Fantasy Clock～Dream Ruler～

In the dark midnight, the last lights of the neighborhood seen from the window go dark, announcing the true end of the day.

Su Huilin, who finished her bath early, stroked her long hair and stared at the scenery outside the window. Although she promised her father to go to bed when her hair was dry, she naturally couldn't feel sleepy at all. Su Huilin turned her head in frustration, and glanced at the message she sent to Su Ruoyang on the phone screen, but there was still no reply.

It is rare for Su Luoyang not to reply to messages, which is why she is so uneasy.

"It's getting late, you go to bed first! I'll be here and wait for Su Ruoyang to come back!"

Su Huilin couldn't help trembling when she heard this, her gaze shifted from the phone screen to the approaching father, and she bit her lower lip unwillingly.

"I want to wait for him for a while..."

"Oh, you have class tomorrow, go to bed early! When that brat comes back, Dad, I will teach him a good lesson for you!"

"What... so self-proclaimed father, you are Su Luoyang's father, right~ You speak as if..."

It seems that when the old father sees his daughter being taken away by his son-in-law, he is gearing up to teach his son-in-law a lesson. Realizing that what she said next was not right, Su Huilin paused involuntarily, with a somewhat embarrassed look on her face.

"Looks like... what? Rin, don't stop talking halfway!!"

At this moment, a sudden ringing of the bell diverted the attention of the two of them. Dad froze for a moment, took out his phone, and muttered that the brat finally called.

But when he saw the name of the caller on the screen, the smile in his eyes suddenly disappeared.

"I'm going out to answer the phone."

After he forced a smile to Su Huilin and dropped these words, he ignored Su Huilin's slightly concerned gaze and pushed the door to the outdoors, and answered the phone while pushing the door behind him.

A sarcastic voice came from the other end.

"I said, Su Guokai, how do you live and lose your son? Huh?"

The voice from the other end of the phone really chilled Su Guokai's heart. He moved the phone away from his ear, took another careful look at the name displayed on the screen, and put the phone to his ear again.

"What exactly do you want?" Su Guokai raised his hand to his waist irritably, his eyes were searching for something restlessly, "Didn't I say in Taoyuan that day that I would no longer be a researcher of the Core Research Association, from now on you Do I not interfere with each other?! Why do you involve my son?"

"Well, well~ don't be so excited~ I'm not interested in your son. Could it be that whoever called you was the one who abducted your son?"

Su Guokai pushed back the hair on his forehead vigorously, and saw Su Huilin peeping at the window at a glance. He tried his best to smile at Su Huilin, and motioned her to go to sleep quickly. Seeing Su Huilin Rin retracted her head before slowly turning around, and her tone changed suddenly.

"I'll just ask you something—what on earth do you want?"

"I said calm down. We did agree before that we should not interfere with each other from now on, but now you accidentally lost your son, and I also have something that was accidentally taken away. Now we have a reason to work together oh~」

＊＊＊

The psychedelic space is trying to describe the abstract word "nothingness" in front of it. It seems that the consciousness does not belong to this body, but it takes my hand and leads me through this long, long tunnel.

No one is here. I don't know if I'm awake or asleep. A dazzling round mouth appeared, constantly opening, shrinking, opening, and shrinking again... I was slowly approaching there, and in the blink of an eye, my whole body convulsed, and my hair stood on end for a moment, wanting to open my eyes. Hugging his body with his arms, his strong desire turned the illusion in front of him into turbidity.

I snapped my eyes open, realizing that I, who had been dreaming, froze again. There was only darkness, coldness, and silence all around.

I realized that I was lying on a hard plank bed so hard that my back resisted my brain.

where is this I question myself. Ah, I remembered, I remember that I am now imprisoned in the Core Research Association - oh, it's so cold, it's obviously summer...why?

Realizing that the seasons on Rongtan Street and this world seem to be incompatible, I couldn't help shivering, and finally sat on the edge of the bed. It was too late to dream and woke up because of the abnormal temperature. Observing this dark room, I really have a sense of fear that I want to escape now.

Why! I obviously didn't do anything, why was I locked up in this kind of place? That's weird...it's not normal!

There was a "click" sound from the door, and then the chain hit the iron sensor door. The girl leaned against the door behind her, hiding the sadness that flashed across her face for a moment, and then revealed a gentle smile.

"I woke up so soon~ Is it too cold for you in the room?"

