Chapter 81: In His Eyes, All Beings Are Equal Except You

Wen Chu shyly: 【We are already preparing for our third child.】

System: 【……】

While speaking, Wen Chu had already followed everyone into the car.

He sat beside Xiu, while Ren Chuanyu sat in the front passenger seat.

To facilitate catching him and quickly locking him back up, the baiting formation was not far from the Great Reincarnation Formation—only a two-or-three-minute drive.

Just as Wen Chu was about to continue asking the System about the favorability panel, he heard Ren Chuanyu’s voice.

“I never imagined… that the Eye of the Formation was actually you.”

Wen Chu looked up and met Ren Chuanyu’s complicated gaze.

“Back then, when you were sleeping during our meetings, was it because you knew you were the Eye and didn’t want to interfere in our affairs?”

Ren Chuanyu paused, then added, “Senior.”

Being called “Senior” by such a highly respected middle-aged woman felt incredibly strange. Wen Chu shivered and spoke the honest truth: “No, I just didn’t sleep at night, so I was sleepy in the morning.”

“You can just call me Wen Chu.”

Ren Chuanyu was stunned for a moment, then couldn’t help but smile. “Alright.”

She continued, “Wen Chu, Xiu, although I sincerely hope you succeed from the bottom of my heart, I have to say the ugly part first.”

Wen Chu watched as Ren Chuanyu’s expression turned serious.

“If the plan you propose fails, we will proceed with the original plan. Even if you are unwilling, we will take coercive measures.”

Wen Chu was innocent; this was undeniable.

But in Ren Chuanyu’s eyes, the people who died miserable deaths because the wronged souls couldn’t enter the cycle of reincarnation were equally innocent.

She couldn’t disregard the entire Association of Exorcists, or even the whole world, just for a moving story.

Wen Chu nodded, accepting this smoothly. “That’s okay. If it doesn’t succeed, I will go back obediently. You just have to remember to make Xiu the next President, okay?”

Ren Chuanyu’s tense expression relaxed a little, and she couldn’t help but smile. “Of course, Xiu is—”

“I will not succeed the position,” Xiu said abruptly.

His elbow rested on the car door, his chin propped in his hand as he looked out at the rapidly receding scenery. Beneath his short blonde hair, his blue eyes were cold.

“If it doesn’t succeed, I will enter the formation in Wen Chu’s place. I’ll trouble you to follow the agreement: piece Wen Chu back together completely, and let him… enter the Great Reincarnation Formation to go to his next life.”

As Xiu spoke, his brows and eyes softened.

“He has stayed in this world long enough. If not for us, he should have reincarnated long ago.”

“Xiu!” Wen Chu was anxious. “That’s not what you told me before!”

Xiu glanced at him sideways. “How is that not what I said?”

Wen Chu choked.

He suddenly remembered that Xiu had only said the small white ball might serve as a substitute for them to enter the formation, but he had never actually said what would happen if it failed.

He had been played by Xiu.

“You…” Wen Chu was furious.

He flew onto Xiu’s lap, hugged Xiu’s neck, and took a vicious bite. “I forbid it. If we die, we die together.”

“Alright,” Xiu said.

He agreed so easily that Wen Chu didn’t even react at first. He was about to continue his angry tirade when, a few seconds later, he realized what Xiu had said.

His anger vanished instantly. He blinked his eyes at Xiu. “You agreed?”

Xiu looked down at him. “Mm.”

“You love to cry so much. If I left you alone, wouldn’t you plague the human world for a thousand years?”

Wen Chu: …

Wen Chu puffed out his cheeks unconvinced. “How does loving to cry plague the human world…”

Xiu said calmly, “Don’t you know that when you cry tears of blood, the surroundings fall into an illusion along with your tears?”

Wen Chu: ?

“Tears of blood?” Wen Chu was shocked. “I cry blood?”

Xiu raised an eyebrow. “You really didn’t know?”

Wen Chu covered his face. “If I knew, I wouldn’t have cried in front of you!”

