Doomsday Wonderland c1-855

by N. Heller

  "Is he somebody you know?"

  Puppeteer squinted his eyes and looked at the figure. Then he suddenly scoffed, "That's a Veda."

  Lin Sanjiu halted in her steps midway. She looked to and fro between Puppeteer and her grand prize as she thought, 'He's right. How did the grand prize come here?'

  "Veda?"

  Perhaps the grand prize had overheard their conversation, as he tilted his head and asked, "Sis? What's going on here?"

  "How did you get here?" Lin Sanjiu took a step back as she became suspicious. 'If this grand prize is another creation of the Veda, then that's bad.' Her temple pulsed as she scanned the area. To her relief, she did not see any suspicious activity around the hall.

  "Sis?" piped up the grand prize again as he walked towards them. There was a quizzical expression on his face, and he sounded hurt by Lin Sanjiu's attitude. "I don't know… Where is this place?"

  "Stay right where you are," Puppeteer snarled in a cold, commanding voice. He waved his right arm, and five people on the floor suddenly opened their eyes, following behind him obediently.

  "Don't!" Lin Sanjiu yelled. She looked around again, and implored the grand prize, "Gra-Graham, tell me first. How did you get in here?"

  The grand prize stopped in stunned silence. After a few seconds, he began to speak. "I… I don't know."

  Lin Sanjiu's brows furrowed in a tight knot.

  Apparently, the answer was not enough to convince Puppeteer and Soulsqn. Both of them snorted, and before Lin Sanjiu could say anything, more puppets rose from the floor. The human bodies sat up one by one all the way up to the grand prize like a row of dominoes in reverse. Then, a man and a woman next to the grand prize grabbed him by his calves.

  "What's this?" The grand prize was startled as he tried to wrench himself free from their grip but to no avail. Horrified, he turned to Lin Sanjiu and hollered, "Sis!"

  "Impressive as always, Lord Puppeteer," complimented Soulsqn, who was strolling around the hall with her desiccated body to find herself a suitable skin. More and more human bodies stood up. They all marched towards the grand prize, gathering around him like a human wall as they waited for Puppeteer's command to strike.

  "Didn't I say not to do anything yet?" Lin Sanjiu screamed while she rushed to her grand prize. "Release him first!"

  "I guess your stupid Messiah complex is getting over your head again," Puppeteer sneered as half of his face twisted in disgust. He waved his hand, but instead of releasing the grand prize, he turned more human bodies into his puppets. Soulsqn joined the fray, adding a snarky remark of her own, "Alas, why don't you just come back over here, my dear? You have no idea whether he's your real friend, or if he's just another knock-off created by the Veda. If he truly is an imposter, then what you're doing now is no different than walking into your own grave. When that happens, I wonder if we should save you or not!"

  Soulsqn's words struck Lin Sanjiu's head like a zap of lightning, and her eyes lit up. She rushed to the grand prize's side and yelled to Puppeteer and Soulsqn in the distance, "He isn't a Veda!"

  Soulsqn was flipping and checking a young female body as if she was deciding whether or not to wear her as her skin. When she heard what Lin Sanjiu said, she questioned, "How do you know he isn't?"

  "Have you forgotten that the Veda need to fully interpret a person's information before they can clone a person?" Lin Sanjiu shouted in a hurry. She wondered why she did not think of that earlier. "They've never met Gra… My friend, so even if they learned of his existence through my memories, there's no way they could create such a life-like replicate!"

  "Feeling very proud of yourself right now, aren't you? You trusted your friend without thinking of the consequences even though you know very well that there might be a chance that this is another trap Veda has set up. You're hopeless," Puppeteer spoke in a slow and mocking tone. He stood with his arms crossed over his c.h.e.s.t, looking supremely confident. "If you have the time to lecture us about what we should do and what we should not do, why don't you turn around and take a good look at your so-called 'friend'?"

  Stunned by his words, Lin Sanjiu slowly turned her head, and the man next to her followed suit. His long hair swayed as he spun to face her. Then, as her gaze met that of her grand prize, the first thing that came into her view was the grand prize's delicate and fair complexion. There was a bewildered expression resting on his face. His eyes were rimmed red, and his voice teetered on the edge of crying. "S—sis?"

