The door to the conference room was open, and there were messy footprints and drag marks on the floor.
The notice board showed the children who had been selected for "scholarship". In the diary, they were no longer in the orphanage, but had become photos on the wall.
The game world couldn't understand this sentence very well, so the informant became a real photo.
By the time Yu Tang and Zhan Chen searched the place, the three photos had completely turned yellow and damaged, leaving only the most blurry silhouettes, and it was difficult to see the specific lines and outlines.
"We also found exercise books and notes."
Zhan Chen said: "Based on these two things, we have been able to confirm the identity of the first photo."
Dai Lei took it and flipped open the title page. Suddenly, his eyes widened in astonishment: "Pu Ying?! The first place in the exam is Pu Ying... Is she the chief of the Special Investigation Section of the Security Department?"
Song Sihang was also stunned for a moment, then came over to take a look.
Sui Zhengfan said: "Do you know the Special Investigation Division?"
"We are agents from the Special Investigation Division, and Pu Ying is our section chief." Song Sihang said, "We received a mission to deal with high-risk targets in this game."
After all, the central star is too far away from the edge of the asteroid belt. The security department does not have the ability to solve the entire game. They can only try their best to protect those who are innocently dragged into the game and eliminate the mercenary teams that snipe players and sell cards.
They have the support of the investigation team and also enter the game as VIPs. During the game, they suddenly get the news of the expansion of the game world.
"The chief told us that the old chief of the Special Investigations Division is also carrying out special missions in the game."
"The old section chief is on a confidential mission, so all the information has been blocked and we can't check it."
Song Sihang said: "The section chief asked us to try our best to find someone and hand over the known information about the electronic storm. But we didn't find any players who were too old..."
Sui Zhengfan felt a mischievous look from his wife and couldn't help coughing. He looked at Electronic Storm who was standing behind Zhan Chen.
In that "exam", Yu Tang and Zhan Chen had already guessed the identity of the new child.
He once looked for an opportunity to contact Zhan Chen several times, but he never got an answer.
…It turned out to be Pu Ying.
The child who had risked his life to find Pu Sicun for him, was used as a demonstration and warning and disappeared in the electronic storm.
Pu Ying became his successor.
"So, Chief Pu came out of the electron storm with the core particles of the electron storm on him."
Dai Lei put down the exercise book and recalled the contents of the electronic video that the players stole in the second level: "He was sent to an orphanage, and then taken by the director to strip particles... In exchange, he was given a set of equipment that can brainwash people."
"The other two people managed to escape from this prison by betraying Section Chief Pu and getting the 'reward'."
Dai Lei: "One is Yu Liuhui, who is the other one?"
Chai Ning shook her head: "You can't tell from the photos. After we left the orphanage, our memories of the orphanage were erased."
Yu Tang asked her: "Do you still remember how you entered the orphanage?"
Chai Ning was stunned.
She and Meng Nanke looked at each other, and couldn't help frowning and shaking their heads.
"If it were a real orphanage, they would indeed pick up abandoned babies, but not everyone would be one."
Yu Tang said: "There must be some who were sent here because they were lost, abducted or for other reasons. These children are older and should not be unable to recognize any words."
But in that diary, the children were able to use pinyin and pictures instead, and even tried to make up a lot of symbols that only they could understand in order to communicate.
"Based on this, I have a preliminary inference."
Yu Tang: "No matter how old a child is, he or she can't remember anything that happened before he or she came to the orphanage."
…
All the children in the orphanage have memories that begin in the orphanage.
Each of them is a true blank. Their original identities, memories, abilities, and destiny have all been stripped away and left outside the orphanage.
In other words, they were first turned into blanks before being sent down here and locked up.
All the people imprisoned in this prison are people who cannot appear in this world for some reason.
"But the dean of the orphanage... didn't he get the memory-erasing device at this point?"
Chai Ning couldn't help but clenched his fists and whispered: "Who else can do such a thing? Who would do such a thing..."
Her reaction was not slow. She had already gotten the answer while she uttered this sentence.
"Terminal." Sui Zhengfan said.
"I remember now that this orphanage was built on the basis of a villa."
Sui Zhengfan frowned: "The third floor of the villa is the children's activity space, and the fourth floor has a sign for the dean's office, but if you go up from the other side, you will see that there is—"
Team doctor Sui held her husband's hand and met his gaze.
"The whole floor above is the machine room."
Sui Zhengfan and his wife have been to this orphanage.
