Forces of Temptation

After {Jiang Fang} noticed that Nan Zhou was touching the back of his head with his backhand, his expression became a little more bewildered.

How keen he is, with a slight turn of his light-colored eyes, he understood Nan Zhou's train of thought.

From the current point of view, Nanzhou and the fixed-point refreshing iron box are the only two variables that have appeared in the three worlds that were originally unchanged.

The only goal of Nan Zhou traveling between the three worlds is to find the "ticket" to leave.

The question is, how to advance the game in order to get a "ticket"?

It is known that the "ticket" does not exist in one of these three worlds.

The "ticket" is not on Nanzhou himself.

"Ticket" may be obtained by improving the game rating or completing achievements.

Although this is worth a try, but due to the large amount of engineering, and no idea what kind of achievement to achieve and what level to improve the evaluation to get the final reward, and the possibility of the reward being a "ticket" has not been clearly stated, so This possibility exists only in theory.

So, is it possible that the "ticket" is the "variable" itself of Nanzhou?

It was at this point that Nan Zhou thought, wanting to verify whether there was something special about him, so he immediately touched the back of his neck with his backhand.

{Jiang Fang} thought, there must be something special on the back of Nanzhou's neck.

It’s just that Nanzhou has half-length hair, covering the back of his neck, and he has a clear main task of “finding the ticket within 12 hours”. Of course, he will focus more on the external environment instead of paying attention to himself The condition of the body, so not aware of it, is also possible.

...The imprint on the neck is the breaking point left by the so-called "Gaowei people".

Thinking of this, he probed to look at Nanzhou.

As he raised his hand to touch it just now, the black hair that was originally hanging on the back of his neck parted to the sides.

The skin there is radiant and dazzlingly white, but there is not a single scar.

This was slightly beyond {Jiang Fang}'s expectation.

But after thinking about it, he understood: "You should have a birthmark on your neck, right?"

Nan Zhou put down his hands and said softly, "It's a scar."

{Jiang Fang} said "Oh" full of interest: "Who can hurt you?"

Nan Zhou put his hair back together: "The person I like."

{Jiang Fang} sneered: "Isn't the person you like not very good?"

"Yes, you're right, that's not the one 'I' likes."

Nan Zhou took a deep breath, so hard that his chest sank.

He lowered his eyes and said, "Because I... am not that person at all."

{Jiang Fang} was confused when he heard the words.

...He thought that since Nan Zhou was set as a "ticket", he was so restless and depressed, it must be because he didn't dare to take the risk of committing suicide, so as not to make a mistake in his speculation.

Originally, he wanted to tease Nan Zhou, so he put the dagger at his waist into his hand, and asked him provocatively if he dared to commit suicide.

Why did Nanzhou come to this conclusion?

Nan Zhou sat down beside the bed, and {Jiang Fang} lying on the bed subconsciously retracted his legs to make room for him to sit.

Nan Zhou's head was buried very low, his body leaned forward, his elbows rested on his knees, as if his torso was bent by an invisible weight: "Do you know how my injury came about?"

When {Jiang Fang} heard the words, he was a little unhappy and said, "Not interested."

Seeing that Nan Zhou pursed his lips and said nothing, {Jiang Fang} clicked his tongue again, and said impatiently, "Say it quickly."

Nan Zhou raised his hand, and according to his own memory, stroked the skin where the teeth should exist, and said, "In a church, I was about to die, and he couldn't do anything, he could only bite my teeth. Neck, trying to call me back with pain."

"Oh." {Jiang Fang} turned his face out of the window and said without sincerity, "A touching love story."

"That's where the problem lies." Nan Zhou pointed to his head, "...I shouldn't remember this matter."

{Jiang Fang} couldn't hide his curiosity: "What do you mean 'you shouldn't remember'?"

Nan Zhou said: "In order to save him, I traded all the memories related to getting along with him with the Gaowei people."

Having said that, he buried his head and muttered: "Look, I also remember this incident."

He repeated: "But I... shouldn't have remembered."

In the tight time limit of the game, Nanzhou would not have the mind to review and sort out his memory, and naturally he would not find that there were "more things" in his memory.

Looking back now, most of what constitutes his memory are shaking images recorded by the camera.

He naturally regarded those as "memory".

But that's possible...just a tracking camera.

{Jiang Fang} pondered for a while, and gradually realized the meaning represented by the Nanzhou dialect.

His face became serious: "You mean..."

"...You are right. The game description is also right."

Nan Zhou, perhaps it should be called "Nan Zhou", raised his head and looked at {Jiang Fang}, with unspeakable bewilderment and sadness in his eyes.

"I am the only 'variable' in the game."

"I'm in a tragedy...cycle."

"My whole life is a ridiculous story written by others."

"Even if you can't catch up with the car and can't leave these three worlds, it doesn't matter, 'because this is your home'."

