Chapter 695: Three Memories

The memories surfacing from deep within my mind were entirely unfamiliar. If the person in those fragments didn't look exactly like me, I never would have believed I had experienced them.

With my Heart Aperture opened and Three of Nine Locks Broken, I sorted through the fractured images in my head. It took a massive effort to piece them together, but I eventually organized them into three dynamic scenes.

In the first scene, I stood facing a divine statue inside a pitch-black dungeon.

The statue in the image had a blurred face I couldn't make out. It gave me a completely different feeling than the Double-Faced Buddha Statue; it felt much older and weathered by time.

The dungeon was incredibly dim. The only light source came from an oil lamp placed before the statue.

The flame flickered. In the memory, I seemed to be waiting for someone. I was dressed casually in ordinary clothes and wore a Paper Doll Mask.

From the looks of it, I was imprisoned.

I looked calm and composed in the image. I seemed to say something to the statue, but it was too muffled. I only caught a single sentence clearly.

"Failed again..."

After saying that, the version of me in the image walked up to the statue and pulled a mirror out of my clothes.

It was an ordinary mirror, but it gave me an inexplicable sense of familiarity.

The first scene abruptly ended there, leaving me somewhat confused.

'Failed? Why would I say I failed again? Did I try this before, only to fail to change the outcome?' I closed my eyes in deep thought, finally recalling the mirror I had been holding.

It really was familiar. I must have seen that mirror surface and material somewhere before.

Reaching into my clothes, I pulled out a Broken Mirror Shard wrapped in soft cloth.

'Right, it's this mirror.' It was the most ordinary mirror surface possible, holding no unique features to an outsider, but it held a vastly different significance for me. This Broken Mirror Shard could reflect anyone and anything, yet it refused to reflect me.

'The mirror I pulled out at the end of that memory fragment should be connected to this shard.' Perhaps they had been a complete whole a long time ago, only to end up shattered for whatever reason.

Solemnly tucking the mirror shard away, a vague theory formed in my mind. I had no way to prove it yet, though; I would need to gather all the Mirror Fragments first.

'Mirrors frequently appear in my livestreams too. These things exist between illusion and reality, as if communicating with another world. If the mirror can't reflect me, does that mean I come from within the mirror?' Shaking my head with a smile, I stopped my wild speculations and focused my attention on the second memory scene.

Unlike the uneventful first scene, the second memory showed me chasing someone. I was sprinting wildly through a distorted city, the scenery on both sides blurring past me in reverse.

'This looks like it's inside the Deep Dream Layer!' There were all sorts of bizarrely shaped buildings, walls soaked with human-shaped water stains, panicking thoughts occasionally drifting through the sky, and those grotesquely shaped streetlights.

'I've been here! This is the No-Lights Road in the Deep Dream Layer!' My eyes widened. I could hardly believe I had ventured into the Deep Dream Layer so long ago.

The endless pursuit went on for a long time. The target I was chasing, the one fleeing in a frenzy, actually turned out to be a woman in a long dress.

'Xiao A?'

Everything in the memory left me astonished. 'That woman, who acts like a queen and dominates part of the dream's time, was actually chased all over the place by me?'

The Xiao A in the memory fragment also wore a Paper Doll Mask. She wore her signature multi-colored long dress, which stood out glaringly within the monochrome Deep Dream Layer.

After being caught by me, Xiao A seemed to give up all hope of survival. She collapsed to her knees, her breathing ragged, as if she had suffered a severe injury.

'That unbearably arrogant queen actually has a side like this?' I shook my head and smiled bitterly. Everything in the memory sharply contrasted with reality, yet it felt incredibly real to me.

As the scene progressed, my memory-self walked up to Xiao A, pinched her delicate chin, and tried to rip the mask off her face. She constantly shook her head and waved her hands, acting as if she would die the moment the mask was removed.

In the end, I stayed my hand. My fingertips slid off her mask, and pointing toward the outer edges of the dream, I laid out a few demands for her.

I couldn't hear the specific details; I could only see Xiao A nodding repeatedly in the image.

Everything that happened next connected perfectly with the previous memory fragment. The Dream Realm shifted, and I walked away in a certain direction. Then, with my back to Xiao A, I delivered that long speech about how wearing a mask for too long meant it could never be taken off.

The scene stopped. This piece of memory was extremely important to me.

I faintly grasped a crucial point: Xiao A and I were not enemies. Although she was a member of the Traitors, there seemed to be hidden circumstances behind it.

This memory gave me the distinct impression that Xiao A was an inside agent I had planted among the Traitors.

'Is that really the truth?' I shook my head with a wry smile. There was no way to verify this baffling memory. Besides, even if Xiao A was a pawn I'd left behind, her strength was unfathomable now. How could I possibly order her around?

A headache struck me. Sometimes, knowing more only brought more pain. 'The No-Lights Road in the Deep Dream Layer was breached. This should be the work of the Traitors. Why would they do that? What kind of role did Xiao A play in it? And is there some kind of connection between this and me?'