The black cat's voice sounded weak, she tilted her head, seemed to notice my strange mood, and walked towards me quickly.

"You... have you been locked up here all this time?"

"Su Ruoyang, I think what you want to ask is ~ 'How can you live in such a ghostly place for seven years?' Am I right?"

I didn't know how to respond for a while, so I had to endure the trembling in my body and stare blankly at the black cat.

"At the beginning~ I was really cold and couldn't sleep...plus, the place where I lived used to have a lot of lights on~ I didn't fall asleep for several days. But then I fell asleep because I was so sleepy. If you feel it carefully , the moonlight outside will actually shine in here, and the heating from the corridor will also leak into the room. So it’s not so cold and dark.”

Speaking of this, the sadness that was suspected to be an illusion just now flashed in her eyes again. The temperature on his body seemed to be much colder because of this, as if the blood flowing in the blood vessels was not blood but mercury.

"I lived here to escape. A lie may not be exposed, because it is a lie that is exposed. Today, another sentence I said became a lie."

Her eyes were blurred and she finished speaking these inexplicable words that made my chest throbbing. Under my scorching gaze, the black cat gently hugged me in its arms. At this moment, I touched the warm temperature of the black cat's body, and my heart was also wrapped in a warm warmth, and the ice sticking to my chest melted and flowed nearby.

"Are you feeling better~huh?"

The black cat's teasing words made me feel unnatural all over, not to mention that I just found my head against her soft chest... This made me break away from her embrace quickly, I Rubbing his hot cheeks, he glanced aside.

"Are you not cold now? Do you want my sister to warm your bed for you~"

"I don't want it! Hmm...but..."

The black cat with a soft expression in front of me made me suddenly have a strange thought. This time it was my turn to hold the black cat gently in my arms. The black cat didn't seem to expect me to do this, her body trembled slightly, and then she slowly put her arms on my back, Accepted my offer tenderly.

But just as we were leaning against each other to keep warm, the induction door was roughly pushed open. A young man with a tie that should hang naturally drooping on his shoulder strangely leaned against the door, casually scratched his ear with one hand, and pointed at me without looking at it with the other.

"The professor has something to do with you kid, come out for me."

As he spoke, he stared at his little finger, then flicked the dust off with his thumbnail.

Seeing a few men outside the door staring at this side, I lost the idea of ​​resistance, let go of the black cat and walked towards the door. The black cat lightly pressed the back of my hand, and I glanced back at her. Her eyes clearly indicated that it was no good for my professor to find me, and reminded me to be careful. But soon her eyes turned to the door again, showing a slightly ironic smile.

"Strange ~ why didn't you wear masks this time? Aren't you worried that there will be poisonous gas poisoning you to death?"

"Tch... this damn witch..." the young man muttered to himself, pushed me aside, and closed the induction door heavily. The temperature in the corridor was much higher than in the room, but there was a deadly sense of oppression staring behind him.

"Go forward and stop by the elevator shaft."

Hearing the young man's cold order, I clenched my fist tightly and took heavy steps forward, and immediately the steps behind me overwhelmed my footsteps, as if trying to control my heartbeat. I was pushed all the way to the second floor of the facility, and finally arrived at the place where the professor said he was waiting to see me. The room was still empty, and the "white" was dazzling.

"The silent midnight is often the time of human inspiration. I am the same...I promise you that I will always choose to experiment in the middle of the night. It gives me a wonderful feeling, like everything is in my hands , just wait for the sudden inspiration in your head to come to you.”

"What does that have to do with you calling me here? No...what I want to ask is, are you planning to keep me here forever."

Obviously, I didn't expect that I would directly ask the questions that all the people who have just been imprisoned here want to ask. The professor held his arms in the air for a long time, and then slowly lowered his hands and turned to me.

"You are my honored guest. To tell you the truth, I would rather keep you here for the rest of my life and treat you well. I know that you are not used to it when you first come here, but I also believe that you will like our hospitality. It’s the way of the guest. No, I’m going to give you our supreme hospitality right now!”

The professor put his hands in front of his right, and clapped his hands gracefully and enthusiastically. I suddenly felt that someone was roughly pushing me down, and I slammed into the chair that appeared behind me at some point. My arms were involuntarily controlled. Although I kicked my legs desperately and resisted awkwardly, the rope wrapped around my body more firmly and tied me to the chair.

