Free Web NovelChapter 537: Chapter 154: The Second Tower
The young Bai Wu vaguely felt a gaze fixed upon him, but when he turned around, he saw nothing.
Hailing from the third layer of Well World, Bai Wu’s speed had long surpassed the limits of human vision.
By Bai Wu’s side was a twisted zone, as if he were the incarnation of the Well, with the center around him, slowly spreading black mist.
But when it reached a certain extent, the black mist stopped.
It was as if it were a domain of Bai Wu’s.
Bai Wu was curious, what would happen if someone approached this domain?
The young Bai Wu didn’t do anything else.
Bai Wu still remembered, at this time, after counting Ultraman, he would wander around to alleviate his mood.
It was Jing Liu, who always followed the young Bai Wu, wanting to see the childhood appearance of the person who had once defeated her.
Jing Liu remained a shadow without substance, invisible and intangible to others.
Only Bai Wu could communicate with her.
However, without any action from Bai Wu, once reaching a certain range, Jing Liu was forcibly summoned back.
Following the young Bai Wu, walking in a town from the Pre-Tower Era, Bai Wu suddenly felt it quite bizarre.
"If indeed I have traveled to the world where I originally lived..." fɾēewebnσveℓ.com
"It means that, on that historical day, I was watching myself, with someone who would become my enemy in the future, and who had already been defeated, by my side."
Jing Liu glared at Bai Wu:
"Perhaps the war between you and me is not yet over."
"On that flight, the causality you saw had already ended. Qian Yixin has grasped the World Will; he will not alter causality from the past, but he has completely changed that from the future."
"I fear that the brand-new future is something even Alpha has never seen. Perhaps your old employer is in the real world, trying hard to find their own body."
"And then prepare for a counterattack from humanity? Your brother Jing Si, my dear elder brother, has also become conscious due to Reincarnation. If you are no longer my enemy, he will no longer be my enemy."
"So the ultimate outcome, there’s no possibility of me and him joining forces?"
Jing Liu looked at Bai Wu in surprise.
Bai Wu responded with a calm gaze.
After a second or two, Jing Liu said:
"We shall talk about future matters in the future. Our attitudes toward the distortion differ. Although I was defeated by you, my Will has been conveyed to my brother."
"Can it also be conveyed to your younger brother?" Bai Wu joked.
Jing Liu said disdainfully:
"You are different from us, you don’t have the memories of being inside the shell, so stop disgusting me."
"Sister is really strict, huh."
Jing Liu had no real way of dealing with Bai Wu and could only let him tease her.
Fortunately, she knew Bai Wu had more important matters to attend to and should prioritize correctly:
"You should figure out what exactly is going on with you coming to this world."
"We cannot simply regard it as a virtual scenario. Perhaps this is truly a return to the past, crossing time and space to your original world, your original time."
"If that’s the case, then you need to be careful to avoid causality. As you have said, even that Qian Yixin wouldn’t dare to casually disturb causality coming from the past, only daring to change the future, so it would be best if you did not do so either."
"I have always been in control of the Power of Causality, trust me, a slight carelessness, and the massive butterfly effect will engulf the entire world."
Bai Wu agreed with her, Jing Liu was not being alarmist.
However, Bai Wu actually already had a certain understanding of this world:
"Do you know, time and space actually have their own logic, similar to the grandfather paradox, it seems illogical, but from our own independent timelines, we are just being pushed along by time."
That statement was a bit convoluted.
Yet Jing Liu understood it.
Bai Wu and herself had traveled to the past.
But traveling to the past, as well as the experiences there, also required the expenditure of time.
So, when looked at in isolation, Bai Wu and I exist both in the past and in the future.
"Of course, I don’t know what will happen if I change causality, but I will try my best not to," he said.
Trying one’s best not to change anything—that kind of baloney meant this madman would definitely change something.
Jing Liu decided to try persuading Bai Wu once more.
Bai Wu waved his hand, indicating that although he might be crazy, it was only in terms of audacity. It didn’t mean he was reckless or delirious.
After Bai Wu awoke, upon seeing his younger self, his eyes popped up with a remark.
[A defective child, you might grow up to be seven-tenths as handsome as me, although you also know that this child is bound to be extraordinary, and will encounter the great life mentor Yan. But for now, you’d better not spoil anything for him.
The woman by your side may possess the source of the Power of Causality, but after all, she is not as precise as Prayle’s Eye.
Next, I will mark some people you can interact with, and some you should avoid.
Of course, think carefully about who you truly need to find.] fɾeeweɓnѳveɭ.com
The marking function of Prayle’s Eye had been triggered by Bai Wu in Mechanical City before.