  'Why? There's nothing wrong with my grand prize. What does he want me to see?'

  Just when Lin Sanjiu was about to voice her concern, the hair on her back bristled as she finally saw the light of what Puppeteer wanted her to see. However, she was still too late. Earlier on, she was so focused on saving her grand prize that she lost track of the things that were happening around her. By the time she came to her senses, she was surrounded by Puppeteer's puppets.

  She had lost her best chance to retaliate, and she had fallen into a passive position. No sooner had she rescued her grand prize from the clutches of a puppet than both of them were swamped with another horde of incoming puppets. For Lin Sanjiu, human wave tactics were nothing but numbers. She could effortlessly lay waste to as many puppets as she wanted.

  However, the situation differed for the grand prize. He was so unbearably weak that he could only scream helplessly when he got caught by a puppet every time Lin Sanjiu took her eyes off him, leaving the latter no other choice but to give up the opening she had made and go back to save him. All of this happened in the time span of only hundreds of milliseconds. Whenever they looked ahead again, they would always be welcomed by a greater wave of puppets that piled up to the height of the wall.

  Lin Sanjiu was both surprised and a little anxious, but at the same time, she felt weird about Puppeteer's actions. She had no idea whether he had shifted sides, or if this was yet another reality created by the Veda.

  "Soulsqn!" Lin Sanjiu shouted aloud as she braced herself against the relentless onslaught of the puppets. She waited for a long while but did not receive any response from the flesh worm. She thought for a moment, and understanding dawned upon her. The Veda did not get to analyze Soulsqn's information, so the flesh worm must be the real Soulsqn. If this Puppeteer were created by the Veda, then he would have included Soulsqn as his attack target as well. Then, the flesh worm would never appear so calm going against Puppeteer. Without a doubt, Soulsqn must have sided with Puppeteer to backstab her.

  "Stay close!" Lin Sanjiu yelled as she decided to throw everything to the wind. She could not use [A Twinkle In The Sky], so she summoned her Tornado Whip instead. She conjured up a tornado and flung all the puppets out of her way. Grabbing the grand prize's arm, she darted straight towards Puppeteer as she cursed aloud, "Puppeteer, you bastard!"

  She crashed into an unseen barrier. Her eyes shifted to black, and for a moment, she only saw stars.

  Covering her forehead with her hand, Lin Sanjiu took a few deep breaths to chase away the throbbing pain. She blinked her eyes hard. Then she saw Puppeteer walking towards her along with a young lady.

  The shape of the "young lady" seemed to be pretty unstable and dynamic, as there were bumps here and there below her skin. It looked as if it were a linen bag containing a struggling animal. Lin Sanjiu took a glance at her before shifting her gaze towards the tall man in front of her. "What do you want from me?"

  "I'm getting sick of you." Half of Puppeteer's face grimaced as he grinned coldly. "Now, open your eyes and look closely. Is he really your friend?"

  Chapter 597 - The Smarty Amongst The Group Is...

  Lin Sanjiu's brain was a muddled mess.

  She inhaled deeply, steeled herself, and threw a punch at the invisible barrier. A deep red color instantly blossomed around the skin on her finger joints along with a numbing sensation, but she paid it no mind. She locked her gaze on Puppeteer, who was standing a stone's throw away from her, and asked in a throaty voice, "Are you mad?"

  Puppeteer
raised one of his brows and pointed his finger at the grand prize next to her. "Are you blind?"

  "What exactly do you want me to see? This is how he looks. Nothing has changed!" Lin Sanjiu took another deep breath. "If you say he's a Veda, then you've got to prove it!"

  Puppeteer looked into Lin Sanjiu's eyes, and his pale cheeks flushed red. At that moment, the expression on his face was beyond description. He looked as if Lin Sanjiu was performing a sword-swallowing trick while piggy-riding on top of a monkey in front of him.

  After a short while, he began talking again, but he sounded slightly quizzical, "Is this how he looks?"

  "Sis, I don't know who the hell this Veda is," the grand prize chimed in, "I was brought here by some weird guy in the Salvation of God."

  Lin Sanjiu turned to her grand prize and asked, "A weird guy? How does he look like?"

