Countdown of the ****-Swap Clock

At seven in the morning, it was still pouring outside, not a trace of sunlight.

The sky was especially gloomy and dark, as if it was about to collapse.

Chen Zixuan was startled awake from a nightmare. Even though he had slept for less than two hours, he did not feel a shred of fatigue. Instead, he was filled with confusion and fear of the unknown.

A sense of crisis, strong enough to make his heart stop, spread wildly in his mind.

Lying on the bed like a corpse, unable to control himself, Chen Zixuan recalled last night’s conversation again.

“I’m not talking about the game, but what you people call the real world.”

That strange woman, with black hair and red eyes, had told Chen Zixuan so.

After speaking, she suddenly laughed softly.

In the flickering candlelight, seeing that smile, a thick sense of unease welled up in Chen Zixuan’s heart.

“There’s a high probability… no, sorry, it’s a certainty.”

Ms. Aesther laughed lightly as she corrected herself.

“Your real body in the real world will definitely turn into what you look like now.”

The silver-haired girl’s pupils shrank slightly.

Was this some kind of prank by the game developers?

Inevitably, Chen Zixuan thought of the only possibility that made even a bit of sense.

Something was wrong, deeply wrong.

Stared at by the woman’s bizarre red eyes, Chen Zixuan actually felt as if all his secrets had been seen through.

The silver-haired girl’s body went completely stiff, her cherry-pink lips moved a few times, but the questions stuck in her throat and simply wouldn’t come out.

“You must really want to know why I’d say such a thing, don’t you?”

Though phrased as a question, aesther’s tone was clearly declarative.

“After all, you’re just a character in a game, yet you’re shameless enough to talk about so-called reality. Funny, and strange, isn’t it?”

She was certain that Chen Zixuan absolutely had such doubts.

After all, everything was already written on the silver-haired girl’s face.

Panic, unease, confusion…

And even a hint of anticipation—a longing to glimpse the truth.

Aesther seemed quite satisfied with Chen Zixuan’s reaction.

She slowly stood up from the chair and, with graceful steps, walked to the narrow window of the room. The crisp sound of high heels on the floor was clearly audible.

Outside, it sounded like the wind was howling.

With her back to the candlelight, the room became even darker.

By the faint, blurry light filtering in from the night, Chen Zixuan barely made out Aesther’s profile.

It was indistinct and hazy, but in the fleeting gloom, Chen Zixuan seemed to catch a slightly mocking smile on her lips.

“Very well, let me show you the scene of another world.”

With those words, the blood-red light in Aesther’s eyes suddenly intensified, and a terrifying pressure swept through the small room.

It was as if an endless sea of blood was surging forward, and Chen Zixuan instinctively turned his face away.

When he looked again, aesther’s right hand was raised, lightly slicing the air.

Though the movement was ordinary, in that moment, Chen Zixuan seemed to see a blood-red military saber, cutting an enormous crack hundreds of meters long through the void, slicing open the endless night beyond the window as well.

Through that crack, what entered Chen Zixuan’s eyes was a world on the verge of collapse and shattering.

The sky looked like a setting sun; fire-colored clouds seemed to be burning the world to ashes. The earth was like a mummified corpse, covered in scar-like fissures. The city was nothing but broken walls and ruins.

On the wasteland, corpses littered the ground. Humans clad in pitch-black armor fought with swords against endless deformed monsters that surged forward like a tide.

Up in the heavens, a figure shrouded in dazzling light continued to swing a flaming sword, bringing down apocalyptic fire.

Dozens of miles away, a silver-white dragon over a hundred meters long coiled atop a snowy mountain peak, its wings spread to cover the sky. It roared upward, seeming ready for a showdown to the death with the figure in the sky.

It was a true vision of the apocalypse.

As though facing a god, Chen Zixuan’s soul shuddered uncontrollably.

In the blink of an eye, the crack closed on its own.

Outside the window, the night was once again quiet and dark.

“Shocked? Does it feel unbelievable?”

Aesther turned her head, her calm smile showing.

Her lips smiled, but her eyes did not.

Chen Zixuan did not reply; the massive fear gripped his heart in a vise.

“Of course, your current reaction is perfectly normal. The figure in the sky is Uriel, one of the four archangels. She is the angel who commands the flames of hell and is responsible for opening the Gates of Hell and releasing those ugly monsters at the end of the world.”

“Also, the curse on you is her handiwork as well.”

Even without a response, aesther continued to explain on her own.

“As for that dragon, she is a frost dragon who’s existed since ancient times. Her name is Tyche—Tyche Melusine.”

“By the way, the surname Melusine was one I gave her when we first met.”

As if lost in distant memories, aesther murmured, “At that time, I was about your age. Unconsciously, so much time has passed…”

“W-wait!”

Chen Zixuan finally spoke in panic.

“Uriel… wasn’t she the final boss in this game? Why is she destroying your world? What do you mean by cursed?”

His throat felt blocked; saying so much in one breath left his lips parched, and an uneasy flame burned in his heart.

Wilder and wilder, impossible to calm down.

After a brief silence, aesther spoke slowly: “Archangel Uriel possesses an artifact so powerful it’s hard to describe. All I know is that it’s a book with six words written on the title page: ‘Everything written comes true.'”

Her tone paused, then grew grave.

“Any text she writes in the book will eventually become reality. And on your body, I sensed the power of that book.”

“Once our world falls, your world will experience the simultaneous descent of all four archangels!”

“And you, too, will soon—”

…….

Boom!

A sudden clap of thunder sounded outside. For a moment, snaking lightning lit the entire city as bright as day.

Chen Zixuan snapped out of his recollection. Yet Aesther’s final words echoed clearly in his mind.

“Completely take over this body, become a female Vampire, and never be able to return to your old self.”

“In your world, as the only Vampire, this bloodline will grant you a fatal charm no ordinary person can resist.”

“But at the same time, because your world has no magic, your new body will be incomparably weak. What’s worse, because of humanity’s instinctive dread of high-level predators, they’ll feel a powerful urge to attack, possess, or violate you.”

“You’ll lose everything you now have—your identity, your family, your friends, your lover. Of course, that includes your entire life.”

“So, cherish what little time you have left.”

In the dim candlelight, her smile revealed a certain unspeakable pity.

Title:

Countdown of the Gender-Swap Clock

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