Chapter 256: Qiangqiang Finally Met

The burnt yellow wind blew in the gray city, no, in the ruins.

Mikael couldn't even remember the last time he came here.

Counting on my fingers, it seems like it was two years ago.

That was after the turmoil of the Seventh Collapse was completely calmed down, he returned to the World Bubble again, and after checking the infiltration phenomenon of the Quantum Sea caused by the repeated changes of power, he never came here again.

Since then, because his control of power has become more and more sophisticated, he no longer controls the space in the world bubble, but allows it to flow in the normal state of time and space.

The result is that the city becomes increasingly deserted.

"Cough cough cough!"

Klein, Yimer, and Ling followed closely behind him. Even though he had put up an imaginary barrier, the fine dust floating in the wind and sand in the sky made people's throat tighten and cough unconsciously just by looking at it. .

When they reached a stone bridge, the terrain was open and windy and dusty. Looking at the patterns on the handrails of the bridge that were almost worn away by the wind and sand, Mikael suddenly stopped.

"If you can't bear it, just rest here for a while."

"Please, Uncle Mikael, this journey is not tiring at all!"

Klein and Yimer both wisely remained silent, but Ling, who had a girlish heart, complained indifferently.

Mikael walked to the edge of the stone bridge, touched the almost unrecognizable pattern, and looked at the flowing water under the bridge... No, where is the flowing water? It had long since dried up, leaving only a river bed covered with moss and water plants.

"You still called me eldest brother two years ago, and at the earliest you called me brother. I am the only one who is getting older, and you are not, right?"

"whee!"

Ling lifted a bunch of red highlights on her forehead, held her head high and answered:

"You are already Ben San's uncle, and I am still an underage girl. Is there a problem!"

"Where did I go?"

"Twenty-three, rounded up, is twenty-five, twenty-five, rounded up, is thirty!"

"Was mathematics taught by the physical education teacher?"

"Master Qian taught me this!"

"..."

If it weren't for Mikael's face, Klein wouldn't have covered his mouth and held it in so painfully. But this did not prevent Yimer from laughing almost to the point of rolling on the ground.

Mikael really couldn't talk to Ling, so he could only sigh dejectedly, his expression getting older and older, and this time he really looked like Ben San's uncle.

He closed his eyes and hummed softly. When he opened them again, the girl's white shirt in front of him was fluttering gently. It seemed that he had not expected the flaw in the imaginary number barrier that was revealed at this moment. She raised her arms to cover herself from the wind.

His vision blurred for a moment.

Same place, same girl, same "sister".

Same fate.

I wonder how she is doing drifting in the quantum sea? When do you want to come back?

"……snort."

Mikael blocked the gap in the imaginary number barrier caused by his emotional fluctuations, then coughed twice, and both Ymer and Ling put on serious faces.

They just received the order and followed Mikael here with their habitual obedience.

But to be honest, neither Mei nor Mikael told them the purpose of their trip. They don't even know where this abandoned city is. If I had to say it, only Ling squinted her eyes and looked around, feeling somewhat familiar, but somewhat unsure.

After all, the streets here were heavily damaged in several battles, especially the battle between Mikael and "himself". Most of the surface buildings collapsed. It is a miracle that this bridge can be preserved. It is unrecognizable. normal.

In fact, among the three of them, even Ling, who looks the most naive on the surface, can be called smart if he removes the superficial disguise. They themselves must have been thinking a lot secretly - since the location cannot be known, they can more or less determine what kind of mission it is by analyzing the candidates participating in the mission.

Klein, researcher.

Ymer, a brick can be moved wherever it is needed, except for scientific research.

Bell, responsible for cuteness.

Well, no clue.

They don't have to know the purpose of the mission in advance, but everyone wants to know the purpose.

But looking at Mikael's face, it was finally time to reveal the answer.

"First of all, let me tell you the truth - this is not the world you are familiar with, but a world bubble in the quantum sea. After experiencing the ninth collapse, I think you should be familiar with these two terms. ”

Klein and Yimer are naturally familiar with each other, but Ling is the only one who is completely confused.

Only then did Mikael remember that unlike members with higher authority such as Klein and Yimer, Ling was not even part of the Fire Chasing Moth's organization, so naturally he didn't know anything about World Bubble.

Fortunately, Klein noticed the embarrassment in time, leaned into Ling's ear, and explained to her softly, which saved Mikael a lot of effort.

"Quantum Sea? World Bubble?"

Yimer muttered twice, then suddenly slapped his head and became excited:

"Captain Mikael, do you want us to use this world bubble as our base to search for the whereabouts of Mu Continent?"

