Doomsday Wonderland

Chapter 316: Two Choices

Even though Lin Sanjiu was aware that she didn’t have the best of luck, she couldn’t help sighing during the long journey from Cape Howling to Free District. Staring out of the window, there was only the dark blue ocean. She was already tired of this unchanging scenery. A few days ago, they flew above a forest of sea stacks, over a cluster of volcanos of all sizes, and over a vast stretch filled with the empty shells of dead Red Nautili. Thereafter, the only scenery which remained was just the vast, boundless ocean.

The few days felt extremely long for Lin Sanjiu, probably because she had to keep her guard up against Soulsqn all the time. Surprisingly, Soulsqn had been exceptionally quiet. She showed no sign of rebellion and did not even try to use her illusions on Jade and Marlon. Yet, that was precisely what made Lin Sanjiu feel even more high-strung and cautious.

AYU’s abdomen had shrunk significantly compared to when she first boarded the airship. From the looks of it, the Souls within her body had already slowly reverted back to their primitive states. Ironically, AYU looked even more unsightly with a loose flap of skin covering her abdominal area after the over-stretched human skin suddenly lost its ‘support’. Each time Marlon brought his passengers their food, he would keep his line of sight above their heads.

All the Souls would consider this period of time quite unlucky.

“So, you all travel from the ocean to the city crawling like grubs?” Lin Sanjiu asked, feeling curious, “Tell me everything from the start.”

Soulsqn was silent for half a second. It was impossible to tell what her attitude was toward the questions from the expression on her human face, “Of course not. When we are near the surface of the ocean, we can emit pheromones into the air. Generally, all carbon-based living organisms would have a reaction to these pheromones. Fainting is a common effect.”

After she said that, she couldn’t help shooting a glance at Jade before reverting her gaze back to Lin Sanjiu.

When she was caught off-guard by Lin Sanjiu at the islet, Soulsqn had secretly secreted her pheromones at them. The creation of these pheromones required quite some time, and the amount she secreted at them was what she had stored for the past one month. Oddly, Lin Sanjiu was completely unaffected. It was as if her nose and mouth was just a decorative feature, and proceeded to sever Soulsqn lower body.

Unlike Jade, Lin Sanjiu was not wearing any sort of protective Special Item. Instead, Lin Sanjiu learned from her previous experience and was cautious when she was fighting Soulsqn. She had activated her [Defence Forcefield] and fully “wrapped” her whole head with it.

After the grueling training in Kisaragi Station, Lin Sanjiu’s control of her abilities improved significantly. On top of that, as she was a Growth-type, the amount of higher consciousness she had was gradually increasing every day. She now had an abundance of higher consciousness unlike before. In fact, ever since she boarded the airship, she did not even deactivate her [Defence Forcefield] once.

However, Lin Sanjiu could tell from Marlon’s behavior that Soulsqn had not tried anything funny.

“Continue talking.”

Even though Souls obviously do not need to breathe, Soulsqn opened and closed her mouth when she heard Lin Sanjiu’s command. When she opened her mouth, Lin Sanjiu could catch a glimpse of something inhuman deep in the “Walter’s” throat.

“The unlucky humans who inhaled our pheromones naturally become our skins… The carriers like AYU are the first of us to don human husks. They were responsible for bringing our kinspeople to the city so that we can find for more humans to wear. We started living among humans. We built our nests and started gathering resources…”

“Are all 1000 over Souls in the Cyber District?”

“No… There are only a few carriers among us. There are only seven carriers. Besides, the coastal areas are sparsely populated… So, we came out of the oceans in batch. Some of us are in the Cyber District but most of the Souls are still deep in the ocean.”

“I have seen one of your nests… There were many unconscious people there. What is its purpose?”

Soulsqn stopped talking for a moment as if she was unwilling to continue explaining. However, she hardly had a choice. Lin Sanjiu took the effort to bring AYU and the other Souls along with them with one important purpose. She could threaten Soulsqn with the lives of other Souls and the other Souls with Soulsqn’s life. If Soulsqn refused to speak, Lin Sanjiu was going to cut AYU open and kill one of the Souls. If Soulsqn tried to hide any information or give her false information, she was going to kill another Soul.

