Crack.
A bolt of purple-blue lightning flashed past the window, illuminating the entire night sky in a ghastly pale light.
Wang Yiyang sat upright in the training hall. His eyes, previously shut tight, snapped open.
He wore the crisp suit from work. His hands rested on the wooden armrests of the chair. Beads of sweat dotted his forehead. His lips were dry and cracked.
His black hair had grown a bit long, partially covering his eyebrows. Wang Yiyang lowered his head, breathing deeply, his lungs frantically exchanging oxygen with the outside air.
"Where... where am I?" He looked around.
The surroundings were familiar. The training hall.
The old training hall at his grandfather's place. The one that had been abandoned.
Training hall?
Wang Yiyang felt an eerie sensation in his heart.
He was just an ordinary office worker. Nine to five.
Then one day he'd been in a car accident. Died on the spot.
And now he'd woken up back at his grandfather's house.
"What's going on? Did I die and come back to life?!"
Wang Yiyang could still recall the pain of the car rolling over his body.
That sensation. He never wanted to experience it again for the rest of his life.
"I haven't even gotten married yet. Haven't had kids. If I just died like that, wouldn't the Wang family line end with me?"
Wang Yiyang reached up and ran his fingers through his hair. He lowered his head, his expression conflicted.
"Was it a dream, or...?!"
He sat in the chair for a long time, gradually calming down, before slowly standing up.
After wandering around for a few circles, he quickly confirmed it. This really was his grandfather's training hall.
His grandfather, Wang Xinlong, had supposedly been a formidable martial arts expert. In his youth, he'd opened this martial hall in his hometown, originally intending to bring glory to his ancestors, honor the family name, and spread the martial way.
Unfortunately, things hadn't gone as planned.
The martial hall had indeed continued operating. But in this modern age of advanced technology, there were far too few people truly willing to settle down and study martial arts.
Even Wang Yiyang had zero interest.
As a child, after trying to practice a few times, he'd completely abandoned his grandfather's guidance due to boredom and tedium.
Later, he'd followed the standard path: school, exams, then admission to a decent university. After graduating, thanks to his solid technical skills, he'd found a decent job at an internet company.
He'd only been working for two years. Hadn't even found a girlfriend yet. Then suddenly he received the devastating news from back home.
The martial hall had caught fire. Grandfather hadn't made it out. Thirteen people total, including everyone at the martial hall, had all perished.
After receiving the news, Wang Yiyang hadn't hesitated. He immediately booked a ticket home.
After a complicated investigation, he finally uncovered the truth.
The one who'd killed his grandfather was actually the martial hall's strongest disciple, the eldest senior brother Zhong Can.
Zhong Can, unable to break through for a long time, had come to believe that Wang Yiyang's grandfather was withholding key secrets, deliberately holding him back. So during an argument, he'd flown into a rage and attacked.
Grandfather had been beaten to death on the spot. The others had been caught in the disaster.
But Wang Yiyang still had doubts about this truth.
Although he wasn't interested in martial arts, he still had basic knowledge.
Given senior brother Zhong Can's abilities, killing grandfather quickly while also taking out all the martial hall members in such a short time seemed completely unrealistic.
According to the police investigation, he'd learned something shocking.
Behind senior brother Zhong Can, there seemed to be a rather mysterious organization.
This organization's purpose was unclear, but they acted with cruel brutality. Grandfather's death, and the deaths of the other martial hall members, were very likely the result of this organization pulling strings behind the scenes.
Through a tech-savvy friend, Wang Yiyang had managed to find a trace of evidence in the police archives about the organization's name.
The organization was called Mantis.
Just as he'd gotten slightly closer to the truth, a sudden car accident had completely drowned out his consciousness.
When he woke up again, he was already sitting in this old family martial hall training area.
The air was damp and cold.
Wang Yiyang felt his right suit pocket. Inside were his familiar phone and car keys.
The plastic texture of the phone and the slightly raised buttons gave him a bit of reassurance.
He pulled out his ROL smartphone and glanced at the time displayed on it.
'March 11, 4471, 7:42 PM.'
"This time...!!" Wang Yiyang's pupils contracted.
Wasn't this from two months ago, when he'd come back home to visit grandfather?
That time, he'd happened to have a three-day holiday from work, so he'd thought about going back to see grandfather since it had been so long.
So he'd bought some fruit and nutritional supplements and returned to his hometown to visit his eighty-nine-year-old grandfather, Wang Xinlong.
Although Wang Xinlong was already a towering eighty-nine years old, he looked at most like someone in his seventies.
Seeing his eldest grandson return home, he'd been deeply gratified and had pulled Wang Yiyang into drinking a hefty amount of liquor.
Both of them had gotten drunk.
Wang Yiyang, tipsy and muddled, had stumbled into the training hall and slept there all night. The next day when he woke up, he'd discovered he hadn't returned to his room but had instead sat in the training hall all night.
In the darkness, Wang Yiyang's expression was grim, his eyes flickering.
"Who could have imagined that two months later, grandfather and everyone at the entire martial hall would die inexplicably."
He didn't believe grandfather would mysteriously die in a fire.
Given Wang Xinlong's physical fitness, he'd recently participated in an ultra-marathon and won second place.
That was a ten-kilometer endurance run. With that kind of physical condition, what kind of fire could prevent him from even escaping?
Wang Yiyang didn't believe it.
"And then, so conveniently, I got into a car accident too."
He looked down carefully at his own hands.
Short, thick fingers. Clear palm lines. On his right thumb was a faint scar.
That was from when he'd been drinking with grandfather before, opening a bottle. He'd used too much force and accidentally cut himself with the bottle opener.
Whew.
Wang Yiyang slowly stood up and walked to the training hall window, gazing out at the peaceful martial hall courtyard.
