In another secluded realm, Lan stared at the person in front of them.
The other party had black hair and amber eyes, wore Xianzhou attire, and had dragon-shaped ear ornaments.
From the overall outfit down to the mole at the corner of the eye, everything was exactly the same as Zero.
The other party grinned at them. The originally approachable face somehow seemed a little more childish.
Lan, "..."
It was clearly the face they were most familiar with, yet it made them feel extremely unfamiliar.
Akivili, who was playing Zero, spread their hands and said rather proudly, "How is it? Doesn't it look just like him?"
Aha's two avatars gave them a thumbs-up and said in unison, "Way too sunny. Doesn't look like my best friend at all."
"Way too cheerful. Doesn't look like my best friend at all."
Akivili instinctively raised a hand and touched the side of their face.
"Does it really not look like him?"
Aha stared at them with a curious expression.
Lan closed their eyes expressionlessly, seemingly unwilling to witness this scene.
Akivili's mouth twitched.
"Lan, isn't that a bit much?"
Lan endured it again and again before saying, "...Don't make that expression."
After saying this, they lowered their requirements themselves.
"Forget it. Just don't smile."
The Bacchus Aha had played before was a beautiful young man whose gender was difficult to distinguish, and people often mistook his true gender. Now that Aha was playing a woman, there was even less sense of incongruity.
The two avatars came over to Akivili. One stood shoulder to shoulder with Akivili, while the other raised a hand and switched off the voice button on the Aeon's ear ornament, preventing the best friend on the other side from hearing the conversation that followed.
Aha glanced sideways at Lan.
"Lan, you're really a boring fellow."
"Can you usually see any other expressions on this face?"
Lan, "..."
No.
But with Akivili wearing that face and allowing the two women played by Aha to approach them...
Even if it wasn't real, even if the three people in front of them were Akivili and Aha...
Lan remembered the elegiac couplet Aha had tried to use to ruin that person's reputation and hurried forward to pull them apart.
'What kind of behavior is this?!'
Akivili didn't care and let Lan and Aha pull at each other.
They were immersed in their own thoughts and suddenly realized, "Aha is right."
The Aeon raised the corners of their lips, took out their jade token, and opened the camera. Just as they were about to take a picture to record it, they saw their own face clearly.
This face was clearly identical to Zero's.
Why did their smiling face look so stupid?
Akivili's expression gradually froze, and they changed their words, "Lan is right."
"I'm not smiling anymore."
They looked at the other two Aeons.
Lan stood frozen in place, the veins on their forehead faintly throbbing.
Aha tightly hugged another version of themself and said with tears in their eyes, "Men and women shouldn't touch each other!"
Akivili sighed.
Lan, as the beneficiary, didn't care about the plan that followed at all.
Aha was simply here to have fun.
Akivili looked troubled.
"Can you hold out for half an hour?"
Lan's expression was ugly. Seeing that slightly worried face, they paused almost imperceptibly for a moment before saying stiffly, "That depends on Aha."
"Whatever." Aha shrugged and pointed at their ear. "At worst, let Akivili turn it off early."
Their best friend couldn't hear them anyway.
The truth would naturally be fabricated by them.
As for the Luofu people following them, Lan would handle them.
Akivili took the initiative to make a concession.
"What about ten minutes? You can at least hold out that long, right?"
Lan didn't answer and reminded Akivili, "Stay behind me."
Aha's eyes shifted, and they immediately laughed.
"What's the point of saying that now?"
"Tell him to his face."
Lan silently rolled up their sleeves.
Akivili couldn't help sighing.
Forget ten minutes. Could Lan and Aha even last one minute?
The three Aeons had met half an hour early. In another half an hour, the external enemy would arrive at the Luofu.
Could it be... that they had to watch the two of them fight each other for half an hour?
Akivili simply lifted the hem of their outer robe, sat down on the steps, and carefully listened to the Nameless Ones' conversation.
One of the Nameless Ones seemed to be a very energetic young girl. The rise and fall of her voice as she spoke made it impossible not to become immersed in the story she was describing.
Akivili listened with a focused expression, as if wanting to fill in their missing past through the conversation.
The senses of the other two Aeons far surpassed those of ordinary people, so they could naturally hear the conversation on the other side as well.
They did not disturb Akivili until they heard someone on the other side say, "You have the look of someone who's going to lose money..."
Immediately afterward, Zero gave his birth date and time.
The three Aeons looked at one another.
Aha moved to Akivili's side from the left and right.
"Let me listen..."