Being asked to continuously inject capital into an orphanage for no apparent reason would be a strange thing for anyone. The Sui family had sent many people before, but they were unable to find any loopholes.
When he was about to leave, the young man standing at the stairs held his hand.
The boy had very quiet dark eyes. He and his wife were led down the corridor and went up the spare stairs, where they saw the fourth floor for the first time.
Unlike the clean and tidy office of the dean that they were invited to visit, this was a huge computer room with an entire floor, countless optical fibers as thick as arms crisscrossing each other, and incomprehensible codes and data jumping on every screen.
They went down the stairs, and the luxurious activity room on the third floor turned into a gloomy corridor with sealed windows.
The well-equipped bedroom area on the second floor became a shabby white-walled narrow bed. Sundries were piled up in the corridor. The broken faucet in the bathroom was dripping with water, and the children's washed and worn-out clothes were hanging on the wall.
Sui Zhengfan and his wife were shocked by the situation. They almost went to question the person in charge of the orphanage immediately, but they were afraid of alerting the enemy, so they used the pretext of adoption to take away the boy who showed them the truth about the orphanage.
…
"We did adopt a child from the orphanage."
Sui Zhengfan said: "He was a boy, very smart, and didn't like to talk much. I remember he had a name..."
His voice suddenly stopped.
This is where memory breaks down.
No matter how hard they thought, they could not remember a child named Sui Si, who was not very good-looking and did not fit in with the Sui family. He had been...
"I've wanted to be an actor since I was a kid," Yu Tang said. "I like acting and experiencing other people's lives in a play."
Sui Zhengfan looked up in surprise.
What Yu Tang said was exactly the same as what came to his mind.
Sui Zhengfan looked at him, his breathing already heavy: "How did you know?"
Yu Tang did not answer him immediately, but instead mentioned another thing: "The first person with superpowers I met in the villa, his superpower was illusion, and the rules of his domain were 'story'."
Yu Tang said: "I have been thinking that this may not be a coincidence, but a hint that the game world wants to give me."
A field cannot be created out of thin air; there must first be a book, or it must be written down on paper and become a book.
After the realm is generated, the players inside will be affected and see the scenes depicted in the book.
“This is a level A ability.”
Yu Tang raised his hand and put down a card with an image of an open book: "After upgrading to level S, it can rewrite the memories and settings of the people in the story."
That student was not the first person to possess this ability. Yu Tang stole twelve cards from the card world of the director of the Secret Service, and this was one of them.
"I just flipped through the book stored in this card."
Yu Tang said: "There is a book that is a luxurious orphanage."
Therefore, no matter how many people the Sui family sent to look, as long as the director of the Secret Service Bureau opened the book, they would be able to see an orphanage with complete facilities and a suitable environment.
So no matter how hard Sui Zhengfan tried to recall or how he felt something was wrong, he could only remember that he had a son named Sui Si.
"The director of the Secret Service has been working with the person in charge of the game. They are selling two things, one of which is cards."
Yu Tang looked at Sui Zhengfan and said, "Do you remember what I said when I first entered your field?"
Sui Zhengfan frowned.
… He remembers it very clearly.
Yu Tang leaned against the tree trunk, pretending to talk to himself, telling him the things that were given to him.
High-dimensional text can be drawn in low-dimensional space by utilizing dimensionality differences.
This world has been unknowingly stripped of a dimension, and countless innocent ordinary people have become the characters in the story, becoming the protagonists, supporting characters and NPCs.
If the supporting characters and NPCs are strong enough, their fate will be rewritten by the story and they will follow the plot completely.
If it is still not strong enough, it will lower the host's dimension and enter the world to help him "be strong".
"This is the truth about Chuanshuju." Yu Tang said, "This world has an auditor and an intermediary."
Yu Tang: "The terminal gave the game world to the reviewer, and the S-level story cards to the intermediary."
Sui Zhengfan whispered: "The director of the Secret Service Bureau is the middleman?"
Yu Tang nodded.
The reviewer is Zhong San who is reborn again and again. His task is to keep the game world running, collect cards and extradite new humans.
The task of the intermediary is to expand the card field in this world, open one book after another, and help the book bureau "paint".
Yu Tang: "What exactly does the Transparent Bookstore do? What is the purpose of doing this?"
Sui Zhengfan was stunned by him.
The Security Department was not completely unaware of what Yu Tang said - many people had already vaguely noticed the situation and began to take different approaches to try to deal with it and save themselves.
