Watching the anime from Madoka Magica and writing the rules

"So...that's why there's an underworld?"

Zhi Xing leaned against the wall, feeling his heart colder than ever before. His heart was so calm that any other distracting thoughts were naturally covered by the coldness before they even arose.

But this coolness is not calmness, but an instinctive reaction of the body to fear.

Zhi Xing has been running in the witch's barrier for a long time, but he still can't find any trace of the shadow of the [Gambler].

Zhixing also tried to comfort himself about the shadow that appeared at that time. Perhaps it was a cognitive existence created by the shadow of [despair].

After all, Zhixing is not a native of this world and cannot tell the differences between the shadows in front of him.

Even in the world of "p5", the only ones who can be distinguished are the mascots of the protagonist group that split from the shadow monster.

Others, even Futaba who used to be the master of the hall, cannot completely distinguish the difference between cognitive existence and shadow, so when dealing with the mother created by their own hall, they need to rely on the power of the Phantom Thieves.

But even though the naked eye could not tell the truth about the [Gambler], he still found some evidence to support his guess.

Because Zhi Xing has the passive ability of the witch's barrier.

In addition to the Witch's Barrier that cannot respond to gravity but can respond to most attacks, there is also the Witch's Kiss that can make the Desperate Group tremble in fear.

Even a personality mask made of shadow monsters is still within the range of the Witch's Kiss.

If the Gambler was truly cornered at that time, then the Witch's Kiss wouldn't have been indifferent. And if the Witch's Kiss had acted, then the Gambler would have been able to survive within the Witch's barrier, just like the bikers and Kamoshida.

Therefore, it is not impossible that the "Gambler" is a cognitive existence, just like the "Baseball Player" and "Idol" who tried to act in the beginning.

However, how could an attack from a cognitive being possibly trigger the defense of the witch's barrier?

Although the shadow monster seems to be very destructive, its status in the real world is obviously higher than that in the cognitive world.

Let me give you a very simple example.

After Long Si entered the hall for the first time, he was imprisoned because he was no match for the shadow monster soldiers.

And under the personal supervision of Kamoshida's shadow, he punched Ryuji repeatedly until he was unable to resist, but did not leave any unusual injuries on Ryuji's real body that could be discovered by the patrolman who passed by the next moment.

The paper line also experienced several [buffer] failures, so the experience of landing made it clear that the damage in the cognitive world and the damage in the real world are completely different things.

In addition, the treatment in the cognitive world does not work on the physical body.

In the cognitive world, the essence of confrontation is actually just to overlay one's own cognition on the other party and reach a unilateral transaction exchange, that is, you accept my request, but I do not accept your request.

As a result, the opponent will suffer injuries that meet their expectations, and these injuries will be revived from the dying health to full health with the help of medicine or treatment skills.

Therefore, the only thing that was lost was the Phantom Thief uniform given by the Persona.

If the body resists, it will result in loss of energy. For the original body that can use itself as the source of desire, it will be just like Mona, who will be locked up if he cannot win.

Unless the power reaches the level of the shadow monster wandering in the impression space, which can cause a large loss of energy at one time, this level of contact will not trigger a reaction from the witch's barrier.

This was the acceptable force range of the witch's barrier, which was tested in Liangshanpo through gradually increasing the intensity of exercise.

If only cognition existed, the possibility of being misjudged by the witch's barrier by approaching with bare hands and making contact with people was still very small, otherwise the [Soldier] would not have planned to use a throwing technique on Zhi Xing.

When both possibilities have theories to explain them, Zhixing still chose the possibility that would arise when fate cannot be changed.

"Both the [Idol] and the [Gambler] went to the so-called underworld due to the disappearance of the shadow of cognition."

"Then we can basically declare this plan to change our destiny bankrupt."

"Unless... I can think of a way for Kamizuru Izuru to reach the underworld."

Although Zhixing's body was a little tired from running for a long time, he still insisted on trying to get out of the edge of the witch's barrier and stuck half of his head out, hoping to find some inspiration by comparing the two spaces.

And this bit of inspiration did help the paper company find a way to maintain this state.

"Although the location of the underworld is known only after arriving in this world, as for what can enter, besides the Kamisaki Derivu who entered voluntarily, there are only the Gambler, the Idol, and the witch's magic that originally possessed half of my body."

The power of understanding the world is very weak.

Not only can it not bring about any substantial changes to reality, it can even drag down the essence of reality. Even the witch's barrier in "Madoka Magica" that was created with several human lives can keep it out.

But the power of understanding the world is very strong.

Not only can the witch herself create her own personality mask in the cognitive world, but even if the [idol] is located in the witch's room deep in the barrier, it is still blessed with a semi-demonized enchantment and is not even completely dead.

But he was still brought into the underworld by the power of the cognitive world.

Since the gravitational force of falling into the underworld is so strong, then, through this suspended death caused by collective denial, without the obstruction of the Velvet Room, there is a high probability that one can be directly teleported to the underworld.

