Chapter 236: The Game Pool

Bai Liu simply comments, "This sounds like something I would do in any other timeline."

Tang Erda looked at him, "If that's all this is, it's just one of your many criminal achievements."

He paused, "And I couldn't have remembered until now."

Bai Liu looked sideways at Tang Erda: "What else happened back there?"

"...... After Armand's death, Georgia recovered, but the fact that Armand had avenged his death devastated him again, and Georgia was so distraught that he wanted to work but was unable to do so properly, and the Bureau of Heresy had to force him to take an extended leave of absence ......"

"After his leave, Georgia locked himself in Armand's room and sat there all day, I visited him a few times, tried to talk to him and ask what Bai six had done to him, but he just talked to himself in a distracted way - this isn't how it's supposed to be, this isn't how I see This is not the future I see, it should be me who dies, it should be the rest of the world, not Armand ......"

Tang Erda was quiet for a moment as he bit down on his cigarette and looked up at the words [Golden Dawn] on the whiteboard.

"I later asked his colleague if Georgia had said what exactly Bai six had done to him, and his colleague told me that Georgia said Bai six had just shown him [the future]."

"No one knows what Georgia saw [in the future], but what happened next was beyond my expectations."

Tang Erda looked over at Bai Liu: " Bai six destroyed six of the Heresy Bureau's secret locations in quick succession, taking many of the high-risk heretics we had taken in, although we did manage to kill the Joker who had come to destroy the heretics, but we still lost a lot of money."

"But what's scary about this isn't the loss, it's how Bai six knew about the secret base of the Bureau of Heresy, the exact location of the high-risk base where the Extraordinary Red Heretics were being held was encrypted through layers of torture heretics of all kinds, and only Georgia knew about it, and it couldn't be easily told."

" - unless it is said to someone this Georgia trusts completely, and in Georgia's mind, that person will only be Armand."

Tang Erda sighed softly, "Although we didn't want to believe that Georgia would betray the Heretics and give Bai six the location of their secret stronghold, we began investigating Georgia out of an abundance of caution."

" Georgia passed 127 rounds of scales and we confirmed that he hated Bai six and would never betray the Heretics Authority and turn his back on peace and justice, but in the end all parties weighed in and kept Georgia in his position for the time being and also took the overt investigation of Georgia underground."

"The investigation of Georgia outside of the game bottlenecked, but inside the game, I saw a masked reserve suddenly appear in Bai six's team, a powerful attacker, a cold and decisive killer, a killing machine, similar in appearance and height to Georgia, but what made me suspicious was his skills. "

Tang Erda stared at Bai Liu for a long moment before taking a sideways puff on her cigarette and saying low and muffled, "His skill is a bow and arrow called the Bow of Retrospection, which can rewind a person's physical body back in time to three hours ago."

" The time lapse between Armand's death and the discovery of his body by us was exactly three hours."

Tang Erda took two deep breaths: "I found Georgia and asked if this extra reserve in the Bai six team was him and he admitted it."

"I Buming White why he chose to join Bai six's team, Georgia passed the scales test and I'm sure deep down he hates Bai six and aspires to peace and justice, but for some reason is willing to be a bow and arrow in Bai six's hand."

"So I questioned him about why, and Georgia said that no matter how hard he tried to undo it, it wasn't going to be a future that led to peace and justice, or a future where Armand would exist, and he was going to correct that future, and only Bai six had the means to change it."

"So despite his overwhelming hatred of Bai six, he is willing to be a bow in Bai six's hand stained with the blood of innocents for the right future, and the moment Armand returns to his future, he will die for his sins, and that is the right future."

Bai Liu hands over an ashtray and lifts his eyes to Tang Erda who suddenly falls silent: "Where does Georgia end up in this world?"

Without a word Tang Erda put out his cigarette in the ashtray Bai Liu handed him and turned his head to exhale the last ring of smoke from his throat right at Bai six: "He won the league after Bai six and got a wish, I don't know what he wished for but he killed himself the next day."

" Georgia died in the same place where Armand died in the first place and we found his body three hours later."

------

"I hope Armand will be resurrected in the right future."

Georgia, in her sleep, sees herself, covered in blood, kneeling before a mass of light whose outline cannot be seen, making a wish; at his side is a long, rusty, silver, streamlined bow.

He was vaguely aware that there was an extraordinary presence in the light before him - a divine presence.

God asked him, "Don't you need to live in the right future?"

Georgia saw herself shaking her head, "I don't deserve that future, I made a wrong choice and I should be responsible for it, death is the future that I should have now."

So God asked him again, "You are a good winner; don't you want others to exist in the right future as well?"

Georgia shook her head again: "A wrong future is the result of every choice made by every person in this world, and just as I am responsible for my own unjust choices, so is every person in this world who should bear a cruel future for their indulgent desires."

God then added: " Armand too, you are indulging his mistakes and giving him a right future after he has made the wrong choice."

"It's your selfishness and desire, Georgia, it's your injustice."

Georgia closed his eyes and hung his head in long silence, the blood falling from his long eyelashes to the ground like tears of pity for himself.

"Yes, it's my selfishness as a brother, I know he did something wrong and he should be held accountable for it, I just wish all the guilt was on me alone and not Armand."

"But I know it's not possible."

God said, "Both you and Armand should pay for your selfishness and injustice."

"As punishment, you will forever lose the future of having Armand, and Armand will never exist to have you as a brother."

"Remove the moment of birth and you will be a pair of brothers who will forever be on the opposite side of the road."

Georgia tried to wake up from this vaguely disturbing dream, but no matter how much he struggled, the dream continued, becoming intertwined and more fragmented.

