Welcome to the Misogyny Game

In a VIP ward of a hospital, Zhao Yuhan propped her head up and chatted with Zhao Xiaomei: "Xiaomei, when will our crisis be over?"

Zhao Xiaomei shook her head.

For their safety, Mu Li assigned them ten bodyguards: four to stand guard outside, and six to keep watch in various corners of the ward. Every time she ordered takeout, the food had to go through multiple screenings before it finally reached them.

They finally got to experience royal treatment.

She picked up the boxed lunch delivered from a high-end restaurant and said somewhat anxiously, "We've gotten used to this taste and this lifestyle. What if we're forced back to our original lives? Will we not be able to adapt?"

"You mean a poor person suddenly becomes rich?" Zhao Xiaomei felt it was alright, perhaps because she couldn't eat anything. The vegetable and meat porridge she ate the most always tasted good, no matter how expensive the restaurant was.

“But isn’t my current state also a consequence of them?” Zhao Xiaomei looked at the unchanging ceiling: “Before we met them, Sifeng wasn’t crazy, I wasn’t crippled, and you didn’t have to be with me because of them, without any freedom.”

She looked at the sunlight streaming through the curtains: "The sun is shining brightly outside, I feel like going out to soak up some sun..." Unfortunately, she was covered in fractures, and the room was dark.

"Xiao Mei, why do you think that way?" Zhao Yuhan felt a little guilty. She didn't dare to admit that if it was really the suffering they brought, then it was actually her who sought out the suffering for them.

Or perhaps, she was the source of all the suffering, and the other two were merely collateral damage.

She glanced around, remembering the six bodyguards who seemed to be hiding somewhere, and said softly, "There are still people watching..."

"So what if I'm just watching? I'm already like this, I'm just one step away from death." She said dejectedly, "In my current state, I'm only one step away from death."

"Don't say that," Zhao Yuhan quickly comforted her. "The doctors all said you have a chance of recovery, and Mu Li and the others are willing to let better doctors treat you. As long as you're alive, there's always a chance of recovery."

"You still haven't found a boyfriend?" Her words finally calmed Zhao Xiaomei down a bit. That's right, she's still so young, she escaped death, her face isn't ruined, there's still hope.

At Sifeng's house, Liu Chaoque sat in a chair, rubbing her head as she made a difficult decision. The clown said there was a certain possibility of choosing consciousness, even if it was the smallest probability, it would be 100% for an unlucky person. Although Liu Chaoque was generally lucky when she was the female lead, this kind of thing was ethereal and difficult to choose.

And what if she didn't choose consciousness, but chose hands and feet? She didn't know what was in the options, or how 21 options could be put together. The unknown was terrifying, as if she would become blind, lose her sense of taste, or become insensitive to pain in the next second.

She was also a little confused about the mechanism for fulfilling wishes. Although this was a game, the manipulators could change the data and bring about earth-shattering changes. Money was just a number, combat power was just a number, and all daily activities were just numbers.

So, the programmer was the one who wanted to harm her? Because she didn't follow the script? Or was it a power struggle between two factions within the company, and her character, her game, became a casualty?

She pondered endlessly, wondering if, if this were truly the case, she would really have to become a puppet on a string.

How tragic, she thought. As a living, conscious being, she had become a puppet. She thought of her cheat codes. What about them? Were they the abilities she created to fight against that force, or were they part of the chain that led her down a path of no return?

"Warning, warning! The heroine's faith is about to collapse! Restart countdown: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1!"

Liu Chaoque lay on the bed, blinked, and came out of the room. Looking at Mu Li, who was busy at home, she felt that this scene was familiar.

Mu Li told her she had slept for three hours. She had wanted to find a doctor, but was afraid he might find something wrong, so she didn't. Liu Chaoque felt that he should be angry at Mu Li's indifference at this moment, and then Mu Li would say that sentence...

"If someone like you, who possesses a secret treasure, is found to be acting strangely, they'll have to undergo a biopsy." That doesn't seem to be the correct statement.

Liu Chaoque's eyes widened.

"What's wrong? Isn't that right?" Mu Li said speechlessly, "You don't think I would say, 'It's just death anyway, I'll go to the underworld and bring you here,' do you? Although I would do that, the underworld is chaotic here. If you really go in, it will take me three to five years to get you out. By then, your corpse will have rotted."

"You want to swap bodies with a dead beggar like Tieguai Li? Then I'll have to look down on you?" Mu Li said, "When that time comes, I'll have to pick a good body for you."

"I don't want someone else's body," Liu Chaoque said disdainfully.

"Is that so? So you'd better live well for me, understand?" Mu Li said.

Liu Chaoque nodded subconsciously, and the two of them tacitly skipped over the topic.

