After hearing this, Earth-Chicken’s expression darkened for half a second, then she slowly walked up to Black Sheep.

“Can’t it be that he introduced himself to me?”

“But that’s very strange,” Black Sheep said. “You said it yourself—your game is exceptionally simple, so simple that the rules can be explained in just a few words. Under those circumstances, would Qi Xia really need to introduce himself to you?”

Earth-Chicken stared into Black Sheep’s eyes for a long time, then suddenly burst out laughing with a “pfft.”

This sudden laughter startled everyone.

“Truly worthy of being White Sheep’s disciple—you really do talk just like him,” Earth-Chicken said, covering her mouth. “What a shame you’re not as handsome as he is.”

Black Sheep frowned slightly after hearing this. “What…?”

“Our team needs someone like you,” Earth-Chicken said with a smile and a wink. “If you all hadn’t stopped me today and let me walk out that door, I probably would never have come back.”

“You…”

At this moment, all the “Zodiacs” present felt that this Earth-Chicken’s identity was rather unusual, but they couldn’t understand her position at all.

“Because Qi Xia told me I could act entirely according to my own preferences—if I think it’s acceptable, then it’s acceptable; if I think it’s not, then it’s not. He’ll bear all the consequences,” Earth-Chicken said, rubbing her feather-covered hands together. “Do any of you have objections?”

“So… do you know why we’ve gathered here?” Black Sheep asked tentatively.

“Of course,” Earth-Chicken said. “I’ve known for many years that you would gather here.”

“Hey… Miss, that’s not right of you,” Earth-Tiger quickly stood up. “You say you already knew everything, yet you still came to say we were ‘disturbing the peace’ and whatnot… Aren’t we all on the same side here?”

Earth-Chicken didn’t directly answer Earth-Tiger’s question, only casually dropping a single line: “Everyone, do you know what the ‘herd effect’ is?”

“The herd effect…?” Black Sheep didn’t understand what she meant. After thinking for a moment, he asked, “What are you trying to say?”

“Qi Xia has always been my ‘lead sheep.’ I can die for him,” Earth-Chicken said with a smile. “Whether he’s White Sheep or Qi Xia, I can die for him.”

This brief statement left everyone silent.

“What Qi Xia excels at most is calculating people’s hearts, but the hardest thing to calculate in this world happens to be people’s hearts,” Earth-Chicken said, looking at the several people in the room with somewhat profound meaning. “I can die for Qi Xia—I’ve been this way all these years. But I’m not certain about your intentions.”

“What do you mean…?” Black Sheep’s eyes instantly filled with anger. “Are you saying we can’t die for Brother Sheep?”

“You will, and Earth-Tiger will too—I believe that,” Earth-Chicken nodded. “But what about the rest?”

The expressions of the other five “Zodiacs” in the room were all somewhat complicated.

The reasons they were standing here might be due to all sorts of strange and peculiar reasons, but it was definitely not to die for White Sheep.

Earth-Mouse slowly stepped forward at this moment and asked, “Does that mean we can only escape from here and break free from the curse if we die for him?”

“No, we don’t necessarily have to die for him,” Earth-Chicken said. “But we need to have the determination to die for him.”

“What…?”

“Only in this way can Qi Xia’s ‘plan’ proceed.”

“So you know what we’re supposed to do…?”

Earth-Chicken smiled slightly and beckoned to everyone.

…

When Earth-Tiger arrived at the venue for his shift carrying a bag of food that had long since gone cold, he found that Qi Xia was already standing at the door waiting for him.

He quickly walked forward, putting away his complicated expression, then said with an apologetic look, “Sheep—Qi Xia, I’m really sorry… I came a bit late today.”

“Mm…” Qi Xia nodded somewhat absently. “It’s fine.”

“So… Qi Xia, I met her,” Earth-Tiger said. “That eighth person is an ‘Earth-Chicken.’ We’ve already met face to face. You really are divinely prescient!”

“…Good.”

Qi Xia seemed not to be listening to Earth-Tiger’s words at all, only reaching up to rub his forehead, his expression appearing somewhat uncomfortable.

Seeing that Qi Xia had no reaction, Earth-Tiger was stunned for a few seconds, then quickly changed the subject, taking out the plastic bag in his hand.

“Qi Xia! I brought you some food!” Earth-Tiger said with a smile. “You haven’t eaten properly in many days, right? Let me tell you, there’s a chicken leg in here that Old Black specifically asked me to bring to you! Don’t you think that smelly kid is being fussy?”

Qi Xia glanced at the bag in Earth-Tiger’s hand, his expression somewhat dazed.

“What’s wrong… Qi Xia…” Earth-Tiger looked at Qi Xia’s bloodshot eyes with confusion. “You look like you didn’t sleep all night. What happened last night?”

“I’m fine. I won’t eat this—you eat it yourself.”

Qi Xia waved his hand, then shook his head and walked past Earth-Tiger, brushing shoulders with him.

Earth-Tiger stood in place completely bewildered, not quite understanding the current situation.

Brother Sheep had been perfectly fine when they met yesterday, but overnight he seemed like a completely different person. What on earth had happened last night?

He watched Qi Xia’s departing back, not daring to say a word like a child who had done something wrong, only gripping the plastic bag in his hand tightly.

Qi Xia only felt waves of dizziness in his brain. He walked step by step along the street, each step appearing extraordinarily heavy.

After waking up last night, his sense of dizziness had been continuously intensifying. It seemed that Heavenly-Dragon really had affected his state of mind. The bizarre degree of his ability completely exceeded his imagination.

Smashing the buildings in his dreamscape to pieces could actually truly affect his thinking?

Qi Xia kept reaching up to rub and knead his forehead, trying to make his mind a bit clearer.

But his current state was like having a high fever—his entire head felt dizzy and swollen, and he was exhausted to the extreme. He could clearly feel every pulsing blood vessel on the top of his head, his entire brain seeming to twist together as if it would explode at any moment.

“Not good…”

He forcefully pounded his head a few times. Apart from feeling his scalp tingle somewhat, there was not a trace of pain.

“You really got me, ‘Heavenly-Dragon.'”

Qi Xia swallowed and took out the map that Qinglong had given him from his chest.

His time was extremely tight. Starting from today, he had to meet those four “Zodiacs” without stopping, and at this critical juncture he had run into “Heavenly-Dragon.”

It was both good news and bad news. The good part was that he now had a way to thoroughly guard against “Heavenly-Dragon.” The bad part was that he had also been left with trauma from this encounter.

Qi Xia steadied his mind and checked which “Zodiac” was closest to him.

It was “Chicken.”

But upon further thought, Earth-Tiger had just mentioned that this “Chicken” had already entered the room, so she wasn’t the target he needed to find.

His targets were only the remaining four people.

Ox, Dragon, Snake, Monkey.

But the locations of these four “Zodiacs” were all quite far from him. The only one he could reach in the morning was just one “Earth-Monkey.”