Shen Ge finished speaking and headed straight downstairs. He had already explored the upper floor several times. Apart from the jarred mutant and the female mutant, there wasn’t much else of investigative value up there. But none of that mattered right now. The first thing he needed to do was verify his theory, so his targets were naturally the “classroom,” the “bedroom,” and the “specimen room” on the negative first floor.
The “bedroom” was the eerie little room where Shen Ge had woken up several times before—essentially his “respawn point.” The mirror in the bathroom was also where he had first learned to wield dream power, using that very method to kill his doppelgänger mutant.
But the real key was the “specimen room.” Shen Ge believed it was where Rongshan Psychiatric Hospital stored its paranormal research materials, because Li Xiang had obtained some pretty solid research results from several crucial specimens found there.
Perhaps the specifics of this world would differ, but judging by Wang Han’s condition, the fundamental nature of things wouldn’t change.
There were no lights in the stairwell. Shen Ge could see using his Specter Eye, but Wang Han couldn’t see a thing and could only barely keep up with Shen Ge’s reminders.
Thud! Wang Han’s foot missed a step and he tumbled down several stairs. In his panic, Shen Ge grabbed him, and he managed to find the handrail, steadying himself—but not without a grimace of pain.
“Where… where are we going?” Wang Han asked through gritted teeth.
“Just follow me,” Shen Ge replied without explaining, simply telling Wang Han to keep going downstairs.
But when they reached the negative first floor, it wasn’t what Shen Ge had expected at all. There was no “classroom,” no “bedroom,” no “specimen room”—only a “morgue” with a glowing red sign.
The hallway lights on the negative first floor were on, but the illumination was dim, and a faint buzzing sound of electrical current could be heard, as if the lights could go out at any moment.
Going by the principle of “since we’re here anyway,” Shen Ge was determined to check in at the morgue—even if it were King Yama’s palace, he’d still go in and clock in.
By now, the world’s rejection was growing stronger, and Shen Ge was beginning to feel some pressure. If he didn’t want to expend too much dream fragment power, he’d have to resolve this as quickly as possible.
Ignoring Wang Han’s attempts to stop him, Shen Ge tried to jog his memory but got nowhere. He pushed open the morgue door and walked straight in. The space inside wasn’t large. On both sides were metal cabinets embedded into the walls, and in the center were over a dozen beds, each with a white sheet covering what appeared to be corpses.
The room was lit by only a dim, off-white lamp in the middle. The entire place was steeped in a chilling, macabre atmosphere that left Wang Han frozen in fear.
Shen Ge swept his gaze over the covered bodies and recalled the memory fragment he’d seen earlier—the scene of Wang Han falling off a cliff.
“Interesting.” Just as he’d suspected, he already knew who lay beneath those white sheets without even looking.
Shen Ge pulled a chair over to the first corpse and lifted the sheet. Lying there was Ma Chao, dressed in a white lab coat.
“Sure enough. Wang Han, Ma Chao—they’re all test subjects in this world. Just like how I saw so many ‘Sanzai’ back then, there are also many ‘Han clones’ and ‘Chao clones’ here.”
“The Freak Association needs them for experiments, so naturally they can’t just let them die easily. That’s why they prepare so many clones.”
“Because of this, when Wang Han’s car went off the cliff, in one moment he was completely dead, but in the next he was only lightly injured and revived. And there are plenty more situations like that.”
At this moment, Shen Ge finally understood why he’d felt such a strange sense of “fragmentation” when observing Wang Han’s memory fragments earlier—like several memories stitched together. That was because it wasn’t a complete memory of a single person at all; it was the memories of several clones all injected into Wang Han’s body.
“Ma Chao? This… this… how can this be?” Wang Han’s eyes widened in shock, clearly unable to accept the horrifying sight before him.
But Shen Ge didn’t have time to keep guiding him toward memory awakening. He directly manifested a scalpel and sliced Ma Chao open from chest to belly.
Wang Han was so frightened he threw up on the spot. Shen Ge, meanwhile, rummaged through Ma Chao’s abdomen and quickly found the same kind of bugs he’d seen in the basin inside the cabinet at Ma Chao’s house.
“No wonder I could find so many parasitic-type anomalies in the village at the foot of Rongshan back then. Turns out that village is the Freak Association’s breeding ground for parasitic anomalies.”
Shen Ge glanced at Wang Han, who was still vomiting in shock, then pulled the sheet off the second bed. Lying there was indeed the corpse of Wang Han from the cliff-fall scene, crushed and deformed by the wrecked car.
“No… this… this can’t be. Impossible.” Wang Han was completely dumbfounded. He felt like his head was about to split open, clutching it in obvious agony.
