That night, I went to the convenience store at the entrance of the residential complex and bought some alcohol. I’ve never had a high tolerance, and right then, I desperately needed the alcohol to numb myself. Getting drunk is actually quite painful and not at all comfortable, but at least it keeps you from being sober. There are some things that a sober mind simply cannot endure. Liu Wukong had never mistreated me; he gave me everything a lover should give, even performing beyond human standards—after all, he was far more powerful than any mortal. But if there was no emotion behind any of it, then our entire past took on a completely different flavor.
Looking back, he still protected me, cared for me, coaxed me into being happy, and stayed close to me... yet it felt like something had fundamentally changed. I had considered just closing my eyes to it all, staying here obediently, and continuing our lives together once he felt the time was right. But in the next heartbeat, a voice deep inside me would say: *No.* I didn’t know why I was being so difficult. I clearly loved him.
Eventually, I gave up on thinking altogether. It was too painful, and I wasn't smart enough to see past it or figure it out. I crouched by the bathroom sink, drinking and crying, wishing I could ask Old Liu if it was all true, yet terrified that if he came, he wouldn't even know how to lie. He couldn't lie; he was the essence of truth, but he could hide. Now, I could no longer feign ignorance.
I sat there hunched over, drunk and hungry, drinking until I was on the verge of passing out, when I finally saw him in the mirror. He looked just as wretched as I did, likely because we were reflections of one another. He looked at me, just as he always did—quietly, appearing almost sorrowful.
"Liu Wukong."
He gave a soft "mm."
"You've kept me locked in here for two days, and you still haven't come back."
He said he was sorry. He said, *Little one, I’ll come get you once I’ve finished my business.*
"Is there some great matter you can't discuss with me? You're always like this."
He shifted uneasily, moving his weight from his left foot to his right, and said with certainty, "I have not abandoned you."
The alcohol I’d consumed turned into a torrent of tears. I crouched closer to the mirror. "Liu Wukong..."
He hummed in response and obediently pressed his hand against the glass, aligning it with mine. The glass was cold and hard.
"You aren't allowed to lie."
He froze for a moment, then asked me not to go any further.
I cut him off. "Just shake or nod your head."
He stood there with a stiff neck, and finally, he gave a faint nod.
"Did you... give all your useless emotions to me?"
I was leaning too close; the mirror fogged up, gradually obscuring his features. But I saw it clearly—he gave a nearly imperceptible nod.
He wanted to say more: "But..."
I shook my head. It was beyond saving. To me, Liu Wukong was the entire world plus the entire world's future, but now that entire world had shattered in the time it took for him to nod. There was no tomorrow left to look forward to. He was truly a bully, making me realize I was just leaning against a mirror, dreaming a drunken dream. I had experienced too many beautiful dreams; waking up was exceptionally hollow, and once awake, I couldn't pretend to be asleep anymore. I truly didn't know what to do.
While I was dazed, Liu Wukong crouched on the other side of the wall, softly tapping the glass and calling me, *Little one.*
I ignored him and prepared to leave. As I walked out of the bathroom and closed the door, I saw Liu Wukong pressed against the other side of the mirror, whispering, "Little one, I will wait for you behind all things in this world."
I cried even harder. *Don't wait for me, you bastard.* I thought you just had a low EQ, but it turns out you don't even have an 'E'. I used to think that no matter how low your EQ was, I could teach you slowly, but now there was no way... I couldn't even imagine how Liu Wukong viewed me. *This is my spouse, so I must accept him no matter how stupid he is and treat him well?*
I lay in bed for half the night, my head throbbing with wild thoughts. When I woke up, it was another repeating day, but I no longer intended to go to school. I hastily packed a few clothes, planning to head to the train station. Even if I was forever stuck in a certain day from the past, the world was big enough; I planned to go out, see the sights, and clear my head.
However, when I opened the front door, I saw Liu Xiaoyu.
