour the human world at any moment.
There, there were Ghost Controllers who turned into Yin Jobs and controlled bizarre entities.
There, there were many secret realms, Ghost Domains, underworld artifacts, and curses.
There, was the future human world,
There, was hell at that time.
Finally, the Young man opened his mouth:
“Hell.”
“What?”
The driver was stunned, thinking he had misheard.
The Young man did not speak again, merely smiled.
The reason was simple: the Luo City Dragon King Temple in the distance had finally arrived.
The Young man paid the fare, opened the car door, and looked at the closed gate of the Dragon King Temple in the distance.
The driver also finally came to his senses, rolled down the window, blinked, and looked at the Young man’s back:
“Young man… what’s your name?”
The Young man turned his head and glanced at the driver. He didn't care about the driver's little thoughts, because it didn't matter.
However, he still smiled slightly.
His gentle smile revealed an incomprehensible meaning:
“Chu Qing. Chu as in King Chujiang, Qing as in clear sky.”
In the darkness, the Young man’s figure slowly walked forward and disappeared.
Only the taxi driver remained stunned for a while, then picked up his phone:
“Hello, Luocheng Inspectorate? I want to report. I met a mental patient named… No, really… He really is a mental patient… Okay, okay, I understand…”
