From the end of the world

Chapter 31: Ending 1
I miscalculated.

The junk food and ice cream did not ruin Ma Zao's stomach, but instead ruined mine, and I had diarrhea that night.

Maybe it was because I didn't cover myself properly with a blanket when I slept on the sofa, which caused my stomach to get cold. Ma Zao slept soundly all night, but I had to get up to go to the bathroom. When I looked back and saw her innocent sleeping face that was not affected at all, I felt like I had shot myself in the foot.

This was not the only miscalculation. When I was in the cave, I wondered if the speed of time in the real world and the other dimension was different. I could have used my phone to check the time difference after returning to the real world, but so many things happened one after another. When I finally remembered this question, the phone seemed to have automatically corrected the displayed time because it was connected to the network.

I can tell Zhu Shi about the cave, but I can't tell Ma Zao. As for the black jade I found under the cave, I originally thought about whether I could give it to Ma Zao for identification. Unlike me, Ma Zao should have knowledge about strange things, and maybe he can identify something.

But then I thought, it would be fine if she couldn't identify it. But if she really identified that the black jade was a strange thing, it would destroy the relationship between her and me. In the end, I had to put it aside for the time being.

The next morning, I bought breakfast downstairs, and when I came back, I called Ma Zao out of bed. She found herself sleeping on the bed in the bedroom, and looked at me puzzled again, as if she still couldn't accept my "friendliness" to her.

I naturally didn't go into detail to explain my sinister intentions, but simply said something that made sense to me: "How could I let a delicate girl like you sleep on the sofa while I slept in bed with a clear conscience?"

She sat on the edge of the bed and listened to me finish this. She twisted her body uncomfortably and said in a dissatisfied tone: "Why are you saying this again... The doomsday does not distinguish between men, women, young or old, and I am not a delicate girl."

"But this is not the apocalypse, and I am not from the apocalypse," I said seriously, "Besides, in my opinion, you are just a delicate girl."

"I'm not delicate."

"Who was the person who fainted and fell down yesterday?"

"…It's me." She answered reluctantly.

"Good answer." I handed him the breakfast in the plastic bag. "Here's a reward."

She immediately forgot all her unhappiness and looked at breakfast with anticipation.

Breakfast was just a simple starter. I didn't forget that I promised her yesterday to cook something even more delicious. In the evening, I would cook her a Sichuan meal full of spicy and spicy flavors, rich in fish and meat, and full of impact, to give her a heavy blow to her fragile gastrointestinal system.

This time I will definitely not shoot myself in the foot - I don't think so.

However, it is not a good idea to always have her sleep on the bed and me sleep on the sofa to prevent her from leaving quietly after I fall asleep. I have actually thought of new ways, one of which is to make some changes to the "Firefly".

"Firefly" is my scattered spirit, and in a sense, it is also a clone. Although it cannot think independently like the original body (that is, me), it should have a certain degree of flexibility.

For example, I can try to input some "preset instructions" into the "firefly" so that when the "firefly" observes certain changes in the environment it is in, it will also make corresponding changes. Take Ma Zao as an example. If Ma Zao makes an attempt to leave me, the "firefly" that observes this change will sound an alarm through the spiritual connection between it and me, waking me up from my sleep.

At present, I am still in the practice and testing stage. Theoretically, it is possible to do it, but the practical effect will have to wait and see.

After breakfast, I told Ma Zao that I had to go out for a while.

"Where are you going?" she asked habitually, like a wife wary of her husband's affair.

I can't say that I'm being sentimental by making such an analogy. Living together with a beautiful person of the opposite sex, brushing teeth, washing and eating together, and after eating, one of them says that he wants to go out, and the other one immediately becomes alert - in such a scenario that makes people imagine, most people must have such an association.

Although the alert person was five or six years younger than me, I had only known her officially for one day.

But I also answered calmly, like a husband accustomed to having affairs: "School."

"Go to school... go to school?" She repeated it as if she was reciting a word that was not easy to pronounce. Then she suddenly realized, "Oh, right, there are schools in this era."

It is natural that there are no schools in the apocalypse.

I lied to her again. I was not going to school, but to the room on the fifteenth floor.

This time the purpose was not to explore the cave, but to watch how Zhu Shi was going to deal with the ritual array. Of course, part of his intention was also to continue to try to establish a relationship with Luo Shan.

I have made up my mind to stay away from interpersonal relationships in normal society, which of course includes interactions with Chang'an.

