This result was completely unexpected by Qingmu.
Even when he and the Crow joined forces, they couldn't completely eliminate Xia Wenyuan's shadow. Forcibly eliminating it might also harm Xia Wenyuan's main consciousness. And the invading consciousness in Mama Yao's mind was clearly more mature than the shadow itself. So, a cat jumped out, meowed twice, and that unkillable creature escaped?
"Auntie, could you be more specific? Have you seen that cat before?" Qingmu asked.
"Of course I've seen it! It's my own pet cat, how could I not have seen it!" said Mama Yao.
Yao Jingjing asked in surprise, "Mom, when did we ever have a cat? How come I didn't know?"
Papa Yao said, "Yes, we've never owned a cat before!"
Mama Yao said, "That was raised by my grandma, of course you wouldn't know. I was too young then, you weren't even here! When I was little, that cat was so affectionate with me, it would always rub against me, and even sit with me at mealtimes."
Yao Jingjing giggled and said, "So Mom was a cat owner when she was little!"
Mama Yao didn't understand and scolded, "What do you mean by 'dying tragically'? Are you cursing me?"
Yao Jingjing quickly explained, "I meant 'cat owner,' which means someone who takes care of a cat. I didn't mean to curse you!"
Mama Yao said, "Young people always use words we don't understand."
They were explaining the pet owner's question, while Qingmu fell into deep thought. The cat that Mama Yao had as a child was at least forty or fifty years old. The average lifespan of a cat is only a dozen years, and the oldest cat in the Guinness World Records was only in its thirties. Therefore, the cat Mama Yao dreamed of should have died long ago. That leaves only two possibilities: one, the cat she dreamed of was a copy of her subconscious memory created in the dream world; two, the cat's consciousness didn't dissipate after death, but entered Mama Yao's brain through some special method and has been lurking there ever since.
Qingmu first ruled out the first possibility; if it were merely a copy constructed by self-consciousness within a dream, it couldn't possibly drive away the intruder. But if it were the second possibility, that would be too bizarre.
Apart from hidden genetic memories, all of an organism's memories are stored in the brain. The brain is like a huge hard drive, controlling the storage and retrieval of information through the nervous system. Generally speaking, consciousness itself does not have memory functions; it must rely on substances with brain-like functions to store information.
Leaving aside the mystical questions of whether consciousness can exist independently of matter and how it can enter another life form, theoretically speaking, once consciousness leaves the body, or the body's brain dies, the consciousness loses the authority or ability to access its memories; its memories of the past cease to exist. It cannot remember who it was, who its friends were, or who its enemies were.
If the cat retained its consciousness after death through some special means and entered Mama Yao's consciousness area, then in reality, it became an external Parasitic Consciousness, just like the invading consciousness.
The saying goes, "Two tigers cannot share one mountain." A single consciousness cannot allow two consciousnesses to coexist. Just as Awakened must be extremely cautious when entering someone else's dream, using powerful Mental Power to conceal their presence or control the other's consciousness, the invading consciousness within Xia Wenyuan's body grew in such a covert way as his shadow. Moreover, because it stole all of his memories, it became exactly the same as the main consciousness once it matured.
So how did that cat manage to live with Mama Yao for so many years without interfering with her?
"Auntie, have you ever dreamed about that cat before?" Qingmu asked.
"No," Mama Yao said very firmly.
Never?
"Hmm... it seems..." Mama Yao also became a little doubtful, "It seems really not. Ever since that cat died, I haven't dreamed about it at all. Even though I was dreaming all the time recently, about all sorts of trivial things from my childhood to adulthood, I never dreamed about that cat."
"That cat is actually dead, isn't it?"
Mama Yao said, "She's dead. She died a long time ago, along with my grandma. I was in high school then, and my dad suddenly came to the school and told me to come back, saying that my grandma was dying. When I returned to Cuan Family Village, my grandma was lying in bed, and the cat was in her arms. When she saw me come back, she asked me to sit next to her. Then I fell asleep, and I think I even had a dream. When I woke up, my grandma and the cat were both gone."
Qingmu realized that there must be a encrypted protected area in the memory region of Mama Yao's cerebral cortex, and it was related to this cat. That protected area must contain what the invading consciousness wanted.
He decided to hypnotize Mama Yao and enter her dream to take a look. Although it might not be what he thought, if he could unravel the secret of the invading consciousness, that would be a relief. After all, he had taken so much money from Xia Wenyuan but hadn't completely gotten rid of that shadow. Moreover, he was very curious about the origin of that shadow and even vaguely felt that it had something to do with him.
However, with that cat present, Qingmu couldn't be sure how long it would take to enter Mama Yao's dream, or what would happen.
Although there is no temporal correspondence between dreams and reality, and one could even say that time itself doesn't exist in dreams—because time is merely an artificial concept created for the purpose of understanding the world—the dream space itself lacks time. The subconscious mind retrieves memories to construct dreams without relying on real-world logic. In other words, in dreams, time becomes a visible dimension, so the subconscious can simultaneously recall and reconstruct elements from different times. When we recall a dream, it may seem long, but it's actually just a fleeting moment.
To prevent the search for Mama Yao's memories from taking too long, or from any accidents caused by the cat, Qingmu decided to send Yao Jingjing and Papa Yao away.
" Jingjing, I'm hungry," Qingmu said.
"Huh?" Yao Jingjing's body trembled. This blockhead had been either politely calling her "Flight Attendant Yao" or rudely calling her "Hey, hey," so his sudden " Jingjing " caught her off guard. Yao Jingjing suddenly got goosebumps all over, and her face involuntarily turned red.
Qingmu didn't notice anything unusual about Yao Jingjing at all. He just called her whatever came to mind. Before, when he called Bi Shenghua, he would sometimes call her Ruhua and sometimes the boss lady; when he called Hu Xing, he would sometimes call her by her name and sometimes Officer Hu. Now, when he heard Mama Yao calling her " Jingjing, Jingjing " all the time, he just started calling her that too.
Bi Shenghua said he came from outer space and his brain was different from that of Earthlings. It might contain several beings with an IQ of only 50. When they were combined, they were extremely intelligent, but when they were not combined, they were mentally challenged.