Chapter 1009: 0606 Bubble Dock

As if time were flowing backward, the moment the red-gold dagger pierced the heart, the bubbles flying all over the sky immediately re-aggregated, condensing the hunched figure of the Pisces Director.

I was careless...

After lowering his head to look at the blade protruding from his chest, the Pisces Director closed his eyes slightly, then didn't make any futile struggle, but sat down cross-legged slowly with the support of a powerful palm.

"Your courage... is still as great as before."

"About the same!"

After laughing gently with a kind expression, the Aquarius Director, who looked only in his thirties, slightly rotated the wrist gripping the dagger, then said warmly to the Pisces Director, whose whole body was shaking violently:

"Don't do anything extra. Since I dared to come directly, it's impossible for me to let you pass the news out."

"That's true..."

The Pisces Director nodded after hearing this, summoned back the bubbles wrapping his tongue, then asked calmly:

"So, what exactly do you want to do by taking such a big risk to sneak into the Dream Realm? It wouldn't just be to stab me to vent your anger, would it?"

"Of course I wouldn't be that bored."

The Aquarius Director shook his head and said with a smile:

"Taurus is about to ascend the palace soon. If I don't get rid of you first, even if I really succeed in killing Taurus, it's impossible for me to ascend the palace. As long as you expand the 【Bubble Dock】 in time, everything I do will directly turn into bubbles."

"Cough... cough cough cough! So... what's the use of you stabbing me?"

After coughing painfully several times while covering his mouth, the Pisces Director wiped the blood from his palm on his robe, then said expressionlessly:

"Although I was careless for a moment and let you find a loophole, as long as you pull the knife out, the fact that I was stabbed by you will still immediately turn into bubbles, and even the torn clothes will be as good as new. You... cough cough cough! You still can't do anything!"

"Your mouth is still as hard as ever."

"This isn't being hard-mouthed, it's a fact."

After coughing violently again, the Pisces Director said coldly:

"The fact now is that you, with your Aquarius Star Palace temporarily sealed, have lost the ability to kill me. Even if my attention hadn't been drawn away, you wouldn't even have had a chance to sneak attack me!"

"Indeed."

Without arguing with the Pisces Director about this issue, the Aquarius Director sat down behind the Pisces Director in a "backstab" posture, then pointed to Leon, who was slaughtering in the dream, and asked with a smile:

"See the knife in his hand? I gave it to him. Even when he was swallowed by the Death Dog of the Garrison and almost digested, I was the one who saved him."

"So what?"

The Pisces Director said coldly:

"You wouldn't want to tell me that this Leon, who exposed your plans in public and almost killed you twice, is actually your person, would you?"

"Where did you get that idea?"

The Aquarius Director waved his hand after hearing this:

"How could he be my person? He isn't anyone's person."

"What do you mean?"

"Literal meaning."

The Aquarius Director explained with a smile while digging hard into the Pisces Director's heart:

"Although this person is a cleaner, he doesn't necessarily stand with the Cleaning Bureau. He has a set of very, very stubborn concepts in his heart that almost don't accept compromise, and he will only ever do what he wants to do.

He chooses to be a cleaner now and helps you deal with me, just because his philosophy is partially the same as yours. If in some matter, the choice I make is more to his liking than the Cleaning Bureau's, then he will also lean toward me without hesitation."

"Heh."

After sneering with contempt, the Pisces Director evaluated with disdain:

"Clumsy provocation... You wouldn't think that after hearing this set of rhetoric from you, I would start to fear him, or even directly take action to dispose of him, would you?

There are plenty of people who join the Cleaning Bureau with their own selfish motives and only view the identity of a cleaner as a channel to obtain power. If one were to care about every single one, more than half of the cleaners should be kicked out!"

"Hmm... you're not wrong about that."

After hearing the Pisces Director's rebuttal, the Aquarius Director nodded thoughtfully.

"In our Cleaning Bureau, many indeed don't take the tenet of 'protecting humanity' seriously. Although Leon is a bit strange, in terms of his intentions and what he wants to do, he might not necessarily be worse than those people."

"Stop talking nonsense!"

