Bi Shenghua placed the Crow next to the old yellow cat, and the cat went over and affectionately rubbed its head against it, then stuck out its tongue to lick the Crow's feathers.
Zhao Pengcheng wanted to speak up and stop them, saying that the specimens should be kept in a dry environment and should not come into contact with live animals, let alone be licked by cats, otherwise they would get moldy.
Seeing the confusion on his face, Bi Shenghua explained, "They were best friends in life."
Zhao Pengcheng asked, "How long has that bird been dead?"
"It's been ten years. When it was alive, it was very strong, could talk, loved to sing, and loved my braised pork hock the most. It often said, 'Life is precious, love is more precious, but for braised pork hock, I would give up both.' People say Crow live long lives, and everyone thought it would live to be a hundred. Back then, this cat was very thin, skin and bones, and its meows were weak. Qingmu said it wouldn't live much longer. Unexpectedly, the cat lived to be an old cat, but the bird is long gone."
He recounted his Bi Shenghua's many anecdotes in a rambling, rambling manner.
Zhao Pengcheng could understand the loneliness of a woman in her thirties who had spent ten years accompanying a mute, vegetative person, although he still believed that such trivial human emotions had no positive significance in the evolution of life.
"Do you drink alcohol?" Bi Shenghua asked.
"I won't drink it," Zhao Pengcheng said.
Bi Shenghua served him rice and ladled out a large bowl of chicken soup. "Have some chicken soup. It's warming and dispels the cold, perfect for this season."
Zhao Pengcheng sighed, but his eyes were fixed on the cat beside him, which was eating its food. The braised pork knuckle on the table remained untouched, like an offering before a funeral hall.
"Are you an alien?" Bi Shenghua suddenly asked.
Zhao Pengcheng was taken aback, unsure how to answer, so he said, "How do you know?"
Bi Shenghua laughed and said, "Why aren't you eating? I heard that aliens don't eat our food."
What should we eat?
"Eating human brains."
Zhao Pengcheng smiled, picked up the bowl, and took a sip of the soup. Whether it was because he hadn't had a good meal in prison for a long time, or because the woman in front of him was indeed a skilled cook, the taste of the chicken soup revitalized Zhao Pengcheng's almost atrophied taste buds.
He gulped it down, wiped his mouth, and said, "That's all just rumors. There's no such thing as eating human brains. Don't you like aliens?"
Bi Shenghua watched him finish the chicken soup, smiled contentedly, and said, "Who would like aliens? They've brought enough disasters already."
"But isn't it peaceful now?" Zhao Pengcheng said.
"Peace?" Bi Shenghua sneered. "They will eventually take over our brains, they will eventually leave this planet. At that time, each of us will become like Qingmu, a mindless vegetable. But who will take care of us then?"
Zhao Pengcheng was speechless, remembering Qingmu upstairs.
The cat next to him meowed, and when he turned to look, he suddenly felt a little dizzy. The cat's double image appeared in front of him, swaying back and forth, and he couldn't see it clearly.
He turned to look at Bi Shenghua again, but she was only a blurry figure; he could only see her smiling. That smile was not friendly; it was cold.
Zhao Pengcheng, holding his head with one hand and picking up the empty chicken soup bowl in front of him with the other, said, "You... you... poisoned me..."
The bowl fell to the ground and shattered into pieces.
Bi Shenghua was still laughing, "I know you, your name is Zhao Pengcheng. You're the one who ruined him. I've dreamed of killing you, but the prison protected you. You got out, and I thought I'd never have a chance for revenge. But heaven has eyes, and you've come looking for me..."
Zhao Pengcheng didn't hear what Bi Shenghua said next before he lost consciousness.
When Zhao Pengcheng woke up again, he found himself locked in a cold storage room, wearing an old military overcoat, without any handcuffs or ropes to restrain him. He stood up and moved his frozen legs and arms, then tried to open the cold storage door, but he quickly gave up; the door could not be opened from the inside.
The temperature here was around minus one or two degrees Celsius. Because he was wearing very thin clothes underneath, even though he was wearing a thick coat, he was still shivering from the cold, and his physical strength was being rapidly depleted in the low temperature. If he didn't go outside, he could only hold on for another twenty minutes at most.
His Mental Power couldn't penetrate the thick walls of the cold storage, and he didn't know if anyone was next door.
"Hey! Where are you? Let me out!" he shouted.
One wall suddenly lit up; it had been covered in thick ice, and only then did people realize that there was a large screen, about seventy or eighty inches in size, in the middle.
A three-dimensional, life-size figure appeared on the screen, with a Western face, wearing a white robe, and radiating divine light.
This screen looks completely different from the common LCD or PDP screens. Zhao Pengcheng looked around but couldn't find a projector. He guessed it was a new technology he had developed during his ten years in prison.
The person on the screen looked incredibly realistic, even better than watching a movie with 3D glasses. If it weren't for the person's dramatic appearance, Zhao Pengcheng would have almost thought there was a real person there. He couldn't help but marvel at how advanced naked-eye 3D technology had become during his ten years in prison. He wondered how VR and AR applications were progressing, and whether they were already being used in patient surgeries!
The person on the screen took two steps toward him, making it seem as if they were about to step out of the screen.
"Hello, Zhao Pengcheng," the man said.
Zhao Pengcheng asked, puzzled, "Who are you?"
"I am Kronos, the god of time and space."
Why am I locked up here?
"You will be punished for your sins, and you will need to undergo redemption through ice and fire to be freed. Welcome to—the Ice Purgatory!" With a wave of his Kronos, the shadow of his hand filled the surrounding ice walls, as if the entire ice cellar belonged to Kronos.
For a fleeting moment, Zhao Pengcheng almost thought he had truly arrived in the underworld, facing divine judgment, until he heard another voice:
"Alright, Kronos, don't let him freeze to death. The professor still has questions for us."
The voice sounded extremely eerie, completely different from the magnetic, godlike sound effects of Kronos. Then, he saw a Ghost appear on the screen, its pale, semi-transparent form appearing and disappearing in the shadows.
"Oh, well, Ghost, I've just been a little lonely since I've seen any strangers in a long time," said Kronos.
The Ghost glanced at Zhao Pengcheng, its gaze so intense it seemed capable of stealing one's soul. Even Zhao Pengcheng, who had dealt with countless corpses, was startled. But his fear stemmed not only from this, but more importantly, from the Mental Power he seemed to sense emanating from the Ghost.
What exactly is that thing?
Before he could think any further, the image on the screen changed.
Zhao Pengcheng saw an old man with white hair and beard sitting behind a desk. His shoulder-length hair was swollen, as if his brain had exploded and was radiating energy rays outward. He had a hardwood pipe in his mouth and was puffing away at Tushu.
Zhao Pengcheng looked at the old man and felt that he looked familiar, but he couldn't remember where he had seen him before. But the old man's image immediately reminded him of those world-destroying mad scientists in comics and movies.
It truly is a world brimming with anime and manga elements.
He had expected the Ghost and the divine Kronos to stand behind the old man, but they hadn't. They seemed to have vanished suddenly, and behind the old man stood a bald man with tattoos on his body who looked somewhat fierce. The man's demeanor was completely out of place with the old man and the previous style of the painting.
"Who are you?" Zhao Pengcheng asked.
"My name is Mei Yiqiu," the old man said.
Zhao Pengcheng finally remembered and exclaimed in surprise, "You are the leader of the Resistance and the Book Organization!"
"Oh, yes, to you we are a resistance organization, but to humanity we are hope!"