After Bai Youwei left, Shen Mo took out a cigarette and lit one.

A nurse walked over. “Mr. Shen, you can’t smoke here.”

“Oh, sorry.” Shen Mo held the cigarette without immediately putting it out, and looked around. “Is there a smoking area nearby?”

“If you go straight ahead and turn right, there’s a stairwell.”

Shen Mo nodded and went to the front.

Between the stairwell and the medical area was a heavy fire safety door. When it opened, a sharp cold wind came rushing in.

Someone had opened the stairwell window.

Shen Mo saw Yan Qingwen leaning against the window ledge, two fingers holding a cigarette. He had smoked a few drags; seeing Shen Mo, he pressed the burnt-down stub against the metal window frame and ground it out.

“Not cold?” Shen Mo asked as he walked over.

Yan Qingwen shook his head slowly, lit another cigarette, switched it to his other hand, and exhaled at a leisurely pace. “A bit of wind clears the head.”

Shen Mo smiled and came to stand at the window.

Outside, the sky was a pallid white tinged with ashen blue. Below, the trees’ bare branches swayed in the piercing cold, shivering as if they too were braving the cold like living things.

Yan Qingwen glanced over, amusement in his eyes. “You don’t usually smoke.”

“Now and then.” Shen Mo said mildly. “Smoking’s bad for your health.”

Yan Qingwen heard that and let out a soft laugh, his gaze drifting to the towers rising in the distance outside the window. “Maybe we die tomorrow—who’s still thinking about health.”

Shen Mo asked, “Did your game this time not go well?”

Yan Qingwen shook his head. “People fighting to the death—there’s no ‘went well’ or ‘didn’t go well.’ Just barely made it out alive.”

“Fair enough.” Shen Mo exhaled a puff of smoke, his tone even. “Two more battles left. Hard to say what the decisive match will look like…”

Yan Qingwen was quiet for a moment, then said, “I probably won’t be around to see the decisive match.”

Shen Mo’s eyebrow rose slightly, and his gaze drifted over.

“Next battle, I’ll surrender.” Yan Qingwen flicked off the ash, and said, “You and Bai Youwei give it everything—don’t let us down.”

Shen Mo was somewhat surprised. “Did something happen?”

“No.” Yan Qingwen’s tone was perfectly calm, as if he had thought it through a long time ago. “I just changed my mind. I don’t want to play anymore. The next two battles—one is Battle 10, which requires eight people; the other is Battle 20, which requires ten. I don’t have confidence in getting all of them out of the game in one piece.”

He laughed softly and said with a hint of self-deprecation, “I want to know the truth of this world, but if someone loses their life because of it—frankly, I don’t know whether it would be worth it…”

As he spoke, Yan Qingwen looked at the steel marionette that stood watch at his side—this puppet, which closely resembled Lu Ang, had aged considerably, its body marked with countless scratches and gouges. Clearly it had saved Yan Qingwen more than once.

After Lu Ang was gone, Yan Qingwen had taken a long time to recover. If anyone else met the same fate, he wasn’t sure how he could face it.

The truth of the game, the lives of his friends—if forced to choose between the two, he chose the latter.

“Have you considered the worst possible outcomes?” Yan Qingwen looked at Shen Mo, and gave a sincere piece of advice. “If not, you’d better start thinking now… which people you can let go of, and which you can’t.”

“I understand…” Shen Mo gazed into the distance, his voice quiet. “But not doing it would leave me with regret.”

Yan Qingwen took a deep drag, exhaled a faint white plume of smoke, and said quietly, “I have regrets too. I want to win.”

But he couldn’t…

He couldn’t sacrifice everyone else’s lives just because he wanted to win. Among those in the maze wars—how many were there in pursuit of the truth? And how many had simply been pushed forward, carried along against their will?

—