Common sense collapses
"……Why?"
The three people uttered the same syllable at the same time, but the meaning was different.
Ximu was simply confused, Molina had a hint of meaning, and Ruixia... had an expression that looked like her worldview was beginning to collapse.
“That shouldn’t be the case…”
The young man, who had been very calm all the way, looked incredulous. He ignored everything else for a moment and rushed towards the place where the collapse should have been.
Fortunately, as soon as he moved, Xi Mu immediately grabbed him.
Being suddenly stopped like this, her briefly lost rationality finally returned - Ruixia took a breath and looked at the mechanical beast sitting on the ground, her eyes changing with each passing moment.
Ximu didn't think that the problem was entirely on Ruixia's side. Besides, a single piece of evidence could not be fully trusted, so he should try a few more times.
Looking around, Ximu wanted to kick a wooden box down to see if there were any other changes, but before he took action, an idea suddenly came to his mind without warning.
Ruixia's observation results have all been fed back by special instruments, relying on the actual flow of energy and are unlikely to be deceived by appearances... Then is there a possibility that everything they are experiencing now is itself a larger "illusion" woven based on some kind of reality?
In fact, there is a collapse here, but some superb power has deceived everyone present. As long as it is within its domain, the laws of the illusion will take precedence.
"It" says this is the complete ground, so it is the complete ground.
If that dense forest, the lake, and even the academy standing on the high ground beside the lake were all under the cover of the same power... then the mecha beasts captured in them would naturally not be able to give them the result that was more inclined to "reality".
After she revealed all her guesses, Ruixia's expression looked a little better.
"That makes sense... If this place truly exists in reality, but someone used it as a framework to create an illusion, then the misalignment between observation and reality does make sense."
After a brief collapse of faith, Ruixia recovered quickly and was obviously more accepting of this statement.
"...What about us? Are we 'outsiders' or 'insiders' right now?"
Molina listened for a while and then raised a very crucial question.
No one would have had any doubts about this question before when they were trekking outside. But now, knowing that the dangers along the way might just be a huge deception is really not easy.
"Let me try."
Since the mechanical toad doesn't count, it can only be confirmed by real "people" like them - Ximu stepped out consciously, as it was natural.
"Wrap the toad's tongue around your waist? It's safer that way."
Ximu shook his head and declined Ruixia's suggestion: "If I am considered to be one with the Mechamon because of this, then there is no point... I can do it myself."
After saying that, she tapped her heel lightly, leaving a fleeting magical mark on the spot.
This was one of the spells she used frequently. As long as she set the anchor point in advance, no matter how she moved later, as long as she did not leave the range of the spell, she could return to this place with just a thought.
Then, she concentrated her mind, calmed her body, and took a step toward the ground where the edge of the collapse should have been.
The moment the toes touched the ground, a very real touch was felt, and there was no miss or fall.
But Ximu did not relax, but continued to take many tentative steps forward - until she stopped beside the mechamon, she stretched out her hand and pressed down hard on its hard shell.
Not moving at all.
She slowly turned around, lifted the magic of instant return, and looked at Ruixia with mixed feelings.
At least from her current exploration, there is no risk of collapse unless an attack is launched.
"Uh, well... actually, this isn't such a bad thing, right? Since this so-called 'illusion' is so real, then we don't have to keep staring at those problematic areas. It doesn't matter if it collapses in reality, as long as it doesn't collapse when we leave, right?"
Seeing that Ruixia still couldn't hide her lost look, Morina didn't dare to mention other more cruel possibilities. She immediately displayed her usual optimism and initiative, and chose to comfort him from the light-hearted aspects.
"Yeah, that doesn't mean anything."
Seeing this, Ximu also walked over and racked his brains, trying to find some appropriate words from his limited vocabulary:
"If this truly is a vast illusion, and we are immersed in it, we will naturally be swept up by its laws... This doesn't mean that what you saw is wrong. Perhaps, the operating principles of mechanical engineering and magic are different, which leads to this contradiction and dislocation..."
"Yeah, you see, Ximu has spoken for such a long time, he must be speaking from the heart! Oh, it's okay, this just touches on our blind spots in knowledge, so the contradiction is difficult to resolve. If there was a serious magician among us, maybe we would have been able to explain everything by now. If you ask me, this is definitely not your problem, don't doubt yourself, ah!"
Morina followed closely, patted Ruixia on the shoulder, and almost pushed him into Ximu's arms before he was prepared.