Seeming to have had enough of these endless "riddles," the Pisces Director, whose chest was soaked with blood, first coughed violently twice, then said with an impatient look:

"My 【Bubble Dock】 has never been closed. In your current state, it's impossible for you to kill me no matter what. Even if you dare to leave me for a step, I can immediately break free from control. You have no way to deal with me!

The cleaners who came to participate in the promotion assessment are the same. They only came with their consciousness, and they are all in the fragments of 【Lost Paradise】. As long as I break free from control, I can immediately send their consciousness back.

If I didn't have the confidence to deal with your attack, this promotion assessment would have been postponed directly. Now, not only can you not move me, but you also can't move any of these cleaners!"

"Rest assured, although I was almost killed by the Bureau, I don't hate it enough to want to destroy the Cleaning Bureau. It's just that..."

After glancing at the cleaners who hadn't dared to come up for a long time after being slashed by Leon, the Aquarius Director couldn't help but shake his head.

"Is the quality of this batch of cleaners a bit too poor?"

After hearing the Aquarius Director's words, the Pisces Director's expression couldn't help but stiffen slightly, while the Aquarius Director seemed to be unaware and continued:

"Before I stabbed you, I also took a look at their performance. Let alone compared to our batch, the level of this batch of cleaners is probably not even comparable to the batch ten years ago that was called the worst in three hundred years.

Among the cleaners who came to participate in the promotion assessment this time, excluding that Leon, the number of people who have the qualifications to challenge the Zodiac Star Palace doesn't even add up to five?"

"……"

"If I remember correctly, for cleaners with this qualification, it takes about thirty or forty people to have one succeed in challenging the Zodiac Star Palace, right?"

Seeming very worried about the future of the Cleaning Bureau, watching the last few brave "challengers" being slashed and scattered all over the ground, and seeing that no one dared to come forward again, the Aquarius Director couldn't help but sigh and say with a worried look:

"If the cleaners who come to the assessment in the future are all in this proportion, then the situation is a bit severe.

After the current Zodiac Twelve Bureaus die of old age, the new Zodiac Directors who fill the vacancies, I'm afraid that even with the blessing of the Zodiac Star Palace, it will be difficult to reach the level of a Pillar God. If the Director seats also have a large number of vacancies, the Cleaning Bureau is afraid it will have no successors!"

"……"

So you came here this time specifically to stab my heart? And even stabbing with a knife isn't enough, you have to stab it again with your mouth?

……

"Shut up!"

After struggling to turn his head and glaring angrily at the Aquarius Director who was speaking sarcastically, the Pisces Director shouted angrily with a look of indignation:

"These things have nothing to do with you! You traitor who joined the King-Slaughtering Society!"

"I don't count as joining the King-Slaughtering Society, I just chose to cooperate with them for some purposes."

After glancing at the Pisces Director who was enraged by himself, the Aquarius Director shook his head:

"However, although I am not of the same mind as the King-Slaughtering Society, I actually think that what they are preparing to do might be a good thing for the Cleaning Bureau and even all of humanity.

The current Cleaning Bureau is too well protected by the Watchtower, basically encountering no crises, which makes the level of cleaners worse batch by batch. If this continues, sooner or later it will fall to the point where even the Watchtower cannot protect it.

If you look at it from this angle, I think it's better to let the King-Slaughtering Society be more active and kill all the royal family members of seven or eight kingdoms, so that future cleaners will have more opportunities for exercise."

"Nonsense!"

The Pisces Director couldn't help but scold angrily:

"Do you know what you are talking about? How many people who sat in the palace have paid for the Watchtower to be raised to its current scale bit by bit? Countless predecessors' efforts, you want to destroy them all with one sentence? You are simply..."

"Eh, don't be excited."

After turning his wrist hard again and interrupting the Pisces Director's words, the Aquarius Director said leisurely:

"I actually don't have any other meaning, I just couldn't leave while waiting for the anomalous object to take effect, and I happened to meet you, an old friend, so I just chatted with you casually. This kind of idle chat doesn't need to be taken seriously..."

Anomalous object takes effect... time is almost up?

