Chapter 506: Chapter 506: Major Discovery in the Second-Level Network

The next day, Xiang Kun, along with Tang Baona and Yang Zhen Er, prepared to go to Pengcheng to discuss with Zhang Qian about some matters related to game operations post-launch.

Of course, his main purpose was to place more “super-connected objects” in the Brilliant Fortune Building, hoping to help Alice retrieve the data from the underground storage device once again.

This time, Xia Libing won’t be going with them. One reason is that a batch of her ordered devices would be arriving soon and she had to be there to ensure that the installation and debugging processes went smoothly. The other reason was naturally to take care of Xiao Pingguo and the Little Fatty Girl.

Though in terms of safety, Xiao Pingguo plus the Little Fatty Girl and Alice would make a formidable trio in Chongyun Village, they were still kids after all—even Xiao Pingguo was not yet eighteen years old.

With three children huddled together, there had to be an adult watching over them. Apart from the rest, when Professor Li and Xiao Pingguo video call and find that Xiang Kun, Tang Baona, and Xia Libing are all out, they would not feel at ease.

On the way to Jianzhou Airport, they drove the same minivan, Old Xia, Little Apple, and Little Fatty Girl also came along to send them off.

When they arrived at the airport and Xiang Kun, Tang Baona, and Yang Zhen Er were about to go into the hall, Liu Shiling, who was standing by Xiao Pingguo’s side, suddenly stepped forward and tugged gently on Xiang Kun’s sleeve.

Xiang Kun looked down and saw the Little Fatty Girl, who just a moment ago had been laughing and chatting cheerfully on the car ride over, staring back up at him, her small face full of worry and trepidation. She asked in a tiny voice, “Uncle Bald, are you not coming back?”

Xiang Kun gently patted her head and assured her, “Of course I’m coming back. I still have to help you find your mom and dad. Don’t worry, when I come back next time, I’ll bring you some tasty food.”

Only when she got an answer did Liu Shiling finally relax. She returned to her usual smiling self but before she could say anything, Yang Zhen Er, who had crouched beside her, scooped her up.

“Xiao Lingdang, tell your fairy sister here what kind of delicious food you want. I’ll bring you back a whole lot of it, definitely more than what your Uncle Bald can. I’ll also buy you pretty clothes, pretty shoes, beautiful watches and beautiful toys!”

Liu Shiling, her small mouth pouting cutely thanks to Yang Zhen Er squeezing her cheeks, could only murmur her thanks in return, “Thank you, Old Fairy Sister. But, Old Fairy Sister, you bought me so many clothes yesterday. I can’t wear them all, there’s too many…”

“Call me Fairy Sister.” Yang Zhen Er corrected her.

Liu Shiling obliged, “Fairy Sister.”

Satisfied with her response, Yang Zhen Er got back on her feet. She walked towards the hall with Tang Baona and Xiang Kun. With only “friendlies” around today, what with Professor Li Yang not being present and Shiling’s mom not there either, she gleefully enjoyed this unique opportunity to enforce the “title correction” upon the Little Fatty Girl.

However, just as they were about to walk into the hall, they heard Little Fatty Girl’s call, “Goodbye, Uncle Bald! Goodbye, pretty Sister! Goodbye, Old Fairy Sister! Hope to see you soon!”

Well, “correction” failed.

While getting their boarding passes, Yang Zhen Er couldn’t help but sigh, “Xiao Lingdang is just too adorable. If I ever have a daughter, I hope she’ll be like Xiao Lingdang. She is too adorable and precious. I would surely cuddle her to sleep every night, buy her delicious food and beautiful clothes, and play with her all day long. If she were like Old Xia as a child, who was obedient and clever, then that would also be fine. I would dress up her prettily and let her play with whatever she wants.”

Tang Baona, standing next to them and holding the boarding passes, couldn’t help but tease, “Tell me, your daughter will certainly be like you when you were a child!”

Yang Zhen Er couldn’t help but make a face, “Then never mind, I don’t want to have children.”

“At least you’re self-aware.” Tang Baona laughed, “This isn’t called liking children, this is entirely you thinking children are adorable; this mindset isn’t ideal. But if you do have children, your mother should be able to help you take care of them.”

