Cataclysm Chapter 99: The Mortality Meter 05

Chapter 99: The Mortality Meter 05

Translated by Addis of Exiled Rebels Scanlations

Editor: Karai

 

The girl recounted the terrifying incident that happened last week. “We were in a car accident, the same place where the man who was just killed by the cloudstone chandelier had been riding the bus. When I heard the rumors, I felt a sense of danger, so I pulled my friends away. At first, we were relieved, but then my two friends died one after another.”

“It couldn’t have been an accident.” The girl seemed to remember the fear she had felt during that time, speaking passionately, “It was definitely a premeditated murder! We were helpless, toyed with by the god of death. We thought we had escaped death, but it turned out there was a dead end ahead. Do you know how my two friends died? One of them was bitten to death by a dog! Can you believe that? He didn’t die in the car crash, he died from the bite of a mad dog. In just one week, two out of the five people who narrowly escaped are now dead, all due to ‘accidents.’”

Chen Yang, as she spoke, took out his phone from his pocket. “So you started investigating the car accident from a month ago, and traced it to the man killed by the cloudstone chandelier, trying to find a way to save yourselves?”

The girl nodded. “Yes. We need to find the order of death and then break the rules.”

Chen Yang paused. “Break the rules?”

The girl answered firmly, “Yes. It was mentioned in Final Destination that death has an order. As long as we break the order and change the rules, we can survive.”

Chen Yang replied, “If there is a god of death, wouldn’t he just kill you without being constrained by any death order?”

The girl hesitated, and then murmured, “That’s what Final Destination said.”

Ma Shanfeng shook his head and sighed. “This is reality, not a movie. If someone truly wants to create an accident and take your life, how could they possibly be constrained by this so-called death order? Besides, isn’t the death order supposed to be set by the ‘god of death’ you speak of? How can you be sure you’ll break the rules and escape alive?”

Upon hearing this, the girl and her two companions turned pale, a look of despair crossing their faces. She muttered, “What should we do then? We don’t want to die.” She looked up at Chen Yang and the others, who remained calm, and then asked, “Aren’t you afraid of death? I just observed, and several times, he almost got killed. He’s being targeted, isn’t he?”

Kou Xuanling, who was mentioned, looked up and smiled confidently. “No, I’m not afraid. My loved ones and friends will save me.” Lu Xiuzhi squeezed his hand and whispered, “They will save you.”

Chen Yang opened the The Mortality Meter app and told the girl and the other two, “Give me your birth dates, and I’ll test it.”

The other two looked skeptical. The girl with the camera was half-convinced, but she still told him her birthdate and said, “I don’t know how to calculate my birth chart.”

Chen Yang shook his head. “It’s okay, I can calculate it. Just tell me your birth date.” “Do you know the time of birth?”

The girl hesitated for a moment before answering, “Yes,” and then gave a time, likely in the early hours of the morning.

After Chen Yang entered her birth chart into The Mortality Meter, Zhang Qiudao asked, “Are you trying to calculate their date of death?”

Chen Yang shook his head. “No. I just want to calculate their luck for the year. From their physiognomy, they don’t seem like short-lived people, so I want to check if it’s a clash in their destiny, and they happened to get entangled with a bad omen.”

Kou Xuanling asked, “That app can tell fortunes?”

Chen Yang didn’t look up. “Yes. If you go into the app settings and change the mode, it becomes a fortune-telling app.” The Mortality Meter was just one mode of the app, used to test death dates, but a person’s fate could change drastically. There was always a chance that a person might find a sliver of hope and live a long life. So, The Mortality Meter was really just a way to predict a major life-threatening event.

Zhang Qiudao asked, “It can calculate anything?”

Chen Yang replied, “Anything. And it’s pretty accurate.”

As soon as the words left his mouth, everyone else quickly pulled out their phones and opened the app to switch modes. Zhang Qiudao tested his marriage fortune, Kou Xuanling tested whether he could successfully be promoted to a Three Dongs Five Thunder Tianshi, and Ma Shanfeng and his wife tested whether their wishes would come true, though they ended up arguing because of it.

Ma Shanfeng’s wife grabbed his ear. “Did you hide some money?”

Ma Shanfeng, with his neck stiff, denied it and then questioned her about her relationship with the old man who danced in the square with her. “If there’s no relationship, why would you want to join him in performing at the community party?”

While they were arguing, Kui Xuan took their phone and entered the questions he wanted to ask, then exclaimed, “It’s really accurate, just like the divination I did myself.”

Ji Jiang leaned in to see what Kui Xuan had asked, and the result was auspicious. She smiled and said, “Congratulations, young miss.” Then she asked if she could try it herself. Kui Xuan handed her the phone to let her test it. Ji Jiang had many things she wanted to ask, but in the end, she only wanted to know if Kui Xuan’s sense of aesthetics could be saved. The result was ominous, and Ji Jiang’s face immediately turned pale.

Kui Xuan swung her legs happily, completely unaware of Ji Jiang’s distress. She tested whether asking her classmates to do her homework for her would ever be exposed, especially if Chen Xiaoyang found out. The result was auspicious, so she was quite pleased.

