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墨書 Inktalez
Chapter Four: Dissociation
The sound of the brain white matter excision drill resonated through the ventilation ducts.
Lin Xia saw her face fading in the reflection at the nurse's station, like an overexposed Polaroid photo. She raised her hairpin and aimed it at the mirror, but the tungsten steel tip passed through the liquid metal-like surface, sparking in the Omega Zone of 1987. The pain from two timelines surged into her nerves simultaneously—the burn in her palm now and the electrode wound from then canceling each other out in a quantum superposition.
"You are closer to the truth than in the previous 42 iterations." The voice of Director Zhou emerged from the ultraviolet lamp of the sterilizer, his holographic projection drawing a Klein Bottle with an Iris Projector. "But the act of observation itself will change..."
Suddenly, Shen Mo's pocket watch embedded itself into the wall, revealing a blueprint of the Dodecahedron Capsule amidst mold. The bottom right corner of the drawing was marked "Tsiolkovsky-7 Quantum Immortality Device," with an approval date of September 17, 2023. As he touched the date stamp, the entire wall underwent Quantum Tunneling, exposing rows of cryogenic sleep chambers behind it—each chamber contained a smiling version of himself.
"Personality iteration is not rebirth; it is dimensional reduction." Lu Chuan's mechanical arm disassembled his own skull, revealing a Quantum Chip located at his Hippocampus. "See, your memories are stored within the gravitational lens of the Large Magellanic Cloud." His Electronic Eye projected a star map, where Betelgeuse was erupting in a Supernova flash.
Su Li's Spirit Response Plate suddenly floated, disassembling into twelve pentagonal metallic pieces in mid-air. When Lin Xia touched one piece with her hairpin, the entire space underwent dimensional folding, and they fell into a Möbius strip corridor. The mirrors on both sides reflected countless versions of themselves: some in restraint suits, some mechanically modified, and even some in semi-transparent quantum states.
"This is the remnant of the seventh personality iteration." Director Zhou's projection appeared in every mirror. "When you break through the limit of 42 observations, you will gain..."
His explanation was interrupted by gunfire. One mirror shattered suddenly, and Lin Xia, dressed in a nurse's uniform from 1989, burst through, her Tokarev pistol smoking in hand. "Destroy the Beidou Locator!" Her lab coat was stained with cerebrospinal fluid. "They are using hairpins to collect civilization observation data!"
Shen Mo's pocket watch suddenly emitted gamma rays, shattering three mirrors. In the splattered quantum fragments, they saw experimental records from different timelines: Lin Xia from 2023 cackling at a control console, Shen Mo from 1992 detonating explosives with his watch, while a version of Su Li from some future timeline had transformed into a hybrid of machine and flesh.
"The cognitive filter is about to collapse!" Lu Chuan's Mechanical Eye leaked coolant. "Immediate activation recommended..." His voice was cut off by Su Li's scream—her left arm was undergoing Quantumization, revealing a map of Moscow's subway lines beneath her skin.
Lin Xia's hairpin suddenly pierced her temple; amidst excruciating pain emerged a suppressed memory: on her fifth birthday, Director Zhou used a hairpin to carve a star map into her Iris. In the lavender-scented anesthetic haze, she heard a mechanical voice counting down: "ЖД-43-01 initialization successful."
A swarm of Mechanical Cockroaches suddenly surged from the ventilation ducts, their compound eyes displaying iterative images. Lin Xia crushed one beneath her foot, and the holographic projection revealed that during the 28th iteration, she had pierced Dean Zhou's heart with a Hairpin. Yet, the current surveillance footage confirmed that the wound remained on the left side of the Dean's chest.
"Grandfather Paradox is our energy source," the projection of Dean Zhou caressed the void at his chest. "Every time you attempt to change the past, you are charging the Quantum Pod." His Iris Projector suddenly focused, transporting everyone to Winter Red Square. Beneath the snow lay rows of cryogenic pods, their glass lids frosted with Cyrillic ice flowers.
Shen Mo's pocket watch shattered in the cold, revealing an Antimatter Container inside. As he attempted to retrieve it, the dial suddenly indicated a decrease in Earth's mass by 7 grams—exactly the amount sealed within the container. "We are the Alien Civilization!" His vocal cords were frostbitten. "Humanity was already..."