Zhu Shi is a demon hunter from a strange world. She is not a "normal person" and has the ability to protect her own safety. It is not as dangerous for me to maintain a relationship with her as it is with Chang'an. However, she is my friend's sister after all. If possible, I don't want to involve her in danger caused by me. After officially establishing a relationship with Luo Shan, I also need to stay away from Zhu Shi. Thinking of this, I began to feel lonely.

If nothing unexpected happens, my fate with Changan - and this friend - will end here.

Growing up, there were only a handful of people who were willing to be my friend, and in college, there was only one person who was willing to be my friend: Chang An. The scenes of our acquaintance and friendship emerged in my mind, and then disappeared one after another like candles blown out by the wind.

In fact, I should have done this long before I met Ma Zao. Even if there is no "jinx" around me from beginning to end, as a person who pursues weirdness, it is possible to bring disaster to the people around me. It is irresponsible to interact with people casually.

The experience under the cave was a quest for me, but just a disaster for the people around me.

Now is a great opportunity to kill my weak self. I am a bad person who values ​​my own desires more than my friends. If I truly believed that the friendship between me and Chang'an was more important than the door to the weird world that Ma Zao opened for me, I would not have chosen that from the beginning.

After saying goodbye to Ma Zao temporarily, I left the "Firefly" behind for secret surveillance and moved towards the community where the room on the fifteenth floor was located.

The battle between me and the Fallen Demon Hunter in that neighborhood must have been captured by surveillance cameras, but no one from the official forces came to knock on the door. I guess Zhu Shi and Luo Shan have reported it. There seemed to be some problems with Luo Shan's examination of the Fallen Demon Hunter's body last night, and this is what I plan to inquire about.

——This incident may not be over yet.

Zhu Shi said this to me.

Although I find it hard to believe that the fallen demon hunter will come back to life, there may be other unknown dangers lurking in the dark.

Will this danger spread to Ma Zao through me? It's not that I haven't thought about it, but it's different from my attitude towards Chang'an and Zhu Shi. In my mind, Ma Zao has never been a weak girl who was involved, but a mysterious character who dragged everything around her into the storm. I am also very curious about how she, who always talks about doomsday and disaster, will behave when facing a truly strange thing.

When I arrived at the room on the fifteenth floor, Zhu Shi had already arrived.

To my regret, she was not wearing the straw raincoat and bamboo hat from last night. Instead, she was wearing a white women's shirt and a black skirt, with a big black guitar case on her back, like a band girl who had sneaked out of some karaoke room.

She should have just arrived. At this moment, she was walking around the ritual circle on the floor, while the wooden cover and the hole on the floor were disappearing. On the way here, I didn't meet the agent who was responsible for surveillance that she mentioned last night. Most likely, he left after she arrived. She looked at the ritual circle with an expression as if she was thinking about where to start erasing.

The door was not closed, so I went in. I couldn't close the door because I melted the lock last night. She looked up at me alertly when she heard the noise, and relaxed her expression when she saw it was me. Even so, she still looked serious.

It seems that now she is no longer in the gentle "Junior Sister Zhu Mode", but in the "Demon Hunter Zhu Shi Mode" where she calls me by my name. I feel a little regretful.

"Zhuang Cheng, why are you here?" she asked, "Also, did you break the door lock?"

"I broke it," I said. "I'm just here to take a look."

"Just looking around? Not planning on entering the cave?" she asked doubtfully.

"I promised not to enter." I answered seriously.

She whispered: "So suspicious..."

"Speaking of which... why did the cave disappear?" I now paid more attention to that place and took out my cell phone.

"You really want to come in, right?" she was surprised.

"No, no, I'm just purely curious."

According to my observation, the carpet rolled up next to the room was still the same as when I left last night, which means that no one had used the carpet to cover the ritual array, and the cave disappeared on its own. In order to rule out the possibility that my memory was wrong, I took out my phone to confirm the photos I took last night.

In this way, the reasoning that "the cave's manifestation state will only change after the carpet covers the ritual circle" is self-defeating.

Of course, it is also possible that the cave itself has a pattern of automatically disappearing after appearing for a period of time, just like a mobile phone will automatically turn off the screen after being inactive for a period of time. This can also explain why the entrance and exit disappeared automatically after I entered the cave last night.

Just then, I heard footsteps behind me and another person entered the room on the fifteenth floor.

(End of this chapter)