Escape from Paradise (XVI)
"future?"
Xu Wei held his breath.
"These are your words. For me, the future does not exist."
"Does the universe have no future?" She frowned.
"No, in your eyes, time is a line that goes from the past to the future and never stops. But in my group, time does not exist. The past, present, and future are all going on at the same time."
Xu Wei was confused: "I don't quite understand."
"Of course you can't understand. If you can directly understand what I mean, then you will also belong to my group." His voice was wrapped in a layer of strange fluctuations, like the ripples caused by water drops falling into the lake. "However, since your question is indeed a little unexpected to me, I am happy to answer it for you."
"You can think of me as an infinitely huge creature. My size, thinking, and abilities are infinitely beyond your cognition. In my eyes, the past, present, and future are happening at the same time, without any distinction between the first and the last. I can go to every place in time and touch any time node at will."
"Similarly, no matter what time period it is, I only appear to you as a part of me. Of course, this is not my problem, but you, as a human being, lack the eyes to recognize my whole self."
Xu Wei's thoughts followed him around in a big circle and finally returned to the starting point.
He kept silent about questions about the future of the Earth, and instead talked about what kind of being he was.
She had seen a movie about aliens coming to Earth. After the heroine understood the aliens' language, she learned their way of thinking and was no longer bound by the form of time and space. It sounds a bit obscure, but to sum it up - the way of thinking seems to affect the form of biological existence in some sense.
Just as the male voice said, his way of thinking is completely different from that of humans. He is a creature that is not affected by the concept of time and can even manipulate time at will. On the contrary, as a human, Xu Wei can never observe his whole body, as if he lacks some racial ability.
A concept suddenly popped into her mind.
"Are you a higher-dimensional being?"
He seemed a little surprised, and even thought about it for a while before he said slowly: "Your intelligence and sharpness make me understand why the universe chose humans. High-dimensional creatures, this term is much more appropriate."
Xu Wei had been exposed to science fiction stories sporadically for a while, and also understood some scientific concepts. The one-dimensional world refers to a space with only length, two-dimensional world adds the concept of width, and three-dimensional world has three dimensions: length, width, and height. From the perspective of existence, humans are three-dimensional creatures, but if the concept of time is added, it constitutes a four-dimensional world. There has always been controversy in the scientific community as to whether humans belong to the three-dimensional or the four-dimensional world.
However, superstring theory believes that the highest dimension of the universe is eleven dimensions - above humans, there may be many incomprehensible existences.
Low-dimensional creatures cannot understand what the high-dimensional world is like, just as humans with only three dimensions of length, width and height cannot imagine what would happen if the world were to have another dimension other than time. In a sense, this inability to imagine is very similar to a fable that has been passed down from generation to generation - the frog at the bottom of the well, who is constrained by objective factors, can only see the world at the mouth of the well.
In contrast, some theories hold that higher-dimensional creatures can manipulate lower-dimensional worlds and even disrupt the time and history of the lower worlds.
It coincides with what the male voice said.
This is not good news, as it means that humanity’s enemy – “it” – is also a higher-dimensional creature.
Xu Wei was depressed: "If all this is true, I think the contribution of interstellar civilization cannot be described by just one word, 'great'."
She couldn't imagine how a low-dimensional civilization had the courage to initiate a decisive battle against high-dimensional creatures. This was not a difference in parallel strength at all, but a crushing defeat on the plane, and the fate of "superiority" and "inferiority" was determined at birth.
But they actually did it.
"Okay little girl, it sounds like the questions in your mind haven't diminished, but it's almost time, and your friends are still waiting for you."
His voice appeared suddenly and disappeared very quickly.
Xu Wei finally realized that the noise around her had stopped without her noticing. The scene of the spiders struggling stopped at the moment she used her skills, and even the gymnastics song stopped before the male voice spoke. At this moment, she seemed to have never been in the underground palace of Paradise, but was thrown into the empty, cold and dark universe, with only the ruins of stars that had been silent for thousands of years.
At this moment, she finally believed everything the man said.
There was a slight friction sound in the air, as if someone snapped his fingers in the void, and everything around was paused, regaining its vitality.
The sharp whistle that pierced her eardrums was still ringing in her ears. The water droplets that had been hanging above her head for a long time finally dripped onto her neck. The coolness they aroused awakened her numb consciousness, and she felt the rope around her waist twitching slightly.
She raised her head and looked Lu Fanye in the eye. Li Xia and Fu Fenglou were lying on the edge of the cocoon, looking down curiously.
All this seemed to have happened in just a few minutes.
She felt quite strange at the moment. The experience just now refreshed her understanding of the world, but when she came into contact with it again, the world in front of her could not be fully integrated with her new understanding, causing her thoughts to be surprisingly confused, and even with an inexplicable indifference.
He pulled the rope, indicating that the situation below was under control.
Not long after, the three of them came down together.
Li Xia started to make noises as soon as she landed: "Why were you stunned for a moment when you went down just now? I thought you were tricked again."
