Chapter 1-3
Xuan did not say much to Heng’s request. He brought out the Na ring and WangXia activated it with Qi. The golden book was taken out. This was the single most important item in the realm. The only item that could revive players.
No one talked much afterward while they finished their food. It appeared that they did not want to take part in Heng’s private matter. Heng also returned with grateful looks then opened the door and walked out by himself.
(Is it time to revive her? Is it finally the team? For real this time?)
Various thoughts were flying through his mind. This short distance to the center of the platform took him three minutes to get there. Before he realized it, he was right under the sphere. Heng hesitated. With the Book of Amun-Ra in his hand, he spaced out as he stared at the sphere.
(Am I… prepared to face her?)
Pah! Heng slapped his face with both hands. The hesitation and look of lost disappeared from his eyes and resolute took their place.
(Yes! I am prepared! If it’s her… I am prepared even if death awaits.)
Heng raised the Book of Amun-Ra over his head and said, “God, revive Min YanWei!”
Her memories and past flooded into Heng’s mind.
By the time he witnessed all of them, tears had drowned his face, sadness, pain, despair, and death of the heart drown him. He knew she was going through immense pain but when he finally experienced the pain, it was beyond what he could handle. For the moment, he felt those people he killed died too fast. He wished he could put them through eternal pain.
Yet, beyond the pain of the experience was the sight of him running away… It struck her soul into an abyss.
Heng wiped the tears off his face. He looked at the beautiful woman whom he could never forget the rest of his life, the woman he had let down, the woman he loved so dearly, the woman whom at every second proved his cowardice and weakness… But his love was real.
(Courage… did I forget my courage? The courage to live on, the courage to carry out my faith, the courage to never be a coward again, the courage to fight for a future.)
Heng took a deep breath. He walked over to YanWei and embraced her.
She seemed to be sleeping insecurely. When Heng touched her, she woke up with a shock. Through the blur on her eyes, she looked at Heng.
“Heng… is that you? Did you come to hell with me?” YanWei uttered, still half awake. Then she laughed drearily. “That’s right. I will be too lonely in hell by myself. Let’s go down together. And then you will suffer with me for eternity.”
Heng kept her in his arms for a while before he spoke. “No. I suddenly want to live. Even though living is painful but I can only mend my wrongs when I am alive. I can only take the punishment when I am alive. Death is forgiveness without punishment. This… isn’t fair to you.”
YanWei opened her eyes wide and looked at Heng in disbelief. Five seconds later, she reached for her forehead and heart. When she finally realized she was alive, she bit his shoulder. Tears rolled down her face and blood dripped off her teeth and lips. YanWei growled like a beast. Tear and blood flowed down Heng’s arm and mixed together.
“I know the word sorry is useless. And I don’t want to say sorry. Please let me go with you to any place, whether it be hell, inferno or anywhere in the future. Can I?” Heng did not move his arm away. His other hand stroke her hair.
YanWei tore a piece of flesh off Heng’s arm then went for his neck. It looked as though she would bite off his neck. Heng lightly stopped her and spoke word by word. “I have said it. I will go with you to anywhere. If you want me to die and go to hell together, I will die in front of you right now. Then we will never separate… Do you want me to die?”
YanWei’s looked at him with hatred and said in a deep voice. “Yes! We will die together!”
Heng took out an enchanted arrow without hesitation. He pointed the arrow at his eyes and placed the other end on YanWei’s hand. “My life is yours, YanWei… I want to live on. I want to stay with you. Everything is gone when you die. There won’t be pain but there won’t be happiness either… Even though I don’t know if I can give you happiness in our future.” He closed his eyes.
YanWei’s hand trembled after she grabbed the arrow. The arrow slowly inched toward Heng and stopped when it nearly touched his eyelid.
She cried with in a harsh tone, “Why should I believe you? Die, let’s die together. It will be all gone after we die. Why should I believe you… Leave, get away from me!” She stabbed the arrow into Heng’s shoulder and pushed herself out from his arms.
