Chapter 520: Whose Lost Memory

It rained all day in the woods the next day; no one knew what kind of plant growth environment the Highland Mage was simulating, perhaps he just wanted to test whether moss could actually grow on a Lowland Mage.

Luo Qi attended the final day of the Hearing, possessing a small rectangular table beneath the Barrier that blocked the rain, sitting right next to the large round table. Du Zhengyi sat with him, expressionless and slightly weary.

Luo Qi himself was also sleepy. Last night, Du Zhengyi had hauled him back to the bedroom; Du Zhengyi hadn't asked him anything, perhaps because he trusted his brother, or perhaps because he was worried that if he asked, he would have no choice but to arrest his brother. Luo Qi didn't want to think about these random things; when he crawled back into bed, he complained to Du Zhengyi that Liu Xiuyun's room was huge, while his own Magic Ability wasn't even fit to carry Du Zhengyi's shoes. The world was just that unfair; Liu Xiuyun could use Magic to live comfortably, while Du Zhengyi couldn't even use Magic at will. Then Du Zhengyi told him to shut up, because he didn't want to start being complained to about the house being too small before he had even taken a wife.

This sentence was too devastating; Luo Qi shut his mouth resentfully and then fell into a deep sleep.

It started raining in his dream.

In the dream, Luo Qi was sitting in Du Zhengyi's car, bean-sized raindrops constantly hammering against the roof, a Starbucks paper coffee cup in his hand, taking a few sips from time to time. Through the car window, he could see a pair of glass doors, with a green siren logo stuck on the top of the door. Ten minutes ago he had bought a coffee from there, and then been chased outside by Du Zhengyi. Right now he was closely watching the black glass shop door.

In the driver's seat beside him sat another person; his mind was entirely on the Starbucks entrance, and he didn't think carefully about who the person behind him was. That person spoke on his own, "What are you doing?"

Luo Qi impatiently "shushed" him.

Unfortunately, he failed to "shush" the person; the person persisted and spoke again, "Are you working with Du Zhengyi? Are you a Battle Mage too?"

"Of course!" Luo Qi retorted irritably, "Can you be quiet and not delay my business?"

He felt a bit dizzy, and a snickering sound came to his ears, "So this is your fantasy? Teaming up with Du Zhengyi to do some work catching High-Reaction Mages. Your dream is as mundane as a dilapidated house in a suburban-rural fringe, fifty square meters at most, and crowded with three generations."

Luo Qi calmed down, as if his fever had broken; the surroundings became clear, and he saw the Clownfish sitting in the driver's seat looking at him mockingly.

"Have you entered my Consciousness Space?" Luo Qi asked, but he wasn't very nervous.

"This is just a dream," the Clownfish said. "I am the opposite side you molded yourself, used to remind yourself."

"Then I must have lost control to let myself ruin my own beautiful dream," Luo Qi said silently.

"Such a shabby scene doesn't count as a beautiful dream," the Clownfish laughed, his smile as infuriating as the one in his memory.

"I must be schizophrenic to create your image to disgust myself," Luo Qi said.

"I am the most dangerous enemy in your subconscious, so when I appear, it is when you yourself are in danger," the Clownfish said.

"I know," Luo Qi said uninterestedly.

"So you must not be far from schizophrenia," the Clownfish laughed. "Your subconscious, which is me, reminds you again—your house is too messy, you need to organize it properly... wait, I understand, you don't have the ability to organize. You've consumed too much; the Alien's racial memories, the memories Shi Xiansheng gave you also contain data on generations of Black Market managers. Consuming the memories of any one of them alone was already too much, and as a result, you ate them all. No wonder your body is recovering so slowly... how pitiful..."

"Looking at oneself from the opposite side is indeed very clear. When there is no emotion involved, everything is understood," Luo Qi said lazily, but he ignored his words.

"Will you be swallowed by other people's memories?" the Clownfish said. "Floating and sinking in Frankenstein's monster, that feeling isn't pleasant either."

Luo Qi didn't want to listen anymore; he looked back out the window, the Starbucks door was tightly shut, and Du Zhengyi still hadn't come out. He was a little disappointed, "I'm leaving."

"You are avoiding me," the Clownfish said bluntly. "You are avoiding your own problems."

