Chapter 4270: Answering the question everyone has been curious about lately regarding the

Answering the question everyone has been curious about lately regarding the "Execution Threshold."

Recently, ever since the term "Execution Threshold" came out, many people have been posting in the fan community, asking for my take on it.

I can only say that I have finally been vindicated. How many times have I said it: major cities on the U. S. East Coast are just like this hellhole! No one believed me!!!

Thinking back to when this book was depicting the miserable state of Cat Getan, I don't know how many people posted objections in the comments section, feeling that Cat Getan is at least a metropolis on the level of New York, so how could it possibly be this much of a hellhole?

There were also those who felt that a character as smart and capable as Bruce shouldn't be getting beaten down just because he went to the slums. They felt I was deliberately smearing Batman. Even later, when Superman went to Cat Getan for an undercover investigation, some of the absurd plot points that occurred were dismissed by some as just for laughs—how could things be so bizarre?

This brings us to the fact that most of the inspiration for the Cat Getan in this book comes from the author's real-life experiences in Chicago, USA.

I believe everyone still remembers the plot involving an old man in the slums whose so-called medicine that could cure illnesses was actually drugs. This was adapted from the real-life experience that left the deepest impression on the author.

When the author was a child, my family had to stay there for a period of time due to work. When we first went abroad, I was young, and the neighborhood where we lived with my family had relatively good security. I remember that there were police patrols in the community at the time; I could often see police cars parked at both ends of the road leading out of my house, blocking the road entirely so that other cars couldn't drive in.

Then, about three hundred meters away from this community, there was a building similar to a community center. I still don't know what exactly went on there, but I remember many people coming and going.

Out of curiosity, I asked my family what that place was for, but they wouldn't answer. At that time, I played well with the two children from the neighbor's house, and they told me it was a "clinic."

Naturally, I assumed it was a community clinic, the kind of place where I used to get IV drips when I was sick.

It wasn't until I grew up that I found out it was a place that sold drugs. When I learned this fact, my worldview was shattered. I asked repeatedly, saying there must be a misunderstanding, that it was a pharmacy or something, and then I received an even more shocking answer.

They said it was a pharmacy—that if you couldn't afford to see a doctor at a hospital, you went there to buy painkillers. They called them painkillers, but they were actually drugs, pure drugs, the kind you inject, not some sort of pain relief pill.

That wasn't the scariest part. The scariest part was that everyone in the community believed it really was a clinic. Some people in the community where we lived even went there to buy medicine—they didn't think they were buying drugs; they thought they were buying medicine to cure their illnesses.

Looking back on the situation back then, the people coming and going in that community center were definitely not the ragged homeless people everyone imagines, nor were they those strangely dressed thugs. Almost everyone was dressed quite decently, yet if you looked closely, you felt something was wrong.

There was an old man at the time who wore a very nice-looking suit on his upper body, brown it seemed, and he even wore a tie, but on his lower body, he wore a pair of those tight leather pants, which seemed a bit short, exposing his ankles, and he was wearing slippers. This strange outfit left a very deep impression on my young self.

Later, I realized that the suit on his upper body might have been clothes left over from when he still had money, and the tight pants on his lower body might have been something he dug out of a trash can or picked up from someone else's discarded items, which is why he was dressed like that. At the time, I even thought this was some kind of fashion trend.

Moreover, there were people in the community who went to this "clinic" to see a doctor; I saw it with my own eyes. They didn't drive; they walked there. Even if they lived at the other end of the community, they walked there. It wasn't the sneaky behavior everyone imagines; it was open and aboveboard. When they walked over, they even greeted the police.

When I was a child, I didn't actually know the difference between communities, but after I grew up, I realized that the community we lived in back then was considered a very good one. Police were everywhere, the police cars looked very new, and the officers were all quite strong and looked quite happy. When the ice cream truck came on weekends, they would even gather around to buy ice cream.

Yet, all of them felt there was nothing wrong with the existence of this "clinic." In their eyes, it was a legitimate place to cure illnesses and save lives, and it was normal for anyone to go there, to the point that I didn't notice anything unusual when I was a child and really thought it was a clinic.

Can you imagine how desperate I was when I learned the truth?

It was as if everyone around me was a Deep One; they didn't feel there was anything peculiar about the other person's appearance at all. They felt that looking like a Deep One was normal, while I was a normal human who had accidentally wandered into this small town.

Or, perhaps I had fallen into some void of cognitive distortion, where something had anchored everyone's cognition—in their cognition, this was the kind of "clinic" humans should go to after getting sick. Everyone took it for granted and didn't find it strange at all, not even the police.

The community I was in wasn't a Chinese enclave; most of the residents were white, including my neighbor's family. The people there were actually quite wealthy. What I remember most clearly is one Christmas when they put up a huge Christmas tree. I don't know if it was because I was too young at the time or if that Christmas tree was indeed that big, but I felt the tree was taller than the house, covered with all kinds of decorations, each one particularly exquisite and beautiful, many of which glowed. It was super pretty; it was the best-looking Christmas tree I have ever seen in my life.

Then, because there were cars parked next to the small square at the time, they hung lights and decorations on the cars as well. Looking into the distance, everyone's house had also done Christmas decorations, all hung with those shiny little lights, and the whole community was as bright as day.