YanWei laughed brilliantly with tears on her face and blood on her mouth. “I will watch you. I will watch you die in front of me. I won’t take your life with my hands. I want to watch you get trampled on and killed. I won’t ever forgive you. This hatred will follow you to hell!”
Heng quietly pulled the arrow out from his shoulder. Blood splashed out but he did not even look at the wound. “I have to courage to face you. I won’t be afraid anymore. This is God’s dimension. You died in The Grudge and I used this Book of Amun-Ra to revive you. Right now, you have to…”
“Choose a room right?” YanWei wiped the tear and blood from her face. “I don’t need you to remind me. Lan has already told me about this place. Don’t worry. I won’t die before you die. I was too stupid to seek death by myself. I now know that I should watch you die miserably before I can go in peace. I won’t die before I see it!”
Heng sat down and stared at her until she entered an empty room. The door shut close with a bang. He finally gave a bitter smile. Yet, no matter how bitter it tasted, it was still a smile.
The team came to the platform the next morning. Every sat there and waited for Xuan. No one knew why he was late but given how much they knew of him, there was definitely a reason. This man was most likely doing the preparations for The Mummy.
An hour passed. Xuan finally came out of his room looking exhausted. The horse mounted Magic Cannon wasn’t with him.
“Uh…” ChengXiao searched around. “Where did you hide the Magic Cannon? Didn’t you say you are going to blow up the Japanese with it? Did you change your mind?”
Xuan didn’t even glance at him and said, “The Magic Cannon is a lifeless weapon. The Nightmare is also just a transportation tool and not creature. So we can put it into the dimensional bag. Everyone hold your hands together. Take the hands of those asleep also. We must make sure they enter at the same time as us.”
Xuan had told them to bring the sleeping members to the platform in advance. No one knew what it was for but they did it given their trust in him. But bringing these members to The Mummy?
Zero frowned. “That doesn’t sound good. They are still sleeping so they are basically defenseless. We are going into an era of war. I don’t agree with this decision.”
“Time.” Xuan squatted down and put the hands of the sleeping members together. “What they need is time. They might wake up in the next second, or day, or a dozen days or longer. A month’s time in the movie worlds is only an instant in God’s dimension. If this danger is the cost to their awakening, then they have to take this danger. The sooner they wake up, the most help the team will get. They must enter The Mummy. Furthermore, if a mission reward is given to the whole team, they will also get the rewards.”
Xuan had put the hands of those sleeping together. The rest of the team looked at each other and could see they had given up. No one had an excuse to refute his reasoning. The danger was accompanied by attractive interests. If they could a little extra careful, perhaps these members wouldn’t get hurt. Or they could leave them to the Medjai.
Finally, everyone’s hands were held together. ChengXiao expressed a face of disgust like he was holding something dirty given several men were here.
“Wait.”
A voice came from the border of the platform. YanWei walked toward the team. She ignored Heng and said to Zero and TengYi. “I want to go to that Mummy world with you. Isn’t it only an instant in this dimension no matter how many days you stay there? I want to go there too.”
Everyone except LiuYu turned to Heng. He quickly said, “You haven’t enhanced anything and have no weapons. It isn’t safe going into a movie world like this. We have to complete missions on top of reviving Zheng too. It’s going to be difficult…”
YanWei gave him a cold laugh, “I don’t value this worthless life. I just need to watch you die in battle. I will watch your death, your cowardice, you running away, your ugly side! I will watch them clearly with my eyes!”
Before Heng could reply, Xuan said, “Oh right, she was cloned into team Devil.”
Heng and ChengXiao nodded then Heng immediately realized it was bad. Xuan continued as he expected, “Then let her into The Mummy. Heng, do you have the extra points and reward?”
Heng knew this would come from Xuan. He knew only of interest and the team surviving. Unfortunately, YanWei’s potential was acknowledged by God when she was cloned into team Devil. Xuan wouldn’t let such a good piece get away.
“No!” Heng refused. “This is the only thing I can’t agree to. She hasn’t received any enhancements and has no weapons. She can’t fight even if I get her a weapon right now. So I can’t agree with her entering The Mummy!”
