Chapter 116
Chapter 116
Lin Ze left Cheng Wanning alone at the inn. Before he left, he asked her about the Ether Group.
Unfortunately, this fake Cheng Wanning only had memories from before college. She knew nothing about anything after graduation, including the Ether Group.
Outside the inn, Wei Sen and Lin Ze walked toward the forest in the pale daylight.
The heavy snow in the forest had just stopped, and the two of them left two deep lines of footprints behind them as they went.
Wei Sen was the first to stop. “There’s no one here.”
She knew Lin Ze hadn’t wanted to talk inside the inn because the others had begun to suspect his true identity.
He Xu, Zhou Jie, Meng Zhenzhen, and a few others had even sent him friend requests directly through the Watch.
That was why he wanted to find an empty place to talk, in case the walls had ears.
Lin Ze stopped and cautiously scanned their surroundings. After making sure no one had followed them, he said, “Start with what you encountered in the Instances related to the Ether Group.”
Wei Sen had no other choice. Lin Ze was the only Order Keeper she had met so far who knew anything about the Ether Group, so she could only trust him.
And so Wei Sen told Lin Ze everything she knew about the Ether Group from Zhihui Primary School, Infinite Flight, and this current Instance.
After listening, Lin Ze’s brows drew tightly together.
“What is it?” Wei Sen asked.
Lin Ze looked into her eyes. “This isn’t a coincidence. No Order Keeper could encounter related clues in three consecutive Instances unless she has a very strong connection to the clue itself. But the people who went through all three Instances with you include those teammates of yours. Maybe this coincidence isn’t because of you, but because of one of them.”
Wei Sen had considered that possibility too, but for now, she couldn’t determine which of them had triggered such a condition.
Still, deep down, she vaguely felt that the person connected to the Ether Group was herself.
First, it was a woman’s sixth sense. Second, it was because she had the Protagonist Aura System.
Ever since the Dark Fairy Tale Instance, she felt as if everything happening around her had been spiraling wildly out of control. Although she had no memories of the past, she could vaguely sense that the life she was living now was completely different from the life she used to have.
Given everything she had experienced so far, even if someone told her she was actually the heroine of a novel, she would believe it.
So the first thing she had to verify was whether she herself had any connection to the Ether Group. If she wasn’t strongly connected to the Ether Group, then she would look into Xu You and the others.
“For the next Instance, I’ll go in alone. If I’m the one connected to the Ether Group, clues related to the Ether Group will definitely appear again in the next Instance!”
After hearing that, Lin Ze lowered his head and operated his Watch for a moment. “No problem.”
“Hm?” Wei Sen opened her Watch to check. It was a friend request from Lin Ze.
She tapped accept, the corners of her mouth curving upward. “Looks like you care about this Ether Group even more than I do.”
Lin Ze’s expression turned grave. “I do. It has to do with Ningning.”
“Cheng Wanning? What connection does she have to the Ether Group?”
“I have nothing to tell you about her.”
Wei Sen nodded. “All right. Then it’s your turn. Tell me what you know about the Ether Group.”
“The basic information about the Ether Group is about the same as what you learned in Infinite Flight,” Lin Ze said, recalling. “What I know is that before 2033, the Ether Group had been secretly conducting an experiment. It was said to be an experiment powerful enough to change the world.”
It was that experiment that might have had something to do with Ningning’s death!
Before he had experienced that accident and arrived in the Eerie World, he had once investigated it. Unfortunately, he had found nothing in the end, so he had temporarily set aside his suspicions about the Ether Group. Until this Instance, where he once again saw clues related to the Ether Group.
Then he met Wei Sen and learned that someone could encounter information related to the Ether Group in three consecutive Instances.
His intuition told him that the Ether Group’s secret experiment was definitely connected to the Eerie World!
“Powerful enough to change the world?” A bold guess flashed through Wei Sen’s mind. “Could it be… that this experiment has something to do with the arrival of the Eerie World?”