And at the same time, when they got sick, they didn't go to the hospital but went to that so-called "clinic." Or rather, that "clinic" could be so close to this community precisely to make it convenient for people in the community to consume—it belonged to the "supporting facilities" of this community.

For a long time after learning this truth, I thought they were self-depraved, that they only bought those things to get high. After all, if you think about it, taking a step back, even if you can't afford a hospital, can't you just buy some medicine yourself? Do you really have to use that stuff?

Later, I learned from the twins in my neighbor's family that their mother no longer reacted to ordinary painkillers.

The ordinary painkillers I'm referring to are the kind of painkillers in the U. S. that come in a huge bottle, the kind with an astonishingly high content of active ingredients.

It seems that when she gave birth to the two of them back then, some accidents occurred, and she didn't fully recover, but she couldn't keep being treated in the hospital. After being discharged, she had been relying on painkillers to maintain, and by now, she had no reaction at all.

And at the time, I thought, surely not everyone is in this situation. And guess what? It really was the case that everyone was in this situation.

When I was a child, my tooth got inflamed. At the time, a large lump swelled on my upper right gum, it was extremely painful, and the right side of my cheek was swollen, as if I had a candy bean in my mouth. Then, when I went out to play, others asked what I had in my mouth. I said I had gum inflammation, and they asked if I had taken medicine, and I said I had.

My family did give me anti-inflammatory medicine, and it was twice a day, and that large lump soon went away, and my tooth was fine, probably in about two or three days.

When I went out to play again, the lump in my mouth was gone, and I was asked again if my tooth was better. I said of course it was better, and then they kept asking what medicine I had taken.

I was young at the time and couldn't explain it clearly, so I told them to ask my parents. Then, after playing and returning home that day, my parents told me: "In the future, if anyone asks if you've taken anti-inflammatory medicine, just say no."

At the time, I didn't understand why I should say that. Later, I learned that they didn't take anti-inflammatory medicine for toothaches but took painkillers—these are two different things. Anti-inflammatory medicine is an antibiotic, while painkillers are just painkillers, and painkillers can only stop pain. If I had taken painkillers for my symptoms, that large lump would have existed for at least ten days or half a month, and it might even have caused the entire oral cavity to become infected.

So when they found out I was better in two or three days, they thought the painkiller I used was more effective, so they went to ask my family about the brand. When they learned I used anti-inflammatory medicine, they were also very helpless because they couldn't buy anti-inflammatory medicine.

As for why they couldn't buy anti-inflammatory medicine, I still don't know very well to this day. Logically speaking, if the gums were swollen like that, they should have been prescribed some anti-inflammatory medicine, but they just took painkillers to tough it out, and then ate until they developed a tolerance, and when the painkillers stopped working, they started taking drugs.

The house in the community where I was, although not reinforced concrete, really wasn't one of those cheap cardboard houses; it was the kind of suburban villa with a bit of an Irish style, the dining room had floor-to-ceiling windows, the backyard had a swimming pool, and the community had a high greening rate. Neighbors could often be seen gathering on the lawns and forest land walking their children or dogs, and everyone was lazy, in a very relaxed and comfortable state. And basically, no outsiders came, and people in the community didn't seem to go out much. The police cars would block the road there for a whole day, and the entire community seemed to be closed off.

And whenever a major holiday arrived, every household would have a table of good food, the kind everyone sees on TV—setting up a long table, laying out tablecloths and table runners, inserting candles, and then all kinds of dishes. Why do I know? Because one Christmas, my family had something to do and went out, and I spent it with my neighbors.

At the time, we finished eating together, and then we were on the big sofa in the living room, eating potato chips while watching TV. Their golden retriever kept nudging me, rubbing fur all over me. After watching cartoons, we played games together, and then their mother was next to us using a curling iron to curl her hair, and there was a smell of burning things. Later, my impression of Christmas was that ridiculously large Christmas tree and the smell that night.

Thinking about it now, these memories seem a bit unreal. The state of life they displayed didn't match the truths they told me at all. Having returned to the country for so many years, if it weren't for the photos telling me these were real, I would really think this was a hallucination from my childhood.

This is a country of complete magical realism, where many things are very fragmented. Some things you think are common sense are actually very unique, such as needing anti-inflammatory medicine for a toothache; some things you think are very unique are actually common sense in their eyes, such as going to a "clinic" to get medicine. I cannot imagine anyone living there for a long time and still maintaining a normal mental state.

But I believe that many of the mental symptoms I developed after growing up come from the magical-realist childhood I spent in this country. This state of cognitive distortion has greatly affected my mental stability. Therefore, I do not suggest any parents take their children there; even if it's for work, it's best not to.

I know this article will be somewhat incoherent, and it's not my usual writing style; it looks very much like rambling because this memory is chaotic in my mind, and I can only write down whatever I think of.

I can only say that novels need logic because you have to convince the reader, and because if you write blindly, the reader will quit; but reality doesn't care about logic—even if it writes blindly, I can't quit.

You cannot expect someone who has faced an Ancient God to describe to you in very clear, logical language exactly what kind of indescribable thing they saw. I am mostly crazy, but for those hiding in a shelter, ignorance is a right. If you can't understand some rambling, you should applaud and celebrate, not get to the bottom of it. ===== CHAPTER 4271 =====