Next, Mu Li asked for West Lake Vinegar Fish, and West Lake Vinegar Fish gave him two large bibs, and he said he would take her to eat West Lake Vinegar Fish at Lou Wai Lou.

She felt like she had experienced something similar before, but couldn't remember when. Maybe it was in a dream.

The police station. This was Liu Chaoque's second time entering the police station in Su City. He walked towards the interrogation room with ease. This time, he didn't follow He Yanzhi, but went with Mu Li. Before entering the police station, Liu Chaoque found a corner and summoned caviar.

A mysterious boy wandering in the torrent of time, wearing a shark hat and shark eye patch, with ashen gray hair and a predominantly dark color scheme, possessing only two hands that can withstand immense force—this is Caviar.

"I had already met you in another world, and I knew that you would appear before me in this world."

“I’ve sensed changes in the world. Is there something you need from me?” he asked.

Liu Chaoque gave him instructions, and the caviar vanished on the spot.

"What, are you going in?" Mu Li asked as she saw her come out of the alley.

"Well, let's go."

It's unclear whether the "God of the Void" he spoke of is truly worthy of the title.

"Went to a mental hospital?" After asking the police, they found that Sifeng was not there. Because of Wu Sifeng's madness, she had been sent to a mental hospital. And because she was a criminal, the mental hospital was always under surveillance, for fear that she was faking it.

"Can we go see her?" Liu Chaoque asked anxiously.

"Police escort is required." The officer who greeted them was Officer Liu Bai from last time, and then he made a phone call, summoning... Zhou Man?!

"Haha, Officer Zhou, what brings you here?" Liu Chaoque, who was sitting in the reception room drinking tea, almost choked on his tea.

"Looks like I shouldn't have come," Zhou Man said helplessly.

"No, that's not true. I just didn't expect Officer Liu to be looking for you. Officer Zhou, shall we leave now?" Liu Chaoque wiped her mouth, pulled Mu Li to her feet, and Mu Li's intense gaze made her almost embarrassed.

"Ha, fickle woman..." Mu Li muttered softly.

Liu Chaoque: "How about we order two more large bowls of vinegar fish?"

Liu Chaoque smiled sweetly, hoping Officer Zhou wouldn't hear. Actually, the sharp-eared Officer Zhou thought: Never mind, the young lady is shy. But when he said "womanizer," was he referring to the man from this morning? What's their relationship?

Colleague? That doesn't seem like it. Lover? There's no diamond ring on his ring finger, and based on his many years of experience as a policeman, the two seem to have a close relationship, but they are actually somewhat strangers. At most, he's just an accomplice that the young woman found.

Officer Zhou, are you using your investigative skills here? Don't you think there's something wrong with that?

The three of them sat in the police car, which drove with all green lights on, and with the beeping of the lights, they felt like they would be handcuffed at any moment.

I am terrified, utterly terrified.

Wait a minute, we haven't broken any laws.

Inside the Qingshan Mental Hospital, patients dressed in blue and white stripes were sunbathing in the courtyard. A group of people were gathered together, and Liu Chaoque overheard them discussing an uprising.

"You have a tyrant here?" Mu Li joked.

"It's all just the patients having fun on their own. Their thoughts change every day, and we can't stop them. Anyway, nothing much happens, and the patients have become much more well-behaved under that person's control." The hospital director greeted them, wiping the cold sweat from his brow, and led them to Wu Sifeng's ward.

Even through the thick windows, Liu Chaoque could hear the chilling murmurs inside. She was still talking about her past with the shark, making a complete mess of the hospital bed.

"Patient in bed 21, have you taken your medication today?" the hospital director asked a passing nurse, frowning.

The nurse nodded.

Only then did he feel relieved enough to lead the two into Sifeng's ward.

Unexpectedly, as soon as the door opened, Sifeng pounced on him, straddled the dean, and grabbed his neck, screaming hoarsely:

"You bunch of murderers, I'm going to kill you all!"

Amidst the chaos, Sifeng was given a sedative and collapsed limply. The dean coughed, gasping for air as if he had escaped death, looking disheveled with his clothes in disarray.

Seeing Wu Sifeng being carried to the bed by the nurses who rushed in, Liu Chaoque asked the only head nurse who hadn't done anything, "Has she been like this for the past few days?"

"Yes, she imagined everyone who came near her as a murderer. At first, she used five vials of tranquilizers a day. After taking the medication, she rarely had an attack. I didn't expect it to turn out like this again."

Liu Chaoque looked at Wu Sifeng: "Is there any possibility of a cure for this condition?"

"Mental illness can only be temporarily relieved, not cured. The human mind is too complex. There is currently no medicine that can completely restore a mental patient to a normal state. We can only say that we can reduce the probability of relapse." The hospital director is also a senior psychiatrist and knows a lot about this kind of thing.

