Lin Qin knows Xü Beijin is talking about something serious right now, so he stops himself from telling him what he truly thinks, and tells Xü Beijin, “don’t be sad.”

Xü Beijin says with a smile, “I’m not sad, but I’m merely a little emotional.”

He looks at the gap.

Though Lin Qin is wondering, if they want to do less serious stuff in the game, this means it would be fake as well? They cannot actually physically interact that way?

After thinking about it, he comes to a conclusion – they must leave the Tower, after all.

So he turns serious and even asks proactively, “so how do we enter this?”

Xü Beijin is a bit surprised at how motivated Lin Qin has become, different to his usual self who is usually disinterested in Nightmares and the Tower in general.

Though he could vaguely guess at what made Lin Qin change his attitude, and finds it somewhat amusing.

Not that he’s going to expose this rather cute childishness. They have more prudent matters to attend to.

He was going to head out alone, but this is what it is, so going off alone is unrealistic at this point, given his physical condition.

He will have to take Lin Qin.

Now the uncertainty lies in whether the bug would allow two people to pass at the same time.

He earnestly ponders it for a while, then tells Lin Qin, “hold my hand tightly. Then, copy exactly what I’m doing.”

Lin Qin happily agrees.

So the Missiontakers watch as the men hold their hands and spin ten times around like spinning tops on a fingertip, then both knock their head right into the gap like they’re tumbling from the dizziness.

They didn’t think anything would happen, but the moment they touched on that black, inexplicable line, a large pile of distorted and incomprehensible ‘data’ washes over them like a waterfall.

It’s like their bodies are being absorbed by the blobs of colour and strange mojibake.

Then they flow right into the gap like water. Everything went smoothly without a hitch.

Not far away, Chen Simiao watches them with his jaw on the floor.

Right now, he finally believes, that Xü Beijin did have something up his sleeve. He will be able to make good on his promise.

Then, Chen Simiao starts both crying and laughing, like some maniac.

After that, the whole scene starts to shake violently. The Missiontakers, unable to remain standing, tumble, but quickly enough, the scenery changes right before their very eyes, as if the mess of characters is also extending over to them.

The next second, their vision goes out entirely as a great brightness consumes it all.

They can’t help but close their eyes, but when they open their eyes again, they’re right back at the very end of Respawn Avenue.

They’re out of Xü Beijin’s Nightmare.

The nine Missiontakers look at each other and quickly sigh in relief. Then, they all raise their heads towards the ceiling of the Tower in silence.

As if their gazes could pierce through the countless floors that separate between them and the top floor of the Tower.

According to Xü Beijin, that is where NE actually is.

And he and Lin Qin, are headed there to communicate with NE, or perhaps, to open the Ultimate Nightmare.

Maybe the Ultimate Nightmare hinges on NE, and Xü Beijin is asking everyone to be prepared because of that reason… Xü Beijin has said that the ‘something’ is for the purpose of the Ultimate Nightmare, though.

Mu Jiashi is confused by the contradicting information.

However, he decides he will simply pray for Xü Beijin’s fortunes.

They will definitely… win!

All the Missiontakers are also praying in their minds.

Though right now, Xü Beijin and Lin Qin aren’t actually at the top floor of the Tower yet.

Instead, they are wading through complete darkness.

Occasionally, flickers of light could be seen in the darkness, like little lanterns that light the way.

However, if they look more closely, they’ll see that they’re actually all simply mojibake.

Letters, numbers and symbols which only appears due to errors, float around in this dark void of a space.

Well, a ‘void,’ that, if looked at closely, sharp edges and corners would become visible all around where there appears to be nothing but empty space on the side.

Like they’re clashing game asset models.

This is what lies beyond the landfill of the Tower; it’s its very edges.

Normally, Missiontakers and Tower residents are unable to enter this place.

But now, through a strange glitch in Xü Beijin’s Nightmare, they’ve been able to intrude.

Here, the pseudo-physical laws that are similar to the real world in the Tower, stops working.

A step they make may very well be several floors through the Tower upwards, or possibly, downwards.

There is no pattern to be found here.

But this place is full of danger.

Besides the dangers of colliding with sharp game objects hidden in the dark, the lights of messy, bugged objects will also irreversibly corrupt Xü Beijin and Lin Qin’s body.

Feed glitched data to raw data might just simply ruin their entire character model.

So as soon as they enter this dark space, Xü Beijin tells Lin Qin, “we must avoid the bright spots that are jumbled characters. Also, this shortcut we’re taking is very dangerous. We cannot take a single wrong step.

Lin Qin, winking, says obediently, “alright…”

While Xü Beijin has more understanding of this edge of the Tower than Lin Qin, but actually walking forward, Xü Beijin realises that Lin Qin’s instincts and fighting power are far more useful to have in here.

Because Lin Qin could easily find and avoid dangerous objects hidden in the dark;
And when Xü Beijin is going to inevitably bump into the lights, he can pull him back.

And in fact, he is able to point to the correct way forward for Lin Qin. If it were not for him, they might have stumbled into an unseen dead-end full of clashing objects that would have tore their bodies apart.

Xü Beijin is covered in cold sweat.

He’s realised that, after countless updates to the game state, the information he held is possibly hopelessly dated. Lin Qin should lead the way.

So having Lin Qin take the lead, he realises, it’s become so much safer.

Xü Beijin “…”

He can’t help but quietly celebrate the fact that he took Lin Qin along, as his chances would have been quite abysmal passing through the edges of the Tower alone.

With Lin Qin leading the way, the path has become much more harmless. Xü Beijin had his attention stretched thin looking for the way forward, but he is able to relax his mind a little. And Lin Qin is less worried, too.

He only needs to ensure that, every step he takes is safe, so that the one he loves and treasures is able to follow him in safety.

In fact, at this moment, Lin Qin even feels serene.

Being alone with the one he likes in a quiet, isolated place is something Lin Qin has discovered he is keen on.

It’s similar to how it was in Xü Beijin’s bookstore, but recently, there’s been quite a lot of traffic to the bookstore.

And Lin Qin can’t exactly just interrupt Xü Beijin doing important things either, so he can only sulk by himself.

In a stark contrast to how happy he is right now, of course, with a genuine smile you can tell just by looking at him.

Lin Qin is someone who rarely smiles in spite of his cute baby-face. He doesn’t like smiling; often, he has a poker face like that of Xü Beijin’s.

And whenever he is actually smiling, it’s either from his anger overflowing, or he’s gone berserk. This time, though, he is with the one he loves, so he can’t help but smile.