After capturing the keywords in the Aquarius Director's words, the Pisces Director's heart couldn't help but be in a slight mess, then he immediately retorted:

"It's useless. As long as 【Bubble Dock】 is still there, no matter what you do to me, as long as I move my thoughts slightly, anything that happened during this period will be equivalent to never having happened. And you, who have lost the Star Palace, cannot break my 【Bubble Dock】 now!"

"Yes, I really can't do it."

The Aquarius Director nodded after hearing this, then said with a smile:

"Your 【Bubble Dock】 is indeed a good thing. As long as you record the 'anchor points' used for restoration in advance, you can almost erase any reality you don't like and forcibly make the situation develop in a direction favorable to you.

But all of this ultimately has a premise, which is that you must be yourself, and you must actively generate the idea of 'using' the Bubble Dock."

I must be myself?!!!

In the Pisces Director's suddenly stern expression, the Aquarius Director's wrist rotated again, and he "twisted" hard in a clockwise direction.

"It seems you have already thought of it."

The Aquarius Director said with a smile:

"Although your 【Bubble Dock】 is basically impeccable, and can even be automatically triggered even in an unconscious state, your soul has a huge flaw.

Because of past events, your soul is divided into four, and will constantly change among the four forms of male, female, old, and young over time. After this most powerful 'old' soul, it is Mimi, who represents 'young'.

And according to my understanding of Mimi, innocent and ignorant as she is, let alone how to control 【Bubble Dock】, I'm afraid she hasn't even recognized how many anomalous objects you have, right?"

So... your real purpose is to let Mimi's soul come out in advance to replace me! And this knife stuck in my heart has been secretly "shaving" my time all along?!

Looking at the short blade protruding from his chest, slowly rotating and gouging in a clockwise direction, the Pisces Director, who vaguely guessed the truth, hurriedly mobilized his secret technique to identify it with all his might, and actually discovered the special imprint belonging to a time-type anomalous object.

Probably every time the Aquarius Director's wrist rotates, the time passed by his soul will suddenly advance a large section unconsciously. And after being gouged by him so many times, his "appearance" time seems to be really reaching its limit.

No! Absolutely cannot let Mimi come out now!

Feeling the ignorant soul slowly reviving in his body and starting to fight for control with him, the Pisces Director couldn't help but grit his teeth and start struggling desperately.

Even if Mimi can also passively "trigger" 【Bubble Dock】 and won't be killed by the Aquarius Director, after losing his protection, these cleaners participating in the assessment will be equivalent to falling into the hands of the Aquarius Director.

And what's even more deadly is that the time for Taurus Director to ascend the palace has been set and cannot be changed. If Mimi is swapped out at this time, resulting in the lack of his 【Bubble Dock】 protection, then...

"Don't move around, your soul will collapse."

After reaching out and patting the Pisces Director's shoulder, pressing down his violently trembling body, the Aquarius Director persuaded warmly:

"Rest assured, I won't do anything to these cleaners. My goal this time is only you alone.

For the sake of our past friendship, I'm not even prepared to hurt you. As long as Mimi, who cannot control 【Bubble Dock】, is let out in advance to replace you, avoiding you using 【Bubble Dock】 to cause me trouble, my goal will be achieved.

As for this batch of cleaners with poor quality... their fate will depend on what you do."

In the Pisces Director's angry glare, the Aquarius Director warned with a smile:

"You know, I don't like killing people indiscriminately. As long as you don't mess around, I naturally won't take action against them. But if you insist on taking the risk of soul shattering to forcibly prevent Mimi from coming out... then I'll have to say sorry!"

"……"

"If you are still unwilling, then I can help you calculate an account."

Looking at the Pisces Director's body that was still trembling constantly, the Aquarius Director accelerated the speed of gouging the heart while leaning into his ear and whispering:

"The probability that you can perfectly suppress Mimi is at most one-fourth. As for the remaining three-fourths of the possibility, it is that your soul appears shattered due to conflict, which makes 【Bubble Dock】 no longer perfect, and then you will be killed by me together with these four hundred cleaners.

And if you choose to listen to my arrangement and honestly let Mimi come out of your soul, although Taurus Director will lose the protection of 【Bubble Dock】, you and the future of these Cleaning Bureaus will all be able to survive."

"……"

"Come on, choose!" ===== CHAPTER 1010 =====

"Come, choose!"