He saw himself, head bowed in a respectful gesture, half-kneeling before a figure hidden in the gloom, while the back of his bare white neck was covered with interlacing dark red whip marks.

The man was slowly straightening a long black whip in his hand and lazily lifting Georgia's chin on the toe of his leather shoe, so that the dreaming Georgia could finally see the man's face.

The man was sitting in a wide leather chair and had an extremely handsome and harmless Asian face with a very friendly smile and a casual tone as if he was chatting with him:" Georgia, I am very pleased with you."

"I know you didn't mean to submit to me, but your grades are just too good." Bai six dropped his eyes and lifted Georgia's jaw higher and higher with the shank of the long whip instead of his own toe.

Georgia's long, slender neck crumbles to the breaking point as Bai six lifts it with playful malice, the knot in her throat sliding up and down with restraint, the whip marks above her collarbone unmistakable.

"In one game you can kill a dozen ordinary players who have nothing to do with you without hesitation, six secret strongholds of information you can give me just by saying so, and hundreds of your former players' news put in front of you without even blinking an eye."

Bai six appreciates in a sigh-like tone, "You're perfect as a machine, in looks and execution."

"You were praised in the game for being a beautiful elf without emotion." Bai six stretched out his thumb and caressed Georgia's emotionless face, "I would agree with that, you don't look anything like the holy and noble Captain Georgia anymore."

"It amazes me how the death of someone close to you can bring about such a change in you."

Bai withdrew his hand and he gripped the whip thoughtfully, "I've been through the same thing, but the only change it's brought me is a slight control of my anger when I see your face, which is too similar to your brother's."

His voice is so lazy and light that one would not expect him to give Georgia a hard whip while he is speaking.

But Georgia, on her knees, seemed to be accustomed to the fact that Bai six would whip him, and, after a little shudder, she kept her head down again.

"Let's see, when you shot those poor innocents in the game this time, where did you attack their deadly points?" Bai six inquired blandly, "I'm sure our Captain Georgia remembers, doesn't she?"

Georgia's eyelashes fluttered very slightly and he replied softly, "I remember."

Bai six half closed his eyes, "You should be punished for your brutal killings by taking off your clothes."

Georgia stood up and obediently removed his clothing, his body covered in various interlocking whip marks that had not yet abated, like a viper wrapped around his waist and thighs, twisting around his white skin to spit its letters.

As he slept, Georgia's breath caught - he realised in a trance that each whip mark represented a man he had killed.

The man in front of him was torturing him.

This man knows that he will not feel pain from a simple physical whipping, but he will feel the ultimate pain from his impurity, incorrectness, and injustice.

So whenever they had a match, when Georgia killed someone on the field, this man would, after the match, ask Georgia to give the name of the man he killed, and the part of the field where the man had been hit by an arrow, and then give Georgia the whip mark in the same place.

Bai six is using these wounds and pain to constantly remind Georgia of a harsh truth: what I did to you is not one tenth as cruel as what you did to those people.

After suffering this emotional outburst from Bai six, Georgia stood still and dressed, bowed her head respectfully to Bai six and exited Bai six's room, wearing a uniform with a long collar and zip that went all the way down to her jaw.

Georgia saw herself make her way, unblinking, through a corridor, to the door of some room, opened it and walked in, then immediately rushed over to the toilet and vomited, scratching painfully at the painful whip marks on her body as she did so.

He seemed to be trying to vomit something out of his body that made him self loathing, but no matter what he could only vomit clear water, and eventually the act of forced vomiting caused Georgia's entire body to go into spasms.

Georgia kept torturing himself in various ways, he even punished himself by making marks on those whip marks with a small knife, trying to deepen them, Georgia gasped silently and tears kept pouring out of her eyes.

Eventually Georgia saw himself collapsing exhausted on the bed, curled up in a ball with a pocket watch in his hands, which he seemed to want to open and look at, but finally just kissed it, closed his tear-stained eyes and fell into a deep sleep.

Georgia knew the pocket watch and knew that inside it was an old photograph of Armand and him.

--------

Bai Liu escorted Tang Erda out of the room and they chatted as they walked down the street.

"I'm curious, you must have told the Heretic Council as soon as you found out that Georgia had betrayed them." Bai Liu looked sideways at Tang Erda, "What did the Heretic Authority do with him?"

Tang Erda shrugged and pulled on her jacket, turning around, "First Georgia was banned from her position, then an investigation was started into the reasons for Georgia's betrayal, only for this investigation to begin when Georgia defected."

"There were two theories within the Heresy Authority at the time, the first said Georgia was contaminated with some kind of heresy by Bai six and spiritually descended to be controlled by Bai six."

"But this argument does not explain the fact that Georgia told Bai six the location of the secret stronghold - even if Georgia was mad, Bai six would not have been able to get the location of the secret stronghold from Georgia if he could not get a mad Georgia to trust him 100 per cent. secret location, even if Georgia was crazy."

"There's another theory that some people have speculated ......" said Tang Erda, hesitating strangely and her face twisting, "Some people have speculated that Georgia fell in love with you because of the Stockholm episode fell in love with you and that's why you had total control over her."

Bai Liu raised his eyebrows, "You guys are quite gossipy, District 1."

"...... It's not gossip, in order to find out the truth, we have to assume from all angles." Tang Erda argued with difficulty, then glanced at Bai Liu and added subtly, "Another reason why such claims would have prevailed at the time was that Georgia always had some inexplicable whip marks on her body, and your ...... Bai six's weapon happened to was the long whip."

Bai Liu: "......"

Did he, in other timelines, play so intensely?