IWOL Chapter 202: Trap

That night, their sleep was extremely peaceful. Even though it was still morning time in reality, the castle wasn’t connected to the outside world, so as long as the lights were turned off, it was no different from late night.

Cui Zuojing wasn’t as tired as Dong Zheng and so he woke up early. The bedroom was dark, and since he didn’t have Dong Zheng’s ability to increase his night vision, he couldn’t see Dong Zheng sleeping. He could only climb up as lightly as possible, move around Dong Zheng, and turned on the lamp on his side.

Unexpectedly, Dong Zheng woke up as soon as the lights came on.

“Did I wake you up?” Seeing that the other person had opened his eyes, Cui Zuojing was no longer so careful and stretched out. His hungry stomach was very uncomfortable, and he was eager to go downstairs to eat.

“No, I’ve had enough sleep.” Dong Zheng admired Cui Zuojing’s smooth muscle lines when he stretched his waist and sat up. This warm way of getting up gave him a sense of unreality.

Cui Zuojing leaned forward to kiss him, and remembering that he hadn’t brushed his teeth yet, his lips finally fell unwillingly on Dong Zheng’s cheek instead.

Dong Zheng also gave Cui Zuojing a kiss in the same place, then he lifted the comforter and went into the bathroom.

By the time they came out of the bedroom and entered the living room, it was already evening. Lillian had just made dinner and served it on the table. Cui Zuojing looked for Victor and couldn’t find him. Finally, he saw Victor’s white cat body sleeping in the corrugated bed.

“Has Uncle changed back?”

“Victor can only recover for about four hours at a time, otherwise he would consume too much physical strength. After he changed back, he’d been sleeping.”

As Fu Zhe was talking, he couldn’t help but subconsciously observe Cui Zuojing’s walking posture. After confirming that it was the same as usual, he secretly breathed a sigh of relief. Then, he suddenly thought of something and looked at Dong Zheng with a subtle expression.

Fortunately, they both looked normal.

Dong Linhai rang Wang Que’s mobile phone, and soon she came down too. She’d woken up in good spirits and looked bright.

Except for Xia Qiongyun, who hadn’t formally joined the team, the Wonton Insurgency finally gathered together again. They ate and drank and talked about the circus.

The Unlucky God still favored Lin Hangzhi. He had a little sheep and was robbed several times. As a result, he didn’t have enough secret letters to upgrade his cards during the card battle, and so he was directly eliminated.

As for Dong Linhai, he entered the Town Box. Unfortunately, two people from the same team also entered the box. These two people were very strong in their own rights, and it was worse once they worked together. Dong Linhai was performing very well, but unfortunately, they ganged up on him at the last minute. Otherwise, he would have gotten one of the top three spots in the card battle.

It lost him an admission ticket.

Dong Linhai didn’t think too much about it. He was no longer that same kid. Although he would shout that two beating one was unfair, he didn’t take it to heart. If he had Cui Zuojing’s strength, let alone two people, even if it was a group of people, how could he lose?

It only meant that he still needed to build his strength as soon as possible.

“Kether, J, and Chang Hui were there. Kether changed the setting of the box arena to kill me but failed. Chang Hui cooperated with J to take away the Space Box Dong Zheng entered.” Cui Zuojing didn’t talk about Murphy, because he didn’t know exactly what this meme wanted to do. If he rushed to tell everyone that they were infected, it would only increase panic for no good reason.

“Dong Zheng still needs to go to Chaos Library. The clown said that this is the only way to release the blood contract.” Cui Zuojing looked at Fu Zhe. “I remember that there are certain conditions for entering?”

Fu Zhe had been invited to enter the library once, and so he was the one who knew most about it.

“The library didn’t have a specific requirement for entering. The administrator will screen suitable visitors across the Pure White Realm. Once a certain requirement is met, the entrance will open near that person. This kind of screening is entirely dependent on the brain developer. As long as Dong Zheng meets the requirements, he would easily get the opportunity to enter.”

Dong Zheng said, “What are the requirements?”

Fu Zhe answered, “I don’t know. At that time, when I saw the entrance, I was confused. But I’m certain that the more skilled the brain developer, the easier it would be for the library to extend an invitation. The library will let many pilgrims with high IQ and strong mental ability compete in order to select the strongest one.”

Cui Zuojing said, “You weren’t selected back then.”

Fu Zhe nodded. “The final winner in my group was an eight year old kid. His ability was very special. He could store memories without limit, never forgetting.”

Lin Hangzhi exclaimed, “Hyperthymesia?”

In real life, Hyperthymesia, a highly superior autobiographical memory, was an extremely rare condition. Patients will remember in great detail everything they’d ever experienced and would never forget them, which brought great convenience. However, there were also unimaginable side effects. For example, it made it difficult for them to distinguish between memory and reality. In order to live in the present moment, new information must be continuously acquired, and these memories will be superimposed day by day, thus increasing the burden on the brain.

“Yes, in the final duel, I failed to defeat him. The administrator took him away, and he should have received some special reward.”

“What about the other pilgrims who didn’t win?”

“They will receive corresponding rewards, such as being allowed to read the books in the library at will for a week,” Fu Zhe said. “This was the reward I got at the time, which allowed me to learn about some secrets that would be impossible for other pilgrims to know.