As expected, Soulsqn continued, “We are making preparations for our other kinspeople. No matter how powerful we are, we can’t simply go on the streets and make people unconscious… That is our storehouse. There is the scent of our storehouse on your body. That was also the reason why AYU targeted you.”

Lin Sanjiu couldn’t resist taking a whiff of herself, but she didn’t notice any scent. Lin Sanjiu frowned and probed further, “Storehouse? Many of the humans have been unconscious for such a long time that they barely looked human. How are you going to use them?”

Soulsqn calmly replied her, “We will use those that are still viable. We will disregard the rest. Anyway, we would always bring new batches of humans to our storehouse.”

Lin Sanjiu realized what that meant. If it weren’t for her actions, Faun, the young man in a Zhongshan suit and the rest of the people in that storehouse would die as “perishable goods”. Lin Sanjiu tried her best to hide her emotions and tried to maintain her expressionless face as she continued interrogating, “After being knocked out, humans would sink into their hallucinations.”

Soulsqn nodded.

“Then… when was I knocked unconscious?”

Soulsqn knew the status of all her kinspeople. Naturally, it wasn’t hard to infer that she probably knew what Sajee was up to. As expected, Soulsqn shifted her body a bit and replied, “You were in contact with a Soul. You have a scent but you were not knocked unconscious then. When you walked out of the small alley, another of our kinspeople noticed you. Sajee was one of the Souls responsible for transporting you.”

Lin Sanjiu was stunned for a second. She never even considered the possibility that she was caught in their illusion so early. She remembered that she was planning to go back to find the young chap that led her to that house in the first place. She really didn’t know that she was knocked unconscious before even returning to the basement of the building with all the appraisal agencies!

Soulsqn had not finished her answer.

“Before you found yourself at the bottom of the ravine, you woke up once. But, you walked into our storehouse on your own after Sajee made you hallucinate.”

Considering Soulsqn’s explanation, Lin Sanjiu could piece the puzzle together.

Faun and the others did not travel with her. They had been trapped in the Souls’ nest a few months before Lin Sanjiu. The reason she could see her “neighbors” in that flesh prison and even her “transporter”, Sajee, was because her higher consciousness was trying to warn her that everything around her was not what it seemed.

Lin Sanjiu felt a sudden chill. After she died in Kisaragi Station, she had not experienced such fear. Jade sat silently, looking somewhat stunned. She didn’t know much of what had happened so she couldn’t really make sense of their conversation. Yet, Lin Sanjiu did not plan to tell her the full story. Consequently, the airship fell into a sort of strange silence.

The silence was abruptly interrupted by a creak from the door.

Marlon peeked from behind the door and saw four pairs of eyes staring directly at him. He excused himself with a quick cough and pushed open the door with his shoulder. He was holding a tray with a flask of water and two glass cups. There was also a plate with some jerkies and flatbreads.

As he was the only crew onboard the airship, Marlon did everything even though he was the captain.

Even though Lin Sanjiu gave the captain quite a sum of red crystals for the food and water, Marlon came with food a little too frequently. It wasn’t even afternoon and Marlon had already approached them twice. He brought dried fruits the previous time.

Lin Sanjiu looked at the middle-aged man once. She wanted to say something but felt that she was just being overly cautious. When she reached for the flask, Marlon quickly interjected, “Let me do it.” Then, he eagerly poured a glass of water for her.

The water in the glass was crystal clear and Lin Sanjiu felt refreshed just looking at it.

The two Souls sat expressionless opposite Lin Sanjiu. They did not even look once at the food. Meanwhile, Jade had been staring out of the window for some time and appeared dispirited. After considering for some time, Lin Sanjiu took a sip of water. The water tasted alright, it was just plain water with a slight taste of rust. It slipped down her throat. After waiting for a while, Lin Sanjiu didn’t notice anything wrong.

