————————

At the same time, underground parking lot.

The door of the car next to Tang Erda's parking space was slowly pushed open.

Mu Sicheng and the other two who had been waiting behind got off the car. They walked to the elevator very quickly and watched Tang Er get in. The elevator quickly descended and finally stopped at the -4 position.

They looked at each other, Liu Jiayi used Su Yang's work ID to open the elevator, and then pressed the -4 button.

Liu Jiayi's eyes were fixed on the red alarm that kept flashing in the elevator. Mu Sicheng's face turned dark as if it could be touched by gray, while Mu Ke remained silent.

"Tsk." Mu Sicheng let out a breath of anger that had been held in his chest while he was listening to the conversation between Tang Erda and Bai Liu in the car. "Can I beat up this Tang guy later?"

"Did he say anything wrong?" Liu Jiayi asked indifferently.

Mu Sicheng was choked - in a sense, this Tang guy was right... Bai Liu was a bad guy from head to toe, with every hair revealing evil...

But it’s just... quite unpleasant!

"But he's right, so what? I'm upset too." Liu Jiayi looked away from the alarm, wrinkled her nose, and a rare childish look appeared on her face. "I'll do my best to buy you some time, so you can beat me up for my upset as well."

Mu Sicheng was stunned for a moment, then raised his lips and said, "OK."

——————————

On the fourth underground floor, Bai Liu quickly shuttled between different passages.

On both sides of the passage are peculiarly shaped metal rooms with numbers written on them. They are all painted in a similar style and occasionally make all kinds of weird noises. If you walk in there for a long time, it feels like you are walking in a maze. It is very difficult to get out on your own without a map.

To make matters worse, there are patrolmen at every corner.

Although there are few patrol officers, their arrangement is very scientific, which makes it difficult for Bai Liu to enter the game smoothly. His attempts to enter the game are always interrupted by patrol officers who suddenly turn the corner.

This made Bai Liu realize that this patrol layout was most likely designed by Tang Erda specifically to target [players].

Under the patrol of these ordinary people, it is difficult for [players] to easily enter the game.

Tang Erda first used the [Magic Space] to make a small cage for Bai Liu. After Bai Liu escaped from this small cage, he would enter a larger mobile cage set up by these patrolmen.

Bai Liu leaned against the wall, regulating his breathing and preparing for one last try.

Bai Liu took out the coin on the chain and prepared to enter the game, but when he was about to call out the system, a patrolman turned the corner at the other end of his passage. Bai Liu had to put down the coin and turn into another passage.

As expected, these turning point patrol officers are equivalent to a disruptive device.

Bai Liu ran quickly as the patrolman behind him chased him. He glanced at the numbers of the rooms on the left and right - 1097, 1096...

The room number that Bai Liu escaped from was 006, and now it has reached more than one thousand, but he did not see all the numbers in the entire process. It felt like he took a shortcut to a certain room.

...It was not an illusion. These patrolmen were intentionally driving him to a room with a certain number.

Bai Liu's footsteps stopped at another corner, his eyes stopped at the end of the corridor, and he was driven into a dead end.

The room at the end of the dead end is numbered [1087].

Tang Er, who was watching all this through the surveillance camera, raised his communication device and gave a cruel order: "Every patrolman, put on your breathing masks. I will turn on the waterproof mode and then open the door of the room named [Swallowing Spring] in heresy [1087]. I will enter the underwater mode soon. Everyone, please be prepared--"

“——3, 2——”

The small windows of the metal doors of the rooms around Bai Liu snapped shut one after another. The doors of each small room sank and pushed outward, tightly forming two smooth metal walls of the corridor. The patrolman opposite him was putting on a transparent breathing mask, and the last sound of the countdown came from the communicator -

“——1.”

The door behind Bai Liu [1087] was slowly opened.

The clear, endless spring water surged out, and the rushing torrent and splashing water were reflected in Bai Liu's eyes as he turned back, sweeping him away in an instant.

——————

elevator room.

The surveillance system in the elevator was smashed by Mu Sicheng as soon as they entered.

Mu Sicheng was a little nervous: "Is there surveillance inside this base? Hey, do we need to hide from the surveillance or something..."

