Embers Ad Infinitum

Chapter 378: Choices

Father Alex ignored Shang Jianyao’s words. After tumbling to a corner that was out of Jiang Baimian’s sight, he immediately responded.

The strange accessory woven from black hair on his right wrist suddenly lit up as if it were on fire.

With the previous few shots’ help, he roughly grasped Jiang Baimian’s position and confirmed that she was within the Ring of Blindness’s range.

With the Ring of Blindness—which he named—Alex could sense human consciousnesses at that distance and lock onto the corresponding target.

In the blink of an eye, Jiang Baimian—who had climbed onto a tree—saw darkness. She couldn’t see anything.

Right on the heels of that, Father Alex’s eyes turned deep as he used the Awakened ability—Dream Journey—on Shang Jianyao again. But this time, his goal of using this ability wasn’t to preview the development or stall for time, nor was it to approach the target and tamper with his memories. Instead, he wanted to use this to produce a fake version of himself and hide his human consciousness.

He could then maintain Dream Journey’s effects and attract Zhang Qubing’s attention elsewhere while secretly escaping in another direction.

His Dream Journey could cover an area of more than 30 meters. It was enough for him to open up a safe distance and obtain a chance to escape.

This was his method of escape that he had carried out several times. Therefore, he began to suspect that he had been affected by a certain ability of Zhang Qubing’s as soon as he saw him.

He became very corny and unreasonable—he wanted to maintain his poise and swagger away instead of fleeing in a sorry state. Therefore, he chose to use Dream Journey to hide himself and quietly approach Zhang Qubing, tampering with his memories so as to facilitate his leisurely departure.

If he had used his old methods previously, Father Alex felt that he should’ve already escaped his predicament.

The next second, Shang Jianyao sensed a human consciousness step past him and run toward the alley’s exit.

Beyond the exit was the Red Wolf Zone!

He then took off his sunglasses and saw Father’s back as he ran.

With Father’s physique, Shang Jianyao seriously considered giving him a handicap of ten meters first.

At the same time, the real Father Alex secretly returned to the previous apartment along the route he had taken. He only dared to jog now, afraid that he wouldn’t be able to maintain Dream Journey’s effects.

Suddenly, his chest heated up as if he had sensed something. Without thinking, he pounced to the side and rolled.

Bang!

Another bullet flew over, sending rocks flying.

How can this be? Father Alex was inexplicably shocked. I was clearly still maintaining the Blind effect. Why was the sniper able to target me? Is the person still human? Could it be that a robot is hiding beside the target consciousness?

Father didn’t have the luxury of time to think about it. Through his item, he maintained the effects of Dream Journey and Blind as he rolled and ran in a zig-zag manner in a mad dash for his destination.

During this process, he relied on the bodhi bead on his chest to sense the danger ahead of time and dodged in time several times.

For him—who was in poor physical condition—this was an indescribable journey of suffering.

Finally, the apartment’s side door was a few meters away.

But at this moment, Father Alex’s gaze froze again.

A silver-black robot in a dark-green military uniform rushed out of the door. The red glow in its eyes lit up as its fists exuded firmness and power. Genava—who had been assigned to the furthest exit—had also arrived!

Upon seeing this, Father Alex no longer had any wishful thinking. He gritted his teeth and raised his left hand.

The glass bead ring on his pinky suddenly emitted pure, bright light.

With this beam of light, the ring itself split into two. Among them, one ring was corporeal, just like before. The other ring became illusory and melted into the air bit by bit.

Genava actually ignored this scene and stepped past Father Alex to rush toward the alley’s exit. The environmental information he had gathered told him that the real Father was fleeing in that direction!

All the electromagnetic signals around him were disrupted!

This was Father Alex’s trump card for dealing with robots. He knew from Shepherd Bouillon that there was more than one or two Awakened at the Mind Corridor level who could affect electromagnetic signals.

This was actually a relatively common basic ability.

Shepherd Bouillon had informed him that after entering the Mind Corridor, Awakened would be divided into two ‘factions’ according to their respective domains. They would each obtain a type of basic ability.

These two basic abilities were Electromagnetic Signal Interference and Matter Interference. Awakened in the Last Man domain obtained the former.

At the same time, according to Shepherd Bouillon, powerful Awakened might be equipped with both abilities from exploring the Mind Corridor’s depths.

