Time goes back to a few days ago, to the Mage Prison in River Bay New City.
It has been more than a day since Xiao Chen and Tang Feng came here, but apart from the guards who delivered meals, no one has come to see them, and there has been no interrogation or questioning.
Apart from trying to practice, the two of them just read books and daydreamed, and their days were extremely boring.
"Something is wrong. Have we been abandoned?" Tang Feng put down the novel in his hand and said, "Can you feel that now?"
Xiao Chen shook his head slightly.
What Tang Feng was referring to was Xiao Chen's own clone. After they arrived at Hewan New City the night before, Xiao Chen took advantage of Jiang Yitian's inattention and projected a clone of himself through a wall when passing by a house.
According to Xiao Chen's inference, after locking them up, those people would naturally take action. No matter what they did outside, an avatar walking outside would be able to observe their every move, then react, and pass this information to him in time.
But he didn't expect that he would be locked up in the Mage Prison. The Mage Prison suppressed his mental power, and naturally suppressed his connection with his clone. Now he can only vaguely feel the existence of the clone, but cannot transmit any information.
"Leaving us alone for more than a day is not too long. Be patient. Jiang Yitian and the others won't come looking for us, and the other people on the committee won't let us be locked up here." Xiao Chen said.
"The key is that I can't do anything. I feel like I'm out. Here and the outside world are two isolated worlds." Tang Feng said.
"Two worlds?" Xiao Chen suddenly had an idea. "I'm going to try to enter meditation. Please help me watch over it."
"Hey? Meditating now?" Tang Feng didn't understand what Xiao Chen was doing.
Xiao Chen sat down in the room and began to prepare to use the dream travel method to enter the parallel world. No one could have imagined that his path to another world was not anywhere, but in his consciousness.
Through continuous practice, Xiao Chen has gradually mastered the trick of traveling between the two worlds. He no longer needs to rely on luck or hope for some kind of blessing to be able to perceive that world. He can even break through the barriers of the world and maintain communication with his own consciousness in the other world by meditating for a period of time.
He fixed the connection point between the two worlds in his own meditation world and made it into a door in his seaside villa.
This door is located in a room on the third floor of the villa. It looks like an ordinary door, but except for Xiao Chen himself, no one in his meditation world can see the existence of this door. Including Tashia and the others. And even Xiao Chen needs to concentrate his energy to hold the handle of the door and open it.
And now Xiao Chen was standing in front of the door. Kona and Elena were both injured and sleeping, and Tasia had consumed too much energy in the last battle. Now only Xiaobai was swimming around him.
Xiao Chen patted its head and said, "Take good care of them. If they wake up, ask them to wait for me patiently."
Xiaobai nodded in the air very humanely, then circled in the air and watched Xiao Chen's movements.
Xiao Chen focused his mind on the doorknob, then stretched out his hand and opened the door. Behind the door was a black world with a little light, which looked like a starry sky. When Xiao Chen walked into the door, his consciousness seemed to have traveled through a time tunnel. Countless murmuring sounds and bizarre colors occupied his senses. After an unknown period of time, these perceptions all dissipated, and the world around him became clear again. Various meaningful noisy sounds began to enter his ears, and his vision became focused. The first thing he saw was that familiar and reassuring pretty face.
This was a hot pot restaurant. Luo Ling, who was sitting opposite him, was holding a piece of mutton with her chopsticks, ready to put it in the pot. When Xiao Chen arrived, she seemed to sense something, and her chopsticks paused in the air for a moment, then she put the mutton into the pot and rinsed it.
"Nice to see you again." Luo Ling curled her lips slightly, put the mutton on the plate, dipped it in the sauce, blew on it twice, and then put it into her mouth.
"Sorry to disturb your leisure time." Xiao Chen found that he was also holding chopsticks, but a meatball on the chopsticks had fallen on the table. He glanced at it, and the meatball jumped into the pot by itself.
"It's not really a bother." Luo Ling narrowed her eyes, looked at his face carefully, and asked, "Are you still working overtime tonight?"
"No, I already published one yesterday, and I have a lot of ideas for the next one. Let me take a break today." Xiao Chen said these words almost without thinking, which surprised him. "This is..."
He thought carefully, and it seemed that a lot of things naturally appeared in his mind. These things did not suddenly rush into his mind, but seemed to have been there. It was like a big room with things piled up at both ends, but there was a curtain in the middle that divided the room into two halves. The current state was just that someone gently pulled up the curtain. Let the things in the room return to one place, without any abruptness or strangeness, as if everything was supposed to be this way.
"Your... fusion is also one step closer, getting closer and closer to the state of two-in-one." Luo Ling seemed very calm, as if she had known about this for a long time. "Before, when you came here, he would always fall into a coma and then wake up, but now, you just dazed for a moment and loosened the chopsticks in your hand."
"You know it so clearly. Have you and her reached this state?" Xiao Chen supported his forehead with his hand, feeling a mixture of confusion and worry unconsciously rising in his heart.
"We, no, I should be walking in front of you. I am having dinner with you now, and at the same time, I am outside Heimu Pass, observing the whereabouts of the imperial people. Such fusion happens almost every day, and I seem to have gotten used to the feeling that this me and that me are both me." Luo Ling said.
Seeing Xiao Chen remained silent, she immediately understood what he was struggling with: "Are you still worried about losing yourself?"
"So you know." Xiao Chen nodded and said, "What I mean is, although you and she have very similar experiences, because of time travel, you actually embarked on different paths and have become different people. Don't you think that one you was swallowed up by the other you? Just like me, because of my experiences, my personality has also changed. He is gentler and I am colder. If we merge into one person, who is the real Xiao Chen?" (To be continued)