"It's not necessary after we enter the base." Liu Jiayi said indifferently, "Our goal is to sneak in and quickly take Bai Liu into the game. Avoiding surveillance will slow us down. Let them take pictures if they want. I don't care."

Mu Ke quickly said, "I don't care."

"...Fuck, but I still have to take the final exam..." Mu Sicheng was a little depressed, "Can I take the exam in prison if I'm wanted? I don't want to make up for it..."

Liu Jiayi pretended not to hear Mu Sicheng's complaints and looked at the two people: "Let's review the plan again. We don't know the situation inside, and we don't have a map. In order to avoid being caught, we implement a coordinate jumping mechanism, which means that if someone wants to catch you, you enter the game."

"After entering the game, you will get a 12-digit coordinate number for logging in. When the three of us enter the game at the same time and meet, we will exchange the dangerous coordinates with each other, then exchange the coordinates, and then go back to the original coordinates and merge them. In this way, we will not get separated and can also obtain a path curve."

"The three of us started from three mutually perpendicular directions, which are equivalent to the z-axis, y-axis, and x-axis of the three-dimensional coordinate axis. We determined different coordinate points in different directions, and then connected them with the original coordinate points. After several times, we can restore a complete path curve."

Liu Jiayi gestured between the three of them with her hands: "Buildings all have rules. Once we have the approximate curve of the building, we can restore a rough map. Do you understand?"

"I see." Mu Ke thought for a second or two, "I have a good memory. I can help you restore the entire map using coordinate points."

Mu Sicheng looked expressionless: "..."

What the hell is this?! He hasn’t learned about coordinate systems since he graduated from college!

Liu Jiayi squinted at Mu Sicheng and asked, "Did you not understand?"

Mu Sicheng lowered his head depressedly and admitted: "Yeah."

The elevator made a "ding" sound, indicating that it had arrived.

Liu Jiayi turned around and looked at the elevator door calmly: "It's okay if you don't understand. Just follow my instructions."

She turned to the elevator door that was opening, and gave an order in a low voice: "Prepare to attack. There are usually people guarding the elevator door."

The elevator door slowly opened and water rushed in. Liu Jiayi quickly climbed onto Mu Sicheng's shoulders to avoid being drowned. She frowned as she watched the swaying waves rushing into the elevator.

The two patrolmen who were guarding the elevator door poked their heads in and said, "Are you from the second team that was urgently recruited to capture Heretic No. 006? Remember to wear your breathing masks. We are using water to capture—"

Their eyes quickly fell on Liu Jiayi, a child who obviously shouldn't be here.

"You are not team members--?!" The two patrolmen raised their communicators in surprise and prepared to report, "Report, someone sneaked in--!" The fourth floor underground of the base!

Before they could finish their words, Mu Sicheng and Mu Ke, who were hiding near the door, grabbed them by the neck, dragged them in, and put them down neatly.

Mu Sicheng took off the clothes and mask communicators of the two patrolmen and handed them to Mu Ke. They stood in the swaying water that half-submerged their bodies and changed their clothes with difficulty. Then they put their own clothes on the two patrolmen and put them into the elevator.

Mu Ke pressed the -1 button, and the two patrolmen who were knocked unconscious, wearing his and Mu Sicheng's clothes, leaned against the elevator wall in an unconscious state and went up as the elevator door closed.

A questioning voice came from the communicator: "Hello?! What's the situation with the intruder?!"

Mu Ke took the communicator handed to him by Mu Sicheng and continued to report: "We found two unidentified intruders at the elevator entrance. We immediately drove them away. They are taking the elevator to escape to the -1 floor!"

After saying that, Mu Ke turned off the communicator.

Mu Sicheng came out of the elevator carrying Liu Jiayi. He shook off the water on his hands and frowned as he looked at the water that had almost reached his shoulders: "What's going on with all this water?"

"We need to change the plan." Liu Jiayi took off her goggles. Her expression was cold. "Someone is using water to trap Bai Liu. Bai Liu and I played a game once. He has a special aversion to water. I think it is very likely that someone is using water to torture Bai Liu and make him confess something. We need to hurry."

Mu Sicheng's expression also changed. He looked at Liu Jiayi on his shoulder: "Why so fast?"

