Clown Game
Chapter 147 - 147 143 Containment Failure Complete

Chapter 147: Chapter 143 Containment Failure Complete Chapter 147: Chapter 143 Containment Failure Complete This hair clip was almost Qiu Mujin’s favorite “anomalous item.” It was discovered half a century ago on the body of a 17-year-old girl.

The girl had no friends in life. She was often bullied by her peers, and when she returned home, she faced an alcoholic father. She was timid, reclusive, liked small quiet spaces, and was somewhat neurotic. Every night, she prayed to a “deity” she herself couldn’t identify, just an image she randomly sketched out in her mind, hoping to escape her suffering.

One day, her wish was fulfilled, and she gained a hair clip. As long as she wore the hair clip, the children no longer bullied her, her father stopped beating her, and the insulting and mocking words also disappeared.

At that time… she felt she was being looked after by the deity.

But gradually, she noticed something was off. People couldn’t just fail to harbor negative emotions toward her—they couldn’t project any emotions onto her at all… They couldn’t notice her, see her, or even remember her.

She was shielded from all emotions.

Not long after, she died in a car accident… It was not until her decomposed body had been lying on the street for two months, and the maggots digging through her scalp caused the hair clip to fall off, that people noticed the corpse.

The field agents who intervened in this accident also discovered the anomaly of the hair clip.

As for how the hair clip appeared? What exactly was the girl praying for? And what was that “deity”…? It was no longer possible to investigate.

Fortunately, many items in the Foundation are like this. So, we just need to figure out what’s anomalous about this hair clip.

Item number: C-077, named “Solitude Ornament”

Its anomalous property is “Perception Shielding!”

Jealousy, anger, threat, attention, even memories… in short, almost all emotions can’t be projected onto its bearer.

This “anomalous property” was very useful. Over the many years of opposition against the Foundation, it saved Qiu Mujin many times, but it was ultimately only a Class C item. It could indeed block common emotions.

However, what Qiu Mujin faced at this moment was “it”

An odd existence materialized from a higher dimension.

So, within a few minutes, the hair clip on her head began to screech, its vermilion surface cracked and damaged.

She still stood in front of the present “Chen Xiao,” the other party was pondering, “it’s” tongue moving neurotically inside the mouth, as if being chewed repeatedly.

After about ten seconds of silence…

“Hehehe—As you wished.”

“Chen Xiao” said with a semblance of grace, and with one hand held high and one foot stepping back, he performed a bow that was fairly standard.

However, paired with his crazily excited face at the moment, it seemed particularly horrifying.

“Goodbye…”

“Goodbye…”

As two nearly simultaneous farewells sounded… the vermilion hair clip atop Qiu Mujin’s head finally gave way, cracking open with a clean split, and the chaos in Chen Xiao’s eyes slowly faded, turning into confusion.

He staggered, one hand leaning on the wall, the other hand buried in his hair, like a drunkard or like a patient suffering from some strange post-disease condition.

In the end, he let out a few sharp, derisive laughs.

“Hehe————Heh…”

And then collapsed to the ground.

…

…

…

Pain

A turmoil inside his head

Chen Xiao struggled to open his eyes

Amid a wave of dizziness and near-nausea, he habitually glanced around at his surroundings.

The ceiling had embedded light fixtures that fitted seamlessly with the walls, leaving no gap whatsoever. The room itself wasn’t very big, about 20 square meters, and apart from a few chairs, it was devoid of any other amenities. The chairs’ material was unknown, but they all had a cold, metallic tone. On the front-left side of the wall, there was a door, but it lacked even a doorknob, suggesting it was controlled electronically.

Well, this setting, this atmosphere, combined with the stark white lighting, clearly screamed Order Foundation style.

At the moment, Chen Xiao was lying on a single bed, covered with a blanket… From the sensation all over his body, he should be naked.

The surface below, rather than calling it a bed, it could be more accurately described as an iron slab. It was clearly not meant for resting, positioned right in the center of the room allowing easy movement around it,

“Uh…”

Chen Xiao hardly needed to think before he could speculate quite a bit, and the most plausible was: this place might be something akin to an “observation room.” He might just have been placed here like an object for some people to… “watch” or “study”.

Suddenly, Chen Xiao sat up. He then rubbed his face and his fingertips, noticing slight wrinkles and flakes in his fingers, marks left after water had seeped into the pores and then evaporated.

“Hmm… seems I was washed not too long ago, maybe an hour or two,” he thought.

Following that, he felt his neck and looked at his wrists. Then while sitting on the bed, he gave himself an all-over “self-examination.” Eventually, on the inside of his right elbow, he found a very small puncture mark.

“Did they draw a tube of my blood? Or did they inject me with some weird stuff?” Chen Xiao muttered to himself, while feeling slightly disgusted with the Foundation’s methods.

Afterward, Chen Xiao hopped off the bed and walked to the door, pushing it. As expected, it didn’t budge, and there was no gap between the door and the wall, making opening it seemingly impossible.

Thus, Chen Xiao walked back to the bed, hands behind his back, bending over, and began circling the “iron slab bed,” while quickly flipping through his memory.

He remembered being in an underground parking garage, attacked by that high school student wielding an iron spike, identified as C-207, like a rabid dog… until he was exhausted… containment successful.

After that… it seemed he was picked up by the Foundation’s ambulance team… then after that, a hallway filled with screams and insane laughter…

He shook his head.

The memories were becoming blurrier, ultimately disappearing into that forbidden zone of thought.

Fortunately, Chen Xiao was already used to this feeling, so he didn’t dwell on it, as no clarity would come from it.

So he spread his legs…

Since he still hadn’t put on any trousers, his legs were wide apart.

He saw him crouch down, holding his waist, spreading his legs to the sides.

…

And began shaking them

…

Er, this is a serious story

So this eye-scorching scene didn’t last long, interrupted by a “beep.”

“Please watch your behavior…”

An annoyed voice, tinged heavily with frustration, emanated from all around the walls.

Chen Xiao instantly recognized it, it was “Mr. Zou’s” voice.

He straightened up… “Wow! Are all the surveillance cameras here ‘built into the wall’? Or is one of these walls a sort of ‘one-way mirror’ like advanced technology? Are you watching me from the other side of the wall right now?”

Chen Xiao showed a hint of surprise, but then nonchalantly stroked his chin and adopted a serious “thinking” expression.

“The previous three-story research center in K city I had almost completely walked through, this color, the style of the surveillance area, and the layout of this small room… feels a bit different, and the sound coming from the speakers seems to emit evenly from all directions, is the wall material now serving as a medium for sound? It seems the technology has stepped up a notch.”

Chen Xiao mumbled to himself.

At this point, Mr. Zou couldn’t stand watching him play “famous detective” in the nude any longer.

An almost tearful voice came over the speaker.

“It’s over, we’ve embarrassed ourselves all the way to the ‘division’… someone, hurry and bring him some clothes…”