Chapter 1918: U: Beyond the Great Event (44)

In fact, for a long time, the vast majority of Schiller's friends have not had a sufficiently clear understanding of how severe his dissociative identity disorder—commonly known as split personality—actually is.

But rather than describing it that way, it would be more accurate to say that the severity of Schiller's fragmentation has exceeded anyone's imagination.

Many of Schiller's friends have seen, or even entered, Schiller's Mind Tower, knowing that there are many personalities inside, and even knowing that these are just the norm; beneath the Mind Tower lies the Abyss where the pathological reside.

But if every one of Schiller's personality traits had split to the point of being able to act independently, then this matter had already evolved from unscientific to horrifying, and even catastrophic.

"That was definitely Schiller." Natasha insisted, pressing her back firmly against the door and saying, "I saw it clearly this time. That hand holding the knife was Schiller's!"

"But he isn't there." Batman shook his head and said, "We only saw the reflection in the glass, but according to optical principles, there is no figure of him at the actual location corresponding to the reflection. In other words, that was just a reflection."

"Schiller has become a ghost." Natasha still had that look of having seen a ghost, which was actually the most horrified expression the female agent could make, but in reality, this was far more terrifying than seeing a ghost.

"No." Batman shook his head. He recalled more details, so he pointed to the clothes Natasha was wearing and said, "We are all wearing hospital gowns."

"So what?" Natasha looked down at her clothes. She had been wearing a hospital gown since she woke up here, the common blue and white top and bottom set found in psychiatric hospitals.

Suddenly she realized, and then said, "The cuff of that hand wasn't a hospital gown, it was... a black shirt."

"But that was definitely Schiller." Natasha emphasized again, "I saw half of his face just now. I couldn't have been wrong."

"Then that means he is not the Professor Schiller we know."

Batman seemed to have a speculation. He looked outside and found there was no movement, so he began to recount.

"Do you remember how we got here?"

After a brief recollection, Natasha said, "I remember after the game in the arena earlier, we were all a bit tired, and we fell asleep after getting on the bus."

The female agent also discovered something wrong. She said, "Actually, I haven't felt sleepy for many years. I don't need sleep to rest like ordinary people. Unless I want to sleep, I won't feel sleepy."

"And even on the bus, our situation couldn't be called safe. Under such circumstances, it's impossible for me to feel sleepy. This completely conflicts with my instincts."

"I wouldn't fall asleep in any unsafe place." Batman said, "It's not that I don't want to sleep, but that I can't. In other words, apart from those few locations that are relatively safe for me, I cannot sleep anywhere."

"But you fell asleep."

"This indicates that this sleep is mandatory; it is the entrance for us to go to the next level of the game."

Batman then speculated, "There is a question here: why must it be sleep?"

"The murderer in this level could completely let the bus drive into a thick fog like before, and when it drives out, it would be another world. That could also let us enter an illusion, instead of forcing us to fall asleep on the bus."

"Are you saying this is a dream?"

Batman nodded and said, "Since ancient times, people have had various speculations about dreams and deep fear of nightmares, deriving countless literary or film works. Since the previous games all had horror movie-like plots, then this time is likely the same."

"A murderer in a dream..." Natasha immediately associated it with a certain classic character, but suddenly she froze.

"That's right." Batman nodded, confirming Natasha's guess, and then said, "This is a dream. The dream occurs within our consciousness space. In other words, this world is on the same level as our consciousness world, and also the same as Schiller's consciousness world."

Natasha slowly opened her mouth wide.

Half an hour ago, in Schiller's Mind Tower, Greed, who was knocking on the floor tiles, looked up with some doubt and said, "Why is there no sound?"

He stood up, looked outside, and walked out, just bumping into Superego, who was heading to the elevator.

"Why aren't they bumping anymore?"

"Very strange." Superego said, "No matter what, the pathological are part of Schiller. They share a body with us."

"They would never act recklessly like this, because if the Mind Tower is affected and loses control, Schiller's body will also be injured. This is a danger outside the control range, which is definitely not what the pathological want, and it has never happened before."

"Then why are they bumping?"

Superego shook his head, walked toward the elevator, and said, "We'll know when we go down and see."

So Greed and Superego took the elevator to the Abyss together.

After arriving at the Abyss, Superego checked the ceiling of the Abyss, which was the foundation of the Mind Tower, and found no damage.

As if realizing something, he said, "Go to the edge."

Greed was stunned. The two rushed to the edge without stopping, and then saw a large hole in the wall on the side of the Abyss.

"They ran out?!" Greed shouted in shock, "But there is nothing outside the subconscious..."

Superego shook his head and said, "There must be space outside, otherwise they wouldn't be bumping."