Liu Jiayi looked around, she looked at the gaps between the doors in the closed corridors: "Someone converted this floor into a sealed environment, and then released water to drown the escaping Bai Liu, but this also made this interconnected corridor environment look like a sewer."

Liu Jiayi lowered her head and "looked" at the shaking water: "Bai Liu should be near the outlet of these sewer pipes, so we can find him faster without using the more complicated coordinate system method before."

"I understand." Mu Ke responded quickly, "Use water flow, right?"

Liu Jiayi nodded: "Yes, use water flow."

"No..." Mu Sicheng interrupted the conversation between the two people humiliatingly, "Can you guys occasionally say something that someone with an IQ of 74 can understand?"

Liu Jiayi said speechlessly: "What this means is that we can determine the location of the water outlet by the direction and sound of the water flow, and then find Bai Liu."

"How do you tell?" Mu Sicheng still didn't understand. "There's no way to pinpoint it, right? The water flow here looks messy, it's not just a small stream..."

Liu Jiayi handed the goggles to Mu Sicheng and interrupted him: "Hold it for me."

Mu Sicheng took it in confusion, then Liu Jiayi took a deep breath and dived into the water. In less than a second, she floated up again, pointed in a direction, then turned her head and "looked" in the direction of Mu Sicheng with a little disgust, as if she didn't want to spend more time explaining these to this fool.

"I can tell where you are in the water by the sound and direction of the water flow." Liu Jiayi made a follow-me gesture, "and because the water flow is blocked where you are standing, it will flow back around you, making a sound. I can also use this to tell if there is anyone in front of me."

Mu Ke looked at Mu Sicheng and sympathetically explained to the still dizzy Mu Sicheng: "It's just like a fish uses the somatosensory lateral lines on its abdomen to identify the direction of the water flow."

Liu Jiayi nodded: "That's about what I mean."

"How come you can even do this?!" Mu Sicheng looked at Liu Jiayi who was rising and falling in the water in surprise and uncertainty, "Hey! This is the real world! Are you a human or a monster?! This is considered a superpower!"

Liu Jiayi did not answer Mu Sicheng's words, but just rolled her eyes at him, turned around and swam into the water freely like a fish into water.

The reason she can do this is because she was born blind, and her senses are several levels more sensitive than normal people.

Another thing is that she is already used to living in the water like a fish.

When she was a child, Liu Jiayi was often thrown into the pond by her father to catch fish. In order to catch enough fish so that the man would show mercy and let her go, Liu Jiayi gradually evolved the perception ability like fish in order to chase those cunning fish that drilled holes in the mud.

She had always hated this ability she had, but not this moment.

"No matter who made the decision to release the water." Liu Jiayi touched her face, shook off the water droplets on her hands, and floated in the water. Her tone was calm and cold. "When he was about to use this water to torture Bai Liu, it also made it easier for a blind man like me to use the water to find him."

——————————

"—148, 149, 150—OK, drain."

The door of room [1087] was closed, and the walls on both sides of the corridor were loose, allowing water to overflow from the gaps in the walls.

Bai Liu emerged from the water with a cough.

He knelt on the ground with his head lowered, hunched over and coughed hard, his white shirt getting wet and sticking to his trembling shoulders.

Bai Liu's skin would reveal an inorganic white after being soaked in water. Due to lack of oxygen, his fingertips were even blue and purple, and his chest was heaving violently. The three-minute long suffocation experience made him completely exhausted.

Soon Bai Liu became paralyzed. He fell on his back with his mouth wide open and his eyes blurred, trying hard to catch the hard-earned oxygen with his lungs.

But it felt as if all the oxygen could no longer enter his lungs through heavy breathing, and Bai Liu looked like he was about to go into shock.

"How does it feel to soak in water for three minutes? Are you used to it?"

Tang Erda's voice came slowly from the communicator in the hand of the patrolman at the end of the corridor: "It is said that the person who can hold his breath the longest in the world can hold it for thirteen minutes. Do you want to try it, Bai Liu?"

"Does it remind you of any bad memories?" Tang Er said in a low voice, "Have you thought about how to explain the plan to Rose Ganyewas?"