But no one really thought about why the bookstore did this.
Yu Tang supported himself with one hand and sat on the table. The card flicked between his fingers and was completely put away: "Have you ever played games?"
Dai Lei didn't know whether to laugh or cry: "I have played it before, but what does this have to do with games..."
He was stunned by what he said, opened his mouth, and suddenly came to his senses.
—They are now in the game world.
Before the game world expanded completely, these players were forced to fight for their lives, and there were countless spectators who opened gambling games, placed bets, and waited to buy ability cards. Some people came in as VIPs and enjoyed the excitement of hunting without any worries.
In Gao Weiwen's eyes, their world stripped of dimensions is just like the game world, it is nothing more than a book, a story, and a game.
"I once attached a part of my particles to a VIP."
Yu Tang: "He failed the assessment and was stripped of his dimension and returned to this world. I left the notification sound that he had never seen before."
—Confirm the book, the new character is generated, and the character's fate is matched.
Virtual memory has been implanted, status: pending recovery.
Welcome to Xiachuan Bookstore.
…
"This world sells two things to the higher-dimensional world: one is cards, and the other is characters."
Yu Tang asked again: "Have you ever played games?"
"When choosing a role, you can look at the plot biography, character settings, and character relationships, and you can choose a role that interests you."
“You can play and manipulate this character, you can claim the identity of this character, and interact with other people and NPCs in the game.”
"This is a game that is currently in trial operation," said Yu Tang. "It is a brand new, immersive game mode where players can pick a book they like and a protagonist they are interested in."
"Where is the original protagonist?" Dai Lei felt a chill on his spine. "We live in a real world, and everyone is real..."
"Eradicate existence." Yu Tang said.
One identity, one destiny, can accommodate one person.
This is the true meaning of "commodity".
"For example." Yu Tang looked at Meng Nanke, "A scout once spotted you and wanted to take you to the central star of the alliance to make your debut, right?"
Meng Nanke didn't know why the question suddenly fell on him. He was stunned for a moment and nodded.
Yu Tang asked: "What happened next?"
"I don't know." Meng Nanke hesitated and whispered, "We have already agreed to sign a contract with the agency. I want to take Ningning to the Central Star they mentioned. I will go there to dance and make money. We don't need to be famous. We just want to buy a house that doesn't leak..."
He was so excited that he couldn't sleep all night. He carefully put the contract under his pillow, wanting to give Chai Ning a surprise.
But the next day, the scout and the agency suddenly disappeared along with the contract.
No one came to look for him again, and the phone number he left became an invalid number. Not long after, Chai Ning was diagnosed with a leg injury and was returned to the orphanage by their adoptive parents.
He seemed to be having an extremely absurd dream.
"Because someone has bought your fate."
Yu Tang: "Everyone who appears in the orphanage is for sale. Everyone's identity and fate can be purchased."
"Or, in other words, your identities and destinies have been turned into commodities and put on the shelves, so you appear here."
These two things are like the outer shells of spirits. If you want to sell the outer shells, the first step is to pour out the original contents inside.
This orphanage is the place where those "poured out things" are stored.
Therefore, everything here is gray, so the children who appear in the orphanage will have no memory before entering the orphanage, do not know who they are, and will not have the abilities and talents they had before.
They should all be the protagonists of the story. Some have great talents, some have unstoppable luck, some have someone they truly love, and some have a colorful future that is both exciting and thrilling.
Because someone bought their protagonist identities, they were hidden here.
This is the Recycle Bin for your terminal.
…
"Now let's get back to the original topic."
Yu Tang looked at Sui Zhengfan and said, "I know that part because I just checked the registration file of the first internal beta VIP player in that S-level card."
The Pu family disagreed with the deal with the terminal and tried to stop it, so the next generation of heirs disappeared in the electronic storm.
The price Sui Zhengfan and his wife paid was that they completely forgot about their children.
"When you came to the orphanage, you saw your child who was taken away from you again."
Yu Tang said: "You both don't remember each other, but you still couldn't help but adopt him, and he returned to the Sui family again."
The Sui family is the sponsor of the orphanage. The orphanage has no ability to stop the Sui family from taking the child away, but the fate and identity of the child have already been determined by the beta test players.
One identity, one destiny, can accommodate a person.
So the Secret Service director came up with another idea.
