My Healing Games

Chapter 908 Fearlessness is the first step towards miracles

The blind boy crawled backward, trembling, until his back hit the table and candlesticks before he stopped.

As the burning candle rolled off the edge of the table, and the scalding wax was about to drip onto his face, Number Three reached out and shielded his head.

"answer my question."

Number Three felt no pain. His ordinary face was very close to the boy's, and now no matter what the boy did, he couldn't escape from under his nose.

"Ah, ah..." the boy stammered, reaching into his throat and trying to pry it open. Number Three pried open the boy's mouth and discovered that the back half of his teeth was connected to a piece of iron that could block his throat.

The children working in this "Hope Pharmacy" don't need eyes or mouths; even if they hear the "boss's" instructions, they can't reveal the secret.

After removing the iron block, the boy lay on the ground, panting heavily. The first thing he did after regaining his strength was to crawl towards the middle-aged man's corpse, pick up the knife, and stab it into the man's chest again.

After taking his revenge, he even touched the middle-aged man's wounds, in order to "appreciate" his "work".

Spitting out the blood in his mouth, the boy threw away the knife and stood blankly in front of the clay sculpture: "My name is Heart. Of the nine children who were tricked into coming here, I was the only one who survived."

His voice was broken and intermittent, seemingly because he hadn't spoken in a long time, which sounded very unpleasant.

“My parents and younger brother are survivors who fled to the new city. We thought it was paradise, but after settling down, we found that it was only paradise for a part of the population.”

“My father and mother lived a very cautious life. I often looked down on them. I used to think they were shameful, but now I realize what a terrible child I was. In order for my brother and me to enter the central district, they went together to steal cursed items from buildings occupied by ghosts.”

"One lucky success means nothing; they left one morning and never came back."

“The guards who arranged for the survivors to go out scavenging learned about my family’s situation, and in recognition of my parents’ contributions, the vice-captain took us into the central district.”

“However, the wonderful life I imagined did not begin. He sold my brother and me to a ‘shop’, and after the ‘shop’ lost its value, we were sold to a ‘pharmacy’.”

“I lost my eyesight in the pharmacy. You all saw what happened next. I became a clerk in the pharmacy, responsible for preparing the offerings needed for sacrificial rituals in the dark cave.”

The boy's voice became more and more fluent; even after experiencing such a terrifying ordeal, he had not given up hope of surviving.

"You still have one question for me." Number Three wiped the solidified wax from the back of his hand, then locked his fingers around the boy's neck: "What's the thing you regret most?"

"My biggest regret is not stopping my parents that morning a few years ago. If they were still here, the tragedy that followed would not have happened." The boy showed no sign of struggling; he was like a fish on a chopping board, completely at their mercy.

"Are you sure?" Number Three asked again, as if this question was very important.

"Of course." The boy nodded with difficulty.

Seeing his certainty, Number Three pulled out the notebook from his pocket: "You regret not stopping your parents, but don't you regret causing them so much pain? Don't you regret selling your brother to the guard's merchant? Don't you regret sacrificing your soul to the evil god at the pharmacy? Don't you regret killing the other eight children with your own hands in order to survive at the pharmacy?"

With each word Number Three spoke, the boy's face turned a shade more ashen. He thought that once the middle-aged man was dead, no one would know what he had done before, but he never expected that Number Three and Number Two had investigated everything so thoroughly.

"The harder you struggle, the darker fate will lead you. You will be the most pitiful, the most despicable, the most desperate, and the least deserving of sympathy child." Number Three closed his notebook, turned to Number Two, and said, "We found it."

“That’s right, I can’t see this child’s fate clearly. In the world of the shrine’s memories, only people who are happy will experience this situation.” Number Two’s hand touched the boy’s eye socket, and all the invisible chains on the boy’s body broke. His original fate trajectory was forcibly changed by Number Two.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I admit I’ve done some bad things, but it was only because I wanted to survive! How could you young masters living in the sunshine possibly understand the lives of homeless children in the outer city?” The blind boy became agitated after being exposed.

"Are we children living in the sun?" Number Three and Number Two both laughed: "The simulated sun in the laboratory is indeed very dazzling; almost every child's eyes have been burned."

“I really don’t understand what you’re talking about! I don’t understand why you’re targeting me. I’m of no use to you. They stole my organs and modified my body. I can only barely survive underground. I’ve given everything, and you still won’t let me go?”

"You probably don't even know your own worth, do you?" Number Three twisted the boy's deformed legs, pulled his feet out of the black lock, then gagged the blind boy again, tied him up, and stuffed him into a sack.

With one hand dragging the sack, Number Three carried Number Two on his back and walked out of the pharmacy.

The people around them seemed completely oblivious to them, and no one stepped forward to stop them. They walked through the dark alley, into the crowded night market, and disappeared into the distance amidst the clamor of vendors' cries.

"Notify the others that the fragment of Gao Xing's soul has been found, and have them all gather at the designated location."

A member of the guard team who was passing by Number Two heard Number Two's voice, which sounded like he was talking to himself. His eyes slowly changed. After a brief hesitation, he immediately turned around and ran in another direction.

A dozen minutes later, there were fewer and fewer pedestrians on the street, and Number Three dragged his sack to the border between the central district and the inner district.