As he spoke, he shook the little crown ghost in his hand with its mouth sealed with tape.
After using the props to meet up with Lu Fanye and the others, everyone made a brief calculation, and with Xu Wei using the skill illusion on the little ghost, the culprit was locked. Li Xia immediately took out the treasured sealing tape and tied it tightly.
The brain finally lets go of the sense of commonality with other people and regains independent consciousness.
Xu Wei didn't say anything. She glanced at Lu Fanye and said, "My songs can be played on repeat. Let's go to the center pit and get the remaining toys back."
There are seven blind box toys, one is lost outside, and the other six fall into the central pit that continuously produces spiders. The toy they picked up can create an illusion and bring them to the nest. The process is quite consistent with the nature of the game.
Thus, with Xu Wei as the center of the circle and the four people's stride as the circumference, a circular vacuum area moved inwards by the dense black spider swarm. Wherever the spiders passed, they died at the hands of Fu Fenglou, leaving behind a pile of corpses. After everyone passed by, they were eaten by other spiders of the same kind who swarmed over and continued to cover the area.
The spiders around were clamoring, but they were unable to break into the circle. They either couldn't control themselves and started doing some weird gymnastics, or they were killed by the knife before they could get close.
"Xiao Lou, cut more. I guess this will count as a share after you figure out the cost." Xu Wei encouraged.
"Okay, sister."
Fu Fenglou wielded his sword even harder.
Li Xia: "How do you know it will add extra points? Are you a spy sent by the system?"
As he spoke, the attack of the item in his hand accelerated, and finally, he began to compete with Fu Fenglou for the nearby monsters.
Xu Wei turned around and saw Lu Fanye falling at the end: "Why don't you try? You can earn points. Maybe you can collect enough money to buy a house by walking all the way."
Lu Fanye paused, then gently put his hand down, and glanced at the two people fighting in front of him: "I'm the eldest brother, so I won't fight with them."
"What? You really admit that you are this guy's big brother? I don't trust him as much as I trust Zhang Yuan," Xu Wei bumped his chest with her shoulder, "Don't tell me you stayed up there for a few minutes. You two really have become good buddies. Li Shaodong is waiting for you to go back and read comics together."
"It's just an excuse. Go back and tell me what happened down there?"
"Okay, okay, nothing can be hidden from you, old man."
When she reached the center of the pit, Xu Wei realized that it was much deeper than she had expected. It was completely dark, and she couldn't see how deep it was. Six blind box toys were hanging two or three meters from the hole, and spiders kept crawling out from the side.
Fu Fenglou lit an ordinary burning stick and threw it down. The tiny flame was pitifully small in the deep cave, and it fell infinitely until it was extinguished without illuminating the expected bottom of the cave.
Considering the strength of pulling people up and the nearby spiders' eager eyes, Xu Wei and Lu Fanye stayed on top. This greatly affected the newborn spiders that were climbing up. There were spiders that kept climbing to the edge and touching the radio gymnastics. They kicked their hairy limbs, disconnected from the cave wall, and fell down.
Fu Fenglou and Li Shaodong, one was responsible for chopping the spider while the other held the toy, and they completed the task without any danger.
Holding seven toys, the four of them quickly left the nest, and it took them a lot of effort to find the correct exit.
When we arrived at the blind box store, the boss smiled and narrowed his eyes: "We have a hidden model, and you have ordinary models. Why don't we go there again while we still have time?"
It was already five o'clock in the afternoon, and there was only one hour left before the next round of card rain. If I entered the underground palace again, it would be difficult to get out before the card rain fell.
The blind box toys that the four people received were indeed all ordinary models, and even two of the crown ghosts were repeated.
Fu Fenglou drew his sword and said, "Is it not possible to have seven in total? We don't have to accept this death."
The boss smiled and said, "Of course not. This is the treasure of the store. Even if you threaten me, I can't do anything. The mission will not be completed."
Xu Wei looked at Lu Fanye. When they got the blind box toys just now, they found the duplication. They were going to search in the underground maze again. After he touched the toys one by one, he affirmatively asked to leave the underground maze first. The mission has been completed.
Lu Fanye took the crown ghost from Fu Fenglou's hand and weighed it repeatedly: "In the underground palace, this coat seems to be unable to be torn off."
He slowly tore open the leather shell of the little ghost, revealing the new interior, which was a dark black cloud-shaped cartoon toy. Apart from its appearance that showed it was a cloud, there was no decoration at all.
As a hidden model, it’s a pity to waste the other cute and exquisite little ghosts.
Throwing the seven toys to the boss together, Xu Wei looked at the task list with satisfaction and ticked the box.
"What a fool! You put two identical ones there to make us suspicious, and then we waste time looking for them, and then we find nothing," Li Xia glared at the squinting boss and slapped the counter. "I was wondering why they felt different to the touch, and we had to leave the underground palace to tear them apart. If we didn't think of trying again, would we have to be coaxed by you to go again?"
"You don't want to open this store anymore, right?"
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
