Chapter 21: We Never Broke Up
Dong Li turned his head and saw cracks spreading across the sword-aura barrier beside him, like glass on the verge of shattering.
He reached out and touched it.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew it belonged to Lufiel.
But being back in the Fuling Region—especially here, in the rear mountains where they had once agreed to meet—put him in a terrible mood.
Dong Li wanted to leave.
So he simply raised his little medicine furnace and smashed it against the barrier.
After several hits, the barrier really did shatter.
Dong Li immediately tried to slip away.
Unfortunately, he had barely made it two steps before another wall of sword aura appeared in front of him.
This one was even stronger.
The golden light of the sword aura was dense and brilliant, threaded through with wisps of red mist.
His medicine furnace couldn’t break it anymore.
Pushing didn’t work either.
Dong Li turned around and found Lufiel standing right in front of him.
He frowned unhappily.
“Let me out!”
Lufiel ignored the demand.
Instead, he asked softly, “Why do you want to break up?”
The Illusion Snake’s illusion automatically selected a target.
Dong Li had been chosen and pulled inside, while Lufiel had entered voluntarily after him.
That meant this illusion had been created around Dong Li.
They were now inside another layer of virtual space within the game world.
For the moment, everything happening outside could be ignored.
Lufiel lowered his eyes.
Layer after layer of sword aura reinforced the barrier, trapping Dong Li firmly in place.
But at his question, confusion flickered across Dong Li’s face.
He looked a little aggrieved too.
Slowly, he said, “You were the one who wanted to break up with me…”
Lufiel frowned.
“I didn’t.”
Only then did he finally realize something was wrong.
They weren’t talking about the same thing at all.
Could it be that after the closed beta ended, the game reset their data and dissolved their partnership, so Dong Li had assumed—
Suddenly, the ground beneath them shook violently.
The illusion began to “compress.”
Lufiel’s mental power was restricted here, and the shockwave scattered the sword-aura barrier.
He immediately turned and pulled Dong Li into his arms, shielding him.
The earthquake stopped just as quickly as it had begun.
But the disturbance seemed to awaken another piece of Dong Li’s memory.
He stood dazed for a moment.
Then abruptly pushed Lufiel away and ran in another direction.
“Yuanbao! Yuanbao!”
Lufiel followed immediately.
Dong Li hurried through the forest, retracing a route from memory as he tried to reach the cave where he had once taken Yuanbao away.
But before they could get far, a second earthquake struck.
This one was even more violent than the first.
The entire mountain seemed ready to collapse.
Dong Li finally got scared.
He instinctively ducked behind Lufiel and clenched the back of his robe in his fingers.
“Don’t be afraid,” Lufiel said quietly.
The Illusion Snake’s illusion could trap people inside, but as long as they remained clear-headed, it wasn’t particularly dangerous.
Sure enough, the shaking soon stopped again.
Dong Li looked up.
The scenery around them had changed.
The original forest looked as though someone had cut it cleanly in half.
One side now connected directly to a flat stretch of land at the foot of the mountain, creating a bizarre, impossible landscape.
Yet instead of being frightened, Dong Li looked curious.
He cautiously walked forward.
He remembered this place.
It was another part of the Fuling Region—the upper residential district, where only some of the stronger snake spirits were allowed to enter.
There were no little alchemy huts here.
No courtyards covered in drying medicinal herbs.
The sunlight was still beautiful, and across from several houses lay a lovely little lake.
Dong Li’s violet eyes lit up.
He wanted to go see it.
Lufiel hesitated.
Seeing that Dong Li was clearly under the illusion’s influence, he chose not to forcibly stop him.
He simply followed behind.
—
Elsewhere inside the illusion—
Rongrong shook out its fur and warily surveyed its surroundings.
Yuanbao and Heidan were beside it.
Yuanbao anxiously looked around, trying to figure out where Dong Li had gone.
Heidan was even more nervous.
It had discovered that its demonic power was restricted here.
It couldn’t seem to transform into its giant form anymore.
That realization unsettled it enough that it pressed close to Yuanbao and shuffled along beside it.
Then the sound of fighting came from somewhere in the distance.
It was loud.