Like when he stumbled upon hoverbike gang members with exclamation points above their heads.
Now, as Bai Wu gazed at the back of his younger self, an "X" appeared above the child’s head.
This meant that approaching this "landmine" to talk would cause the causality line to explode.
Massive fluctuations could indeed, as Jing Liu had said, destroy the world.
Of course, those without an "X" weren’t necessarily free to be interacted with either; certain conversations might cause Prayle’s Eye to change its marking.
To change causality without entangling the threads of fate was a test for Bai Wu.
It was also what he believed to be one of his main missions in coming to this world.
Bai Wu said,
"Let’s take a walk around the town. I’ve always been curious about this town, even though I also find it quite boring."
Jing Liu had no other choice.
So, Bai Wu quickly went off into the distance and came back with a whole new outfit.
He had changed his clothes. He didn’t look very different from the people of this era.
The young Bai Wu was not even ten, while Bai Wu himself was twenty-one.
Despite certain resemblances, Bai Wu, wearing glasses and a fake beard, wasn’t likely to be recognized as the son of the town’s perfect man—Dr. Bai.
With this disguise, Bai Wu looked about ten years older.
Even if he stood side by side with Bai Yuan, he couldn’t be recognized.
All of this happened swiftly, for Bai Wu’s speed, to the people of this world, was something supernatural, something even machines could not capture.
As Bai Wu walked through the town, he first headed for "perfect man" Dr. Bai’s place of practice.
But Dr. Bai wasn’t there.
Bai Wu also didn’t know what Bai Yuan was doing at this time.
Previously in Well World, he understood that since his memories had been stripped away, his obsession had also changed; he was no longer Bai Yuan.
Later, because of the Ten of Spades, Bai Yuan also did not want to appear.
So now, with the Ten of Spades gone and his memories reclaimed, why wouldn’t his obsession from the Inner World, Bai Yuan, want to appear?
Was it simply a reluctance to appear, or an inability to do so?
Bai Wu prepared to enter the clinic to take a look, but before doing so, he stole a passerby’s phone with a speed undetectable to them.
Along the way, he saw many people without an "X" above their heads, but Bai Wu had no real desire to interact with them.
The current Bai Wu, in view of all this, was just like a normal person living in this era.
Although in terms of ability, he was capable of destroying the world.
The clinic was small, a two-story bungalow. While the door was locked, the windows were not, and Bai Wu easily leaped in.
Jing Liu still didn’t know that this place was where Bai Yuan resided.
Nor did he know that his defeat back then was not solely due to Bai Wu, but rather the joint effort of the father and son, Bai Wu and Bai Yuan.
The clinic was very neat.
Bai Yuan rarely allowed young Bai Wu to enter the clinic, especially to look through patient histories.
When he was a child, Bai Wu spent most of his time playing games, solving puzzles, and doing various strange multiple-choice questions.
If he made a mistake, he would be served with a session of acupuncture.
Walking inside the clinic, memories began to assault him densely.
Bai Wu’s emotions also involuntarily became somewhat uncontrollable.
In the Well World, in the High Tower World, his emotions were like a dead pool of water.
But returning to his original world, this place that posed no danger, Bai Wu found it hard to remain calm.
Bai Yuan’s obsession with cleanliness had reached a pathological level.
Interestingly, as Bai Wu looked at this clinic, he felt very unfamiliar with it.
His impression of Bai Yuan was of someone who occasionally said some strange things, always wearing a repulsive smile, and then torturing him madly.
"What’s wrong? Did you sense danger?" Jing Liu looked at Bai Wu.
Bai Wu shook his head.
He had thought countless times that the memories of his past were now merely anecdotes he could jokingly reference.
But having truly returned to the world of those memories, Bai Wu discovered... the shadows of his childhood were not so easily erased.
No matter how well Bai Yuan and he cooperated in the High Tower World, no matter how formidable the enemies they had defeated together, how many calamities they had evaded—
The experiences of childhood were destined to prevent this father and son from having a normal filial relationship.
Bai Wu did not believe there was any argument for "redeeming" Bai Yuan.
He did not think that Bai Yuan truly had any hardships.
Even though, in hindsight, what Bai Yuan did to him gave him an extraordinary advantage in the High Tower World.
But torture is torture.
No matter what other meanings he attributed to it, the fact that a father tortured his son... is unchangeable.
After taking a deep breath, Bai Wu gradually calmed down:
"It’s nothing, we need to be careful. I’m not sure if Bai Yuan is someone we can approach, or an untouchable mine."
"He is a person so clever it’s frightening. We can’t leave any traces. Otherwise, if he realizes something, it might lead to unnecessary trouble."
Jing Liu realized that throughout their journey, Bai Wu had never been so grave when it came to the seven major conglomerates.
