I'm trapped in a block

Chapter 661 Ask
After witnessing the rise and fall of more and more races, Vine also understands very well that the world is cruel and dangerous for many races.

Peace is something that is hard to come by. Killing is part of the ecology. The strong prey on the weak, and the fittest survive.

From a certain perspective, peace will only bring decline, and killing can stir up the mud at the bottom of the water, enriching the "nutrients" of the entire water area.

The vines have no way to change such rules, and can only try their best to satisfy the wishes of those weak creatures, collect their eyes, and carry those eliminated souls to keep their gaze going.

After learning about Wenwen's origin, Tengman began to train it frequently. Wenwen learned very quickly and before long, Wenwen could have simple communication with Tengman.

"You are a Shadow." The vine tried to make Wenwen recognize his origins, but as the Everthirsty told it, Shadows would not consider themselves Shadows. Their minds would automatically distort racial ideas and replace them with other information.

"I'm just asking."

Wenwen stretched out the vine tendril whose color was becoming increasingly brighter, shook it, and replied.

"No, I didn't mean your name, I meant your race."

"My name is Wenwen..."

It is still an irrelevant answer. No matter what method the vine uses to tell it the "truth", it will find a way to avoid it if it asks.

Moreover, as Wenwen looks more and more like Vine, its imitation becomes more and more comprehensive.

Even began to imitate vines to collect eyes...

"Why do you collect eyes?" The vine asked worriedly, looking at the eyeballs curled up on the black tendrils.

"Because you collect eyes."

“I collect eyes so that I can see the world with them.”

"Me too." Wenwen replied.

Ivy looked at the confused and asked, her heart filled with worry.

It knew clearly that Wenwen collected eyes not for the same purpose as it did, but just for imitation.

The shadows have no idea what they are doing, nor do they know the meaning of what they are doing. Their thoughts are also "copied" and completely follow the thoughts of the person being imitated.

They think that these thoughts are their own, but they don’t know that these thoughts are “shaped” and are exactly the same as the ones being imitated. Just like the cognitive distortion they are experiencing, these followers will not feel that there is anything wrong at all. Only “onlookers” can see the reason.

"Wenwen, listen carefully... You don't really want to collect eyes, it's just because you are from the shadow and you copied my mind, so you think so."

Tengman tried to explain the logic to Wenwen, but cognitive distortion always existed. Wenwen didn't think there was anything wrong with him. When the fact that "I am from the shadow" could not be established, all explanations about autonomous thoughts and subjective behaviors would become castles in the air.

"Ask, there is no self." The vine realized this terrible thing.

Under the limbs that were wriggling like a living creature, there was an empty shadow.

The shadow turns everything it receives into "labels" and sticks them on the empty black body, whitewashing its meaningless existence.

"Behavior" is a label.

"Thought" is also a label.

Even "self" is a label.

These labels form a "vine-like" creature. Shadow uses the biological body sewn together by these labels to exist in this world, but underneath those colorful labels, there is still empty darkness.

Shadows are meaningless things in themselves. They are just places where light cannot reach. The illuminated area outside the shadow outline is "existent", while the area inside the outline is "non-existent".

And to follow the shadow is to create oneself with the light beyond the outline, but one is also trapped by the light.

After realizing this, the vine understood that this was a characteristic of the Shadow and was difficult to change. If it wanted to awaken Wenwen's self-awareness, it had to remove that powerful cognitive distortion. "Only by letting it understand that it is a Shadow can it lead to self-awareness..."

But how can we make it realize that it is from the shadows?

The vine couldn't think of any solution, so it decided to ask the Eternal Thirst again.

Soon, it found the Everthirst through the jelly left in the Everthirst's library.

“Do you have any new knowledge?”

"Yes." Vine told the Everthirsty what he had seen and heard during his recent journey.

"Is there any way to make Congying realize that he is Congying?" Tengman asked his own question.

"It can't be done." The Eternal Thirst gave an affirmative answer: "A shadow will never realize that it is a shadow, unless..."

"Unless what?"

"Unless it's no longer a shadow..."

“Once you are no longer in the shadows, you will realize that you used to be in the shadows.” The Everthirsty gave a strange answer.

"But what's the point of realizing that you used to be in the shadows only after you're no longer in the shadows?" Ivy asked in return.

It was somewhat unable to understand the Eternal Thirst's meaning. Only by making the Shadow realize that he was a "Shadow" could he break free from the constraints of his Shadow nature. If he was no longer a Shadow, then there would be no point in breaking free from the constraints.

The Eternal Thirst did not answer, but instead tapped the surrounding jellies with its pipe-like tentacles, and then pointed at Wenwen who was following the vines.

“Can you see its sync rate?”

"Of course, its synchronous orbit is exactly the same as mine, and its running position is exactly the same."

"You have to make it change, make it realize in advance that it is from the shadows."

"In advance?" Teng Man was a little confused.

"Yes, in advance. Let its mind recognize that it is a slave race in advance. Then it will change and break the shackles of the slave race..."

The Eternal Thirst introduced a mysterious method to the vines:

As if the shadow's mind and body were two different synchronous tracks.

What it needs to do is to speed up its thinking and reach the stage of "recognizing that it is a shadow" in advance, bypassing the powerful cognitive distortion. At that time, the shackles of the shadow race will be broken, the shadow will have self-awareness, and it will no longer be a shadow.

At the same time, the body will also change.

"To put it simply, it is to allow the mind to reach the 'future' that has already broken free of its constraints, and then react to the 'present'."

Since it has changed now, it will definitely change in the future.

So use the certain future to define the certain present.

This can be easily done by slightly changing the speed of time in the two tracks.

The vine quickly understood this method, but it still had a question.

"What if it is always from the shadow? Then wouldn't the mind never reach the stage of 'realizing that it is from the shadow'?"

"Of course, the future is certain, but whether it is or not is still unknown. If it is, it is, and if it is not, it is not. But whether it is or not, you have to try it yourself..."

(End of this chapter)