He thought he was shedding tears, but it turned out to be blood.

A face full of crystal-clear tears and a face full of bloody gore—even if Wen Chu had no concept of aesthetics, he knew the two were completely different things.

It went straight from an urban romance movie to a horror movie.

He wanted to cry but had no tears. “Why didn’t you warn me?”

No wonder the people on the subway looked at him with such horror—who wouldn’t be terrified seeing a ferocious ghost crying tears of blood right in front of them?

Xiu held back a laugh. “I didn’t expect it either; I thought you knew.”

He gently pried away the hands covering Wen Chu’s face and said softly, “It’s fine. It’s not ugly. It’s very cute.”

Wen Chu looked up at Xiu, and only after confirming that Xiu wasn’t mocking him did he slowly lower his hands.

He said awkwardly, “Oh.”

If Xiu thought it was cute, then let it be cute.

After all, he started crying in the first place to act pitiful in front of Xiu; now, the result was the same regardless of the method.

Ren Chuanyu, who had been forgotten in the front seat: …

She simply couldn’t bear to look.

She sighed. She had wanted to ask if Xiu really intended to give up on succeeding as President, but after seeing the interaction between Xiu and Wen Chu, she felt asking would be stating the obvious.

She picked up her phone and began contacting other promising new-generation exorcists she had previously noted.

Xiu was indeed outstanding, but there were a few others below him who were passable. Ren Chuanyu hadn’t considered them before because their strength was inferior to Xiu’s, and most were from the old-school exorcist families.

After they left, the Association of Exorcists would inevitably be leaderless.

But this was also an excellent opportunity for reform.

With the exorcist families dominating for a century, the Association had produced many parasites like Wen Yaozu who held positions without doing any work. This was an inevitable disadvantage brought about by deep-rooted family entanglements.

They needed a New School exorcist to take the position; they needed new reforms.

Thinking of this, Ren Chuanyu skipped over the descendants of the exorcist families and contacted the New School exorcists.

Most of the New School exorcists were arranging the baiting formation for Wen Chu and did not know the details of the Great Reincarnation Formation.

As Ren Chuanyu’s long message was sent out, the phones of many New School exorcists who had been left behind began to buzz.

“Tsk tsk, those Old School types retreated completely. Such heavy authority.”

“Treating us as free labor is one thing, but not even revealing the location of the Reincarnation Formation? Isn’t this just treating us like thieves?”

“…Huh? Whose phone rang?”

“President Ren just sent me a message.”

“I got one too.”

The New School exorcists, who had been gathered together chatting, suddenly stopped.

Many who received the message suddenly looked serious, pulling their companions aside to whisper.

As the social butterfly, Yuan Le naturally received the news immediately.

He looked at the long message forwarded by a friend from Ren Chuanyu. While his eyes stung a little, they also turned a bit red with envy.

“Am I not excellent enough?” Yuan Le bit his handkerchief. “Why didn’t she send it to me? I want to be a candidate for President too.”

The next moment, his friend sent another message.

【We want to go see if we can help. Do you want to come along?】

.

Wen Chu was unaware of the undercurrents among the New School exorcists.

Because he had already arrived in front of the Great Formation.

Almost the instant he got out of the car, Wen Chu couldn’t help but start trembling.

A century had passed, and the mountain forest was still dense. Aside from being lusher, there was no change from back then.

Memories began to return. Wen Chu could even feel parts of his body calling out, recounting the pain of each part being dissected.

“Wen Chu?” Xiu, carrying Wen Chu on his back, sensed something was wrong immediately.

Wen Chu hugged Xiu’s neck tightly, trying hard to calm down. “It’s nothing… I just remembered the scene from back then.”

His trembling voice explained everything.

Xiu didn’t speak, but the Five Emperors Coins on Wen Chu’s wrist lit up again.

The copper coins, once used to form a formation to kill him when they first met, now emitted a soft glow, allowing warm spiritual power to infuse his limbs and bones little by little, gently protecting him.

Wen Chu stopped trembling. Looking at the chains on his wrist, he whispered on Xiu’s back, “Xiu.”

