"Gege! It's not just Molly in the egg!"
Youxi looked in horror at the corner of the pillar; Irene and Eric, who had been captured earlier, had now multiplied into dozens.
They were densely packed, like a group of cancerous cells with the ability to replicate and divide.
"What does it mean, it's not fictional?" Li Andy looked at Molly.
Molly frowned and pondered for a moment before explaining:
"It's like Andy Gege... it's a reality I cannot change."
"A reality... like us?"
Li Andy froze.
These pillars, like him, were also external things??
"Buzz—"
At this moment, all the light eggs had become completely transparent, and a mind-disturbing shockwave instantly swept over everyone.
"Hiss—"
Li Andy's brain was splitting with pain, and he heard countless versions of himself arguing loudly inside.
'It can split? Is there such a good thing? As you sow, so shall you reap?'
'Then can't I play ball with four or five Sophias at once?'
'No, she's so silly, what if they share one brain?'
'That's right! What's the point of having the same person? I like having different styles at the same time.'
'Shut up! Shut up, you lower brains!!'
Noisy!
Very noisy!!
Li Andy clutched at his hair with both hands, his eyes bloodshot, his brain forced into overdrive.
'A reality like me?'
'I influence the Heart Source and change the world through words and actions...'
'And these pillars control the Heart Source's ability through mental interference and light eggs....'
'The essence of our actions... is the same!'
'Outsiders... we are all outsiders!'
Li Andy suddenly understood, but the chaotic speed of his thoughts mismatched his physical functions, leaving him unable to speak.
Youxi, who had extremely high mental resistance, also began to show signs of unfocused eyes, her expression alternating between anger and sorrow, crying and laughing.
Even Sophia, who had abandoned her active thinking ability, had the fur on her beast ears and tail standing on end, and her protective wall seemed on the verge of breaking.
This mental interference was far stronger than ever before!
Just as Li Andy was about to stimulate his mind through self-harm, Molly suddenly snapped out of her daze, turned around, and embraced the three of them.
The next second, the world became quiet, and the whispers instantly vanished!
"Hoo—!"
Li Andy and his sister gasped for air like drowning people who had just been rescued, looking at Molly in astonishment.
"What... did you do?"
Molly slowly raised her head in their arms and calmly explained:
"I modified the properties of the medium that transmits the whispers, turning this place into a silent 'vacuum zone'."
Li Andy was stunned.
She could do that?
That amazing?
Molly's operation was like modifying the fundamental constant of gravity in the real world.
Modifying a constant sounds simple, but if you asked Sophia to do it, she probably wouldn't even know what a 'constant' was.
Li Andy felt that Molly at this moment wasn't just cheating; she was a professional developer, modifying the game's underlying code!
Thinking of this, he smiled with relief.
Although the pillar monster could interfere with the mind, the one with "creation power" was ultimately the Heart Source!
"Andy Gege, what do we do next? Destroy it?" Molly asked.
Although the pillars were "real things" that could not be modified, destroying them with other things was still possible.
"Buzz buzz—"
Perhaps sensing the failure of its mental interference, the pillars began to vibrate, and a light blue fluorescent liquid was injected into countless light eggs.
The brows of the people sleeping inside gradually furrowed in unease, as if they had fallen into a nightmare.
The mindscape was controlled by the Heart Source, and a large number of terrifying things, condensed beneath the shadows, were about to be born!
"Destroy it quickly!"
Seeing this, Molly also couldn't linger in the embrace of her Gege and Jiejie, and with a touch of anger, she turned to face the pillars.
At this moment, the pillars had detached from the seabed, fully revealing their true form—a gigantic and bizarre worm.
Molly concentrated, turning the seawater around the pillars into lava, intending to melt them.
Perhaps it was the advantage brought by her mental illness, but her modification of the mindscape was exceptionally smooth, requiring no external prompting.
However, her attack failed.
The lava around the pillars flickered continuously, like glitched textures in a game, switching between seawater and lava.
Molly frowned, increasing her modification efforts.
The pillar monster was not to be outdone; the liquid inside the light eggs turned a crimson blood color.
Countless sleeping people inside showed pain, their bodies trembling violently.
The two sides were like two programmers simultaneously modifying code; the entire world, due to conflicting instructions, twisted into an extremely bizarre appearance.
Water was not water, air was not air, gravity was not gravity.
Code stacked upon code, forming a mountain of buggy code.
