Doomsday Wonderland

Even J7, an automaton that had no human emotion, felt sorry for what Bohemia had experienced. Finally, after what seemed to be an eternity, Bohemia was dead; her figure vanished before their eyes. Lin Sanjiu had regained much of her Higher Consciousness form, and J7’s body had also evolved from the size of a seed to the size of a hamster. They helped each other walk over to the gate. After they opened the gate, they poked their heads inside, and they heaved a sigh of relief at the sight they saw. It appeared to them that the game had been cleared after they had defeated the warden.

Once they were out in the square, the broadcast which they had been anticipating finally rang out, “… Congratulations to the players for clearing the game “Three-Legged Prison Break.” All dead characters, as well as the chunks of Higher Consciousness form of the opposite players, will be distributed evenly to the winning team in the form of Higher Consciousness.”

After that, each of them had received their share of Higher Consciousness. If Potential Growth Value was the hen, then the Higher Consciousness was the egg. Under the circumstance where there was a short supply of hens, or the production time took too long, many people were willing to go through the game to earn some eggs.

Of course, in essence, only the online gaming platform would never suffer loss while the rest of the players were playing the zero-sum game. Like the “prisoners,” they were, in fact, the Higher Consciousness of players who had been defeated in single-player games in the past.

“We should’ve realized that earlier,” J7 said to Lin Sanjiu as its body was becoming larger and larger, “If we knew beforehand that all the dead characters could also replenish our Higher Consciousness, we should have killed more of them to make the most out of the run.”

“We were too weak to kill them all.” A satisfied grin appeared on Lin Sanjiu’s face when she saw her Higher Consciousness form had become complete again. This time, they not only received Higher Consciousness from the dead prisoner; they even got a share of Higher Consciousness from Bula and Bohemia, “Anyway, we can always join another game next time.”

The Higher Consciousness form imitated the body size of the user accurately. Once the Higher Consciousness had finished shaping the body, the remaining bits would be then refined into the “body,” improving the rigidity of the Higher Consciousness form. Clenching her fist, Lin Sanjiu basked in the delightedness of becoming even stronger.

Once they received their rewards, Lin Sanjiu and J7 was teleported out from the online gaming platform, where the sight of a million stars once again welcomed them. Up until now, only then Lin Sanjiu saw the light of why Bohemia would have followed after her into the game. To cope with the high volume of players, the gaming platform had set up more than a dozen channels around, with one white ribbon in the center of the two channels serving as the divider. Each channel led the player to a different direction in the starry sky, and it was indeed a tiresome and an impossible feat for a person to go back and forth alone between the channels looking for his or her target.

Since they entered the same game, they both came out from the same channel. Congealing into a ball of light, not long after Lin Sanjiu and J7 flew over the starry void, they were greeted by a bright auburn-colored star.

“You guys finally came out!”

Bohemia felt that she had been waiting a lifetime for this day. Fraught with anxiety, she had been accompanied by a distinct constant fear of the occurrence of an unfortunate event that might ruin their plan while waiting for Lin Sanjiu. If that happened, all the torture she had endured earlier on would be in vain, but the goddess of luck smiled at her at last. Her eyes gleamed, and her heart jumped in jubilation the moment she saw Lin Sanjiu. It was as if she had seen the savior of her life. She yelled at J7 eagerly, “Get out of my way!” before darting at Lin Sanjiu.

Just when Lin Sanjiu was going to say something, a highway suddenly appeared underneath the auburn star and connected both of them in a blink of an eye.

Bohemia heaved a relieved sigh after she saw the highway connected. With the highway, even if Lin Sanjiu ran away, Bohemia would be able to trace her down with a simple flick of thought, given that she wasn’t too far away.

Then, she said, “Come, follow me. It’s better off not to fight in the gaming platform. Let’s go away further a little bit to settle our score.”

“She has some interesting corresponding conditions…”  As the thought flitted into Lin Sanjiu’s mind, she walked up to Bohemia, only to be stopped by a call from J7.

“Where are you guys going? Mind giving me coordinates?”

“Why?” Leaving the bobbing star—Bohemia—hanging, Lin Sanjiu turned to J7 and asked unhurriedly, “You want to oversee our fight?”

“Affirmative. It’s a rare occasion for me to come across a fight between stars, so I want to have a look. But I have to go out and check on my body first since this is the first time in half a year I can step out from the Astral Plane. I need your coordinates so that I can go to looking for you when I come back.”

“But I don’t know—”

Before Lin Sanjiu could finish speaking, Bohemia suddenly charged in, standing in the center of the two people, “Why all the fuss? All you need to do is just swap a touch of your Higher Consciousness with each other! Let me show if you don’t know how to do it! Ugh! Why on earth do I have to stick with you, this ungrateful and demanding person?!”

“You don’t say,” Lin Sanjiu praised her again, “Although you are a bit annoying, it’s pretty convenient to have you at my side.”

Bohemia rolled her eyes as she did not want to talk to her anymore.

After she had finally gotten rid of J7, the auburn star turned and flew in front, followed by Lin Sanjiu, who studied the highway with great interest as she flew by.

As stars, both of them traveled at very high speeds. They soon flew away from the online gaming platform, leaving the swirls of stars behind. The light ebbed away, and the area grew darker. Lin Sanjiu soon found themselves entirely shrouded in an endless black emptiness. Just when Lin Sanjiu was going to ask where they were heading, the auburn star, which had been flying in front all the time, suddenly disappeared into the ether.

Stunned, Lin Sanjiu came to a halt. The highway was still there, stretching far into the endless darkness in the distance. Her surroundings plunged into complete obscurity after Bohemia was gone. There weren’t any stars around.

