Chapter 159
Chapter 159
“Alice? Alice, are you all right?” the Mad Hatter called from outside the door.
Wei Sen swept her gaze around the room. Finding no further clues, she calmly opened the door.
The Mad Hatter, March Hare, Dormouse, Twins, Dodo, and Eyeless Rabbit were all waiting outside.
The path beneath their feet was now covered in footprints.
“Finished looking around?” the Mad Hatter asked with a smile.
“Mm-hm.” Wei Sen stepped out of the room and discovered that the Twins had become three people again. Third Brother’s scarf was visible floating in midair.
The Dodo was still blue and featherless.
The Eyeless Rabbit wore sunglasses over the two empty sockets in his face.
“You’re the March Hare.” Wei Sen looked at the Mouse.
The Mouse nodded. “That’s right.”
She turned to the Gray Rabbit. “Which means you’re the Dormouse.”
“Oh, Alice, you’re as clever as ever,” the Gray Rabbit said.
The Mad Hatter stared at Wei Sen in a daze, his eyes overflowing with love. “Alice? You… You are Alice.”
Wei Sen looked at the Mad Hatter, immediately noticing the change in his attitude toward her.
Gazing earnestly at the face identical to Lin Ze’s, she asked, “Answer me one more time. How many people are there among the Twins?”
A trace of anticipation shone in Wei Sen’s eyes.
“Hmm?” The Mad Hatter glanced at the Twins out of the corner of his eye before answering with complete certainty, “There have always been three of them. Alice, you seem a little strange.”
Wei Sen finally understood what had caused the Cognitive Contamination earlier. It had all stemmed from the Mad Hatter refusing to acknowledge her identity!
It was a Hidden Rule of this Instance World, one concerning whether others recognized her identity as Alice!
At the tea party, the Mad Hatter had said that she wasn’t his Alice. Because he had partially rejected her identity, she had been eroded by an indescribable force, resulting in Cognitive Contamination.
In reality, nothing here had ever changed. The Twins were three people, the Dodo had no feathers, and the Eyeless Rabbit had no eyes. There was also a Mouse named March Hare and a Rabbit named Dormouse.
All the abnormalities she had seen earlier had been caused by Cognitive Contamination.
That extreme Cognitive Contamination had also allowed her to enter the Mirror World.
Inside the mirror, she had found her identity and learned about Cheng Wanning and Lin Ze’s past. Thus, within this Instance projected from reality, the Mad Hatter had finally acknowledged her identity as well.
She was his Alice.
“Alice?” The Mad Hatter leaned closer and studied her with concern.
“I’m fine. I think I finally understand what’s really going on with this Instance.” Wei Sen looked around.
The Mad Hatter tilted his head in confusion. “Instance? What are you talking about?”
“Mad Hatter, take me to the White Queen.”
“Of course. I’d be delighted. The final battle is close at hand, so it is indeed time for us to see her.”
The Twins and the others quickly followed.
The group left the Mad Hatter’s territory, departed the manor, and entered a forest.
The road twisted and turned, but footprints remained visible along it, so they weren’t violating the rules.
The dense canopy blotted out the sky, leaving the forest shrouded in gloom. A rancid, bloody stench filled the air, while indescribable noises rose and fell among the trees. It sounded as though the earth itself were writhing, or perhaps the entire forest was breathing.
[System, I want to use a Card Draw!]
To be safe, Wei Sen decided to use a Card Draw first.
An electronic voice rang out in her mind.
///Ding! One Card Draw attempt has been consumed. Remaining Card Draw attempts: 0!
Ding! Card Draw in progress!
Based on the current Instance mission, the System will randomly draw one Instance-exclusive Anomalous Artifact for you!
Congratulations, Host! You have obtained the Instance Anomalous Artifact, “Dragonslaying Sword”!
Usage Instructions: This Anomalous Artifact may be freely used within the Alice in Wonderland Instance! Killing any character in the Instance with this Anomalous Artifact will not deduct Merit Points! The Anomalous Artifact will become invalid once the Instance ends!///
There were even Instance-exclusive Anomalous Artifacts?!
Wei Sen stopped in her tracks, stunned.