After some thought, Greed accepted Superego's statement, because he knew that the pathological also knew that outside the Abyss—that is, outside the subconscious boundary—it was solid. Apart from the walls, there was nothing, so they had no need to bump into the wall in this direction.

But if they bumped, it meant they might have perceived something outside the subconscious, at least a space that could allow them to pass. So what was that?

Surrounding the subconscious, in the space around it, Greed slowly spat out a word: "Dream."

"And not a simple dream." Superego frowned and speculated, "The dream surrounding the subconscious is definitely not a coincidence. It's not above the subconscious, not below the subconscious, and not inside the subconscious, but happens to be around it."

"Dreams above the subconscious are too shallow and easy to wake up from; dreams below the subconscious are too deep and difficult to construct. Dreams inside the subconscious are the most common dreams and the easiest to shape. So why not?"

"Unless the other party wants more than just a dream." Greed thought and said, "When a person is in a dream, their limbs cannot move freely. That is because the conscious mind that controls the body's actions is completely in a dormant state. If the software system doesn't give instructions, the hardware naturally doesn't work."

"But in monitoring sleepwalkers, it is found that their brains still send signals to their limbs, but the patients don't remember it after waking up. This is because it is the subconscious, not the conscious mind, that is controlling their bodies at this time."

"The subconscious can certainly control the body, and it does so without the conscious mind being aware of it." Superego said, and he continued to speculate, "Sleepwalking is precisely a manifestation of the dream within the subconscious manipulating the body."

Greed seemed to think of something and said, "If you want to manipulate a person's body, then create a dream within their subconscious, so that the actions in the dream within the subconscious affect the limbs in the real world."

"But if you want to manipulate a group of people's bodies at the same time, then creating a dream within relatively independent subconscious spaces is not a good choice."

"If a certain entity already has the ability to create dreams, like the Dream God, then creating a shared dream like a dream kingdom would be a good choice."

"And the other party likely doesn't have the powerful authority of the Dream God." Superego crossed his arms and said, "He cannot create the deepest dream under everyone's consciousness, so he chose to create a shared dream around the subconscious of a few people."

Greed instinctively constructed an imagination of a similar scene. In other words, normal dreams occur within human subconsciousness, like sesame seeds in a rice ball.

And a shared dream is like putting rice balls into a bowl; the rice balls are soaked in soup, and this soup is the shared dream.

Both sesame seeds and soup can affect the taste of the rice ball, just as both normal dreams and shared dreams can manipulate human limbs by affecting the subconscious.

Superego looked up at the ceiling of the Abyss and said, "Although the actions in the dream and the actions in reality are not completely corresponding, there is a certain connection. If I'm not mistaken, the real bodies of all participants have already started moving."

In the ward, Batman and Natasha's speculation continued, but they were at a stalemate.

They guessed that this was a dream, but they didn't associate it with the true intention of the murderer in this level.

Because there was a significant contradiction here.

They had speculated before that the murderer shouldn't be able to kill within a period of time after the game started, otherwise, it would easily lead to the awkward scene of blocking the door.

But the dream world and the real world don't necessarily correspond completely. Now a day and a night have passed in the dream, but maybe only two hours have passed in reality.

But this murderer obviously couldn't set the time flow like this, because it was very disadvantageous for him. If 1 hour in reality equals 12 hours in the dream, wouldn't they have to wait for several days in the dream world before the killing could start?

So it should be the other way around, that is, 1 hour in the dream equals 12 hours in reality. This way, a day and a night spent in the dream is equivalent to several days having passed in reality. Then the safety protection definitely wouldn't apply, and the murderer could definitely kill.

But since that's the case, why doesn't this murderer take action?

Although there was smashing of ceilings and lifting of tiles just now, these actions were more about special effects than damage. Let alone Batman and Natasha, even if you called a few college students, they would at most just get a few scratches.

This isn't really filming a horror movie, where you have to create grand special effects before delivering a one-hit kill. Since there are ghosts in the dream, why not just rush up and strangle them?

Then another possibility is that the murderer cannot control the time flow of the dream reality.

The time flow is forcibly fixed at a value favorable to the participants, that is, a day has passed in the dream, and several hours have passed in reality.

Then why does the murderer want to encourage them to escape the hospital?

If the murderer might not start killing until several days later, then locking them in the hospital is the best choice.

According to the weakened physical fitness of the participants, there is no need for any hospital scene at all. Just make a tin house and they wouldn't be able to break it open. When the time comes, just start the massacre.

"Have you noticed that the two corridors we just ran through were exceptionally long?" Batman said with a frown. ===== CHAPTER 1919 =====