Loop

“Zhuangzi's butterfly dream?”

“Was there a problem with my memory?”

Yue Shi tapped his fingers lightly on the desk, thinking carefully, trying to find any abnormal traces in his memory.

But he couldn't find any.

Chijing City, Fluorite Valley, Cuifeng City, Zhongzhou, the Deep Blue Route... every detail was vivid, and every scene was lifelike.

If those were dreams, then the dream was simply too long—long enough to be longer than his actual life.

Yue Shi felt a rare moment of self-doubt, but his skepticism lasted only a few seconds. He quickly snapped out of it; the problem was definitely not with him!

He looked down at the snow leopard cub in his arms; the chubby thing was curled up in the crook of his elbow, its tail hanging down and twitching back and forth.

He never used to have a habit of keeping pets. Back when he worked at the Amber City Investigation Bureau, he hadn't even kept a potted plant. Now, he had a snow leopard cub in his arms, yet his colleagues acted as if it weren't there.

Yue Shi looked at the calendar again: April 1st.

When he left Amber City, it was winter; now, it was the following spring. More than four months had passed, but judging by the reactions of Wei Jianxian and the others, they didn't think he had ever left.

“Could I have come to a parallel world?”

Parallel worlds were mostly the same, with only minor deviations.

Perhaps there was another Yue Shi in this world who hadn't left Amber City and hadn't experienced those storms. He was just an ordinary investigator in the Investigation Bureau, slacking off at work every day, going home after work, and occasionally having dinner with colleagues on weekends.

And now, the Yue Shi who had weathered countless storms had entered this world—had he replaced his counterpart in this reality?

Well...

The idea was too far-fetched even for him; it was pure nonsense.

Yue Shi leaned back in his chair, looking at the computer screen. He opened Minesweeper, and the 147-second record flickered in the upper right corner of the screen.

He picked up the mouse and clicked restart.

The grid spread out. He coordinated his left and right clicks, the mouse clicking rapidly.

67 seconds. A new record.

A 【Congratulations】 dialog box popped up on the screen.

Just then...

With a bang, a gunshot rang out.

A bullet shot in from outside, piercing the office glass and hitting Yue Shi right between the eyes.

...

Everything went black.

When he opened his eyes again, he saw the familiar white ceiling.

The air held the astringent scent of photocopier toner and the aroma of instant coffee.

Yue Shi looked around in shock, discovering that he was once again standing in the lobby of the Investigation Bureau.

Beneath his feet was the terrazzo floor. To his left was a row of plastic chairs, and to his right was a service counter where two uniformed staff members were—one on the phone and one tapping at a keyboard.

Everything was exactly the same as before.

“Yue Shi, why are you just standing there?” Ling Xun's voice came from behind him.

Yue Shi turned his head and saw Ling Xun making the exact same expression and saying the exact same words as before.

Yue Shi was greatly shocked. He quickly scanned his surroundings. The staff member on the phone was saying, “Right, right. We’ll send someone over immediately.”

The tone, the pauses, and even the pitch of every word were identical to before.

He looked up at the clock in the lobby. A round white face, black numbers, and the hands were moving.

9:30. It was exactly the same as when Yue Shi had first looked at the clock.

Time had reset?

He was back in the past again!

Yue Shi's heart pounded. He had been completely unaware of the anomaly in space-time.

The reset left no traces, as if the entire world had suddenly returned to its starting point.

This was too abnormal.

Yue Shi rapidly replayed everything that had happened in his mind.

Before the time reset, he had heard a gunshot.

A bullet had shot in from outside, pierced the glass, and hit him between the eyes.

It seemed someone was sniping him from outside the window.

As for the sniper's position?

He hadn't looked out the window at the time, but the angle the bullet came from was from the front-right—likely a window in the building across from the Investigation Bureau.

Yue Shi turned and walked toward the main entrance of the Investigation Bureau.

“Where are you going?” Ling Xun's voice chased after him from behind.

“I have something to do.” Yue Shi pushed open the glass doors and walked outside the Investigation Bureau.

The sunlight was pleasant, feeling warm on his body, and there were pigeons foraging nearby.

Yue Shi's shadow moved on the ground, and countless ravens flew out from it, scattering in all directions toward the nearby buildings to search for the suspected shooter.

When Ling Xun chased him out, he happened to see the flock of ravens flying out of Yue Shi's shadow. The cigarette in his mouth almost fell to the ground. “What on earth is going on?”

Yue Shi ignored him, his vision connected to every raven. The perspectives of all the ravens overlapped in his mind.

He checked every window of the building across from the Investigation Bureau but found no suspicious persons.

“What exactly is the matter?” Ling Xun's voice became serious. He walked up to Yue Shi and waved a hand in front of his eyes.

“Could there be something supernatural nearby?” He looked around nervously, his hand already resting on the sidearm at his waist.

Just then.

“Bang!”

Another gunshot rang out.

But this time, the gunshot sounded behind Yue Shi, and the bullet hit him in the back of the head.

...

Everything went black.

When he opened his eyes again, Yue Shi was back in the lobby, in the exact same scene as before.

“Yue Shi, why are you just standing there?” Ling Xun's voice came from behind him, with a slight upward lilt at the end.

This was the third time Yue Shi had heard this sentence.

He looked up at the clock in the lobby. 9:30.

He was back at this point in time again.

Yue Shi's expression darkened.

This was a loop.

Every time, it would pull him back to the same point in time, the same position, to hear Ling Xun's greeting.

Why was it looping?

He recalled the details of the first two loops; both times, he had heard a gunshot.

The first time, the bullet entered through the window and hit him between the eyes.

The second time, the bullet entered from behind and hit the back of his head.

Bullets couldn't kill Yue Shi—they couldn't even break a single strand of his hair—but they were the variable in the two loops. The bullets were not fired from the same position.

Especially the second time; he had been standing outside the main entrance, and the bullet came from behind him.

Yue Shi's gaze became sharp. When the gunshot rang out in the last loop, his back was to the Investigation Bureau.

The bullet came from behind, and the lobby was behind him.

The person who fired was inside the lobby!

Yue Shi's expression suddenly turned fierce, his gaze sweeping over the face of everyone present.

Who could it be?

Why were they shooting him?

The staff member on the phone had their head slightly lowered, the receiver pressed to their ear, their lips moving.

The staff member at the keyboard was tapping away rapidly, eyes fixed on the screen.

The people on the plastic chairs didn't look like they were doing anything out of the ordinary either.

Ling Xun was looking at him with a 'what is wrong with you' expression.

Everyone's behavior was perfectly normal.

Yue Shi couldn't distinguish who had fired the shot. After the loop reset, there were no traces left.

Fortunately, he was no great detective; there was no need to pinpoint the culprit.

Since he couldn't tell who it was, he might as well just kill them all.