If he hadn't been standing in the safe zone of Molly's perception, Li Andy felt he might have been crushed into pixelated mosaics by the chaotic information flow.
He frowned, looked at the dazed Sophia beside him, and pinched her soft flesh hard:
"The whispers are gone now, stop idling, wake up and help!"
Sophia grunted, instantly coming to her senses.
She looked around, her eyes confused.
Where did I come from?
Li Andy didn't give her much time to think, pointing at the pillars and saying:
"Attack those pillars, however you want!"
"Huh? Oh..."
Sophia felt she began her attack.
The already messy code, stirred up by her, a "recent graduate intern," instantly exploded with numerous bugs.
The entire world became extremely sluggish due to overload.
"Click—"
Suddenly, some kind of protection mechanism was triggered.
The entire world seemed to have been put on pause.
Then, light and shadows began to rewind, and the entire space-time began to reverse!
Finally, the world rebooted, returning to its original state.
Li Andy sat blankly in front of the computer desk, his face reflecting the screen's light.
In his pupils, the shadow of the screen was reflected.
On it, warning pop-ups continuously appeared:
【Program running abnormally, error code error0333...】
【Program running abnormally, error code error0003...】
【Game crashed, attempting to restart...】
【Restart failed, attempting to restore from backup...】
【Latest backup selected, starting backup restoration...】
"Hoo—!"
Li Andy's pupils suddenly constricted, his eyes wide.
"What... did you do?" Youxi's voice sounded.
Molly slowly raised her head in their arms and calmly explained:
"I modified the properties of the medium that transmits the whispers, turning this place into a silent 'vacuum zone'."
"Andy Gege, what do we do next? Destroy it?" Molly asked again.
Li Andy froze.
What's going on? Time reversal?
But the residual image on the computer screen was clearly visible in his mind.
Youxi noticed his daze and asked with a frown:
"Gege, what's wrong?"
Li Andy stiffly turned his head, an extremely absurd thought rising in his heart.
Could it be that I haven't woken up at all?!
In fact, am I the true Heart Source of this mindscape world?
Splash—
His lost memories, like surging seawater, poured into his mind.
Every little detail from the orphanage days became incredibly clear.
Li Andy stared blankly at the pillar, stiffly raised his right hand, and tried to imagine the opponent disintegrating.
"Splash—"
The pillar shattered so easily, just like that.
Countless light eggs scattered, like floating stars.
Then, with a gentle touch, the sea monster and the "stars" stopped together.
So, the reason I hadn't recovered my memories before—was because I hadn't woken up at all!
"Gege, did you do that?"
Youxi looked at him in astonishment.
Li Andy stiffly turned his head, looking at the girl's pretty face, his heart gradually filled with panic.
Then is the Youxi in front of me real?
Did I go through all that trouble, only for everything to be fake?
"Gege, what's wrong?"
Youxi frowned, feeling confusion and doubt in his eyes. The intelligent girl suddenly realized something and quickly hugged the retreating Li Andy tightly:
"Gege, I'm real! We're all real!"
Li Andy's body stiffened; the girl's embrace was truly warm.
But if you comfort me like this, how do I know this isn't my own imagined self-comfort?
"Gege, I am absolutely real! You can feel me, you can touch me!"
Li Andy's eyes were dazed, and the girl anxiously tried her best to prove herself.
"That's right!
"Gege, can't mindscapes merge?
"Maybe... we're just sub-Heart Sources integrated into your mindscape! We have a relationship of inclusion and hierarchy!"
"And!
"Those sea monsters, they can realize they are mindscape fictions, maybe we can find some clues and proof from them!"
"Gege, you... you have to believe me!"
Li Andy gave a bitter smile; the more Youxi spoke, the more bitter he felt.
Because he was also constantly trying to convince himself, and Youxi's analytical thinking was too similar to his own.
It was as if she was acting exactly as he expected.
In his eyes, Youxi's figure gradually became somewhat distorted.
Youxi was so anxious that tears fell. She cried and grabbed the two other bewildered girls beside her,
"Sophia, Molly! You prove it too! We really aren't fake!"
Molly opened her mouth, not knowing how to prove it. In fact, as she thought about it, she also began to doubt herself: Is my existence truly real?
"Hmm?"
The AI Sophia frowned, seemingly regaining her self-thinking:
"What are you doing? Those noises... are gone?"
