A brave man may not live, but he cannot die

Chapter 251 The Lost Child (Part 2)
"Sister Yutong, this cashmere long coat really suits you! It doesn't show your belly at all. Oh dear, I've noticed that other clients inevitably gain weight during pregnancy, but you don't seem to have any extra fat except for your belly."

At 3 p.m., on the first floor of the Jianghai City International Trade Center shopping mall, a sales assistant sweetly praised Mi Yutong, who was trying on clothes.

Mi Yutong stared at herself in the mirror, then tilted her head slightly and reached out to pull at her smooth, snow-white cheek, picking at her flaws: "I do yoga, and more exercise is good for the baby. But... look, I still can't escape this double chin."

"No way!" The sales assistant's flattery, though somewhat exaggerated, genuinely revealed a touch of womanly envy for the beautiful young woman before her: "You have an oval face with a touch of baby fat, it's so pretty! Men love that kind of face. Don't believe me? Ask your husband—"

Mi Yutong immediately turned around and asked Quinn, who was sitting to the side scrolling through his phone with a blank expression, "Honey? Do you think a rounder face looks better or a more pointed face looks better?"

Quinn didn't answer, his attention was entirely on his phone, and he looked as focused as if he were browsing a cultivation technique that could be destroyed after being viewed.

Mi Yutong pouted, thinking he was working. Fortunately, the sales assistant was perceptive and quickly praised Quinn, "Your husband must love him terribly! I recently saw his news; I heard he's involved in a joint venture in Africa and was received by the prime minister of that small country—"

"It's not going to be decided so soon."

"The flamingo design on this cashmere sweater was inspired by our Hermès designers' experience in Africa! In late autumn, the large and beautiful flamingos hold a spectacular courtship ceremony, pairing up and remaining together until the following year. This was a limited edition item allocated to our store by the French headquarters, and there's only one left in this size."

Quinn tapped his fingers; he hadn't touched a modern electronic device in almost half a year, and his typing skills were a bit rusty.

No information about "Taimouran" can be found on any search engine, whether domestic or international.

Searching for "time traveler" mostly brings up advertisements for a certain patriotic novel website.

The same applies when searching for terms like "another world" or "hero".

It seems there won't be any results on the internet.

Quinn silently put down his phone.

Through chatting with his "wife," he learned that he was now in a world line that was very different from the one he remembered.

Or, in other words, parallel universes.

Before 1999, everything in this world was the same as the Earth that Quinn knew.

But the turning point came in 1999 when Qin Weizheng was not arrested during a manhunt in Beibu Gulf City; instead, he escaped.

The victim changed from Zhang Rui to Lan Na Niu, thus altering the timeline.

Qin Weizheng did not survive; shortly after Quinn's birth, his parents died in a car accident. The truck driver who killed them was fatigued, a common occurrence in those days of poor road conditions. After an investigation, the police found nothing suspicious and closed the case.

The perpetrator served several years in prison, but because he had no insurance, he couldn't get much compensation. Quinn's childhood in this world wasn't much different from that of his drug-dealing parents. After his grandfather passed away in middle school, he had to start working to earn money for his grandmother's medical expenses.

Quinn has no memory of this; it all comes down to Mi Yutong's account. It was still the pianist from the Nordic fantasy who introduced him to the Mi family as a tutor. Their relationship quickly blossomed, and he confessed his feelings in their second year of high school. After graduating, they went to study in England together, and soon after returning to China, they got married. This year, she is six months pregnant.

Because it was Lan Naniu who died, not Zhang Rui, Officer Liu's life underwent a significant change. For some reason, he no longer harbored resentment towards Qin Weizheng and the people behind him, and after becoming disabled, he even stopped participating in frontline work.

Without Officer Liu, who relentlessly pursued the case, Quinn in this world was unaware of what his father had done and had no doubts about the cause of his parents' deaths. After reaching adolescence, he genuinely fell in love with Mi Yutong and is now a complete winner in life.

From the chat history with others on his phone, it's clear that this Quinn is someone who makes the souls from different timelines within his body question the meaning of life.

With a gentle personality, humility, and a work style befitting a Wall Street elite, his management style also reveals many of Mi Beilin's traits.
Damn, where did your abstract language and perverse sense of humor go?

Quinn felt that everything happening now was definitely related to him.

It's definitely related to the abyss!
He remains skeptical about whether this is the real Earth. After all, while the changes in the world line are logically consistent, what about the name?
Mi Yutong would never call herself "Quinn".

Just like Mi Yutong, played by Celia, in the incident where the plane crashed, this world is also missing the name that was taken away by the system.

