Puzzle Madness

Chapter 155 Circle (Part 5)
If it wasn't inserted, then it was originally inside the skull.
The only thing in my mind can be --
DouDou slapped her hand with her fist and suddenly realized:

"Oh, I get it! All these miscellaneous things are actually materialized; thoughts turning into matter or something, right?"

Combining these diverse and unique items, DouDou feels the reasoning can be even more profound:

[It's somewhat like a memory taking shape and becoming a physical object—it seems to have that feel to it. Perhaps some of it is an important or particularly vivid memory?]

For example, family, hobbies, etc.? Anyway, a family photo is usually a good choice.

No one around him had the energy to respond or answer, making it seem as if he was talking to himself.

This conclusion cannot be verified in the short term, let alone in this chaotic scene. However, DouDou is more concerned about something else.

He touched the top of his head, then scratched his mouth and ears; feeling a strange sense of alienation.

"By the way, why isn't anything coming out of my mouth?"

DouDou pinched her ears, deep in thought; trying hard to visualize the specific object in her mind:
"The Magic Swan 2 cartridge—the complete launch set! Plus two copies of *Dino Crisis: Apocalypse* and *New Digimon Legends*. Oh, and peripherals too. I want the motion-sensing controller, that's about it."

Although Richard gave her a handheld console, DouDou had seen the packaging; it was just a bare console, without any game cartridges. But since it was a gift, DouDou certainly wouldn't take advantage of it.

If you can just "think" out a bunch of things directly, you can save a lot of money!

No matter how many times he repeated it, nothing seemed to pop out of his head; DouDou quickly grew annoyed. He waved his hand and spoke to the researcher again:
"Alright, alright, we can't keep thinking about taking advantage. You agree, right? Uh, are you even listening?"

The researcher was still lying on the ground. His mouth and nose, blocked by the gushing foreign object, were submerged in a puddle; he seemed to have become a corpse in the cold, rainy night.

"How terrifying! Gone in an instant. Ah, an accident is always better than—ouch!"

Plop, plop. The sound of his hand slapping against the puddle suddenly stirred in the researcher's limbs. He braced himself on his elbows, straightened his upper body, and trembled all over.

"Wow! It's back to life!"

DouDou, who was just about to turn around, almost dropped her chin to her stomach: the researcher didn't look like a living person at all.

Even with his head exploding and strange solid matter flowing out, the researcher was still not dead; but he could not speak, because even his mouth was churning out long spirals.

The only thing that could be considered lucky was that their eyes were unharmed: many people had their eyeballs pushed out and fall to the ground along with their optic nerves.

[Nothing's wrong? That's amazing. Is it a psychotic awakening? Or is it some other strange thing?]

However, the conjecture was quickly shattered. The other researchers who survived the mental broadcast also began to move, desperately trying to pull out the various foreign objects gushing from their seven orifices.

It's like a zombie movie with some kind of mutated form: except the "zombies" are trying to dig outwards instead of devouring.

The researcher in front of DouDou propped himself up and knelt in the rain; perhaps because of pain, the researcher's facial muscles were tense and ferocious, no different from the cannibalistic zombies on TV.

But the researcher should still be rational: he pointed behind DouDou with one hand, and with the other hand he tried to pry out the long, hard, protruding roll that was stuck in his mouth, but he couldn't get it out no matter what he did.

The researcher moved even more nimbly than before, and the blood flowing from his seven orifices stopped. It seemed that the near-fatal wound that had burst open in his skull had actually relieved the intracranial pressure; even his body became more flexible.

DouDou turned around following his movement: her newly ignited curiosity was pulled in a completely new direction—
I don't have time to deal with this researcher who's both alive and dead right now.
Because the catalogers are taking off.
-
The cataloger floated up, his limbs spread out in a starfish shape. He was tilted at a forty-five-degree angle, his body arched backward. The blood-soaked people, their fingers interlocked, surrounded him in the center of the circle, swaying and rising and falling, dancing a simple, rough human wave.

The movements carried a certain rhythm and cadence: perhaps it was the recitation of a song that had not been spoken, or perhaps it was merely the trembling of a strange body; the truth remained unknown.

The cataloger rose higher and higher, soaring into the sky, almost suspended in the very center of heaven and earth. Above were thick, gray clouds, like concrete; below lay blood-soaked figures and rotting wooden paths; and the waves continued to churn, never once still.

It was as if he were possessed, as if he were under a spell.

DouDou felt like she had seen this scene before: Was it in "Rosemary's Baby"? Or in "The Exorcist"?

The spiritual broadcast finally rang again, but this time it was clear and bright; there wasn't a trace of noise.

[Where? Where? Where?]
[Dreamscape. Spiral. Martian craters. Memory channels. Life, death, love, and desire. Everything is so tiny. Signal. Opportunity.]
[The sea of ​​suffering is too thick, truly too thick.]
Where are they? Where are they? Where are they? Where is humanity's conduit?
Is it too early? Is it really too early?
[Not finished yet. Not finished yet.]
It poured out continuously, wave after wave, in all directions.

[Is the cataloger broadcasting his inner monologue again? But he doesn't seem to be fully awake: the things he broadcasts are all strange and confusing.]

[Hey, this time the telepathy is different. Has it been upgraded?]

Perhaps the cataloger had secretly had a big drink while DouDou wasn't looking—DouDou found it hard to describe the feeling she received. It was completely different from the previous mental broadcasts:

It's not like the "thinking voice" that speaks to yourself in your head, nor is it an audio reproduction of recalling songs or chatting; it's more like a kind of [knowing], a complete and perfect [communication], imprinted deep in your heart.

The content was vague and unclear, like a dream—
DouDou couldn't understand a word the cataloger was saying: it was like piling up all sorts of nonsense, like a tongue twister.

However, DouDou didn't have time to figure out whether the cataloger was reciting poetry or daydreaming too much—
His curiosity was completely captivated by the scene before him, and there was no sign of it stopping.

Sizzle—Pfft!
The hand on the cataloger's face suddenly shot out, bouncing four or five meters high like a firecracker, before finally landing on the ground with a clanging sound.

DouDou only realized now that "that hand" wasn't just a decoration on the outside of the mask. It was more like a back scratcher that didn't need anyone's help, with a shiny long stick attached to the back of the palm with the index finger raised.

Reflecting the light from the engineering lighting, it was likely made of metal. Judging from its length, it was clear that during the previous duel, a large portion of it had remained embedded in the cataloger's mind.

The cataloger who pulled out the long pole had a large hole in his mask: deep and dark, obscuring any visible wounds or facial features.

Everything is still going on.

Bright red, bubble-like spheres are rising one by one: upon closer inspection, one can see that they are clumps of blood suspended in the air, seemingly unaffected by gravity and raindrops.

"How sudden! How did it turn into blowing bubbles?"

DouDou raised her hand to shield her eyes, staring intently at the increasingly violent anomaly.

These thin streams of red flowed and drifted from the severed necks of each blood-soaked figure; then they traced an arc, coalesced again into lines, and burrowed into the holes in the cataloger's mask.

Countless drops of blood poured into the cataloger's mask, yet there was no sign of it overflowing.

Even the raindrops changed their trajectory.
The rain from the sky seemed to be poured into an invisible funnel, beginning to pour towards the cataloger; the rain lines drew closer and closer until they converged, swirling, and joined the ranks of blood.

(End of this chapter)