“That’s exactly why I can’t. My mother once said that bringing me up added at least fifty strands of white hair on her head. Especially before I went to primary school, I was too mischievous. I can’t possibly let her go through the same thing again. “Yang Zhen Er said, turning to Tang Baona, “But Nana, you were super cute when you were little too. Your daughter would definitely be as adorable. Yes, when you and Brother Xiang have children, let me be the godmother.”

At these words, Tang Baona and Xiang Kun both stopped in their tracks to stare at her.

Yang Zhen Er was taken aback by their reaction for a moment. Looking at both of them, she laughed, “Hey, why are you looking at me like that? Can’t I even joke around? The child of the two of you, or both of your own children, can have me as their godmother, right? Where on earth do your thoughts wander off to? Come on, let’s go through security. We might miss our flight. Ah, Nana! Don’t pinch my stomach…”

Once they boarded the plane and took their seats, Xiang Kun once again made a show of falling asleep.

He was going to enter the “Super Sensory State” again to help organize the “emotion-infused objects two-level network”.

Since discovering the “emotion-infused objects two-level network” the previous night, with Qi Haoguo’s unexpected change of heart serving as the trigger, Xiang Kun had been continuously entering the “Super Sensory State” and spent the entire night organizing it.

Now, he basically could clearly distinguish the identities of half the people who had been affected by the “emotion-infused objects” and established a “connection” in the secondary network – all of them were people from those he had perceived before while in the “super sensory state”.

However, there were still a significant number of people, mainly those affected by the “eight-armed, eight-eyed wood carving” and the twelve yellow men and four cat wood carvings placed in the Youlong Restaurant, especially the former, where half of the established connections belonged to people whose identities were unknown to him.

On one hand, he was helping Alice delve deeper into the “emotion-infused objects two-level network” to identify and interpret this cognitive information, which would in turn help him gauge the surroundings of the targets, which would then facilitate the identification of the targets.

On the other hand, he was striving to find a way to activate the dreamland of the “connected” in the “two-level network” while they were asleep, hoping to determine their identities through the sensory information in the dreamland.

Based on the characteristics of the “emotion-infused objects”, this was theoretically possible.

But later that night, when Xiang Kun was in the middle of organizing the “two-level network”, he arrived at an astonishing discovery:

Out of the twenty-eight objects linked to the “eight-armed, eight-eyed wood carving”, one of them turned out to be a “mutated creature”, a completely unknown “mutated creature” to Xiang Kun!

This was truly incredible!

Based on the cognitive information, the “mutant” was also human in origin. His degree of mutation seemed to be much less than John and Mr. Liang who currently resided in the Brilliant Fortune Building. As for whether he was more or less mutated than Guo Tianxiang used to be though, that was unclear. Back then, he didn’t have the ability to perceive super sensory information at that time.

However, the question was: When was this “human-shaped mutated creature” deeply affected by the emotional projection of the “eight-armed, eight-eyed wood carving”?

If Xiang Kun called upon the “Eight-armed, Eight-eyed Wood Carving” for emotion projection, and a “mutant” was influenced in the process, he would be able to sense it immediately.

Even when he was in Myitkyina, affecting a wide range, he could assure that as long as there was a “mutant” within the range, he would indeed detect it.

Especially under the “Super Sensory State”, the cognitive information of “mutants” and other things have an essential difference, like a spotlight in the night, he could not possibly miss it.

In fact, in Myitkyina and on the journey back to his country, he deliberately searched for “mutants”, but found none.

So perhaps, when Little Apple used the “Super Sensory Item System” to call upon the “Eight-armed, Eight-eyed Wood Carving” emotion projection to influence others, she unknowingly influenced a certain “Human-shaped mutated creature”?

But he quickly negated this possibility. When Little Apple projected fear onto others, she had to do it through her eyes, so there was no chance that she unknowingly affected nearby people.

Based on the information Alice found, the three suspects influenced by Little Apple’s fear projections during the Spring Festival period at the lakeside are not “mutants” – two of them are currently in prison. The one outside, after Alice analyzed the information from the electronic devices around him, was determined to be a normal human.

So the only possibility is that someone within the crowd influenced by him in Myitkyina mutated into a “mutant”.

According to Xiang Kun’s knowledge, in this world, “mutant” was an extremely rare and unlikely entity, and “human-shaped mutants” or “mutants” that came from human mutation were even rarer.

Was it really the case that someone underwent mutation not long after being affected by his “Eight-armed, Eight-eyed Wood Carving” emotion projection?

