Doomsday Wonderland

As the red-haired figure gradually approached, Lin Sanjiu bit her tongue to keep from calling out, "Marcie."

It was quite funny. Just minutes before, she was thinking about how to set up a broadcast to find Marcie and Silvan; mere minutes later, she watched Marcie walk across the broken red brick ground, without making a sound.

Lin Sanjiu felt something was off in the scene.

If one were to describe Marcie, she was like the older sister next door who would greet you with a perfect smile in the morning or baking trays and trays of cookies during the holidays, delivering them door to door. She was warm, affectionate, and busy, a person you should meet on a clear day—not like now.

Marcie was off too.

The soft, plumpness of her cheeks had worn away, leaving tightly stretched skin over rigid bones. Her lips had thinned, and though breathing seemed difficult, they remained tightly closed, as if she might reveal fangs when she opened her mouth.

She leaned on a discarded thin water tube, dragging a bloody and flesh-obscured leg, limping step by step towards Lily. The injury on her leg was not the most shocking part. What was most surprising was that below half of her calf, there was nothing.

At first glance, Lin Sanjiu thought Marcie had lost a foot and gasped, standing up quickly. Upon closer inspection, she realized she was wrong. Marcie's foot had not entirely disappeared; a faint outline could be discerned through the camera, but its color and texture seemed washed out, as if it was gradually fading away, threatening to wash away Marcie's entire body.

Evidently, Marcie was about to be teleported.

Lin Sanjiu never thought that their meeting would coincide with their parting. She was even more surprised that she was so shocked that she couldn't utter a word. Even as the teleport process began, Marcie had not given up, reacting immediately to Lily's appearance, gritting her teeth and approaching her, no matter how far away. But why?

Why did Marcie so urgently and desperately seek Lin Sanjiu?

Lin Sanjiu couldn't speak, and Lily was even more at a loss. She just stood there, watching Marcie drag her soon-to-disappear leg, step by step until she was in front of her, asking, "Where did you come from?"

Faced with any other question, Lily might have been able to answer, but this question left her tongue-tied, not knowing where to begin. Marcie looked at her and couldn't help but frown, glancing at Horst behind the door.

She obviously recognized Horst and slowly raised an eyebrow. Marcie's face had no color, looking like she was constantly losing blood and extremely tired. After a pause, she slowly said, "What a coincidence."

Lily glanced at the silent walkie-talkie in her hand and stammered, "Um..."

"The game you just came out of," Marcie interrupted her, "was there a player named Lin Sanjiu?"

"I... I didn't come from a game." Lily, already reeling from a series of shocks and now confused, and unsure what she should or shouldn't say, fumbled several times without getting to the point, making Marcie frown in apparent impatience with her confusion.

It was only when Lily looked down that she finally noticed the oddity of Marcie's leg and exclaimed, "Your leg!"

The part of Marcie's injured leg that had been washed away and become invisible was growing larger. In just this short time, it had spread to her thigh, and it seemed that in a few more minutes, she would be teleported away. This thought made Lin Sanjiu take a deep breath and grab the communicator.

"Sis," Ji Shanqing's voice suddenly sounded behind her, low and subdued. "Don't speak yet."

Lin Sanjiu was startled and quickly turned around, lowering her voice to ask in a whisper, "Why? Have you... have you gotten everything ready?"

"She's the one you're looking for, right?" Ji Shanqing whispered in her ear, looking at the screen. "It seems she is looking for you for an extremely urgent and serious reason... How many worlds have you been separated from her? You also said she has been in contact with Gong Daoyi, right?"

Lin Sanjiu already knew what he was going to say. She pursed her lips and gripped the communicator tightly.

"She's not the same person she was before, with only a very basic evolved ability. She's probably faced Advaita. Against an opponent like Advaita, Marcie not only survived but also managed to find this place using Advaita. After so many years, you don't know what she has become or what she has in mind for you... Since she doesn't know you're watching her, now is a good time to understand her motives."

Ji Shanqing couldn't understand the bond between her and her friend. To him, everyone in this world besides Lin Sanjiu was background noise, to be dealt with in a cold, mechanical way. But, if she were to be honest, similar doubts had crossed Lin Sanjiu's mind before. What exactly was Marcie trying to do?

"If you write what she's saying after Lily's text," Ji Shanqing said, with the detachment and precision of a surgeon, "I think Lily will speak according to the script you provide."

Yes... Now Lily's nature was essentially the equivalent of an NPC in the game, or to put it more bluntly, an item.

This would be another blow to Lily. Lin Sanjiu sighed inwardly, closed her eyes, and put her hand on the keyboard, writing a question for Lily to ask, "Do you know Lin Sanjiu? What do you want from her?"

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After typing, she hung her head, looking at the communicator. She didn't look at the screen because she didn't want to see Lily's expression when she realized she could become a human loudspeaker.

Marcie's voice rose as she asked, "Is she nearby? When did you last see her?"

Just as Lin Sanjiu was indeed nearby, and Marcie was certainly too late to find her, Marcie seemed to realize this and urged, "Speak quickly."

On the screen, Lily spoke again, "I don't know where she went... Do you have a visa? Do you know where you're going? Maybe you can contact her in some other way."

Marcie waved her hand, as if to sweep away Lily's words, but Lin Sanjiu had already written the text, and Lily continued to speak according to the script, "Like paper cranes or eBay."

"You seem to know her well." Marcie looked down at her gradually disappearing lower body and then fixed her gaze on Lily. "Since you know so much, do you know where she's going next?"

Before Lin Sanjiu had finished typing, Marcie continued, "I wasn't supposed to be teleported yet... The Great Deluge is happening more and more frequently now. But I have a way to teleport again after, to meet her in her next world."

Marcie opened her mouth slightly, gasping for air, as if pleading was very difficult for her. "If you know, please be sure to tell me."

"Karma Museum," Lily said mechanically and smoothly. "She said she's going to the Karma Museum."