"Sophia!"
Youxi cried and grabbed her, quickly explaining the situation and asking for her help in explaining and proving.
Sophia froze; she somewhat didn't understand what Youxi was saying.
Am I real, and I have to prove it myself?
Explain, explain what?
Are you sick!
At this moment, she came to a conclusion: Andy was unstable!
She looked down at her simple attire, then suddenly lunged at Li Andy, embracing his head to block his vision while using her ample bosom to jumble his thoughts.
"??"
Li Andy was stunned,
"No, what are you doing? What kind of situation is this! Get off!"
Li Andy tried to push her away, but as his hand landed on her waist, he suddenly realized that Sophia was not acting according to what he considered normal logic, completely exceeding his expectations.
So, they really are real, and not just his imagination?!
Seeing Li Andy suddenly quiet, Sophia raised an eyebrow, slightly loosened her arms, and looked down through the valley between her peaks, meeting his gaze:
"Feeling more stable now?"
"......"
Seeing Li Andy didn't react, Sophia frowned and closed the valley again.
"Stop, stop!"
Li Andy pushed her away, stopping her 'face-washing'.
His thoughts, disrupted by this, cleared up quite a bit.
He seemed to have accidentally fallen into some kind of thought trap during the shock of recovering his memories, failing to notice some crucial flaws.
Since I am also a Heart Source, why couldn't I change the mindscape world before?
You know, even without recovering their memories, Sophia and Youxi could subconsciously influence the world.
But why could I only control the mindscape when I recovered my memories?
Could it be that my Heart Source authority is strongly tied to my memories?
Or is there something deeper and more terrifying at play....
"Slap!"
Sophia suddenly clapped both hands on his face, squeezing his cheeks and shouting,
"Focus your mind!! Stop thinking wildly!"
Li Andy froze.
Wild thoughts... coming true...
If I could influence the world at will like a Heart Source from the beginning...
Li Andy felt a chill run down his spine.
With his personality, his thoughts were no less numerous than Youxi's!
So... forgetting, was a form of protection?!
"Whoosh—"
Li Andy took a deep breath, forcefully suppressed the various conjectures in his mind, and gradually gathered his thoughts.
He couldn't think about it anymore; perhaps everything would have an answer once he got out.
As his mindset changed, his tense mind finally relaxed:
"Sorry, I... am much clearer now. You are incredibly real."
"Woo!"
Youxi hugged him tightly, crying like a small animal almost abandoned.
Li Andy felt somewhat guilty and was even more eager to leave this fragmented virtual world.
He looked down, raised his hand, and beckoned; the leader of the stopped sea monsters floated up.
Li Andy snapped his fingers, lifting the sea monster's time suspension.
He wanted to understand why this sea monster knew about something called a Dream Master. And whose memory this sea monster was generated from.
After the sea monster regained its movement, it was startled for a moment, but when it heard Li Andy's questions, it laughed maniacally:
"Since you are also a Dream Master, why do you ask me?"
"Since you are awake, why do you seek answers in a dream?"
"Our world is false to you, but what you call reality, is it not also a dream of some existence!"
"Hahahaha... Hahahaha!"
"Reality does not exist, existence is meaningless!"
He looked at Li Andy mockingly, his body beginning to blur and fade, about to disappear.
Li Andy quickly tried to stop him, but found that the other party had broken through some kind of restriction, and actually deleted himself right in front of him, the "administrator."
"......"
Li Andy was silent for a few seconds, then decided to leave here to find answers.
If he truly was the top-tier Heart Source, perhaps he wouldn't need to truly wake everyone up to leave here.
He tried to detach himself, and his consciousness began to float upward.
When he opened his eyes again, he was in front of that monitor.
He thought for a moment and clicked to exit the game.
The next second, he returned to the stream of books spiraling like a DNA helix.
Youxi, Sophia, and others floated around him, asleep.
At this moment, a voice sounded in his mind.
【The memory collector has awakened, the trial is over】
Li Andy was startled, feeling his earlobe suddenly become a little heavier.
He reached up and felt an earring.
He quickly took out the 【Mysterious Mirror】 to check, and saw that it was a black, teardrop-shaped earring.
This was not the light blue 【Translator's Earring】 he remembered!
At this moment, a wisp of information entered his mind, and the earring revealed its identity.
It was not the 【Translator's Earring】, but rather... the 【memory collector's earring】.