“I must be too paranoid.” Lin Sanjiu exhaled and withdrew her higher consciousness from the glass of water.

“The flatbreads are quite delicious, why don’t you try one?” Marlon stayed a little longer with them and smiled while he recommended the snack, “I bought this from Depizza. It is their local specialty. People like to bring this back when they return from that world…”

Inexplicably, Lin Sanjiu found it difficult to say “not now” to the man. After hesitating, she finally took one flatbread from the plate. The yellow flatbread looked crisp and delicate. It had a mysterious aroma but it looked tasty. The only downside was that it was larger than a human’s head so it wasn’t easy to hold.

Lin Sanjiu tore a corner of the flatbread and turned to Marlon saying, “I know, you can go back fir—”

Before she finished her sentence, her vision became blurry.

A dense gray smoke suddenly appeared from nowhere. It seemed slow but it filled the room in the blink of an eye. When Lin Sanjiu suddenly realized her predicament and leaped up. She could only see gray smoke all around her. The smoke was so thick that she couldn’t even see her chest when she looked down. When she brought her hand right in front of her eyes, she discovered that the smoke was coming out of the torn part of the flatbread.

As the smoke surrounded her, she could even see the small particles it carried. She had merely taken two breaths and her nose felt extremely uncomfortable.

[Haze Essence]

Just as the name suggests, this Special Item is concocted from the best essence of industrial smog. It can reduce visibility, cause serious health problems and can be hidden in various objects. When it is released, it would provide a dramatic surprise.

“Marlon wouldn’t just target me for no reason. It must be something those two Souls did.” Lin Sanjiu swore silently. She felt an instant stinging in her eyes as if they had been burned. Her eyes started tearing non-stop. The effect of Haze Essence was pretty much instant. After just two seconds, her respiratory tract, mouth, and eyes were affected. It was as if someone had buried her in sand. The second she shut her eyes involuntarily, a black shadow tried to stab her from one side. Her hair stood on end immediately while she activated her Higher Consciousness Scan. Lin Sanjiu twisted her body sharply and barely dodged a knight lance in Marlon’s hand.

“Jade Zhang!” Lin Sanjiu stabilized herself and growled, “Watch them!”

No answer came from within the smoke.

It was almost as if the smoke had even swallowed Jade’s existence. She sat quietly and appeared unaware of the situation around her. If Lin Sanjiu stared harder, she might have spotted the plump lady yawning in boredom.

The knight lance struck from her side again, almost like a serpent. Lin Sanjiu’s wings shifted subtly before suddenly reacting as if it was alive, blocking the lance.

As a matter of fact, Marlon’s combat capability wasn’t much better than the Souls’. Lin Sanjiu could easily come up with five to six different strategies to incapacitate him. However, Lin Sanjiu found herself unable to do much. It wasn’t because they weren’t on a moving airship with the captain in front of her. Neither was it because she was afraid of any sneak attacks from the two Souls.

She simply couldn’t harm Marlon.

[Familiarity Breeds Fondness]

There is supposedly a psychological phenomenon where people would find a face more attractive the more they look at it. Could this be the basis of for the familiarity principle? Many people are saved from being single because of this particular phenomenon.

A middle-aged man without much money and charisma had developed this ability through desperation. Originally, he thought he could finally find a wife with this ability yet the ability only worked on his own enemies.

Instructions: The user must create many opportunities for the target to see him. The more frequent the target sees the user, the stronger the fondness for the user, which means the target would be less likely to attack the user.

It was quite obvious that Marlon had taken a few days to prepare beforehand so that he could fully utilize his ability. Lin Sanjiu had seen him at least twice to thrice per day over the past few days, and as a result, the effect of his ability was painfully obvious. Each time she had the thought to retaliate, both her hands would fall to her side limply as if her bones have been drawn out and she would feel no will to fight at all.

