It was 3 o’clock in the wee hours. After the crowds were gone, it was only then that the other side of the Mokugyo Encyclopedic Forum was revealed. Unlike the bustling atmosphere in the daytime, the Mokugyo Encyclopedic Forum was quiet and looked deserted. The smoke had dissipated, half of the lights had been put out, and the air felt colder. There were only a handful of cleaners roaming here and there to clean up the debris and trash left behind by the patrons during the day. As Lin Sanjiu moved towards level B2, she found that there were a lot more parts of the hall that she had never seen before. She surmised that there should be more, as she could see some shadows in the distance where the light couldn’t reach.
When she arrived at level B2, she slid into the cocoon-shaped operating pod and activated the monitor. Then, as soon as the monitor was activated, an “Incoming Call” icon popped out from the left corner of the screen. She hastily tapped the icon, and then a huge peacock head appeared. Behind the peacock head was a white wall. Lin Sanjiu looked around, yet she still couldn’t tell where the peacock head was right now.
The peacock head swayed a little as if there was something moving underneath. Then, from the two slits on its head, a pair of bloodshot human eyes appeared.
“How was it?” Lin Sanjiu asked as she examined the peacock headgear. “Any good news?”
Even though the peacock head was just another “commoner” in the Twelve Worlds, he was vigilant. Lin Sanjiu hoped that he would keep a vigilant eye while he was doing his job.
“Yeah,” the peacock head answered simply, “Your task is simple. If I could pick up a few more of these jobs, I’d soon be able to buy a visa.”
“All right. Spill the beans.”
“She is pretty famous in the Twelve Worlds, so I was able to dig up her information without much effort. She is 29 years old this year, and she came from the world “Sensual Nightmare”. She had been roaming around the apocalyptic worlds for about four or five years before she finally arrived in Heaven Underworld two years ago,” the peacock head reported his finding as he fumbled about something outside of the screen. Then, an “Incoming Files” icon jumped out on Lin Sanjiu’s side. She pressed on the receive button.
The profile about Jezebel was short. It had only two pages. She flipped the profile and found that most of the contents took place in Heaven Underworld, which revolved around the process of her building Bliss.
“There is nothing special about her except the fact that she’s pretty.” The peacock head shrugged indifferently. “In my hometown, we used to call this kind of woman a courtesan,” he added, not bothering to hide his sarcastic tone. “Women are good, all you have to do is just spread your legs and—”
Lin Sanjiu raised her head and darted him a glance, prompting the peacock head to shut his mouth as he suddenly remembered that his client was a woman as well.
“This isn’t right,” said Lin Sanjiu. She wasn’t in the mood to mind what the peacock head said. She put the document away and leaned back in the chair, a hard frown roughening her brows. “This is all you could dig up on her? It’s too normal, something just doesn’t add up.”
Jezebel transformed from a struggling, little-known posthuman into a posthuman who had the ability to claim a small territory as her own in the Twelve Worlds and become the owner of Bliss. The entire process was too strange. Lin Sanjiu flipped through Jezebel’s profile again, and the feeling of something missing did not ebb away, but only got stronger.
“What more do you want to know?” said the peacock head. The expression on his face right now suggested that he was not in agreement with Lin Sanjiu’s comment. “This is everything about her. To complete her information, I even found one of her fellow countrymen. I am confident that there is no one who could do better than me and investigate more carefully than I did.”
He was right. The man really had a good reputation for doing his job.
After paying the peacock man the rest of the money, Lin Sanjiu remained seated in the pod and stared at the monitor as if lost in her own thoughts. Generally, based on the principle “you will get what you’ve been dreaming of day and night”, Reverie Libretto would respond to every posthuman who had cleared the pocket dimension by rewarding them the thing that they had in their mind. Even though the reward sometimes did not fully meet the requirement of the posthuman, it was still more or less in line with their goal. That was the reason why Silvan suggested that she try her luck at Reverie Libretto.
If the parasite she brought out of the Reverie Libretto really had given her a hint, then the only possible clue was none other than Jezebel, since she was the only one who was unaffected by the parasite.
She skimmed through Jezebel’s profile anew, yet she still couldn’t make heads or tails of it.
She had never met her in the past and they did not have any mutual friends, so there was no reason for Jezebel to kill her. Besides, from the profile, Jezebel did not seem to be in contact with those who wanted her life.
‘So what was the clue about…?’ Lin Sanjiu thought.
“I guess I have no other choice but to use that one,” Lin Sanjiu sighed. She pulled up the message interface from the Mokugyo Encyclopedic Forum’s system and noticed that Silvan still remained greyed out. She didn’t know if he had already gotten out of the underground or whether the Munitions Factory was still looking for her. She continued to browse through the messages and found several replies from the Consular Officers. Amongst the replies, there was one in particular that caught her attention.
