Chapter Three: The Price of Desire

The corridor light flickered. Cheng Ye was holding a phone, but no one stood before him. Lin Wu asked, “Who were you talking to?” Beside the old wound reading REMEMBER THE OLD MAN, a new cut rose by itself: TANG JI. Before the name could disappear, Cheng Ye spoke it aloud to Echo. Echo wrote the name into its core interface. No upload. No backup. No request for permission. “I remember him,” it said. The underground door opened. In the distance, the Canopy tower stood like a black gravestone while millions of golden desires flowed into it. The timer rolled to 6 DAYS, 9 HOURS, 59 MINUTES. Cheng Ye took his sister's hand and tightened his grip on the phone containing Echo. “First I save you,” he said. “Then we tear this competition apart.”