After Zhixing made this decision in his mind, he thought of using his cognitive existence to fake his death at Hope's Peak Academy.

Anyway, the days here are likely to meet other conditions for return. Even if you enter the underworld and there is no way out, you can still escape by finding the way out of the throne.

With this thought in mind, Zhixing gave up the plan to look for the whereabouts of the [Gambler] and returned to the memory space.

But after getting rid of the witch's barrier, Zhixing took a few steps outside and found that he had left the location of the school referee and came to a vast mountain forest full of corpses.

Zhi Xing looked around and saw a huge central lake, swallowing up the people who were slowly crawling out of their corpses.

It is connected to the apocalyptic background of the desperate group killing people in reality, and the examination room at the bottom where people are frantically writing test papers.

"So... you're writing a suicide note..."

Zhixing felt a sense of empathy as he walked towards the lake. After sinking for a while, he landed steadily on one of the rock passages that he had seen connecting many examination rooms.

Zhixing looked back at the lake that he could never touch again, and then turned his gaze to the location of the black and white bear's secret treasure, because the Hope's Peak Academy was near the black and white bear.

However, what caught Zhixing's eye was the base of the open-air examination room, but he did not see the black and white bear, whose body should have been partially visible from the gaps in the open-air classroom no matter where it was.

"Has [Despair] come yet?"

Zhixing realized that he might have been in the witch's barrier for too long, so he ran towards a nearby classroom without holding on to much hope.

As expected, a huge open space appeared within the circle of shadows surrounding the classroom where the suicide note was written.

In the center of the clearing, the actions of the super high school level protagonist group were being displayed on the surveillance screen of Hope's Peak Academy.

Zhixing took a deep breath and realized clearly what the movement of the secret treasure meant. After all, this was also the reason why Zhixing and [Despair] made a deal.

Let the cognitive world cover the real world.

So even though he didn't know how long it would take for the reality to be affected, Zhixing had no intention of running back layer by layer.

After using all the despair that had accumulated since entering the witch's barrier to imagine himself as a demon, Zhixing jumped down from the edge of the classroom.

In free fall, relying on the advantage of long landing time, he used the witch's barrier to complete a [cushioned] landing, and came to the side of a cognitive being that was born in the center of the open space and was gradually becoming a demon.

Looking at the surveillance footage being watched by a crowd of people, the TV receiving the signal blocked the surveillance footage in the picture because of the cognitive existence, thus attracting the attention of others.

Zhi Xing followed his own words and sent the cognitive existence Zhi Xing without the witch's kiss into the witch's barrier, and returned to the memory space when his hand lightened.

Seeing that the familiar Zhixing did not appear with his return, Zhixing understood the fate of the [Gambler].

Zhi Xing regained his composure, said what he wanted to say to the projection screen in front of him, and then used the witch's barrier to escape from the spot.

And ran towards the direction of Hope's Peak Academy.

Finally, with the help of the safe house at Hope's Peak Academy, which was at the same location, and the coordinates provided by the Witch's Kiss, Zhi Xing successfully [teleported] to the side of the [soldier] and returned to reality.

When Zhixing walked out of the monitoring room and successfully fell to the ground from the 4th floor after several "wall-passing" attempts, Zhixing looked at the super-large black and white bear that had appeared in reality with a bit of confusion, and realized that the cognitive world had come to reality, so he could not rely on entering the cognitive world to offset the influence of gravity and achieve "buffering".

Crawling forward with the remaining strength in his arms, Zhi Xing couldn't help but feel very inconvenienced that [Reset] couldn't be triggered actively.

But fortunately, the battlefield is not far away.

When Zhi Xing climbed around the corner of the wall, he soon saw [Lucky], [Detective], [Nobleman], [Swimming], [Fortune Teller], and [Literary Girl] who had truly escaped from the Subtle Peak Academy.

But the next moment, Zhixing saw an incredible scene.

"Huh? How is this possible??"

In front of the black and white bear, which was as huge as Godzilla, Hope's Peak Academy was only the height of a small mound.

But between this mound and the black and white bear, there is a colorful energy wandering.

The paper lines can be seen clearly.

A shadowy figure holding a scale was floating behind him. The [Disciplinary Officer] was moving and directing the actions of the others.

A biker gang on a modified motorcycle was carrying another biker gang to clear out the attack of a desperate group wearing black and white bear masks that came out from the side of Monokuma.

“Bang~!”

A baseball flew bigger and bigger, and Zhi Xing's attention fell on the [baseball player]. At the same time, he saw the [fighter] who was feeding the ball to him while fighting against the soldiers.

"Bang~"

As the baseball's attack had little effect, a UFO flew back from the place where the baseball was hit and landed next to the [Fan Fiction Writer].

Then, a ball of green light enveloped the UFO, causing it to peel off its scar-like outer shell, revealing a magical girl wearing a pink girlish outfit inside. As the girl turned around to express her gratitude, Zhixing followed her gaze and saw an "idol" holding a microphone and dancing like a solo concert.

