AWB Chapter 65 Dreams and War
Chapter 65 Dreams and War
[An existence rejected by death, abhorred by life...]
When that destined moment arrives...
Looking back, I realize I was the one who deserved to die the most...
You would give your own life to save others...
Or should we sacrifice everyone's lives for our own frozen future?
"..."
He stepped into that space again, surrounded by that pale, faint light, which instantly blurred his consciousness. He gently shook his head, trying to dispel the haze and calm his thoughts again.
Happiness, farewell, dreams...
It seems I've gained everything, and yet lost everything.
I once had it, I still possess it, but I cannot step into that new future...
[The next morning, noon, night... those figures will never be seen again...]
What can I do? What can I change?
【…】
Oh, I forgot.
[It was my interference that caused their deaths!!!]
[You can't change the inevitable death of others, but you can cause the deaths of many more...]
Why?!
So noisy...so noisy...
He struggled to cover his ears, shaking his head in trembling hands. He couldn't even begin to process who was making the noise, who was issuing these warnings to him.
"What exactly do you want me to know?!"
"It repeatedly put me in completely unfamiliar scenarios to experience what it truly means!"
"What's the point of this?!"
He really wanted to activate his red talent and just cleave this place in two, but for some reason, he found he couldn't summon the sword in his hand anymore. It was as if some higher level of control was preventing him from doing so.
My already irritable heart became even more irritable. You know, it's one thing to put him in that kind of situation, but my own emotions also changed along with it!
【...For you and the future...*＃＃*≠*】】
[This is everything you want to know.]
It was you who... wanted to reclaim your power to change all of this.
The jumbled sounds around him cleared up once more, and unsurprisingly, the most crucial words from before were blocked out again. He had no time to ask any more questions; the scene had already begun to change once more—
This time, what overwhelmed him was an uncontrollable despair and pain.
"..."
Why... even though I avoided everything this time...?
Why...did it still end like this?
Walking through a sea of flowers, the small white blossoms swayed in the wind, guiding him deeper into the landscape. With each step, he felt an unspeakable despair filling his heart, to the point that he could barely see ahead. His steps faltered, and he stumbled and staggered through the surging tide of life.
Finally, it stopped in front of a grave:
It was a new grave, recently built, quite ordinary. But what set it apart was the many small white flowers he had seen in the flower field placed before it, seemingly as a tribute to something.
His vision strangely cleared at that moment, and struggling to kneel before him, he saw clearly who was buried in the grave.
【sorry】
"Avoid flames!!!"
He jolted awake from the mountain of documents, struggling to stand up, but nearly knocked over a stack of neatly arranged files beside him. Adjusting his position, he almost kicked over the blue panel next to him that contained key offensive strategies.
"..."
He eventually sat back down. The pain in his shoulder gradually brought him back to his senses, making him realize that what he had just seen was nothing more than a dream.
He is still in the military camp on the front lines.
"...He actually fell asleep at this crucial moment... Damn it..."
He leaned back in the chair, feeling somewhat weak, and slapped his head hard, trying to clear his muddled mind.
"Host...you dreamed about that scene again?"
"...Yes, once again."
"...System, I'll ask again."
"Is this situation really unrelated to that hooded man, or rather, to the world's consciousness?"
The blue panel in his mind seemed to have some doubts as well, tapping and fiddling around for a while, but still giving him the same answer as his previous question.
"I did not detect any external frequencies or traces of intervention from the world's consciousness."
"……I see"
He slowly sat up straight, processing the system in his mind, while wiping the bloodstains on his desk to prevent them from soiling the information he had compiled.
He no longer has the same mindset he had when he first encountered that situation; he no longer questions the other person.
Not long after the dragon boat race ended, an unprecedented wave of phantom elephants erupted on the desolate rocky highlands. Because it happened so suddenly, many were caught off guard, suffering heavy casualties and their defenses crumbling. The situation had even deteriorated to the point where these newly trained recruits were forced to hold their ground.
As a rising star among the new recruits, he naturally went to the front lines—to look out for the camp.
This is a testament to the honor of new recruits who have just joined the Night Return program.
But in his view, whenever someone receives this honor, it often indicates that the situation is out of control.
More people need to be prepared to face death, and to be ready to stay there forever once they go...
What can I do?
What else can I do?
What can I possibly change?!
"hiss……"
He clenched his fist, abruptly pulling his consciousness away from it, and shook his head.
"My host! Don't think so much!"
"The war over the past few months, along with the aftereffects of your prolonged use of your medical talent, have nearly pushed your mental limits to the limit!"
"If you use that talent of yours again and cause your sanity to collapse... I don't know what will happen!"
"...System, do you know what I saw this time?"
"What did you see? Fighting a bunch of random people again, just like before?"
Hearing the puzzled mechanical voice in his mind, he said nothing, a bitter smile playing on his lips, and slowly closed his eyes.
I saw a sea of flowers.
"Those white flowers...swaying gently in the breeze..."
"They guided me deeper...to see the burial place of that person...the passing of..."
"I saw the new grave...I saw the name engraved on it."
"Ji Yan, age 14..."
"To die on the battlefield, without a complete corpse."
This cenotaph was built in memory of him.
His vision blurred the moment he saw everything clearly; he only felt something tightly gripping his neck, and then he never woke up again.
"That's impossible! Key characters in the plot generally can't die!"
"Especially since this is before the main storyline begins! If he dies, the subsequent plot will undergo drastic and irreversible changes, preventing the story from progressing..."
