Chapter 958

Jenna didn't really go to Xinhong Residential Area to find Lu Mian and Ludwig, but instead chose a nearby hotel, opened a room, and watched to see if she would also be kicked out.

Nothing happened overnight. After waking up, she immediately returned to Dechuang Garden and sat in a corner of the lobby, facing the door leading to the interior of the residential area from the side.

After more than ten minutes, she saw Franca.

Franca was still wearing old-fashioned black-rimmed glasses and dressed as a relatively conservative office lady.

Seeing this, Jenna breathed a sigh of relief, changed her sitting posture, and turned her back to Franca, not meeting her.

Her purpose for returning to the residential area early in the morning was to confirm whether the current "Luo Fu's" style of conduct remained consistent with the previous Franca; if the other party removed her disguise and put on makeup and clothes that most highlighted her own characteristics, allowing the charm of a "Witch" to be displayed to the greatest extent, she would have to consider finding an excuse to stop "Luo Fu" from going to work and delay her for a day.

Now it seems that the style of this NPC "Luo Fu" will continue for a period of time.

…………

Technology Building, 10th floor.

Franca sat at her seat and slowly made herself a cup of coffee.

At this moment, she saw Zhou Mingrui walk in, so she said with a smile:

"Looking for Luo Shan? She hasn't arrived yet."

"I thought you would be together." Zhou Mingrui did not hide his surprise.

In his view, Luo Shan and Luo Fu, whether on the surface or in secret, had a very good relationship and a special connection, and should belong to the type that would wait for each other and go to work together.

Franca smiled:

"I asked her, and she said she was delayed by something, telling me not to wait for her."

"I see..." Zhou Mingrui nodded and turned to walk outside the Administration Department.

During this period, the frequency with which he came to find Luo Shan to inquire about various company news was much higher than before, leading some idlers in the Administration Department to spread rumors about him and Luo Shan.

Zhou Mingrui walked to the entrance of the Administration Department at a steady pace, failing to wait for Luo Fu to tell him to wait a moment.

The person he was actually looking for today was not Luo Shan, but Luo Fu; he had originally thought the other party would take this opportunity to hint at something else, but who knew, Luo Fu didn't even have the thought of chatting with him, being polite yet distant.

Zhou Mingrui frowned slightly, didn't turn back to look again, and walked straight out of the Administration Department.

"Something feels a bit off..." He had just muttered in his heart when he saw Luo Shan walking over carrying a jianbing guozi and a cup of multigrain soy milk.

"Morning." Luo Shan greeted him cheerfully.

"Morning." Zhou Mingrui smiled, "I just went to look for you, but you hadn't arrived yet; Luo Fu said you were delayed by something."

Luo Shan looked left and right:

"Want to ask me about something again?"

The two chatted for a few sentences and walked toward their respective department offices.

Suddenly, Zhou Mingrui's phone vibrated.

He took it out and saw a message from Luo Shan, whom he had just been chatting with:

"Don't look for Luo Fu to chat about anything today; wait until tomorrow."

The moment he saw this message, Zhou Mingrui thought the relationship between the two girls had suddenly broken down and they had started to gang up to try to isolate each other, but after reading it carefully again, he reached a preliminary conclusion:

"Luo Shan means that today's Luo Fu has a problem, don't contact her, and it will be fine tomorrow?

"Why would there be a problem? She was very normal yesterday...

"Is it because we chatted about vending machines, 'Assassin' drinks, subsequent troubles, etc., last night? This is a bit like, a bit like when 'The Star' in the group suddenly goes offline when mentioning key things...

"What would the problem be, who gave the problem, and why is it here today but solved tomorrow?"

Questions flashed through Zhou Mingrui's mind one after another, but many could not find a reasonable explanation.

…………

13th floor, Security Department.

Lu Mian and his partner, Old Xia, had already patrolled all the floors once and found no security hazards.

After sitting in the room that was more like a place for security guards to rest than an office, Lu Mian took out his phone.

Because Franca had already withdrawn from the dream and could meet with the Major Arcana card holders, he didn't need to pass on the experimental results from yesterday, along with the fact that the vice president of Mushu Hospital was suspected to be the Mother of the 'Mother Goddess of Depravity' church, through the Star Dream Grocery Store.

And the results of this experiment were mostly within his expectations; the only thing that surprised him was:

Luo Shan's memory was still there, and all the memories of her interactions with Franca and Jenna were still there!

"This means we can 'cultivate' dream characters... but it's not yet certain to what extent dream characters understanding the truth will cause abnormalities...

"In the future, perhaps such a situation will arise: the five of us and even the subsequent gold coin holders are completely kicked out of the dream and can only watch from the sidelines, yet many dream characters have inherited our will and cause, still working hard to awaken Mr. 'Fool', and they are part of the dream and cannot be kicked out!

"This belongs to a shift in thinking; it doesn't necessarily have to be outsiders, it doesn't necessarily have to be us; NPCs can also play a role...

"At that time, hmm, these dream characters won't be kicked out, but they can be killed or corrupted, just like the Divine Envoy.

"When many dream characters are killed, is that also a kind of stimulation for Mr. 'Fool'? This also belongs to a disaster in the dream city, with a large number of important characters dying or falling...