What are the odds?

But it seems now, this is the most likely possibility, otherwise it couldn’t explain why there is a “mutant” connector in the secondary network of the “Eight-armed, Eight-eyed Wood Carving”.

It’s not any sort of open “network” where any terminal can connect on its own.

But if this hypothesis holds, Xiang Kun couldn’t help but suspect: was the mutation of that “human-shaped mutant” directly or indirectly related to the influence of the “Eight-armed, Eight-eyed Wood Carving” fear projections?

This discovery could be a clue to unravel the cause of the mutation.

Of course, he wouldn’t simply assume that mutations resulted from deep emotional projection. After all, not only humans can mutate, but also parasites, spiders, and even plants can mutate, and they can’t be affected by the emotional projections stimulated by the “Emotion Infused Objects”.

There must be more complex reasons.

For now, Xiang Kun could only ascertain that this “human-shaped mutant” was male, approximately 175 cm to 177 cm tall, and always in a state of indifference and calmness. This led him to slightly doubt his own hypothesis. If the target had just mutated recently, shouldn’t his emotions be nervous, scared, excited, or restless instead of calm?

He continuously analyzed the cognitive information of the “human-shaped mutant” under the “Super Sensory State”, and then confirmed all the connectors in the “Emotion Infused Objects secondary network” again. After confirming that this was the only “mutant” connector, he withdrew from the “Super Sensory State”. Realizing that the plane was preparing to land, he opened his eyes.

Upon seeing Tang Baona and Yang Zhen Er, who were sitting on either side of him, staring at him, Xiang Kun laughed and asked, “What’s up? Is my sleeping posture unattractive?” He was oblivious to whatever Baona or Zhen’er were saying or doing when he was under the “Super Sensory State”

Tang Baona shook her head, “On the contrary, your sleeping posture is too ‘serene’.”

“Exactly, it doesn’t resemble the way an average person sleeps. If it were Baona, her drool would have reached her shoulder by now.” Yang Zhen Er nodded in agreement.

“Yuck! It’s clearly you who does that! Do you remember how many times you drooled on my shoulder when we used to go out together?” Tang Baona retorted.

“Did I? I don’t remember!” Yang Zhen Er shifted the focus back to Xiang Kun,” Brother Xiang, your sleeping posture is really weird. You had a ‘I’m indifferent to everything including life and death’ expression on your face. Coupled with your bald head, you look like a wise monk who’s soul-traveling around the world!”

Xiang Kun laughed, “So, having a good sleeping posture is a flaw now? And ‘serene’… the way you word it makes it sound like I’m already dead. Alright, I admit, I was not asleep, I was pretending to sleep.”

“No, you were definitely asleep.” Tang Baona asserted confidently from the side.

“Oh? Why do you say so?” Xiang Kun asked.

“Intuition.” Tang Baona replied.

Yang Zhen Er immediately revealed, “Nonsense! Baona just secretly touched your bald head, and you didn’t react, so you were definitely asleep!”

“Nonsense…clearly you were the one who touched it!” Tang Baona retorted, blushing slightly. She said to Xiang Kun, “I just touched it very lightly, you won’t be mad, right?”

Xiang Kun didn’t know what to say, feeling both amused and exasperated.

After they arrived at Pengcheng City Airport, the people Zhang Qian had arranged to pick them up had already been waiting for quite a while.

Xiang Kun initially thought that Zhang Qian would arrange a driver to come, but he didn’t expect her to come to the airport personally.

After greeting Tang Baona, Yang Zhen Er, and Zhang Qian, Xiang Kun also walked over with a smile and said, “How come you, a busy person, have time to pick us up?”

“You’re the busy one, okay? It’s quite difficult to meet you. Even making a phone call requires scheduling through Miss Tang several times.”

“That’s not the same. I was aimlessly busy, you, on the other hand, have genuine tasks. See, there is a difference, ha-ha.” Zhang Qian seemed to harbor a slight grudge against him, so Xiang Kun hastily laughed it off and made self-deprecating remarks to appease her.

In the business vehicle, Zhang Qian sat with them in the back seat, introducing them to the game’s test data during this period along the way, as well some problems that arose and possible situations they might face, their treatment plans, etc.. The information was very concise and well-prepared, which somewhat embarrassed the three “executives” of QianKun Technology who were still pondering where to go for dinner.