Doomsday Wonderland

The symphony of dark and light spiraled together, moving faster and faster until a clear scene appeared before Lin Sanjiu’s eyes. It was the same dank and old lane.

Lin Sanjiu could see the shopping basket she clumsily threw on the floor. Puppeteer was holding her in his hand.

His pallid face magnified several folds before her eyes. Puppeteer looked at the packet of chips in his hand. His brows were creased in a perplexed frown, and he had a dark, gloomy expression like dense clouds that blotted the sun in the winter. He seemed to be locked in his thoughts.

‘He’s finally here!’

Before Lin Sanjiu could get over the initial shock of almost getting eaten, she was overwhelmed by the mixed feelings of ecstasy and fear. If she still had a heartbeat, it must be jumping as fast as a galloping horse. But unfortunately, she only had a bag of air-dried internal organs.

‘How did Puppeteer know this bag of chips is me? He would not happen to grab me by luck, would he? Though I do look the freshest amongst the other chips on the shelves. Could he distinguished me from the others in a mere glance based on this?’ There were a ton of questions in her mind that Lin Sanjiu wanted to ask, but she could not emit even a syllable now. All she could do now was study Puppeteer’s face, which had grown much bigger due to their close distance, and pray hard that she could find some clues from it.

No matter how intense her emotions were, she was now a bag of chips that could not speak. Aside from the susurration as Puppeteer pinched her, the lane was utterly silent.

Standing firmly, Puppeteer looked at her with a frowning stare in silence. It seemed to Lin Sanjiu that he did not know the identity of the packet of chips in his hand. Suddenly, something clicked in Lin Sanjiu’s mind as she thought of an idea to notify Puppeteer that the package of chips in his hand was her. She split a small portion of her Higher Consciousness and moved to pat his arm. However, before the Higher Consciousness could touch him, Puppeteer snapped, “Don’t touch me with that!”

‘Huh?’

“I know who you are. Otherwise, of all the chips, why would I pick you up?” Puppeteer sneered as if he knew the question in her mind. “I wonder if your brain is really that bad, or if you are a simpleton. Have you forgotten that I’ve planted a tracking device on you?”

‘Oh yeah! The tracking device!’ Lin Sanjiu was filled with jubilation as she immediately pulled her Higher Consciousness back. As she was thinking about how to communicate with Puppeteer, he suddenly raised his head and growled menacingly, “Who’s there?”

Then, he took a step forward and threw something at her back.

Startled by his sudden display of hostility, Lin Sanjiu turned around, and it was at this moment that something with splendid clarity appeared in her mind.

However, even if she could talk, it was already too late, not to mention she was now stripped of the ability to speak.

The moment Puppeteer took her off the shelf, he left a gap on the shelf. A face flitted from the depths of the rack, and it seemed unaffected by Puppeteer’s attack. Furrowing his brows, just when Puppeteer going to attack again, a floppy arm popped out from the hole and grabbed his wrist.

Not only Lin Sanjiu, perhaps even Puppeteer did not expect that. With his fighting power, he did not even have a chance to fight back.

Both of their eyes blurred, then dulled as they were dragged onto the shelf. The difference was that this time, there was a roar around her. Puppeteer’s cry sounded like the echo in a long tunnel, everlasting and loud, and it filled Lin Sanjiu’s ears to the brim until it was snuffed out all of a sudden.

She had returned to the shelf, facing the lane and the yellowish two-dimensional figure.

It was only at this moment she realized why she thought the flat figure looked so familiar to her. This was because his uncanny face was the face she saw in the depths of the shelf. However, it seemed that he was not the one who turned her into a packet of chips.

The flat yellow figure emitted a long chain of freakish noises. There was now a tinge of green on his half-reddened face. Judging from the new bag of chips under his feet, he must have opened up a packet of wasabi-flavored chips when Puppeteer picked her up from the shelf.

“I must not eat anymore. They are all for sale,” he said to himself and turned to leave as if he did not realize the commotion that occurred on the shelf. His crunchy feet stepped on the wasabi-flavored chips, and a bit of yellowish fat squeezed out from the opening.

The lane quieted down.

Without looking aside, Lin Sanjiu knew the spot of the Mexican chili-flavored chips was replaced by Puppeteer.

Well, truth to be told, she felt a little glad that both of them had turned into a bag of chips. Even at this point, when the surroundings were quiet, Lin Sanjiu could feel Puppeteer’s intense glare as if he was attempting to set her ablaze with his eyes. Also, she seemed to be able to hear his curses that were laced with venom and anger.

‘Hold on a sec. This is not an illusion.’

“Why did I not kill you when I had the chance? Why did I let you live until now?” Puppeteer said word by word through gritted teeth. It was as if he wished nothing more than to skewer Lin Sanjiu with those syllables. “A person as doltish as you would be better off dead.”

Lin Sanjiu felt a little insulted. ‘How could he blame me for this? The Veda deleted the session with the explanation of the rules, so I’m as clueless as him!’

Since Puppeteer could talk, Lin Sanjiu opened her mouth as well. It was just that she could not find her mouth, much to her chagrin. Since she could not fight back, she could do nothing but listen to Puppeteer’s long tirade of cursing. After five minutes had passed, he finally stopped with a snort. “Fortunately, the item I planted on you could transmit both images and sounds, but I’m the one who’s controlling it. You won’t be able to speak any nonsense until I permit you to do so.”

Lin Sanjiu had beared with the scolding for five minutes, and there were several things she would like to say. However, when Puppeteer gave her the green light to talk, she contained her anger and tried to be as calm as possible. “It’s the Veda who deleted the explanation of the rules. Can you truly solve the problem by slinging mud at me? It’s better to put that time to good use and think about what we should do right now.”

“Okay, give me a heads-up when something comes to your mind. I’ll do the opposite of whatever you suggest.”

“Are you not through with that yet?” Lin Sanjiu began to feel a headache despite the fact that she did not have a head now. She seized the chance while she could talk and told Puppeteer everything she had experienced just now. It was also to divert his attention. “That’s it. Any ideas come to mind?”

Puppeteer became quiet, seemingly immersed in his own thoughts.

“This Pocket Dimension has two different forms on each side of the shelf,” he said after a short while, “Even if we go to the other side, we won’t be able to turn back since you did not turn back just now.”

“It must be because I did not fulfill the criteria,” Lin Sanjiu explained, “When these chips stopped me from leaving, they said I have to find the correct bag of chips. Hold on a sec.”

“What’s wrong?”

It was not an easy task to calm Puppeteer’s rage. Lin Sanjiu sighed in her heart as she chided herself for realizing this too late. However, she had no other choice left and said prosaically, “What if the Veda has changed the instruction as well? Perhaps what we need is not a particular bag of chips, but a kind of snack on this shelf.”

There was a moment of silence in the air. Puppeteer’s anger mounted so fast that Lin Sanjiu could see fire streaming from his back.