Lin Ze’s gaze darkened slightly.
As far as he knew, the Ether Group had not only been the leading technology company of its time, but Mark himself had also always been very interested in topics related to parallel universes and multiverses.
If this technology-obsessed madman really had accidentally opened a passage between the Eerie World and the Real World while researching the multiverse, it wasn’t impossible.
But truth was truth because it could be proven, not because it could be guessed.
It seemed he was going to have to follow the Ether Group lead to the end.
Whether it was for Ningning, or to uncover the truth behind the Eerie World.
Wei Sen looked at Lin Ze, who had fallen into deep thought, and suddenly thought of a question. “How do you know about what happened in 2033? And I looked into it. In the Real World, there’s no evidence that Ether Group ever existed at all. So how did you know about it?”
Lin Ze fell silent. The air around them seemed to grow heavy.
In a sense, Ether Group’s situation was exactly the same as his own.
Back then, he had asked someone to investigate him in the Real World, and the final answer had been… no such person found.
A moment later, Lin Ze’s gaze shifted to the snow piled on the treetops. His voice carried a trace of helplessness so faint it was almost imperceptible. “Before I came to the Eerie World, Ether Group still existed in the Real World. But ever since I came here, I have never returned to the Real World, so I don’t know what things are like outside now.”
Wei Sen grew wary. “What year are you from? And exactly how long have you been in the Eerie World?”
Lin Ze once again found himself impressed by this woman’s logical reasoning. He sighed softly and said frankly, “I’m from the twenty-first century. This year marks my fiftieth year in the Eerie World.”
Wei Sen’s fists clenched unconsciously.
Someone from the twenty-first century?!
Then beneath that mask of his, could he actually be a white-haired old man in his twilight years?
And if he hadn’t returned to the Real World for fifty years, how could his body possibly have held out?
Could he already be dead in the Real World?
Then what remained in the Eerie World was his… soul?
But if the Eerie World truly was a world of souls, then why had the compass Xu You carried with her in the Real World appeared in this world too?
In an instant, Wei Sen had far too many questions she wanted answered.
“Do you know what form those known as Order Keepers actually take when they come to the Eerie World?” she asked.
“Most of them believe it’s the soul.” Lin Ze smiled coldly. “But I don’t agree. Rather than the soul, I lean more toward… consciousness. Our consciousness appears in the Eerie World and is then given a body identical to the one we have in the Real World. Similar to soul transmigration in transmigration novels.”
“Objects we carry don’t have consciousness. Why do they appear in the Eerie World too?”
“Have you heard of consciousness projection?”
“Consciousness projection, also known as psychological projection, is a common psychological phenomenon. It refers to an individual unconsciously transferring their own emotions, thoughts, traits, or conflicts onto another person or an external object, then believing those characteristics belong to the other party rather than themselves.”
Lin Ze gave her an approving look. “Yes. I believe the principle behind things from the Real World appearing in the Eerie World may be very similar to the concept of consciousness projection.”
Wei Sen thought it over. “You mean that because those objects exist within our consciousness, when we come to the Eerie World through the Gate of Xuanpin, not only is our own consciousness granted a body, but the objects are granted corresponding physical forms as well.”
“Mm.”
Wei Sen sank into thought. “Rather than consciousness projection, it’s more like a kind of… manifestation of consciousness.”
More than once, she had wondered whether she had entered some kind of virtual reality game.
But the natives of this world were not emotionless NPCs. On the contrary, they were truly alive, just like people in the Real World. They had flesh and blood, and all seven emotions and six desires.
And Anomalous Artifact items from this world could be brought back to the Real World. The Watch from this world could even communicate across spatial distance.
None of this could possibly be achieved by human technology.
So what kind of world was this, exactly… Was it truly a world created by the so-called “God”?
Were all phenomena that could not be explained by science… miracles?