Chapter 2941: Dream
Xu Huo's goal was to find people, so after discussing with the two of them, he decided they should split up. Fortunately, the middle area had already been "cleared" into open ground, making it convenient to signal each other if anything happened. If contact was suddenly lost, that would indicate something suspicious.
Although the "getting lost" incident that had ambushed the three players earlier was also strange, they hadn't found any clues, so they had to let it go.
During their movement, the ambushed player fell asleep again. However, he was easier to wake up than the two ordinary people from before, and his mental state was quite good.
"I even had a dream," the ambushed player said with a hint of nostalgia after being woken up. "I dreamed of a huge patch of wisteria flowers. They were blooming so beautifully, more beautiful than any wisteria I've ever seen. That kind of beauty—neither reality nor a projection tuned by a terminal could compare. Do you understand that feeling?"
"It's like you can see every detail clearly, but it doesn't feel harsh. Instead, it exudes a soft beauty everywhere. And the colors—they were different from the purple-pink you see with your naked eyes. That color was a beauty beyond description..."
"Alright, alright," the short-haired female player interrupted impatiently. "Besides the wisteria, what else was there?"
The ambushed player thought for a moment. "Just the flowers."
They locked eyes, and the female player could tell he wasn't joking. She was momentarily speechless. So you really just had a dream, and you thought you'd gained something from it?!
No longer bothering with him, she turned to Xu Huo. "It seems the space here is indeed abnormal. We were clearly walking in different directions, but after a while, I ended up in the woods ahead of you and ran right into you... Old Crow hasn't come back yet. I don't know how things are on his end."
Old Crow was the male player traveling with her. The four of them had split up, but the ambushed player had fallen asleep, and she had ended up ahead of Xu Huo.
"Did that many people really enter this instance?" The female player began to doubt whether everything she had seen before entering was real.
"Don't overthink it," Xu Huo warned. "The more you doubt yourself, the more your judgment will falter." He was concerned that the spatial anomaly in this instance was secondary; the real danger lay in that inexplicable deep sleep.
"Was there any other obvious difference between the wisteria in your dream and other wisteria?" He turned back to the ambushed player. "Besides the exceptionally beautiful color, what about its growth state, size, and the surrounding environment?"
"It was a dream," the ambushed player said, puzzled. "Even if I tell you, how can you be sure it's real or just something I made up? You're not planning to find clues based on my dream, are you? I might have a rich imagination and a few extra romantic cells, but I can't bear the burden of clearing the instance..."
Under Xu Huo's gaze, his voice grew softer and softer until he slowly shut his mouth.
"Dream or not, since you can imagine, imagine more. Next time you fall asleep, remember to remind yourself to note the appearance of the wisteria and the surrounding environment." Once the man's mind was clear, Xu Huo gave his instructions.
The ambushed player nodded sheepishly.
The female player took a small sip of water. "Do you suspect this is a mental-type instance?"
"Not sure." Xu Huo still couldn't clearly categorize this instance. Moreover, the biggest risk for those entering was falling asleep, which was different from the mental-type instances he had encountered before. It was far too gentle.
"Boiling a frog in warm water, I suppose," the female player said pessimistically. "For players, it's not strange to die quietly at any time."
Hearing this, Xu Huo gave her a strange look.
"What's wrong?" The female player was puzzled.
Xu Huo said nothing and just shook his head. After a brief rest, he continued to kill trees.
This time, the ambushed player followed him. Having fallen asleep twice already, he didn't dare act alone.
But not long after, the female player contacted them. Old Crow was dead.
It was unclear how he died, but he had certainly been killed in his sleep. His body had been gnawed beyond recognition, making it impossible to determine the true cause of death.
When Xu Huo arrived, the female player was standing by the corpse, muttering, "How strange... I just passed by here a few minutes ago, and I didn't even notice he was dead. In just a few minutes, his body became like this. Is it a problem with time, or is it my mind..."
"Are you okay?" The ambushed player quickly interrupted her. "I told you, this might be a mental-type instance. Don't let your mind wander. If you go astray and kill yourself, that's one thing, but don't drag us down with you!"
The female player took a deep breath. "I'm not losing my mind. I just think this space is too strange. Such a short distance, and I felt nothing at all."
Xu Huo remained silent. He was starting to have a bad feeling.
But staying in place and letting his thoughts run wild was pointless. He decided to stick to his plan.
This time, the three of them no longer split up.
Another two hours passed. Along the way, they found about a dozen people—some players, some ordinary people—mostly from different wormhole points in different districts, but no one from District 014.
The sky quickly darkened. Everyone found a place to rest. Xu Huo also released the group from E25, whom he had stored in a container item, and asked if they had fallen asleep during that time.
These people were worried about their lives and tried their best to stay awake. None of them had slept. But unexpectedly, within just over ten minutes of being out, four of them fell asleep directly. One even plunged his head into a pot of soup. Fortunately, the soup had cooled down a bit, but when they pulled him out, his face was still scalded red. Even so, he didn't wake up.
"Should we give him an injection to wake him up?" The ambushed player leaned in.
"Let's wait and see," Xu Huo said. "See how long it takes them to wake up."
The adults kept realizing they had entered a very dangerous instance. Watching their companions fall asleep for no reason made them even more worried about their own safety. They huddled together out of fear, unable to focus on anything else.
Only the one child in the group didn't fully grasp life and death. Compared to the danger, after a while, he found it more novel. He circled the sleeping people, then ran up to Xu Huo and asked, "Are they having sweet dreams?"
"Why do you think they're having sweet dreams?" Xu Huo asked in return.
"They're sleeping well," the child said. "If it were a nightmare, they'd wake up scared. I've woken up from nightmares before."
"Everything in a dream comes from the brain," Xu Huo said with a slight smile. "It's a world created by the brain's boundless imagination, yet bound by the shackles of real cognition. The false half is imagination, and the true half is common sense."
"I can fly in my dreams!" The child didn't understand and shared his own dream. "But I'm scared when I fly. I only fly over water. If a cliff suddenly appears ahead, I'm afraid of falling, so the cliff becomes very, very short."
Dreams are created by the brain. When danger is detected, the brain naturally alters the dream to maintain consistency. But not all dreams can be manipulated that way.
Xu Huo looked toward a certain part of the forest. Another figure had appeared there.