"Death can't make you compromise. You are not afraid of death, so I won't threaten you with death. Now I give you two choices. First, tell me the solution to Rose Ganyewas. I will give you a satisfactory amount of money. If you don't regret it and do what you should do, we will not interfere with you anymore."

"The second option is that I lock you up with this [Swallowing Spring]. I will drain the water from you every one and a half to three minutes. You won't die, but you will have to stay in the water the whole time. You should be familiar with this feeling of suffocation, right?"

Tang Erda chuckled with an ambiguous tone, and then lowered his voice: "After all, the director of the private welfare home liked to educate you like this. You are too bad. You have been extremely bad since you were a child. She wanted to lead you back to the right path, so she often educated you like this."

"It's a pity that no matter how harshly she educates you, you don't change at all, and you don't show any expression. As a person who likes to torture others, Bai Liu, you should understand that educating a child like this will make people feel unfulfilled." Tang Erda dragged out the last note, he was so calm as if he was coaching a death row prisoner.

Bai Liu put his arms over his eyes to block the glaring white light from the overhead lamp, and his breathing became increasingly weak.

Tang Erda continued: "So she tried many methods, and finally found a way of torture that you would struggle with, which is to make yourself -"

Tang Erda was interrupted. It was the voice of Lu Yizhang who was struggling hard. He shouted at the top of his lungs, trying to drown out Tang Erda's voice and stop him from continuing: "Stop talking! He has already forgotten it! Don't let him remember it again!"

But Tang Erda raised his voice and continued speaking coldly. His voice was like an extremely sharp thorn, piercing into Bai Liu's brain, which was still blank and drowsy after suffocation.

Bai Liu frowned rarely. He subconsciously rejected what Tang Erda was saying. This rejection even made his head hurt as if it was about to split.

"Have you forgotten everything, Shiroku?! No one pushed you into the water! You were the one who kept burying your head in the water!!"

"Because someone took the blame for the bad things you did, someone accepted the punishment from those teachers to protect you, but those teachers failed when they punished him, and he was repeatedly pressed under the water, and was tortured to the point of drowning in the pond of the orphanage."

"His body was at the bottom of the water and you kept putting your head down to look at his body at the bottom of the water, trying to pull him out."

Tang Erda's tone sank to the bottom: "——Bai Liu, why are you afraid of water? You are not afraid of water at all, you are afraid of seeing the body in the water. Do you still remember who he is?!"

Lu Yizhan struggled with all his strength to stop Tang Erda, his voice was heartbreaking: "Don't tell him!!!"

Tang Erda said in a low voice: "His original name was Xie Ta, but in this timeline, you forgot about him and mistook him for Lu Yizhan."

"Do you still remember the face of Sheta that you saw when you were drowning? Was it by your side, accompanying you, or staring at you from the bottom of the water?"

"Really, Sheta has died for you, remember this!"

Thank you...ta...?

Amid the suffocating feeling of near death, Bai Liu saw a dazzling white light.

Countless memories flashed in the white light, which Bai Liu had long since forgotten, whether intentionally or unintentionally trying to avoid.

Memories turned into fragments and came pouring in in the white light, as if they were a torn-up picture book, scattered into pieces, black and white, or the edges of color pages, with fragments of the silhouette of another person he had forgotten.

Then, with Tang Erda's cold voice, these originally blurred or forgotten memory corners were pieced together again in Bai Liu's mind, page by page, and then like a revolving lantern before a person's death, they began to replay frame by frame in front of his eyes, with the noise of long-gone years.

Human memory can deceive its owner.

When you are unable to bear the intense emotions contained in your memory, the memory will considerately correct itself, allowing the owner to pretend nothing has happened and continue to live peacefully with a disguise.

To put it simply, it is deceiving oneself and others.

The memory was automatically cut into a form that Bai Liu could accept and stored in Bai Liu's brain. It would not easily change back to its original form until the last moment.

The honest and simple face of Lu Yizhang was erased in the white light of distant memory and turned into another face, one that was both familiar and unfamiliar to Bai Liu.

The facial structure was beautiful, but he always seemed to let his long, somewhat curly hair hang down to cover his eyes. However, his exposed lips were still beautiful and delicate, making for a very eye-catching look.

He turned his head from his forgotten memories and looked at Bai Liu, and called his name softly, Bai Liu, long time no see.