He instantly figured out everything in his mind - Klein provided technical support and technical connection, while he carried out specific search tasks, Ling... I heard that she learned a lot of psychology knowledge from Aponya and Su, and she had a lot of fun giving psychological counseling to those "people" in the sanatorium before... Her existence may be to prevent psychological problems caused by long-term boring tasks.

His thoughts were transmitted to Mikael's mind without any difference under the influence of the power of the Eighth Law. Mikael, who was still thinking about what excuse to use, breathed a sigh of relief and chose to copy it intact -

He is not a golden retriever, who "showed his cards" like he did with Mei before. Naturally, he does not want to do that to everyone.

Again, this is not a question of frankness or trust. Even if we look back at Xi'er's tragedy from the current perspective, it cannot be said that it was caused by Mikael's insincerity.

Sorry, standing here, it is really difficult for Mikael not to think about Xi'er.

His concealment did have a bad impact on Seele, and it might even be some kind of psychological trauma. But if he had told her directly that she would become the Sixth Herrscher, Seele would certainly understand his decision, but how would she face Alicia and Mei in this world?

With Seele's personality, it is not impossible for her to blame herself for "things that have not happened yet".

Moreover, whether Seele was able to return to the Eigenworld due to the influence of the fluctuations of the Quantum Sea, the awakening of her own stigma power, or both, is impossible to verify, and there is no need to verify it.

However, if there is still a choice, Mikael will definitely make a completely opposite choice from that time. But that is a decision made based on the result.

As for the current situation, the so-called "knowing a possible future" must be explained clearly, and a lot of effort must be spent on words. The reason why his communication with Mei is slightly relaxed is that in most cases, Mei is telling her own guesses.

And she was very measured and focused. She only cared about the result. As for why Mikael was like this, she didn't ask.

But if it was someone else...

After finally explaining the task, Fengchen actually stopped slowly.

Mikael suddenly turned around, and a pink light appeared in the sky. If you have very good eyesight, you should be able to see that it was a pink rose.

Just like two years ago, she was waiting for him here.

Before the person came, the voice came first--

"Hi, long time no see, did you miss me? Oh, there are so many people this time!"

Klein, Yimer and Ling looked puzzled for a moment.

…………

The spacious underground base became lively again. There were enough supplies for tens of thousands of people to live for a hundred years, so there was no need to worry about survival. Ellie also knew that Mikael probably had something to say to Mei, so she used the excuse of preparing a welcome banquet to trick and drag the three people away, who didn't know how long they would stay here.

Mei did not come out to meet the guests. Mikael guessed that she probably felt that there was a long time to come, so she should leave this matter to Ellie, who was more proficient in it.

Besides, she probably didn't want to be called "uncle" or "sister" by Ling like Mikael and Ellie.

But for Mikael, facing Mei twice in less than two hours, and Mei was still "different", he felt a sense of time and space confusion.

"Three people came this time?"

Mikael knew that Mei had noticed the situation outside through the surveillance, so he did not rush to reply, but waited for Mei's next words.

"Which Herrscher is it?"

Although it was a question, her voice was somewhat flat.

"The ninth one just ended. These are two individuals of the tenth Herrscher, and the twelfth Herrscher."

Somewhat tired, Mikael was ready to explain it again, but for some reason, Mei did not ask about it. With her silence, the atmosphere became a little awkward.

"Ahem! This time, in addition to bringing these three people here, I have two more things to do."

"Speak."

Mei's unwillingness to say a word made Mikael mistakenly think that he had done something wrong.

Speaking of which, leaving this world bubble idle for two years is indeed a bit wrong. Facing the same faces every day, facing the same cold walls, facing Prometheus, who cannot be regarded as a real life even if equipped with a human emotion module, Mei... The mental state of Mei in the world bubble is a bit worrying...

But it was not until he walked up that he found that Mei was just staring at a bunch of formulas.

She even took the initiative to apologize to Mikael, "Ah-sorry, I was thinking about the problem for a while."

Mikael shook his head and put a small pocket watch-like device on the table in front of her.

"This is..."

Mei couldn't help but put down the work in her hands, picked up the "pocket watch" in doubt, and looked at it for a long time under the light.

The workmanship is exquisite, but if you really think that she really regards it as a pocket watch, it is too insulting to Mei's IQ.

Saying sorry in his heart, Mikael plagiarized a name without any psychological burden:

"I call it Gnius, which is your masterpiece in the intrinsic world, mainly used for communication in the quantum sea."

"Oh?"

Mei raised her eyebrows, feeling a little excited and a little disappointed.

She suddenly reached out and DEL all the formulas that Mikael had not had time to read. Prometheus was about to say something, but she turned on the mute mode.