After pondering for a long time without reaching a conclusion, I sighed and began to view the final memory.

Compared to the first two, this memory felt the strangest to me.

The setting of this third memory was completely identical to the first!

It was in the exact same pitch-black dungeon, facing the exact same divine statue, lit by the exact same oil lamp.

I compared the height of the lamp's flame and the direction it flickered at that specific moment, then reached a startling conclusion.

The flames were perfectly identical! These two memories seemed to be repeats!

'Something isn't right!' I continued watching. The me in the memory quickly spoke that same sentence again—"Failed again..."

Not a single word had changed, but the tone was slightly different. Compared to the first time, it carried a bit more regret and remorse.

'What's going on?' The same place, the same time, not even the oil lamp's flame had changed. Why would my tone of voice in the memory be different?

Before long, more differences appeared between the two memories.

In the first memory, I had walked straight up to the statue and pulled out the mirror.

But in this memory, after saying that sentence, I slowly slumped onto the ground, looking as if I had suffered a serious injury.

The version of me in the memory took off the Paper Doll Mask. Lost in thought over something, my hands moved quickly, casually folding the mask into a little paper man.

"Heaven's will is hard to defy. What should I do?" There was no one to talk to in the pitch-black dungeon. In the scene, I was muttering to myself. After a long silence, I placed the paper man folded from the mask next to the oil lamp, pulled a book from my pocket, and began to read.

The book wasn't thick. The opening line read: The living are all ghosts, ritually buried within, cycling endlessly, eternal auspiciousness and no misfortune!

'The Burial Scripture!' It turned out I had obtained this book a very long time ago. Surprise and confusion welled up in my heart simultaneously. If I had owned it in the past, why didn't I have the slightest impression of it?

The scene in the memory seemed to stagnate. Flipping the pages of the book, the oil lamp flickering—everything in the dim dungeon felt as if it were predestined.

The memory scene was very peaceful, but looking at it, my heart found it hard to calm down. 'The Burial Scripture is said to be able to bury three past and future lives. Could it be that reincarnation truly exists in this world? Otherwise, how can these memories of mine be explained?'

Before I could figure out an answer, the scene in the memory shifted. I didn't know how long I had been reading the book, but the me in the memory seemed to have completely comprehended something. I reached out and tapped the paper man.

I chanted an incantation, but the paper man showed no reaction. The me in the scene snorted coldly, snatched it up, and held it over the oil lamp.

The moment it drew near the flame, the paper man unexpectedly revealed a crying face. It waved its paper arms, repeatedly begging for mercy.

"This method truly is miraculous." The me in the image smiled and set the paper man down, giving it a calm glance. "Through so many cycles of reincarnation, yet no one remembers me. Since you were born of me, stay here and keep me company."

My memory-self spread the Burial Scripture open, ensuring the paper man could also see its contents.

"You were folded from white paper. From now on, I will call you Mr. Paper..."

The final memory ended there. Having finished watching it, I was left with endless questions.

'Mr. Paper?' When my memory-self spoke that name, my heart gave a violent lurch. It was too familiar! I had encountered Mr. Paper in the Jianghu Cancer Research Hospital, and he had tried to kill me on more than one occasion!

'It should just be a coincidence in names. After all, one is a living person, while the other is just a paper man I folded.' I tried to comfort myself like this, but I still felt like something was wrong.

'The me in the memory possessed the Burial Scripture, and the paper man I folded was tossed right next to it. Meanwhile, the Two-Faced Buddha's subordinate, Mr. Paper, also mastered parts of the Burial Scripture. Is that just a coincidence too?' Logically speaking, the Burial Scripture had been lost to time and was incredibly precious, yet Mr. Paper had managed to secretly learn its feng shui techniques. Where did he learn them from? If he learned them from the Two-Faced Buddha, then where did the Two-Faced Buddha get the Burial Scripture?

I rubbed my temples. If I kept following this line of logic, the Two-Faced Buddha and I were bound to cross paths.

The memory scenes in my mind slowly dissipated. I tried moving my body; the cold Yin energy inside me had been swept clean, and every beat of my heart pumped fresh vitality into me. I felt like I had an endless supply of strength.

'Surviving a great disaster brings subsequent fortune. That should perfectly describe my current situation.' The Yin energy was huddled back inside my yin aperture, and my Pre-Heaven true qi had grown stronger. I punched the air, producing a faint whistling sound.

'Suolong Village is the Two-Faced Buddha's territory. I shouldn't stay here long; it's better if I leave as soon as possible.' After checking my belongings, I grabbed my suitcase and walked to the door. 'Earlier, Wang Shi said there was something outside and told me to be careful. I have no idea what "something" he was referring to.'

Wang Shi's soul body was heavily injured, so I didn't want to bother him for the time being. Gently pushing the wooden door open, I activated my Judging Eye and looked outside.