Rules-related weird stories: 4016.

Chapter 626 The boy who slayed the dragon eventually became the dragon himself, didn't he?
Mao Feiyang is one of them.

At this moment, Mao Feiyang was looking at the dome above the relief sculpture, and on that dome, there was a piece of glass that he had not noticed before. The glass was covered with religious patterns, and dim light and shadow floated in the dark night...

Rays of light streamed down from the dome, like the cool moonlight over Swan Lake.

Mao Feiyang was like a black swan, with the light, like snowflakes, falling on him.

Those snowflakes looked like pieces of ashes.

Meanwhile, Mao Feiyang was constantly absorbing the ashes.

Just as Lin Yi's will entered the art classroom, he seemed to sense it in real time. His body trembled slightly, and then he quickly straightened up and looked in the direction where Lin Yi was.

"Old Lin?" Mao Feiyang muttered softly.

Lin Yi was startled, but immediately replied, "It's me... Maozi, we're here."

Mao Feiyang wasn't surprised; instead, he smiled with relief: "They've finally arrived. Let's get started."

Tian Bufan said, "Old Lin, go and possess the Russian's body. From now on, the three of us will be one."

"Okay!" Lin Yi responded, and floated down onto Mao Feiyang, like a snowflake falling from the sky, melting onto Mao Feiyang's body.

Mao Feiyang's body trembled slightly, and a hidden glint flashed in his eyes. He looked at his hands as if they were a brand new body: "It's been a long time since I felt whole... a long time since I felt a sense of reunion... If Wei Sang and Kuai Kuai could come too."

“They all have their own things to do. Kuai Kuai will pick you up with 'Bai Fangshuo's' student ID after you finish your mission,” Tian Bufan said. “From that moment until you leave, you will be 'Bai Fangshuo'.”

Mao Feiyang said, "Okay... Let's set off now. I've already prepared everything."

"Okay, let's set off immediately," Tian Bufan said.

With Tian Bufan's instruction, Mao Feiyang quickly got up from his seat and followed the line of people queuing to get drawing boards and paintbrushes.

"Xiao Mao, why are you here to get a drawing board too?" Yan Jinming had already left the art classroom with his own tasks, and the one who asked this question was another art student who was somewhat familiar with Yan Jinming.

"Yes, I also want to do my part," Mao Feiyang said.

The art student hesitated for a moment, then thought that although Mao Feiyang was a freshman, the amount of green powder particles he could sense and the amount of extraordinary substances he absorbed at the "Feast" were far beyond the standard of ordinary beginner art students. Considering Mu Daxian's care for him, he stopped questioning him and nodded, saying, "Alright then, wherever you go, remember to be careful."

"It's best to avoid areas marked 'No Entry' by signs; those areas are usually guarded by senior students."

Lin Yi felt a warmth in his heart upon hearing this; these art students were all so caring towards their junior.

Unfortunately, they were there specifically for the observatory.

Mao Feiyang nodded: "Okay, senior, I understand."

Before long, it was Mao Feiyang's turn. He picked out a large sword from the easel, folded it a few times, and folded it into a tortoise shell shape, carrying it on his back.

Lin Yi whispered, "Actually, I think the katana that art student in front was carrying was pretty good too."

Mao Feiyang curled his lip: "The drawing board is just proof of leaving. It's too suspicious if we don't carry a drawing board on our backs. Do you really expect us to use the drawing board to fight the crisis that the observatory is about to face?"

Lin Yi was also taken aback for a moment, then immediately nodded: "That's right, that's right..."

"I'm leaving." Mao Feiyang grabbed some paintbrushes and a palette, then left the classroom fully equipped.

“Huh…Huh…”

A chilly wind blew through the corridors of the art building, and a damp atmosphere began to permeate every inch of the space.

Lin Yi glanced at the time; it was already 10 PM.

Mao Feiyang followed the flow of art students unhurriedly through the corridor. After walking for five or six minutes, he arrived at the spiral staircase in the lobby of the art building. There, a wooden sign clearly indicated the direction of the observatory.

Of course, there was also an "X" painted in red in that direction.

