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Chapter 323: The Future Behind the Door

In the instant he saw the email subject, Chen Xuan was stunned for a few seconds before reacting. Was this actually a promotion email?

When was the last time he submitted his promotion request?

That was months ago...

Since he hadn’t received any response, he thought the application hadn’t been approved, but unexpectedly, he was promoted to an LV6 store manager at this time.

Yet only a second passed before Chen Xuan realized that the successful promotion wasn’t because of Elorie’s matter, but rather related to Honglian!

Transmitting Honglian into the store likely completed the "saving a doomed world" requirement.

In this case, Lin Qing’s wish... fulfilled?

Could it be——

He rummaged through the drawer, found the room card for room 202, and dashed toward the second floor.

"Master?" Xu Xuanling looked at his agitated demeanor, puzzled.

He didn’t have time to explain, "Room card is on the table, room 206!"

Entering Lin Qing’s room, it maintained its previous appearance, with traces of her life visible everywhere. Chen Xuan went to the back door and gently rotated the doorknob...

Click.

The lock opened.

The future was indeed completely changed.

So would this door lead to Lin Qing’s home? What scene would be behind the door? How would she look after the timeline change?

Chen Xuan felt his heart pounding, this kind of tension was comparable to the first time he was transported to the store.

But in any case, it was better than completely disappearing!

Since it wasn’t the worst outcome, what was he hesitating for?

He took a deep breath and pushed open the door.

The scene before him left him greatly disappointed and confused—is this really the future where destruction was avoided?

It was a dim, dilapidated, ruined room, about twenty square meters, where the furnishings could be seen at a glance. The walls were filled with mottled gaps left by falling paint, all the furniture was covered with a thick layer of dust, most of it damaged, and the bed was left with only a wooden frame.

More astonishingly, there was a hole in the window, exposing the view outside the room. He seemed to be in a high-rise apartment building, outside the wind was howling, and the sky was dusky, seemingly struck by a sandstorm. Several other high-rises were also in bad shape, looking as if they had been ravaged by artillery fire. Coupled with the absence of lights and shadows, they seemed like monuments to civilization.

Lin Qing couldn’t possibly live in a place like this.

This place had clearly been abandoned for a long time.

This outcome was entirely unexpected for Chen Xuan, weren’t the second-floor guest rooms supposed to link to the residents’ homes? When Liu Shuyue stayed at Hot Pepper Village, her room connected to Wanshan Wilderness; and when she went to Yunzhou, the room changed to Liu Family Mansion. In other words, the door follows the resident’s location, no matter where she lives, she could conveniently return to the store.

He couldn’t figure it out.

"Oh? Is this another world?" Liuli came in, pushing the door.

"You..."

"That woman is being taken care of by your disciple, but you yourself... look strange, making people a bit worried." Liuli looked around, "What exactly happened?"

She rarely actively inquired about this kind of thing.

Although N21 wasn’t a guest, Chen Xuan trusted her relatively much... but as for this issue, he himself didn’t know where to start.

"You seem like you’ve lost something, now searching constantly." Liuli didn’t mind his lack of response, "But according to my experience, the more anxious you are to find a lost item, the harder it is to find it."

"You can see that too?" Chen Xuan was surprised.

"Of course. In a swordsman duel, it’s all about the details, seeing you looking around, I can guess eight or nine out of ten." She said proudly, "So, what exactly did you lose?"

Chen Xuan gave a wry smile, "I lost a person."

"What?" Liuli showed a surprised expression, "A person?"

"That’s right, this person spoke to you a few hours ago. Her name is Lin Qing, a guest and employee at the store, but now... none of you remember her."

"No wonder you asked us earlier if the store is missing a person." Liuli suddenly realized, "You changed history?"

"Yes, similar to what Elorie did." Chen Xuan wiped the table, leaving a fingerprint in the thick dust, "And this world... is the transformed future."

This is what puzzled him the most at this moment.

The nanobot crisis’s outcome had been changed, his promotion meant he indeed saved a world on the brink of destruction, but why did the actual situation seem like a regression?

It’s important to know that this is the future!

Humans had already managed to construct large-scale space stations in space, colonized the Moon, even if the Crystal Palace was about to crash down, it couldn’t deny the abundant achievements in scientific and technological fields.

Yet the desolate scenery before them, not to mention compared to Angel’s Paris, even Jiang City from a hundred years ago was better than this situation.

"Who knows, there’s no need to stop moving forward due to temporary setbacks." Liuli gently said, "The world is so big, maybe you only see a small part of it."

"You’re right." Chen Xuan knew he was being biased, perhaps this city suffered some disaster, and other places were still fine. "I’ll head to the rooftop, see if I can find any signals."

Bang!

Suddenly, a jarring sound came from the stairway.

Chen Xuan raised his eyebrows in surprise, the moment he entered, he scanned with the Heart Method, there was no life response within 500 meters around. He scanned again immediately, still the results were the same.

"Did you hear that?" He looked at Liuli.

The latter nodded, "Not far from here, want to check it out?"

"Hmm." Chen Xuan was about to step forward, but was held back by the other.

"Don’t rush, let me take the lead—this is a swordsman’s duty."

The two of them walked out of the room, outside was a dim corridor, with numerous closely packed apartment doors on both sides, resembling the style of the eighties or nineties, not futuristic at all. It was easy to imagine that when the building wasn’t abandoned, it must have been crowded.

Following the direction of the sound to the end of the corridor, Chen Xuan saw that the entrance to the stairs was blocked by a large pile of debris, with wardrobes, bed frames, and tables, seemingly moved here deliberately. Among these obstacles, there was even an upside-down drum washing machine.

"Is this a barricade?" Liuli lifted her hat, "Blocked not knowing if it’s by outsiders or the people inside the building. Maybe... there’s a zombie outbreak?"

Indeed, the scene resembled a set from a zombie movie.

It’s just that he hadn’t found a single corpse yet.

Chen Xuan’s gaze stayed on that washing machine, compared to the completely rusted frame and table legs, its exterior was oddly clean. If the obstacles had been left here for several years, then the washing machine seemed like it was moved last week, with the emblem of two young boys still gleaming brightly.

He approached the machine, wanting to check its manufacturing label to determine what year it was, unexpectedly as he crouched, he suddenly found the drum inside the washing machine spinning.

No sound from any motor.

There wasn’t even a power source nearby.

But the drum was spinning, and the inner walls were filled with sharp teeth, resembling a deep abyss mouth.

"Retreat!" Chen Xuan warned.

The moment the voice was uttered, the washing machine lid suddenly opened, and the spinning drum flew directly out! It wasn’t a simple drum, but hundreds of drums stacked in layers, so when it flew out it resembled a string of nimble hoops... or rather, a steel neck! Its speed was astonishing, immediately smashing where Chen Xuan stood, the high-speed spinning drum punched a pit into the ground, and debris was sucked into the barrel, instantly ground into powder by the "sharp teeth," the scattered sparks faintly lit up the dust-laden corridor.

What kind of teeth were those, clearly razor-sharp blades!

"Wow, what the heck is this?" Liuli sidestepped calmly, avoiding the flying debris, still in the mood to ridicule, "Is the washing machine going to eat people?"

If it were ordinary people, caught off guard by this washing machine attack, their entire bodies would likely be sucked into the drum and pulverized into minced meat. But Liuli knew Chen Xuan wasn’t ordinary, at the moment the drum lunged out to devour, he had already flashed aside to five or six meters away, out of the thing’s attack range.