Cheng Shi blinked. "Who did you say?"
"Sin Brood Mother Go Lis. It's a very ancient chapter of history. She..."
'Of course I know it's Go Lis!'
'Who in this world could possibly know Go Lis better than ?'
But that wasn't what Cheng Shi ant. Sothing had just clicked!
A bright flash sparked in his eyes. He raised a hand and cut the doctor off, asking urgently:
"Just answer this: was the creation of the Eternal Sun connected to this experint?!
The Tower of Logic did eventually create a pseudo-god. So did their experience in making pseudo-gods originate from this experint?"
"?"
Wang Mou froze. He hadn't expected Cheng Shi to circle all the way back to the Stars Dagger after everything they'd discussed. What did any of this have to do with the Stars Dagger now?
Though puzzled, the doctor answered honestly.
"I'm not certain. All the data from that experint was lost when the lead scholar was hauled away by the Grand Tribunal.
But I can confirm one thing: if you insist on finding a link between the two experints, the Stars Dagger does have so connection to the stitching experint. Perhaps not the academic kind you're imagining, but rather... a connection of blood.
The initiator of the faith-stitching experint — Kov De, Grand Scholar of the Life Extension Departnt — was a maternal ancestor of Zangier, the mastermind behind the Stars Dagger. And Zangier's own mother was likewise a Grand Scholar of Life Extension, and even a mber of the Erudition Presidium.
Madness has always coursed through that family's veins. It was she who brokered the deal — persuading her son to surrender his seat on the Presidium in exchange for the chance to conduct an experint. And it was she who personally approved the Stars Dagger's feasibility study, letting Zangier transform the mad vision in his head into an even madder reality!"
"???"
'Wait — so Zangier is basically academic royalty?'
Cheng Shi was stunned. The flood of information derailed his thinking, and before he could follow through, he blurted out:
"His mother was on the Erudition Presidium — how could she agree to the Presidium sacrificing her own son?"
But the instant the words left his mouth, Cheng Shi realized his mistake. Soone that deep into the Truth faith had probably drowned their humanity in obsession long ago.
"Correct — I see you've guessed it, though I think you're still underestimating the truth.
So mothers are mothers only in a biological sense. They may never have fulfilled a single maternal duty. Take the great and mad Lady Clo Yer. No one knows why she was so supportive of her child's experint. All I know is that midway through — when the Erudition Presidium still had the ans to rescue Zangier from his Hanged-Man-of-Doomsday state...
It was she who vetoed the rescue plan first, declaring that the experint's cost of blasphemy was too great not to see through to a proper conclusion.
And the rest you know. Zangier was trapped in the Stars Dagger, never to erge."
"..."
Cheng Shi had never imagined such an absurd story lurking behind the Stars Dagger experint. So the doctor was right — Zangier's entire family carried the gene for madness. From the founding of the Tower of Logic, they had been first-echelon Truth zealots!
But the aftermath of the Stars Dagger wasn't as simple as Zangier being trapped. At the very least, in the present day, the Hanged Man of Doomsday had escaped!
And very likely into reality!
And that was the real reason Cheng Shi had asked whether the stitching experint was linked to the Stars Dagger. He was theorizing: could 0221's entire endeavor be connected to Zangier? Or, to be bolder — was this Truth follower perhaps running an experint dood to fail specifically to prepare for Zangier's arrival?
After all, even if Zangier had escaped, he couldn't possibly have taken the Tower's pseudo-gods with him. Zhen Xin had said Zangier vanished during a consumable replacent, aning he must have found a window to slip past the Erudition Presidium's surveillance and leave undetected.
Otherwise, with the Presidium's resources, even handing Zangier two extra pseudo-gods wouldn't have let him escape their grasp.
So the question was: if Zangier truly wanted to replicate the experint in reality, could he scrounge up the massive resources the Tower of Logic had accumulated as a nation?
No. Obviously not.
Reality didn't have those kinds of resources. Even with 0221's entire fortune, he was just a decently skilled scholar compared to the Tower — a single household's wealth versus a nation's treasury. Not even close.
So to continue the experint, Zangier would have to start from scratch. And that "scratch" was... perhaps precisely the interrupted faith-stitching experint!
True, that experint appeared to have no viable outco. But the person running it could very well be the most insane Grand Scholar in the Land of Hope's history, partnered with reality's most ambitious and capable Truth Chosen. What opportunities those two powerhouses might seize in this new age of faith fusion was anyone's guess.
So this nightmarish Truth experint was definitely not a replication of the Stars Dagger — but it could very well be the prerequisite for replicating it!
0221 was using this experint to create a new "Eternal Sun" for Zangier!
At that realization, Cheng Shi's heart dropped.
'Not good. We've been played!'
If this experint was truly just a prelude — the "Eternal Sun" was accounted for. But what about the "Blood Moon"?
'Where is the Blood Moon?'
The Blood Moon represented Corruption. Creating such a thing required exposure to vast amounts of desire. And conveniently, this experint site was overflowing with all manner of freely coursing desires!
Survival, curiosity, dominance, greed, rage, fear...
Wherever the mother-tree's tentacles reached, it wasn't just Birth's paradise — it was also desire's inferno.
'So — is 0221 killing two birds with one stone?'
'He designed this experint, then let outsiders find the trail and flood in by the hundreds, wreaking havoc and exploring freely — thereby feeding desire into a second, hidden experint?'
'Did he calculate this scene from the very beginning, spreading the net wide and waiting for the players to jump in?!'
'If that's real, his read on human nature is terrifyingly precise.'
'But even if it is — what about Wei Mu? Wouldn't that an the Folly Chosen fell for it too?!'
'No!'
'He didn't!'
Cheng Shi's heart sank as he suddenly recalled what Hong Lin had relayed from Wei Mu before they'd set out: "He said he wants to witness the grandest act of folly under the heavens."
'Foolish act...'
'I really did beco the fool!'
Cheng Shi's expression darkened by several shades. He desperately hoped every one of his deductions was wrong — that he wouldn't end up the actual clown. But as his understanding of the experint sharpened, he knew it was a done deal.
And so, brow knotted tight, the Clown asked one final question.
"How did the Tower of Logic create the Blood Moon used in the Stars Dagger?"
Wang Mou had already gleaned pieces from Cheng Shi's line of questioning. He simply didn't know Zangier had escaped, so he hadn't made the deeper connections. Hearing this question now, he thought for a mont:
"I'm not sure.
But I do know that during the sa era as the faith-stitching experint, the Tower had another noteworthy experint. It was called 'Desire Ravine.'
That was the Void Mass-Energy Departnt's first step toward exploring Truth — and the experint's objective was to strip the desires from the experintal material in the adjacent experint, then use those desires to carve an abyssal channel toward Corruption."
"!!!"
The instant the doctor finished, Cheng Shi's face changed completely.
Not only because he'd finally connected every last thread — but because they'd stalled too long, and the returning aberrant mother-tree had finally arrived!
Dense tangles of tentacles erupted throughout the underground laboratory, and the very first thing they unleashed was a barrage of fury-laced lashes.
In that instant, tentacles rained down from above like a storm, smashing toward every person in the underground lab!
...
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