It happened that the conservatives and Wen Er's mentor joined forces to use the electronic storm to get rid of the sharp knife team. The director of the Secret Service Bureau took advantage of the situation and revealed the news to Sui Zhengfan.
Sui Zhengfan naturally chose to carry out that mission instead of Zhuang Yu.
After Sui Zhengfan and his wife and the Sharp Knife Team fell into the electronic storm, the director of the Secret Service recruited their adopted son.
He was a gentle but stubborn young man. He went against the advice of the Sui family elders and insisted on studying logistics at the Military Academy. He also chose to drop out of the Military Academy and joined the Special Operations Division of the Security Department regardless of the Sui family's opposition.
The director of the Secret Service recruited him temporarily and told him that if he became an action agent and went undercover in a laboratory, he could get his parents back.
In order to prevent the leakage of secrets, the price of going undercover in that laboratory is to briefly enter an electronic storm and be implanted with a program.
The director of the Secret Service told him that to be an operational agent, he would need to erase all his memories, give up his identity, give up everything he loved, and give up his predetermined future.
The Director of the Secret Service made that young man into an instrument of revenge.
The vacant identity and destiny were sold to a beta tester from a higher dimension who had wanted to be an actor since childhood, liked acting, and liked experiencing other people's lives in the play.
"This is the first time I've been reborn."
Yu Tang said: "Senior Zhan—"
Zhan Chen had been reminded of the past so many times that he already knew what he was talking about. He reached out and cupped the back of Yu Tang's head, pulling him into his arms like an electronic storm, and gently rubbed his scalp twice.
Zhan Chen admitted softly: "I made the biggest mistake here."
The "Yu Tang" stripped away by the electronic storm has the dual memories of Yu Tang and Feng Qing.
Every time he would be reset along with the world, and then he would happily go to find the brother who was the most sensible one in his memory, who had given them candy and promised to give him a home.
But that was no longer Zhan Chen.
He was an imposter who had assumed an identity, who came to their world to make games, and also bought a destiny for the little star he picked to be successfully signed, debuted and became a big star.
Yu Tang failed the assessment at Chuanshuju for the first time and was tricked into stripping off his own particles.
After he suffered a concussion and lost his memory fragments, he took Zhan Chen's flyer for the second time and rejoined Chuan Shu Ju to start his internship. He had experienced Yu Tang's entire fate once.
"It was this time." Yu Tang said, "I started from the orphanage."
This time, the orphanage became an ordinary orphanage.
Ke Ming had robbed someone else's fate and had to go back to the orphanage to follow the plot. With Sui Si's care, he was able to successfully get a place to study, but this time, Yu Tang accidentally got the first place in the exam.
Ke Ming used candy to exchange for the first place, and once again changed the fate of others.
"But... aren't they high-dimensional players?"
Dai Lei swallowed hard. He hadn't been able to fully digest the truth yet, but he instinctively found a topic: "I've read the news. Sui Si... and his little celebrity didn't end up well. Recently, the two of them have been in court again..."
Yu Tang rubbed Zhan Chen's shoulder and raised his head: "Why don't you ask, why did the orphanage become an ordinary orphanage?"
Dai Lei was stunned.
"The solitary and the laboratory are the two passages for high-dimensional players to enter and exit."
Yu Tang said: "They came in from the computer room of the orphanage and went back from the computer room of the laboratory. Logically speaking, if a situation that is disadvantageous to the players occurs, they can just leave the mess behind and walk away."
"I understand this." Dai Lei said, "Just like in the game, VIP players can request to be teleported back to the game lobby at any time..."
Yu Tang: "Can we go back now?"
Dai Lei opened his mouth and shook his head blankly.
Now no one can go back, because the game world was compressed into a singularity and then backfired, swallowing up all beings in the same dimension.
"This isn't the first time I've done this," Yu Tang said.
After failing the assessment at Chuanshuju, he was deceived by Zhan Chen forty-two times in succession.
The last time, he finally became completely furious and out of control, violating the rules Zhan Chen taught him.
He devoured Wen Er's mentor, and in 0.75 seconds, completely annihilated the laboratory in the electronic storm.
That lab contains all the information about the Electronic Storm, countless databases of human knowledge and programming, and a host that players can leave.
All the "high-dimensional players" who turned low-dimensional text into games and wantonly played with the fate of others were locked in this world by him, and they no longer had the chance to quit the game.
"They lied to me, so I just ate their food, Senior Zhan."
Yu Tang said: "I think I will be able to find you this way."