Rongrong gave a soft “mm,” signaling for the two little beasts to stay close.
Then it quietly crept toward the noise to investigate.
When they got near, they saw a gigantic python attacking several players.
Most players knew how the Illusion Snake’s abilities worked, so they hadn’t been mentally confused.
And while the enormous python looked intimidating, it wasn’t particularly agile.
It was steadily losing ground.
Rongrong watched for a while.
The python was about to be defeated.
The little fox lifted violet eyes identical to Dong Li’s, studying the giant snake and then the players surrounding it.
Perhaps it thought the fight was entertaining and didn’t want it to end so soon.
Rongrong casually spat out a tiny ball of golden fire.
The flame streaked through the air and merged directly into the python’s body.
The next second—the giant snake’s vertical pupils snapped open.
Its strength instantly returned to its peak.
It lunged forward and bit one of the players.
“Holy shit!” the player yelled. “Why won’t this thing die?!”
Not far away, Rongrong secretly wagged the tip of its tail.
—
Dong Li was too far from his spirit form to sense what was happening on the other side.
At that moment, he was sitting beside the lake.
He turned around and complained unhappily,
“Stop following me! We already broke up!”
The illusion had muddled Dong Li’s memories and left his thoughts hazy.
He was far from fully conscious.
But even like this, one thing remained clear in his head—
Lufiel was his ex-boyfriend.
They had broken up a long time ago.
Lufiel stood off to one side, half-shrouded by the shade of a tree.
He lowered his eyes and said, each word distinct,
“We did not break up.”
Dong Li didn’t really want to listen to him.
Just then, the illusion shifted again.
The lake in front of them rapidly vanished as though the tide were receding.
The ground split into several separate sections, cracking and sinking one after another.
The shoreline suddenly became a high ledge.
Dong Li hugged his little medicine furnace tightly and looked down.
Lufiel had already landed below.
He reached up toward him.
“Rongrong,” he called. “Come here.”
Dong Li was still hesitating when several heavy bangs sounded in the distance.
He turned his head.
A giant python made entirely of stone was winding its way toward them.
Its rigid eyes searched constantly for prey.
Dong Li’s eyes widened.
He immediately jumped down from the ledge.
Lufiel caught him securely.
Then he guided Dong Li over the uneven terrain until they reached the shelter of a broken tree trunk.
The stone python continued roaming nearby.
Its head alone was at least two meters thick.
It looked terrifying.
Dong Li was a little frightened.
“What is that?” he whispered.
Lufiel was right beside him.
“A puppet created by the Illusion Snake’s illusion. As long as we stay hidden, it won’t find us.”
The puppet snake’s senses were dull.
And unless absolutely necessary, fighting it was best avoided.
Using too much mental power against it would only feed more energy into the Illusion Snake’s illusion.
Dong Li half understood.
“Oh.”
Then he couldn’t resist lifting his head to sneak a look outside.
The two of them were nearly pressed together.
Lufiel could easily pull Dong Li fully into his arms just by reaching out.
The sudden appearance of the giant snake had also made Dong Li stop resisting his closeness.
Lufiel watched him quietly.
His dark gaze was unusually intent.
“Rongrong,” he suddenly said softly, “I would never break up with you.”
Dong Li was caught completely off guard.
He froze for a long moment.
Then he said nothing and lowered his eyes, unconsciously tightening his fingers together.
Lufiel waited patiently, watching Dong Li’s thick lashes tremble.
The noise outside gradually faded.
The giant snake seemed to have moved elsewhere.
Only then did Dong Li finally speak.
“Then why…” His voice was very small. “Why didn’t you come find me?”
Lufiel frowned deeply.
“What?”
“Why didn’t you come back for me?” Dong Li still wouldn’t look up. His words sounded almost like he was talking to himself. “I waited for you for so long. I waited every day…”
Lufiel’s expression changed.
For once, genuine shock appeared on his face.
He had considered countless explanations.
That the system had altered Dong Li’s memories.
That the reset had dissolved their partnership.
He had even spent time thinking about how he would win Dong Li back.
But it had never occurred to him that while he had been waiting for Dong Li to wake up—
Dong Li had been waiting for him too.
