Echoes of the Past C2

Chapter 2 — Safe Word

**【Lighthouse Survival Codex — Rule One:

【The Lighthouse is the one and only existing shelter.
If you should be unfortunate enough to enter any “other” shelter, escape by every means available.】**

—

“Go pick it back up.”

“Ah?” Mena was in the middle of drinking water and nearly choked.
“Cough—cough—pick… pick the walkie-talkie back up?”

Li Wei leaned against the edge of the ruins, one leg stretched out and the other bent.
His long, distinct fingers rested beside his knee; the flickering fire cast a strange crimson glow in his eyes.
He lifted his fingers into the tip of the flames—fearless, careless.
“Recite Survival Rule Ten.”

Mena wilted.
“Everything abnormal that occurs outside the Lighthouse must not be underestimated.”
But the walkie-talkie had already been kicked deep into the swamp.
No one knew where it had sunk.

The shirtless muscle-bound man beside them wiped his torso and laughed with schadenfreude.
“That’s what you get for throwing things around.”

“Bard, shut up!” a curly-haired girl snapped.

She knelt beside the swamp, staring at the small depression in the mud.
A moment later, a bubble surfaced.

Her eyes narrowed like a predator locking onto prey.
Her hands plunged fiercely into the hole!

The swamp’s devouring pull dragged at her arms, forcing her nearly flat against the ground.
But she remained unfazed, round black eyes fixed on the mud—
The moment was right.
She yanked hard, and a fifty-centimeter centipedal worm was hauled straight out!

The creature writhed with all its strength, thrashing wildly in midair.

“Shit!” Bard nearly got bitten.
He stumbled back several steps before steadying himself, then shouted through gritted teeth,
“A-Se-li!”

Ase­li let out a proud puff. “This one’s huge!”

Bard laughed in exasperation.
“Ancestor! I’m begging you—can you at least value our lives even if you don’t value your own?!”

Ase­li countered, “You’ve got eyes. Why didn’t you dodge?”

“……”

The worm was grotesquely plump—its countless legs looked like they could be peeled for meat.
Its round, swollen body was thicker than Ase­li’s arm.
From a distance, it looked like a giant many-legged beast devouring her flesh.

Enraged at being restrained, the worm coiled brutally around Ase­li’s arm, barbed mandibles ready to inject venom.
But after piercing her sleeve, it found itself unable to break through skin.

Soft-looking though it was, her skin was impossibly tough—without so much as a scratch.

Such was Ase­li’s ability: keratin hardening.

She snorted. “Useless thing.”

Lan Zhao watched with growing horror—
The worm’s strength was immense.
It looked ready to break free and lunge at the girl’s delicate face at any second.

But his fear was entirely unnecessary.

Ase­li impatiently seized the worm’s head between its mandibles and tore the venom sac clean off.
Brain matter and blood splattered everywhere—brutal and unrestrained.

A closer look revealed this was not her first trophy.
Three more lay crushed beneath her feet.

Even dead, the worms twitched, their many legs clawing at empty air, searching for a chance to crawl back into the swamp to regenerate.

“Run and my babies will eat you anyway. Better I eat you myself.”
Ase­li licked the corner of her lips.
“At least if your remains stay in my stomach, you’ll die in one piece.”

Lan Zhao fell silent. “….”

So these were the legendary Divine Envoy and his teammates?

Li Wei, known throughout the Lighthouse as the “Divine Envoy,” had countless rumors surrounding him.
To date, there had never been a single echo-zone he could not leave, nor a single contamination source he failed to reclaim.

Lan Zhao had run into them purely by accident—
He had gone out to find his missing younger brother, only to fall into the swamp on his way back.
Li Wei’s team had passed by and rescued him.

Then, bafflingly, they chose to camp in this dreaded swamp—
Their reasoning:
“The food here is fatty and delicious.”

The ground beneath them happened to be the remaining roof of an old submerged building—
The only relatively safe patch of earth.

Lan Zhao rose and offered, “I’ll go help look for the walkie-talkie with you.”

Mena tossed him a rope.
“Sure—if I sink, you can pull me out.”

The words had barely left his mouth when a hand grabbed Lan Zhao’s arm.

Lan Zhao patted the overly pale hand and looked toward his thin-faced younger brother, offering reassurance:
“It’s fine. They saved us. I should help a bit. I’ll be right back.”

