Chapter 410: Library

The sensation of weightlessness vanished in an instant; Li Cheng rolled forward and landed steadily on the ground.

The electronic eye mounted on his back swept left and right, literally seeing in all six directions and hearing in all eight, prepared for any sudden attack.

"Is this a library?"

Li Cheng stood up slightly surprised; the surrounding space was a modern library.

Central air conditioning blew cool air; LED eco-lights embedded in the ceiling emitted light; the tiled floor was spotless; two-meter-tall solid wood bookshelves were filled with books from all eras and cultures.

Crack!

A faint whipping sound came from deep underground—the estate guard's doing—

It arrived one second before Li Cheng, following his command to pursue all non-human targets within his attack line of sight.

"The estate guard can sustain only fifteen seconds; its whips inflict massive psychological and soul-level pain."

Li Cheng silently recited the skill description; at least for these fifteen seconds, he was relatively safe.

The Information Synthesis Glasses rapidly scanned the surroundings; this place was indeed, as surface players had speculated, an amorphous space that defied physical laws—

Outside the windows were solid brick walls; no bacteria existed on the floor or bookshelf surfaces, comparable to the cleanest sterile room.

Dozens of meters away on the ground lay two devices: a Whale Song drone and a Prometheus-brand robot dog, both capable of remote human operation and AI autonomous exploration.

The Information Synthesis Glasses showed these two devices had been deployed by surface players nine minutes and fifty seconds ago,

Just as they began autonomous exploration, at nine minutes and forty-one seconds, they were suddenly drained of all energy and shut down.

"So, the ambush waiting here to attack me is an anomaly capable of draining energy?"

Li Cheng's mind raced; he immediately pulled from his 3D storage a crate of lithium-cobalt-oxide-graphite solid-state batteries, ready to plug the charging cables into his chest.

These batteries were what Huiyu had insisted he buy—she got stuck in Bronze rank in games and wanted to overclock to boost her brainpower; overclocking drained power rapidly, so she needed backup hidden energy sources.

Ten seconds, eleven seconds, twelve seconds.

Li Cheng silently counted; the fifteen-second summoning window had passed, yet the surroundings remained deathly silent. The Information Synthesis Glasses detected no anomalies.

Had the estate guard struck too hard, scaring the energy-draining anomaly into staying away?

Li Cheng raised an eyebrow slightly; the potential death scenarios shown by the 【Death Note】 did not include this library, so he was likely safe for now.

After a moment's thought, he pulled out his electronic pet egg and released Huiyu, briefly explaining the situation.

Huiyu scratched her head. "Where did the Bai Ma Mu Bei crew go?"

"Dunno. But they're not here."

As Li Cheng installed blade-shaped solid-state batteries like ballistic plates on his chest and back, he added casually: "Before me, three waves of players and countless autonomous drones came down.

Yet only these two drained drones remain nearby.

Either this area actively consumes foreign objects, or the teleportation point changes each time someone enters the secret realm.

Given the drones lost power nine minutes ago, the second hypothesis is more likely."

With that, he stepped forward, picked up the two drones, plugged in power, recharged them, and restarted.

These high-end reconnaissance drones used by players all had real-time video recording capabilities,

Li Cheng opened the footage: both drones, upon teleporting into the library, instantly lost external signal and switched to autonomous exploration mode.

Just a few meters out, the drones suddenly flickered—then a baby appeared out of thin air.

The baby resembled the character from the cartoon "Baby Boss": porcelain-skinned, fluffy-haired, sucking a pacifier, dressed in a suit with a tie, holding a briefcase in his right hand,

Except that he—or she—looked utterly defeated, bearing the weary, sorrowful expression of a worker forced to overtime.

The sorrowful suit-wearing baby extended its chubby left hand and touched the two drones. The theoretical eight-hour battery life vanished instantly; the recording cut off.

"Damn, there's actual child labor in this secret realm?"

Huiyu gasped: "I thought only I hired elementary students online to do my homework." Damn, no wonder you never asked for student workload reduction policies.

Li Cheng multitasked: he flicked Huiyu's forehead while simultaneously sticking blade-shaped batteries under both her feet and his own.

Biological electricity is still electricity; if the suit-wearing baby touched them, it wouldn't be good.

After securing precautions, Li Cheng activated his assembled doll effect, forcibly inserted new batteries into the drones, and launched them to continue autonomous exploration.

He then turned toward the bookshelves, randomly pulled out several books on wireless communication, infant care, self-help, and art history, and flipped through them quickly.

Huiyu frowned. "Hey, aren't we looking for Bai Ma Mu Bei? Why are you reading?"

"This area is an amorphous space; its area could be dozens, even hundreds of square kilometers. Without clues, finding people is nearly impossible."

Li Cheng didn't look up. "As for reading—books are uniquely significant in all types of illusions, dreams, and amorphous spaces.

If a book's cover is intact but its text is blurred, it likely means you're under an illusion, or the secret realm's quality is low."

Opening the books, the text was clear, paragraphs neatly arranged; publisher info, printing house addresses, expert reviews—all present.

Nothing like an illusion.

The only two oddities: the book genres were wildly mixed, spanning all eras and languages, with no categorization.

And every book's latest printing date was capped at two years ago.

"Two years ago."

Li Cheng narrowed his eyes; whether it was Gary Hoy, the Vietnamese ghost woman, or the facial recognition distortion patient, all events occurred before two years ago.

Could this time point be critical—linked to the entire secret realm's generation?

As he pondered, a thud echoed—a book fell from a shelf five rows away.

"Don't go over."

Li Cheng stopped Huiyu from rushing forward and pulled out his Ape Regression Gun, advancing cautiously.

The book was titled "Robot Motion Programming," published in 2022, extremely thick.

As it fell, its pages flipped open automatically; on the torn pages were two incomplete human faces.

One was 【Binary Tree】 from Whale Song; the other was 【Red Spider】 from the 【Suit Thug】 guild.

Each had only the right or left half of their face; the rest of their faces and bodies were gone.

To a certain extent, they were still "alive," retaining some ability to sense the outside world. The moment they saw Li Cheng appear, they immediately struggled and thrashed about, blinking desperately, signaling Li Cheng to rescue them.

"WTF?"

Li Cheng's eyelid twitched. Binary Tree and Red Spider were lv28 and lv27 veterans—how could they have been sealed directly into a book?

However, what stunned him even more was yet to come.

"【Stage One Mission Objective: Rescue Binary Tree and Red Spider before being digested】

【Mission Time Limit: 10 minutes】

【Mission Reward: None】

【Mission Failure Penalty: Permanent confinement within the secret realm】"

The system notification chime sounded.

(End of chapter)