"The world's consciousness will not allow it; it must rely on the code obtained from the main storyline to maintain this plane..."
The system was starting to panic, after all, the host it was bringing along this time had been plagued with all sorts of troubles and problems since the contract was signed. Even casual remarks could come true, let alone something so obviously problematic!
"...can be system-enabled"
"I am not a character in the story."
I am an "outsider".
"As you said, my appearance will change countless things."
"Deliberate, intentional, unintentional, or inevitable... my appearance will point the fates of countless people toward an unknown future."
"It's like I saved Xiaobai, preventing him from being taken in by the Remnant Star Society and having his perception altered, thus preventing his 'death'."
"It's like I saved Beiwang while simultaneously holding the line. This allowed many people who should have died in the original storyline to survive while trying to retake the line."
"...To put it simply, I casually kicked a stone, and it almost caused the loss of a team in this year's Pufferfish Race."
"..."
I almost forgot.
"I'm not accepted by this world, and that guy is trying every possible way to eliminate me..."
He felt his emotions were very complicated, and a sense of despair was almost overwhelming him: months of fighting, months of non-stop travel, months of unrestrained use of his abilities...
He wanted to save more people, so that more people could return to their hometowns alive, see everything they wanted to see, and respond to the people they wanted to respond to...
Even so... even if he exhausted all his knowledge...
Yesterday, now, tomorrow, and in the countless days to come where the fighting may continue... on this battlefield...
People are still getting hurt and dying in corners all the time, rotting on the ground like withered leaves.
Is it meaningful to do all these things?
He didn't know.
He could sense that those dreams were someone deliberately reminding him.
But is it torture or a warning?
He couldn't tell
But will his appearance bring salvation or destruction?
he does not know
"...Host, it was my fault for not explaining Geshulin's 'death' clearly to you back in Beiluoye."
"But didn't they eventually join the Remnant Star Society? Although their cognition wasn't altered and they didn't suffer a loss of consciousness, they're now doing things similar to those in the original story."
"Saving Beiwang and holding the line didn't affect the later plot much, because the opponent was just an insignificant existence in this world, and was never mentioned again."
"It's harsh, but it's the truth:"
"They're just NPCs; their only purpose is to advance the plot."
"As for a small action changing the plot... that happens quite often."
"Not to mention that the final result didn't change at all."
"...So, the host doesn't need to worry too much about the plot you're interfering with."
"You should worry about yourself more than these hosts... your mental state is as weak as it can get."
"Why don't you cry it out... I'll keep an eye out for anyone coming in..."
The system explained and analyzed things to the other party step by step, while also paying attention to its host's mental state from time to time.
After all, the person was under immense pressure over such a long period, constantly teetering on the brink of a breakdown, yet always managing to pull themselves back up at crucial moments.
This time, the host he brought... had too many people he wanted to save.
"...Where is the plot heading?"
"...Insignificant...Not worth mentioning"
"No change..."
"..."
My vision blurred again, and I could only see a lamp emitting a faint white glow guiding something. I closed my eyes and opened them again, and a few words kept flashing through my mind.
【【trade】】
{don't want!!!}
Feeling the keys at his waist vibrate suddenly, he gradually came back to his senses and realized he had been daydreaming for quite some time. He turned his gaze back to his desk and nodded slightly.
"……I see"
I won't use my talent unless absolutely necessary.
He rubbed his head, looking at his desk stained with blood again, feeling somewhat helpless, and wiped it clean once more.
"Several lines of defense have already fallen... If this continues, the pressure will soon be on our side..."
"With so few people... when that time really comes..."
Can we hold out?
Although he was doing his best to minimize casualties, even though he attacked in the best possible way every time, even though he was always at the forefront, even though he risked being discovered every time to secretly use his talent to heal others...
He could only brush past those around him time and time again, bidding them his final farewell.
"...Sometimes I wish I could split myself in two."
"Wouldn't it mean that if I save one more person, I can save even more people?"
As for crying? It's not like he hasn't cried before.
When he first went to the battlefield and found that almost half of his men were gone, he couldn't help but cry in the middle of the night.
But what good does crying do afterward?
Cry or scream, the dead are gone, the next morning will still come, and those monsters will not give them a chance to breathe.
And all he could do was grip his sword tightly and try to preserve everything before those beings took away those around him.
Before my reason fades, before my emotions become numb, before I feel nothing at the departure of those around me... I will keep those words of parting in my heart.
Use up all your strength, then clink glasses and drink with them again.
He shook his head, picked up the unorganized intelligence report from his desk again, and gave it a shake.
Fortunately, his own blood hadn't stained it yet, and the messy handwriting was still legible, which should make the processing much more accurate.
"...It's true, the sense of clarity that pain brings is almost completely losing its effectiveness."
"Given my current state... I hope I don't end up doing something really wrong."
Thankfully, the system does work in some ways. Whenever he gets carried away in a fight and ignores his own wounds, it reminds him to treat them first before continuing the fight.
Otherwise, he figured he would have been a dead man on the battlefield long ago due to his severe injuries.
"Sigh... Host, cherish your life."
"Although I can bring you back after your physical body dies here, you're torturing yourself like this."
"My eyesight has deteriorated severely... and my physical condition couldn't be worse."
"Oh, I value my life quite a bit."
"..."
The system indicated disbelief.
He didn't care what was going on in his mind; he was just about to calm down and process the intelligence when a knock sounded at the door—