Chapter 494 Strange Reappearance 1
"I suggest you introduce yourself first," I said. "Introducing yourself is basic courtesy in interpersonal communication, and you agree with that, right?"
The cartographer's gaze toward the young man grew increasingly dangerous. The young man seemed to vaguely realize his predicament and hesitated before answering, "My name is... my name is Sandalwood. Yes, Sandalwood."
"Sandalwood?" The cartographer looked at the young man with a threatening gaze. "Are you sure that's your name?"
"This is my online nickname... uh..."
Sandalwood realized he had let something slip after it had already been said, and quickly covered his mouth.
This isn't to blame him for being careless with his words; the cartographer clearly possessed a far more powerful soul than him. Faced with the pressure of a stronger soul, an ordinary person would easily lose their footing.
This difference isn't limited to interactions between ordinary people and witchers; even mortals with exceptionally strong wills can exert this influence on others. Those who don't understand the underlying reasons might vaguely summarize it as "the aura of a great person."
In secular society, people in high positions can often exert this influence on ordinary people. However, in most cases, it's not because those in high positions possess a stronger soul, but rather because those in a weaker position unconsciously belittle their own souls first. If one is unaware of the other person's higher social status, one can remain calm and composed.
In a sense, it shares a similar concept with the impermanent law of heaven and earth. However, due to its excessive primitiveness and simplicity, it can be used in the chaotic, post-apocalyptic land. I can use it now, but because it simply and brutally applies mental pressure to the opponent, like the "powerful aura" in a battle manga, I can't expect to create anything fancy.
"Online nickname..."
The draftsman pronounced the word unfamiliarly, then loosened his grip on the steel pipe.
The reason the other party would use such a pseudonym is most likely because the cartographer gives off a first impression that is too much like a gangster. A normal person would certainly not want to reveal their real information to such a person.
"Does that mean he passed?" I asked.
The cartographer said with an experienced tone, "You passed. If you're so consumed by madness that you forget your own name, your mind might even become so muddled that you can't come up with a nickname for yourself."
"Um... what exactly is this 'doomsday' you were talking about..." Tanxiang weakly raised her hand.
The cartographer gave a brief explanation, and Sandalwood was immediately dumbfounded, exclaiming incredulously, "The nation... even human civilization has been destroyed? And it's been destroyed for a very long time!? You must be lying to me, it's only been a few hours!?"
"So, where were you and what were you doing a few hours ago, as you mentioned?" I asked curiously.
"A few hours ago... I was at home, lying in bed playing on my phone..."
Tanxiang revealed an expression of desperately trying to recall, as if he had accidentally fallen into a terrifying nightmare and was trying to use his memories of living in the real world to prove the irrationality of his current situation.
"I had just finished dinner, and it was already dark outside. While using my phone, I saw a notification from my shopping app that my package had been delivered, saying it was at a nearby pickup station. It was a mouse; my old one had stopped working, so I got a new one. I wanted to pick it up before the pickup station closed, so I went downstairs..."
"I was walking down the street and playing on my phone. When I looked up, I realized that it had become very dark around me. The neighborhood was also dark, which was very different from usual."
"I was wondering if there was a power outage in the neighborhood, so I turned on my phone's flashlight to illuminate the surroundings. Suddenly, I saw a... no, I should say a bug? in the roadside green belt. The bug looked like a large dog, and it seemed to be stimulated by the light from me. It jumped up and bit my shoulder..."
"I was terrified. After shaking off the bug, I kept running away. As I ran, the surrounding scenery became more and more dilapidated and eerie. I even passed by an abandoned amusement park along the way. I also saw several particularly terrifying monsters on the road. I tried my best to hide so that they wouldn't find me. Later, I didn't even dare to take out my phone, afraid that the light would expose me."
"However, I lost that phone later because when I tried to call the police, I found that the photo of my crush that I had set as my desktop background suddenly became terrifying. The face in the photo looked like a ghost, covered in blood, and blood kept flowing out of the screen... Who would dare to keep holding that?"
"Then I came to this place and encountered that monster that looked like ink. I thought I could hide in a corner and not make a sound, but heaven knows how it found me."
"I had no choice but to run for my life, and that's when I ran into you all..."
His memories sounded quite coherent, unlike someone who had lost their memory.
The cartographer fell into thought, then spoke to Tanxiang again, posing several keywords such as "blessing," "karmic demon," and "madness," asking if he remembered these terms. Tanxiang looked blank and shook his head at them all.
"That's strange. Even if someone has lost a lot of memories, they should still have a faint impression of these words," the cartographer said.