The Dragonslaying Sword… In the original story, this was the very weapon Alice had used to kill the Evil Dragon.
Now, she had skipped the entire process of searching for the sword and obtained it directly through a Card Draw!
As expected of the Protagonist Aura System. She really did have at least some of a protagonist’s cheat-like advantages.
With that settled, Wei Sen continued onward. Having a weapon like this in hand put her much more at ease.
Along the way, Wei Sen noticed that the Mad Hatter kept staring at her, as though something were written across her face.
“Why do you keep looking at me?”
The Mad Hatter beamed. “You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for you.”
“I remember you saying that I never left. Since there was no parting, there could be no reunion. So why would you have been waiting for me?” Wei Sen asked, eyeing him suspiciously.
The Twins chimed in as well. “That’s right, Mad Hatter. You said Alice would never come back, but look! Hasn’t she come back now? She’s really back.”
The Mad Hatter’s smile froze, and he stopped in his tracks. He stood there blankly, like a windup puppet whose mechanism had ground to a halt.
His eyes shifted as he murmured, “Never come back? Why would I say Alice would never come back?”
“Why would I say that?” The Mad Hatter suddenly lunged toward the Twins. “Hmm? Why?”
The Twins scratched their heads. “A long, long time ago… Alice came out of your Windmill House and left. You said she would never come back!”
“No! I never said that!” The Mad Hatter clutched his hair, desperately trying to remember. “Alice has always been here. I only waited so long because the Time Lord trapped me one minute before the tea party began. But she was here. She was always here…”
“No, no, no!” The March Hare hopped forward as well. “That day, Alice left the Windmill House and headed out of the manor. You chased after her and said she would never come back. I heard you!”
The Mad Hatter grew even more frantic. “Did I? Why can’t I remember any of it?!”
Something suddenly occurred to Wei Sen. Her expression turned grave as she looked at the Mad Hatter. “Do you remember when you first met me?”
The Mad Hatter stared into Wei Sen’s eyes, his lips trembling. “The first time we met? Oh… It was… When was it? I-I can’t remember! All I remember is waiting for you at the tea party! I… was trapped there, waiting for you all that time…”
Seeing the Mad Hatter become increasingly unstable, Wei Sen began to understand what was going on. She even formed a bold theory.
“Gray Rabbit, did the Alice you saw look and dress the same as me?” Wei Sen asked.
The Gray Rabbit thought back. “Oh, not at all! Back then, you were wearing… um… Well, you looked very cold, and you had a hat on. And then… what was it again? Anyway, you looked completely different from how you do now.”
“You were wearing thick blue clothes and a white hat, right?”
The Gray Rabbit struck a fist into its palm. “Yes! That’s exactly it!”
Wei Sen drew a sharp breath.
So she was right!
Cheng Wanning, who had appeared in the previous Instance, Snowy Night Traveler, had come from this Instance!
She was the Cheng Wanning from the Mirror World, the Cheng Wanning to whom Lin Ze was supposed to confess his feelings onstage.
But because Lin Ze had made a wish upon the Aurora in Snowy Night Traveler, the Cheng Wanning from the mirror had been summoned by the power of an Eerie Entity and transported from this Instance to another!
As for why the Mad Hatter did not remember saying that “she would never come back,” it was probably because those words had actually been spoken by the Lin Ze of the Mirror World.
The Mad Hatter was a reflection of Lin Ze’s real-world memories. At times, he might break free of the role assigned to him by Alice in Wonderland and repeat things Lin Ze had once said, without the Mad Hatter himself having any idea why.
For now, however, Wei Sen had no way of knowing why Lin Ze had said those words.
She had spent too little time in the Mirror World and had yet to experience what would happen later.
In theory, if she had remained in the Mirror World, she might have continued living through Cheng Wanning’s future with Lin Ze under Cheng Wanning’s identity.
But that also meant she might have been completely consumed by Contamination in the Mirror World, come to believe that she truly was Cheng Wanning, and remained trapped in that world forever.
Now, if she wanted to learn what circumstances had led Lin Ze to say “she would never come back” and “wait until the day we meet again,” she would have to clear the Instance, find the real Lin Ze in the present, and ask him herself!