by N. Heller
"He's a Soul?" Lin Sanjiu repeated, but she soon realized this was impossible. "That's not possible. Every organ a normal human has, he has it."
Squatting down, both Soulsqn and AYU gathered near the elder brother and began to study him. Perhaps because their lives were really terrible after Puppeteer abducted them, they looked like they had not changed their human suits for a long time. The current suits they were wearing now looked loose and saggy. When they lowered their heads, their scalps and hair would slip forward.
"This is... Interesting. You're right. He isn't a Soul," Soulsqn affirmed as she glanced at the elder brother's stomach and poked at his exposed white vertebrae with her finger. The elder brother rolled his eyes as he sensed her movement. Unfortunately, he could neither speak nor make an expression, so nobody knew what was he thinking.
"What makes you think he is a Soul?"
"As Souls, we survive by overtaking bodies," Soulsqn responded without raising her head, "Hence we are very familiar with human skin. Whether or not it is a living organism, we'll know just by a single glance."
'The elder brother is not a living thing?' Lin Sanjiu thought to herself.
"But I can't turn him into a card," Lin Sanjiu refuted, "This means that he is alive. Besides, before he becomes like this, he can walk and talk just like you and me."
"I'm a pro at distinguishing human suits, but you beat me in the league of not keeping one's word," Soulsqn chimed in, "I said he is not a living organism. I didn't say he is dead."
"What do you mean?"
"He is alive, but at the same time, he isn't a living creature." Lin Sanjiu was even more perplexed. When Soulsqn saw her dumbfounded face, she continued to explain, "Take your friend as an example. If she can create a flesh that can breathe, have a heart, and a fully functional blood circulatory system but has no consciousness, no soul, no feelings… Can it be still considered a living creature?"
"Maybe not. But this fella has self-consciousness," Lin Sanjiu said doubtfully.
Soulsqn did not reply. It seemed that she had the same question as well. She lowered her head and kept muttering as she flipped the elder brother's body, "This can't be right. I can feel it. I can feel it."
The elder brother could not move. He could only watch helplessly as Soulsqn studied his body. She opened his mouth, then flipped his eyelids. When she went for his abdominal skin, she jumped up. Then, the little girl with twin ponytails turned her head to Lin Sanjiu and asked, "Did this guy have genitals before he became like this?"
"Why do you think I'd know that?"
Lin Sanjiu sighed. She then looked at the elder brother. He looked miserable after having gone through a bumpy journey. He had lost most of his internal organs, and all he was left with was an empty body. "I suppose so."
"Great!" Soulsqn's eyes glowed.
Before Lin Sanjiu could question her sudden mounted enthusiasm, the little girl lowered her head, and her cheek quivered. A hole then appeared and split her suit from her forehead asunder. By the time Lin Sanjiu came back to her senses, half of Soulsqn had already emerged from her human suit, her worm-like body crawling over the elder brother's body. There were lots of white matter running down her body, dripping mucus as she made her way on top of the elder brother.
"Jesus Christ! Was it so hard for you to give me a heads-up first?!"
This was the first time after so many years that Lin Sanjiu saw the true form of the Souls. Even though she had seen it before, she still could not help but shift her gaze away. Nevertheless, she soon forced herself to turn back to face the wriggling fat worm and asked, "What are you doing? You cannot use his skin. He's broken!"
"Let me answer in my queen's stead," answered AYU, who had been silent for the entire time, "My queen said something is inside this human suit, and the method it uses to wear the human suit is different from ours. After devouring our host's internal structure, we recreate something similar, but the recreated structure will never include reproductive organs. Simply put, it'll just be a package of skin hanging outside of the body that has no function at all."
The elder brother's lower jaw dislocated as his mouth opened to a shocking degree, splitting to both sides up to his ears. Even so, the hole was still too small for Soulsqn, who was about the size of an average human.
Looking at his eyes, Lin Sanjiu had never been so sympathetic toward an enemy before.