No matter how hard I struggled with my feet, I would only fall back and fall to the ground, so I couldn't get up by myself, and was surrounded by people around me.

"Su Luoyang, have you heard the story of Sleeping Beauty? You must have heard it. I also need you to fall asleep like Sleeping Beauty now, just like the ending where the 12 distinguished guests arrived here-you can no longer wake up from the dream. Wake up in a dream, of course, the prince in the fairy tale will not appear, no one will wake you up with a kiss."

"Why!? Why did you do this to me?"

Obviously, I came here to solve the nightmare of the world, but everything turned into my nightmare.

I knew that I couldn't break free from the rope, but I was dominated by that inexplicable sense of fear. I knew it was useless but I struggled with all my might, screaming in pain. Chatter in the dream world, I heard that he was also trapped in the dream, and he couldn't wake up no matter what. On the other side of reality, he may be surrounded by countless facilities, and he shows no sign of waking up.

Now I will reach the ending like him. I couldn't bear to be told this ridiculous fact.

"Because the beloved president repented~ I didn't expect it, I didn't expect you to have such a fate with us."

"Repent? Who is the president?! I don't know you at all!"

For some reason, a strange and pervasive smile appeared on the professor's face. He no longer intends to continue talking with me, and pushed a device that is as tall as a person to my side, rubbing it up and down gently like stroking his newborn child, his eyes are full of chilling love. But in the next second, he grabbed the headset-like device heavily and put it on my head.

My head throbbed for some reason, as if this scene in front of me was not my first experience, and strange memories were buzzing in my ears. I let out a howl from the depths of my throat in pain, as if I was roaring with the posture of shouting my throat dumb. At the same time, the body resisted vigorously, trying to shake off the device on the head,

"Oh, don't move around. If I break my "Dream Image Recording System", I will be very distressed." The professor with violent veins raised a fist and hit me in the abdomen. This force stopped the riot in the body, and the buzzing memories dissipated in an instant, as if I couldn't find it no matter how hard I searched. "Ah, although it can't do the best in spying on dreams, at most it's a beta version, but it has other unexpected effects~ To make it truly a finished product, I think you probably That’s where it breaks through.”

There was a "click" sound of pressing the button, and a strange electric current suddenly flooded the whole body from above like a flood. A strong spasm overwhelmed me in no time.

"Don't worry so much, don't worry! Because there will be someone to accompany you, I can't leave the honored guest alone."

All I can think about in my mind is that I have to break free from the ropes that get in the way, and take off this damn device on my head, but even I feel that the strength of the struggle seems to be squeezed out bit by bit, leaving only a pair of playful eyes in my vision.

At the moment when my consciousness was about to collapse, I heard the professor's voice crowding out all other sounds into my mind.

"For the success of the great experiment one day, please make sacrifices—my honored guest."

I don't know how long it took, when the darkness that filled my field of vision gradually brightened, I opened my eyes, and I was standing at the door of Xinghai Tavern with Xiao Lulu. Realizing that time was flowing again in a dream, Xue Xueer came to reality through the entrance, while Xiao Lulu and I were left here, I quickly reached out and stopped the flowing time, and finally pushed Xiao Lulu returned to the alley. Looking at the man with dark green pupils behind him in a falling posture, I frowned and remembered everything that happened in reality.

Suddenly, it seemed as if all the motivation in my body had been drained, I took a few steps back, turned around, stepped forward and ran desperately. Obviously no one was chasing me, but my chaotic and helpless brain gave me this command, and my legs moved involuntarily. Realizing that I would never wake up again like Chart, I screamed in pain, the time around me caught up with my speed, and the people on the street began to wander aimlessly. I don't even know where I'm running to.

The hustle and bustle was gradually dispersed by the remote and silent alley, and I suddenly bumped into someone hard, and my body was pushed back heavily to the ground. I rubbed the back of my head where the pain was coming from, and sat up in a daze. I should perhaps be thankful to this unexpected visitor for my brain to finally stop its desperate daydreams.

That person seemed to be holding a box of fruit before, but I knocked him down and fell to the ground. As a result, the ground was full of apples that were rolling down. I raised my gaze slightly, and I couldn't help but startled when I saw the other person's face. It was not someone I had never seen before. When I jumped off the Dominator clock for the first time, the first person I saw was this person with a scar on his face. The man with the obvious scar.

