Eternal Night

Chapter 879 Sphinx Containment Station

The mission to contain the civilization was one of the exploration tasks requested by the mainframe of Wu Pifu, whose main task was to find the core of this civilization.

After searching for a while, he encountered the Mind Civilization, which later became one of the trump cards to kill the Root of Warhammer Dreamworld. During that exploration, he learned that the Containment Civilization had only one remaining entity. In order to avoid its own demise, this entity did not show itself, but hoped that humanity would send a more powerful individual to form an alliance with it.

In short, that mission can be considered a failure.

Unexpectedly, they encountered the contained civilization again during this trip to the Shattered Realm.

Previously, Wu Pifu did not know the specifics of the contained civilization, but now he does. The contained civilization is no simple matter. Although this civilization now only has one individual left, judging from Per's strength and the past deeds of the contained civilization that he now knows, the contained civilization is an extremely special civilization.

First, there is the extraordinary method of containing civilizations. As the true civilization of the previous era of mankind, according to the information currently available, the contained civilization only stayed in the Absolute True Era for seven or eight thousand years before it began to decline in dimensionality. Compared with the true civilizations of the past, the contained civilization can be described as young to the point of being almost an adult.

However, the unique feature of the contained civilization is that it was also a civilization that already had the ability to explore the dream world when it was at the Absolute Reality level.

Their race-specific extraordinary ability is called "containment," and its concept is actually not complicated. It is to materialize the pollution of the race and contain the materialized pollution in a special way.

Well, with the appearance of the giant eyeball and the arrival of the dream world, the pollution had already begun. However, when one is in the Absolute Reality layer, reality offset the effects of the pollution. But as one descends from the Absolute Reality layer, the lower the level, the more visible and terrifying the pollution becomes. This is not just a phenomenon affecting superhumans, but also ordinary people. The most serious effects are loss and information dimensional reduction, while the most common and milder pollution is the sterilization of all people, or a decrease in the number of births and an increase in the probability of deformity.

The unique and extraordinary method of containment civilization is to materialize these intangible contaminations into concrete things and then contain them using a ritual-like ceremony. This is fundamentally different from all civilizations before containment civilization. Therefore, when containment civilization was born, some dream world civilizations even believed that containment civilization might be the ultimate true civilization.

Do you think that containing civilizations is "just that"?

No, in addition to being able to materialize and contain pollution, the key is that they can also use these contained pollution materializations to achieve countless incredible effects, which even violate basic logical concepts. As a result, when the contained civilization was originally considered a true civilization of the era, it caused quite a few major incidents.

For example, the most famous deep-sea fishing project...

Wu Pifu and the others entered the base through the entrance opened in the sand. Sure enough, beneath the desert was a futuristic high-tech base with completely metal corridors. Inside were security personnel wearing exoskeletons and bewildered researchers.

As Wu Pifu walked, he said, "So your true form isn't here?"

"Nature is not there."

The last individual of the contained civilization said, "My life is extremely precious, bearing the weight of the rise and fall of an entire race. Don't worry, I'm perfectly safe... By the way, Mr. Wu, what brings you to the Shattered Realm?"

At this moment, the researchers seemed to have received some information. Two people who looked like supervisors came up to them. One of them said a lot of polite words and then led the group towards the dormitory area.

Wu Pifu said to the empty space, "Come and find the extraordinary path I need."

The last individual of the contained civilization seemed to pause for two seconds before realizing, "That's right, Mr. Wu is about to ascend, and you are an Extreme Path Seed, which requires you to combine the perfect extraordinary pathway cluster you need... But I'm sorry, I don't know much about the Broken Domain. However, there are some collections that the civilization has explored before, which I will send to Mr. Wu in a moment."

Wu Pifu shook his head slightly without answering for the moment, and instead asked directly, "What about those thirty-odd people who were imprisoned? Experiments?"

"No, no, no." The last individual of the contained civilization seemed to know Wu Pifu very well. He immediately understood Wu Pifu's meaning, and this answer was crucial. He immediately said, "Those are containment objects. I suppose Mr. Wu should also know something about our contained civilization? Our contained civilization treats contamination with a scientific attitude. In fact, although all containment objects are unreasonable, my civilization, including myself, is still willing to use scientific methods to analyze them. We do need experimental subjects and volunteers, but not this kind... We are by no means inhuman, Mr. Wu, please rest assured on this point. As for the more than thirty people who are imprisoned, they look like people, but they are actually containment objects."

Wu Pifu remained silent, saying nothing.

