[Host, can you hear my voice?]

【Host!】

The system's voice woke Ye Nianzhen from her chaotic thoughts.

[Host, you're finally awake... You were trapped in a very, very long dream! I thought you'd never wake up again.]

Ye Nianzhen wanted to speak, but it felt as if she was surrounded by a sea of ​​immense weight, the pressure was so great that she couldn't move an inch.

So she could only communicate with the system in her mind: "What's wrong? I was just injured and unconscious, it seems like less than half a day has passed, right?"

The system's anxious voice came again, but it was muffled, as if it were separated by some kind of barrier.

[Host! Don't be fooled! These are all... all...]

The system's audio produced a series of distorted noises, which eventually disappeared, leaving Ye Nianzhen with deep doubts.

Was I scammed? Or was it a dream?

What exactly does "system" mean?

These words were completely different from the system's usual silly and useless demeanor. Which side should she believe?

Wasn't she accidentally bound to the "Most Popular System," able to win over the male guests from the original novel, gain their trust and favor, and thus gather strength to achieve her revenge?

—Where did such a good thing come from?

Suddenly, a jarring voice entered her mind. The voice was cold and inorganic, yet it sounded somewhat like her own.

—Quickly remember your true situation and everything that is happening right now!

Suddenly, the wound in her abdomen began to throb with pain, and Ye Nianzhen couldn't help but cry out in pain. But soon, she realized that it wasn't just her abdomen that was in pain; her whole body was aching, especially her head, which felt like it was about to split open.

She struggled to open her eyes and saw a sky full of yellow sand. All around her were the corpses of her companions lying in a mass of corpses. Some of them died in gruesome ways, too painful to look at, while others stared blankly at the sky with their eyes wide open.

Her gaze moved upwards and she saw a pair of feet, standing arrogantly in front of the corpses scattered on the ground, the toes of their shoes unwilling to touch a speck of dirt, standing far away, indifferent as if it were none of their business.

She suddenly remembered.

She had witnessed this scene.

In countless midnight dreams, in countless sleepless nights filled with hatred and illusions.

This is... standing before them is Su Yue.

*

Ye Nianzhen remembered that there was an esper in Su Yue's camp who specialized in illusion magic. With the support of high-level magic crystals, he was able to open a large illusionary realm that could accommodate hundreds of people and whose story could last for several years.

Combining the system's intermittent words with that voice that sounded so much like her own... Could it be that everything she had experienced before was fake?

Are all those stories of a salted fish turning over a new leaf, and those memories of the characters they pursued, fake?

impossible!

Even at this moment, Ye Nianzhen still managed to find that tiny flaw connecting reality to the illusion.

That is—these characters are too real and have different personalities, and she couldn't have created them entirely through her imagination.

In other words, even if this is all part of the illusionist's environment, those people are not fake.

Their memories of adventuring and fighting together are real, and the feelings between them are real; no one can deny that.

In that case, Ye Nianzhen only needs to consider one thing: what is Su Yue and the others' purpose?

Why not just kill her? Why go through all the trouble of creating this illusion...?

Could it be that they don't want to kill her? That's impossible. It must be because they've discovered that even if they kill Ye Nianzhen again and again, she will only be reborn again and again, and she will become even stronger after her rebirth!

Therefore, they immersed Ye Nianzhen in such an illusory world where everything was developing too smoothly, in order to numb her mind and control her body until she lost the will to resist and became a useless and confused puppet forever!

She understood just one point, and then it dawned on her.

A crack appeared in the illusion, revealing her true surroundings...

It turned out that they had imprisoned her in a dungeon, surrounded by sophisticated instruments that maintained her vital signs. She was placed in a transparent round box, surrounded by a suffocating, viscous green nutrient solution, just like the seawater that squeezed her in her dreams.

So that's how it is.

She gave one last, cold look at her surroundings, including the man leaning back in his chair with a pair of cold, gold-rimmed glasses—Su Yue's strategist, the man she had almost killed in the illusion.

She was supposed to seriously injure him, but in reality, he simply sat in a chair, his gaze unfocused on the instrument in front of him, seemingly lost in thought.

There was another person in this dungeon, the one with superpowers who created the illusion.

He was also firmly bound to some strange device, which supplied him with magic crystals as if they were free, and the device, in turn, powered the ability user to use his powers, like a machine that was not allowed to rest.

I wonder if this foolish man, who acted as an accomplice to evil, had foreseen that he would end up like this, a puppet without dignity or will, a machine used by Su Yue and her group to control others. Would he still have foolishly submitted to Su Yue's irresistible charm?

Okay, the answer to this question is actually quite obvious.

Ye Nianzhen knew that with the system's support, Su Yue's charm was not something that could be easily stopped.

Except for...except for him.

A figure flashed through her mind: a man with long black hair, a tall and handsome figure, who was always by Ye Nianzhen's side, protecting her and following her.

It is... her painting spirit.

Ye Nianzhen regained consciousness only for a moment before falling into a coma again.

The strategist of Su Yue's camp, who was deep in thought, seemed to sense something was wrong. He looked up and checked, but found nothing unusual, so he turned and left the dungeon.

Meanwhile, back in the illusion, Ye Nianzhen begins a new round of planning.

Since she can't escape the illusion for the time being... and the characters in it are real to some extent, why doesn't she turn the illusion around and make use of it?

She could easily win over these characters and make them her partners in real life, until she completely isolates Su Yue, and then work together with them to break the illusion and finally defeat Su Yue!

Well... anyway, let's wake up first.

Whether what she encounters is real or illusory, she always has things she must do.

*

After willingly succumbing to the seawater that had been pressing down on her, she heard the beeping of medical equipment. A heavy head rested on her lap, and she gradually regained consciousness.

Qin Qiu, the owner of the big head, had a very keen sense of perception. He noticed Ye Nianzhen's awakening the moment she did, and excitedly got up to call for medical staff.

Ye Nianzhen stopped him, saying, "Wait, Qin Qiu."