Quinn had a ten percent, or even a nine percent, doubt that this place was still the abyss, or even the legendary fifth level, the depth that only heroes had ever left—the level of no return!

"Wrap it up." Mi Yutong was persuaded by the sales assistant; this cashmere long coat was indeed very beautiful.

"Okay! This dress is very popular, I know you'll definitely like it, so I specially reserved your size. You only need to buy another 40,000 yuan worth of other items."

Mi Yutong nodded nonchalantly, letting the sales assistant pick out some expensive trinkets for her, before sitting down next to Quinn. She didn't blame Quinn for ignoring her, but instead asked softly, "You seem really strange today. You've been so distracted. Don't you really need to see a doctor?"

Quinn shook his head, ignoring Mi Yutong's concerned gaze, and instead looked at the elevator outside the huge floor-to-ceiling windows of the Hermès store.

That elevator goes directly to the top floor of the China World Trade Center.

Elevator number 13 was the very one he, Lin, and the rest of the divination team took when they left the abyss. As expected of an imported product, it remained as good as new after so many years of meticulous maintenance in the mall.

“Let’s go see a movie. It’s about to start,” Quinn said.

"There's still half an hour left." Even so, she still took her husband's hand and stood up. "Let's go! Let's play some King of Fighters outside the movie theater. I'll give you two lives."

Quinn did not struggle, but felt the palm of his hand.

It's strange that she's already a young woman approaching thirty.

Perhaps due to proper care, Mi Yutong's small hands remained as soft as those of a fifteen or sixteen-year-old girl. They felt exactly the same as she remembered. And just like Celia's hands.

Sometimes remembering everything too clearly isn't a good thing, as it can make people doubt whether their memories are truly accurate.

The bill doesn't need to be paid now; Mi Yutong is a major Hermès client, the kind who receives invitations to the front row seats at their fashion shows every year, and her bills are always paid monthly via credit card. But this time, the main purpose isn't to buy clothes, but rather she ordered two toboggans for Quinn. She plans to give birth in Norway and have her husband go on a skiing vacation while she's there.

A custom Hermès sled costs $50,000, but she treats it like a five-dollar pancake. Today, the wealth of the Mi family, or rather Quinn's father-in-law, far exceeds what a drug dealer could earn.

The two walked out of the store and chose the nearest elevator, number 13.

There were two other girls, around high school age, coming up from the basement level in the elevator. One was wearing a Lolita dress, and the other was carrying an ita-bag covered in metal shards depicting anime characters. They pressed the button for the fifth floor, the same floor the couple was going to.

The elevator doors slowly closed. Mi Yutong was still staring at the glass, rubbing her chubby cheeks. The two girls were playing on their phones when Quinn suddenly said—

"Identity verification!"

The sound was so loud and clear that it startled all three of them.

“I need to use the elevator—” Quinn mimicked Lynn’s Chinese words when she started the elevator and left the abyss.

Lin is not a hero. The reason she can activate the elevator is clearly not magic or arcane power, but rather Chinese.

But instead of using an electronic voice to verify identity as Quinn had expected, the elevator silently ascended to the fifth floor, floor by floor.

The three people in the elevator remained silent.

Mi Yutong pointed blankly at the elevator panel: "I already pressed the button. The movie theater is on the fifth floor."

"Yutong. Ask me."

"What do I ask you for?"

"What kind of thing gives you a hundred free draws just for logging in?" Quinn asked seriously.

"Ding Zhen?" Mi Yutong answered uncertainly.

“I told you to ask me.” She had no choice but to repeat the strange question.

“British slave ships,” Quinn answered clearly and precisely.

With a ding, the elevator doors opened, and we arrived at the fifth floor.

The two girls couldn't hold back any longer after they stepped out of the elevator and whispered, "I thought it was Shadowverse 3."
Mi Yutong, her pretty face slightly flushed, playfully punched Quinn and complained, "What's wrong with you?"

Quinn walked out of the elevator without saying a word, took out his phone again, and started clicking away, seemingly searching for something.

The two walked to the ticket machine. She wanted to enter the ticket code, but her phone froze, so Quinn helped her enter it.

Mi Yutong had shown him the ticket collection page once; once he saw Quinn, he would never forget him.

Mi Yutong poked at her phone, saying helplessly, "It's 2027 already, and Apple's signal is exactly the same as it was ten years ago. Ah! It's here, 7717-1633-19."