Ase­li, watching the man stare intently at Lan Zhao’s departing figure, grew curious.
“What’s your name?”

“Zhu En.”

“Oh.”
Ase­li tilted her head innocently.
“You and that Lan… Lan…”

“His name is Lan Zhao,” Zhu En rasped.

“Right, Lan Zhao. What’s your relationship?”

Zhu En lowered his head.
“We’re brothers.”

Ase­li said bluntly, “But you don’t look alike at all.”

Zhu En abruptly lifted his head—his pitch-black eyes boring into hers.

Far from intimidated, Ase­li found it amusing and stared right back.

Zhu En glanced toward Li Wei, then said quietly,
“Even if we don’t look alike, he is my brother… and mine alone.”

Ase­li dismissed it.
“I have a dad. I don’t need to steal your brother.”

Zhu En gave her another bewildered look—
Apparently unable to understand how “brother” and “dad” belonged in the same category.

“You’re no fun,” Ase­li concluded, ignoring him and bouncing up to Li Wei.
“Boss.”

Li Wei lifted his gaze.

Ase­li proudly produced two enormous worms from behind her back.
“Ta-daa!”

Their thrashing legs nearly scratched Li Wei’s eyelids, yet he didn’t even blink.
His voice was cool and flat.
“Not bad.”

Beaming from the praise, Ase­li pinned the worms to the ground and used a special dagger to slice them cleanly in half, then propped them over the fire using their own shells as support.

The worm meat was a translucent black, bouncy in texture; after being licked by fire, it released a faint fragrance.

“It looks like sashimi,” Ase­li remarked.
“I want to eat sashimi.”

It wasn’t the first time she’d said so.
For reasons unknown, she thought everything resembled sashimi.

Bard, polishing his round axe, responded for the nth time,
“When we pass by the coast on a mission, I’ll get you some.”

“Great!”
She clapped her hands for the nth time, smiling brightly.

“That’s if your dad even lets you out again.”
“I can sneak out.”

Zhu En stood, eyes fixed on the direction Lan Zhao had gone.
“They haven’t returned.”

Ase­li echoed, “Yeah, they’re not back yet.”

Bard looked to Li Wei.
“Boss, should we go look?”

Ase­li chimed in: “Go look!”

“You’re a broken recorder,” Bard flicked her forehead.
“Eat. I’ll go.”

Before he could move, the reeds rustled—
Mena stumbled out, covered in sludge and cursing.
“Shit shit shit—there’s a worm king fighting a reed toad over there!”

“Who’s winning?” Ase­li dodged aside while asking.

“Hell if I know—it’s not done yet!”

Lan Zhao looked shaken.
It was his first time witnessing such a scene.
He had considered abandoning the walkie-talkie altogether, but Mena had insisted that any order from Li Wei must be carried out—
Even at the cost of one’s life.

Lan Zhao couldn’t understand.
Fortunately, the walkie-talkie had been retrieved without casualties.

Mena handed it over.
“Not sure if it still works.”

Li Wei said nothing—and didn’t take it.

Lan Zhao was puzzled.
Didn’t he want it retrieved? Why ignore it now?

Mena instantly understood the disdain in Li Wei’s gaze.
Using the only somewhat clean patch of sleeve on his arm, he wiped the device down and personally pressed the transmit button—
Dutifully acting the part of a human tool.

Then Li Wei took out a finely crafted die—black overall, each groove traced with gold lines.
Closer inspection revealed a hundred tiny faces, numbered 1 to 100.

This was an Orderer’s Hundred-Faced Die, unique to its owner.
It could be used to make any kind of check—team sanity, contamination levels of an area, and so on.
But only the Orderer knew what was being checked.

Li Wei flicked his wrist and let the die fall.
It tumbled casually across the ground—
Landing on 75.

At that exact moment, Li Wei spoke into the walkie-talkie, voice low and steady:

“The Lighthouse is the one and only existing shelter. Leave your current location immediately.
If you cannot leave, do not communicate with the creatures there.
Do not eat anything that appears edible.”

Only static answered.

Lan Zhao asked hesitantly, “Will he listen?”

“Depends on luck,” Bard said.
“If he hears the boss, he’s got a chance.
If not—he’s done.”

Lan Zhao dismissed it inwardly.
Even if he hears it, so what? Li Wei’s words aren’t scripture. Who would instantly obey?

