The once clear and solid surroundings had become distant and insubstantial in an instant, as if she were glancing around within a dream. Yet, oddly, it didn't feel strange at all.
Lin Sanjiu glanced again at the grand prize, who was waving and shouting at her from afar. With a hint of daze, she thought to herself, 'No wonder the previous posthumans who entered the pocket dimension didn't realize anything was wrong.'
Like dreams and memories, the boundaries of reality had been blurred and erased. The floor, the mast, the clouds—everything had become liquid and fluid. With each turn of her body, each lift of her hand, the space around her bent and dissolved slightly, as though yielding to her movements.
What should have been a marvel felt entirely normal, as if the world had always operated this way.
"Sis!" The grand prize's shout transformed into the wind of the high altitudes. It surged toward her, swept past, and dissipated.
1
In front of her, Ah Quan let out a low sigh.
"Memories flow out of everyone who enters the pocket dimension," he said quietly, "wrapping around me like a starry sky." This time, he also held a teacup in his hand. The cup was still empty, not yet filled with her memories.
But it was likely about to be.
"Like frames of a painting," Ah Quan continued, "their edges worn down by time, their colors altered by the owner's will or subconscious—I can sense them all." Following her gaze, Ah Quan looked down at the teacup in his hand. "For each person, the most precious, important, and defining memories will rise to the surface before me."
Lin Sanjiu recalled that she had just asked him, 'What are the rules of the pocket dimension?' So, was Ah Quan explaining them to her bit by bit?
"I have almost no choice in the matter. The memories that rise to the surface become my target; they are the ones I must manipulate. For example..." He paused, and his eyes narrowed slightly. "The first one is about your parents."
It felt as though a row of piano keys in her mind had been struck all at once, producing a sudden, jarring chord. The impact was so overwhelming that tears spilled from Lin Sanjiu's eyes before she could stop them.
"From today on... in this world, I'm someone without parents," she whispered as she slowly crouched down, her voice soft and reminiscent of her teenage years. "No one will worry about me wholeheartedly anymore. No one will care whether I've eaten properly during work. Among the endless crowds of strangers in this world, I have no parents anymore..."
"Ah Quan!" A sudden shout rang out, startling her. After the initial jolt, the voice became familiar—clear and gentle, but carrying urgency. "Stall for time!"
The voice seemed to be carried far away by water, its desperation softened by the distance. "Ah Quan, can you hear me? Don't do anything to my sister. Stall for as long as you can!"
1
It was the grand prize. Lin Sanjiu raised her head in a daze.
He stood far off at the edge of her vision, his anxious urgency palpable, as though his own life were crushed under a heavy stone and he was trying desperately to free it.
Lin Sanjiu suddenly took a deep breath, feeling slightly better.
She wiped her eyes with her hand and stood up again. The movement drew a startled, uncertain sound from someone nearby. "Huh?"
Lin Sanjiu turned toward the voice and saw a short man whose face, though blurred, felt strangely familiar. He stood not far behind Ah Quan, yet it felt as though they were separated by two entirely different worlds. Even the thought of walking toward him filled Lin Sanjiu with an overwhelming sense of futility, like a dream in which the path ahead stretches endlessly and impossibly.
The other passengers on the ship were either staring in their direction, retreating to safer distances, or murmuring to one another in hushed tones. Were they real people? Or were they just hazy, indistinct background elements in this dreamlike space?
Ah Quan—at this moment, the only person in Lin Sanjiu's view who felt solid, real, and familiar—glanced toward the grand prize before turning his gaze back to Lin Sanjiu.
"Ji Shanqing is a clever person," he said.
It seemed he had already figured out the grand prize's intentions. With a look of realization, he continued, "Usually, the rules of a pocket dimension are designed to restrict those who enter it. But the one built specifically for me is different. Almost all of its rules exist to constrain me. Once you enter, I'm compelled to follow the instructions of the person who activated the pocket dimension and make a series of alterations to your memories... The only thing I can control is the speed at which it happens.
"Have you ever wondered," Ah Quan added, his voice calm, "why they would create a pocket dimension capable of altering memories? What could they possibly gain from changing someone's memories?"
Lin Sanjiu shook her head slowly. The short man behind Ah Quan didn't seem to hear their conversation. He was craning his neck and frowning anxiously at Lin Sanjiu, occasionally casting wary glances at the grand prize in the distance. ŕΆ₦őᛒĘ𝒮
Using her Higher Consciousness, Lin Sanjiu had placed a barrier between the short man and the grand prize, originally to ensure the grand prize's safety. Now, however, it had become a shield protecting the short man instead.
