The light disappeared, along with the noise and clamor, darkness surged like a rising tide, completely engulfing Hart, pulling him into the deep sea.
Even though his body was covered with dense fur for protection, Hart felt the bone-chilling cold in an instant, his body temperature plumted, and layers of thin frost gathered on his skin. Looking around, all that greeted his eyes was darkness, nothing else.
Hart shouted the nas of the others in terror, his voice echoing through the darkness, only to be t with a delayed booming response. It was as if the mont he picked up the card, he had been exiled to another world, a lonely, dead world where he was all alone.
Nothing could be seen, nothing was there.
Hart knelt on the ground, his hands frantically groping the cold surface, which felt hard and smooth, like a marble floor. He crawled forward like a blind man groping in the darkness.
The scale of ti fell into chaos. One second Hart felt he had just moved forward for a few minutes, the next he felt he had spent several months here.
His senses were completely distorted, and his once firm will was full of cracks under the cold darkness. Hart began to go insane, roaring, trying to berate the darkness with the loudest voice he could muster. But like shouting against a reverberating wall, a few seconds later, the darkness returned with an even thicker roar.
The darkness roared back at him.
Just as the long and bizarre dark years were crushing Hart’s mind completely, Hart saw it, a faint light rising in the darkness.
Hart dashed towards the light like grabbing at a life-saving straw; it was a glimr of light he had seen for the first ti in weeks, months.
His body crashed into the light, bursting open a door.
In an instant, the footsteps of the crowd, the low hum of car engines, the piercing whistles, the songs emitted from the street radios... countless sounds converged into a torrent of noise, washing over Hart.
He hadn’t heard such sounds in so long, his expression was sowhat dazed, his ears couldn’t adapt to the sudden clamor, bringing waves of sharp pain. But the pain almost brought Hart to tears.
Not knowing what happened, but Hart finally escaped from that dark world, he rembered... he rembered before the dark world...
What happened before?
As Hart was caught up in his muddled mory, he noticed a pool of water in front of him, and reflected in the mirror was no longer the beast covered in fur, but a real human.
Hart slowly squatted down, staring at his reflection in the water, his breathing gradually beca rapid, finally bursting into a wild laugh.
He had shed the beast’s pelt, turned back into a human, looking at the face in the water, Hart had almost forgotten his original appearance.
Passersby cast curious glances, scrutinizing this strange fellow, but after a few glances, they moved their attention away. Abnormal figures like this were quite common in Opus, encountering a few each day.
Hart’s cheeks were flushed with excitent, but before he could savor this mont of joy, a tingling and itchiness crept over his body, as if countless beetles were crawling all over him.
The muscles of his body began to swell. Black fur erged from his pores, Hart’s body distorted visibly, and in agonizing struggle, his body started to beastify.
"No... no no!"
Hart had barely turned back into a human, he didn’t want to take on the beast’s shell again. But as if fate was mocking him, after the brief ecstasy ca a greater despair.
The crowd suddenly halted, countless gazes fell on Hart collectively, like watching a freak show on the street.
Hart heard the low murmuring whispers, the crowd scrutinizing him, whispering amongst themselves. He could hear every word they spoke, they were mocking him, pitying him, their gazes felt like a scorching sun, almost burning through Hart’s fur.
At a certain mont, the crowd burst into laughter, surging forward with a voyeuristic intent. Imnse sha and humiliation made Hart furious, he raised his hand and crushed a few passersby’s heads, yet more people surged up, they didn’t attack Hart, only laughed at him.
Cars on the street also ca to a halt. Drivers rolled down their windows, mimicking beastly roars with their mouths, then laughed and honked their horns. The successive blaring sounds were like gunshots, piercing through Hart’s body, so even pulled out caras, the flash like gunfire, riddling Hart with holes.
Covered in blood, Hart escaped into an alley, but people didn’t let him go, they followed closely behind, blatantly mocking Hart’s body, shouting to put him in a circus, a zoo.
The shadow of the beast rampaged through the jungle of steel and concrete, Hart couldn’t find a way out.
...
"Hart! Hart!"
Palr threw himself on Hart, shaking Hart’s head vigorously, but no matter how much Palr called out, Hart showed no signs of waking up.
With his eyes tightly closed, Hart trembled intermittently, as if enduring a terrible nightmare, his hands clenched into fists, like a pair of solid iron hamrs.
"Stop calling, he can’t hear you."
Gold’s voice echoed from above, gazing pityingly at Hart, "He has been caught by the Joyous Desire Witch and is in a torturous purgatory."
The calm voice carried a slight tremor, as Gold had experienced the sa ordeal, he understood the suffering Hart was enduring at that mont.
The Condensers possess Extraordinary Power, strong enough to sweep through armies, yet no matter how powerful one is, there remains an irreparable void in one’s heart - sothing even Extraordinary Power cannot nd.
The Joyous Desire Witch doesn’t harm your body, but ruthlessly ravages your mind, expanding that tiny hole into a gaping wound.
"What should I do!"
Palr looked up at Gold, realizing why Gold had fallen into a coma before and hadn’t awakened for a long ti; now Hart was trapped in the sa predicant as Gold.
"I’m sorry, I don’t know."
Gold shook his head, still sealed within the card’s image, and Bologue’s decision had rely freed him from purgatory’s tornt; now they were still within the Joyful Garden, the ga was yet to conclude.
"Ga... Ga!"
Cinderella stepped forward, this big-hearted girl showed remarkable courage, shouting at Bai Ou’s head, "The rulebook! There ought to be one!"
"Yes! The rulebook!"
Aimou suddenly realized, they had played this board ga before, but as it morphed into a reality ga, they assud to understand its rules.
What they were playing now was not the deluxe edition but the Devil’s special reality version!
Bai Ou was silent for a mont, then its head violently trembled, and it spat out a blood-stained rulebook.
Cinderella ignored the blood stains on the rulebook, quickly searching for answers, and finally found the details regarding the Erosion Card in the card category introduction page.
"There are three thods to break free, one is to overco the nightmare and escape actively."
The first thod was evidently difficult, defeating the shadows of the heart is no easy task, for anyone really.
"The second thod is to wait for rounds, the effects of the Erosion Card aren’t permanent, lasting only a few rounds, but the duration depends on the target’s willpower, the more steadfast, the fewer rounds impacted, and vice versa."
Palr checked Hart, pulling his eyes open, his gaze vacant and lifeless. He couldn’t find the countdown to the rounds.
Bologue asked, "What about the third thod?"
"Wish Card."
Cinderella continued, "In the original ga, there weren’t cards of this type."
"Consider it as the Devil’s special edition," Palr shoved a rag into Hart’s mouth to prevent him from biting off his tongue, "What’s its effect?"
"Depending on the dice roll, one can make wishes of varying degrees, if it’s a great success..."
Cinderella’s voice paused, looking at Ewen, so did the others, all focusing their gaze on him.
She said, "All wishes will be fulfilled."
Bologue walked over, taking the rulebook, personally verifying the rule, just as Cinderella claid, the Wish Card’s effect was precisely like that.
Granting wishes.
The others suspected Ewen wanted to use the Wish Card to gain immortality, but Bologue understood that it was re coincidence; Ewen couldn’t dictate what ga the Devil played with them, let alone as the original author, this was his second ti playing this derivative board ga.
Bologue was truly concerned that the Wish Card’s restrictions were sparse, rely requiring a dice roll, no need for proofs of value, no soul bargaining; all it required was a little luck...
With enough luck, you possess the ability to seize immortality.
Bologue felt it wasn’t a Wish Card at all, but a sinister trap card.
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