In the face of such an ability, every effort seemed utterly futile.
But the facts proved that this approach could work. At least, his mind was now full of lust.
Behind her glasses, Maimaiti shot Joey a mild glare. Her expression barely changed, remaining as calm and unruffled as ever.
"An interesting idea, but for a gentleman, behaving like that in front of a beautiful lady is rather rude."
"Hmm..." She tilted her head slightly, as though something had occurred to her. "I don't use my ability all the time. That would drive me mad. Mr. Keliwei, I think we can have a normal conversation."
As soon as she finished speaking, Joey felt that persistent sense of being watched disappear.
For a moment, he felt a strange, wonderful ease. He no longer had to keep a deliberate guard over his thoughts.
What did she mean? She didn't use her ability all the time?
After two seconds of reflection, Joey understood.
It did make sense. Constantly receiving the thoughts and emotional fluctuations of everyone nearby would drive even an ordinary person mad, let alone a Transcendent perpetually struggling against themselves.
"It seems you understand what I mean." Maimaiti hummed approvingly, then spread her hands, seemingly savoring the afternoon sunlight.
Hot and warm. How long had it been since Joey had experienced this feeling? A year? Two? Perhaps not since his previous life.
"You don't seem surprised?"
Joey swirled the cup in his hand. Its rich aroma drifted through the air, stirring his nostalgia.
"You mean the sun?" He stretched out a hand, letting the sunlight fall upon it.
"Senegal hasn't seen the sun for a thousand years, I believe."
Joey nodded, a faint smile appearing at the corners of his mouth. He seemed to have guessed her identity, but he still needed more clues to confirm it.
"Judging by your reaction, you've seen the sun before. Someone born in Senegal wouldn't react like this."
"An Ancient. Am I right?"
I wanted to draw information out of her, and she was just as curious about my identity?
But what did 'Ancient' mean?
He instinctively asked:
"What is an Ancient?"
Sure enough, she wasn't using her ability.
At least, Joey no longer felt that someone was prying into his mind.
Maimaiti took a small sip of coffee and tilted her head, as though recalling some distant memory.
Only after several seconds did she speak leisurely:
"People today probably call them the Remnants of the Old Era." She clicked her tongue. "Humans from before the Calamity Era."
"The age of the Blank General History!"
The moment those words left his mouth, Joey realized something was wrong. He hadn't meant to speak at all. The thought had merely flickered through his mind, and his mouth had voiced it on its own.
He eyed the woman opposite him warily.
For some reason, a saying suddenly came to mind.
Better to believe in ghosts than trust a woman's words.
What happened to not using her ability?
...Dealing with a High Sequence Transcendent really demanded caution. One careless moment, and you fell into their trap.
Their eyes met, and Maimaiti shook her head.
"I didn't deceive you. You should know that, as a higher being, my Beyonder characteristics have certain ideas of their own."
Maimaiti leaned back slightly, settling into a comfortable position.
"For example, I often can't help causing trouble or playing a little joke."
"That isn't my intention. It's a characteristic I can't control."
Her words fully confirmed Joey's suspicions.
The identity of the woman before him was now unmistakable.
The Ancient Sun God's daughter, the God of Mischief.
Maimaiti suddenly rose. The sea breeze lifted her golden hair as she raised her head and glanced at the azure sea nearby.
"Could you tell me what that world was like?"
Her eyes were deep, filled with an intense longing and curiosity.
Her words carried Joey's thoughts back to his distant previous life. There was so much to remember that, for a moment, he didn't know where to begin.
Maimaiti didn't hurry him. She waited quietly for his reply.
"I mean you no harm. You can think of me as a young girl hungry to learn about the unknown."
A young girl who had lived for at least a thousand years, Joey silently scoffed.
"To make this fair, I can give you a gift first."
As she finished speaking, a box carved with exquisite patterns appeared on the table before Joey. Before he even touched it, the box opened on its own.
Inside lay slender worms. At first glance, they looked like strands of hair.
Antenna worms, one of the main potion ingredients required to advance to Sequence 8.