"Nanzhou" slowly recited the prophecy-like words on the game description, his mind became more chaotic, but his thinking became clearer.

Combining all the previous clues, including the achievement pop-up window, the game evaluation on the sky screen, and the sentence in the game description [Do you really feel happy in the game? ], it can be deduced that the ring world formed by these three boxes is a complete independent game.

At first, the three worlds are like three trains closed to each other, each interpreting its own storyline independently.

In the game, "Nanzhou" is the first person to "recognize" the truth of the world, and is also endowed with the attribute of "protagonist" and all the memories related to Nanzhou.

He thought that he was Nanzhou, that he had also experienced such a thrilling adventure with Jiang Fang and Li Yinhang.

Driven by such memories, "Southern Boat" has an absolute reason to look for iron boxes.

The game that really belongs to "Southern Boat" starts here.

He set off to find the iron box and began his 12-hour adventure.

... which also happens to be in line with the length of an indie game.

He is the leader in this story train, but he is also a puppet in the dungeon.

The game keeps showing him "achievement" and "evaluation", which is to induce him to compete for resources with [Southern Boat] and {Jiangfang} in the other two worlds, to fight for more interesting "achievements". Cause more positive "reviews".

In fact, he, [Nan Zhou], and {Jiang Fang} are indistinguishable creatures of the same dimension. They are vassals of the game, and they are also variants split from the real Nan Zhou.

He is even more pathetic than [Nan Zhou] and {Jiang Fang}.

At least they have their own [Jiang Fang] and {South Boat} beside them.

But his own "Jiangfang" was actually just an illusion that was thousands of miles away and never really belonged to him.

past memories?

...fake.

good feelings?

...It's just a one-way chemical reaction in his mind.

Friends made during the trip?

... are all people who have nothing to do with him.

He is not Nanzhou.

Jiang Fang was not his, and neither was his partner.

He is just a game character constructed out of thin air who thinks he is a real person.

The point of breaking the game was that he found out that he didn't have a wound on the back of his neck, and then realized that he had a memory that the original owner Nan Zhou shouldn't have.

It is not so difficult to expose this illusion.

The question is, after realizing this illusion, how should he choose?

……

On the other hand, knowing his true identity, {Jiang Fang} relaxed a lot.

"I haven't played the game, but I've seen a lot of stories."

Like a child who loves pranks, he laughed at Yan Yan and poked at the scars of "Nanzhou" without hesitation: "... At the beginning, the protagonist of the story, his parents died, and he had a blood feud. In short, the story gave him Strong motivation to act."

He patted "Nanzhou" on the shoulder, and said in a relaxed and teasing tone: "Think about it, you are just the protagonist of a more complicated story, and your meaning is actually to travel through the world and be mobilized by others." Fight with us. If you lose or die, your memory will be cleared and the game will be restarted. You will be resurrected with the task of 'finding a bus ticket'... Just like the protagonist in the story, every reader opens After the title page, all I see is the same you, repeating the same fate, repeating all the encounters in these 12 hours, trying all the possibilities, and finally getting the same result... Ah, it's scary, Yes or no?"

The more {Jiang Fang} spoke, the lighter and more relaxed the tone became.

"Nanzhou" and him are characters in the same game, and this recognition makes him secretly happy.

Even if they can't get rid of this 12-hour reincarnation tragedy, even if the game will restart, and they only have 12 hours of fate each time, but after excluding those useless fighting time and search time, they still have at least 3 hours to do. friend.

At least it won't be eternal loneliness.

Facing {Jiang Fang}'s irony, "Nan Zhou" bowed his head and remained silent.

{Jiang Fang} watched his lips turn pale, but he didn't feel as happy as he imagined.

...Is it too hard to bully?

{Jiang Fang} leaned on the bed, supported his side cheek with one hand, and said with a smile: "You, like me, are a meaningless existence. In this way, my mind will be balanced."

"Nanzhou" replied: "I am not."

{Jiang Fang} smiled noncommittally: "Then what are some people thinking in their little heads?"

"Nanzhou" said: "I was thinking, where is the real Nanzhou?"

His eyes were clear and calm: "If I die, will Nanzhou be able to get the 'ticket'?"

{Jiang Fang} frowned, and sat up: "Why should you die? Didn't the game description say that? As long as you live, this game will continue? Why do you want to die for that body?"

Hearing this sentence, "Nanzhou"'s face moved slightly, and he looked at {Jiang Fang}.

He seems to understand why the Gaowei people endowed [Nan Zhou] and {Jiang Fang} with enough intelligence.

——In order to persuade him and shake his mind, it will be more convincing and more... tempting.

The author has something to say:

In short, Nanzhou is not in the game at all

He just gambled whether this "Southern Boat" would come out.

So I skipped "", the most basic identifier for distinguishing characters, and used []w

"" to be used here