Superhumans of the Dome City
Chapter 278 - 278 36 Interwoven Dreams 7

278: Chapter 36: Interwoven Dreams (7) 278: Chapter 36: Interwoven Dreams (7) This time, Gongsun Ce first heard a girl’s humming.

“I bet you’ve never talked with time before.”

“If you’re nice to it, it will make the clocks obey you.”

“As long as you like, you can stop the clocks, and if they’re willing, the hands can even dance as they move!”

The ditty had many alterations from the original, but Gongsun Ce still recognized it, yet another element from “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland,” the Mad Hatter’s nonsensical nonsense.

“Mad Hatter… it’s time for the tea party now, is it?”

Gongsun Ce muttered darkly, turning his attention to the new scene.

He saw a particularly wide, particularly long table that seemed like something out of a giant’s furniture collection, with stools just as oversized on either side.

Shiyu Ling, carrying a basket of pastries and holding her kitten, hopped and skipped on the pristine white tablecloth, followed by a rabbit in a white robe leading the way.

“Whom would you like to find today, Miss Ling?”

“This table is too big!

Let me see the map.” Shiyu Ling took out a hand-drawn map from the basket, exactly the same as the one he saw at the Shiyu Research Institute, “Let’s go find Little Shiqi first!

She and I are very close.”

She hopped and skipped her way to the stool corresponding to “17,” and indeed, Shiyu Shiqi was sitting there.

Her stool was dirty and broken, with a lingering smell as if someone had spilled tea and milk on it and ran off without cleaning up.

“Sister!” Shiyu Shiqi exclaimed in delight.

Shiyu Ling approached her sister, talking to her with the kitten in arms.

“Little Shiqi, look at the pastries I brought for you~”

They chatted eagerly, just like real sisters.

Shiyu Ling told her stories from fairy tale books, described the beautiful furniture in mansions, and talked about the shows on television… she told her about the gifts their father bought for her, about how good their father was to her.

“But, sister,” Shiyu Shiqi said softly, “Daddy never treats me that well.”

“Daddy has too many children and too little money, he can only give his love to the best one!” Shiyu Ling declared with pride, her chest puffed out.

She said this with great pride, a sense of superiority over her sister in her eyes.

Seeing Shiqi becoming sadder, she quickly added, “But you still have your sister, right?

Look, even if you are not as excellent as I am, I still take care of you.

Let me show you a fun trick!”

Shiyu Ling lifted her cat again, while Diana was grinning broadly.

“Off with your head!” Shiyu Ling cried out, slapping her hand onto the kitten’s neck.

“Meow!” Diana’s chubby cat face rolled off like a ball, landing on the big stool, still laughing.

“See, it won’t die even if its head is chopped off.” Shiqi Shiqi laughed happily, “That’s amazing!”

Gongsun Ce stood quietly behind the girl, watching all this unfold.

He waited until the girl finished chatting with her sister and was about to go searching for the next sibling.

“Enough.” He walked up to Shiyu Ling, “Stop, let’s end this here.”

Shiyu Ling acted as if she could not see him.

The young man with grey hair squatted down, looking straight into the girl’s eyes.

“I know what time it is now, August 27, between 10:30 and 3:30.

I also fully understand why you have the character you have now, what you went through at this point in time…”

Gongsun Ce said softly, “So there’s no need to continue, stop making this dream that torments both you and me.”

Shiyu Ling no longer smiled.

Her gaze sharpened, just like when she got older.

She stared at the young man and said icily, “No.”

The scenes within the dream changed with dizzying speed.

The research institute turned back into the cozy mansion in less than a second.

This time there were no clocks, no calendars, nothing that could confirm the time for him in the mansion.

Shiyu Ling was sitting on the sofa, with Shiyu Genmi beside her, holding a fairy tale book, and reciting the passages to her.

[“You wouldn’t want to be among mad people,” Alice replied.