Lu Xiuzhi turned to Kou Xuanling and said, “Let me borrow it to test.”

Kou Xuanling asked, “What are you testing?”

Lu Xiuzhi stared at him. “When will you marry me?”

Kou Xuanling’s face flushed slightly. “Testing things like that is useless. After all, I’m the one who decides.”

“Then when do you say we’ll test it?”

“Not now.”

The constant talk of “testing” made everyone in the room feel like they were about to forget the meaning of the word. The girl and her two companions felt quite awkward. They had thought Chen Yang and the others were in the same situation as them, but it turned out they were fake Taoists, and even their sales pitch seemed fake.

Chen Yang glanced up and immediately realized that the three in front of him were treating them like frauds. He didn’t feel offended, however, and casually said, “There was a clash with an inauspicious star recently, but it wasn’t a death threat, you’ve already escaped it. However, there’s still a minor danger, though it shouldn’t be life-threatening. Do you know the birth dates of your two friends who died unexpectedly?”

The girl appeared cautious and gave an awkward smile. “I’m not really sure. Sorry for bothering you. We need to check out of our room, so we’ll be leaving now.” Her two companions had already turned and left, murmuring complaints as they walked away.

Chen Yang didn’t lift his head, but called after the girl. “What’s your name?”

The girl froze for a moment before answering, “Zheng Xiaoyu.”

Chen Yang provided Kui Xuan with the girl’s birth information and then asked Zheng Xiaoyu, “What were the names of your two friends who passed away?”

Zheng Xiaoyu didn’t react at first and answered immediately. As soon as the words left her mouth, she realized what she had done, and a wave of unease washed over her. She quickly stood up, took a few steps, and tried to leave but was stopped by a calm, gentle voice from behind.

“Kui Xuan, can you figure it out?”

“No problem,” Kui Xuan replied, closing his eyes and forming a strange hand gesture in front of his chest. He muttered words that were odd, incomprehensible, and difficult to understand, even his accent was foreign to anyone listening. After a long pause, he suddenly opened his eyes. “Chen Xiaoyang, I figured it out.”

“How is it?”

“Your fate is not meant to end.”

The doll near Chen Yang’s ear sneered and said in a jealous tone, “I can figure it out too.” Chen Yang patted the doll in a comforting manner, and the doll was quickly appeased. Zheng Xiaoyu reflexively looked over, only to see the ugly, strange doll. It looked nothing like the delicate one that Kui Xuan held in his arms, and yet it terrified her.

Zheng Xiaoyu kept her eyes on the doll and suddenly saw its dark, eerie eyes shift, sending a chill down her spine. But when she looked again, it seemed to be just her imagination. She snapped out of her daze and heard Chen Yang’s voice: “Your friend’s life was not meant to end, but their unexpected death suggests that you may also be targeted by a divine calamity with its own consciousness.”

“…What divine calamity?” Zheng Xiaoyu asked, still trying to understand the unfamiliar term.

Chen Yang paused briefly before replying, “In your understanding, it would be the ‘Grim Reaper’.”

Zheng Xiaoyu sat back down, stunned for a moment before speaking. “So you believe in the existence of a Grim Reaper? That it hides around us, watching, and is always ready to cause an accident to kill us?”

Chen Yang didn’t go into the differences between the ‘Grim Reaper’ and divine calamities, since calling it simply the ‘Grim Reaper’ seemed easier for Zheng Xiaoyu to understand. He only said, “Your life was not meant to end.”

Zheng Xiaoyu gave a bitter smile. “But the scythe is already hanging over my throat.”

“There’s still a way,” Chen Yang said, shrugging as he reached out for her camera. “Didn’t you take a clear picture earlier? Show me, we’ll find the divine calamity and eliminate it. Then you’ll survive.”

Zheng Xiaoyu stared at him in disbelief, as if he had just spoken nonsense. “You want to kill the ‘Grim Reaper’? How is that possible?”

Zhang Qiudao spoke up. “Learn more about the domestic Taoist and ghost god systems. There’s no ‘Grim Reaper’ in this country, only ghost gods. And a divine calamity is not the ‘Grim Reaper.’ You can’t kill it, but that doesn’t mean others can’t.”

Zheng Xiaoyu gave an awkward smile. “I… well, let’s take a look at the pictures first.” She quickly opened the camera’s playback to show the photos she had taken earlier. “Actually, I’ve taken pictures during several of the so-called accidental deaths. Lately, I’ve been running into accidents all the time. Sometimes, I’ll have two accidents in a single trip. I thought it was strange, so I started taking pictures.”

Chen Yang took the camera and pressed the button to replay the photos, enlarging them. The others gathered around to look, but it was only Kou Xuanling and Lu Xiuzhi who didn’t crowd in. Kui Xuan squeezed into Chen Yang’s lap, and Big Fatty jumped onto the back of the couch, sticking his head over, nearly burying the doll.

Du Shuo pointed to something in the photo. “Zoom in here.”