The last remaining individual of the contained civilization continued to explain: "This containment object appeared when my civilization still had many individuals. And I want to solemnly declare here that my contained civilization is not as magical as the outside world claims, nor as demonized as it is said. For example, the Abyss Fishing Project was not originally intended to tear apart the entire Dream World; these are all malicious rumors... Okay, let's not talk about that. Let's talk about my civilization's special extraordinary method of 'containment.' First, we cannot actively materialize contamination; all contamination materializations appear passively. In other words, we cannot know the time, place, or type of contamination materializations, nor can we deliberately materialize them. Second, the strength of the containment object is completely random. In fact, a large part of the reason why my civilization now only has one individual left is due to the berserk behavior of the containment object..."

“Alright, let’s continue talking about these thirty-odd humans who are being held captive. They are actually containment subjects, appearing when my elders were still alive and when there were still many members of my tribe. Their characteristic is that unknown human individuals keep appearing in various containment bases of my civilization. They call themselves D-level personnel, which means they are ‘experimental subjects’ humans, several levels lower than digital access. Their origins are unknown, their circumstances are unknown, but they are recorded humans in the derivative dream world occupied by my civilization.” Wu Pifu paused for a moment and said, “Recorded? That means they have families, relatives, and so on?”

"Correct."

The last individual from the contained civilization gave a bitter laugh and said, "At first, we were at a loss. After checking their records, we found that all of these people were death row inmates. But you can't torture death row inmates, right? Execution is the solution. So we sent them back to the derivative dream world where their records were kept. But the containment effect appeared. Once they leave the containment facility, their intellect, intelligence, and even life attributes will rapidly change. To put it simply, they will first become idiots, then lose all intellect, and finally, their nature as 'human' will drastically change, transforming into some terrifying and unbelievable things. For example, the mildest case is becoming a doll or a robot, while the most extreme cases are becoming cursed beings, strange and bizarre creatures, and so on..."

Wu Pifu pondered carefully and fell silent. At this moment, Xu Shilan said from the side, "If we don't believe your explanation, how can you prove it and make us believe it?"

The last remaining individual of the contained civilization smiled: "It's simple, just ask."

Soon, one of the detainees that Wu Pifu sensed was brought to the dormitory. Although there were security personnel escorting him, it was clear that the accompanying security personnel did not care and did not think he was a threat.

This was a tall, thin, fair-skinned man with a shifty look in his eyes. As soon as he entered and saw everyone, he immediately focused his gaze on Wu Pifu, clearly knowing who was in charge here.

Wu Pifu flipped through the records of this person in the derivative dream world. He was an arms smuggler. The key point was that in order to sell arms, he led his subordinates to commit massacres many times, and had at least thousands of lives on his hands. He was a death row inmate, the kind whose sentence could not be reduced.

Wu Pifu asked directly, "So, you volunteered to be a Class D personnel?"

The man paused for a moment, then immediately replied respectfully, "Yes, when I signed the agreement, it was mentioned that as long as I survived ten experiments, I could be released without charge, so I did it voluntarily."

Wu Pifu immediately said, "Alright, I've spoken to the big shots above, and you're pardoned now. You're no longer a D-level personnel."

The man was completely stunned. He stared at Wu Pifu in disbelief, while the supervisor next to him seemed to have received some information and immediately confirmed, "Yes, you have been granted a pardon. You can leave at any time, and I can arrange for someone to take you back to your family right away."

The man's face immediately lit up with ecstasy, but before he could speak, the ecstasy turned into a daze. He muttered to himself, "That's right, I signed the agreement. I'm not a D... no, I'm a D-class personnel. I must be a D-class personnel. I... who was I again? Ah, I'm a D-class personnel. I have to do the experiment, voluntarily, voluntarily, voluntarily..."

Wu Pifu frowned, because at that moment, his emotional perception could no longer detect any of the man's emotions, and his self-awareness was rapidly collapsing.

When Xu Shilan saw Wu Pifu nod, she nodded slightly as well, and Huang Rong also nodded slightly beside her.

It seems that what the last individual of the contained civilization said was true; this thing that looks like a human is indeed a containment object.

Soon, the man who had lost his sense of self was taken away, and as he was being taken away, his sense of self began to heal and regenerate at an incredible speed.

The last remaining entity of the contained civilization said, "See? I didn't lie, did I? Don't worry, I'm a person, and my subordinates are all people. That won't change... Alright, the information has been transmitted to your civilization's artifact. Rest for the night, and then continue your journey. I don't have anything good to offer you, so please excuse me..."

"Wait a moment."

Xu Shilan suddenly spoke up: "What kind of containment items do you have here? Would you mind telling us about them?"

The last individual of the contained civilization paused for a moment before saying, "Of course. Although we haven't formed an alliance with you humans yet, I'm optimistic about your future development. In particular, Mr. Wu's existence has strengthened my confidence... This research institute has six contained objects, but five of them are insignificant and just filler. The reason this containment base is located in the Shattered Domain is to contain one of the most important contained objects."

"Omniscient containment object..."

"Sphinx!"

(End of this chapter)