Lan grabbed Aha by the back of their collar with both hands, trying to pull them away from Akivili, who was wearing Zero's face. Unfortunately, Aha was determined to join the fun and refused to budge.
Zero on the other side asked, "This mole of mine... doesn't it mean that I'll have good luck in my career?"
The person said, "No, it means you'll lose money."
"Your Earth is weak. You have wealth in your destiny, but you can't bear it."
"Your health wasn't good before you were sixteen."
"Your comprehension is extremely high, and you're best at business studies, but your temperament is unstable. It's difficult for you to settle down and study, so you need supervision from teachers and elders."
"Your children are naturally intelligent and have strong personalities. You'll invest a great deal of money and energy in them. Even in your later years, you'll still worry about them."
Akivili and Aha looked at Lan at the same time.
'That last one is too accurate!'
The person on the other side continued, "Your nature is gentle. You always think too highly of other people, believing there aren't that many evil people or malicious intentions in the world. This makes it easy for others to deceive and use you."
"You're too outstanding, so you always make people jealous. You always encounter petty people. They'll secretly trip you up. In this lifetime... there are very few friends who truly want to help you."
"You must always guard against others. Whenever interests are involved, you must be careful, otherwise it's very easy for you to turn against them and become enemies."
The more Akivili listened, the more something felt wrong.
'Who is this guy talking about?'
'How could anyone be jealous of their best friend?'
'Who would turn against their best friend?'
Aha crouched beside Akivili, laughing so hard they could barely stand upright. When they heard the last sentence, they rarely fell into a daze for a moment and murmured, "This person's calculations... are really accurate."
"Is this Xianzhou magic?"
Lan stood behind Aha, looking down at the top of their head.
It seemed Aha knew quite a few secrets.
Lan calmly asked in return, "You're jealous of him? You turned against him?"
Aha raised their head and made a face at them.
"How could that be?"
"That happened a very long time ago. After so long... even Fuli might not remember it."
Akivili slightly furrowed their brows and borrowed Lan's jade token.
They opened it and took a look. The jade token was currently recording.
Akivili didn't understand, but they chose to respect the Aeon's preference and logged into Lan's social media account, "Hundred Steps Pierce the Willow Leaf."
They entered the Aeons' group chat and checked the messages they had missed.
More than ten days ago, Aha had appeared in the group chat.
[Aha: @Fuli]
Fuli did not reply.
After a while, Aha appeared again.
[Aha: Where's Scrap Metal?]
[Aha: Why did you leave the group?]
[Aha: It's all Scrap Metal's fault!]
Akivili scrolled the screen.
Further back were messages from several hundred years ago.
Aha had pulled their best friend into the group chat, and Lan had only sent a period.
Akivili patiently continued scrolling backward.
[I heard I had a little grudge with Nous. I'd like to take this opportunity to clarify it.]
They returned the jade token to Lan and said, deeply puzzled, "Is that 'Erudition'? They were jealous of my best friend? They became enemies with my best friend? Impossible."
"Ah, forget about that. Let's discuss the plan." Aha's two avatars raised their hands first. "Let it possess me instead."
Akivili saw through Aha's intentions at a glance.
The heliobi could parasitize other people and control their bodies.
Aha clearly wanted to slack off.
Akivili immediately shook their head.
"No, I'm the most suitable choice."
Aha's avatars crossed their hands in front of their chests to form an X, then simultaneously raised all four hands and said righteously, "Objection overruled. I have four votes!"
Lan looked at the two Aeons arguing, then turned their head toward the direction a hundred meters away, where the external enemy was.
There was an unmistakable aura of Destruction there, like mud on snow, that they could not ignore.
And the result?
No Aeon cared.
The old saying really was right.
Three monks really do have no water to drink.
Lan reminded them in a low voice, "It's coming."
Aha said "Oh." Their two avatars turned around and, under Lan's cold gaze, came over to Akivili. The three stood shoulder to shoulder, looking very intimate.
The heliobi gradually approached. When it was less than twenty meters away, Lan took three steps in two and quickly moved behind one of Aha's avatars, then kicked hard at the back of its knee.
Both avatars cried out in surprise. One fell face-first to the ground, while the other hid behind Akivili.
Mindful of the heliobi nearby, Aha deliberately struggled to get back up, turned around, and gritted their teeth.
"You really, you really have no consideration for women at all!"
'You're taking revenge for personal reasons!'
'Aha didn't even lie!'
'If you want to protect your best friend, tell him to his face!'
'What's the point of telling Akivili?!'
Lan's eyes grew colder as they looked down at Aha lying on the ground.
