Doomsday Wonderland

Lin Sanjiu grabbed the seat belts and tore them apart. Once she regained her freedom, she seized the chance and delivered a tremendous kick at the driver’s seat, sending the driver ramming into the steering wheel. The horn belted out its one-note tune, and the vehicle lurched and swayed side to side before finally crashing into a wall. Flames and sparks then leaped high into the night sky as the vehicle was filled with the sound of bone cracking and flying scrap metal.

When she jumped out of the vehicle, she heard the intermittent groan and moan of pain coming out from the pile of wasted metal. Taking a deep breath to calm herself down, Lin Sanjiu proceeded to pry the door open. She looked into the vehicle, and it took her a long while to make out the driver from the heap of iron and bronze scraps.

“Who do you work for?” she demanded, gritting her teeth as she inspected the driver.

The man was still conscious but was right on the border of losing consciousness. Blood was smeared all over his face and he was gasping in great pain. His mouth opened and closed several times, yet no words came out from it.

Truth to be told, Lin Sanjiu was quite surprised to find that they would send such a weak fighter to come after her. She did not know if she should feel happy or angry that they underestimated her.

“Hey! Wake up!” she called out again.

Just as Lin Sanjiu was about to slap him in the face, she heard a noise from the dark. She jerked her head back and squinted into the distance. The night echoed with undisturbed silence, but very soon, a string of lights emerged at the rim of her vision followed by the rumbles of engines filling her ears.

‘Are they his comrades?’

Lin Sanjiu did not plan to find out now, so she opened the rear door and jumped into the vehicle. She lay flat on the backseat and closed her eyes. More and more light flooded into the vehicle and pounded on her eyelids. Sometimes she saw red, and at other times orange. Then, she heard several vehicles stop beside the vehicle accompanied by the conversation of the drivers.

“See! I told you it’s him!”

“What the hell is happening to Old Greg? How is it possible that he’d smash his vehicle into a wall? There aren’t any obstacles on the road.”

“Alright, alright, enough talking. Let’s go and check him out first.”

‘Well, this is quite unexpected. Can it be that they don’t know anything?’

However, before she could think further, a dark silhouette rapped on the window and shouted, snapping her out of her thoughts, “Hey, are you okay?”

Lin Sanjiu kept her eyes tightly shut. After a few seconds, the man, who was standing outside, pulled out what Lin Sanjiu thought was a flashlight as she could feel a beam of light on her face. The light moved up and down her body as the man inspected her. Then, he murmured, “This is weird. He doesn’t seem to be injured…”

The group of drivers pulled the injured driver out from the wreckage. However, the way they handled a wounded person was rough. There was the ear-grating shrill of metal in the air as they tugged the driver’s body out of the wasted metal hull, and were it not for the driver being a posthuman, Lin Sanjiu was certain that he might not be able to wake up anymore.

“Hey, don’t you think this man looks familiar?” another voice asked.

Lin Sanjiu peeled open her eyelids a little and peeked through the slits.

“Now that you mention it, he does look familiar,” said the man holding the flashlight. The light from the flashlight had blurred him out, so Lin Sanjiu could not see his face clearly. “Has he used our service before?”

“Hey, you two!” one of the men shouted after he settled the driver on the ground, “Can you get him out of the vehicle first? We still need to report this to the organization. Do you two want to stay here for the whole night?”

The two silhouettes did not give any response and Lin Sanjiu could not see anything as the light from the flashlight had blinded her enough to make her vision inaccurate. Just as she had no idea what was happening, she heard a slight click.

Then, the door opened.

“I…remember…who he…is…”

Even though the voice was the same, the tone was different. It was as if a sleepwalker or a duoluozhong was talking. It sounded cold, toneless, and rough as if the voice was struggling to come out from a decayed throat. Lin Sanjiu’s chest tightened and her heartbeat leaped into a gallop. Just when the door opened, she sent out a large gush of Higher Consciousness and flipped the two men outside onto the floor. The flashlight slipped out of the man’s hand and rolled onto the floor.

“Hey!” The other two drivers were startled. They ran over in a hurry and shouted, “Hey, stop! What the hell are you doing?!”

In the fleeting light, the two men could be seen wriggling on the ground. Their eyes were highly protruded and their irises had shrunk into slits. As they tried to pull themselves up from the ground, there was a nasal gurgling stuck in their throats, and the air was full of bestial growling that caused all of their skins to burst into goosebumps.

“What happened to them?”