  In reality, she still expressed reservations about his identity. However, the Veda had told her that the data constitution of humans or any sentient creatures with human-level intelligence was complicated. If they did not fully interpret or possess their information in advance, there was no way they could code and create a replica of such a being. Hence, in a situation where she did not even know about the location of her grand prize, what were the chances that they could locate him from the Salvation Of God in merely a few hours and obtain his information? This had nothing to do with their nigh-omnipotent ability. It was just impossible.

  Ji Shanqing glanced at Puppeteer warily. He thought for a while and whispered to Lin Sanjiu, "Sis, is he the reason you called me Graham?"

  Lin Sanjiu came to a momentary pause when she heard the question without rhyme or reason. However, she soon saw the light of why he would ask this question.

  She had nearly forgotten that the grand prize had seen Puppeteer before!

  In the last round of the Starry Carnival Amus.e.m.e.nt Park, Ji Shanqing had been observing every posthuman in the mirror house, including Puppeteer. The grand prize was well aware of Puppeteer's goal for participating in the amus.e.m.e.nt park. Thus, when Lin Sanjiu called him by the other name, he immediately understood everything.

  "There was an expressionless man with two round eyes who kept following me around." The grand prize sighed. "I thought I'd gotten rid of him, but never did I expect that he could control gods. The last memory I have is of a god catching me, and then the moment I came back to my senses, I was already here."

  'So, is he the real grand prize?'

  Lin Sanjiu was confused again. Just when she was tangled in her chaotic thoughts, a sharp voice pierced through the invisible barrier and wafted into her ears, "Lord Puppeteer, the Veda have made us look like fools. Don't you think we should return the favor and teach them a lesson?"

  Soulsqn had chosen a young girl in her twenties as her skin pouch in the end. She fixed her hair into two ponytails as she offered Lin Sanjiu a toothy grin.

  Watching her terrifying grin, Lin Sanjiu wondered why she did not kill Soulsqn when she had the chance.

  She could face the music of mistaking the Veda for her Grand Prize, but not otherwise.

  "I'd be glad to do so." Puppeteer took two steps back from the barrier, tilted his head, and enjoyed watching Lin Sanjiu blow her fuse. With a satisfied smile plastered on his face, he said in a soft murmur, "I have to think of a way to kill this Veda."

  "With all due respect, Lord Puppeteer, since the Veda have attained your information, I'm afraid you can't do that." It seemed that Soulsqn had recovered much of her stamina after wearing a skin pouch, as her voice became firmer. "Why don't you leave the job to me?"

  Were it not for the barrier, Lin Sanjiu would surely have shredded Soulsqn into a million pieces with her hands. Her eyes were ablaze with fury, but the flesh worm ignored her. She paid her no mind and continued to ask Puppeteer, "If you don't mind me asking, is this barrier sturdy enough to contain her? You know, she's a barbarian with brutal strength. I fear she'll catch me the moment I touch him."

  Lin Sanjiu smashed the barrier hard when the two people left her hanging on the sidelines again. She turned around to see that Ji Shanqing had a gloomy expression as well. He scratched his head in frustration as he said, "Sis, what the hell is this Veda that you all keep mentioning? You have to tell me everything about the Veda so that I can prove my innocence…"

  Before the grand prize could finish his sentence, Lin Sanjiu saw a shadow zoom past the barrier next to him. She had not dropped her guard the entire time; thus, she reacted fast. She pulled the grand prize towards her with great force, causing him to smack into the barrier behind her with a loud thud.

  Lin Sanjiu did not check on her grand prize but looked around warily instead. When she saw the thing outside, she froze.

  "What… What are you doing?" Lin Sanjiu asked blankly. She shifted her gaze and saw that Puppeteer was equally as stunned as she was.

  "Didn't you just wear a skin?" he asked in a low, dangerous voice.

  The scene that was unfolding in front of them was one that was too gory to be unseen.

  Her scalp and the skin on her face, as well as her neck, had piled together and slid backward. A fully restored, grub-like, burgundy creature then emerged from the opening. There was a network of white veins coiling around its body, spitting mucus with every pulse. None of them knew why Soulsqn would suddenly extend herself out of her skin pouch.