"What's wrong?"

Mikael instinctively felt something strange, but couldn't explain what it was.

"No, I just want to feel it... It's a pity. If possible, I really want to sit down and have a good conversation with my other self."

Two Meis sitting together and communicating?

Mikael tilted his head. With his poor imagination, he really couldn't simulate that state.

Instead, the image of two plums, one holding scrambled eggs with tomatoes, and the other holding a plate of sushi, sandwiching Kevin, suddenly came to mind.

"Pfft... hum hum hum... hehe hehe... hahahahahaha!"

"why are you laughing?"

Mei was caught off guard and was startled by him, then she narrowed her eyes slightly and asked calmly.

"Mei...no, I just thought of happy things."

The two joked for a while and got back to business again.

"Actually, according to Mei, uh, what Mei said, this little thing can maintain the user's integrity to a certain extent to help the user's ability to travel in the quantum sea. But I don't need this, and I haven't done it. You can do any experiment if you have time."

After Mikael finished speaking, he found that Mei's expression became even weirder.

It seems that there is both loneliness and unwillingness, but also expectation and excitement.

So Mikael had to sigh that compared to the Mei in front of him, the one in the original world was more emotionless and emotionless.

It's a bit strange to say that Mikael thought that Mei in the world bubble would be more mature than in the original world after experiencing life and death with Kevin. This is of course not to say which one of the two is more naive, it's just a relative term.

But if you think about it carefully, the so-called growth is actually to make up for your own shortcomings. Some people cannot accept or face life and death, so it is often easier to achieve overnight growth under such circumstances.

And some people need exercise more than facing it.

From this perspective, Mei, who has been in charge of the Fire Chaser and guided the destiny of mankind for four years, is naturally closer to the appearance of Mei in Mikael's impression.

In this way, he answered his own questions and doubts, and unknowingly forgot why this doubt arose.

And Mei seemed to be aware of her gaffe, and she steered the topic in another direction without leaving a trace——

"You just said that there are two more things. One is to give me Gnius, but what about the other one?"

From Mei's perspective, Mikael's expression suddenly looked a little sad, but in just a blink of an eye, he disappeared without a trace.

Just like before in front of Mei in the Intrinsic World, Mikael waved and a stack of documents appeared in his hand, and he handed it to Mei.

"This is again..."

"There is a plan related to the retreat of our civilization. Although Mebius and Apponia...oh, you may not know Apponia. In short, I agree with the plan they proposed, but I am not satisfied with it - —

"I don't want 50,000 years of struggle to leave only a bunch of data in the end, and I don't want a glorious civilization to only exist in the memory of a few dozen people. I want to combine their plan with the world and let the data ...It’s no longer just data. Of course, you and Alicia are the masters of this world, and I need to ask for your opinions first.”

Mei was stunned by what he said, as if she suddenly remembered something, she lowered her head and looked at the title page of the plan - "The Paradise Plan"

"Of course, I hope you can help. With the resources and time we have, mainly time, there is no time to make more choices about this plan."

"clatter--"

Mei tapped her fingers lightly on the table - "I know, leave it to me."

Mikael didn't expect her to agree so readily, so he couldn't help but poke his head and said further:

"Ahem! Then... there were some minor problems during the ninth collapse. Can you help me with one more thing?"

"Okay."

Mei held her forehead helplessly.

"Mikael, a lot has happened in two years."

"..."

Is this kind of life really just brought about by time?

…………

"Hey! The dumplings I made by myself...uh, is it called this, right? After all, it's a delicacy from Ah Hua's hometown."

Michael, who was forced to stay here to eat, looked at the rosebud-like dumplings in his bowl with some embarrassment, feeling that something was wrong...

It’s not that the shape of this dumpling is... I can’t say it’s weird, it’s just that it’s very Alicia’s style.

The real problem is -

"Alicia, you...don't you know Hua?"

In this world without Mikael, everything should mostly unfold according to the future he knows well.

In that case, Hua and Ai Li wouldn't have had much interaction before the tenth collapse, and it's not even clear whether they knew each other.

But it's not absolute. After all, the ending of this world bubble deviates from that kind of future, so it makes sense that there is a slight deviation in the middle process.

Not to mention, Hua, as an "old antique" who joined the Fire Chaser Moth during the third Collapse, may not have crossed paths with Ellie before becoming a fusion warrior.

Before Ellie opened her mouth to explain, Mikael had already consciously given a reasonable answer.

After all, no matter what, she is Alicia, and the name itself means a lot.

At the very least it means that complete trust can be given and given.

"Oh! You have discovered such small details. You are indeed the number one Herrscher! In fact, Hua and I met several times after the third collapse, but she probably didn't until... I found out that I have been paying attention to her."