Ruixia quickly stood still. She knew that her companions were trying to comfort her. She smiled and scratched her head, seeming a little embarrassed.
"Yes, being overly cautious is actually a bit restrictive... Morina is right. No matter what happens in reality, as long as we can walk through it, we'll be fine. Let's avoid those obviously distorted spatial vortexes and ignore the others for now."
If a problem cannot be solved immediately, it means that the time to solve it is not yet right, so just skip it.
Ruixia took out one of the scrolls given by the old man from her backpack, opened it and saw that it was the route map from the supply area to the dormitory area.
"Looking at it this way, it seems quite close?"
Morina turned her head to look at the two of them. Ruisha nodded and did not put the scroll back into the bag. Instead, she rolled it up and inserted it into her belt.
"After exiting the supply area, turn right and then go up the stairs on the left... Let's go. Given the current situation, we can only take it one step at a time."
When passing through several halls connected to the supply area, the "auditory hallucination" phenomenon that was previously encountered on the outdoor platform reappeared.
But after waiting quietly for a while, these trivial daily conversations and howling and running away quickly faded away, and it was so quiet that it seemed as if they had never appeared.
"What is this, a pre-calculation to generate new scenes?"
Ruixia even made a joke about it, and it seemed that she had indeed recovered from her previous self-doubt.
"All I can say is, if these noises aren't fake, then something truly chaotic may have occurred here."
As he spoke, Ximu had already walked to the gate of the supply area.
Perhaps because this is the servants' workplace after all, the decoration is very ordinary. The main door is just an ordinary-sized wooden door, and even the door lock is very common. There is no sign of any restrictions at all.
Moreover, perhaps because people here left in a hurry, the door was not locked at all.
Ximu gently pushed the door open a crack and looked at the corridor outside. He found that there were no windows on either side. The only lighting came from clusters of candles carved into the niches in the stone walls.
But it's not surprising. According to the geographical location, this place should still be inside the rock wall, and it would probably be difficult to introduce natural light... Only when they go to the ground building will their view be wider.
After confirming that there was no problem for the time being, Ximu nodded to the back.
Thanks to the use of some special door-pushing techniques, this wooden door, which was not very old, did not make any sound during the opening process.
Morina, who was still protected in the middle, was amazed and quickly avoided an inconspicuous space distortion on the side of the road.
Their tacit understanding was undeniable. After walking quietly for a distance, the only staircase soon appeared before them.
To be honest, the combination of the narrow passage, the dim firelight and the long stairs did not make Ximu and Ruixia have any good associations.
After they exchanged knowing smiles, Ximu still took the lead.
But as soon as she stepped onto the first step, her movements suddenly stopped.
The two people at the back immediately became alert and retreated quickly. After all, the terrain at the stairs was too cramped, making it inconvenient for both fighting and escaping.
Ximu obviously thought so too, so he did not attack immediately when he saw the other party, but slowly retreated and returned to the corridor.
The person coming down from upstairs is a person.
It should be a person - at least judging from the limbs and appearance, this is a normal magician wearing a magic robe and holding a magic wand.
There's nothing much to say about a magician appearing in a magic academy, but...
Ximu had never heard of any magician with such messy facial features.
It was roughly a human face, but each organ was not where it should be.
The mouth is on the forehead, the nose is on the right side of the ear, one eye is on the chin, and the other one seems to have found the right position and is trying hard to climb up to the eye socket - but after finally moving up, it finds that it is the right eye, but it has climbed into the eye socket of the left eye.
This man is like a wax figure that has melted and is trying to reconstruct itself, but perhaps he has long forgotten what he should have looked like. No matter how he adjusts, he cannot accurately reproduce his original appearance.
Even the fingers, nails, and knuckles that were exposed from the robe were struggling to adjust their positions... He was still able to hold the staff in his hand, which really showed that he loved magic deeply.
Seeing that the person coming was so abnormal, Xi Mu really didn't want to provoke him, but the human figure that was originally moving forward strangely did not seem to have completely lost the ability to recognize. When one of its eyes swept over them, it actually stopped and turned its head tremblingly towards them.
"Any enemy outside, release them alive... release them, capture them, and kill them!"
After spitting out a bunch of broken words that were completely unrecognizable, the strange magician turned around staggeringly and suddenly swung his staff violently. Several rays of light instantly fell like meteors, attacking them mercilessly!
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