Late at night, in a bar restroom located in the ancient city of Houhai,

Shen Xun twisted open the faucet on the sink with his right hand and scooped up a handful of water, splashing it on his face. After some time had passed, he slowly lifted his head and looked at himself in the mirror. His face was young and attractive, albeit slightly pale, with a touch of malevolent air.

According to the usual cliché, this handsome, wicked face in Houhai should have a fatal attraction to women.

In fact, that was the case in Shen Xun's life. At the age of twenty-one, he had already opened his own bar in Houhai and bought a Mercedes-Benz E-Class with full payment. Although he could hardly be considered very successful, he was already synonymous with "young and wealthy" in the small girls' frequent Houhai visits.

Inside the bar, countless women wanted to climb into his bed and have a romantic evening with him.

This was an enviable life, of course, provided he wasn't about to die.

Three days ago, he passed out in the bar and was then urgently sent to the hospital. It was discovered that he had a congenital cardiovascular obstruction, with the severity of the obstruction reaching 93 percent!

The hospital immediately gave him a death certificate, stating that Shen Xun's life was at most only a few days left and advise him to rest well and fulfil his wishes before it was too late.

When Shen Xun returned home, intending to quietly face his death, he was vaguely bound to a chip from future technology that night!

After binding to the chip, he suddenly found himself with the ability to see the lifespan of others and, most crucially, he became able to manipulate time!

However, it seemed that heaven was fair. If he wanted to manipulate time, he had to purchase time from others first.

By purchasing time, Shen Xun had absolute control over it, he could use it to extend his own life or sell the time to those in need or even accelerate or decelerate time!

Out of the blue, Shen Xun spoke expressionlessly,

"How much time left do I have?"

The world in his eyes changed dramatically in the next moment.

The misty mirror suddenly twisted and distorted, and then a long line of blood-red small

characters appeared in front of him.

"Name: Shen Xun,"

"Age: 22,"

"Remaining lifespan: 23 hours, 17 minutes, and 56 seconds."

The mist dissipated, and those blood-red characters disappeared.

Shen Xun narrowed his eyes. Does that mean he has less than a day to live before his heart attack occurs?

"It's time to try."

Shen Xun twisted the faucet shut with his right hand and strode out of the restroom.

When he walked out of the restroom, a bar named "Reindeer" was quiet; the quiet blues music flowed like a stream, and there were scattered customers in the bar.

Almost all female customers.

When Shen Xun walked out of the restroom, almost at the same time, these female customers lifted their heads and looked at Shen Xun with slightly drunken and colorful eyes.

They wanted to talk to Shen Xun, but they were hesitant inside. Everyone knows that the young and handsome boss of this bar has high standards. Unless he's interested in a woman, many people who approach him are coldly rejected, adding to the joke.

Shen Xun also looked at them.

He was looking for the right person to purchase time.

First, there was a mature, tall female white-collar worker.

"Name: Li Jing."

"Age: 25."

"Remaining lifespan: 39 years, 65 days, 9 hours, 19 minutes, and 53 seconds."

Shen Xun's gaze twisted slightly, and then he looked at a seductive woman with heavy makeup in a black bustier long dress.

"Name: Zhang Cai."

"Age: 23."

"Remaining lifespan: 27 years, 198 days, 47 minutes, and 41 seconds."

Shen Xun narrowed his eyes, planning to find one of the targets, or clients, to purchase time

when

suddenly a girl wearing a blue and white school uniform, with a rather innocent appearance, hesitated for a long time, seemingly mustering up the courage, took out a letter with pink hearts all over it from her uniform, lowered her head, walked up to Shen Xun, and pushed her hands forward, summoning her courage and shouted,

"Shen Xun, I've liked you for a long time! Please date me!"

It’s clear that this girl is very nervous, trembling, and holding her love letter tightly.

Shen Xun looked at her coolly, his eyes flashing with a hint of amusement.

The girl was pretty, with fair skin and delicate features. She must be a school flower admired by thousands in school.

Of course, this is not the reason why Shen Xun is moved. He has seen too many beautiful women; this girl is just ‘okay.’

The main reason is that on top of this girl, Shen Xun saw a row of blood-red characters.

"Name: Ye Qingxue,"

"Age: 19,"

"Remaining lifespan: 74 years, 21 days, 17 hours, 5 minutes, and 34 seconds."

Young body, lots of time, and love for oneself...