Seeing that this was having an effect, Shen Ge pulled the head out of Ma Chao’s stomach. Instantly, he felt an immense repulsive force. Clearly, his actions deviated too far from what “Shen Ge” in this world would have done, and the world’s oppression and rejection of him kept intensifying.
Just like when he’d dissected the jarred mutant earlier, a flood of rotting flesh began pouring out of Ma Chao’s stomach. Unless Shen Ge was willing to let this entire dream fragment shatter right here, he’d have no choice but to abandon this body.
“Death isn’t necessarily the end, Wang Han. There’s not much I can do for you. You have to overcome the fear yourself to wake up.” With those words, Shen Ge withdrew his dream power, and in the next instant, he was devoured by the decaying flesh, his consciousness returning to his own body.
When Shen Ge looked at the memory fragment again, Wang Han had already escaped the morgue. The rotting flesh, much like what Shen Ge had encountered before, instantly filled the entire morgue, burst through the door, and surged into the hallway, “chasing” after Wang Han.
Shen Ge had expected Wang Han to run for the stairwell, but instead, the guy chose a dead end. Shen Ge was speechless: “You idiot, do you even think before picking a route? If you’d run upstairs, at least you could get out of the hospital building when the flesh came. But you’re wandering around on the negative first floor—how do you expect to get out?”
Compared to Wang Han dying from flesh corrosion, Shen Ge was more worried that after Wang Han’s death, his memories wouldn’t stitch together properly, or worse, they’d be altered by Dr. Chen—meaning his use of dream fragment power would have been for nothing.
Because based on previous patterns, Wang Han wouldn’t truly die. Instead, influenced by the patched memories, he’d restart from another clone.
Fortunately, Wang Han was still “resourceful.” Instead of waiting to die after hiding in the supply closet, he found a way to escape through the ventilation duct.
“What did Shen Ge mean by that… Damn it, if I ever see you again, you cryptic bastard, I’m going to punch you!”
Huh?
Shen Ge saw Wang Han muttering to himself in the picture and couldn’t help but laugh in exasperation: “Oh, so you’ve grown some backbone, have you?”
The next second, he heard Wang Han curse at the rotting flesh at the door: “Damn it, if I had my full gear, I wouldn’t be afraid of some lousy anomaly. I’d beat the crap out of you!”
“Oh? Is he about to wake up?” Shen Ge was glad the guy hadn’t made his dream power go to waste; it seemed he’d be waking up soon.
Just as he was about to praise Wang Han, he saw the guy climb up a cabinet and squeeze into the vent. Shen Ge was dumbfounded: “Bro, I could fit through these vents because I was the size of a ten-year-old. But you’re built like a bear—how are you supposed to fit?”
Sure enough, the next moment Wang Han got stuck in the vent. At the same time, with a strange sound, the rotting flesh seemed to have broken through the supply closet door and was pouring in.
In such a tense moment, Wang Han froze in the vent, clutching his head in pain. Shen Ge knew his memories were probably returning.
“I’m Wang Han, deputy captain of the Third Anti-Anomaly Squad of the Special Tactics Department of Rong City, Great Tian Dynasty!” Wang Han’s memories cleared, and everything came rushing back.
Ads by Pubfuture
At that moment, the rotting flesh was almost at the top of the wall.
Though Wang Han still had many questions, now wasn’t the time to dwell on them. He struggled with all his might to push forward.
Shen Ge knew this was probably Wang Han’s only chance to “wake up.” He had to buy him some time. So he channeled dream power into the dream fragment. This time, since it wasn’t his own consciousness invading but only interference via the fragment’s power, the drain wasn’t significant.
Wang Han was stuck in the vent, pushing forward with every ounce of strength, when suddenly he heard a series of creaking sounds. The vent had deformed under his pressure, and he actually managed to squeeze through.
“I’m this strong?” Wang Han was stunned for a moment, but naturally didn’t waste the chance. He crawled forward with effort, and at the junction, chose the path leading toward the stairwell.
Finally reaching the end, Wang Han kicked off the metal grate blocking the vent and crawled out—only to find himself not in the stairwell at all, but in a strange secret room.
The room was packed with disgusting fat and internal organs. What was even more terrifying was that those foam-like blobs of fat were covered in eyeballs. They had been staring at the center of the room, but now, as Wang Han kicked open the vent cover, they all turned to look at him.
Wang Han was frozen in terror at the sight. Shen Ge, however, saw these rotting flesh blobs and eyes and his eyes lit up. The first time he’d been able to leave the dream world had been thanks to those very eyes.
At that moment, Wang Han noticed a door in one corner of the room. He didn’t know if it led anywhere or if it could even open, but at least it was “hope.”
Plus, with the sound of the rotting flesh surging through the vent behind him, Wang Han had no time to think. He prepared to dash toward the door before those disgusting eyes could react.
