this infinite world

——In the story.

"What does it mean?"

After hearing Zheng Zha's sudden words and his conclusion that was contrary to his usual lazy thinking attitude, the remaining members of the Zhongzhou team looked at each other in bewilderment. In the end, Qi Tengyi asked first, "What do you mean by everything is predetermined? And what is 'story'..."

"It means exactly what it says... In Doraemon, isn't there a secret item, a pair of shoes that can enter a storybook?"

Zheng Zha sighed softly and rubbed his temples that were slightly swollen due to the pressure. His tone was a bit helpless and deep: "The environment we are in now is just like this... What we first stepped into was not the real world of the movie "Watchmen", but directly fell into a story constructed by a weaver."

"But compared to the 'outsiders' who use secret props and can actually interfere with the development of the story, we are more like plot NPCs who are lost in the story without knowing it."

——Because it is a "story", it can be reset more than once. At most, you just need to close the book that records the story and then read it from the beginning. And precisely because it is a "story", it needs the so-called "protagonist". A story without a protagonist has no value in reading.

“The three elements of a story… character, plot, and setting.”

Zheng Zha said, "A story is what happens to specific characters in specific situations. But in the world of Watchmen, there is a background of two superpowers in the Cold War, and there is also a plot planned by the Pharaoh, but the only thing missing is the protagonist of the story, Rorschach."

"Perhaps we are in a world where Rorschach does not exist, considering that a significant part of the content of the movie Watchmen is the thoughts and feelings in Rorschach's diary and the narration of real events, which serve as narration and proof of his experience."

"You mean, we are now in Rorschach's diary?" Qi Tengyi thought thoughtfully: "Because it is a diary written by him in the first person, he does not exist in this story, because he is originally a part of this world..."

"Yes, that's what I want to say, and this can also explain why Dr. Manhattan has never appeared in this world, but this world is full of traces of him."

Zheng Zha slowly raised his right hand, looked at the Lord God Watch on his hand, and slowly said to the task prompt with only one line: "As for why the Lord God only gave us such a simple task, the reason is very simple, because only by finding Dr. Manhattan can we leave this box and return to the real world..."

"Perhaps this is what the Lord wants to tell us and what he has been hinting at us all along. Because this world is truly a man-made box, a box within a box located inside the world of Watchmen..."

The box, the creator of the box, and the outside world, the creator of the story...

"I think someone told me this theory before..."

Suddenly, Qi Teng covered his forehead with his hands. He said in confusion, "Is it Chu Xuan? No, it doesn't seem to be him, but who else could it be? There should be another wise man in our Zhongzhou team, a wise man who is different from Chu Xuan, but also knows a lot of things..."

"I think that must be Yang Yun, the real captain of our Zhongzhou team... the one who has been leading us forward all along."

Unlike the previous situation where only a name remained in his mind and the rest of the story was unknown, Zheng Zha seemed to have drawn an outline in his mind. Fighting Yinzhou, defeating the demons, and destroying the gods... and the many slightly strange things before, after adding the variable named "Yang Yun", at this moment, they all seemed to have an explanation. "...But Zheng Zha, thinking about Yang Yun can't change our current situation."

Although he knew it was inappropriate to speak in the current atmosphere, Luo Yinglong, who had just joined the Zhongzhou team and was not very familiar with Yang Yun, still spoke up to remind him. In his opinion, solving the problem at hand was obviously more urgent: "Even if we understand that we are in 'other people's stories', the problem is still not solved. If we can't find Dr. Manhattan according to the Lord's instructions, then everything is in vain..."

"There is a way. The key to the outside world has been fully gathered."

Zheng Zha smiled and answered Luo Yinglong's question. The man opened his clenched left fist, and in the palm of his hand was the medal belonging to the Comedian, which contained trace elements of Dr. Manhattan.

"The story begins with the murder of the Comedian."

And on Zheng Zha's right hand was the red cat belonging to the Pharaoh that Chu Xuan found behind the chair.

“Cats are compasses that can guide us along the way.”

“…I still don’t understand what you are doing now.”

Luo Yinglong looked at Zheng Zha, who had a badge in his left hand and a cat in his right hand. Zheng Zha looked like a bad acrobat. He shook his head helplessly and said, "Even though I know that the cat and the badge are important, I still don't understand what you are going to do and how to use these two things..."

Zheng Zha did not answer directly, but said: "There is such a theory in the movie Watchmen that every living thing has an intrinsic field, or an internal force field, which binds all the atoms of the living thing to their proper positions. This is a quantum fingerprint composed of four basic interactions, and each person is unique."

"...It sounds like some kind of folk science theory." Qi Tengyi shook his head helplessly on the other side: "Zheng Zha, you don't really believe it, do you?"

"Each world has its own rules. Existence is reasonable." Zheng Zha said firmly: "And don't you think this theory is very similar to the 'light of the soul'?"

"You mean..." Qi Teng's face was full of surprise at first, then turned into shock. After a few seconds, his face gradually became enlightened, as if all the previous doubts and confusions were suddenly connected.

"Yes, the ability of my spiritual light, 'Sky-walking Dragon', is to strengthen and sublimate."

Between Zheng Zha's hands, a radiance of spiritual light shone: "So next, I will upgrade these two items that are directly related to Dr. Manhattan..."

"Then, get out of this 'box' and find Dr. Manhattan's trace." (End of this chapter)