Shen Xun knew that his first client had arrived!

The next moment,

Shen Xun reached out and gently lifted the girl's chin, looking down at her with a frivolous and playful expression.

"Raise your head and look at me."

Ye Qingxue's chin was lifted, and her delicate body trembled, as if she had been electrified. Then she timidly raised her head and looked at Shen Xun.

Her eyes were full of a young girl's yearning for love.

Shen Xun's mouth curved into a smile and suddenly leaned down. His cheek approached Ye Qingxue's ear and whispered slowly and calmly,

"Tell me, what do you think can attract me from head to toe?"

Ye Qingxue, feeling the low and wicked voice near her ear, trembled more violently,

quaveringly said, "Shen, Shen Xun, I can do anything for you! Give you everything!"

"Give me everything? Hmm, it's naive and adorable. "

Shen Xun's mouth curved upwards, then he loosened Ye Qingxue's well-defined chin, straightened his body, and maintained an appropriate distance.

He looked down at her with more interest.

"I... I mean it!" Ye Qingxue seemed to think Shen Xun didn't believe her, biting her lower lip, and stubbornly said.

However, to her surprise, Shen Xun nodded and said,

"I believe you."

"Ah? Then..."

Ye Qingxue's expression was bewildered as she looked at Shen Xun, feeling a little confused.

Shen Xun faintly smiled, not offering too much of an explanation. He said instead, "Come with me, I have something to tell you."

Without further words, Shen Xun turned around and headed towards the second floor of the bar.

The second floor of the bar was his dwelling, and also the most mysterious place of the Reindeer Bar. Since the birth of this bar, only two stunning women had followed Shen Xun to the second floor. Everyone said that whoever could enter the second floor of the bar with Shen Xun would become his new favorite.

Ye Qingxue had also heard of this rumor. As she looked at Shen Xun's slender back, her heart was filled with nervousness, and her palms began to sweat, while at the same time feeling some indescribable excitement.

Would she become the third woman to climb onto Shen Xun's bed?

Her mind was full of unrealistic thoughts, her cheeks blushing involuntarily, and she felt like her steps were unsteady. Just as Shen Xun was about to reach the spiral staircase to the second floor of the bar, a woman dressed in a gaudy and heavy make-up, named Zhang Cai, suddenly slammed the table and walked quickly over with her eyes fixed on Shen Xun.

"Shen Xun! I have both money and a good figure. My pursuers line up all the way to France. Do you think I am invisible? I spent a week with you, and you ignored me. Now you want to pick up a student?"

Afterwards, she looked at Ye Qingxue with a sneer on her face, "Little sister, have you finished your homework and come out to imitate people? Why don't you look at yourself in the mirror and see what you look like?"

Pausing a bit, her gaze shifted back to Shen Xun, as proud as a peacock opening its screen, confident to say, "Shen Xun, whether it's my figure or my appearance, look carefully, where am I not better than her?"

At Shen Xun's words, his steps halted, then he turned his head and glanced up and down at her, with a light and disdainful gaze as if he could see through her.

The next moment, his mouth slowly curved up.

"Areyou saying that your nose is better than hers, with cheap and low-grade hyaluronic acid? Or those two silicone gel-filled breasts that are nauseating? Or is it the counterfeit Gucci coat made in a small workshop you wear?"

"Hmm, so cheap and low-grade."

After a pause, Shen Xun's curled mouth bore a trace of contempt.

"Now, tell me where do you get that kind of self-confidence from?"

As his voice fell, Zhang Cai's beautiful eyes widened, her face mocking. She stepped back like she had seen a ghost, her mouth agape for a while without a word.

"Get out, you're bothering me."

Shaking his head, Shen Xun walked up the spiral staircase step by step. Halfway through, his footsteps halted again, and a voice, indifferent and somewhat playful, rang out, "Naive little sheep, why are you still standing there?"

At the mention of "little sheep," Ye Qingxue, who was previously devastated, shuddered. Was he talking about me?

Ye Qingxue shook, stuttering, "Com-coming."

Upon arriving on the second floor of the Reindeer Bar, there was only one bedroom. The bedroom was very clean and simple, with a black bed in the center, a glass water cup on the bedside, and a black clock hung on one side of the wall.

On the other side of the wall were several paintings inlaid with strange characters, including a little boy smoking a pipe with a flat expression, Solomon with black flowing blood, and a vertical pupil full of bloodshot veins like a black hole.