“Mm.”

“If only you had really existed back then.”

Xiu hiked him up higher on his back. “It doesn’t matter. I am here now.”

Wen Chu gave an “Mm” and stopped talking.

What he wanted to talk about wasn’t just a hundred years ago.

It was also about the time in the hospital before he entered the quick transmigration system.

Having stayed in the second world for so long, the memories of the hospital had become distant, but Wen Chu remembered them clearly.

Endless deathly silence, pure white wards, and strictly business-like doctors.

Occasionally, nurses would talk to him, but they would be transferred away within a month.

If only Xiu had been there at that time too.

When his treatments were finished, he also wanted to be patted on the head by Xiu.

Under the gazes of the exorcists, the young blonde exorcist carried the red-clothed ferocious ghost and walked step by step into the formation.

The Great Reincarnation Formation was extremely complex and included a concealment array. The figures of the exorcist and the ghost disappeared little by little.

Inside the formation.

Wen Chu jumped off Xiu’s back and obediently squatted to the side, watching as Xiu took out the small white ball and various items from his bag, tinkering with things inside the formation.

Holding his face in his hands, he squatted there and slowly recalled his past within the formation.

Every day inside the formation, all sorts of wronged souls would line up in a long queue to enter reincarnation.

He was responsible for maintaining order, dragging out troublemakers to beat them up, and providing energy for the formation daily.

During this time, Wen Chu heard a lot of gossip.

Like the newly opened commercial street, the capture of a serial killer, the airing of a new TV drama… but mostly about the Association of Exorcists.

Almost all the ghosts who were sent over knew about the Association of Exorcists.

The Association had a new President again… The Association was accepting New School exorcists…

And Xiu from the Association.

The memories of ghosts were mostly fragmented. Wen Chu only knew that this blonde New School exorcist was called a genius and was about to succeed as the next President.

This oddly familiar experience reminded him of himself.

Wen Chu didn’t think a rootless New School exorcist could become President so easily.

It seemed more like bait, a conspiracy to lure Xiu onto the hook.

Wen Chu looked at the increasingly dim formation and a bad guess arose.

—The second Eye of the Formation.

So, one day, Wen Chu ran away.

The Great Formation lacked his heart and thoracic vertebrae; he had always been able to escape, he just hadn’t had the desire to leave.

He was just a ghost. There was nothing to do outside, so he might as well stay in the formation and listen to gossip.

But this time, he had something to do outside.

He wanted to find Xiu.

To tell Xiu the truth about the Eye of the Formation and to be careful of the Association of Exorcists.

Following the directions given by other ghosts, he arrived near Xiu’s university town and dizzily followed the crowd into the subway.

On who-knows-which day of squatting in the subway, a man with short blonde hair stepped onto the train.

“University City Station, arrived.”

The man-made genius from a century ago and the genius from a century later finally crossed time in this moment, their gazes meeting.

【Did I do this?】 Wen Chu held his throbbing head and couldn’t help asking the System.

System: 【To be precise, it is the backstory developed based on your personality.】

So that meant he did do it.

But clearly, the Wen Chu of that time had guessed wrong. The Association of Exorcists didn’t intend for Xiu to become the Eye.

“Done.”

Accompanying Xiu’s voice, the white ball in the center of the formation emitted light, and complex formation patterns suddenly appeared on the ground.

Wen Chu stood up, floated to Xiu’s side, and asked in confusion, “Is it already successful?”

Xiu nodded. “It’s just changing the energy source of the formation. It’s not difficult.”

“So easy?” Wen Chu’s eyes widened. “But you guys made it sound so serious in the car.”

“Without one hundred percent certainty, no one dares to make a definitive conclusion,” Xiu said helplessly.

Wen Chu hugged his neck and whispered, “I thought I was going to die with you.”

Although dying together would be fine, he still wanted to live with Xiu.

If Xiu died too, the two ghosts really wouldn’t have anything to eat.

“President Ren!! Wuuuuuwuuuu!!”

