Chapter 160

Chapter 160

What about Qin Nan and Jian Fan?

When the two of them realized there was no one behind them, they were indeed stunned for a moment. But soon, both of them calmed down.

If Qin Weiyi could figure it out, then naturally Jian Fan could too.

Overlapping Space. It wasn’t as if he had never seen anything like it in the Realm of Death.

Qin Nan, on the other hand, looked completely lost.

“Overlapping Space,” Jian Fan said.

“Huh?” Qin Nan was baffled.

He understood the term. It wasn’t like novels and movies with wild concepts didn’t exist these days. But hearing Jian Fan bring up that term right now made Qin Nan feel like things had gotten a little ridiculous.

“To be more accurate, it should be Overlapping Time-Space,” Jian Fan added. He had seen a little more than Qin Weiyi had.

Qin Nan didn’t understand. “How can you tell?”

Jian Fan raised a hand and pointed at the information sheet posted on the fifth-floor dormitory door.

“Is there something wrong with it?” Qin Nan glanced at it and didn’t notice anything strange.

“It’s newer than before,” Jian Fan explained.

Qin Nan: “???”

At last, Qin Nan understood why some people could become Big Shots while he could only get carried through everything.

Aside from brains, even his powers of observation couldn’t compare to Jian Fan’s.

Inferring the existence of an overlapping time-space wasn’t actually difficult.

They hadn’t done anything, yet when they turned back, their teammates were no longer where they had been. They were still in the dormitory building, still at the landing by the Stairs between the fifth and sixth floors, and yet this was not the same dormitory building where Mu Xin and the others were. From that, it wasn’t strange to deduce that there was an Overlapping Space. As for the time-space part, that came down to the paper.

The overall environment was the same, but the paper had tiny differences.

With an Overlapping Space, it was either a completely different space or a space that was exactly identical. Why would the little details be different? That was why Jian Fan suspected it was an Overlapping Time-Space.

Simply put, it was the same scene at a different point in time.

Judging from the condition of the paper, they had clearly gone backward along their own timeline. If his deduction was correct, they had likely arrived in the time-space before something happened to Zhao Yingguo.

Jian Fan let out a laugh.

So this was where the breakthrough lay.

Running from the sixth floor down to the fifth probably couldn’t make them travel through time and space. In that case, if they hadn’t turned back again, they never would have found this Overlapping Time-Space. Then they would have been missing a piece of the puzzle forever. And without that missing piece, they would never be able to leave.

For an ordinary person, knowing full well there was danger on the sixth floor, choosing to turn back was indeed an extremely difficult decision.

“Let’s go. To the sixth floor,” Jian Fan said, reaching out a hand to Qin Nan as he spoke.

Qin Nan froze for a second. Looking at Jian Fan’s outstretched hand, he was bewildered. “What for?”

He understood going to the sixth floor.

Since this was time-space, the current Zhao Yingguo very likely had not met with trouble yet, so naturally they weren’t in danger either. Even if there was danger, their lives had always been gambled on the edge of death. One way or another, they had to go take a look. But what was with the hand?

Holding hands?

Two grown men doing that… It was kind of awkward.

Qin Nan stared at Jian Fan’s hand, conflicted. The fingers of the hand hanging at his side, however, twitched unnaturally.

It would be hard to refuse such heartfelt sincerity. Maybe… he should hold it for a bit?

Jian Fan looked at Qin Nan’s conflicted expression and the way his face kept changing. His brows drew together. “What are you thinking?”

“Ahem.” Qin Nan cleared his throat and said, rather too obviously, “I’m not thinking about anything.”

“This is an Overlapping Space. Right now, we still don’t know whether there are any other places like this. We can’t split up again,” Jian Fan said.

No one knew whether there were any other spatial junctions here. Once they triggered one, who knew where they would be sent? Granted, judging by the current situation, they seemed to have been sent to before the incident occurred, so the danger might be a little lower. But who could say for sure? What if they were sent to the moment Zhao Yingguo died?
Jian Fan only kept those thoughts to himself and did not say anything more.

Qin Nan finally came back to his senses as well.

What on earth had he been thinking? How could someone like Jian Fan possibly do something pointless for no reason?

Annoyed with himself, Qin Nan no longer looked conflicted. He simply took Jian Fan’s hand. “I get it. I was just thinking about how we’re supposed to get back, that’s all.”

Jian Fan glanced at Qin Nan, too lazy to expose him.

Once he had Qin Nan’s hand in his, Jian Fan took the lead and headed up toward the sixth floor. Qin Nan was pulled along behind him.

Qin Nan’s palm was very warm, while Jian Fan’s hand was cold.

“Jian Fan, why is your hand so cold?” Qin Nan asked.

“Born that way,” Jian Fan replied casually.

Qin Nan didn’t buy it. “Are you wearing too little? Trying to look good instead of stay warm? You can’t do that. You’re not exactly young anymore. What if you end up ruining your…”

Jian Fan abruptly turned his head and stared at Qin Nan with an indescribable expression.

Qin Nan finished the rest one word at a time. “Health.”

Jian Fan just stared at Qin Nan without saying a word. Under that gaze, Qin Nan swallowed and silently raised a hand, making a zipping motion over his mouth.

Once he was sure Qin Nan would stop spouting nonsense, Jian Fan turned back around and continued upstairs.

The two soon reached the sixth floor. However, at this moment, the iron gate on the sixth floor was locked. Not only that, the corridor was quiet as well, as if it were no different from the corridor they had walked through earlier.

Qin Nan lowered his voice and asked, “Are you sure this is Overlapping Time-Space?”

What if there was no such thing as an Overlapping Space at all? Wouldn’t that mean Zhao Yingguo was still on this floor? If they made a sound, would Zhao Yingguo suddenly dart out and run straight into them?

Jian Fan frowned as well.

The situation before him was indeed different from what he had guessed. But after his gaze landed on the doorway of the dormitory supervisor’s room, he took out the key with clean, decisive movements and opened the iron gate.

Although it was a different point in time, the key to the iron gate would not change.

Jian Fan successfully unlocked the iron gate with the key.

“You’re really not afraid?” Qin Nan asked, still keeping his voice low.

Jian Fan pointed at the rug in front of the dormitory supervisor’s room.

Qin Nan looked over as well. It was just a rug. What was the problem? Qin Nan did not foolishly ask right away. Instead, he thought it over in his head first.

After thinking it through, he quickly had his answer.

There was no dust on this rug at all!

In other words, the space they were in now was indeed not the same point in time as before. But why was the entire dormitory building so quiet right now?

Qin Nan could not figure it out, and Jian Fan had no answer at the moment either.

He stood in the corridor and looked around, then walked toward the dormitory supervisor’s room.

The key to the dormitory supervisor’s room was on the windowsill.

Jian Fan found the key with practiced ease, then opened the door.

The inside of the dormitory supervisor’s room looked more or less the same as when they had seen it before, except it was a little cleaner. At the moment, there was no one inside.

Jian Fan went straight to the desk and dug out the dormitory supervisor’s Diary. He did not read it carefully, only flipped through it roughly. It was obvious that this Diary showed no signs of having had pages torn out, and on the last page, there was no sentence saying “she died.” However, the last date in the Diary…

Wait.

The last date in the Diary was February 26, 2014.

Wasn’t that the day before something happened to Zhao Yingguo?

No.

The diary entry should have been written that night, which meant today, at this moment, was already the 27th.

February 27, 2014. Zhao Yingguo died.