Unknowingly, Ye Qingxue felt a bit pressed when she entered this bedroom.

"Shen...Shen Xun, did you paint all these?"

Shen Xun nodded, and over the years, he had earned a lot of money, but a large portion of that money had gone into painting.

Then the atmosphere fell into silence, leaving only Ye Qingxue's increasingly rapid and nervous breathing. She forced herself to look up, feeling a little overwhelmed, yet also looking forward to seeing Shen Xun's reaction. In her eyes, Shen Xun's face did not show any signs of the expected movements.

Shen Xun tilted his head and said with a smirk, "Ye Qingxue, I have something to tell you. But before that, let me show you a magic show that exists in real life."

Snap.

Shen Xun took the glass from the bedside and threw it in the air, then snapped his fingers. In an instant, no one saw anything. In Shen Xun's eyes appeared an ancient clockwise clock that moved counterclockwise!

In that moment, the world seemed to have changed.

"Hmm? Seems... no different?"

Ye Qingxue was dazed for a moment, believing that Shen Xun was just kidding her. Suddenly, her pupils sharply contracted, and a look of terror spread across her face. No! She realized the circular clock the wall had stopped rotating abruptly when she fell into a deep obsession—something she noticed when walking into the bedroom!

This wasn't all; what shocked her the most was that the glass that Shen Xun dropped was falling, but it suddenly froze in mid-air, suspended in space as if frozen in time. As well as the blues music playing in the bar, even the distant sound of car horns, as well as many more, all froze in place!

It felt like time had come to a halt.

Suddenly, Ye Qingxue turned her head to look at Shen Xun who was calm and composed, trembling and looking at him with shock on her face.

How was this possible?!!!

The next moment.

A deep, hoarse voice rang slowly in her ear.

"I have walked from the night to the dawn..."

"I have walked from the wilderness to the prosperity..."

"I have seen through all the vicissitudes of the world..."

"In the long river of time, I have seen human suffering, seas turning to mulberry fields..."

"My only purpose is to buy time from the world and sell time to the world."

Puh!!

At the next moment, Ye Qingxue saw Shen Xun take a step forward and stand in front of her, with his hands open and pressed against her head. The corners of his mouth slowly curved upwards, and the eerie voice rang out above her head:

"So..."

"Are you willing to sell your time to me?"

Ye Qingxue trembled all over, even if she was stupid she knew that she was face to face with extraordinary power!

"I... I..."

She opened her mouth, her eyes with a hint of fear, but more than that, it was excitement!

Who didn't have extraordinary dreams when they were young?

And now, she witnessed the extraordinary with her own eyes!

"Shen... Shen Xun, may I ask how much time I have remaining?"

Taking a deep breath, Ye Qingxue tried to maintain a hint of reason and cautiously asked.

"Of course."

Shen Xun smiled slightly, like the king of hell, pronouncing the lifespan of humanity, and said:

"Ye Qingxue, 19 years old, remaining lifespan 74 years, 27 days, 16 hours, 33 minutes and 59 seconds."

Upon hearing this, Ye Qingxue was slightly taken aback. Did that mean she still had 73 years left to live? So, she could live until the age of 93? It seemed like...she was destined to live a long life. Rebounding slightly, Ye Qingxue looked at Shen Xun's face, which was as exquisite and angelic as that of a celestial being. Her eyes gradually filled with determination.

"Shen Xun, as I said before, I am willing to give you everything, and that naturally includes all my time! I...I only askthat you remember me after taking my time."

Shen Xun, with a smile hanging off his mouth that became increasingly sinister, thought to himself that she was such an innocent and cute little girl, to say such things. Shaking his head, Shen Xun casually said, "I don't need all your time, just three years. In addition, the price for buying your time will be double your annual income. That means, if you can create an annual income of 100,000, then the price of buying one year of your time will be 200,000. If your annual income is less than 100,000, the lowest price will be calculated at 200,000 per year."

Ye Qingxue felt a little dazed at his words. "Just three years? And I can get six hundred thousand Yuan? " For Ye Qingxue, it was almost an instant decision that she didn't need to think about. As she had said, she was willing to give everything for Shen Xun.