Amidst the smog, Lin Sanjiu heard a soft rustling sound from the direction of the two Souls. Lin Sanjiu focused on them but heard another clashing sound as the lance hit her skeletal wings again. At the same time, Lin Sanjiu caught a very silent thud.

Lin Sanjiu identified the sound the very next second. It was the sound of Soulsqn freeing herself. From the start, the two Souls did not count on Marlon defeating Lin Sanjiu. This was all a distraction. Lin Sanjiu had gotten her [ANTI Posthumans Collection: Female Slave Bondage Rope] from the Garden of Eden, she didn’t actually know the right way to use it. She didn’t even have the full collection. It was actually already quite incredible that she could restrain Soulsqn with it for such a long time.

“I have no choice but to use that…” Lin Sanjiu thought to herself feeling a slight sense of loss. Subsequently, she gritted her teeth as a thin piece of card appeared in her hand. She immediately slammed the card on the floor.

“Stop!”

As that particular action did not result in Marlon being physically harmed, Lin Sanjiu successfully evoked [Souls Queen’s Reality] from her Nostradamus’ Card. It quickly affected the owner of the knight lance.

This was the first time Lin Sanjiu was using the Souls’ ability. She waited anxiously for a few seconds and finally the gray smoke gradually abated. Past the disappearing smoke, Marlon’s face was pale. Lin Sanjiu didn’t know what sort of “reality” Marlon was seeing, but he was panting. He slowly slipped to the floor and sat down. His lance fell to the floor with a thud.

After regaining her freedom, Soulsqn observed Lin Sanjiu standing some distance away. As she did not have legs, the way she was “standing” was mind-numbingly creepy. However, Lin Sanjiu’s only had her gaze on Soulsqn for half a second before focusing her gaze on AYU, who was standing behind Soulsqn.

AYU was standing right beside a window. The vast open skies and ocean were on the opposite side of the window. Lin Sanjiu exhaled slowly. She did not know what sort of physics principles affected the flight of the airship. Neither did she know how high they were. However, all her experience from before the apocalypse situation told her that no one, other than the Souls, would survive if that window was compromised.

While the Souls stared at her, she smiled. She pulled the armchair she had previously knocked over closer to her. Then, she sat down. While Soulsqn was visibly stunned by her action, AYU immediately placed her hands away from the window.

“You guys have been drifting and struggling for so many years. Your main goal is to find a way to reproduce and create your next generation, right?” Lin Sanjiu spoke very slowly, in an intentional manner. Her words were clearly rhetorical.

“But, no matter how many worlds you have been to, you can’t find a suitable host body to reproduce.” She pointed to Soulsqn and continued, “You were interested to take over my body because you noticed that I was different from other humans. I have hypervariable genes… Also, I managed to modify my own body.”

When Soulsqn’s gaze landed on the skeletal wings behind her back, Lin Sanjiu was almost convinced she saw a glint in those eyes.

“But, have you ever considered this question? How did I modify myself?” she crooked her head and asked quietly.

As expected, that questions provoked a response from Soulsqn.

“How did you do that?”

“I know a person,” Lin Sanjiu’s smile remained on her face. “She personally designed and created a new species of sentinel being. Furthermore, they can reproduce.”

God knows if those “Sages” could reproduce, but that didn’t stop Lin Sanjiu from continuing, “She helped me modify my body, taking me as a friend… You noticed my skeletal wings, right? They’re quite powerful, aren’t they?”

No one would ever interpret Nüwa’s action of helping Lin Sanjiu develop a set of weapons as being an act of animosity. Similarly, Soulsqn was no exception. She eyed Lin Sanjiu’s skeletal wings without moving. She only spoke after some time.

“What… do you mean?”

“I think what I am trying to convey is very clear,” Lin Sanjiu said coolly. “You have two choices. You can either continue standing there and let me kill you guys before you break that window. Or, you can come back here obediently. Sit down in your armchairs and think about how you are going to make your requests when you meet my friend. What would you choose?”

—

As the Free District appeared in far in the horizon, Soulsqn sat in an armchair, staring down at the human settlement outside the airship.