Alicia looked a little regretful, but she soon became optimistic:

"Eat it quickly! No! Guess what kind of stuffing is in the bread here!"

Is there any need to guess?

Mikael laughed dumbly. Several other people at the table seemed to be eating with their heads covered, but in fact they were staring here intently.

"Ugh!"

Ling tremblingly picked up a dumpling with pointed chopsticks and opened her mouth to make gestures for a long time. Unfortunately, the "flowers" wrapped by Alicia perfectly followed the principle of one-to-one reproduction in terms of volume. She really couldn't follow it. Being accustomed to swallowing in one gulp, I could only bite off a corner lightly, then my eyes lit up, and I winked at Mikael, trying to secretly convey information to him through lip language.

A pair of slightly cold hands quickly covered Mikael's eyes.

"Hmph! Do you still want to cheat in front of me? Mikael, guess it! Guess it, guess it!"

There was nothing Mikael could do against her. He originally planned to use his sense of smell to give an answer, but he didn't seem to smell any obvious filling smell.

He was about to randomly select a lucky person among "pork and green onions", "corn pork", "cabbage pork", "celery pork", "shepherd's purse pork", "carrot pork" and beef and mutton, but suddenly something happened in his heart. , changed his words:

"The truth behind this must be Alicia's sincerity!"

Direct ball attack!

"Eh...Eh? Eh!"

Ellie barked three times in a row, each one louder than the last.

Then she quickly covered her cheeks, shook her head wildly, and screamed shyly:

"Ahhhh! Is this Mikael now? Your answer is so foul!"

"Um...Ellie, there's no need to be so excited..."

To be honest, the reason why Mikael was able to give such an almost perfect response was simply because he had long been manipulated by Ally from the original world...

It’s simply because he knows the Alicia of the original world so well that he can easily figure out the thoughts of Alicia in this world.

So he himself couldn't tell clearly. No, he knew very well that the person expressing his feelings in his words was definitely not the Alicia in front of him.

But what he doesn't understand even more is how should he face the Ally in front of him?

She is indeed Alicia, but she is not Alicia.

Among the existing philosophical thoughts of mankind, at least those that Mikael himself has seen, there is no thought that can describe this problem.

After all, in a world without collapse, there would be no phenomenon of two people being both the same individual and two different individuals.

Perhaps such a question has been raised in psychology, and Mikael plans to take a look at it when he has time in the future.

Mikael frowned, skillfully picked up the flower buds in front of him with chopsticks and stuffed them into his mouth.

"Hmm? Hmm..."

He finally understood why Ling looked like he was hesitant to speak.

He finally understood why he couldn't even smell the stuffing with his nose.

Because the bread inside the dumplings is still dumplings...

To put it simply... these are not dumplings, but steamed buns.

When she turned around, Alicia was laughing so hard that half her mouthful of rice spat out.

Mikael could only comfort himself with Ah Q's spiritual victory method - it was okay, in a sense, he had eaten Ally's steamed buns.

The so-called banquet ended quickly, and Mikael didn't say anything in advance, so Ellie prepared in a hurry.

Mikael left quickly and didn't stay long. He seemed a little reluctant to leave, but also felt...unable to avoid it.

"Yeah! It's so late, Mei, you're still working overtime, you're really working hard!"

Mei said nothing. There was Gnius on the table in front of her, but her eyes were fixed on the clock on the wall.

"Oops, Mikael looks like he can't tell the difference between me and me!"

"I think he is much clearer than when he first came to this world. At least when faced with that choice again, he will probably kill you and the Sixth Herrscher mercilessly."

"Wow! It sounds scary! But you still don't know Mikael well enough, May. No matter what, he won't do anything to Alicia!"

May shook her head noncommittally.

The clock on the wall was ticking, and in an atmosphere of extreme silence and oppression, the bright red time numbers finally all returned to zero——

【00:00:00】

"Zizzi...zizi..."

A sound similar to electricity suddenly came from the Gnius on the table.

"Hello?"

A voice that was extremely familiar to Mei sounded:

"Finally we meet, the other me."

Mei smiled:

"Yes, it's too tiring and not stable enough to communicate in dreams all the time with the help of quantum entanglement. But you are still awesome. I am still in the theoretical verification stage, but you have already made something."

"After all, my Prometheus...zizi..."

Gnius's communication was suddenly interrupted. When the connection was reconnected, along with Mei's sigh, a joyful voice sounded from Gnius:

"Hi, long time no see. Isn't it wrong to say this? Oh...ah? Should I say it like this? Oh!

“Qiangqiang finally met another me, another Mei!”