  However, that was not the worst part. Soulsqn had her "head" dug deep inside the mouth of another human body nearby, leaving only her deep red, slimy, grubby body outside in the air. The person's mouth, face, and head had ballooned up to a shocking degree. His skin had ripped and was dripping with blood. It seemed like a playback of when she had tried to get into the elder brother's head.

  The deeper Soulsqn went, the worse the body became.

  There was a limitation to the human skin's tensile strength. The skin had stretched to a certain point that after the skull was crushed, it began to split apart, exposing the flesh beneath. Puppeteer could not bear to continue watching anymore. His expression turned ugly when Soulsqn ignored him after he yelled a few times for her to stop whatever she was doing. Just as he strode forward towards the flesh worm, she came out.

  Soulsqn opened her multi-layered mandible and said, "Okay, it's done!"

  Both Puppeteer and Lin Sanjiu were stunned.

  'Done? What is done?'

  Soulsqn used her two hands, which were still inside the skin pouch, to grab the skin that piled on her back. Then, she threw the skin back onto herself as if she was putting on a hoodie. There was a gruesomely huge scar running from her chin to her neck.

  After Soulsqn had put on the skin pouch, she looked at the two, and she seemed even more stunned than they were. "What are you two standing there for? Chop-chop and get the job done!"

  Pressing herself against the barrier, Lin Sanjiu yelled out a question, "What did you do? What do you mean by getting the job done?"

  Soulsqn was able to display a shocked expression even though she was not accustomed to her new skin. She hummed and hawed for a long time before it came as a distinct surprise to her that Lin Sanjiu and Puppeteer did not know what she was doing. "Oh, my good Lord. Don't tell me that you guys haven't figured it out yet?"

  "Quit hitting around the bush and get to the point!"

  Soulsqn had never imagined that amongst the three, she would be the only one who saw through the entire situation. She sat on the ground as her eyes flitted back and forth between Lin Sanjiu and Puppeteer. Then, the next sentence that came out of her mouth shocked both of them to the core. "Don't tell me that both of you think this guy here is a Veda? No way! Didn't we all escape from the same place? Whatever I've experienced, you guys should've gone through it too."

  Lin Sanjiu stole a glance at her grand prize and heaved out a long sigh of relief. Although she did not know how Soulsqn was so confident that Ji Shanqing was not a Veda, things should be easier as long as they came to a conclusion. When she thought about this, she quickly asked, "How ca
n you tell that he isn't a Veda?"

  "Tell?" Soulsqn was taken aback by her question. She soon recomposed herself and replied matter-of-factly, "This is so simple. I don't see any reason behind your confusion. How can he be a Veda if he's a creation of the Veda? If I plant an apple, does that make me an apple?"

  Chapter 598 - The Veracity Of The Queen Witch

  The hall fell silent abruptly as if a television had suddenly been switched off. All of them stood in a trance. Their mouths were agape. Nobody spoke.

  If there's a word to describe the atmosphere, that would be "confused".

  A bit taken aback by their reaction, Soulsqn lowered her voice and stammered a question, "What, what's wrong? Did I say something wrong? Why do you just kept silent?"

  It was at this moment that Lin Sanjiu regained her senses.

  She moved away from her grand prize. She thought she would hit the barrier, but unbeknownst to her, Puppeteer had switched the barrier off, so she went straight out of it. Ji Shanqing became perturbed when he saw that Lin Sanjiu had abandoned him. He shouted, "Sis!" and went after her.

  However, he slammed into an invisible object face first when he took a step forward. After Lin Sanjiu was released, another barrier had been enacted to separate the grand prize from them.

  Lin Sanjiu spun her head around and met gazes with Puppeteer. He sneered coldly as he averted his gaze from her.

  "What is going on?" Ji Shanqing's face turned scarlet. He smacked the barrier as he yelled as hard as he could, "I don't know what or who the hell is a Veda!"

  Lin Sanjiu stared blankly at the face she was so familiar with. He looked so real, whether it was the wrinkles in between his brows, the pinkish blush on his cheeks, or the veins that were phasing through the skin on the back of his hand and his neck… She could not believe that he was not her grand prize.

  "Explain. Start from the beginning," Puppeteer glared at Soulsqn and spoke to her in a commanding tone.