And then—
He was swallowed.
“F*CK!!”
Wang Han, still enveloped in the dream fragment’s power in front of Shen Ge, cursed inarticulately and shot up from the ground. Clearly, after being fully devoured by the rotting flesh and eyes in the dream world, his conscious mind had returned to his own body.
“Oh, finally awake, are we?” Shen Ge said with a hint of teasing.
Wang Han was still reeling from shock and fear when he heard the familiar voice. His expression shifted from dazed to delighted: “Gen Tan?” (Shen Tan?)
“…” Hearing Wang Han’s garbled pronunciation, Shen Ge froze.
Wang Han also realized something was wrong. He instinctively touched his face and winced in pain: “Gen Tan, wuh appened do me? Wy iz my face swolwen wike a pig head?” (Shen Tan, what happened to me? Why is my face swollen like a pig’s head?)
“Probably… the aftermath of being devoured by those anomalies. We’ll have the doctor treat you when we get out,” Shen Ge replied with a serious, straight face.
“Hiss—” Wang Han rubbed his face and sucked in a sharp breath through his teeth: “Wy do I feel wike my brain is damaged too?” (Why do I feel like my brain is damaged too?)
Shen Ge said seriously, “Wang Han, pull yourself together. We’re not out of danger yet. We have to find a way out of this anomaly space as soon as possible.”
“Yes sir!” Wang Han rarely saw Shen Ge so serious. He figured this anomaly incident must be extremely dangerous, and the fact that Shen Ge had risked his life to save him moved him deeply. Naturally, he’d follow Shen Ge’s lead. At this point, not only would he obey orders, but if Shen Ge told him to jump into a fire pit, he wouldn’t hesitate for a second.
Now that Wang Han was awake, the next step was to break out of this anomaly space and get him out of here as soon as possible. The last thing Shen Ge wanted was to solve Wang Han’s problem only to have Deng Yuqi and the others run into trouble.
The most direct approach was to use the power of the dream fragment to open a gap in the anomaly space, finding the crack in the mirror.
Shen Ge focused, channeling the dream fragment’s energy. A small orb formed and spun in his palm. Wang Han stared in amazement: “Gen Tan, are you doing some kind of immortaw shtuff?” (Shen Tan, are you doing some kind of immortal stuff?)
“… Bro, with your face like that, maybe just keep quiet, yeah?” Shen Ge couldn’t help but complain.
The dream power Shen Ge released collided with the dream-world fragment they were in, and suddenly, faint sounds of shattering glass echoed throughout the pitch-black space.
Crack!
Crack!
Crack!
In the next instant, the memory fragments floating around them all shattered. Then, the darkness above split open, and a torrent of eerie black mist poured in wildly.
Wang Han couldn’t see any of it, but Shen Ge, with his Specter Eye, could perceive all the changes around him. He also saw the dream fragment dissolve into specks of starlight.
“Go!” Shen Ge didn’t have his Red Mist Armor now, so he manifested a tentacle using his materialization power, wrapped it around Wang Han, and then enveloped them both in dream energy.
The collision between dream fragments was like breaking through spatial dimensions, sending them hurtling through the torrent of time.
Shen Ge was long used to these mirror-image fragments collapsing, but Wang Han, experiencing such mystical phenomena over and over, felt his brain about to short-circuit.
Then, a tremendous force dragged them into a pitch-black void, as if they were being sucked into a black hole.
After that, their bodies were stretched, compressed, crumpled into balls, flattened into paper—all sorts of bizarre torments wracking Shen Ge and Wang Han.
“Found it!” Shen Ge successfully located the crack in the mirror. As he pushed Wang Han through, he condensed his dream power, turning the tables and beginning to devour the dream fragment hidden within.
Shen Ge had several dozen dream fragments in his possession. His power was clearly more than a match for this single fragment, and he quickly “subdued” it.
CRASH!
Shen Ge and Wang Han burst through the glass. Shen Ge landed steadily on his feet, but Wang Han tumbled out and slammed into the bathroom door, grimacing in pain.
“Gen Tan, are we out now?” Wang Han rubbed his arm and stood up with effort, realizing they were back in the hotel bathroom.
Shen Ge looked at the mirror above the sink, now restored. A thought struck him. In the past, the dream worlds born from his influence were “genuine” dream worlds, so after they collapsed, they always produced countless dream fragments for him to fight over.
But this time, it seemed the entire world had been formed from just a single dream fragment. Could it be that someone had deliberately released one dream fragment just to cause trouble?
But aside from him, Shen Ge, was there anyone else who could master fragments of the dream world?
Shen Ge fell into deep thought. He couldn’t help but think of the Freak Organization’s most mysterious ability—the “flash of white light” from their teleportation device.