When they entered within 100 meters of the inner city, two members of the guard team personally opened a side gate of the inner city for them.

Everything seemed to be arranged. The guards along the way had strange, blank, and unfocused eyes, like puppets being manipulated.

Their eyes gradually regained their focus when the shift changed, but by then, Number Three and Number Two had already entered the heavily guarded inner city.

"Alright, this is no longer your business." Number Two said to the two guards who were leading the way. Upon hearing this, the two men drew their swords and thrust them into each other's chests without hesitation.

"Ahem!" Number Three coughed, and the two guards stopped what they were doing. They turned around and left in a daze.

"Everyone will die, why bother?" Just by listening to Number Two's voice, you can't tell what he's thinking.

“There’s no reason, I just did it subconsciously.” A smile appeared on Number Three’s ordinary face: “In life, many moments are done on a whim, and I think it is these unconscious actions that constitute the destiny with its countless tributaries.”

"That's just the excuses of losers. They always blame everything on fate. I don't want you to become like that." Number Two's attitude towards Number Three was completely different from his attitude towards the other children. In his eyes, it seemed that only Number One and Number Three existed as his equals.

This equality has no special meaning; it simply means that, in Number Two's view, Number One and Number Three are not the ones to be protected, but rather the ones who should step forward to protect the other children.

“I have no idea about controlling my destiny; I just don’t want to be changed anymore.”

Upon hearing what Number Three said, Number Two remained silent. Number Three's personality and abilities were quite unique, and his words seemed to have another layer of meaning.

The inner city is significantly more prosperous and cleaner than the central city. Almost everything produced by human society in the past can be found here. Hopefully, the inner city of the new city is the last seed of human society, or at least that's what the people living here think.

Walking along the clean and tidy road to the end, in the inner city where land is extremely valuable, the detached building in front of No. 2 also has a sizable garden.

At the end of the courtyard filled with flowers, hangs an advertising sign for the Hope Pharmaceutical General Store.

"I also want to save many people, but is it worth it?"

Number Three entered the building, where the other children were cleaning up the bloodstains. They covered all the blooming flowers with black cloth and blew out all the candles in the pharmacy.

“We are all ready and can start anytime.” Number Four pointed to the clay sculpture in the center of the main store: “It took me a lot of effort to move this statue out of the cellar.”

"Thank you for your hard work." Number Two nodded and gestured to Number Three to release the blind boy.

The boy, whose eyes had been gouged out and whose body was severely deformed, lay on the ground, whimpering helplessly. Anyone who saw him would feel extremely sorry for him.

"Is this the child? He does look quite pitiful." Number Four walked to the child's side, his brows furrowed. "However, there is no trace of death in him. He has a strong will to live. If we don't interfere, he can probably continue to live such a miserable life."

"I have already changed fate. Let Number One come over and proceed according to the original plan." Number Two seemed to lack the complex emotions of ordinary people; everything he did was for the purpose of rewriting fate in the end.

"What exactly do you want to do!" The blind boy lying on the ground suddenly spoke, spitting out the piece of iron and two teeth from his mouth.

The blind boy was not as honest as he seemed. He never gave up on escaping the pharmacy. In order to be able to speak, he secretly broke his teeth back to life a long time ago.

"What we need to do is simple: kill you in advance, drive all the hatred around you into madness, disrupt your blood sacrifice process, and take all the sacrifices for you."

"You madman! I have no idea about hatred or blood sacrifice! What does this have to do with me!" The blind boy had never felt so desperate. Number Two gave him an unprecedented sense of threat.

"Stop struggling, Gaoxing." After Number Two said Gaoxing's name, the necrotic flesh in the blind boy's dark eye sockets moved slightly, and then blood flowed out. He covered his eyes in pain.

"Impossible! I never did those things! I just want to live! I just want to live like everyone else!"

A crack appeared in the rotten flesh around his eye. He gripped the soil with his fingers, trying to stand up.

"In reality, you must have also experienced such a day, with anger and fear tormenting your mind, enduring excruciating pain, and refusing to succumb to fate, even if you end up becoming a monster that everyone fears." Number One pushed open the door and stepped out from behind the clay sculpture. His tall figure brought a sense of security to all the children.

Seeing Number One appear, Number Two also breathed a slight sigh of relief.

"I have nothing! I'm not born with a personality like you freaks! I just want to live! What did I do wrong!" Blood slid down his eye sockets, the rotten flesh was slowly torn open, and two foul-smelling, pitch-black pupils rolled around.

"What did those people you killed do wrong?" Number One raised his arm, and in that instant, all the faceless clay sculptures hidden inside Hope City began to tremble, and invisible chains wrapped around Number One's wrist.

Those chains of fate were very similar to those used by Number Two before, except that they were made entirely of dead souls and were dripping with foul blood.

“When the fate of the majority can be decided by the minority, then fate itself loses its original meaning. My existence is to break it.” Dragging all the chains of the dead, Number One’s conviction gathered on his right fist, slowly approaching the boy’s eyes.

"Fearless personality?" As the boy's pupils fully opened within the rotten flesh, another person's voice came from his mouth.

The chains of fate tightly bound Number One's arm, and cracks began to appear on all the clay sculptures at the other end of the chains!
"Fearlessness is only the first step toward miracles."

(End of this chapter)