“Has it already started?”

Lin Sanjiu raised her guard and studied her surroundings meticulously while staying in her stellar form. Bohemia’s corresponding condition was strange. Lin Sanjiu had seen a house, a door, and a highway so far. She couldn’t figure out what was going to appear next.

Suddenly, something clicked in her mind as she transfigured from her stellar back to her human form. As a star, they could travel in breakneck speed, but it was more convenient to use her human form when it came to a straight battle.

After the highway had made a connection with her, the highway followed her wherever she went. After she tried to turn to the side twice, she was certain that the highway could do her no harm asides from acting as a tracking device for Bohemia to track her down. Hence, she did not move anymore and stood completely still.

However, even when she had stopped moving, it didn’t stop the highway from growing narrower. The asphalt gradually softened until it became a carpeted walkway. When she raised her head, she found that her surroundings had changed as well. Right now, she was standing inside a dimly lit, empty spacious room with a grey screen at one end. There were rows of shadows in front of the screen. Though Lin Sanjiu’s could not see very clearly in such an ill-lit atmosphere, she was able to make out from the outline that they were seats.

“Looks like I’m in a screening room… It seems that Bohemia’s corresponding condition is related to human buildings…”  Lin Sanjiu stood there and thought to herself.

Bohemia wouldn’t make any advances if Lin Sanjiu chose not to move. The screening room was dark and silent. She walked around, looking for an exit, but she stopped her attempt right after she realized that she was going around in circles.

Everything was odd, but Lin Sanjiu had no choice but to finish this fight. She believed that Bohemia wouldn’t be able to snatch her Potential Growth Value by just enacting and trapped her in a building. If she could do that, she might have already become the most powerful person in the Astral Plane. Hence, Bohemia must have something up her sleeves, and Lin Sanjiu was going to find out what that was soon.

Suddenly, there was a pale light beam coming from nowhere, and the screen in front lit up, causing her train of thought came to a halt. Then, the next thing she heard was the rattling sound of an old machine, presumably a projector, she thought, as a black and white motion picture began to appear. As Lin Sanjiu came back to her senses, she turned around to see that the seats around her, which were empty a few moments ago, were all occupied.

One after other bloodless faces hovered in the dark. Nobody was paying attention to her as they were all too absorbed in the screen in front. However, whenever she moved or made a noise, somebody would shush her.

Turning her gaze back to the screen, Lin Sanjiu saw a group of samurai talking while walking. Each of them held a katana in their hands. The image quality was sloppy, and it seemed like an old movie.

“Hey, you! Are you going to watch or not? Get out of my sight if you don’t want to watch!” A man behind her yelled impatiently.

Startled, Lin Sanjiu turned around, but the man seemed to not care about her reaction at all. He tilted his head and stared blankly at the screen in front. Under the steely gaze of the crowd, a sense of uneasiness slithered up Lin Sanjiu’s back. Just when she raised her feet to walk to the back of the screening room, she heard the sound of the wind coming from her back.

“Dodge!” Mrs. Manas only managed to say a word. Usually, it was an easy feat for Lin Sanjiu to avoid a forward strike like this; however, just as she tried to dive to the side for cover, her legs gave way, and she lost all her strength.

As before, she had regressed to her normal human form.

Lin Sanjiu knew things were going to be like this, so she wasn’t too surprised. She hastily threw herself onto the ground. When she fell heavily on the concrete, she felt a wisp of cold air grazed past her head.

She raised her eyes to see that a samurai was glaring at her. He was holding a katana in his hand, and his face was grim and full of murderous intent. Behind him, several samurais were crawling out from the screen. Some of them were hanging out of the frame while the others were getting up from the ground. The theatergoers seemed unsurprised; they just turned their head and watched at them quietly.

The first samurai took a step forward; his katana held high above his head.

The last time, Lin Sanjiu had a hard time dealing with an unarmed mafia. Although she bested him in the end, it was a Pyrrhic victory. This time, she was facing a gang of katana-wielding samurai.

Despite her great effort slaloming between the seats to evade the hail of assaults, Lin Sanjiu was still hit in her back. The good thing was that her Higher Consciousness form had become sturdier, so although her movements were slow and sluggish, she sustained nothing more than a slight injury on her back.

However, things were going to be bad if she did not make any changes. With that thought in mind, Lin Sanjiu threw herself forward and rolled on the ground, causing the katana to scrape past her hair and slam deep into the concrete. The samurais had trapped her in a circle, and there was nowhere for her to run. When it all seemed to have come to an end, something in her mind suddenly clicked, and her eyes lit up. She grabbed hold of a chair, yelling at the woman sitting on it, “Get up!” before hurling it towards the incoming mobs.

The woman was so shocked that she stayed still after she stood up from the seat. After Lin Sanjiu had warded off a few samurais, she retreated to the other side of the screening room. She began to see through Bohemia’s tactic.

Ever since their first meeting, Bohemia had never engaged Lin Sanjiu in a close-quarter fight. Whenever they were fighting, it was either happened within her ability or inside her corresponding condition. In fact, there was almost no direct contact between them. The only time they engaged physically was in the jungle that night. During that time, even though it was short, Lin Sanjiu could see that Bohemia was not a great fighter.

It now appeared to Lin Sanjiu that Bohemia was taking over the advantages of the samurai to wear her down. So that when she was injured, Bohemia could then appear to steal her Potential Growth Value.

As Lin Sanjiu ironed out the situation, she quickly put a large distance between her and the group of samurai. It was a difficult feat, for many audience members were blocking her way inside the screening room. When she almost tripped on a chair, she froze as an idea rammed into her mind.

” Bohemia just put these audience members here to obstruct my movement? ”