The older students were also heading in that direction, and Mao Feiyang naturally followed without hesitation.

After turning another corner, an eerie atmosphere, ten or even a hundred times colder than that of an ordinary art building corridor, suddenly filled the corridor.

If the previous art building corridor had a distinctly European Renaissance feel, then when Mao Feiyang stepped into this corridor, the atmosphere all around him was that of a dilapidated monastery.

On the stone pillars in the corridor, more and more symbols similar to the secret symbols on the inner wall of the clock tower gradually appeared, but some of these symbols were full of blasphemous aura.

In the niches between the stone pillars, there were also broken sculptures. Lin Yi had never seen so many broken sculptures before. Some of these broken sculptures were in the shape of nuns, while others were in the form of half-human, half-animal figures, such as the winged lion of ancient Babylon, the sphinx of ancient Egypt, gods with animal heads and human bodies, centaurs of ancient Greece, and statues of Nuwa and Fuxi from ancient China...

Lin Yi had never seen so many richly detailed and broken sculptures before, and he could clearly sense the strong obsession that existed within them.

This is a dilapidated sculpture gallery of unwavering dedication!

Numerous sculptures lie dormant here in a state of agony, their fates unknown, and they exude an aura of both protection and tyranny.

"These sculptures...they're so rich in elements!" Lin Yi couldn't help but exclaim.

Tian Bufan said, "According to the legal code, the Black Moon Outpost is a shining light that existed before the birth of human civilization. It is not an exaggeration to see anything here that carries the cultural flavor of all over the world."

Lin Yi also remembered that Tian Bufan had indeed told him these things. The "first apostles" went to sea in batches. Some returned, while others went to other places, which gave rise to all kinds of civilizations.

Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that this is the birthplace of civilization.

"Are these sculptures here also to prevent the gray fog from invading?" Lin Yi asked.

Tian Bufan said, "I guess so, but I'm not really sure."

"Are you genuinely unaware, or is it just that you don't want to say it because the time isn't right?" Lin Yi asked.

Tian Bufan smiled and said, "Then I'll tell you, they're here to prevent people like us from getting lost in the observatory and returning in some unknown and bizarre form. Do you believe me?"

Lin Yi shuddered upon hearing this. Could it be that Young Master Tian was referring to the fact that these few people were in their twilight years and had returned with the Red-Haired Whirlwind to kill them?

but……

"The way you put it, the more believable it seems to me..." Lin Yi pursed his lips. "The dragon-slaying youth ends up becoming the dragon himself, right?"

"In the Möbius strip time paradox, we ultimately become what we tried to fight against?"

"Wait a minute... wait a minute... I think you've got me hooked." "Weren't we just here to get the principal's notebook? Like, grab it and leave... Could it be... not?"

"Could it be related to that so-called 'side quest'?"

"Are we fucking dragon slayers?"

A flurry of thoughts suddenly flooded Lin Yi's mind, and he blurted them all out: "Young Master Tian, ​​say something! Why aren't you answering me?"

Tian Bufan's voice drifted over leisurely: "I'm just speechless. How could you come up with so many random things?"

"We're here to retrieve the principal's notebook, that's right."

"Secondly, after picking up the laptop, we'll see what happens next."

"We're not going to slay the dragon?" Lin Yi was still unwilling to give up. He didn't know if it was Tian Bufan's half-joking words that opened up his mind, but at this moment, becoming a dragon-slaying youth seemed like a more reasonable change...

Otherwise, how could there be the saying "I'll defend Night Man alone"?
"Slay your sister!" Mao Feiyang's words were filled with a smug, dog-like aura. "The boy who slays the dragon eventually becomes the dragon himself. Does that mean we all become dragons together? Two tigers cannot share one mountain. Won't so many dragons fight if they're all together?"

Lin Yi seemed to be infected by the dog's smug aura and couldn't help but mutter under his breath, "Uh... what if it's someone like Tiamat?"

"Old Lin, you motherfucker..." Mao Feiyang couldn't hold back any longer, "How come you're even more argumentative than me? What have you been through these past few days?"

