Chapter 495: A world full of "bugs"

Chapter 495: A world full of "bugs"

Chapter 495: A world full of "bugs" (5k)

At this moment, Zhao Duan, who was lying on the computer desk, opened his heavy eyelids. His vision was blurred at first, and then gradually became clear.

The first thing that came into his field of vision was the computer screen, which had entered the "screen saver" mode due to long-term inactivity.

Then, there are "sticky notes" of different colors pasted on the edge of the computer, each of which has a "reminder" written on it in neat handwriting.

This is his work habit. Since there are too many "to-do" items to remember to deal with every day, in order to avoid forgetting, he is used to posting them in the most conspicuous place.

Moving my eyes to the side, I saw a stack of folders on the back of the computer case, next to the black keyboard. The file names were written on the light blue "spine" of the cover.

At this moment, the top page was open, with a document issued by the superior printed in black and white.

Behind him, in the filing cabinet in the room, through the translucent cabinet door, the files were crowded like sardines in a can.

"Is this...my office?"

Zhao Duan felt dizzy and confused, as if he had just woken up from a hangover, and sat there in a daze.

"Drip-"

Outside the window, a car horn sounded in the distance. He subconsciously turned his head to look. In the dead of night in summer, a gust of wind came in through the window railings, blew through the half-closed curtains, and messed up his hair.

"I... am not in the old building in the palace?" Zhao Duan regained his senses little by little, and then, he suddenly remembered everything!
The memories of Yu State are too vivid, lively and complex to be explained by "dream".

A huge look of shock and astonishment appeared on his face, and a thought flashed through his mind like lightning:

"I...did I...travel back in time...?!"

This guess almost made him jump up. When he stood up suddenly, his body was unstable. He staggered and put his hand on the table. He pressed the keyboard, the computer turned on, and an electronic document lit up.

It was the speech he was drafting before he "traveled through time"... At the end of the unfinished manuscript, the cursor was still flashing!
Zhao Duan raised his eyes and looked at the time in the corner of the computer screen, which showed that it had just passed midnight.

The date also corresponds.

"I didn't die suddenly? After traveling through time for so long, I was just asleep for a moment here?!"

Zhao Duan couldn't believe it. Almost subconsciously, he pulled open the drawer and hurriedly took out a personal document from it.

Open!

On the one-inch photo that had just been stamped was his face on Earth, and in the name column, the word "Zhang Hui" was printed.

Zhang Hui... This was his former name. However, it seemed a little strange now.

"Did I really travel back in time? But I was only visualizing the murals on the fourth floor..."

Zhao Duan was in a trance. He was excited at first, but then felt disappointed. A year ago, when he was facing the danger of death, coming back had been his greatest wish.

But now, he clearly has someone he cares about in that world, as well as new family and friends...

family……

Zhao Duan was suddenly stunned. He grabbed a mobile phone from the table in a panic, opened the address book with a little unfamiliarity, and dialed his parents' phone number.

Dial...

However, the call was not successful. There was no busy tone, the signal was full, but strangely it just stayed on the "Dial" page.

“I can’t get through? That doesn’t make sense…” Due to the nature of his work, he has plenty of cell phone credit.

Zhao Duan opened WeChat again, and somehow opened the circle of friends with a little red dot, and then... the circle of friends was blank.

"Is there something wrong with the network?"

Zhao Duan was stunned. He quickly opened the browser on his computer, but found that he could not connect to the Internet. He turned on and off the cellular network on his phone. After repeated attempts, he was shocked to find that all networks were disconnected.

"Something's wrong..."

Zhao Duan realized something was wrong later. He suddenly took a step forward, pushed the door open and ran out of the room.

The sensor lights in the corridor lit up one by one, and Zhao Duan, wearing a shirt, trousers and leather shoes... or "Zhang Hui" ran along the stairs.

The sound of footsteps echoed in the building late at night.

After a while, he arrived at the first floor and headed straight to the security department in the compound...

……

After half an hour.

On a busy street nearby, Zhao Duan walked out of a 24-hour convenience store woodenly and sat down on a nearby road step without any image.