Just then, the sound of crying and shouting came from outside.

Did an accident happen?

Wen Chu and Xiu exchanged glances. Without delay, they quickly packed up the items on the ground and walked out.

The tassel earring on Xiu’s ear began to glow blue, and Wen Chu prepared himself to cry tears at any moment to pull people into an illusion.

However, seeing the scene before them, both were stunned.

They saw Yuan Le, snot and tears running down his face, hugging President Ren’s leg, followed by a crowd of teary-eyed New School exorcists.

Wen Chu: ?

Xiu: ?

“What… is happening?” Xiu asked cautiously.

Ren Chuanyu, looking embarrassed, saw Xiu walk out of the formation as if seeing a savior. “Xiu, hurry and explain to these kids. We didn’t plan to…”

“You guys want to go to your deaths, right?”

Wen Chu, lying on Xiu’s back, spoke first.

His voice silenced everyone present.

The white-haired youth looked at Ren Chuanyu with round, clear blue eyes and said seriously, “I remember. Back then, none of the exorcist families who participated in building the Great Formation survived. The Wen family only lived until now because they pushed everyone from Wen Yan’s branch out.”

“In the modern era, there are no spiritual veins. Running the Reincarnation Formation relies entirely on draining all your spiritual power. In recent years, the formation has become dimmer and dimmer. Even if I hadn’t escaped, you all would have organized a time to secretly provide energy for the formation.”

As long as it didn’t involve Xiu, Wen Chu was very logical.

He glanced at Yuan Le, who was crying his heart out, and added, “Of course, only the Old School exorcists knew these things. This was also the content you deliberately concealed at the Exorcist Conference.”

Yuan Le nodded with tears in his eyes. ” exactly! President, that message you sent—didn’t it mean you were entrusting your affairs before death? I… wuwuwu… I was wrong! I’ll never say you’re biased behind your back again!”

Ren Chuanyu had never been hugged and cried on like this. Her face was full of awkwardness. “I didn’t tell you not to show it to others…”

“President, did you just copy and paste the message you sent me back then?” Xiu spoke helplessly.

“You said, ‘After we leave, the Association of Exorcists will be fully under your responsibility. To avoid giving people with ulterior motives something to use against you, please do not spread this.’ But most of us New School exorcists are just errand runners. That sentence you added was really too obvious.”

Ren Chuanyu touched her nose awkwardly.

She waved her hand to disperse the crowd. “Go, go, go. Isn’t it solved now that Xiu is here? Hurry up and help dig out Wen Chu’s body.”

Yuan Le and the others scattered instantly. Xiu carried Wen Chu to Ren Chuanyu’s side.

The new and old Presidents looked at each other in silence.

After a long while, Ren Chuanyu joked, “It looks like you won’t be able to succeed me within ten years. I’ll have to work until retirement.”

Xiu also smiled slightly. “That’s great. When can we improve the marriage laws between humans and ghosts?”

Wen Chu perked up. “Yeah, when can we improve them?”

Ren Chuanyu: …

Those laws don’t even exist, how can we improve them!!

.

There were at least a hundred exorcists present. Their efficiency was extremely high; digging together, each person grabbing two or three pieces was enough to assemble Wen Chu.

Xiu put Wen Chu back together on the spot. The red clothes on Wen Chu began to change, eventually turning into the small black cape from the previous world.

He changed from a ferocious ghost to an ordinary ghost.

His power remained, but he was finally no longer a resentful soul who could only cry tears of blood, but a contracted ghost bound to Xiu.

The brand-new, pretty ghost Wen Chu immediately felt something was wrong.

He flew around Xiu—up, down, left, and right—and then hugged Xiu’s neck under Xiu’s confused gaze.

“Strange…” Wen Chu said.

“What’s wrong?” Xiu asked.

Wen Chu frowned. “You don’t smell good anymore.”

“Ah.” Xiu remembered that he used to smell very fragrant to Wen Chu. He explained, “Because back then you were a ferocious ghost with heavy Yin energy, you craved my Yang energy, so you thought I smelled good. Now you aren’t a ferocious ghost anymore.”