That brat was wearing the green crocodile hoodie I’d put on him two days ago before he vanished. His little backpack was dragging on the ground, and he was filthy from head to toe, as if he’d been fighting someone in a mud pit. Normally, I would have scolded him, but now I was rushing off on a spontaneous trip to forget that heartless—yet not unfaithful—ex-husband whom I had no idea how to handle. For a moment, I didn't know what to do with the boy. But Liu Xiaoyu took an inch and wanted a mile. He actually lunged at me and started hitting me! He didn't even reach my waist, but he reached out and punched me right in the crotch! Then he kicked my shins! I quickly grabbed both his hands. "What are you doing? Liu Xiaoyu, what do you think you're doing?"
"You're bad!" he gritted out, trying to bite my hand. "You made Daddy sad!"
*Bullshit, he doesn't even have a heart! None! His heart is right here with me, you little brat! Also, I'm your mother, okay!* I decisively dropped my backpack, hauled him over my knee, pulled down his pants, and gave him a good spanking. Once I was done, I turned to leave. Liu Xiaoyu cried the whole way, cursing and telling me to get lost, saying the five of them were a happy family. In the end, he clutched the hem of my shirt and followed me onto the train. I found it bizarre. "What exactly did you come here for?"
Liu Xiaoyu started spewing profanities again. From his ten-minute-long tirade, I managed to extract one useful piece of information: "Daddy told me to come protect you."
Protect my ass. He already had me locked in a mirror world; wasn't that hidden deep enough?
While Liu Xiaoyu was cursing me, the food cart rolled by. His eyes went straight to the instant noodles, and he gulped. I bought him a cup of noodles and one of those five-yuan coffees that only filled half a paper cup. Liu Xiaoyu huffed twice. "Even if you bribe me, I won't be nice to you."
I found it strange and ruffled his hair. "Why have you been at odds with me since the moment you were born?"
Liu Xiaoyu started crying. "You actually wanted to abort us! You didn't want us! To prove we were good kids, Big Brother came up with the idea for everyone to try their best to form a human face, thinking you'd like it! But you still wanted to abort us! I don't want to be your son anymore, I don't!" As he spoke, he buried his face in my arms and wailed. His younger brother also timidly walked over, leaning against the shadow of my legs. I felt pressure on my right ankle, as if a child were sitting there. Following Jin Mu's method, I broke off a piece of instant noodle and held it near the shadow's hand. He paused, then joyfully took it, rubbing against me after he finished eating.
I absentmindedly comforted Liu Xiaoyu while staring out the window. Outside, it was a cloudy day without rain. The high-speed train passed through the countryside; green farmlands were dotted with small rural buildings, narrow streams, and flocks of chickens and ducks. Everything was so vivid. Passing through cities, I saw small roads with cars coming and going, uniquely shaped streetlights, and power lines crisscrossing above them. At the station stops, many strangers with their own stories boarded and disembarked with their suitcases, crossing paths on the platform only to never be seen again. Thunder began to rumble in the sky. I found it a bit strange; the previous repeating days had all been sunny. Why was it starting to rain today...
With a *bang*, someone suddenly slid open the door to our carriage and rushed in, his face and head covered in blood. I was startled, but he looked relieved. "Thank God you're okay..."
I stood up. "Big Brother, what happened to you?!"
My eldest son scooped up Xiaoyu and pulled me toward the exit. "We can't stay here anymore. This boundary is very fragile. I have to get you to a safe place before it completely shatters."
WTF!
"What do you mean? Was I locked in this boundary because it's unsafe outside?"
He gave a bitter laugh. "You won't want to see what's outside."
I really couldn't take it anymore. "Why is he playing such clumsy games again? If it's dangerous outside, then just tell me! Even if he's worried and wants to lie to me... at least don't make every day a repeat of the last. It's too easy to see through!"
As soon as the words left my mouth, the eldest son's grip on my hand tightened. He turned back and looked at me sternly, his lips pressed thin. Just when I thought he was going to say something harsh, he lowered his head and whispered, "Can't you feel it? He is so weak he can't even pass through the boundary he set himself. Yesterday, I detected traces of other gods passing through. Fortunately, you're unharmed."