Madness can erase memories of events, but it's difficult to erase memories of knowledge. If the two are intertwined, the latter might be erased, but not to the point of complete oblivion. I had previously claimed to remember nothing, but later demonstrated some understanding of the apocalyptic era, which surprised the cartographer, probably partly due to this.
“I understand! It seems you were in the period right after the apocalypse began…” The cartographer seemed to have figured it out. “When my companions and I were struggling to survive, we passed through some very special places. They were places in the future, long after the apocalypse, where the chaos of time and space was so great that even the most basic laws of physics could not be maintained.”
"Since there are places in the 'future far in the future,' there must also be places very close to the time of the apocalypse. Although they are rare, I've heard that people who come out of there think the apocalypse has just happened, or they don't even realize that the apocalypse is coming... You must be that type, right?"
"Huh?" Sandalwood couldn't accept it.
I've heard similar things from Mazao before; in other words, Sandalwood is "someone who has just entered the apocalyptic era."
But is it really as the cartographer described?
"Sandalwood, in your memory, what year is it now?" I asked.
Sandalwood hesitated before saying, "Two or five years...?"
2025, which means it was the same year I lived before I traveled to the apocalyptic era.
It was just a matter of answering a year; there was no need for him to be so hesitant. However, it seems that the series of strange experiences had made him strongly doubt the reality he was encountering.
Sandalwood looked at the cartographer, who seemed to understand his gaze and said, "Don't ask me what year the apocalypse will come; nobody knows that."
In my past era, the apocalypse was predicted to occur "within the next ten years." While it's unclear which year within those ten years, two to five years is still a considerable distance from the apocalypse. Since it's outside the apocalyptic radius, the cartographer's definition of sandalwood becomes contradictory.
However, the apocalyptic era itself is filled with all sorts of bizarre forces that transcend the logic of time narratives. Perhaps even a period of two to five years, which seems out of place, is actually within the apocalyptic era's influence. You know, even I have the power to rewrite history; it would be inconceivable if an apocalyptic world-destroying event couldn't do that.
Perhaps the ambiguity in the doomsday prophecies regarding the timing of the apocalypse is due to the fact that the apocalypse may have the characteristic of swallowing things up in reverse from the upstream of the river of time.
At the same time, I thought of amnesia.
In the past, Ma Zao and I have suspected more than once that the souls of people with amnesia may have traveled through time to the post-apocalyptic era, and Tan Xiang's experience seems to partially fit the definition of time travel.
Could it be that Tanxiang simply thought he had time-traveled while going downstairs to pick up a package, but in reality, he unknowingly entered a state of amnesia while lying in bed playing on his phone, and his soul was captured by the apocalypse?
Could the bizarre phenomenon of "loss of soul" occurring in the modern world be seen as an invasion of the upper reaches of the river of time by the apocalypse?
If this is true, how can we explain the connection between the afterlife and the apocalypse? Meizuo has said that Asaho's apocalyptic dream was exactly the same as the afterlife; even the architecture of the Fukuinin church looked like Mount Rasen, which had been located in the afterlife over a hundred years ago…
As I pondered, the draftsman turned to Sandalwood and asked, "Can we see the soles of your shoes?"
Although he didn't understand, the latter still lifted his foot. He was wearing sneakers, and the pattern on the soles matched the shoe print we had been tracking. There was no mistake, Sandalwood was the owner of that shoe print.
After confirming the diagnosis, the cartographer nodded, stepped forward to examine Tanxiang's wound, and then took out disinfectant and bandages from his backpack to treat and bandage the wound. Although Tanxiang said that his wound was caused by a giant insect bite, fortunately, the insect did not seem to have any venomous abilities; otherwise, he probably wouldn't have made it to us.
"I want to invite Sandalwood to join us, Zhuang Cheng, what do you think?" the cartographer said, indiscriminately.
While Sandalwood may lack combat prowess and doesn't seem like a particularly brave character, in the post-apocalyptic world, simply having an extra person is of great significance.
The cartographers' group was just a stopover for me, so I had no objection to it; in fact, the cartographers didn't need to consult me at all. So I nodded, and the cartographer turned to Sandalwood and formally extended an invitation: "Then, you can come with us from here."
Sandalwood, seemingly unwilling to fall into a hopeless situation of isolation again, hurriedly agreed to the cartographer: "Okay...okay! Thank you!"
Sandalwood joined our team.
“Well then, let’s go back,” the cartographer said. “Hopefully we can get back to the safe house soon.”
I also hope to meet the cartographer's partner soon and ask him for clues about the small bowl.
We started moving again, and before we had gone far, and before we had even left the school area, I heard a familiar sound coming from afar.
It was the sound of unusually nervous footsteps, like walking on muddy ground.
(End of this chapter)
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