"Even though the king's election is going on now, can you stop running around in the alley all the time... Really..."

The scarred man put his palms on his knees and stood up slowly, but I still stayed where I was a little bit lost. Probably noticing that something was wrong with me, he squatted down again, looked at me inexplicably, and muttered to himself, "So it's already this time? That's it", and then showed a look of enlightenment.

"Come in and sit for a while."

He stretched out his generous palm towards me. I was stunned for a long time, and I didn't know if it was his pure eyes that infected me... Finally, I weakly held his palm and followed him into the pawn shop he ran in this town.

A cup of bitter tea, a creaky wooden chair. A pawn shop that no one cares about... There is a leisurely atmosphere everywhere, as if the house itself wants to drive away all the hustle and bustle around it, leaving the only pure land in the cracks of the dream. I warmed myself with the scalding cup of tea in the cup, and the manager of the pawnshop walked into the counter and let out a sigh of relief on the palm of his hand.

"Are you feeling better? You just looked like you just came back from a funeral."

The store manager sat across from him with a relaxed face, lifted the teacup in front of him casually, and took a sip with the rising steam.

"The temperature is just right, and it doesn't taste like loose tea. How about you?"

"I...I'm not a tea drinker... I usually just drink a cup of coffee in the morning to relieve sleepiness..."

He gently put down the teacup, facing the door of the store, his eyes drifted back and forth from right to left and then left to back again, trying to take in all the scenery on the street.

"I didn't like drinking tea before... coffee hurts my stomach too, so I don't touch it."

I'm not interested in the topic he raised, but my eyes followed him intentionally or unintentionally. Probably because of the vicissitudes of the old man's aura that he showed in every gesture, instead of his thug-like appearance, he adjusted it into a unique charm, which made me have such a translation. .

"By the way, you just said 'this time has come'... What do you mean by that?"

"Actually, I don't know...Although it's not appropriate to tell you, I don't have anyone else to talk to. I don't know when my memory has become blurred. Some things can be easily remembered , Some things can’t be remembered no matter how hard you try. Sometimes it may be that the previous memory suddenly awakens, and I will say something that I don’t understand. So I don’t know.”

"It's much more serious than mine..." I said to myself, he didn't seem to care what I just said.

"Like today when I saw you on the street, there was a sentence in my head that I wanted to say to you..."

He seemed to be suppressing some strong emotion and clenched his fists. Seeing this, I gently put down the clenched teacup.

"What...?"

As soon as the words fell, the surrounding scene became blurred, as if I was thrown into the sea without knowing it, and when I was approaching the bottom of the sea, I looked up at the sky through the vast sea.

"I hope you can wake up from your dream... I should wake up too, everyone who fell into a deep sleep and couldn't wake up should wake up."

The sound seemed to be far away, and my back hit the gravel on the bottom of the sea heavily. This impact instantly turned the blurred surroundings into a void of darkness.

"Myths are dreams shared by everyone in the world, and dreams are private myths. Sometimes we can't control our dreams... Even if we can, sometimes we can't distinguish between reality and delusion after a long journey in the dream world. But even That’s right, we still need reality and delusion, and we can’t have one without the other.”

The store manager's words were like an electric drill slamming open the skull, stirring wantonly in the brain, and the missing memories were washed away with the violent storm of consciousness.

I vaguely remember hearing these words for the first time, but it sounded stranger than any other. Then, in the blink of an eye, I stood in what seemed to be a hospital. In front of me was the door of a ward, and on both sides were long corridors that extended to the end of an unreachable deep place. I seem to be standing in the middle of this long corridor, no matter which way I run, the distance from the ends on both sides will still be the same.

"That's right, like this... Keep shaking violently... Only then can you wake up from the dream."

"Who the hell are you? Here...where is it?"

The inner emotions are not limited to shaking, but more of the fear of this unknown place. Just seeing the number on the ward made me tremble with fear,

"As I said - I have a lot of fuzzy memories. In fact, I can't even remember who I am. As for where this place is... you should remember it yourself. You said this is an unknown place, but That may not be the case, have you really never been here before?"

I didn't have time to think about why the other party knew what I was thinking. I just ran desperately to the side I chose arbitrarily, but the number of the ward was always the same, and it seemed that I came back to the original point after all. No matter how hard I try to escape, I just keep walking in the same place.