Seeing Quinn enter the ticket code perfectly, Mi Yutong felt a little discouraged. She knew Quinn had a great memory, and she was more interested in seeing if Quinn had made a mistake, but unfortunately, she hadn't caught him yet.

Two movie tickets were slowly printed out, but Quinn didn't reach for them. Instead, he stared thoughtfully at the ticket machine screen.

"What's wrong with you today? You've been spacing out the whole time."

"Let me see your phone," Quinn suddenly said.

"What? Trying to check my phone?"

Even so, Mi Yutong still handed him her phone. She felt it was quite nice that they could still be possessive occasionally after being in love for so many years.

Little did anyone know that Quinn wasn't even looking at the chat software; instead, he was staring at the ticket collection page.

He was staring at the 14-digit ticket code.

When Quinn was promoted to Sequence Seven of the Thief, he once again saw digital information emerging from his mind.

The first time was through code, which prompted him to steal Peipei's suitcase.

The second one was just numbers. Numbers that are hard to understand.

Quinn also tried to decipher it, applying many mathematical formulas, translating them into English and then using initial letters to spell them out. He tried all sorts of methods, both reasonable and unreasonable, but unfortunately, he came up empty-handed.

But now, he suddenly realized...
The string of numbers was exactly the same as the ticket collection code in front of them.

Even the first four digits are the same, 7717.

Although he thought it unlikely, Quinn still took out his phone and texted his secretary: 'Check a movie ticket code for me. 【7717-8400-4934-33】, which movie, which theater, and what time.'

He thought for a moment, then added, "As soon as possible."

The other party replied instantly, "Received".

Mi Yutong chose the VIP theater, where even the seats were twice the size of the regular ones. The two of them sat side by side in the back of the huge theater.

The movie was an action film, which Mi Yutong thoroughly enjoyed. Her pickiness about film and television works was limited to anime; she preferred mindless popcorn movies when it came to live-action films. Quinn, however, found it even less interesting. Although well-made, with excellent special effects and action choreography, compared to otherworldly supernatural battles, the film inevitably lacked imagination.

I'll jump over Grindelwald's Eye, will you? I'm willing to die, are you?.jpg
As the movie was about to end, the secretary finally replied to the message.

Although he didn't know this secretary, her abilities were clearly outstanding. She had no doubts about this absurd request and quickly mobilized resources to find a solution.

The four digits of the ticket code represent the cinema, projector number, time, and seat number.

‘7717-8400-4934-33的电影是2016年3月2日下午六点四十五，江海市国贸中心渤海影院放映的《哈利波特与死亡圣器重映版》。’

"I confirmed with my colleagues in the cybersecurity department; they retrieved the movie website's historical data archives, and the information is correct. The VIP seating number is row seven, column five."

Quinn was startled.

His shock stemmed not only from the fact that he was now in the same theater, in the same auditorium, in row seven, column five, right next to him, sitting Mi Yutong.

Even more because
March 2, 2016, was the exact date he appeared in Jianghai after falling into the abyss!
Quinn began to recall.

That day, Mi Yutong came to see him in a Rolls-Royce and asked him to go on a date, but Quinn refused because he hadn't finished get off work yet.

Quinn couldn't quite recall what he did or who he met at 6:45; it was as if a piece of his memory of that day was missing.

Is it playing the piano in a Nordic fantasy?

If I had given in to Mi Yutong's coquettish advances back then, perhaps the two of us would have appeared in that movie, since Nordic Fantasy is so close to the China World Trade Center.
His vision suddenly began to flicker.

Intermittent blue light flashed and disappeared like snowflakes.

No mistake, this is the blue light from the system page!
Just as he was trying to think things through and seize the moment of inspiration.

Suddenly, his wife said softly, "Husband."

Quinn ignored her, holding his breath and trying to figure out if this was a system.

"You're acting really strange today."

"It's like he's become a completely different person."

"Don't you love me anymore?"

Seeing that Mi Yutong had even stopped watching the movie and stood up to question him, Quinn had no choice but to answer impatiently, "No, I was thinking about work."

"Then you love me?"

"."

"Why don't you answer?"

"Love."

So she lifted her clothes, knelt face-to-face on Quinn's lap, and offered her beautiful body to her husband's lips, whose pupils trembled.

“Let’s make love. We’ll definitely have a perfect child,” she whispered in his ear.

On his wife's swollen belly, on her fair skin, in the darkness, against the backdrop of the film's climax.

The totem of lust radiates an illusory light—

Quinn seemed to be hallucinating, hearing the dead Lanna Bull laughing mournfully:
"Do you really think you can resist that desire?"

(End of this chapter)