Xiu looked at Wen Chu uncertainly. “…Did you prefer my Yang energy?”

“Impossible.” Wen Chu hugged Xiu, tossing the trivial matter of fragrance to the back of his mind. “I like you. Even in the illusion, I didn’t stop liking you just because you didn’t smell good. You aren’t allowed to doubt my sincerity!”

He didn’t speak quietly, attracting the attention of the surrounding exorcists.

Xiu’s cheeks burned hot. “Keep it down.”

Night fell gradually.

After the formation restarted, wandering spirits from all directions began to gather there.

Those who gathered voluntarily were mostly residual souls without consciousness—white or gray—emitting a faint light in the darkness, lining up lifelessly to await reincarnation.

Ren Chuanyu was arranging the shift schedule for guarding the formation. Xiu, with Wen Chu on his back, greeted her. “I’ll take him back first?”

Ren Chuanyu nodded. “Be safe on the road.”

Yuan Le, who was doing odd jobs nearby, passed by. “When are you giving out wedding candy?”

Xiu smiled and glanced sideways at Wen Chu on his back. “Wait for me to pick an auspicious date.”

Wen Chu was very happy, lying on Xiu’s back and following him step by step toward the helicopter.

The System suddenly spoke up: 【Mission failed. Do you want to finish the remaining three years, or leave now?】

Wen Chu froze: 【How did it fail?】

This was the best he had done across three worlds.

Both he and Xiu were alive, no one was hurt, and the world was restored to peace.

System: 【…Your mission was to collect Xiu’s Yang energy. Now, you are no longer a ferocious ghost.】

The System had thought of countless possibilities for passing or failing, but Wen Chu exceeded its expectations every time.

This time, he directly changed his species.

Wen Chu: …

Wen Chu finally realized what not smelling the fragrance meant:

His food was no longer Xiu’s Yang energy.

Previously, he had focused all his thoughts on the entanglement of identities with Xiu. Wen Chu hadn’t expected the mission to fail in such a dramatic way.

It wasn’t until he followed Xiu onto the helicopter that Wen Chu reacted.

【It doesn’t matter. There’s still the next world. You said before that succeeding three times would allow resurrection.】

Wen Chu wasn’t actually that disappointed.

After all, from the moment he entered this world and received the information, he had prepared for failure.

Success would have been a pleasant surprise; failure was within reason.

He just wished he’d known earlier—he would have dragged Xiu to do it enough times before retrieving his body.

The helicopter took off. Wen Chu leaned next to Xiu, watching the city lights gradually receding on the ground, and said: 【You mentioned the Favorability Panel update. Can I see it?】

He had been interrupted by other things just now and hadn’t had time to look at the Favorability Panel.

The System didn’t speak.

The next moment, a pink light screen appeared before his eyes.

Compared to the simple favorability progress bar in the previous world, this screen was much longer; he couldn’t see the end of it at a glance.

Why were there so many?

Wen Chu looked closely and actually saw many names he recognized.

【Narwhal】 Favorability: 0/100
【Dorothy】 Favorability: 0/100
【Catherine】 Favorability: 0/100
【Minnie】 Favorability: 0/100
…
【Ren Chuanyu】 Favorability: 0/100
【Yuan Le】 Favorability: 0/100

Looking across the board, it was all zeros.

Was the screen broken?

Wen Chu scrolled down suspiciously, but it was still an endless stream of zeros.

Everyone he had met, whether he had an impression of them or not, whether they were good or bad—in Xiu’s eyes, they were all an equal zero.

The System said coldly: 【The favorability values from all worlds and all people have been imported to stop you from thinking nonsense.】

Wen Chu pursed his lips. 【Where am I?】

System: 【Top right corner, search, or sort favorability from high to low.】

Wen Chu clicked ‘sort from high to low’ as instructed.

【Wen Chu】 Favorability: 80 (+20) / 100
【Ocean World】 Favorability: 0/100
【Steam World】 Favorability: 0/100
…

Except for him, everything below was a sea of zeros, including the worlds themselves.