He threw his cell phone and keys on the ground, tore off the film of the cigarette he had just bought, shook out a cigarette, put it in his mouth, habitually used his hand to block the wind, clicked on the lighter, and immediately began to puff out smoke.

His eyes became blurred in the smoke.

"Is this... also a mural scroll?"

He whispered.

In the past half hour, he had tried various methods and had determined that something was wrong with this world.

On the surface, everything seems to be normal. People in this city are living "normal" lives and can communicate verbally.

However, all networks were disconnected, but the cash register system that relied on the network was functioning normally, and he could even scan the code to pay...

On the streets, food delivery riders were still delivering food on their bikes in the early hours of the morning, but the map routes on their phones did not move, and they strangely did not notice anything unusual...

In the Security Department, the acquaintances who used to greet me every day still recognize me, but if I chat with them carefully and indirectly, my colleagues will act as if they have forgotten something and are unable to respond correctly to certain topics.

Everything is like... a bug in this metropolis with a population of nearly ten million...

"This world seems to be functioning normally on the surface, but it cannot withstand close scrutiny... It's like an incredibly real dream..."

Then I think about it...Xu Zhenguan once said that the fourth mural is a strange world...

Then, everything is clear.

"I didn't travel back in time. I'm still in Dayu, but my consciousness entered the fourth mural... and this painting is actually the world in my memory. I am here with my original identity, and even the time is the time when I traveled back in time..."

Zhao Duan puffed out smoke with a slightly unfamiliar look, like a 35-year-old unemployed office worker, sitting on the curb and looking up at the sky filled with severe light pollution.

"So... could it be that the ability of the fourth painting is to construct a world based on my self-awareness? Just like when the 'Bewitched Master' invaded my memory? This can explain why it is a modern city..."

"...But Zhenbao also said that she had entered a strange world...It doesn't make sense for Zhenbao to construct a new world..."

"unless……"

Zhao Duan's eyes suddenly turned inward, his brows furrowed:

"Could it be that the fourth mural really depicts such a city? So, what I saw on the mural outside was like countless stars scattered around, which was exactly the night view of the metropolis that I saw when I looked down at this world?"

This guess is shocking...but...it is not impossible!

"I can travel through time, so why is it impossible that Dayu and Earth have some kind of connection? But how did Old Xu leave this scroll six hundred years ago?"

"It can't be that Old Xu is also a senior time traveler... It can't be that cliché, right?"

Zhao Duan found it absurd.

"No... it doesn't make sense. If Old Xu is also a time traveler, then it doesn't make sense that after six hundred years, he hasn't left any traces of 'time travel', right? Even if he is a rough guy, he can at least leave a poem like 'hoeing the field at noon'."

However, after traveling through time for more than a year, he had never found any trace of his "fellow countryman" in the world of Yu State, Emperor Taizu of Yu State.

"Was it erased? Hidden for some reason? Or is my guess wrong? Is Old Xu a native?"

"Old Zhang said that Old Xu rose to prominence after he entered the Mubei Forest and got a chance. In history, there were more than one person who entered there... If he was a native and accidentally had some kind of connection with the Earth, why did he leave behind such a painting?"

"The key is, how does all this relate to me?"

A mural left over from six hundred years ago recorded the city he passed through that day.

This is simply inexplicably bizarre.

"Moreover, I showed something special when I first practiced the Martial God inheritance... It's as if Old Xu knew that I would come into contact with these stone tablets six hundred years later..."

The more Zhao Duan thought about it, the more horrified he became. He felt that there was a thick fog, and the history of six hundred years ago seemed to be shrouded in a layer of fog.

He suddenly had a strong urge to enter the "Great Dream Scroll", follow Pei Niannu, and find Old Xu to ask him for the truth!
This seems to be the only two ways to solve the doubts in my heart. Another one is to explore the Mubei Forest, but it is too far away.

Unconsciously, the cigarette in his hand burned out. He felt the pain from the burn and came to his senses. He smiled bitterly and said, "Here, my body is just that of an ordinary person again."

Rubbing his face vigorously, Zhao Duan cheered himself up and decided to cheer up and take advantage of this entry to try some more exploration.

As for the disappointment of discovering that this was not Earth...it was quickly dispelled.

He had long given up hope of returning, and now that it had been proven to be a fantasy, he was not too disappointed.

