Tokyo: The Player Behind the Scenes

As for how Huiming became an Onmyoji and obtained the demon sword, it must be related to the legendary Ashiya Dōman.

Nobi also shared his information, and then, combining the information from the three of them, he gave the new player 'Tada' a crash course on the game's plot.

“I roughly understand.” After listening, Tian Anjing’s voice was a mix of calm and indifference. “In other words, we need to find and reconstruct the actual historical trajectory that happened in the three historical timelines corresponding to these three doors. Only in this way can we unlock the final official game.”

The opponent has good gaming skills, so Nobi can save a lot of trouble.

“Next, we have two options,” Nobita suggested. “First, we can maintain the status quo, each of us responsible for our own timeline, and continue exploring. Second, the three of us can take turns entering each door to conduct a thorough investigation, identify the most crucial clues, and then decide on our next strategy.”

Tian's voice barely paused, as if he had already thought of something before Nobi finished speaking, and he said decisively: "The game modes of these three doors are almost completely the same, the only difference lies in the information they carry."

"Therefore, the exchange of information is especially important." He proposed an extremely radical strategy: "And the key to all information lies in the origin of the story. I suggest that we concentrate all our playtime today on you, the captain. You should focus all your efforts on the 1220 timeline and uncover the secret of how Huiming became an Onmyoji as quickly as possible."

Nobi was slightly shocked. He hadn't expected this new player to be so decisive and sharp-minded, and his proposed solution was extremely risky.

This placed almost all the burden and resources of the team's early exploration on his shoulders.

If he proposed this plan himself, it would seem like he was greedy for credit and reckless, but if the team members proposed it, it would become a purely tactical consideration.

Indeed, only by knowing how the first Daoman became the Daoman can one understand what mission he carried and what he needed to do.

Otherwise, the subsequent timeline is easily misunderstood, leading to a cycle of trial and error.

Renault's thoughtful voice rang out: "What if the three of us entered the same timeline at the same time? Would there be any synergistic effect?"

"The possibility is relatively low," Nobi immediately dismissed. "The more likely scenario is that if one person dies, it will directly consume one of the team's travel opportunities. It's not worth it."

Renault was more inclined to agree with Tian's suggestion: "Captain, you make the decision. I think either option is acceptable. Of course, although Tian's option is more radical, I think its feasibility is quite high."

Seeing this, Nobita no longer hesitated: "Okay, but you may have to wait a long time at the door."

Renault doesn't care about winning.

“It was all worth it,” Tian finished Renault’s sentence.

Renault was slightly taken aback, but then became serious.

He seemed to have caught a whiff of someone like him.

The other person's personality definitely has a lot of biases.

Nobi focused his mind and once again aimed at the dark door marked with [1220].

Let's start from scratch.

Unlike them, Nobi did not discover the existence of the Suspicious Value, which may be related to the fact that Huiming is still just an ordinary person.

Snow village, dilapidated house, seriously ill mother, hungry boy.

Nobita manipulates Hikari through commands, repeating the routine of getting up, checking on his mother, and going out to find food.

But this time, as Hikimi walked along the dotted path toward the forest trap, Nobita's gaze was fixed on the pixel details of the image.

Even from this God's-eye view, it's impossible to tell that Yasuke was carrying a knife, indicating that it was hidden inside his clothes.

Why would a farmer's son have weapons? This isn't a ninja village, after all.

"Yasuke has a knife on him, avoid him." Nobi tried to give such an instruction.

But the countdown didn't end, the command didn't work, and Huiming still rushed out.

It seems that even if information is given in advance that the character doesn't know, it's useless, especially if there are no relevant clues at all.

As the plot unfolded as before, Hikari was held at knifepoint by Yasuke, who ordered him to hand over the rabbit.

"I can't die yet. My mother still needs someone to take care of her. I'll leave the rabbit with Yasuke and think of another way."

Nobita immerses himself in the role, reducing cold, impersonal commands and making his instructions sound more like what the character himself is thinking.

Sure enough, her mother was Huiming's biggest weakness. Using this method, Nobi immediately made Huiming give up the dead rabbit in her arms.