Since Soulsqn was too busy fitting herself into the hole, AYU continued to explain to Lin Sanjiu, "However, my queen said this guy is different. His human suit has everything a normal living human has, so we suspect that the reproductive organs should be complete too. If my queen can get in and figure out what's going on inside, it will benefit my species greatly."
By right, this should be an excellent opportunity for her to leave as Soulsqn was distracted by the elder brother, Lin Sanjiu did not run away. She sat at the side as she was equally curious about the elder brother's identity. Besides, she had nothing else to do.
'Should I go now and find the grand prize?' Lin Sanjiu asked herself, but she soon killed the thought as she knew Puppeteer must be watching her somewhere. As she combed through her situation, Lin Sanjiu found herself trapped in a dead alley. With her current combat skill, she could never best Puppeteer in a match. Even if she was able to defeat him by luck, there was still Sanduria, the Titan that Puppeteer had personally nurtured, for her to deal with. Lin Sanjiu did not have the confidence to defeat a Titan. On second thought, she had no idea what would happen to the cat doctor and the grand prize if she did not make her move soon.
However, looking on the bright side, if she could figure out the real face of the gods, then perhaps she might stand a chance against Sanduria should they end up facing each other in a duel.
Even though she had thought it all through, it was still a gruesome scene to see Soulsqn take over a human's body.
She did not go into the elder brother's body through the rear of his head the way she had been using in the past. Instead, she squeezed her body through his mouth. There were times where her girth was too large to cram in, so AYU, who had been standing quietly aside, went forward and tore the elder brother's cheeks apart, releasing a shriek that caused Lin Sanjiu to scratch her cheeks subconsciously.
The beefy worm continued to wriggle down the elder brother's body. Then, suddenly, Soulsqn stopped moving.
"What's wrong?" Lin Sanjiu jerked up and asked.
Frowning, AYU said hesitantly after a few seconds, "My queen said she's found a spot in this body that's different from other human beings."
"Where is it?"
"Under the cranium," AYU responded quickly, "My queen devoured his lower jaw and his facial bones, but she found no brain underneath the cranium. There are only bone pieces. It kind of looks like a box in there."
Lin Sanjiu's heart pounded harder the more she walked closer. However, she could not see anything other than the elder brother's bushy ebony hair.
"My queen said the box has broken, and that thing is stuck."
"Then, what are you still waiting for? We gotta open his head."
This time, Lin Sanjiu did not hesitate anymore. She called out a blade and helped AYU to cut open the elder brother's forehead.
In the next second, something unseen flew out from between the skin and the Soul.
The moment the thing entered the air, it disappeared, leaving only the whistle of the wind behind as it shot toward the sky. Lin Sanjiu quickly formed her Higher Consciousness into a net and sent it toward the thing as she leaped into the air.
In the next second, Lin Sanjiu felt like she had caught something with her Higher Consciousness, but it did not stop it from flying upward. It continued to fly at breakneck speed into the sky. Looking from below, it was as if Lin Sanjiu was flying.
Lin Sanjiu somewhat heard AYU yelling something amidst the roaring wind. Feeling that there was some extra weight on her feet, Lin Sanjiu lowered her head, and her irises shrunk into pins. Soulsqn had wrapped her tail around her
ankle while her wormy body wriggled in the air.
That thing seemed to be unaffected by the weight of two a.d.u.l.ts. It continued to fly at high speed, carrying Lin Sanjiu and Soulsqn straight into the white mist. In the blink of an eye, their figures could no longer be seen from the ground.
Chapter 564 - A Strange Place
Lin Sanjiu had no idea how long she had been flying. It felt as if an eternity had passed.
It had happened too fast, and it was already too late by the time she came to her senses. She couldn't release her grip. No person would survive a fall from such a height; not even a posthuman.
Her thoughts, her consciousness, her perceptions, and her feelings… Everything was blown away by the raging wind that assaulted her like a massive truck. Time seemed to have abandoned her as every second feeling as long as a century to her. The air had long since disappeared, and although she was shrouded in the [Defense Forcefield], she did not dare to open her eyes. She was afraid her eyelids might get stripped away by the air stream.