Chen Yang followed the suggestion and zoomed in. The photo showed a place where a stone chandelier was supposed to hang, with several swollen screws visible. Zheng Xiaoyu had taken five pictures in total. Some were overexposed, others had the wrong aperture, but one photo turned out the best. Even when zoomed in, the spot where the chandelier was supposed to be hung remained empty.

Kui Xuan curiously commented, “There’s nothing there. Wait… it looks like a screw is missing.”

As soon as the words were spoken, a metallic expansion screw rolled across a corner of the hotel lobby, unnoticed by them. Its sharp tip gleamed. Du Shuo said, “The photo earlier was taken before the accident happened. Open it and check the floor.”

Chen Yang seemed to have an idea and found the photo taken earlier, when the man hadn’t been killed by the cloudstone chandelier yet. He was holding a knife, his face filled with anger. There was a puddle of water on the floor, and the man hadn’t noticed it, causing him to slip. When the puddle was zoomed in, the reflection of the chandelier could be seen on the shiny floor.

Above the chandelier, a vague black shadow lurked. Kui Xuan asked, “God Slayer?”

Chen Yang replied, “It should be the God Slayer.” The entity had pulled out the expansion screw from the chandelier, causing the hundred-pound fixture to fall and kill the man who had intended to murder someone. Afterward, the God Slayer fled.

The faint sound of metal echoed through the lobby. An expansion screw rolled under a soft chair. A small child clapped and giggled, kicking the screw away. The parents, seeing this, picked up the child and kissed him, laughing warmly, “Why is our little one so happy?”

The hotel had already cleaned the lobby. Police were coming and going, and more guests were checking out. New arrivals, unaware of what had happened, sat in the waiting area.

The hotel returned to its usual calm, like a still pond. The expansion screw rolled into the water without causing a splash, yet still disturbed the peace, like knocking over a domino. A businessman, distracted on his phone, failed to notice the screw on the floor. His polished shoes kicked it, and the screw continued rolling.

Chen Xiaoyu’s two other friends, Cheng Xi and Ding Sheng, walked toward the elevator. Cheng Xi said, “They really did a good job acting, like the real deal. And then there’s that whole thing where you input your birthdate and it predicts your future. It’s less professional than the blind fortune tellers in the alley. At least they pretend to be blind.”

Ding Sheng, frowning, asked, “Do you think we’ll die?”

Cheng Xi scoffed, “You believe Chen Xiaoyu? Let me tell you, this is just an accident. There are plenty of coincidences in the world, and when they all align, people think they’ve found a pattern. But really, there’s no pattern. The odds of such coincidences happening are so tiny—just a fraction of one in a billion.”

Ding Sheng replied, “What if we’re the one in a billion?”

Cheng Xi rolled her eyes. “Why don’t you say you’ll win the lottery? At least the odds of that are higher.” She didn’t notice the cleaning cart ahead and bumped into it, wincing in pain. In frustration, she kicked the cart, but the heel of her high heel broke off, stuck inside. “Ding Sheng, help me.”

Ding Sheng pulled the heel out, and Cheng Xi walked a few steps before stumbling. She looked down and saw the heel was broken. She was furious, deciding to walk barefoot, tossing the broken heel into a trash can as she complained, “Sixth floor? What a hassle.”

She didn’t notice that the broken heel fell out of the trash can and rolled a few circles before stopping. The expansion screw rolled to her feet, stopping about thirty centimeters from the elevator door. The cleaning lady came out of the restroom, draped her towel over the cart, and pushed it toward the elevator. She didn’t see the thin, round heel on the floor. As she stepped on it, she slipped and crashed into the cart, which was pushed toward Cheng Xi, who was about to enter the elevator.

Cheng Xi screamed as her clothes were smeared with dirt, feeling disgusted, pressing herself against the elevator. “Do you have eyes? How do you walk?”

Instinctively, she stepped back and pushed the cart away, only to step on the sharp screw. It hurt, and she kicked the cart in reflex. She accidentally pulled the unstable vacuum cleaner down, and it struck her head. She staggered backward, and the elevator, which should have reopened, closed mercilessly, trapping her upper body and pulling her upward.

Cheng Xi screamed in terror, and Ding Sheng shouted for help, holding onto her lower body. Chen Xiaoyu heard the screams and turned around, immediately crying out, “Cheng Xi!!”

Chen Yang and the others quickly rushed over, bypassing the sofa, and pried open the elevator, pulling Cheng Xi out. She was injured and still in shock, while the elevator continued to ascend. In that split second when Chen Yang saw the black shadow reflected in the elevator door, he froze.

The hotel manager rushed over and fainted upon hearing the noise. The cloudstone chandelier accident had just happened, and now another elevator accident—he didn’t want to face reality anymore.

Author’s Note: I initially thought elevator accidents involved clothes, hair, or ropes getting stuck, but after researching elevator incidents and watching videos, I was terrified. It’s completely unpredictable—several videos show people stepping in just as the elevator doors are closing, and it suddenly moves up or down! Also, when the doors are about to close, don’t try to pry them open or use your hands to wedge them—they may not sense it and will clamp down, dragging you up or down.

 

 

 

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