Dong Li continued quietly,
“You never came, so I thought you didn’t like me anymore. I thought you wanted to break up with me…”
He no longer remembered how many days he had waited before finally accepting that conclusion.
Yet now Lufiel was telling him they had never broken up.
Dong Li’s thoughts were a mess.
He vaguely remembered Lufiel saying that this place was an illusion.
That none of it was real.
Then maybe…the Lufiel standing in front of him was fake too.
Because they had already—
“Rongrong,” Lufiel said, interrupting his thoughts. “I was waiting for you too.”
Dong Li looked up in confusion.
The corners of his eyes had turned red.
His violet eyes shimmered with tears as he asked softly, “What do you mean…?”
Seeing how hurt he looked made Lufiel’s throat tighten.
At that moment, the puppet python returned.
Apparently it had discovered something in the distance and began roaring as it attacked.
The sudden crash made Dong Li flinch.
His lashes trembled.
“Rongrong, don’t be afraid.”
Lufiel extended a hand to him, his voice low and soothing.
It was the same gesture Lufiel used back when they were dating whenever he wanted to hold Dong Li.
At the time, Dong Li had always thought his boyfriend was terribly reserved.
Even when he wanted a hug, all he did was hold out his hand like this.
Dong Li stared at him.
After hesitating for a moment, he finally leaned forward and slipped into Lufiel’s arms, wrapping both arms tightly around his waist.
Lufiel raised a hand and gently stroked Dong Li’s golden hair, carefully keeping within the limits of the system warnings.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “It was my fault.”
Of course he remembered their promise.
But the day after he and Dong Li parted, the closed beta ended without warning.
Players could no longer enter the game.
By the time Lufiel was finally able to log in again, Dong Li had become an NPC with the lowest possible freedom.
He no longer responded to Lufiel at all.
And after they reunited this time, Dong Li had already left the Fuling Region.
Lufiel had failed to realize what that meant.
“Rongrong, I never left you,” Lufiel tried to explain. “I went to the Fuling Region every day. But you were asleep then. You couldn’t see me.”
He didn’t know whether Dong Li could understand.
Under the game’s restrictions, NPCs simply ignored anything beyond the boundaries of their programmed awareness.
Dong Li rubbed his face lightly against Lufiel’s neck.
Then he looked up again.
His expression remained confused, but he was clearly trying hard to understand.
Lufiel brushed his thumb gently beneath Dong Li’s eye, wiping away the tiny tear clinging to his lashes.
“So we never broke up.”
The noise outside grew louder.
Another earthquake began.
This time, the illusion contracted with far greater force, as if it were about to collapse entirely.
Lufiel released another barrier of sword aura to block the rocks falling around them.
—
Elsewhere, Rongrong was having the time of its life.
It wandered around the illusion with Yuanbao and Heidan and came across two or three more giant pythons.
Rongrong gave every single one a little burst of golden fire.
With the golden flames empowering them, the pythons’ combat strength multiplied several times over.
Quite a few players died because of it.
One of the smarter giant snakes even approached Rongrong on its own and lowered its head submissively in greeting.
But the fighting had grown too intense.
It was affecting the illusion itself.
Sensing that more than half the players inside had died, the Illusion Snake finally withdrew its illusion.
—
On Dong Li’s side, he was still protected in Lufiel’s arms when his vision suddenly went black again.
When he reopened his eyes—he was back in the beast arena.
Dong Li got to his feet.
He found himself standing in the open space at the very bottom of the arena.
Thick multicolored smoke still filled the area, obscuring his vision.
Rongrong was back in his arms.
Heidan and Yuanbao were there too, waking one after another.
Then Lufiel emerged from the smoke.
“Rongrong.”
As usual, he immediately moved to shield Dong Li at his side.
“Stay with me. We’re leaving.”
Dong Li stared at him blankly for a moment.
He remembered everything that had happened inside the illusion.
Lufiel had said…
Dong Li didn’t fully understand.
He was still confused.
But when he looked at the hand Lufiel held out to him, he hesitated for only a moment before placing his own hand in it.
Author’s Note:
Dong Li: (T ^ T) Hmph. I’ll let you hold my hand for now.