Seeing this, Yasuke gradually regained his senses and felt a wave of fear. He wondered how he could have been so irrational, as if he really wanted to kill someone.

"Hmph, you're smart to know what's good for you. Let's go."

He sheathed his knife with a hint of relief, picked up the rabbit from the snow, snorted coldly, and turned to leave with Matsujiro beside him.

Huiming, as if all his strength had been drained, collapsed onto the cold snow. Snow dust covered his tattered clothes, and he hung his head, clenching a handful of snow tightly in his fist until it melted into water in his palm.

[Yasuke and Matsujiro both deserve to die!]

But what should I do now?

There are still a few traps they probably haven't discovered, but they're all quite far away. I'm so hungry.

"Go find those traps and see if you can find anything," Nobita instructed.

Huiming struggled to his feet, brushed the snow off his body, and dragged his tired and hungry body deeper into the snow-covered forest along the shimmering dotted path.

He walked slowly, and it took him nearly two hours to reach the vicinity of the trap.

It's hard to say whether his luck was good or bad today. The trap did catch its prey, but there were other people nearby.

They were a group of people, armed with weapons, and judging by their attire, they looked like bandits.

They huddled around the trap set by Huiming. A scarred man squatted on the ground, silently watching the rabbits trapped in the trap, while his companions talked beside him.

"Should we keep looking? It shouldn't have been lost that far, right? Maybe it was buried by the snow."

"There's a new trap here, probably set yesterday. Maybe the person who set it found it. Leave two brothers to guard it; that person will definitely come today! We can catch him and interrogate him; we might get something out of him."

Their voices were anxious, as if they were looking for something lost.

The first thing that flashed through Nobita's mind was the knife in Misuke's hand that shouldn't belong to his social class.

[Bandits! I have to sneak away!]

Huiming instinctively wanted to sneak away.

The next second, a bandit who had been lying in ambush slowly approached leaped out from behind a snowdrift like a ghost and pounced on him, knocking him to the ground.

"Boss! I caught a little brat!" The bandit proudly boasted, quickly pulling out a rope and binding Huiming like a dumpling in a few moments, then dragging him in front of the scarred man.

【Finished.】

Huiming's legs went weak and his eyes were dull.

The scarred man slowly rose, looking down at Huiming, pinching his chin, and staring at him: "A well-set trap. Are you a hunter?"

Nobi couldn't respond to this. He knew that Hikari wasn't a hunter, but he didn't know where he had learned to set traps.

"No... no one else taught me." Huiming's voice trembled, and he didn't dare to look the man in the eye.

"If you're not a hunter, how dare you set traps to hunt without permission? Don't you know that's illegal?" The scarred man didn't seem to be in a hurry to ask about the whereabouts of the lost item, but instead said some irrelevant things.

Huiming remained silent for a few seconds, perhaps knowing he wouldn't survive under their control. His despair was tempered with a newfound toughness: "If you're about to die, are you afraid of breaking the law?"

A strange smile appeared on the scarred man's hard face: "Yeah, if we can't even survive, what's there to fear about the law?"

Before he finished speaking, he casually pulled and untied the ropes binding Huiming.

Then, he pulled a small bag of hard, dried meat from his pocket and tossed it in front of Huiming: "I lost a wakizashi (a type of Japanese sword), the scabbard is engraved with Chinese characters. Have you seen it before?"

Nobi knew very well that revealing the truth would not end well, but given Huiming's current personality and perspective, he was more likely to tell the truth based on the actual history.

"Wakizashi? Is that the sword Yasuke just used?" Nobita prompted in this way.

Upon recalling Yasuke, a fierce hatred instantly ignited in Huiming's eyes: "I've seen him! He was picked up by someone named Yasuke! He's from Little Stone Village, taller than me, very strong, and has a dark face!"

The scarred man nodded slowly, without asking any further questions: "Let's go to Little Stone Village."

Nobita could already foresee how the story would unfold: either Mom would die or be captured.

The bandits rose in a chaotic commotion, none daring to disobey the scarred man's orders, and quickly disappeared into the forest.

On the snow, only the bag of dried meat and the rabbit tied up in the trap remained.

Huiming seemed to wake from a dream, staring incredulously at the jerky and rabbit in his hands.