Ase­li chewed on roasted worm.
“But how did that shelter know Boss’s name?”

“Looks like more than one person fell for the shelter trap… and one of them knew Boss.”

Shelters did not know names on their own.
Only through someone already trapped—like Jeffrey’s acquaintance—could they imitate voices and lure others.

Bard asked,
“Highway 297 is close by. Boss, should we check it?”

The little recorder chimed in again.
“Go check!”

Li Wei said nothing—
Rolled the die again.

This time, it landed on 100.

His eyes narrowed, his expression turning slightly cold.
“Go check.”

Lan Zhao felt uneasy.
He wanted to ask what Li Wei had just checked—
But didn’t dare.

He tested indirectly:
“You’re just going in like this? You haven’t resupplied after the last echo-zone…”

“Boss says go, so we go.”
Mena wiped mud off himself.
“You’re pretty tough to wander out alone looking for someone.”

“I had no choice. I can’t abandon him.”
Lan Zhao glanced at Zhu En, then changed the subject.
“Leader Li doesn’t talk much, does he?”

“Not really.”
Mena lowered his voice.
“But after dealing with a contamination source, Boss is always in a bad mood.”

Lan Zhao nodded.
Makes sense—
Echo-zones were deadly.
Bring in ten people, and you were lucky to bring out half.
Any leader would be stressed.

He had no way of knowing—
Li Wei had brought only three people this time.
And all three returned unscathed.

Li Wei stood at the edge of the ruined roof, lazily tossing the die and catching it again.
In the distance lay a half-submerged winding road, with a rusted, near-collapsing sign still standing:
297.

Most of the road had been swallowed by the swamp—
Only scattered fragments remained.

Li Wei pocketed the die.
“Let’s go.”

“Coming!”
Ase­li stomped out the campfire and skewered two strips of worm meat on reed stalks—one handed to Li Wei, one shoved into her own mouth.

“Will you two come with us?” Mena asked Lan Zhao.
“If not, follow the edge of the swamp toward the forest.
Don’t enter it—just cross the mushroom grove beside it and you’ll see the Lighthouse lights.”

Ase­li added seriously,
“But don’t step on mushrooms!”

Lan Zhao hesitated.
Zhu En squeezed his arm and murmured,
“Let’s go together. It’s safer.”

Lan Zhao sighed.
“…Alright.”

Li Wei neither approved nor objected to their joining.
He merely turned slightly and said,

“Test his safe word.”

Lan Zhao froze.
“…How did you know—”

How did he know Zhu En was an Orderer?

Ase­li answered proudly,
“Boss knows everything!”

Orderers could assess team contamination,
but could not assess another Orderer.

And because Orderers had overwhelmingly strong mental fortitude, even after losing order they could still behave completely normally.
For safety, teams usually gave an Orderer a preset question-and-answer password—
A safe word—
to verify their sanity.

If no safe word existed, they used simple questions—
“How many eyes do humans have?”
“What is a chrysanthemum used for?”
A sane person answered normally.
The deranged… did not.

Mena had once met a deranged Orderer.
He asked,
“What’s the easiest tool to crack black nuts?”
The correct answer was a cross-clamp.
The Orderer picked Mena up by the head and tried smashing him against the nut.

Mena subconsciously rubbed the dent still left on his skull.

“Zhu En’s safe word was last reset during Light Day,” Lan Zhao explained.
“It’s fine to say.
What do you like most?”

Zhu En’s lashes lowered instinctively.
A long silence.
Then he answered:

“Lan Zhao.”

The thing he liked most—was Lan Zhao.

Ase­li shrieked:
“You said he was your brother!”

Lan Zhao forced a smile.
“What’s wrong with liking your brother the most?”
He hurriedly shifted topics.
“To be fair—shouldn’t Leader Li test his safe word too?”

The atmosphere froze instantly.

Mena shot him a “you are very bold” look.

Lan Zhao pressed on.
“I mean… you’re strong, but this is our first time traveling with your team.
It’s safer to confirm you’re lucid, right?
If you lost control, none of us could stop you…”

Li Wei nodded.
“Reasonable.”

Lan Zhao exhaled in relief—

Then ice poured down his spine at the next words.

Li Wei slid on a glove, smoothing out the creases with slow precision.
Only then did he say, in a calm, unhurried tone:

“But reason is what I detest most.”

“……”