His words left me feeling flustered and anxious. "That was just Jin Mu, it's fine. What happened to your father?"
"Jin Mu?" The eldest son stopped in his tracks. "What was he doing here?"
I flushed. "I asked him to help me leave this place. He sympathized with my situation but couldn't help me. In the end, he asked me for a drop of heart's blood to give a soul to his sculpture."
With a *thud*, the eldest son dropped the third son onto the floor. His entire body began to tremble.
"Jin Mu has been fighting alongside us for the past few days! He knows Father sealed you here to protect you! He would never say anything about 'sympathy'!"
I froze as well. "Are you saying he was a fake? A fake Jin Mu came here to take my heart's blood?"
The eldest son shook his head, his eyes vacant. "Maybe he was never real... My God! It was a diversion! Father is alone with him right now!"
Having said that, he ran a few steps and transformed into a bird, flying rapidly toward the east. The third and fourth sons also scrambled up, turning into a pair of small birds, attempting to take flight. At that moment, the sky turned completely dark. Thunder roared overhead incessantly; it sounded terrifying, much like the day Old Liu had stubbornly tried to destroy the entire city. As the third son flew into the air, raindrops began to fall. The drops were so heavy they instantly knocked him off course. I ran over and caught the falling third son in my palms. He reverted to his child form, eyes wide as he clutched his arm. "It hurts! The rain is so heavy."
I looked at the torrential rain outside the platform and was utterly stunned.
The rain was red. A thick, pungent scent of blood permeated the air.
In this rain of blood, the remote high-speed rail platform, the lush green farmlands in the distance, the busy cars on the roads leading to the city, and the travelers bustling about with their suitcases were all washed away. Their bodies broke apart and gradually faded, revealing the steel-gray, cold ruins of the city behind them—decaying human corpses, the silent gates of the campus, and restless swarms of crows. I wasn't at the station; I was right beneath my dormitory building. The sky was red, the ground was red, and blood and fire were everywhere. In the distance, there were the shrieks of strange beasts, but no one was left to cry out.
The apocalypse.
I was witnessing the end of the world.
While I was wallowing in self-pity inside the mirror, Liu Wukong had used a mirror to shield my eyes. There, I had gone to school, returned home, taken exams, and worried about this and that as usual, while on the other side of the mirror, the world had already ended.
The blood rain soon rose above my ankles. We were soaked from head to toe as if we’d been drenched in gore. The blood rain was lukewarm. Trembling, I asked the eldest son, "Is this human blood?"
He shook his head, his entire face twitching before tears began to fall. He just kept shaking his head.
"This is the blood of a god," someone said from behind.
I turned around and saw Jin Mu.
Jin Mu was holding a long spear. The spear looked like it was made of bone; the tip was soaked in blood, which had seeped into the bone itself and could not be washed away. "Legend says a spear stained with the heart's blood of Christ can tear through anything, including Christ himself, which is why it is called the 'Spear of Destiny.' But no one knows its other name is 'Gungnir,' meaning eternity. Its power is simple and absolute; it never misses its mark. The material used to craft it is a 'branch of the World Tree'—the very bones of the Lord God himself. It would seem no one could ever obtain it, but who would have thought the Lord God would place both his rib and his heart's blood upon a single person?" He smiled, wiping the tip of the spear. "You really should have seen how I killed him. I can even tell you that I split him into eight pieces. See, even the Lord God cannot defeat fate and eternity."
"You aren't Jin Mu at all. You're Zhang Litian..." the eldest son hissed through gritted teeth.
Jin Mu—or rather, Zhang Litian—smiled elegantly. "Has there ever been a real Jin Mu who escaped my mental attacks? Has there ever been a real Jin Mu who killed my god and obtained a divinity? You are all far too naive."
He gave a delighted bow, like a clown. "I am the God of Deception."
Then, he raised the Spear of Destiny and pointed it at me. "Now, it's your turn."
***
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