"Is this place so shabby?"
Bohemia couldn't help but exclaim in a low voice. "This world—how disgusting, and it has a priceless value? Ah, of course, I'm not questioning the lord..."
"It's normal for you little fish to not know," Puppeteer's voice was calm from afar. His face and figure were shrouded in shadows, and only when he slightly turned his head did the shimring powder at the corners of his eyes faintly gleam before dimming again.
"For posthumans who understand this world, Esculent Alethia is a sanctuary that allows one to relive old dreams," he said just this one sentence before abruptly stopping. From Dr. Hu to Bohemia and even the Descartes Spirit, no one dared to urge him to continue.
Behind them, Lin Sanjiu slowly stood up from the ground, her body trembling in bouts of dizziness.
"What is going on in this world?" she asked in a hoarse voice.
Puppeteer fell silent for a mont. After a few seconds, a tremor ran across half of his face, as if a cold smile was gradually erging from the depths of the night. In a gentle voice, he said, "Since you all want to know so badly, why not go and see for yourselves?"
An alarm bell imdiately rang in Bohemia's mind, but before she could gather the courage to say, "Actually, I'm not very interested," a figure nearby suddenly stood up silently. As he rose, the shadow of the chair beneath him split into two separate shadows that also stood up.
"Follow ."
If they didn't want to beco living dolls that people used as chairs, they'd better obediently follow along.
Though the species present were different, their thoughts were the sa. Lin Sanjiu swayed as if she still couldn't stand steadily. Bohemia reluctantly reached out her hand to support her and, after a mont of thought, asked in a low voice, "I have a question. What happened between you and Puppeteer when you were alone? That baby-drool bib..."
Unexpectedly, just at that mont, the nearby mass of mosaic found an opportunity, swiftly turned around, and dashed off into the night without a sound. Its movent was silent and elusive. By the ti the others reacted, it had disappeared without a trace, leaving behind only its echoing words in their minds: "Since the ga is over, I won't accompany you any longer. We are now even, goodbye!"
"I forgot to use Higher Consciousness to trap it!" Bohemia realized, gritting her teeth. "This guy is really cunning!"
After the ga ended, she had completely forgotten about continuing to detain the Descartes Spirit, and the spirit had remained motionless as if it had also forgotten about it—Bohemia's Higher Consciousness was very fast, so the Descartes Spirit had waited until she was distracted before escaping.
"Let it go. It's not worth the trouble." Lin Sanjiu took a deep breath. "Don't grip my arm so tightly..."
"But..."
Bohemia hesitated, looking at the direction it had fled, but in the end, she didn't say anything.
When the group, consisting of the injured, weak, and a cat, finally stopped, they had already ventured deep into the city. It was the darkest hour of the night, just before dawn. Nearly all the buildings along the road were pitch-black, forming a forest of shadows of various heights. Only one after another randomly placed streetlamp posts cast irregular gray-white light onto their path.
"Do these streetlamps cause accidents every day?" Dr. Hu skeptically asked in a low voice.
The streetlamps were crooked and twisted. Sotis several lampposts stood closely together, while other tis they couldn't be seen even after walking for ten minutes. The people who installed the streetlamps might have been drunk, just like the people who built the buildings. There were even lampposts of various sizes sprouting from the middle of the road, the steps beside the road, and the entrances of drains.
Not far from them, at the edge of a dim white glow from a streetlamp, was where Puppeteer stopped. The tall and slender figure obstructed the light, creating a deep darkness.
"L-Lord," Bohemia glanced at Lin Sanjiu and saw that she still had a lost and absent-minded expression. She had no choice but to pluck up the courage and ask, "We ca here... because, because..."
"Didn't you want to know the truth of this world?" Puppeteer's voice was cool and seed to contain a trace of mockery. "Then co and et the owner of this world."
"Y-You an that so-called truth... Where is it?" Bohemia's voice beca weaker and weaker under the pressure of fear and unease. She glanced at Dr. Hu for help, but due to their height difference and lack of understanding, her gaze only t a round head and two pointed ears.
"Isn't it everywhere?" Puppeteer said with a sneering smile. Then, he turned slightly and looked at Lin Sanjiu. "Your cherished aning of life is here. So, why not bow to your beloved streetlamp?"
Bohemia and Dr. Hu both made choking sounds.
"What?" Lin Sanjiu even forgot who was in front of her. "Street... streetlamp? Why streetlamps?"
Lin Sanjiu stood dazed in the middle of the road, her gaze wandering between Puppeteer and the streetlamp. The gray-white lamppost, thick at the bottom and thin at the top, extended into the air before suddenly realizing it had to emit light. Sparsely and intermittently, a faint glow erged from the semicircular "head," as if it had just rembered that it still needed to illuminate its surroundings.
Even though she knew exactly what she had missed out on, even though the lingering sense of loss continued to ache in the hollow of her chest, Lin Sanjiu was still shocked into silence when she saw the streetlamp.
"I..." She stared at the streetlamp, and after a few seconds, she blankly glanced at the diverse buildings along the roadside. "Is this my life goal...? I rember it being sothing very important, very aningful..."
"Nurturing the truth, upholding the truth, harmoniously coexisting with the truth... Isn't that important?" Puppeteer's bloodless, snow-white face revealed a half-hearted smirk. "Without the shit in your eyes, can't you recognize your aning of life anymore?"
Bohemia struggled and hesitated for a while but ultimately succumbed to her curiosity. She whispered to Lin Sanjiu, "I... I still don't quite understand..."
However, it was Puppeteer who answered her.
"Every streetlamp and every building you see is not man-made. They are living entities that grow from the underground, which is why they have such diverse appearances. They have thoughts and like to refer to themselves as the Truth. Those who have been blinded by their shit consider themselves Servants of the Truth. These so-called Truths have another na," he paused, his voice resembling a cold winter wind brushing against the skin, "Fungi. Or, you can also think of them as mushrooms."
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