Something he had searched for so long without success was now right in front of him.
"I can also tell you the potion formula for Fortune Teller, Sequence 7."
This... was an enormous benefit. All he had to do was nod, and he could soon become a Sequence 8. In return, he only needed to provide some harmless information.
Had he not guessed her identity, he would have agreed without hesitation.
As the Sun God's most beloved child, her greatest pleasures were causing trouble and playing pranks.
There had once been a saying: better to believe the sun would be destroyed than believe Plato's words.
As he pondered, something seemed to occur to Joey, and a smile quietly crept onto his lips.
He recalled what had happened earlier. Maimaiti seemed wary of that gray fog.
Since he couldn't solve the problem before him, he would make it bigger and let someone capable of handling it deal with it. He would pass the trouble on.
He planned to stir up the mad ravings of the Endless Sea beneath the gray fog and use them against his enemy.
That might turn him into a lunatic, or a mythical creature without a will of its own.
Yet the instant the thought arose, he seemed to forget what he had been about to do. He froze, his expression blank.
She stole my thought?
How was this even fair? How could I escape?
The moment he understood, Joey despaired. A deep sense of helplessness made him lower his eyes in defeat.
"Just steal my memories."
Maimaiti covered her mouth, as though something amusing had occurred to her, and chuckled.
"Passing the trouble to someone who can handle it. What an interesting idea."
For her, there were indeed certain beings she couldn't face right now. Doing so would be troublesome.
"Why don't you just steal everything from me? For an Archangel like you, that should be easy. Is it because you're incomplete right now?"
Maimaiti nodded frankly.
"You're very clever. That's why I want to learn about that era without alerting anyone."
"But it seems you don't approve of this transaction."
As she spoke, the Ancient Sun God's most beloved youngest daughter slowly turned and looked down at Joey.
An instinctive flicker of fear crossed Joey's mind. He wanted to flee, but outwardly, he could only maintain a calm expression, as though he had no fear of death.
He tried to calm his thoughts and regard Maimaiti as an ordinary, beautiful woman rather than an Archangel.
"This coffee isn't very good. Back home, there was a drink that would suit you."
Joey opened his mouth, about to speak, but Maimaiti spoke for him first.
"Milk tea. A drink filled with little popping balls."
As she spoke, she gently tapped the table with a slender, pale finger. A cup of milk tea from Joey's memories instantly appeared, with the name "Xiangpiaopiao" prominently printed on its side.
Dealing with a thief who could steal everything really was no fun.
"What are popping balls?" Maimaiti asked curiously.
"You should just steal my memories."
Maimaiti rested her chin on her hand and remained silent for several seconds before speaking. Two lovely dimples appeared on her cheeks.
"I like talking to people."
"Even though I know what you want to say before you open your mouth."
Joey shrugged helplessly and said:
"You can think of them as a food made from coconut jelly. Adding them to milk tea improves the texture."
Maimaiti adjusted her gold-rimmed glasses, then smiled.
"Like this?"
A coconut appeared beside the milk tea on the table. Before Joey's eyes, its shell peeled away on its own, and its flesh turned into little spheres.
Then some translucent pearls appeared, perfectly recreating the bubble tea in Joey's memories.
Maimaiti mixed the milk tea with the coconut jelly and took a small sip. A radiant smile spread across her face.
"It tastes quite unusual, but I like it."
The Archangel Nur Maimaiti Plato liked bubble tea. Joey wondered how many jaws would drop if that news got out.
Joey opened his mouth, about to say something, but Maimaiti suddenly stood and looked in a certain direction.
"I should go. Thank you for the bubble tea. See you!"
The sun and the sea faded bit by bit before Joey's eyes. By the time he came to his senses, he was back in West District 9, outside Naomi's house. The sky was as gray as ever.
She didn't kill me?
Why didn't she kill me?
Countless questions suddenly flooded Joey's mind.
Most incredible of all, he now held a box containing antenna worms, along with a sheet of paper bearing a Sequence potion formula.
He hadn't paid anything at all... well... apart from a cup of bubble tea.
