It feels like falling into a deep icy sea, with endless cold and darkness enveloping your warm body. No matter how you struggle or reach out your hands, you can never touch the faint light above your head that is gradually moving away. A heavy feeling of suffocation grips your throat, and all you can do is keep falling until you reach the bottom of the abyss.
In the end, nothing exists anymore. All you have left is the cold and your thoughts in the darkness. Gradually, you no longer know how long it has been going on, until your only consciousness also sinks into the darkness.
"Begin the will test."
"Apply power to the electrodes... record the value..."
Someone whispered in the darkness, as if it was not the time to die yet, so I opened my eyes and returned to this crazy world.
Galahad coughed violently, and some blood came out from under the translucent respirator. He breathed deeply, and the machine rumbled, sending mist containing painkillers into the respirator.
His tired eyes swept back and forth, and all he could see were the four steel walls and the snakes carved on the steel dome. They were entangled with each other, biting each other's tails, and their black scales were like the dark night, until they formed a perpetual circle.
That was the Ouroboros, a religious symbol. Some said it represented the cycle of life and death, or reincarnation. In mysterious alchemy it was described as the crystallization of the soul, but Galahad knew very well that in his impression this thing only represented one meaning.
Infinite, perpetual operation.
That was a concept proposed by the first director of the Institute of Mechanical Engineering. He invented the great steam engine. On this basis, he believed that there should be a machine in the world that would never stop working after it was started and would not require any subsequent energy. He quoted the symbol of ouroboros and named the machine the perpetual motion machine.
Galahad's knowledge of mechanics was very low, but he knew that this did not conform to the law of conservation of energy and that such a thing could not possibly exist. But just like the crazy imagination of humans, the director was convinced that the machine must exist, so he built a perpetual motion pump in the Mechanical Institute in pursuit of the ideal machine, which continues to this day.
"I thought you would be in a coma for at least a week, but I didn't expect you to wake up so soon."
The voice sounded at the side, and Nicholas walked over slowly with a cup in his hand. He had a pair of dark circles under his pale face, and he walked lightly, making people feel that he would die suddenly in the next second.
"How does it feel?"
Sitting aside, Galahad tried to move, and he found that he was contained in a translucent jar, filled with light green liquid covering him, leather and steel firmly holding him, the fatal wound slowly healed under immersion, but on the other side there were exposed metal cables also soaked in water.
"Like a nightmare..."
Galahad said weakly.
As if noticing his gaze, Nicholas continued.
"Please forgive me, you have been corrupted by the Armor of Original Sin. If you lose control again, we scientists will not be able to control you."
As Nicholas spoke, he looked around and smiled. There was a group of people wearing the same uniform as him, but like ghosts, they walked without making any sound, and there was no unnecessary conversation. There was only the sound of keystrokes and the sound of calculation formulas being written.