Dong Linhai asked curiously, “Are there secrets in the Pure White Realm?”

“Yes. I found an unfinished chronicle in the library. At first, I couldn’t understand the language, but after a few pages, the strange characters were automatically converted into characters I could understand. It was a record of the current Queen’s history. The rest of the book was blank.”

Fu Zhe paused and continued, “From this book, I learned that the current queen was also a pilgrim once. She and her team made a successful pilgrimage to the former queen’s palace and killed her, and that was how things become the way they are now.”

No one spoke, listening quietly to this undisclosed secret. As early as before, everyone knew that the queen could be killed, and their goal was to kill her.

Wang Que whispered, “If we really succeeded in killing her, will there be a new queen?”

“There will definitely be a new ruler governing the world, but I am inclined to think that the new ‘queen’ will be selected by the will of the world, and it should not have much to do with us at that time.”

Dong Linhai said, “Yes, at that time, we must all go home.”

“It was also from the library that I found out about the existence of the five major elements. The library probably contains all the knowledge in the world, and the Pure White Realm isn’t fully representative of this ‘world.’”

“Here is just a single plane, right?” Lin Hangzhi said. “Just like those fantasy novels, there must be many different planes of the world. Maybe every box is a small plane.”

“It can be understood that way.” Fu Zhe looked at Dong Zheng. “If you are determined to enter the library, you must improve your abilities as much as possible from now on. In terms of logical reasoning, conscious systematic training is required.”

Dong Zheng nodded, “I understand.”

Cui Zuojing said, “Dong Zheng has always been good in logical reasoning.”

Seeing him want to speak for Dong Zheng, Fu Zhe laughed, “My logical reasoning skills were also very good back then, but didn’t I also fail to get to the end?”

Cui Zuojing closed his mouth, hummed, and stopped talking.

After the meeting ended, everyone left to do their own things. Wang Que and Lin Hangzhi left together to write reports to hand over to Heimdall. Since the circus was a special existence and wasn’t a box, any information they could provide would be very valuable.

They concealed some secrets, focusing on their respective experiences when participating in the elimination rounds in different venues, the freak show in the mansion, and the rewards of the pilgrims who finally received tickets.

Dong Zheng opened the app to check the team’s remaining points. The circus didn’t give them points, so there weren’t many left. The next Blood Night was coming soon and so they would have to go into another box in a few days.

Cui Zuojing had gone to the study to have a small meeting with Fu Zhe. Dong Zheng couldn’t help but think of the young man’s eager eyes full of desire in the corner of the circus. He vividly remembered the scene, reliving it over and over again; it seemed to be a moment that he would never forget.

There was a little gentleness between his eyebrows, and though neither he nor Cui Zuojing had publicly announced their relationship, they also had no intention of hiding it.

Heinrich sent a message, and Dong Zheng was chatting with him when he suddenly felt an unusual fluctuation in his kernel world.

His typing hand paused briefly before continuing to send the message to Heinrich. But Dong Zheng’s consciousness had already entered the kernel. The girl in the wheelchair sat quietly against the backdrop of the information superhighway that extended in all directions, her figure looking extremely small compared to it.

“Congratulations,” Dong Zheng said, stopping not far from her. “Your purpose has been achieved.”

Dong Zheng carried Murphy and infected her to other pilgrims, and those people had passed on to other areas in the Pure White Realm after leaving the circus. As long as the others have a slight visual contact with these pilgrims, she would continue to spread.

Dong Zheng was certain that within this time, Murphy must have had already infected the entire Top of the Giant Tree, and even now, the endless train was carrying some of these people to other areas of the Pure White Realm.

She had really left the box that had contained her for a long time.

Murphy hummed softly. She looked at Dong Zheng and said, “It’s time for me to leave here.”

“Leave?” Dong Zheng smiled. “Even if your consciousness left the kernel, you will still exist in my memory. How can you really leave?”

“That only made you infected,” Murphy said. “You can rest assured that I will always follow our agreement and will not hurt you. To be honest, I don’t have any other intentions. I just don’t want to stay there anymore.”

“Why did the Red Queen chase you back then?”

“She couldn’t bear to have a powerful entity that she couldn’t control, particularly one who could threaten her country without restraint. Wasn’t this a common problem among rulers?”

Maybe she was telling the truth, but Dong Zheng had a hard time believing it, and Murphy didn’t seem to expect him to believe it either. Whatever Dong Zheng thought had nothing to do with her.

She’d finally gained the freedom that she’d been looking forward to during those countless days and nights.

“The current queen will definitely hunt you down.”

Murphy nodded. “Yes, but this time, no one will ever catch me again.”

She got up from the wheelchair and spoke to Dong Zheng who was ten steps away. Nodding her head, she said, “If there is nothing else, I will leave.”

She moved past Dong Zheng and said, “Take care. I look forward to the day when you rewrite the rules of this world.”

Her body suddenly became transparent. At this moment, the thin virtual highway under her feet suddenly changed, splitting into long thin strips. The data-formed belt churned and stretched, and in an instant it pieced together a cube, which firmly trapped Murphy inside.

Dong Zheng calmly looked at Murphy, who seemed slightly surprised, and he said in a deep voice, “Although I know it may not be of much use, I have to try my best to stop you.”

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