"I don't know how big this place is. I wonder if I can drive back home... Well, considering the distance, I'm afraid it's unlikely."

"Although the network is down, since even the text in the folder is still there, are the books in the library still there?"

Zhao Duan muttered to himself, planning to hail a late-night taxi or something… However, just as he stretched out his hand and took a step to try to stop a car, he felt the world spinning.

……

The old building has four floors.

Zhao Duan suddenly opened his eyes and saw a lonely stone wall standing in front of him.

In the quaint house, candlelight was bright, and the empress, who looked like a fairy in white, stood by. When she saw him wake up, her eyes were filled with expectation:

"Did it work? Have you ever seen that world?"

Coming back? Because my current cultivation level is not enough to stay in this picture for too long? Zhao Duan was stunned, and then he felt a headache and mental exhaustion, as if he had been awake for three days and three nights, and felt extremely tired.

"I... vaguely overlooked a strange... city."

Zhao Duan pinched his brows, urging the green lotus in his sea of ​​consciousness to sway in order to restore his energy.

After hesitating for a moment, he stammered and tried.

He did not say that the visualization failed, but gave an ambiguous answer, mainly to test the answer.

Xu Zhenguan's eyes lit up, he leaned forward, and asked hurriedly:

"What city? Are they the strange buildings that are taller than the tallest buildings in the capital, with pillars that are bright but have no lights? Are there also carriages with lights on that run very fast on the road without horses?"

"..." Zhao Duan's heart sank, and he said:
"It seems so. But when I tried to see it clearly, I failed. Your Majesty, what is that?"

The naive empress was completely defenseless and took the initiative to reveal key information. It was obvious that this "Human World" did indeed depict the cities on Earth.

Rather than some illusion directed at others.

Xu Zhenguan did not show much surprise, but paced and wandered around the room excitedly:
"You are indeed special. You see the same world as me. Unlike Eunuch Hai, even though he was a half-step celestial being at his peak, when he looks at this picture, all he can barely see is an ancient city from ancient times."

What? Only Zhenbao and I can see the modern city? The royal children and worshippers of all dynasties cannot see it?

Zhao Duan was stunned again.

Xu Zhenguan was so happy that he didn't notice his abnormality, or he thought it was a normal reaction to seeing the mysterious city, and said:
“It seems that either one must have royal blood, or the painting has changed in the past hundred years and is different from the past… The fact that you cannot penetrate the depths now must be due to your lack of cultivation. There is no rush for this matter.

As for what the world inside is, I have no idea... I had already successfully visualized and entered it with the help of dragon energy, but the time I stayed there was very short each time.

Moreover, that world is extremely strange. Its language and writing are completely different from those of Dayu and are unheard of.

My cultivation disappeared in it, and in the past two years, I have barely mastered some of its language and writing, as well as a few rules of that world... I haven't been able to go deep...

Unfortunately, the dynasty is in rebellion right now, and I have no time to explore and explore the method of ascending to the human immortal... You are not yet capable of entering it.

Otherwise, I can take you to get familiar with and tour that strange world, and explain to you the many strange things in it..."

At this moment, Xu Zhenguan was like a proud child who wanted to share the treasure with his friend...

An expression that said, "It's a pity you can't go in now, otherwise you would definitely be scared."

Zhao Duan pursed his lips and dared not say a word. He thought to himself that it was fortunate that you had not explored this world deeply and had not yet come into contact with "ancient poetry" and "history", otherwise the secret of my plagiarism would have been exposed...

It's just social death...

Well, it seems that if the Eight Princes Rebellion ends and Xu Zhenguan has extra energy, he will sooner or later find clues of Zhao Duan's copying in the murals...

But Zhao Duan felt that when that time came, Zhenbao would be the one who would be shocked... Good fellow, you are an alien demon, yet you are so shameless as to say that you would take a native like me to tour the Earth...

However, he finally swallowed the countless complaints in his heart.

At the moment, he was not ready to expose himself, even though the two of them were already in a relationship, but the secret of the time traveler was too big, so he could keep it a secret for as long as possible...

Anyway, Zhenbao won't be able to find out in a short time...