"You should feel fortunate."
'You should be glad the one standing here is me, not him.'
Lan slowly stepped forward and stood in front of Akivili in the posture of a protector. Their tone unconsciously carried a trace of coldness.
"Heliobi feed on emotions."
"They can control the host's body."
"Now, stay at least three meters away from him."
Akivili thought to themself, 'These two...'
'Can't they even last one minute?!'
They lowered their eyes and thought about how to handle the situation.
'If they were Zero, what would they say?'
"All right." Akivili gently squeezed Lan's shoulder and said softly, "This doesn't fit our way of treating guests."
If they were their best friend, what kind of smile would they show now?
Akivili slowly curled their lips, revealing an extremely approachable smile.
There was no warmth in their eyes. Their gaze lightly swept over Aha's avatar without stopping for even a moment.
Forget it. Even if they wanted to slack off...
They still had to consider Lan's feelings.
With this face on, if something unexpected happened halfway through, Lan might... be unable to attack them.
After the heliobi took control of Aha's avatar, Akivili asked gently,
"Didn't scare you, did it?"
As for the heliobi's answer? Zero wouldn't care.
After asking this, Akivili turned their head and was about to move the plan forward and introduce their code name and identity within the "Disciples of Sanctus Medicus" when Aha's other avatar blinked at them and intimately wrapped its arms around theirs.
Akivili, "..."
The Aeon's scalp went numb. Their thoughts were forcibly interrupted, and the carefully prepared words from the previous second vanished completely.
Lan's eyes were as cold as a blade as they sternly warned, "Stay away from him..."
The heliobi's eyes moved. It looked at Akivili for a moment, then at Lan.
It seemed to have reached some remarkable conclusion, and its expression became quite subtle.
After a while, it raised its brows and smiled.
"Nice move."
Akivili, "....."
'Best friend, what should I do?'
'I can't protect your reputation.'
'Your reputation has already been ruined by Lan and Aha!'
Akivili collected their thoughts and, while pretending to adjust the loose hair beside their ear, pressed the voice button on their ear ornament and quietly reminded the other two Aeons.
"Let's begin."
'Stop causing trouble!'
'Your best friend is listening over there!'
On the other side, Zero silently turned off the voice button and asked, "What about the mole on the bridge of the nose? What does it mean?"
The person's hair was gray. They looked around, then fixed their gaze on the mole on Daiyang's nose and said knowingly, "You're asking about her physiognomy? That's a peach-blossom mole. It has a very good meaning."
Zero breathed a sigh of relief.
"That's good."
After hearing this, Daiyang smiled until her eyes narrowed, and even the look she gave the old man gained a little warmth.
Zero picked up the jade token, and the person very sensibly displayed the payment QR code.
Daiyang carefully watched Zero's expression, then looked at the amount of Patrol Tokens he paid. After confirming that he wasn't angry, she lowered her head and deleted the message she was about to send to the Ten Lords Commission.
After Zero paid the Patrol Tokens, he smiled at everyone.
"Want to give it a try? I think it's pretty accurate."
Before coming to the low-dimensional world, he had suffered from a blood-clotting disorder and had poor health.
He didn't like studying. Even with Zandar supervising him, he still didn't want to study.
If his final ten years as marshal were counted as his later years, then he really had always been worrying about Hua.
As for petty people...
That was really too accurate.
There were always Aeons secretly tripping him up. Even if Zero became best friends with them...
Apart from Akivili, very few Aeons were willing to help him.
Once their interests became involved, they would turn against each other and become enemies.
The only thing it hadn't calculated correctly was his financial luck.
March was very tempted.
Could this person calculate her past?
Her eyes filled with anticipation as she asked, "What is the birth date and time?"
The person stared blankly at the payment information on the screen. Only after hearing the question did they barely recover.
"Your birth date and time are your date of birth."
"The time has to be accurate, otherwise the calculation won't be accurate."
"Huh?" March looked disappointed. "Then forget it."
Daiyang had already gotten along well with the Nameless Ones. She patted March on the shoulder.
"It's fine."
At worst, they could ask the Divination Commission for help.
The group left the museum and took a star skiff to the residences of the previous "Imbibitor Lunae."
Zero looked at the statue in the inner courtyard, then at the furnishings in the inner courtyard.
It was the residence of the "Imbibitor Lunae."
They hadn't come to the wrong place.
Zero spoke in confusion.
"...What is this thing?"
The Vidyadhara elder glared furiously, his beard practically crooked with anger.
"How dare you show disrespect to the 'Father of the Xianzhou'?!"