Just now, Father Alex had completely ‘burned’ the ring that Shepherd Bouillon had given him. He had activated the remnant aura obtained from a Last Man domain Awakened at the Mind Corridor level, hoping to distort the various electric signals in the alley for a certain period of time.

This would reduce the ring to an ordinary item.

Without feeling the pinch, Father Alex quickened his pace and rushed to the side door of the apartment.

The next second, a howling wind blew past his ear. A figure rushed past him like they were in a race and blocked the door.

Shang Jianyao had returned.

This... Father had the urge to vomit blood.

Shang Jianyao didn’t wear sunglasses this time. He turned around, held the Destiny Pearl in one hand, and waved his other hand.

At the same time, he scoffed. “Are you stupid? Gunshots keep sounding here. Can’t I guess that the real you wants to escape in the opposite direction? With your physique, it’s too difficult for you to climb the high walls. Therefore, there’s only one answer...”

Father Alex naturally wouldn’t tell him that he wouldn’t have heard the gunshots outside the illusion if he wasn’t affected by the sniper and couldn’t focus on maintaining Dream Journey.

In the face of Shang Jianyao’s punch, Father Alex subconsciously wanted to dodge and parry the blow. However, he had only raised his hands halfway when he stopped.

It was as if he had forgotten what to do.

At this moment, Father Alex also sensed that he might encounter fatal danger if he dodged to the right. This was clearly thanks to the distant sniper.

Why can she still aim? What did I do wrong? As Father Alex roared inwardly, he could only force himself to lower his body and dodge to the left.

Unfortunately, he was too slow. As if he had lunged forward, he used his face to meet Shang Jianyao’s punch.

Thud!

Alex felt his head spin as he involuntarily spat out several bloodstained teeth.

After the gunshot, he staggered to his right as if he were flying.

Father Alex wasn’t in the mood to care about the swelling on his face. He rolled the moment he landed, attempting to circle around Shang Jianyao and enter the apartment.

From the development at Wolf’s Den, he could tell that his current enemies were too benevolent and kind. He believed that this was something he could exploit.

After entering the apartment, he planned on using hostage tactics if he couldn’t escape.

Shang Jianyao didn’t give the real Father a chance. He nimbly turned around and blocked Alex outside the door.

This also resulted in their eyes meeting.

The real Father instinctively used Hypnosis, causing deep and illusory vortices to appear in his eyes.

Shang Jianyao was immediately stunned, but he raised his hands as if he had another personality commanding him.

Unlike before, he had already stuffed the Destiny Pearl back into his pocket at some point in time. He held Ice Moss in one hand and United 202 in the other.

The two black muzzles were respectively aimed at Father’s body and Father’s left profile.

The right side was reserved for Jiang Baimian. This was something they had paid special attention to during training.

Upon seeing this, Father Alex couldn’t help but feel vexed. I’m really stupid, really...

He clearly knew that the man opposite him was immune to Hypnosis to a certain extent. It would take five to ten-fold the normal time to affect him, but he couldn’t help using Hypnosis just now.

This reminded him of Zhang Qubing’s words—’are you stupid?’—after intercepting him. He suspected that he had been affected by the other party’s abilities since then.

At this moment, he could sense that the right side was the most dangerous. If he stayed in place or turned left, he might be injured, but it might not be fatal.

He only had three choices.

As this thought flashed through his mind, Father Alex smiled contemptuously.

He chose the right. At the same time, he completely activated the bodhi bead hanging in front of his chest.

To Father, he would either fail to fend off the attacks and die on the spot or forge a path of survival. He definitely wouldn’t accept the outcome of being captured.

His pride didn’t allow him to do so, nor did he allow himself to land in the hands of a mortal.

Bang!

Jiang Baimian sensed the change in the target’s bioelectric signal and squeezed the trigger.

The Orange rifle’s bullet instantly hit the real Father, but there seemed to be an invisible barrier around him, blocking the bullet.

The barrier only lasted for a second before silently shattering. The bullet ultimately drilled into Father Alex’s body.

Blood splattered amidst two other gunshots.

I’m ultimately not at the real Mind Corridor level... Alex collapsed as such a thought flashed across his mind.

After he fell to the ground, he saw Shang Jianyao quickly approach him and heard him anxiously shout, “You must hang in there.”

While Father Alex was confused, Shang Jianyao took out the Destiny Pearl. “I haven’t searched through your memories!”

Upon hearing this, Father felt greatly insulted. The next second, he saw himself in Shang Jianyao’s eyes—an ordinary, heavily injured, and dying person at the mercy of others.