“I don’t know who Hai Tianqing is, but I’ve heard of Sayo before. It seems that she is now in the Twelve Worlds Centrum too. I will contact you as soon as I get any news about her.”
The reply was two days ago.
If she could get to Sayo, then she could possibly get to Hai Tianqing and B. Rabbit as well. Hu Changzai had been held captive along with the cat doctor by Puppeteer, and she hadn’t heard from him since they parted ways in the Data Streams Library.
‘Did he get the cat doctor to tend to his wounds?’ Lin Sanjiu asked.
Lin Sanjiu’s heart sank when she realized how much she missed her friends and how much she worried about Puppeteer. After a short bout of rumination, Lin Sanjiu decided to do something wild. It was now a quarter past 3 at midnight. Setting her jaw tight, she pulled open the general channel and published a message in a gross language, “Who the f*ck knows where the f*ck Puppeteer is? If any of you happen to bump into that little b*tch who always plays with dolls, tell him to come and find me. I want to snap his two f*cking puny legs into half!”
She did not leave an address since her objective was to lure Puppeteer out.
Even though she used a pseudonym to publish the message, Lin Sanjiu still felt a little guilty. However, she also felt a little delighted. After she had published the message, or to be more precise, the bomb, she jerked up and got out of the operating pod as if she was burned by the seat.
As she closed the pod, a slight clicking sound was released into the air, which accentuated the silence in level B2. Lin Sanjiu was the only guest, as the other people were on the upper floor, which was charged at a cheaper rate. She strode towards the door and when she pushed it open, she almost crashed into a man who was walking in.
The man’s reflexes were obviously slower than Lin Sanjiu’s. He staggered a few steps back before regaining his balance. He pulled his hat lower to hide his face under its shadow. He examined Lin Sanjiu from below his hat and then hurried past her.
Lin Sanjiu got onto the upper level and walked down the rows of monitor screens toward the main entrance. There were very few people in Mokugyo Encyclopedic Forum right now. From time to time, there would be noise coming out from somewhere. However, no matter how they looked, how they dressed, or what kind of species they were, those who appeared at Mokugyo Encyclopedic Forum at this hour looked very suspicious, including herself.
When she walked down the hall, she saw that one of the screens was still on, its lonely light trying to cast away the darkness that was closing in. Lin Sanjiu swept a gaze over it and saw a rolling message. “Looking for a bodyguard. Somebody is coming to kill me, but I don’t have much money to offer.” She let out a wry smile but didn’t stop. She continued to stride forward and exited Mokugyo Forum.
Dawn was breaking as the sun began to rise from the east when she arrived at Black’s Market. She stood at a stoop and allowed her gaze to travel out. She could see the undulating shadows in the distance, but she couldn’t tell whether or not it was the mountain range that surrounded Mid Mountsburg. After she bought several new masks, she walked forward and dug out a few red crystals from her pouch.
Since she was in Black’s Market right now, she decided to put Jezebel’s matter aside and settle another issue on her hand right now.
Lin Sanjiu could smell the sweetness in the air when she went near the checkpoint. She paced towards the shop that sold pan-fried buns stuffed with duoluozhong slices and then handed a few red crystals to the duoluozhong that wore a mask. “Give me a few buns and slices.”
It seemed that time had abandoned the duoluozhong as well. Even though several months had passed, Naga-ashi still looked the same. It stayed in the same place and did the same job. Whether or not it was injured or engulfed by its hatred, as a duoluozhong, it had to return to the shop to do its job and serve the customers. Apparently, Naga-ashi did not recognize her. It took the red crystals and threw her orders into two paper bags. After the collapse of human’s society, plastic had become a rare material. Perhaps as Nüwa said, the demise of mankind might actually be beneficial for a planet.
Lin Sanjiu took over the paper bags. She leaned against the wall and popped a bun into her mouth.
Naga-ashi threw her a surreptitious gaze but did not say anything. After a few minutes, it looked at her again. The shop was small, and Lin Sanjiu was blocking almost half of it. When Lin Sanjiu popped another bun into her mouth, the duoluozhong finally spoke up, “You can’t eat in here.”
“I know. Your shop is so packed.”
“Then, can you eat somewhere else?” Naga-ashi asked sternly.
“Sure, but I have a condition.”
Stunned, Naga-ashi’s hand slowed down.
Lin Sanjiu turned her head over but she did not take down her [Mask]. “I want to see Timo. I know you’re still looking out for him,” she stared at the duoluozhong and said softly, “Tell me, where he is now.”