It seems this trip to the mental hospital is coming to an end, since the person in question is no longer in a conscious state.

"Take me to meet your tyrant?" Liu Chaoque stopped looking at the sleeping Sifeng and instead changed the subject in a very cold manner, leaving the dean almost unable to process what was happening.

"You mean Patient Number 1?" the dean said. "He should be on the fifth floor now. Do you want to go see him? But that patient is a bit special; I can only take one person with me." Liu Chaoque and Mu Li exchanged a glance.

Liu Chaoque asked, "Is it because many people are going there, and he won't be used to it?"

The dean said seriously, "No, it's just that he has regulations on the number of visiting envoys."

"Is the Dean getting too carried away with his role as the visiting envoy?" Mu Li was somewhat speechless.

Liu Chaoque's expression remained unchanged, as if he were used to it.

In the end, Liu Chaoque went along anyway, after all, it was out of curiosity. Once on the fifth floor, Liu Chaoque felt that the decor here was much better than the lower floors. The floor was paved with soft cushions, and the walls were painted a deep red. If it weren't for the modern decorations, it would really feel like traveling back to ancient times.

"Little Xu, you've brought people again?" Someone stopped them.

Looking at the newcomer, Dean Xu's face showed a hint of obsequiousness: "Yes, Lord Zhao, does His Majesty have time?"

"Let me inform him." The patient, surnamed Zhao, was dressed in a hospital gown, but his demeanor gave off the air of a civil official. He glanced at Liu Chaoque and then walked into the room, waiting for a call to enter.

The two were then led into the "Golden Palace".

The man sat in the chair, turned to the side, and casually sized up the newcomer. For some reason, Liu Chaoque secretly observed him, feeling a sense of déjà vu, but she knew she had never seen him before. And had he glanced at her several times just now? Was it just her imagination?

"Young Master Xu, what brings you to me?" he asked Dean Xu.

Dean Xu, who was standing nearby, quickly said, "A foreign envoy has come to pay his respects to the Emperor."

He nudged Liu Chaoque, hoping she could also perform well in this scene.

Liu Chaoque was also very tactful. She patted non-existent dust off her knees, half-knelt, and cupped her hands, saying, "The envoy from the Western Regions, Si Nanfeng, has come to pay homage to Your Majesty. Long live the Emperor! Long live the Emperor! Long live the Emperor!"

"Be flat."

"Thank you, Your Majesty." Liu Chaoque stood up.

The dean was dumbfounded. "I asked you to act, and you acted so professionally. This makes me look like a complete idiot."

"I wonder what brings you here, envoy?" Shen Yueqiu seemed to be in a good mood. He turned around and looked at Liu Chaoque with a smile.

"Your Majesty, I have come here for two reasons: first, to pay homage to your countenance, and second, to resolve my doubts," she said without hesitation, her expression unchanged.

"Oh, tell me about it." Shen Yueqiu became interested.

"I wonder if Your Majesty has a way to relieve the suffering of the world?" Liu Chaoque continued.

"I don't have that."

"Then what is the way to relieve one person's suffering?" Liu Chaoque asked.

"That depends on who you're asking."

"Wu Sifeng".

"Who?"

"Patient in bed 21."

"presumptuous."

"I've already let them off no matter how outrageous they were, so why should I let them off this time?" Liu Chaoque smiled. "Your Majesty, I have another question. I wonder if you could answer it?"

For some reason, although Shen Yueqiu was presumptuous, there wasn't much anger on his face. He asked, "What is it?"

The hospital director standing nearby was a little apprehensive. This girl was too bold, telling the mental patients their bed numbers. Wasn't that tearing off their normal facade and making them realize that they were abnormal?

If the patient surnamed Zhao next to her hadn't been without a knife, he would have been holding it to her neck by now.

Unaffected by the threatening gaze, Liu Chaoque calmly replied, "Your Majesty, I am truly curious, who exactly are you?"

In the timeline that Caviar went to, there was no Shen Yueqiu, and Wu Sifeng was not imprisoned in this mental hospital.

The only variable is the person in front of you.

"Hehe." Shen Yueqiu stepped forward and looked into Liu Chaoque's eyes: "And who do you take me for?"

“Border Town? Chen Qingsong, He Yanzhi?” Each of his names corresponds to the male protagonist’s name that has appeared so far.

"Still Xu Moyu and Zhao Wangyan?"

“You are… Pei Midu!” Liu Chaoque said decisively.

“Yes… I am Pei Midu, should I call you… Miss Liu Chaoque?” Pei Midu revealed a genuine smile.

It turns out it wasn't the name that changed, but the person.

Pei Midu dismissed everyone, leaving only Liu Chaoque to speak with him alone. The dean hesitated for a moment, but before he could make a move, he was pulled out by the patient surnamed Zhao.