“Ha.” Earth-Monkey laughed in spite of himself, then slowly turned his head to look at Qi Xia.

“As long as it’s a secret I know, you can ask anything.” Qi Xia said coldly. “I guarantee I’ll speak everything I know and absolutely won’t lie.”

“Oh…?” Earth-Monkey nodded. “For you, I only have one question… a question that’s been weighing on me for a long time.”

“I’m all ears.”

“Do you truly want to get out?”

The brief question instantly dropped into Qi Xia’s mind, making him feel surrounded once again by thick fog.

“What…?”

“Do you truly want to get out?” Earth-Monkey asked again. His tone seemed to become less friendly, but rather more like an interrogation.

“How… could I possibly not want to get out?”

Earth-Monkey slowly stood up, his pair of eyes incomparably weathered. He stared at Qi Xia and asked word by word: “Tell me, do you actually want to get out or not?”

Qi Xia looked into Earth-Monkey’s eyes and paused for a long time before slowly uttering a single word: “Yes.”

Upon hearing this answer, Earth-Monkey’s yellowed old eyes flickered for a moment, and no one could tell what he was contemplating.

After waiting a long time, he finally slowly spoke: “I’ll tentatively believe… what you said is true.”

“Of course…” Qi Xia narrowed his eyes and nodded. “How could I possibly lie about this…?”

Earth-Monkey sat down in his chair, let out a deep sigh, then said: “Now it’s your turn. What do you want to ask me?”

Fog.

His brain was full of fog.

The question he had just thought of had actually already been lost in the fog.

“Wait… wait a moment…” Qi Xia held his forehead, feeling panic for the first time.

This was an unprecedented panic. Once fog appeared in his brain, it proved that even the only thing he could rely on was gone.

A flesh and blood body, powerless strength, combined with a brain full of fog to challenge this chaotic city—this would be the most helpless he had ever been in his life.

“What’s wrong? No questions?” Earth-Monkey looked at Qi Xia with some confusion.

Qi Xia didn’t respond, just kept tapping his forehead with his hand, trying to make his brain wake up a bit.

“If he has no questions… do any of you have questions?” Earth-Monkey looked at the remaining few people.

Chen Junnan and Qiao Jiajin both looked at Qi Xia with some worry. This segment had clearly secured an opportunity for Qi Xia to ask a question, but at this moment both of them saw that Qi Xia’s body was trembling.

He seemed to be afraid.

“If no one has any questions…”

Before Earth-Monkey could finish speaking, Zheng Yingxiong’s small nose twitched slightly, and he instantly widened his eyes: “Uncle, I have a question.”

Upon hearing these words, Qi Xia suddenly turned his head, as if seeing his lifeline.

“You…” Earth-Monkey’s brow furrowed slightly as he looked at this child who was only seven or eight years old. “You have a question?”

“Yes!” Zheng Yingxiong nodded, then turned his head to look at the people beside him. “Brothers and sisters, can I ask?”

“This…” Tiantian was at a loss and sought help from the others with her eyes.

“Ask.” Qi Xia said decisively. “Say the question you want to ask.”

“Okay!” Zheng Yingxiong agreed, then his nose twitched. He picked up his face-up card “Frost’s Descent” in his hand and turned to look at Earth-Monkey. “Uncle, may I ask which day is ‘Frost’s Descent’?”

Tiantian and Xiao Cheng beside her couldn’t help but gasp upon hearing this question. They felt that Zheng Yingxiong had messed things up.

Shouldn’t they be asking Earth-Monkey what his hand cards were instead?

“You want to know which day ‘Frost’s Descent’ is…?” Earth-Monkey confirmed.

“That’s right.”

Earth-Monkey thought for a few seconds and said: “The twenty-third of the ninth month.”

Qi Xia’s eyes slowly widened, feeling that Zheng Yingxiong had once again helped tremendously. This was precisely the question he had just wanted to ask, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t remember it.

And Earth-Monkey’s brief four words instantly opened up his line of thinking.

The twenty-third of the ninth month—one could tell immediately this was the lunar calendar expression…

Compare sizes using the lunar calendar date of each festival?

No…

Qi Xia ultimately still frowned. Something seemed not quite right, but his current brain…

He slowly raised his head and looked around, his gaze locking onto the wooden box on the table.

He had already lost all patience with his current state.

This wooden box was initially used to hold this deck of “Lunar Phases.” Now it was completely empty, but Earth-Monkey hadn’t taken it away and instead kept it in the center of the table.

Qi Xia stood up and grabbed the wooden box with one hand. This action made Earth-Monkey’s expression darken, and he also stood up.

Whether he thought Qi Xia wanted to hit someone or destroy the game props was unclear, but in any case, he kept staring at him intently.

Qi Xia paid no attention to the other party. He rotated the wooden box in his hand, aimed the corner of the box’s bottom at his own forehead, then under everyone’s astonished gazes, he fiercely smashed the wooden box against himself.

With a muffled “thud,” a chunk of flesh was clearly missing from Qi Xia’s forehead. Half a second later, crimson blood flowed down his forehead like an unbridled horse until it covered half of Qi Xia’s face.

“Liar… liar boy, what are you doing…”

Qiao Jiajin also stood up, feeling the situation was somewhat unexpected. It was just a pity he hadn’t thought of it in advance, otherwise he should have been able to stop him.

He was right beside Qi Xia on his right and could clearly feel that Qi Xia had used tremendous force in this strike, even stirring up a gust of wind across his face.

“Still not enough…” Qi Xia completely ignored the blood flowing all over his face, just narrowed his eyes and kept thinking. Soon he came up with a new idea.

He sat down and placed his right palm face-down on the table, his slender five fingers spreading in five directions. Then he grabbed the wooden box and fiercely smashed it down toward his right pinky finger.

Seeing this, Qiao Jiajin had already stepped forward and reached out to block, but Qi Xia’s striking speed was simply too fast. Before he could block it, the wooden box had already solidly landed on his hand.

The dull sound instantly exploded. Both Qi Xia’s and Earth-Monkey’s expressions changed at the same time.

Earth-Monkey had been staring at Qi Xia, but looking at his expression, it seemed he wasn’t worried about Qi Xia, but rather worried about the wooden box in Qi Xia’s hand.

Qi Xia gritted his teeth and slowly lifted the wooden box, revealing his somewhat reddened pinky finger.

At this moment, the fingernail of his pinky had already begun seeping blood outward. The entire finger quickly displayed a red color and was slowly transitioning to purple. It looked like this strike had been extremely heavy.

“Good…” Qi Xia smiled bitterly and reached up to wipe the cold sweat from his forehead. “It seems I can figure out many things now.”

He slowly raised his head. His eyes had now become sharp. Many scattered memories were gathering in his mind, but before he had time to collect these memories, he was attracted by the wooden box in his hand.

Very strange.

This wooden box was very strange.

It was lighter than he had imagined.

Although it was made of wood, the feeling of holding it in his hand was clearly not solid wood. The wooden pieces composing the box were most likely hollow.