Four Split Personalities

"Ah, what could it be?"

Beo chuckled softly, walked past Cliff at an unhurried pace, and said lazily, "From a personal standpoint, I actually didn’t want to make this trip at all, and I don’t want to give you people even half a piece of advice, so—"

"..."

"If I’m here, then it can only be to perform official duties, right?"

Leaving those words behind, Beo Lucanus’s figure vanished from the office area, as if he had never appeared in the first place.

Rabinsky Cliff, however, collapsed into his chair and only after a long time did he straighten up with difficulty, as if he had suddenly aged more than ten years. He pulled a specially made quill from his space pouch, dipped it in the blood at the corner of his mouth...

...

Ten minutes later

Game Time PM13:27

Academy City outer ring, [Serene] Water Bar

"So I really got caught, huh..."

Beo Lucanus, who a moment ago still had an extremely high fashion score, let out a deep sigh, picked up this shop’s signature drink and took a sip, then asked with a wry smile to the girl who had appeared in front of him just a second prior, "You... what exactly is your goal?"

"No comment."

The petite, fair-skinned girl replied with a blank face, then whispered something under her breath. The next second, a drink identical to the one in Beo’s hand appeared in front of her as well.

"Uh, miss..."

Beo shrank his neck a little and lowered his voice. "You’re not planning to make a move in a place like this, are you? That wouldn’t really be appropriate, right?"

"Unnecessary concern."

Ming Shen of the Love to Gossip Team—who was also the girl that had all but killed Beo with every trick she had, only to inexplicably drop dead in the end—shook her head. Cupping the glass in a rather adorable posture, she took a sip of the drink that seemed a bit too sweet for her, and said without the slightest hint of emotion, "Right now I don’t have the permission to kill you, and any Strength outside my permissions cannot threaten you at all, Beo Lucanus."

"If you could put that in more plain, easy-to-understand language, that would honestly be perfect..."

Beo rubbed the tip of his nose awkwardly, staring with lingering fear at the girl in front of him who looked harmless to humans and animals from any angle, and said dryly, "I actually still had quite a lot I wanted to say to that professor just now."

Ming Shen looked at Beo indifferently and said calmly, "That’s your business, Beo Lucanus. I didn’t interfere with your dealings with anyone."

"Yeah, well, I’ve always been the timid, overcautious type."

Beo tugged at the corner of his mouth and shrugged. "Honestly, if you strip off that ’Third Pillar’ disguise, the guy in front of you has a pretty unlikeable personality."

"I don’t have any so-called personal preferences. I serve only ’rules.’ Past, present, or future, this shell in front of you has nothing to do with causality. It’s merely a simple symbol."

Ming Shen drained the overly sweet drink in her hand with no expression and said blandly, "At that time you broke the rules and committed an act of defiance. So at least for those brief few minutes, you were no longer under this world’s protection—and that result, in turn, raised the permissions I possessed."

Admittedly, Beo Lucanus counted as a smart person. He had more or less guessed that the girl in front of him had indeed adopted his earlier suggestion, using a ’plain and easy-to-understand’ way to explain her actions. But that explanation was still too high-level, to the point that even a Beo who had ’seen the world’ couldn’t make sense of it for the moment.

So all he could do was put on a look of "I didn’t get it, but I’m deeply shaken."

Ming Shen, for her part, didn’t seem inclined to explain further. She simply went on, as calm as a still pond: "You broke the rules, so I obtained the permissions and resources to act against you. And you held out under my attack until that ’retribution’ on you was offset. Even though it was by cheating, once your existence was re-accepted by the world, I, who failed to pull back immediately, still suffered backlash."

Beo blinked and subconsciously asked, "What kind of backlash?"

"Death."

The girl answered without thinking and pointed at herself with that soft-looking, fair little hand. "This existence called [Ming Shen] on the Innocent Continent was forcibly subjected to a non-waivable, thorough, and swift Death."

Beo had just been about to say, "You seem pretty alive to me," when he suddenly shut his mouth again, quickly thinking of another possibility.

"You’re... an Otherworlder?"

Beo took a deep breath and probed cautiously.

"Although I do indeed possess a name, a shell, a degree, and identification documents in another dimension, and on the macro level I satisfy all your natives’ assumptions about the word ’Otherworlders,’ in the strict sense I can’t be considered a ’person.’"

Ming Shen corrected him with utter seriousness, then fixed Beo with those bright yet completely emotionless eyes. "Your existence in itself is not a mistake, Beo Lucanus. If you’re willing, I can turn you back into your past self."

"Turn me back into my past self?"

Beo gave a speechless laugh, curiosity piqued. "What’s that supposed to be? A boon? Or a defection offer?"

"I don’t need anyone to surrender to me. In fact, the very fact that I’ve come into contact with this world at all is an accident."

Ming Shen shook her head and said lightly, "But a problem is still a problem. If you still cherish your own existence, you should accept my proposal. Objectively speaking, it’s a win–win deal."

Beo sighed softly, wearily pressing a hand to his forehead, and admitted with a bitter smile, "I don’t understand."

"You don’t need to understand. You only need to choose."

Ming Shen glanced at him, her expression still utterly unchanged. "I have no obligation to explain to you."

"Doesn’t seem like you’re a very good negotiator."

Beo smacked his lips, then raised a hand to snap his fingers, intending to order another drink for himself—only to notice that the waiter not far away completely ignored him and gave no response.

He instantly guessed that the few square meters around him and Ming Shen had probably been sealed off by some kind of ’Strength within permissions.’

"Information rewriting, the most basic method of permission application. It’s the same principle as the ability you were previously given to erase other people’s memories."

Ming Shen said this softly, apparently not minding giving Beo a bit of a crash course within a certain range.

"Yeah, I’d more or less guessed that the Strength Domination granted me was pretty powerful."

Beo muttered lazily, then a flash of realization flickered through his eyes. "Oh-ho, so that’s how it is. That so-called ’information rewriting’ is probably the core reason you saw me as an ’error’ that day, right?"

Ming Shen didn’t answer his question. She merely narrowed her eyes for once in a rare show of humanity. "So, you’re not planning to accept my proposal?"

"Why me?"

Beo likewise didn’t respond directly. He only asked curiously, "As far as I know, there should be quite a few people like me, right? Or have you already approached them?"

Ming Shen shook her head slightly. "You’re the only one who meets the conditions."

"What conditions?"

"An innate tendency toward chaos keeps you from blind reverence—even for an existence like me."

"That really is... sorry to disappoint you."

"That’s your answer?"

"As a matter of fact, I used to have a chance to choose, and what I have now happens to be exactly what I wanted."

"Understood. Then I’ll offer you a piece of advice here—"

"Advice?"

"You’d best remain forever as lacking in reverence toward everything as you are now. Also, don’t touch Strength that you can’t control, or even aren’t qualified to comprehend."

"And the reason?"

"I don’t like erasing Life."

"Heh... don’t like erasing Life, huh..."

Beo suddenly laughed and asked, "Would a mere symbol have its own likes and dislikes?"

"A meaningless conversation."

As that sentence brushed past Beo’s ears, the girl’s figure vanished from the air in the very same instant, leaving with no trace, just as abruptly as she had appeared here a few minutes earlier.

Chapter 1195: End

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!