“Ah, you can’t help that,” said the Cat, “we’re all mad here: I’m mad, you’re mad.”

“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.

“You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here!”]

Shiyu Genmi vividly imitated the voices of the characters in the book, uttering absurd dialogues, which made Shiyu Ling giggle incessantly.

She laughed so hard she nearly cried; only then did she notice the grey-haired youth standing in the living room.

“Stop,” said Shiyu Ling.

And so time obediently stopped, and only she and Gongsun Ce could move.

She hopped off the sofa, tilting her proud little face upwards, looking at Gongsun Ce with his somber expression.

“What have you understood?

You understand nothing!

I have my father, I have gifts, I have the wonderful candies of the Immortal Realm, my life is beautiful, happy like the protagonist of a fairy tale!”

Gongsun Ce closed his eyes, taking a deep breath.

He wanted to say that she was right, that she was a little girl spoiled by a loving family.

But he couldn’t do that.

Not just because he needed to understand the dream to escape from it, but also because everyone ought to confront the truth, no matter how cruel or sad it might be.

You’re always right, Alandia.

He thought of the silver-haired lady’s advice, smiling bitterly.

“Well then, long overdue decryption time, it’s about time to unveil the truths in the dream one by one.

Where shall we start?

It doesn’t matter, let’s start with your magical cat.”

Gongsun Ce stepped into the girl’s bedroom, lifted the quilt, and there lay a blue-furred cat on the bed.

It smiled like a human, its round, chubby face brimming with a wide grin.

“Diana, your cat.

You’ve given it a name from the little cat in the book, and it behaves just like the Cheshire Cat, blue fur, a smile, its head could be chopped off, and it wouldn’t die…

quite magical, isn’t it?” The Superpower User shook his head, “But there’s no such cat in reality.”

Shiyu Ling argued, “Diana is a creature from the Immortal Realm!”

“Which cat would contently nestle under the quilt and let you carry it everywhere without struggling?

And what’s even stranger is that I’ve never seen Diana move by itself; it only ever has two states: either being held in your arms or lying alone in its spot, motionless…

The answer is clear.

It’s quite simple, and has nothing to do with the Impermanence Skill.” Gongsun Ce adjusted his glasses, “Your pet is a toy cat, it’s just that you believe it to be real.”

As soon as these words were spoken, Diana’s appearance immediately changed; its face lost its liveliness and its expression turned fake—it became a plush toy—a small doll whose head could be twisted off.

Shiyu Ling stopped talking, and Gongsun Ce walked up to the mirror.

“A talking Magic Mirror, quite magical.” He crouched down, fumbled behind the mirror for a while, and pulled out a tape recorder, “In reality, it’s a brainwashing tool working with machinery.

By repeatedly instilling concepts into your mind day after day, it is truly a trick for fooling children.”

The young man with grey hair set the recorder aside: “Come, let’s see the main event, your magical little snacks.”

He and Shiyu Ling entered the kitchen and took out “Eat Me” snacks and “Drink Me” bottles.

“Drink Me, in the fairy tales, it’s a drink that makes one shrink.

And in reality?

Of course, it’s the same…” Gongsun Ce crushed the bottle.

He had known the answer for a while, hadn’t he?

Mr.

Shiyu had told him before that Impermanence Law Enforcers should start training from childhood.

Because a child’s dreams are simple, their souls are pure, and it’s easier for them to cultivate.

“What’s in this bottle is a growth-suppressing drug; it nearly halts the growth of your body, and thus affects the appearance of your soul.

That’s why the way you once looked doesn’t match with now; why Shiyu Shiqi still looks like a middle school student to this day!”

The shards of the glass bottle pierced his palm, and blood dropped steadily to the floor.

The Superpower User was completely unaware, for he had to do this to contain his own anger.

He grabbed the “Eat Me” snacks.

“This, in the fairy tale, is the prop that makes Alice grow.