The bandits not only released him, but also gave him a reward? He eagerly grabbed a piece of dried meat and tore it apart with all his might.

The jerky was as hard as wood, with a strong salty and smoky flavor. But the long-lost meaty taste stimulated his taste buds, causing his saliva to flow wildly, prompting him to chew greedily.

He struggled to stand up, wanting to run home with his spoils, but his legs gave way and he fell heavily back onto the snow.

Extreme hunger and fright had drained him of his strength. He could only sit slumped in the snow, struggling to eat the jerky bit by bit with the cold snowflakes.

Half an hour later, he finally mustered up some strength, picked up the rabbit, tied the remaining jerky tightly to his chest, and staggered toward the village.

Sure enough, just as they were about to return to the village, the classic scene unfolded—several thick black plumes of smoke rose into the distant sky.

Oh no! The village!

Huiming's heart clenched suddenly. He rushed out of the woods and saw several burning houses.

Those are the houses of the Yasuke family, the Matsujiro family, and their uncles!

Fortunately, it's not the worst-case scenario.

No, he couldn't be so sure yet. He quietly walked toward where the crowd was gathering.

In the open space in the center of the village.

The scarred man stood like a demon, a thick wooden stick deeply embedded in the snow, the top of which was the head of Yasuke, Matsujiro, and their family, their frozen expressions twisted with extreme fear and pain.

The scarred man was carefully wiping the wakizashi he had lost and then found again with a cloth.

His men were brutally binding young village women one by one, their ropes tying them together. Most of the other villagers were forced to kneel on the cold snow, shivering and weeping as they watched their loved ones being abducted, yet no one dared to resist.

Huiming's gaze swept quickly through the crowd, but he didn't spot his mother, which secretly relieved him.

"Child, come here."

The scarred man noticed Huiming, and a strange smile appeared on his face.

Huiming dared not disobey his orders, so he could only grit his teeth and walk shakily to the other party.

"Your information is accurate; this is your reward." The scarred man actually took out a silver coin and gestured to hand it to Huiming.

【.】

In an instant, there was deathly silence.

Countless gazes converged, and the villagers who had lost their property and family members instantly fixed their eyes on Huiming like needles, their eyes filled with boundless hatred!

Huiming felt his scalp explode and his blood freeze. He knew he was finished, completely finished!

"What, you think it's not enough?" The man's tone turned sinister.

Huiming shook his head blankly, and just as he was about to take it, the other party flipped his wrist and put it away again.

"If you think it's too little, then forget it. Everyone, take our goods and go home!"

The bandits erupted in a boisterous cheer, tightened the ropes binding the weeping women, and laughed as they rode away.

On the snow, only the wooden stick riddled with human heads remained, along with a group of villagers who had lost their loved ones and whose eyes were filled with blood-red hatred.

They slowly rose from the snow, their fists clenched, their bloodshot eyes fixed on Huiming's lonely figure, filled with a deep-seated hatred that wished they could devour him alive.

"No, it's not my fault, it's Misuke's fault," Huiming murmured incoherently, his voice so weak that even he couldn't hear it clearly.

Nobita quickly gave the order: "If we stay here any longer, we'll definitely die! Get out of here! We have to get out!"

Huiming's eyes cleared a bit, and he dropped the rabbit in his hand, turned around and ran away.

"kill him!"

"That damned bastard! Pay for my child's life!!"

The villagers' roars were like a flood bursting its banks! The surging crowd picked up whatever they could wave on the ground and frantically chased after Huiming's fleeing figure.

Thank you to "地祸" for the donation.

Chapter 211: Human Lives Are Like Firewood

Having paid the price of several lives, Nobita roughly figured out how the villagers were pursuing him.

And clues for escape.

I remember there was a small hole over there!

A thought suddenly occurred to Huiming.

Nobi quickly slid over, taking advantage of the villagers' anger and inattention to the flaw in the snow tracks, allowing Kumei to hide in the small, barely large hole in the slope.

Before long, shouts of fighting swept past them, almost within reach, but they couldn't find the small hole on the slope. Moreover, they had completely obscured the footprints in the snow, covering the narrow opening with a layer of snow, making it even harder to find later.