The entire martial hall housed only grandfather and him, plus senior brother Zhong Can, and a hired housekeeper. The other disciples all returned to their own homes and didn't live at the martial hall.
"Could I really have come back? Returned to two months ago?" Wang Yiyang still felt somewhat doubtful.
He pushed open the door and walked into the courtyard.
In the courtyard grew a large tree. He didn't know the species name, but every year this tree would produce many purple-red leaves.
Every autumn, a few purple-red leaves would slowly drift down with the wind. The scene was quite beautiful.
Wang Yiyang stood under the large tree. He pulled out his phone again and opened the messaging app Feixun.
Then he found the company group chat.
He ignored his colleagues' idle chatter and directly opened the group announcements to take a look.
The newest announcement showed a timestamp from three minutes ago, followed by a complete timestamp.
'March 11, 4471, 7:45 PM.'
He still didn't believe it. He opened other apps and checked everywhere he could see the time.
Ten minutes later.
Wang Yiyang finally confirmed it. He really had been reborn.
Reborn back to two months ago.
"Yangyang, sobered up from the alcohol already?"
Suddenly, a low male voice came from behind Wang Yiyang.
He jumped, startled. But his body remained calm. He quickly turned around.
Behind him stood a burly man at least two meters tall.
In the darkness, the big man's eyes glowed faintly like a hungry wolf, inspiring fear.
"Is that Brother Zhong Can?" Wang Yiyang's heart skipped a beat. He immediately recognized the other person's identity.
Zhong Can. Origins unknown, age unknown. When Wang Yiyang was in his teens, Zhong Can had suddenly appeared at the martial hall one day and had been following grandfather to study martial arts ever since.
This person was always silent and honest. Didn't talk much, but was extremely trustworthy. He had naturally great strength.
Although Wang Yiyang hadn't been close to him since childhood, he still respected him greatly.
He respected all people who kept their word.
Because keeping one's word was itself something very difficult to consistently achieve.
"I slept for a bit. Cleared my head some. Came out to get some air and cool off." Wang Yiyang forced a slight smile onto his face.
"You're not wearing enough. You'll catch cold. Better go back to sleep soon." Zhong Can said in a low voice.
"Got it. Brother Zhong Can should also get some rest early. You worked hard all day today." Wang Yiyang replied.
"It's nothing." Zhong Can replied briefly, then slowly passed under the tree toward his own room.
His silhouette in the dim evening light seemed vaguely cold. It made Wang Yiyang's whole body feel an indescribable creeping sensation.
Wang Yiyang watched him leave and enter the house before withdrawing his gaze.
Since childhood, grandfather had been very good to him. Then two months later, sudden disaster had struck. And then he himself had suddenly been in a car accident.
Too many coincidences were hidden in all of this.
"Too many coincidences stop being coincidences... they become inevitable..." Wang Yiyang's heart sank.
He didn't know exactly how he'd been revived and reborn, but since he'd returned, he would first investigate clearly what exactly was going on with grandfather's situation.
"But how should I proceed?"
He was just a powerless ordinary office worker. The strongest thing he'd ever done in his life was using a knife to kill a chicken.
And even then, the chicken had struggled and viciously clawed him.
"Should I just go to the police?" Wang Yiyang frowned.
But on what grounds would he report to the police? Could he really run over and say, I suspect two months from now grandfather will be killed by Zhong Can, so I'm here to file a case in advance?
That would be insane.
But investigating secretly on his own was obviously highly dangerous.
From the martial hall fire, plus his own extremely coincidental car accident, it was clear that behind all this, there was very likely a hidden hand manipulating and orchestrating everything.
"Too bad Mom and Dad aren't here... though even if they were, they probably wouldn't have any solutions for this kind of thing either." Wang Yiyang felt somewhat irritated.
He pressed his hand against the tree trunk. The rough, cold bark quickly calmed his mood.
"Should I just go find grandfather directly and hint at it?" After thinking for a while, he came up with this approach.
Given grandfather's personality, he'd probably just pat his shoulder and laugh heartily, dismissing it as Wang Yiyang having too many strange dreams.
Wang Yiyang's heart couldn't settle down. He thought and thought, but for a long while couldn't find a way to break through the situation.
He couldn't confirm whether he'd just had a nightmare, but the memories in his mind were so clear that he had no choice but to believe they were real.
'Even if it were a mental hallucination, it wouldn't be this vivid, would it?'
After hesitating for more than ten minutes, he finally made up his mind. First, he'd go find grandfather for a proper talk. He'd drop some hints and see what happened.
He turned around, about to head toward grandfather's room.
Suddenly, as his eyes swept across the scene, they happened to catch sight of senior brother Zhong Can's room window, where a pair of eyes reflecting a faint glow were quietly watching him.
Wang Yiyang had no idea how long the other person had been watching. He only felt his whole body covered in goosebumps, wave after wave continuously rising.
The sensation was exactly like that time in the city when he'd encountered two rabid dogs.
But the intensity was far, far greater.
Wang Yiyang felt as if his heart was being tightly gripped by a large hand, unable to move.
Even his lungs struggled to breathe.
His eyes began to blur. His face gradually flushed red. His back broke out in waves of cold sweat.
But somehow, he just couldn't shift his gaze away. Couldn't move his eyes from staring at those eyes.
"What... what's happening to me??" Wang Yiyang tried desperately to break free, but it was useless.
The blood and qi throughout his body felt as if they were being controlled by someone, circulating slower and slower, slower and slower.
Creak.
Just then, the sound of a wooden door opening interrupted Wang Yiyang's dangerous state.
He gasped for air and snapped out of it. When he looked again at Zhong Can's window, it was already empty. There was nothing there.