Luo Qi closed his eyes and left the deep consciousness; sleeping like this was too tiring, he might as well just wake up completely. He began to blur the dream, mist obscuring the street scene, and the coffee shop disappeared. He struggled to swim toward his waking Consciousness Space, ignoring many mists of memory and phantoms along the way.

But one mist of memory scattered; before Luo Qi could struggle free from the recollection, a winding and leisurely sound of a flute broke free from its restraints, lingering in his mind. The melody became clearer and clearer; he happened to remember that this was "Gusu Xing," and in the end, he couldn't help but take a look.

That mist of memory scattered as his consciousness pointed directly at it, and he was stunned to find himself standing at the bridgehead of the Ancient Town. The damp water vapor made him shiver, and the ghostly figure of the Alien was about to emerge from his memory. Luo Qi really didn't want to recall those monsters again, especially while he was still in a state where his surface consciousness was basically asleep; he was a bit fragile at this time.

He hesitated for a moment in the dream; the clear flute sound had just reached the joyous second half, the flute sound becoming more and more winding, and the chill in his heart was blown away by more than half. He suddenly remembered that the scene of a lonely flute flying secretly in the Ancient Town was not in his memory. If someone else had ever walked in here, he actually wouldn't mind stopping to take a look.

A thought suddenly arrived, and the scenery beside him changed; he was standing outside a house. Luo Qi looked closely and recognized that this was the courtyard of the Society of Mind Mages, and inside was the Society's library. He strolled through, observing his surroundings along the way; it seemed to be the way it was in his memory, but some details were hidden in the dark and couldn't be seen clearly. It was as if someone had intentionally extracted the memory, deliberately dimming the background that didn't need attention, and perhaps even compressing the size of the memory to save brain space.

Luo Qi didn't know whose memory this was, or perhaps it wasn't anyone's memory; it was a terrible situation, his brain had started to assemble memories at will, forming hallucinations.

He walked through the courtyard in a few steps; a lamp was lit in the library, the person playing the flute was in another courtyard, but now there was someone upstairs. Luo Qi stepped onto the wooden stairs in his memory and immediately saw the light of a candle revealing itself in a library room on his left.

Luo Qi hurried over and pushed open the half-closed door. A slender man was standing in front of a bookshelf with his back to him, holding an Ancient Scroll in his hand. His heart relaxed; he was too familiar with this back, and he immediately let down his guard.

"Brother, why are you here? So I'm still in a dream?" He breathed a sigh of relief, his hands shoved into his pockets. There was no cat in his pocket; he felt slightly uncomfortable.

The man turned his head upon hearing this and looked at him gently. The candlelight was constantly flickering, and Du Zhengyi's face was in the shadow of the bookshelf; Luo Qi couldn't see it completely clearly. Du Zhengyi's brows and eyes seemed softer than usual, without so much cold sharpness, but because of that, he was a bit unlike Du Zhengyi.

"What are you doing here?" Luo Qi asked, knowing full well that this was either a memory or a dream, so speaking was better than nothing. But after the words were out, he was stunned for a moment; it felt familiar, as if this sentence had been asked by his memory before.

Du Zhengyi smiled slightly, his brows and eyes gentle. "I don't seem to understand Mind Mages."

Luo Qi shivered with disgust; Du Zhengyi couldn't possibly have such a gentle personality; he had been notorious for his bad track record since he was a child. "Are you crazy?"

Du Zhengyi didn't respond to him, and Luo Qi was even more suspicious; he wanted to walk closer to take a good look at Du Zhengyi, but he always kept his distance, standing in the shadows. After tossing and turning for a long time, Luo Qi suddenly understood; this was someone else's memory, and in this strange memory, no one could move the camera or change the depth of field.

Luo Qi stopped tossing and turning, the memory stopped, and the chapter broke. Perhaps it was because he had been mentally tense for a moment just now, falling into a state where the more he tried to recall, the less he could remember; Du Zhengyi stood there the whole time looking at him.

He was incomparably irritable; waking up from the nightmare, the very real Du Zhengyi kicked him several times with a face full of irritation. He lay there depressed, not daring to sleep anymore; if he woke Du Zhengyi up again, he might be strangled.

So now he was sitting behind the table being interrogated, yawning incessantly.

(End of this chapter)