"In that case, I look forward to that day." Zhao Duan said seriously, and then reacted: "Your Majesty, can you take me in for a tour? Can two people enter the same visualization picture?"

This has never happened before.

"This fourth scroll is quite special. All the monks enter the same scroll, but I have never tried it before," Xu Zhenguan explained, smiling and winking:
"Then it's a deal. But you must keep your mouth shut about what you saw today. Don't tell anyone else."

"Of course." Zhao Duan nodded and took a deep look at the stone wall. "I will never mention this to outsiders."

The king and his ministers reached an agreement, and the painting viewing tonight should come to an end.

"You look so listless. It must be due to the continuous visualization. Go back and rest." Xu Zhenguan looked at Zhao Duan who seemed weak.

Zhao Duan heard this and hurriedly pulled himself together: "I am full of energy and would like to sleep with you in the palace."

Tut - Xu Zhenguan was used to this guy's thick skin and his ability to talk, and he had experienced three days and three nights of continuous bombardment together, but his cheeks still turned red and his face became stern:

"Don't talk nonsense. I have already entered the heavenly realm, and you are still thinking about sex. Do you want to lower your cultivation level, which you have worked so hard to improve?"

Zhao Duan's face fell. The bad situation he had imagined had become a reality. There was a gap between the two of them in their cultivation. This meant that if they practiced together, Zhao Duan would become a useless person...

"I have a bold idea. If my king and I don't practice dual cultivation, but simply do that..." He thought calmly for a moment and made a suggestion.

Xu Zhenguan seemed to smile, his eyes staring at his lower abdomen:

"Can you suppress the dragon soul?"

Zhao Duan suddenly became depressed: "I can't hold it back."

During the three days in Baihua Village, he discovered that once he had sex, the dragon soul would automatically absorb and exhale to practice, starting a dual cultivation process that he couldn't stop at all.

Xu Zhenguan said with a straight face: "I can't suppress it either. Even though I am already a celestial being, the dragon soul has some kind of blood suppression on the inheritance of the Martial God."

Zhao Duan was dejected. Although he was mentally prepared, he could not hide his disappointment when he faced this cruel reality.

Doesn't that mean that if I want to touch it again next time, I can only wait until I advance to the level of a celestial being? Well, if I use something else...

While he was thinking about this dirty idea, Xu Zhen looked at his depressed expression, and his brows softened. After hesitating for a moment, he suddenly said:
"I have already ordered people to prepare gifts and send them to your home in the next two days to propose marriage."

"Ah?" Zhao Duan, who was looking downcast, suddenly stood up: "Propose marriage?"

Under the lights, the empress with a rosy face maintained her regal demeanor, turned her head away, avoided his eyes, raised her neck, and tried to pretend to be a female boss:
"Since you are the emperor's husband, I should send someone to propose marriage. However, the situation is critical now, so it is not appropriate to arrange it. Our wedding can only be postponed."

Zhao Duan was extremely surprised and suddenly understood what she meant:
Given the current situation, it is impossible to hold a grand wedding celebration at this time.

But he could propose marriage, which would be equivalent to officially announcing his identity as the emperor's husband, rather than just a hint like in the New Year's banquet.

"Ah Zhen..." Zhao Duan couldn't help but speak softly. In the ambiguous atmosphere, he took a deep breath and said seriously:

"Then wait until the rebellion is quelled, and then I will..."

He wanted to say marry, but it felt wrong. He wanted to say marry, but it felt even more wrong... He couldn't help but choke.

"Get out of here now." Xu Zhenguan urged with a blushing face and a pounding heart.

"Oh." Zhao Duan picked up the lantern and walked out. Suddenly he stopped and said:
"By the way, I plan to lead the Shenji Battalion to quell the Qingzhou rebels outside the city."

Xu Zhenguan was stunned for a moment, and looked at him in surprise, as if he had guessed something: "How sure are you?"

"Ninety-eight percent."

"Then just go for it." Xu Zhenguan did not hesitate.

Even though Zhao Duan had never had any experience in leading troops in battle, as long as he proposed, she would agree directly, as if she didn't care even if she failed.

-

These few chapters are laying the groundwork and the story is progressing a bit slowly. We will wrap it up and move on to the new plot.

(End of this chapter)