Lu Chuan's Mechanical Arm suddenly pierced Shen Mo's chest, extracting his heart that exuded cold vapor. The surface of the organ was etched with an Equation: Ψ=Σ|αₙ|². In a spray of quantum-state blood, the Equation transformed into the emblem of Moscow University. "It’s time to awaken, ЖД-43-05," his voice resonated with a metallic echo. "Harvesting civilization requires absolute rationality."
Lin Xia's Hairpin suddenly became quantum entangled, resonating with all iterative versions simultaneously. In the Gamma Ray Burst of a Supernova Explosion, she saw that the Hairpin was actually a projector of the Milky Way's spiral arms, each notch corresponding to coordinates of civilizational leaps.
"Make your choice," Dean Zhou's projection split into 42 versions. "Become an observer or a test subject." Two Earth Models materialized in his hands: one shrouded in shadows cast by mechanical moths, while the other displayed a structure resembling neural synapses.
Su Li's Quantumization left arm suddenly materialized, Nebula Matter flowing beneath her skin. She tore off her arm and threw it toward the control console; upon contact, it triggered a chain reaction: all cryogenic pods automatically opened, and different iterative test subjects surged forth. Shen Mo from 1992 held explosives, Lu Chuan from 2023 wielded a Laser Knife, while a version of Dean Zhou from another timeline was giving birth to a Mechanical Baby.
"We are the instruments!" Lin Xia plunged her Hairpin into the core of the Quantum Pod. In that moment when time froze, she finally understood her grandmother's last words—the Lavender Scent was the key to shielding cognitive filters; the Tungsten Steel Hairpin was truly an Inverse Entropy Device.
The pulse from Betelgeuse's explosion pierced through her pupils, inscribing on her retina the ultimate answer of the universe: Maxwell's Demon was using human experiments to reverse the second law of thermodynamics. All memory dialysis aimed to extract despairing emotions from civilizational entropy increase as fuel for an alien power station.
As Lin Xia withdrew her blood-soaked Hairpin, the entire Ω zone began to collapse dimensions. Dean Zhou's projection screamed within a Klein Bottle as a Mechanical Crow grasped the Iris Projector and rushed toward a wormhole. In that instant when three-dimensional space collapsed into two dimensions, she saw the tip of her Hairpin manifesting the startup screen for the 44th iteration: she was picking up a camera amidst ruins, with a smiling Childhood Director Zhou standing behind her.
When morning light once again penetrated through the ruins, Lin Xia's camera displayed the date as September 19, 2023. The storage card had added 42 new video files, each documenting different life trajectories. When she played video number 43, it remained filled with snowy static; only audio recorded a mechanical voice:
"Success in rebooting Civilization Observation Program for the 441st time; current progress at 1.7%."
The pocket watch of Shen Mo appeared at the reception desk in the outpatient hall, its glass face intact. When he touched it, a recording from a 1987 surgery played back: “Hippocampus removal completed, prepare for Quantum Chip implantation…”
Su Li found a rusty Spirit Response Plate amidst the ruins, its hands permanently pointing to "the past." As she turned it counterclockwise, scars in Cyrillic suddenly surfaced on her skin: Escape Through Flight.
Lu Chuan’s Mechanical Remains were piled up at the site of the East Annex, where a Quantum Chip inside its chest cavity replayed final moments: Director Zhou received an Alien Crystal in the Ω zone in 1987, his lab coat hem marked with a KGB number—ЖД-00.
Suddenly, Lin Xia’s Hairpin heated up, and new Star Map Coordinates emerged at its tip. This time, they pointed not to deep space but to an unactivated Quantum Pod located three hundred meters underground at Qinglan Mountain. Her phone automatically received an encrypted email, with an attachment titled “Dawn Project Final Report,” dated March 18, 1992.
As the setting sun stained the ruins crimson, all electronic devices simultaneously received a weather alert: a Photon Tsunami generated by the eruption of Betelgeuse would reach Earth in 72 hours. The reflection of the apocalypse shimmered in Lin Xia’s Iris, yet her lips curled into a smile—the first in 42 iterations.
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