She curled herself into a ball. Despite Mrs. Manas' effort to reapply a new layer whenever a layer was gone, the [Defense Forcefield] thinned out fast by the friction. Her perception of the outside world dulled, and she felt like she had plunged into an endless void, surrounded by a chrysalis of never-ending torment of great flame and abyss ice. A second earlier, it was so bizarrely hot that she felt that each of her nerves were burned, the pain so unbearable that she almost passed out. Then, in the next second, it suddenly turned so cold as if she were dropped into a pool of freezing water. Her temperature plummeted, and her blood froze.
After some time that seemed like ages, Lin Sanjiu's torment finally came to an end as she felt her surroundings become quiet.
In the next second, she landed on something hard with a loud thud.
A harrowing pain then exploded inside her body, coursing through every cell she had. However, the pain was swift; it ceased the moment it appeared. It was as though her nervous system had temporarily shut down so that she wouldn't die instantly from all the pain that had been building up.
Lin Sanjiu did not know whether she was still alive or dead. Her brain felt clouded as if it were shrouded by fog. Her eyes couldn't see anything clearly, being only able to register a few vague shadows that phased in and out of her vision. She had no idea where she was now.
Overhead was a boundless dome made of a metallic material, glistening with a cold silvery gleam in the dimly lit room. Lin Sanjiu allowed her vision to travel across the dome, but she couldn't find the end no matter how far she looked.
Lin Sanjiu had not been breathing throughout the whole journey, and now she was almost at her maximum. Throwing everything into the wind, Lin Sanjiu deactivated the [Defense Forcefield] and took a deep breath.
Lin Sanjiu felt better once fresh air flowed into her lungs. Pushing herself up from the ground, the first thing she saw was Soulsqn.
Lin Sanjiu had never imagined that the Souls could become even more disgusting and ugly than they already were.
Perhaps the voyage through the sky had been lethal to not only Lin Sanjiu but Soulsqn as well. Since she did not have the [Defense Forcefield] to protect her body, the deep red outer layer of her skin was gone. Even her mucous had been reduced to only a single layer. The only thing that showed that she was alive was the twitching meshwork of interwoven white "matter" that grew all over her body.
Lin Sanjiu shuddered at the sight. She quickly averted her gaze, all the while getting a clear view of her surroundings for the first time.
Similar to what she had already seen in the corner of her eyes earlier, above her was a large dome-shaped ceiling. On the ground, there was row after row of n.a.k.e.d human bodies lined up neatly next to each other, stretching as far as her eyes could see.
Where Lin Sanjiu landed was a spot that fit her perfectly. On Lin Sanjiu's left was a well-proportionate woman; her eyes were shut tight, and her c.h.e.s.t rose and fell slowly as she breathed. To Lin Sanjiu's right was an equally unconscious man in his birthday suit. His face was serene, as if he was having a good dream in his sleep.
Lin Sanjiu couldn't tell the exact number of human bodies in the hall, as the hall was too large. She could barely see the two greyish metal plates at the two ends of the hall that connected to the dome above. Upon closer inspection, she realized that there were some empty spots here and there amongst the rows, just like the one she had fallen into.
'Where am I…? Wasn't I in the air just now?'
Lin Sanjiu felt a little punch-drunk, and her thoughts couldn't connect. She tottered for a moment before realizing that the thing she caught using her Higher Consciousness was gone. Her heart skipped a beat, but she soon relieved herself of the thought. 'That thing must have escaped when my concentration slipped and I lost control of my Higher Consciousness…'
Slowly, she got up to her feet. She felt as though she were an elephant and her legs were made of two pieces of thin ice; her enormous weight was crushing her legs, and she was on the verge of falling at any moment.
After walking for two steps, Lin Sanjiu felt that something was amiss. She held her breath and pricked up her ears. Although there were thousands of people in this spacious hall, she found that there was only one breathing sound.
Their aspiration was in sync, breathing in and out at the same pace. The only exception was the one coming out of Lin Sanjiu's nostrils.