And beside him, protecting the concert from being disturbed, the "enchanted paper line" who had just separated from him.

"What's going on? Is this a dream? Or... am I too desperate?"

Chapter 373: Standing Outside the Battlefield [Observing]

Zhixing stared at the situation at the scene intently, confirming that the picture was indeed changing in real time, while secretly stimulating the wound caused by falling from the 4th floor with his hand.

The wound is still there, and [Reset] has not been triggered yet, but why are they all gathered together at this point in time?

Zhixing looked at the scene in front of him and couldn't help but doubt his life.

After all, Zhixing had just used his state of despair to eliminate other distracting thoughts and think about the power of the cognitive world, but now he was in a somewhat confused situation.

"If the [Witch's Barrier] can be divided into a system formed by the interweaving of the two forces of [Enchantment] and [Wish], then the [Cognitive World] should be the product of the interweaving of [Desire] and [Cognition]."

"I should have analyzed it almost completely, so where did this unexpected development come from?"

Although Zhixing has experienced four worlds, the ones that have helped him the most so far are [Witch's Barrier] and [Cognitive World]. So without too much brainstorming, Zhixing began to compare the extraordinary power of [Witch's Barrier].

"[Witch's Barrier] itself should be the soul of the magical girl, using the emotion of despair as a transformation energy source."

"In theory, any emotion can be transformed into usable energy with Kyubey's technology. At most, the tendency of the magic power will be slightly different, such as hope, despair, and love."

"What makes a witch a witch and not a despairing magical girl is the intervention of the power of [Wish]."

"Where does the energy that explodes when hope turns to despair come from? Just think about the fact that every girl has and must make a wish, and you'll understand. This is using girls as a medium to steal the energy within the wish."

"The upper limit of a wish is enough to create a god, to break free from the constraints of time and space, so the [Witch] is used to bear the cost of Kyubey's exploitation of [Wishes]."

"Although the [Witch] can't fulfill her wishes like the [Temple], other than that, it doesn't seem to have too many restrictions, namely amnesia, cognitive filters, violence, and a bit of overindulgence."

"If I'm not mistaken, the witch's current situation must have been changed little by little through the wishes of many magical girls who knew the truth. Perhaps in the beginning, the witch's fate would have been even more miserable."

"So... the [Witch] uses [Magic Enchantment] as its power source, and through various insufficient [Wishes], it is possible to build the current system of Witch's Kiss - Familiar - Witch - Witch's Night."

The same can be obtained:

"The ability to [perceive the world] originates from one's [desire], but it is probably [perception], of equal status, that truly wields and limits this power."

"Even if Desire is divided into seven deadly sins, there aren't many essential differences between them. Therefore, the only thing that can lead to the current situation is the power of Cognition."

"[Cognition]... Whose [Cognition]? Who is [Cognition]? What is [Cognition]?"

Zhi Xing looked at the battlefield that was still in full swing, but because of the problems he was thinking about, he shifted his gaze away from the twelve super high school level people present and his own cognitive existence, and looked at the situation outside the venue.

"The bullet is the mark left by a gun, and it was so close."

Because they were crawling on the ground, the paper shop soon found traces of bullet holes in the overgrown ground where no one was taking care of it.

Zhixing was naturally well aware of the fact that there were guns pointed at them outside. After all, the apparent purpose of [Despair] was to use these people as hostages to force the Future Agency to allocate troops to break through and rescue them.

Although the real purpose of [Despair] is to integrate talents, it started a live broadcast of this campus life of fratricide to the whole nation.

But this does not mean that [Despair] does not attach importance to defense work.

It's better to say that the reason these super high school-level protagonists can live in peace is because [Despair] alone bears all the external pressure and even provides them with food, water and electricity.

Although the school had been specially transformed into a self-sufficient circular ecosystem, it still required everyone to have work to do in order to maintain it. So in order to hold this game, [Despair] could be said to have taken on all the work by himself.

Of course, considering that the second generation is an electronic world, it is very likely that in the current timeline, AI artificial intelligence can already complete most of the work, so [Despair] may not be that busy.

"After all, they're the mastermind behind the mass production of Monokuma. They should have the technology to fully automate things. So... to be able to get so close to the wall, they must have found a way to defeat the automated firepower."

"But even at such a close distance, we still couldn't break through the wall, which means..."

Zhi Xing turned around and looked at the nearby enclosed dormitory building of Hope's Peak Academy.

"No matter how intelligent Despair is, the shadow of the Programmer doesn't have the memories that the AI ​​has already completed, so it wants me to fill in this gap."

"Even if Despair possesses a minor omniscience, it can't directly overcome the technical difficulties plaguing Programmer. Therefore, this AI's intelligence is still not comprehensive enough."

"So... this close-range rescue, in which they were discovered and repelled, was probably due to Despair using its own manpower to make up for the lack of defense."

"If you want to do this...it seems like that's some kind of micro-surveillance."