However, during that moment, she thought about many things. To be honest, the reason why she confessed to Shen Xun in the bar, apart from her admiration for him, was that she had some of her own little ideas. She had a younger brother who was only one year younger than her, but he was particularly useless. At the age of fourteen, hedropped out of school and has since been drifting around. Last year, he brought a woman back and said he wanted to get married, but the bride price required was Two hundred thousand. For Ye Qingxue's poor family, they could not afford this money. So the most popular method for the poor, and also the most practical, appeared in their hearts: sell their daughter! Of course, this "selling daughter" is not literally selling their daughter, but rather marrying Ye Qingxue off, and using the dowry money given by the groom to help her brother get married. Even in the past few days, her family had already started looking for a marriage partner for her, who was still a freshman in college.

"For Shen Xun, what is three years of time? And I can even get six hundred thousand Yuan, which is enough for my brother to get married, and even to renovate our house!" Ye Qingxue said firmly, raising her head.

Shen Xun had been watching Ye Qingxue all along. The figure of three years was not just a random figure he came up with. He had carefully calculated and measured it, as it could not only ensure that he would be able to buy himself some time before his impending death but also prepare a foundation for him to sell time after that, allowing for some leeway. And six hundred thousand yuan was all the money he could get out of his pocket at the moment. So that was why he chose Ye Qingxue as his first customer: she was young, had a lot of time on her hands and loved him. He could buy the richest time at the lowest price.

And now, everything seemed to develop according to his plan.

"Okay, then let's sign the contract," Shen Xun said, with a smile that was hard to decipher, as he produced a thick blue book with an ancient clock on the cover.

Opening the first page with small bloody text on it, it read:

Name:Ye Qingxue

Age: 19

Remaining lifespan: 74 years, 27 days, 16 hours, 20 minutes, and 31 seconds.

Time for sale: Three years.

"Put your handprint here," Shen Xun said, pushing the blue book forward.

Ye Qingxue did not hesitate and pressed her crimson handprint on her name. Instantly, a contract was established, and an invisible force connected Shen Xun and Ye Qingxue.

The blue book disappeared, and Ye Qingxue suddenly turned pale, her body trembling slightly, feeling a little overwhelmed.

But she didn't feel any different physically after selling her time. However, there seemed to be a certain kind of extraordinary power that told her that she must not tell anyone about the time transaction without Shen Xun's consent; otherwise, she would face absolute obliteration from above.

In the room where time flowed slowly, Shen Xun watched Ye Qingxue leave with a smile. The number of three years had been accurately calculated and was in no way a random number. For example, it could preserve his impending death, and at the same time, he could pave the way for selling time in the future, leaving some room for adjustment. And six hundred thousand was all the money he could get at present.

"You have received six hundred thousand yuan, which has been automatically transferred to your bank card. You can check it later. Then...pleasant cooperation," Shen Xun extended his hand and said with an enigmatic smile.

Ye Qingxue left the room feeling dazed, and her footsteps were uneven, feeling a little complicated.

Selling three years of her life, she didn't feel any different after selling her time.

However, there seemed to be a supernatural force telling her that she couldn't tell anyone about the lifespan trade without the consent of Shen Xun, otherwise she would face absolute annihilation from the supernatural world!

...

In the room, time flowed a hundred times slower and had now returned to normal.

Shen Xun watched as Ye Qingxue left in a daze, shaking his head and pouring himself half a glass of red wine.

Moonlight spilled onto the wine through the window, creating a bewitching blood-red color.

"Name: Shen Xun"

"Age: 22"

"Remaining lifespan: 3 years, 22 hours, 11 minutes, 48 seconds."

Shen Xun looked at his personal panel, a faint smile on his face. After a moment, the smile gradually widened, and he closed his lips, his whole body trembling with silent laughter.

At this moment, Shen Xun was so eerie and sinister!

From 23 hours to three years of lifespan, he felt like he was reborn at this moment! Downstairs at the bar, the soothing blues music had turned into Vladimir Horowitz's rendition of "Kinderszenen (Scenes from Childhood)," which Shen Xun preferred to Robert Schumann's original version because it was more profound and thought-provoking.

After a moment, Shen Xun picked up his glass and took a sip, the taste bitter at first but then a sweet sensation rose up in his throat.

Knock, knock, knock. After putting down his glass, Shen Xun looked out the window, tapping his fingers rhythmically on the windowsill. In the world outside the window, cars and pedestrians came and went, and everyone was in a hurry.

Not far away, the brightly lit hospital building saw people being born, dying, and struggling to survive.