She glanced at the people on the floor suspiciously as she continued to walk towards the edge of the hall. After nearly half an hour, she finally came close to the wall.
The wall was riddled with holes. Column after column of round holes were arranged systematically across the entire surface. Each of them was about the size of a human head and was immensely deep. Lin Sanjiu poked her head in and tried to look inside, but she could see nothing but the smooth metallic interior and the thick blackness at the end.
She knocked on the wall gently and sighed inside her heart.
The wall was made of a kind of metal that Lin Sanjiu had never seen before. She was sure that even a world like the Garden of Eden would not be able to create such material. It had the cold and smooth attribute of metal, but on the inside, it was extraordinarily spongy and soft, seeming to be able to absorb a lot of impacts.
As Lin Sanjiu was considering whether or not to blast it open, she heard a noise from behind.
'Has Soulsqn awakened?' She turned around, but since she was too far away, she couldn't see anything aside from the human bodies on the floor. She did not want to go back, so she yelled loudly, "Soulsqn? Is that you?"
Her voice created a vibration that lasted for about half a second across the hall, shattering the silence.
However, Soulsqn did not reply to her.
A terrible hunch had been stirring within her the moment she first opened her eyes. She looked at the wall, and although it had a lot of holes, none of them looked like an exit to her. After a short rumination, she then decided to go back to Soulsqn. 'Although Soulsqn is not one of my kind, she's the only familiar face—well, if that thing can even be considered her face—I see in this strange place.'
Halfway through her journey, Lin Sanjiu suddenly realized something.
Soulsqn had just suffered severe injuries. Since there were so many human bodies lying around, it was like a wardrobe specially built for her.
'She must be "wearing" a human again!'
Lin Sanjiu's eyes blazed with anger at the thought.
As she hastened her pace, Lin Sanjiu began to think about the conjecture she'd had about these human bodies. 'No matter what these gods are, and what that invisible thing inside the elder brother's body was, at the very least, these people are real living humans. They were just brought here by the "gods" and used by the "gods" as their vessels!'
Lin Sanjiu couldn't stand to see Soulsqn overtaking an innocent person's body. She yelled, "Hey, Soulsqn, can you hear me? Don't take their skin. Maybe there's a corpse somewhere around here—"
; But Lin Sanjiu was too late. The moment she arrived, she saw a n.a.k.e.d woman getting up from the floor. Lin Sanjiu stopped and hissed, "...Couldn't you wait a little longer?"
The woman turned and looked at her.
"Sorry, what did you say?" Surprisingly, her voice was husky and soft, unlike Soulsqn's sharp and effeminate voice.
Before Lin Sanjiu could process what was going on, more human bodies got up. In an instance, ten or a dozen people had gotten up from the floor.
"I'm right here." Soulsqn's sharp voice rang out from the other side. Lin Sanjiu turned her head in that direction, only to see Soulsqn being pinned down on the ground. There was a man sitting on top of her.
Chapter 565 - Follow After The Footsteps Of Soulsqn
Soulsqn had lost count of how many years she had lived to this day.
For as long as she could remember, she had always been the queen of the Souls. Not only did her ability dwarf the other Souls', but she was also the only one of her kind that had formed gender identity. She was the hope of her species. With her "reality," there were no battles that she could not triumph over. Together, she and her species had overtaken many humans, and there was almost no force that could threaten them...
That was until she met Lin Sanjiu. Then, her smooth-sailing days finally came to an end.
Whenever Soulsqn thought that the worst was over, there would be an even more severe treatment waiting for her ahead. This time, she lost nearly half of her body. She had become so weak that she couldn't break herself free when she was pinned down on the ground, a feat she could have easily achieved when she was in her prime.
The tall woman winced at her, her brow locking in a disgusting crease. "...Why are you so useless?"
Soulsqn g.r.o.a.n.e.d in fury, but it did nothing to Lin Sanjiu. She turned away from the worm and looked warily at the people that were getting up. She asked, "Who are you?"
She found that each of them had a different appearance. Hearing her question, all of them turned their heads in unison and looked at her, but none of them responded to her question.