Chapter 4

My heart tightened.

Stiffly, I turned.

On the trail outside the woods stood a man who looked exactly like me.

Motionless.

Expressionless.

Staring straight at me.

Cold swept through my body.

My thoughts spun at a dizzying speed.

Then understanding flashed through me.

That was me.

The me from 2016, taking Yuanyuan hiking.

I was the one who didn't belong at this point in time.

I immediately scooped up mud and smeared it over my face.

At this distance, he probably couldn't see my features clearly, only my general shape.

But that “me” seemed to misunderstand.

He charged in fury, knocked me down, and began punching and kicking me.

He called me an animal.

Accused me of having filthy intentions toward Yuanyuan.

I had no time to react.

She took the chance to run, heading straight for the summit.

He was stopping me from saving her!

In desperation, I fought back.

By the time I came to my senses, the cleaver in my hand was covered in blood.

The other “me” lay on the ground, clutching his stomach.

Motionless.

Had I...

Killed myself?

At the same time, on Mount Tianfeng's summit, the column of light enveloped Song Yuan.

She vanished with the silver spacecraft.

I'd failed.

I hadn't saved her.

It took a long time to calm myself.

I couldn't give up.

If I could find that humanoid again, there was still hope.

I buried the other “me” in the woods on Mount Tianfeng.

As I emerged, I happened to look up.

A security camera pointed straight at me.

The realization struck like lightning.

Slowly, I lowered my eyes to the cleaver I hadn't had time to dispose of.

Everything suddenly looked horribly familiar.

I'd seen this scene before.

In the security footage the police had shown me in the interview room.

Then, I'd watched from outside.

Now, I was living it.

I immediately returned to the woods and began piecing things together.

The person caught on camera in 2016 was the me from 2026.

That explained why my 2016 self had no memory of what the footage showed.

But if the me from 2016 was dead, how could the me from 2026 exist?

Unless...

I hadn't traveled into the past.

I'd entered a parallel world.

As I puzzled over it, I remembered a detail I'd overlooked.

In 2026, when I saw the silver craft for the second time, Wu Wei suddenly appeared and desperately tried to stop me.

Did she know something too?

After dealing with the scene, I called the police.

Almost everything happened as before.

They followed procedure and investigated.

In the end, I was still their prime suspect.

Before long, Wu Wei divorced me.

Like the police, she thought I was lying.

Yet she also believed I wouldn't hurt Yuanyuan.

That contradiction made it impossible for her to face me.

We separated.

Unlike before, I didn't fall apart.

At least I still had hope.

After the divorce, Wu Wei kept the house.

I rented an apartment nearby and found work close to her workplace.

I was convinced she knew something about Song Yuan's disappearance.

I'd pressed her to tell me, but she'd looked genuinely bewildered.

I could only keep watching quietly.

Something must have happened between 2016 and 2026 to make her so determined to stop me on June 9, 2026.

As for how much older I looked, she suspected nothing.

It was perfectly normal for a man to look haggard after losing his daughter.

Time passed quickly.

In a blink, it was 2026.

Wu Wei had lived alone all those years.

She hadn't remarried or had another child.

Everything she did seemed ordinary.

I'd found nothing unusual.

Gradually, even I began to doubt my judgment.

Until June 8, 2026.

Following her, I saw her enter private room 101 at the Tianxiang Teahouse.

She stayed a long time.

By the time she came out, it was the next day.

Her eyes were red.

She drove straight to Mount Tianfeng.

At the summit, the silver craft appeared as before.

I watched her race desperately to stop...

Another “me.”

Yes.

Another me.

The third one I knew of.

I couldn't believe it.

Even in a parallel world, there should only be two of us: the one I'd killed, and me, the visitor from another world.

Where had this third one come from?

Perhaps only the humanoid could answer.

While I was still thinking, the third “me” broke free of Wu Wei and rushed toward the column of light.

I couldn't miss this chance.

I quickly charged ahead of him.

The glowing humanoid caught me tightly.

A few seconds later, I was back inside the silver spacecraft, looking once more at Song Yuan on the bed.

She was much paler than the first time.

Her condition had deteriorated.

“How strange,” the humanoid said. “Even without its consciousness, a body shouldn't weaken this quickly. Has something unexpected happened?”

A bad feeling rose inside me.

It was about to speak again, but I cut in, saying exactly what it was going to say.

Then I demanded, “What is that machine? It doesn't actually let people travel through time, does it?”

“Travel through time? Back to the past?” It paused in surprise. “There's no such thing as time travel. Time itself doesn't exist, so what would there be to travel back through?

“The world is always in motion. One rotation of Earth is twenty-four hours. One orbit around the sun is a year. What you call time is really movement. And movement can't be reversed.”

My head buzzed.

“Then... what does that machine do?” I asked shakily.

“It's the Causality Machine. It can calculate every possible outcome of any event.”

I suddenly understood.

“So everything I experienced was just a calculation? All fake?”

“Both real and unreal.”

It continued.

“When the Causality Machine starts, it calculates everything you do. Each action generates quintillions of outcomes, reflected in countless worlds.

“For example, you buy a lottery ticket. That's the ‘cause.’ Every possible result of the draw then appears in a different world.”

My thoughts were still muddled, but I understood the gist.

All the different versions of “me” came from the same cause, splitting into countless parallel worlds, each corresponding to a different effect.

I asked what troubled me most.

“Then why can I see the other versions of myself?”

It shook its head.

“The Causality Machine is broken. The effects have become confused, overlapping and entangled.”

I was silent for a long time.

“Can Song Yuan... still come back?” I asked hoarsely.

It thought for a moment.

“Among the countless effects, there must be one in which she returns successfully. I let you enter the machine in the hope that you'd align with that causal path.

“You'd save Song Yuan, and I'd recover the Coordinate Core. We'd both benefit.

“But the machine is broken now, and the facts prove... you've failed.”

My eyes reddened as I looked at her lying on the bed.

“I still want to try again. Maybe this time I can align with that path.”

It hesitated.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. I want to save her.”

“...All right. One more try.”

When I opened my eyes again, it was June 9, 2016.

A completely new world.

I sprang out of bed and immediately ran to Song Yuan's room.

Empty.

She'd already left for Mount Tianfeng.

I chased her desperately, but still couldn't stop her.

Almost everything happened as it had the first time.

This time, though, I went to Wu Wei and told her everything I'd experienced, hiding nothing.

She found it too incredible to believe.

I couldn't persuade her, so I could only beg one favor.

“If I try to go up Mount Tianfeng on June 9, 2026, you must stop me!”

“Why?” she asked in confusion.

I looked at her solemnly, almost pleading.

“It... might save Yuanyuan. Please. I'm begging you.”

Perhaps it was because I looked so old.

I'd aged twenty years, after all.

Half convinced, she finally agreed.

If I didn't enter the silver spacecraft or meet the humanoid, I wouldn't use the Causality Machine.

Would that mean it wouldn't break?

Clinging to that thought, I counted the days.

One after another.

At last, 2026 arrived.

June 8 again.

Wu Wei went out and entered room 101 at the Tianxiang Teahouse.

I followed, sneaked into the teahouse, and opened the door a crack.

The sight inside froze me.

Opposite her sat a humanoid glowing from head to foot.

The one who claimed to come from four-dimensional space.

I felt I'd been deceived from beginning to end.

Blood rushed to my head.

I kicked the door open, charged forward, and punched it.

“What are you doing here with her—”