There was even a little red heart in front of his favorability value.

Wen Chu looked at his favorability value again and again in disbelief. His first reaction was that the System was coaxing him: 【Really? Did you really not fake this?】

The System was impatient: 【If I wanted to fake it, wouldn’t I just write 0 for everyone? Why go to the trouble of importing everything? You can click on the character page to see the details of favorability increases and decreases, as well as video playback.】

Wen Chu randomly clicked on someone, and it happened to be Minnie. Several familiar videos popped up.

【Adopted Minnie】 Favorability +0
【Minnie Rebelled】 Favorability -0
【Met Minnie again in Reincarnation】 Favorability +0

Wen Chu: …

Wen Chu clicked on his own.

【Bumped into by Little Jellyfish】 Favorability +2
【Little Jellyfish Fainted】 Favorability +3
【Little Jellyfish slept holding tail】 Favorability +5
【Made a little nest for Jellyfish】 Favorability +3
【Jellyfish threw a tantrum】 Favorability +7
…

Essentially, every time Wen Chu breathed, the favorability went up.

【Then what does the +20 behind the 80 mean?】 Wen Chu asked his final question.

This time, the System’s voice carried a hint of embarrassment: 【It’s a bug I discovered only after importing the data from all three planes.】

【Because Xiu’s memory is temporarily sealed in each plane, his favorability toward you from the previous plane was also sealed. This part of the favorability was hidden, so it couldn’t be seen.】

Wen Chu was stunned.

The last world was ninety; this world was eighty.

If the full favorability from every world was sealed, and entering the next world meant starting with ten percent invisible favorability, did that mean…

Wen Chu asked urgently: 【Are you saying that in the first world, Xiu already—】

“Wen Chu,” Xiu called out to him from beside him.

Wen Chu turned his head and saw Xiu pointing at a brightly lit place beneath the helicopter. “That’s the amusement park in the city center. Want to go play? I’ll take you tomorrow.”

Wen Chu looked at Xiu’s profile, opened his mouth, and finally said, “Mm.”

“Xiu, which is more important to you, me or the world?”

He finally asked the question he had struggled with for a long time.

Xiu didn’t expect him to ask this. following Wen Chu’s words, he thought for a moment, then said, “You.”

“As the next President, I have a responsibility to be accountable to this world, but you are my selfish desire.”

Therefore, when Wen Chu stood on the opposite side of the world, if Wen Chu didn’t love him, he was willing to die in Wen Chu’s place. But since Wen Chu couldn’t bear to part with him, he would go to his death together with Wen Chu.

Of course, the best outcome was using his own ability to keep Wen Chu safe.

Xiu reached out and scraped his nose. “What random nonsense are you thinking about? I’m so powerful; as long as you ask, I will save you no matter what.”

Wen Chu blinked his eyes.

“…Mm.”

He knew.

Because Xiu was a god.

To be able to accompany him through so many worlds, to be by his side every time, and even possess the ability to bring the dead back to life—that was the ability the doctor said only gods possessed.

“Wen Chu,” Xiu said.

He looked at Wen Chu seriously. “Although I don’t know why, you always think that saving the world is important in my eyes, but I need to clarify something.”

“In my eyes, apart from you, all beings are equal.”

If it were any other day, Wen Chu would have thought these were just words Xiu used to comfort him.

But right now, looking at the dense array on the light screen, Wen Chu couldn’t speak.

He thought, maybe Xiu really did like him quite a lot.

The kind of like where he valued him more than the world.

Or perhaps, the partial gaze of a god had rested upon him a long time ago.

The roar of the helicopter and the beating of his heart overlapped at this moment.

The little jellyfish who had once felt uncomfortable in the turbulent ocean without knowing why, and those tears shed while hugging Xiu in a breakdown, seemed to finally receive an echo at this moment.

Wen Chu heard the System’s voice:

【Do you want to stay and rest for a while? I can help you fight for a little more time.】