The other two drivers stopped in their tracks, stunned by the scene happening before them. One of the shorter men gazed at Lin Sanjiu with a shocked expression on his face. Then, he turned around and began to flee. As he ran, he shouted, “I’m not a posthuman! I don’t know them! Whatever feud exists between you and them, it has nothing to do with me!”

The man’s remaining comrade cursed under his breath and then proceeded to pull out his belt, which poised its head up like a snake the moment it touched the ground. Pressed back by the advance of his two companions, who now lumbered forward like duoluozhongs, he looked over at Lin Sanjiu with fear spread across his face.

Lin Sanjiu could see the question in his eyes even though he did not say anything.

“It wasn’t my doing!” she said, “They are the ones who attacked me!”

The flashlight finally stopped rolling. It shed a uniform beam of light on Lin Sanjiu and brought her face into view.

The man with the belt frowned. The fear on his face had dissolved away and was replaced by a weird expression. His eyes became blank as he stared Lin Sanjiu down.

“You look familiar…” he mumbled, “Have I seen you somewhere before?”

In just a few minutes, she had heard this sentence about four times, and she knew very well what effect this sentence would bring. Not wanting to be caught in a pincer attack, Lin Sanjiu leaped onto the roof of the car. At the same time, the belt that looked like a snake tore through the air and slammed onto the ground. When the man retracted the belt back, there was a crack on the ground.

“I…remember…who you…you…are…”

The man holding the belt lowered his head, but his eyes were rolling upward as if someone was grabbing his neck. Lin Sanjiu had no idea what was happening. These men acted like normal humans a few seconds ago, but all of them became like this and behaved just like duoluozhongs after that sentence.

Then, Ryuji’s words echoed in her head, ‘No matter where I go, they keep coming for me…’

“So, that’s how it is…” Lin Sanjiu mumbled as she finally figured it out.

With that thought in mind, she gazed down at the three people that were circling around the vehicle. Even though they were posthumans, they were all working at the bottom-most level and earning the lowest pay in the Twelve Worlds. Their abilities were weak and their fighting skills were not worth mentioning. Lin Sanjiu thought for a moment, then she took off her [Mask] and called out the [Ability Polishing Agent]. Holding the little light bulb in her hand, she placed it near her face.

The three men all came to a sudden stop. A bewildered expression flashed across their faces as they stood stock still in their places. After a few seconds that felt like ages, the man with the belt gasped and took a deep breath as if he had just woken up from a slumber. Soon enough, the remaining two people were snapped out of their respective reveries as well. They rubbed their eyes, and when they raised their heads, they had become normal again.

“What happened?” somebody muttered, “The last thing I remember is that Old Greg had a car accident.”

“Why are we all standing here in the middle of the night?” Another man glanced at Lin Sanjiu and then asked his companions, “What are we doing here?”

Setting her jaw tight, Lin Sanjiu had a full grasp over the entire incident.

Apparently, all of them were put under some kind of hypnosis whereby they would react violently when they remembered they had seen Ryuji or Ryuji’s [Mask] somewhere. So, in other words, as long as she was not wearing Ryuji’s [Mask], then it would not trigger the hypnosis.

However, there was something Lin Sanjiu could not fathom. Why would they choose these people with mediocre combat capability as their specimens? Why did they not pick someone more powerful? Was it because it was harder to hypnotize a stronger person compared to a weak person?

Seizing the chance as the drivers were all absorbed in their own conversation, Lin Sanjiu jumped down from the vehicle and went into an alley stealthily. Using the darkness in the alley to cloak her movement, she sped all the way down in her top speed. Even though they called out to her after realizing she was gone, she paid them no mind and soon vanished out of their sight.

By the time she arrived at the Lost Dog’s Pod Hotel, it was already 3 o’clock in the wee hours. Looking from a distance, the dingy and dilapidated building looked nothing like a hotel. As she went nearer to the hotel, she saw light spilling out from the main entrance.

The dark-skinned woman who was dressed gorgeously sat beside the entrance, still looking as energetic as before. As she watched a crystal ball in front of her intently, she shoved a handful of snacks into her mouth. When she heard somebody open the door, she spoke without raising her head, “Twenty Rondos for one night. I don’t accept payment on credit.”

“What are you watching?”

Startled, Dali angled her head up and a smile broke across her face. “Yo, what brings you here today?”

Without waiting for Lin Sanjiu to say anything, she continued energetically, “Someone brought a TV series back from an apocalyptic world. The storyline is pretty good, but their aesthetics, hmm, how shall I put it? It’s a little weird. By the way, are you staying in tonight?”