2
"Anyone sent here, if they have a strong attachment to something, I'm tasked with dissolving it. Whether it's affection, obsession, or greed, I must replace their focus with something else. To put it simply—let me give you an example," Ah Quan said.
'So, this is his way of stalling for time,' Lin Sanjiu thought. The short man looked increasingly agitated, but he couldn't pressure the pocket dimension NPC.
"For someone like you," Ah Quan continued, his tone as if he were recounting a story, "what kind of price would it take to make you wear a robe that covers you from head to toe, bowing with fear, humility, and gratitude to a master? Smiling at their commands while constantly watching others to see who might show disobedience? There's no such price in the world, is there?"
No, there wasn't.
"But what if I erased everything your parents ever told you?" Ah Quan's gaze swept across her as he hypothesized. "What if you forgot the day your mother angrily quit her job when you were eight? What if the outcome of that school strike you led as a child turned out differently? What if Ren Nan hadn't tried to devour you but instead kept you as a pet, forcing you to live under their control? If all these key moments in your life—the events that made you who you are—were altered, would you still be the Lin Sanjiu standing here today?"
1
Lin Sanjiu couldn't find the words to respond. She simply shook her head vigorously.
"It's an intricate, laborious process," Ah Quan said, sighing, "but by the time you leave, you'd be fully capable of becoming an excellent servant. Of course, you're an extreme example. For most people, the changes don't need to be so drastic to achieve the desired result."
"The person who activated this pocket dimension..." Lin Sanjiu began to murmur, but Ah Quan understood immediately.
"The person who activates the pocket dimension leaves with a clear blueprint of what they want their target to become once it's over," he said with a bitter smile. "For instance, if they're wealthy and turn you into someone who loves money, they'll know you inside out. Once you leave the pocket dimension, it's almost guaranteed that you'll fall into their trap. In this particular case, however, the person who activated the pocket dimension only wanted to harm you... Their request was to make you timid and cowardly."
Lin Sanjiu couldn't help but laugh at that.
Ah Quan chuckled softly too, casting another glance outside the pocket dimension.
Her perception of the world was now influenced by the pocket dimension, leaving it light and fragmented, yet oddly sticky and fluid. Things drifted in and out of focus. But Ah Quan's thoughts remained clear; he seemed to glance in the grand prize's direction. Just as Lin Sanjiu was about to turn and look too, he suddenly redirected her attention by speaking.
"I've just realized," he said, "that part of your memory is missing."
"Yes," Lin Sanjiu replied. "Puppeteer told me..."
"I know," Ah Quan said gently, as though trying to comfort her. "I've seen it."
"Then the memory I lost—"
Ah Quan shook his head.
"I can't create something out of nothing," he said apologetically. "I can only modify or erase what's already there. When faced with nothingness—something that never existed to begin with—I can't do anything."
"You can't... restore it?" Lin Sanjiu asked blankly. It had been so long since her office days, but she vaguely remembered that even deleted computer files could be recovered through data restoration, right?
"Memory doesn't work like computer files," Ah Quan said after hearing her question. "The Special Item Gong Daoyi used erased part of your memory entirely, turning it from something into nothing—complete obliteration. It's not like a computer file, which simply moves from one location to another and leaves a trace during the process."
Lin Sanjiu shivered involuntarily. "So, if he didn't keep a backup, I'll never know what memories I've lost?"
Given Gong Daoyi's methods and personality—yes, there was a chance he might have kept a backup. But Lin Sanjiu was almost certain that if Gong Daoyi did reveal a backup, it would mean an even darker shadow was waiting for her just beyond.
She didn't know whether to hope Gong Daoyi had kept a backup or not.
"All I can tell you is that the memory was erased very skillfully," Ah Quan said, skirting the question. "All the parts directly related to it were kept intact as much as possible. The logic, timeline, and context were cleverly and carefully filled in, ensuring that your memory from that period feels perfectly seamless. Even if you tried to recall it over and over again, you wouldn't sense anything amiss. And even with my ability [Memory Master], I can't deduce what was erased just from the memories that remain."
Lin Sanjiu stiffened and stared at him.
"Wait, you said 'that period'," she said urgently. "You... you know when the memory I lost occurred?"
Ah Quan nodded. "It happened in your native world, Hyperthermal Hell."