"'Witch' and 'Hunter', are they really going to bring disaster?"

Lu Mian mocked himself and chose "Intis Group Green" to enter the chat interface.

He raised his chin slightly, his expression cold, and sent a message using voice input:

"How are you doing with the recent matters?"

Two or three meters away, Old Xia, sitting in another chair, heard this voice and these words and suddenly shivered, feeling that this kid Li Ming was even more like a captain than Team Leader Xu.

After a few minutes, Green replied to the message:

"I haven't found a way to make Huang Tao return to his mother's embrace again.

"Without Huang Tao's cooperation and acquiescence, there are many things we can't do. Currently, we can only use the authority of the Security Department to monitor Zhou Mingrui's actions. We have installed pinhole cameras and wiretaps in his position and implanted a Trojan horse in his computer. This allows us to discover problems from his browsing history, search history, and call records at the first opportunity and stop them in time.

"A few days ago, Zhou Mingrui had the idea of resigning and searched for the specific process and precautions, but later he didn't do it, nor did he look at articles and videos in this regard again.

"Without Huang Tao's cooperation, we can't keep him through promotions and salary increases for the time being; we must solve this problem before he actually resigns."

Lu Mian finished reading carefully and felt that Green, or rather the children of the "Great Mother" in the dream city, currently hadn't thought about how to cooperate with the Celestial Worthy to turn Zhou Mingrui into a "Witch"; they were mostly monitoring and observing, and wanted Zhou Mingrui to always stay within the Intis Group where they had great influence, not resigning and leaving.

"It feels like the children of the 'Great Mother' are currently maintaining balance and obtaining information on the latest changes at any time...

"This is basically consistent with the judgment of the Major Arcana card holders and me regarding the intentions of the evil gods..."

After Lu Mian muttered two sentences in his heart, he stood up and started pacing in the office.

He was thinking about how to use Green and the other children of the Mother, and also thinking about Mr. 'Fool' drinking the "Assassin" potion.

Frankly speaking, knowing that the Celestial Worthy induced Mr. 'Fool' to drink the "Assassin" potion, attempting to make him step-by-step become a "Witch" and change his gender, thereby causing him to have cognitive problems, Lu Mian felt it was a bit absurd.

In his view, gods are all "He/She/It", and except for a few pathways that need to emphasize gender, they shouldn't care whether they are male or female; those ancient existences who have lived for thousands or tens of thousands of years might be even more so.

Would Mr. 'Fool' really have cognitive problems because of becoming a female?

Recalling that Mr. 'Fool' requested to be addressed as "He" rather than "Him/Her/It", Lu Mian barely accepted this reason.

At the same time, he also suspected that the Celestial Worthy wanted to use the conflict of Beyonder characteristics from symbolically non-adjacent pathways to make Mr. 'Fool' go mad, thereby gaining the upper hand and achieving victory—the "Witch" pathway and the "Seer", "Apprentice", and "Marauder" pathways are not adjacent.

After killing the resurrected female corpse Panatia and knowing her mission, the balance in Lu Mian's heart leaned more toward the guess that the Celestial Worthy wanted to use the conflict between non-adjacent pathways:

Panatia was to make Zhou Mingrui fall in love, and after he drank the "Witch" potion and changed his gender, she would not leave him; isn't this helping Zhou Mingrui, helping Mr. 'Fool' stabilize his mental state?

This is somewhat contradictory to the guess that the gender change was used to make Mr. 'Fool' have cognitive problems.

And if stabilizing the mental state was to let Zhou Mingrui drink a higher-sequence "Witch" potion and accumulate more madness, it seems even more reasonable.

Now, after Lu Mian followed this line of thinking, a new question arose:

Why must it be the "Assassin" potion, the "Witch" pathway?

Any potion that is not in an adjacent pathway to "Seer", "Apprentice", and "Marauder" could achieve the goal...

Does becoming a female early really have its effect, bringing hidden mental dangers?

Combined with the fact that most of our team are "Witches" and the Celestial Worthy specifically pulled a "Witch" marionette into the dream city, does it indicate that there is a hidden reason for inducing Zhou Mingrui to drink the "Assassin" potion instead of other non-adjacent potions?

Lu Mian immediately went through the various specialties of the "Witch" pathway in his mind.

In just a few seconds, he thought of a term:

"Mirror Person"!

Becoming a "Witch" not only turns one into a female but also results in a corresponding, fixed "Mirror Person".

Starting from this sequence, "Witches" can use mirrors to create doubles and use corresponding magic.

And from Lu Mian's current experience, "Mirror People" are all more extreme, more vicious, and more sinister.

"What the Celestial Worthy actually wants is for Mr. 'Fool' to have a 'Mirror Person', and then by doing certain things to the 'Mirror Person', or letting the 'Mirror Person' do certain things, achieve the goal of winning this confrontation? To pass off the fake as real, to turn the fake into reality?" Lu Mian fell into deep thought.

At this moment, his phone vibrated, and the new message came from Anderson Hood.

PS: Last day of August, begging for monthly votes. Tonight, no, at 0:02 on September 1st, there will be an extra update~

(End of chapter)