The apprehension Lin Sanjiu felt earlier on slowly ebbed away when she saw Dali. She turned around but saw no one on the corridor behind the reception desk. “I came to look for a friend of mine.”

Considering her previous history, Dali immediately became skeptical. She asked, “A friend? Really? You’d better not cause any trouble to me.”

Dali would not stop talking when it was related to her hotel. Nonetheless, Lin Sanjiu did not stop her from rambling and looked over at the crystal ball.

The couple in the crystal ball was having an affectionate moment. The male lead actor was sharing a kiss with the female lead actor. It should have been a lovely scene, were it not for the appearance of both lead actors. The world that produced this TV series must have a rather bizarre sense of beauty.

Even though Lin Sanjiu knew that now was not the right timing to get held up by such a small thing, she still could not help but be absorbed by the crystal ball. A massive mole was sitting in the center of the male lead’s face. There were several hairs growing on it, and they kept rubbing the female lead’s face as they kissed. The image from the crystal ball flickered on and off. By the time it became clear again, the female lead actor had already opened her pair of beady eyes. She gazed at the mole affectionately as a smile spread across her face, revealing a row of yellow-stained teeth.

“See?” Dali cast a surreptitious glance at Lin Sanjiu before turning back to the crystal ball. “If it weren’t for the plot, nobody would watch this kind of thing.”

“Is this a television?”

“Well, sort of,” Dali said as she patted the crystal ball and the image returned to normal again. “Although the quality is mediocre, it’s much more cost-effective than a TV. A new TV set with a satellite antenna would probably cost you a fortune.”

Lin Sanjiu gave an indifferent answer before saying, “Well, I’m going to look for my friend now. Enjoy your movie.”

Dali turned back to the crystal ball and waved her hand. Her free hand then moved towards the telephone. It probably was one of the legacies from the modern days. It looked just like the landline Lin Sanjiu had used when she was a child. The telephone looked shabby with the paint mottled.

Ryuji’s room was in the innermost of the hotel. Just when Lin Sanjiu turned around the corner, the two actors surfaced in her head. Their kissing scene was slowed down by ten times, giving her a better view of how the hairs on the male actor’s face rubbed against the female actor’s face that was marred with scars.

“What the hell are you doing?” She stopped and glowered, “I’m not in the mood for a prank, Mrs. Manas!”

“Who said that I’m pranking you?” Mrs. Manas shouted back, “Look closer!”

Lin Sanjiu had no other choice but to stare at the scene that was playing before her eyes albeit hesitantly. After what seemed like an eternity, she said, “This is a nightmare. Can we stop now? There’s nothing to watch!”

“Can’t you have more patience?” Mrs. Manas said, “Just hold on for a little longer. It’s almost there.”

Lin Sanjiu swallowed down the urge to puke and continued watching. Suddenly, the image flickered. Then, an image that had nothing to do with the TV series cut into the endless kissing shot. In front of a blue background, a delicate, androgynous face offered her a gentle smile.

Lin Sanjiu had no idea why she felt the smile was strange even though the person who was smiling had a tender face. She had a feeling that the person was relaying some kind of message through his smile. Perhaps it was a psychological suggestion.

There was no time to insert sound since the scene only appeared for a fraction of a second. The long-haired man with a delicate face was holding a picture in his hand, and the person in the picture was someone Lin Sanjiu very familiar with.

It was a picture of her own face.

Even though Mrs. Manas had slowed down the speed, the image still came and went in a flash, and was soon replaced by the couple’s kissing scene. The image whizzed through Lin Sanjiu’s mind like a bolt of lightning, but the message had been projected clearly into her mind even though the message was not composed with words.

Mrs. Manas sighed.

Lin Sanjiu had seen a beer advertisement in the Heaven Underworld that could relay its message without needing any words. Apparently, the image used the same tactic as well. If somebody slipped a particular image into another message and played it to a person at a speed faster than a human’s eyes could catch, the human’s subconscious mind would memorize the image and accept it completely.

“So, that’s how they hypnotized those drivers…”

Lin Sanjiu blinked her eyes and slowly turned around. At the end of the corridor, the light from the reception desk was still on.

An inaudible conversation stopped as the monologue rang out from the crystal ball. After that, a slight click echoed as Dali hung up the phone.

“When you see this person,” Lin Sanjiu mumbled, “Inform me immediately and stop her at all cost.”

The floor creaked as the chair moved.

Dali had stood up.