Xuan shook his head. “You should think it through. Are the movie worlds more dangerous or a near modern China that we are prepared for? Instead of putting her straight into the next movie world, it’s better for her to familiarize the dangers in The Mummy. Furthermore, you can protect her. This is perhaps the best practice she can get.”
Heng hesitated while YanWei sneered at him. He gritted his teeth and said, “I have the extra points and reward… but if it gets dangerous, I hope you can help me take care of her… Please. Given how much I have done for the team.”
YanWei finally became part of the team heading to The Mummy. Heng exchanged a rank C bow named Kamis. It was an upgradable bow that started at rank C and could end up at SS.
Everyone spent their points and rewards and carried the sleeping members into The Mummy.
“It looks off every time I see this place.” ChengXiao exclaimed and then he was dumbfounded. This sight was different from the Cairo that he knew of.
The city was devastated. Houses were destroyed as if they had been bombed. The walls were pitch black. Houses still standing in whole could be counted easily. Craters were left on the ground.
The team entered through that same inn. However, nothing else was the same anymore. The inn looked broken. A piece was missing from the roof. This place looked like a battlefield.
“Uh. Has the year reached 1940 already?” Xuan murmured. “It’s about the height of the second world war. Egypt is one of the major battlefields. No place in the country is safe, especially Cairo.” He turned to the other members. “Do you really want to leave them here?”
ChengXiao said in a low voice, “Why do I have a feeling that he’s taking pleasure at this?”
The others smiled bitterly. The team headed toward the museum as usual. However, as soon as they stepped onto the street, a group of troops walked by. They quickly slipped into an alley or it would have been troublesome being seen by the troops. They had no identity after all. The only other way to avoid getting imprisoned into concentration camps was to kill the troops, and maybe all the troops in this city, and then get air bombed.
“Looks like we can’t go to the museum.” Zero looked down from a building and said to the others.
After a brief discussion, the team felt it wasn’t necessary to go to the museum. Their goal was Hamunaptra. So Xuan brought out four Sky Sticks. With two people on each one, they flew toward Hamunaptra.
No jets or planes during World War II could catch up to the speed of the Sky Sticks nor even detect them. The flight was peaceful. The only thing worth mentioning was YanWei rejected Heng’s invitation and went with Xuan.
“Okay, don’t look so down.” ChengXiao comforted Heng. “I don’t know how good you are with women but your look is okay. She probably loves you very deeply given how much she hates you. Be persistent and victory will be yours… By the way, Xuan’s sexually apathetic. I suggest you think of him as asexual. Then you wouldn’t feel losing anything from her being with him.”
Everyone let out a sigh of relief as they neared Hamunaptra. The city of the dead was preserved almost the same as the last time they came. The outside world couldn’t so easily find this place in the desert.
To their surprise, Ardeth was also in the military base settled neared the city. Their base was no longer a field of tents. The Medjais had built a major military base using the gold they had and surrounded Hamunptra in the center. Over fifty thousand people receiving training here. Tanks and rifles were abundant. There were even seventy fighter jets. This army was a force to be reckoned with in Egypt.
“It’s been a long time.” Ardeth sighed with emotions when he learned that they were here to revive Zheng. He led the team to the altar and thanked them for their help on the way. With the war that was going on, independence for Egypt was no longer a dream.
“Jonathan sent us several letters. He wants me to hand you the letters when you come. It seems to be able a tomb in the east. The Chinese government and a few other countries are involved. The case is a little complicated. He also mailed a little piece of stone saying it was what the powers are fighting for. I will let you take a look after we return.” Ardeth said.
The team recognized it must be a lead for a bonus mission related to China in the 1940s.
Though the most important thing was whether Zheng could revive. Everyone’s hearts tensed up when Xuan brought out the Book of Amun-Ra.
A beam of light appeared on the altar. As it faded away, Zheng was lying there. Everyone let out a sigh of relief.
Zheng opened his eyes but didn’t get up. He put his hands in front of his eyes then said, “I am back, my comrades… I can rival my clone. I have to power to carry out my beliefs.”