I couldn’t understand at first what it represented in reality—they never made you physically larger or older.

But when I changed my line of thinking, everything became crystal clear.

Alice needed to eat it to enter the Immortal Realm, and so did you.”

What happened to Shiyu Ling after eating this?

Flowers and grass sprung up in the environment, the hands of the clocks twisted, walking seemed like flying…

Beneath the façade of a realm as magical as the Immortal Realm, lurked malice and viciousness from reality.

“This too is a drug!

It makes you have bizarre hallucinations, making you see all the dreadful things at the Shiyu Research Institute as beautiful, disrupting your sense of time, all to facilitate Shiyu Genmi’s despicable research!”

Gongsun Ce threw the jar aside, and the gummy snacks rolled across the floor, disregarded.

“Why did Shiyu Genmi go to such lengths to create these disguises?

Why did he create a false realm of happiness for you?

Why did he offer you false love, leading you to interact with other Shiyus under illusions?

Because all of this is a part of the artificial Dual Phase Mage experiment!”

Shiyu Ling had once been very close to his brothers and sisters.

Shiyu Ling’s personality had undergone a major change.

Often using the Alice Adar known as Shadow Orchid, craving freedom as an adventurer; and staring at the narcissus in the mirror was Shiyu Ling, only loving himself, a villain.

Cultivating both phases was highly liable to collapse into monstrosity.

Shiyu Ling was a Dual Phase Mage.

Shiyu Ling had an even better talent for Brahma Form, yet Shiyu Genmi decided to focus on cultivating his Spiritual Image…

He should have realized this sooner; he didn’t even need this dream to reach this conclusion.

Gongsun Ce slammed his fist onto the table: “He’s afraid of your talent!

He’s worried he will cultivate someone truly powerful, a Brahma Mage filled with malice, wishing nothing more than to kill him in satisfaction!

That’s why Shiyu Genmi shifted the focus of cultivation to the Spiritual Image Skill; he meticulously designed this new experiment—you spend half of each week in the research institute for Brahma Form cultivation, and the other half living with Shiyu Genmi.

Surrounded by omnipresent suggestions, your personality traits suitable for the Spiritual Image Skill were deliberately fostered, along with love for him as a father!”

On August 27th, Shiyu Ling took the medicine at the mansion.

Just a day before, on August 26th, Shiyu Ling’s memory was wiped clean at the research institute.

This switch of identity took place every week; as the days went by, the cultivation of the Dual Phase Mage gradually matured…

“The memory-wipe technology and the disorientation from hallucinogens made it impossible for you to discern the true self, no matter where you were.

But there were inevitably flaws in the experiment, and as time passed, you began to notice an unsettling sense of discord.

Your weeks were passing too quickly!

Then, one day, you sought help from Shiyu Lianyi…

on the day he acted, you discovered the truth.”

Gongsun Ce couldn’t bear to look at the girl’s face.

Gongsun Ce forced himself to face the little girl.

“This is the truth, Shiyu Ling.

The truth outside of the Immortal Realm.”

“No,” Shiyu Ling cried, “No, no, no… NO!!!”

The girl ran to the young man with grey hair, desperately pounding on his body.

“You’re lying!

My father loves me!

He buys me presents!!

He tells me stories from books!!”

Gongsun Ce wished he could deny his own deduction, that it was all his overthinking, that they had once been a close father and daughter—if only there had been such a time, how wonderful that would have been…!

He clenched his teeth and spoke in a low voice.

“You like reading, but there’s not even a bookshelf in your room.

I never found a book suitable for children in this house, except for ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’!

This book was your New Year’s gift, but now it’s already the end of August…”

“For over half a year, Shiyu Genmi hasn’t given you a single new book!”

Shiyu Ling let go of her hands.

She stared at the young man with grey hair, tears seeping into her eyes.

“No…” she said in despair, “No.”

Everything lost its color.

The dreamlike illusion shattered.