The return was remarkably generous.
With a heavy heart, he climbed to the second floor and stopped outside Naomi's door. Although he already had his suspicions, he still clung to a faint hope.
He gently pushed the door open. Everything inside was neatly arranged. The floor and ceiling were spotless. There was no blood, no tentacles, and no Naomi.
An inexplicable sense of loss spread through his heart.
He understood. Naomi was already dead. She had died in that basement, and everything he had encountered afterward had been the work of the Archangel Maimaiti.
The God of Mischief possessed many incredible abilities, which made her pranks all the more troublesome.
Joey couldn't distinguish what was real from what was false.
Without knowing what was happening, he would gradually fall into the pranks Maimaiti had prepared. He had to stay vigilant at all times.
Now that Joey knew of her existence, he could at least guard against her to some extent by taking extra care.
At least he was certain that the time and space he currently occupied were real.
Maimaiti really had left.
And that was precisely what unsettled him.
Every gift came with a price, and he had no way to refuse the benefits she offered.
Back at his own home, he didn't summon 0-013 this time. Instead, his spiritual consciousness entered the Round Table Hall.
Only here could he remain free from the influence of certain beings.
"Great master, I sense that you are feeling very low. Is there anything Azrael can do for you?"
"Was the story you deduced earlier true?"
He thought of the story about Naomi that 0-013 had deduced. Maimaiti's appearance had made him doubt it.
No words appeared on the yellowed pages. Only after more than ten seconds did a passage emerge.
The information on it left Joey utterly stunned.
0-013 had remained in the Round Table Hall the entire time. It had never been summoned.
In other words, the 0-013 in the basement, and perhaps everything that had happened there, had been Maimaiti's work.
Naomi was real, 0-013 was fake, 0-09 was real, and Sarah was fake?
Some real and some fake, or was everything fake?
Right. Here, no one could interfere.
At that thought, Joey said gravely:
"Tell me, did the Naomi who appeared in the basement truly exist?"
"Yes."
"Did the Naomi in the Red House truly exist?"
"Yes."
0-013 gave him a definite answer, and that very answer was something Joey found difficult to accept.
An Archangel's abilities were terrifying to this degree.
He had now experienced that firsthand.
According to rumor, Nur Maimaiti Plato held a certain authority.
The Guardian of Time and Space.
She could make herself exist in the past, present, and future.
The Naomi he encountered later must have been someone Maimaiti had taken from a particular point in time. Thus, both the Naomi in the basement and the one he met afterward were real.
The 0-013 that appeared in the basement must have been a simulation created after his memories were stolen, making Joey believe it was real.
Maimaiti couldn't let Joey truly summon it. That would alert certain beings to her presence.
If both were real, why were they so different?
Joey couldn't figure that out, so he put the question to 0-013.
Although it currently lacked the authority a Grade 0 Sealed Artifact should possess, it could still serve as an encyclopedia here.
Here, He seemed to possess even stronger abilities.
Swish, swish, swish~
Dense, tiny characters gradually emerged upon the yellowed pages. As soon as Joey finished reading one section, new text appeared.
Half a quarter-hour later, he leaned weakly against the round-table chair while the pages of 0-013 hovered right before him.
The Color Out of Space used the dark-side emotional energy of humans as nourishment.
It would bewitch, induce, and lead people toward darkness and extremes, generating negative energy.
A perfect love story-that was not what It wanted.
Therefore, It fabricated Naomi's extreme, tragic love story, driving her into paranoia and despair within false memories toward death.
"The Color Out of Space-what connection does it have with 0-09?"
0-013 could not deduce information that involved too deep of a connection.
A depressed little human head emoticon surfaced upon the book's paper pages.
They were more like a mutual arrangement of taking what each needed; perhaps only by meeting 0-09 would he know Its purpose.
Just needing a certain kind of emotional energy was enough to turn Naomi into that kind of Monster. In the eyes of certain existences, humans really were an insignificant species.
Looking at the endless Gray Fog, Joey felt a heavy heart, and he murmured to himself, "Is this Divinity?"