A long silence passed.
As if gathering all her courage, Chai Xiaomi spoke softly, "If I were to say..."
"I came from another world. Would you believe me?"
Wu Li looked at her quietly, not a trace of surprise visible on his face.
He gave a slight nod, then suddenly reached out to take her hand, intertwining his fingers tightly with hers one by one.
His posture made it seem as though he wanted to hold onto her firmly, terrified that she might disappear in the very next second.
"I believe you."
"Then why did you come here?"
"I came for..."
Suddenly, a sharp alarm exploded in her mind.
Youtiao seemed to have been forcefully rebooted. Its mechanical voice carried a sense of exhausted weakness: "The great demon is gone... Thank goodness... Xiaomi-chan actually didn't die..."
Chai Xiaomi: "..."
Why did that sound like it was hoping she would kick the bucket?
But the next second.
She realized she had wrongly accused it.
A loud burst of crying suddenly erupted in her mind.
"Waaaah! I thought I was going to have to send off another host..."
"Thank you for surviving, Xiaomi, waaaah! I will never call you squishy again, you are a literal iron tank! How can you be so durable!"
Perhaps because they had just survived a life-and-death crisis brought about by an SSS-rank great demon, Youtiao's tone was noticeably much more intimate.
This was the first time it had called her by her name, rather than the monotonous title of Host.
"But the system just received a warning! It detected that you were about to reveal your transmigration mission to a character in the book. This is a severe cheating violation strictly forbidden by headquarters! If you say it, we are both doomed. You absolutely cannot say it, waaaah... I can't just watch you ruin yourself!"
Chai Xiaomi's brain buzzed from its crying. "I got it."
Youtiao sobbed, "Then hurry up and make up an excuse to cover it up, quick! Don't let the villain get suspicious!"
She pursed her lips, looked up to meet Wu Li's gaze, and braced herself to force out an awkward smile. "Well, you see, I lost my memory."
Youtiao: "..."
Wu Li: "..."
"Do you really think a guy like the villain, who traded his emotional intelligence for double the IQ, is going to believe an excuse that wouldn't even fool a three-year-old?"
Youtiao covered its face in despair. "You are rubbing his IQ against the dirt! Knowing his temper, even kneeling down to beg for mercy might be too late now!"
The moment its nervous voice trailed off.
Chai Xiaomi was pulled into a firm embrace.
Wu Li's arms wrapped around her back, his palms pressing firmly against her as his gentle voice fell by her ear:
"If you forgot, then let it be forgotten. Don't try to remember."
"From now on, the only person you are allowed to remember is me."
Youtiao: "???"
Youtiao: "This defies science. Did the villain's IQ drop?"
Youtiao: "Can anyone tell me what just happened? Is this incredibly gentle tone of voice really coming from the villain himself?"
Youtiao: "Hello? Anybody here? Is the system channel still connected?"
Chai Xiaomi, getting a headache from its incessant chattering, threw out a crisp and straightforward sentence:
"I slept with him during the time you were offline."
Silence.
A long, drawn-out silence.
Youtiao's voice stuttered, "...Slept, slept with who?"
Chai Xiaomi replied without changing her expression, "The villain."
"5&1!K^j%8@mZ$9eP...%#@*&..."
A violent burst of static noise swept through like an explosion.
A moment later, Youtiao trembled and squeezed out a single dry word:
"Damn..."
This was absolutely, without a doubt, the most badass host it had ever guided in its entire system life!
From now on, Doujiang next door could forget about ever walking all over it again!
It could no longer smugly mock it for being a trash support!
So what if Doujiang was strong?
So what if the host it guided was great at completing missions?
In the future, if Doujiang dared to come over and show off, Youtiao would only need one casual sentence to completely obliterate it:
And that was...
My host slept with the villain. Can yours do that?
Just imagining that scene made Youtiao feel like its entire system existence had been fully vindicated!
"Hahahahahahahaha..."
Chai Xiaomi's scalp tingled. "My friend, you have been laughing continuously for three minutes now. Aren't you tired?"
In the end, Youtiao laughed so hard that it crashed its own system again.
Chai Xiaomi fell into a speechless silence, and right at that moment, her stomach growled with hunger.
The arms Wu Li had wrapped around her paused slightly. He tilted his head to listen and asked, "Where is that frog croaking from?"
Chai Xiaomi: "..."
She couldn't take it anymore; if she didn't eat something soon, she was genuinely going to pass out from hunger.
Ever since she entered the Falling Star Plateau, it had been a thrilling and terrifying journey without a single moment to catch her breath. Her stamina had long been overdrawn to its absolute limit.
She immediately struggled out of his embrace, grabbed the oil paper package, and tore it open in a few quick motions. The aroma of the meat pancake wafted into her nose. She opened her mouth and took a huge bite, her cheeks instantly puffing up.
Wu Li watched the girl before him eating with chubby cheeks and glossy, oily lips. The way she moved as she chewed made her look like a little squirrel sneaking food. He couldn't help but say, "Eat slowly. No one is fighting you for it. Are you trying to choke yourself to death?"
Food always tastes exceptionally good when one is starving.
The meat pancake that had previously given her no appetite at all now smelled so good it hit her right in the brain. It was unprecedentedly delicious. Chai Xiaomi even felt it was a hundred times tastier than the first time she tried it.
She demolished half the pancake before asking indistinctly, "Where did you get this pancake?"
"I went outside and bought it."
Chai Xiaomi's confusion deepened. It had been daytime outside when she entered the Falling Star Plateau, but judging by her biological clock now, it was probably past midnight.
Still open for business past midnight? Was the boss risking his life just to make money?
Meanwhile, outside the Falling Star Plateau.
The area around the giant boulder in the town had long dissolved into complete chaos.
Many participants of the New Moon Archery Tournament were scared out of their wits by the blood moon that had appeared out of nowhere. They abandoned the competition one after another, scrambling over each other to escape from the giant boulder connected to the Falling Star Plateau.
Earlier, the entrance to the boulder had been tightly blocked by a thick, malicious aura, trapping many people inside with no way out.
But for some unknown reason, that mass of malicious aura had suddenly dissipated not long ago.
The people who escaped all had pale faces, looking as if they had just survived a disaster. They gathered together, talking all at once as they discussed that bizarre blood moon.
There was also a group of participants near the ore vein who had suffered varying degrees of internal injuries.
According to their descriptions, an invisible force had swept out from the center of the ore vein at that time. Plants withered instantly, and demon spirits and wild beasts fled in all directions.
Right now, they were sitting on the ground in a sorry state, regulating their breathing, their faces still carrying lingering terror.
When Ouyang Huai and the County Governor hurried over with their men, this scene of chaos was exactly what they saw.
In all the past New Moon Archery Tournaments, such a sudden and unexpected anomaly had never occurred.
Ouyang Huai looked down at the spirit stone in his hand, which had completely lost its luster. This meant that the Moon Shadow Demon Spirit had been shot and killed, and the Ice Bow and Mystic Arrows had found their master.
The adjudicating demon spirit of this archery tournament was originally the Moon Shadow Demon Spirit, historically the most difficult to capture, especially since it also harbored a magical artifact on its body.
Ouyang Huai had originally assumed that three days might not even be enough time, yet he never anticipated that someone would secure the prey in merely a single day.
However, this was no longer the moment to dwell on victory or defeat.
Inside Luoxing Yuan, something far more severe than the archery tournament had clearly taken place.
He had already dispatched his men, intending to widen the boulder entrance and escort all the participants out together.
Little did he expect to walk into such a completely unforeseen scene.
