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Participants
Translated by boilpoil
Edited by boilpoil
Ding Yi doesn’t fit Xü Beijin’s requirements.
After briefly thinking about it, Mu Jiashi realises the problem immediately.
XĂź Beijin wishes for Missiontakers who have been to as many Nightmares as possible, which Mu Jiashi thought was the case for Ding Yi at first glance, but then, maybe she was active in the very beginning, going through Nightmares frequently, but she has likely decreased her frequency once she gained that utility card.
She didn’t need to enter the Nightmares anymore.
While she went back into the Nightmares recently, she ended up back down on the bottom floor afterwards.
Mu Jiashi feels a bit embarrassed for realising it this late. After a brief silence, he says, “I’m sorry…”
“It’s alright,” Ding Yi gently replies, “I certainly could be said to be… an unprofessional Missiontaker.”
Mu Jiashi is even more embarrassed.
Once, he was also an ‘unprofessional’ Missiontaker, being a Golddigger.
Necessities Merchants, Golddiggers, Planners… in a sense, while they’re more reputable than Carddealers, Zombies or people like Mr Suicide, they are still pretty far out from their objective.
Their ultimate goal is to resolve Nightmares and ascend, but they were focused on inconsequential side activities.
Not that Mu Jiashi regrets having spent his time this way, as his Golddigging experience has allowed him to pass through Nightmares with ease.
Though… those time spent was also quite detrimental to their willpower.
For example, Ding Yi.
They are talking about the Ultimate Nightmare… Well, at least, something closely related to the Ultimate Nightmare. This is the opportunity to fight for their own fate, but Ding Yi gave up on the chance without a second thought.
Looking at each other, they remain silent.
That is when Ding Yi produces a utility card from a hidden pocket, and hands it to Mu Jiashi.
The man receives it, looking a little bewildered.
When he sees the information panel on this utility card, and see Ding Yi’s hair return to its original black colour instead of grue, he immediately asks in shock, “you just… why?”
Ding Yi says, “this is the help I can offer,” she sits there, smiling, but it looks quite forced, and she says, “whatever happens, I also want to help out in this. For me…”
She stays silent for a long time after that, until finally, she mutter, “there is someone I want saved.”
Mu Jiashi almost immediately recognises who she is referring to, but decides against brusquely pointing it out. She continues listening quietly.
Ding Yi says, “I regret it. I never regretted anything since becoming a Necessities Merchant, nor did I think I will. It isn’t… really my thing.
With this utility card in my hand, I thought this career was my destiny.
But… I regret it now. You should also know utility cards have corresponding consequences. Do you know what the consequence for this utility card is?”
Mu Jiashi looks closely at the utility card.
‘Card Name: Unconditional Trust
Card Illustration: [An image of a faceless woman with her hair dyed a grue colour]
Description: Your hair shall turn grue.
Anyone looking at you, will trust whatever you say; the insane woman dyed her hair grue, and, when her beloved’s guard was down entirely, she killed him.
Uses: This card is Permanently Active when you do not initiate an attack against someone. The moment you do, any effect from this card is immediately nullified and forfeit.’
After reading this, Mu Jiashi shakes his head, and answers, “I can’t tell.”
Ding Yi says, “when you use this utility card, others trust you more and more easily, while you──lose trust in yourself more and more.”
Mu Jiashi is astonished.
Ding Yi murmurs, “I’m doubting myself more and more. I cannot tell if what I chose to do was correct. Should I have stayed by my companions? Should I have left this utility card alone?
If I simply sold this, I might have brought a better life for the three of us. If I do this, then… I keep thinking about stuff like that.
Maybe, if I didn’t leave, she would not have ended up trapped in the Nightmare… hopelessly.”
Ding Yi turns quiet for a bit before saying firmly, “yes. I believe in that.”
Her expression relaxes a little, then she explains, “even so, I would wonder, am I thinking that way because of the utility card’s effects? Maybe even with me there, she would still have met danger.
In the Tower, Missiontakers always have to take risks. I can’t just simply say that I would be able to help her avoid the danger. I might deeply regret not having saved her from this, but in reality, there was nothing I could have done.”
Mu Jiashi continues listening quietly.
He can hear the struggle Ding Yi is going through, but no one else can help Ding Yi with this but herself. This is her own issue to overcome, and she knows that as well.
Does she regret it? But even if she does, can she really save Jiang Shuangjie from succumbing?
And also, while Jiang Shuangjie is trapped, what if the other Missiontakers out in the Tower could leave? What happens to those Missiontakers that have succumbed to Collapsed Nightmares?
Are they even still alive?
Ding Yi wants to save Jiang Shuangjie, but they all know, that this is simply an unattainable wish.
Ding Yi has been stressed to breaking point because of this conundrum. She can’t forgive herself. She can’t convince herself. This is her fault. Is this her fault? She wasn’t even in the Nightmare.
Ultimately, it boils down to this utility card’s effect maximising thanks to the incident.
Ding Yi probably felt at least a little guilty, and this utility card amplified it endlessly.
Ding Yi used the utility card for far, far too long. and its price is perhaps written into her soul at this point.
Maybe she left the bottom floor of the Tower in search of salvation, but then, learning about what happened to Jiang Shuangjie, devastated her.
She realised that while she built up her massive commercial empire using the utility card so many years ago, the price for that, was always lying in wait, waiting to pounce at her at some point in the future.
A mirage. A fictitious mirage. A ‘reality’ inside a dream, that merely deceives.
That is not what she wants.
Ding Yi is looking blankly at the utility card in Mu Jiashi’s hand. It looks like chains have been cut off from her, but it also looks like a treasure has been robbed from her.
She takes a deep breath, and then says with a solemn tone, “I have handed it to you, now. Please use it well, or otherwise, destroy it.”
Mu Jiashi looks like he still wants to say something, but in the end, he simply nods, and says, “I understand.”
He is going to keep talking about Xü Beijin’s Nightmare when someone walks into Ding Yi’s residence. It’s Jiang Shuangmei.
She greets Ding Yi, while looking at Mu Jiashi curiously.
She knows him, and he also knows her, even if they have never met the other person before.
Ding Yi asks gently, “Shuangshuang, did you need something?”
Her relationship with Jiang Shuangmei has gradually improved since their reunion. They have picked their friendship back up.
More importantly, the conviction that they want to save Jiang Shuangjie, has unified them.
Jiang Shuangmei says, “not really. I was going to ask about your Nightmare last night.”
She knows Ding Yi went to a Nightmare last night. She went to another one.
Nowadays, they enter Nightmares regularly. Sometimes they are together, sometimes not.
In the latter case, the following day, one of them would go and visit the other at noon, but it is more often that Jiang Shuangmei goes to Ding Yi.
Because Jiang Shuangmei doesn’t really like going back to where she lives – where she was betrayed, where she lost everything her older sister left behind for her. It’s not uncommon for Jiang Shuangmei to stay over at Ding Yi’s as well.
Ding Yi then nods, and, glancing at Mu Jiashi, she thinks about it and says, “perhaps Shuangshuang could go to the Nightmare.”
The person in question seems confused, asking, “which Nightmare?”
Mu Jiashi then tells her about Xü Beijin’s Nightmare.