It seems that the owner of this clinic is extraordinary.
Bai Wu scanned the room, quickly discarding a pile of useless items through Prayle’s Eye, and finally, his gaze settled on the patient histories.
There were many patient histories, and Bai Wu decided to read through each one.
He gently took out a history and carefully opened it.
"Zhan Gensheng, a dull man, who makes no interesting choices in life. I have to admit being a doctor isn’t much of an interesting job either, as it’s not every day that you encounter an interesting patient."
This was an assessment, followed by numerous notes about the patient’s condition.
Bai Wu opened the next one.
"He Shuhuai, more interesting than her trivial severe cold is her procrastination. It seems there was something very important for her to do, yet it always gets easily replaced by smaller matters. Thus, it’s endlessly deferred. She’s somewhat more interesting than the previous patient, with a certain cleverness for loafing around in the workplace."
Bai Wu found that Bai Yuan seemed more interested in the patients’ mental aspects.
"Tian Jing, staying up late, drinking excessively, and eating irregularly; of course, there are only so many ways humans can torment their bodies, but I’m more interested in their torment of the soul.
He is unusually tolerant of women, and I’m very curious about his views on the opposite sex and human love.
However, having recently started dating, he seems indistinguishable from a normal person, showing the gains and losses of a common man. Perhaps I should stop paying attention to him?"
Bai Wu was actually quite curious about what Bai Yuan’s evaluation of him would be. But he estimated that it would not be found in these patient histories.
But the next medical record drew Bai Wu’s attention.
"Li Xiaorui, food allergy. Although this woman is rather dull, and even though I killed her father, she did not expose me.
Because of this, she became someone I found more interesting. Of course, she is still not qualified to be a favored subject for my experiments.
It is worth mentioning that through her, I could sense the human perspective on the opposite sex and marriage. She has a husband, but I wonder, if I desired, would she be likely to divorce him?
Human love, it seems, is far less solid than it is praised to be. On the contrary, the resilience demonstrated by the mother-child relationship puzzles me.
But perhaps it’s just that my sample size is too small, and not seeing other cases doesn’t mean they don’t exist?
In the end, I’m not sure whether Li Xiaorui was talking nonsense or deliberately saying things of interest to me in order to capture my attention.
Last time we spoke, Li Xiaorui asked me if the world we live in could be a tower.
That was her dream talk, but undoubtedly, that phrase was quite interesting and reminded me of some... past events."
Li Xiaorui’s file left Bai Wu extremely puzzled.
Jing Liu also saw this dossier.
The various comments at the beginning were undoubtedly nonsense, merely Bai Yuan’s explorations of the human psyche.
The real key lay in that last piece of dream talk.
"Could this world be a tower?"
That sentence exploded in Bai Wu’s mind with a buzz.
He seemed to suddenly understand something.
Tower, Well, these two words correspond to two worlds.
Although Jing Liu did not understand, she too reacted to the sentence.
"Did you find anything?" Jing Liu asked.
Bai Wu slowly closed the medical record and cautiously returned it to the shelf.
His breathing was slightly rapid as he suddenly recalled his initial altercation with Cain, during which Cain had mentioned something.
"The first time I went out of the Tower with the captain, I encountered Cain’s disciple, Elijah."
"Cain?"
Jing Liu knew of this person, whom she considered a minor character.
Perhaps, when Bai Wu was not so powerful, this person could have caused Bai Wu some trouble.
But Bai Wu’s growth rate surpassed everyone’s imagination.
Now, Cain was no longer a worry for Bai Wu.
Yet Bai Wu did not think so lightly of Cain.
Because this man was a disciple of the Ten of Spades.
But what really brought Cain to Bai Wu’s mind was a remark he saw in the Second Building of the Ninth Psychiatric Hospital—
Bai Wu recited the words spoken by Elijah at the time:
"I am drifting further from the light but getting closer to the truth that the teacher spoke of. I’m about to become complete, and once I get out, I will become the teacher’s strongest weapon and will split open that tower." (See Volume 1, Chapter 12)
Jing Liu was also shocked this time.
"Are you saying... that the tower in Elijah’s words... is not the High Tower?"
Bai Wu nodded.
As early as during the High Tower defense battle, Bai Wu had wanted to ask Cain some questions.
But at that time, he had no chance.
Even during several operations with Cain, he consistently failed to bring up Elijah due to the insignificance of his role. But now, Bai Wu, who was always good at piecing things together, suddenly felt... that Li Xiaorui’s sentence and Elijah’s sentence might just be the two puzzle pieces needed to unravel the mystery.
At this moment... Bai Wu suddenly began to doubt the reality of the entire world.