Yeah...it's not my first time here. My dream palace... and my sister's are all in this hospital. If only I had this hospital in my dream, it might be synthesized based on my unreliable memory, but even Su Huilin's dream also has it, then it must be a place we have been to.

However, I can't remember where it is. Only the lingering sense of fear haunted me, making me unable to think normally.

The not-too-distant past was covered with a fine and unbreakable veil, and I was always scrutinizing on the periphery, unable to touch the real and substantial memories inside.

I gradually became tired and stopped weakly. The ward in front of me was still the previous number. I feel the store manager standing right behind me...always there.

"Your memory is just as unreliable as mine."

The sound came again and I couldn't help turning around, but the person standing in front of me made my pupils shrink suddenly, and I took a step back. The door of the ward was pushed open heavily, and I fell on the floor behind me Even so, my eyes never left the person in front of me for a moment. Because the person standing there is not the face of the store manager at all... but my face.

"Who the hell are you?" I stared at the face in front of me that looked exactly like mine. Different fears overlapped, and my consciousness doubled.

The other party did not answer my words, but raised his head to signal me to pay attention to my surroundings. I froze for a moment, only to realize that the scene behind me was not a ward at all, but the room where I met the professor just now, with dazzling white lights everywhere. And the memory flashed before my eyes in an instant, and I realized with astonishment...I knew this place a long time ago.

"Su Ruoyang? Come here soon!" A strange but familiar voice sounded from the center of the room. I was dominated by this feeling that it was difficult to determine which side was real and which side was illusion, so I quickly stood up and walked towards the room. He ran out as if he was fleeing, and hurriedly closed the door of the ward.

When I looked at the store manager again, I found that he was no longer like me... What was in front of me was obviously his original face with scars. It seemed that the moment he left the ward, he changed back to his original appearance. I adjusted my breathing heavily, wanting to search for memories, but the paradox of being afraid of those memories made me hold the back of my head tightly.

"What the hell did you do to me?! Who the hell are you!!"

I shook my head in pain. Those memories made my brain throbbing. I couldn't remember anything, it just added to the pain.

"I didn't do anything...I just hope that you can wake up from your dream."

"It's so annoying..." I complained almost instinctively, and turned to the ward behind me with my head in my arms, but my knees screamed uncontrollably, and I knelt down heavily due to a strong sense of powerlessness. The feeling of dizziness went hand in hand with the nausea surging up from his abdomen, and his extremely shaken consciousness suddenly went dark.

I blinked my dry eyes vigorously, and the scene in front of my eyes turned back to the shop, as if what I saw just now was just a nightmare. But the store manager is not in the previous position. This made me lower my head in confusion, and there was still a faint mist floating above the teacup. I breathed a sigh of relief, and closed my eyes irritably...unexpectedly, when I opened them again, they were blindingly white.

"I...really woke up?"

After uttering these uncertain words, I quickly looked at the surrounding environment. Something seems to be pressing on my chest, making me a little out of breath. I quickly lowered my head, only to find that it was a beautiful girl I didn't know lying on my chest. I was taken aback by this sudden development, and my consciousness suddenly became extremely grateful. I struggled in a hurry to get out, but the rope was still tightly entangled with me, making me unable to move. The girl also raised her head in a panic, her tearful eyes looked like a frightened rabbit.

"What's wrong, what are you yelling about!?"

The men in suits around cast warning glances because of the girl's sudden movement, but when they noticed that I woke up, their faces instantly changed into astonished expressions.

"Teacher...Professor!! This kid has woken up?!"

Accompanied by that unbelievable shout, I looked at the girl just now again. Her cheeks were painted full of cherry red, maybe if it wasn't because the chair behind her tied her up, I guess she would have rushed to the corner and buried her head shyly... Having said that, her eyes kept avoiding He looked at me carefully, as if he wanted to say something to me.

"That...Sorry! I...I just listened to see if your heart is still beating...Sorry for scaring you!!"

"Uh...Could it be that you still want to give me artificial respiration later?"

"This kind of thing... I can't do this alone!!"

What a girl who blush easily. I thought about it and felt the heavy breath hitting my face again and again, and I couldn't help but look to the side with some curiosity——Lin Yu, who was tied to the chair, was lying on the back of the chair facing the ground and closed tightly eyes. The eyebrows are sometimes furrowed and sometimes stretched out.

I was stunned for a while, and finally realized that Lin Yu seemed to be imprisoned in sleep too...