"Uh..." Faced with the Russian's questioning, Lin Yi suddenly felt guilty. Of course, he didn't dare to say that when you were playing the hellish difficulty level in the art building, he could at least communicate with the boss and Li Huiyuan.

However, when he thought of the boss and Li Huiyuan, he thought of what happened last night.

So he quickly changed the subject and asked, "Russian, did anything happen last night?"

Mao Feiyang was slightly taken aback: "You mean?"

"For example, my future self descends into your body through the boundary of a dream, and then you summon Li Huiyuan, or something like that?"

Mao Feiyang was taken aback: "Wait, who is Li Huiyuan?"

"Huh?" Lin Yi was taken aback. "You don't know Li Huiyuan?"

"Should I know?"

"Weren't you asleep?"

"I'm in the art building, how the hell am I supposed to sleep? Old Lin, are you kidding me? I'm busy too, you know!"

"Uh, it was my oversight, I'm so sorry..." Lin Yi quickly admitted his mistake.

“Okay, I was just kidding you…” Mao Feiyang said, “Although I can’t sleep, I can still observe some things through my field of vision… just like you did back then.”

Lin Yi suddenly realized what was happening.

Mao Feiyang added, "However, I don't have that much free time to waste watching your daily life... I only saw some of the more crucial information."

"I see..." Lin Yi nodded slightly. It seemed that Li Huiyuan's part was not a big deal in their plan.

He then asked, "So, what exactly happened last night?"

Mao Feiyang refused, saying, "I can't say."

Lin Yi's heart stirred slightly, while Mao Feiyang continued, "Last night, you did indeed descend through the boundary of the dream, but... it wasn't about anything related to Li Huiyuan."

Lin Yi asked, "Has something bad happened?"

Mao Feiyang shook his head again: "I can't say."

"All I can say is that what you told me is unrelated to our mission, so you don't need to ask any more questions."

"If the future changes, you won't know these things, and I will forget them. If the future doesn't change, you will naturally know what to do when the time comes."

“If I really say it out loud, things that haven’t happened yet could very well be led into a new paradoxical cycle.”

"Then... how did you 'block' them?" Lin Yi couldn't help but ask.

Mao Feiyang said, "I just treated it as a very short dream, using the dream to overwrite that part of my cognition."

To categorize events that have already occurred but must be kept outside of one's cognition as "dreams"... Is this self-deceptive tactic also part of dream studies? Lin Yi's heart stirred slightly, and he couldn't help but purse his lips: "Alright then..."

"Cheer up, Lao Lin," Tian Bufan said. "We should be out of the corridor soon... It's still quite a distance from here to the observatory."

Mao Feiyang said, "That's right, we still need to pass through a gathering place of fanatic leaders."

"A gathering place for fanatic leaders?" Lin Yi couldn't help but picture the fake humans wearing tattered dark green cloaks in the matrix of the desolate land.

Even the bizarre art teacher treated them with utmost respect; clearly, those were the leaders of fanaticism.

"Those fanatical leaders are actually staying in the art building?" He looked surprised.

"Otherwise?" Mao Feiyang retorted. "They are essentially transformed art students and art teachers, not pseudo-humans or nocturnal creatures. Of course they exist in the art building."

Lin Yi was taken aback. Yes, he had almost forgotten that fanatics and pseudo-people were not the same in essence. They were not "dead" units at all, but people who had sunk into depravity while still alive, or... extraordinary units.

Mao Feiyang said, "Their understanding was destroyed by the pollution, but the Night Watchers and the teachers still believed that they could reverse their understanding, so they used some kind of pollution field to attract them to certain deep areas in the art building, such as the area near the observatory."

Lin Yi asked, puzzled, "Aren't you afraid of raising a tiger that will eventually become a threat?"

Mao Feiyang shook his head and said, "No."

"Beneath the 'sanctuary,' all are ants."

"Even the most powerful fanatical leader cannot withstand the baptism of the Night's Watch, who rule the 'Sanctuary.'"

"The Night's Watch seems to want to use them for something else, I'm not sure of the specifics, but it may be related to something deep in the sea."

"The direction that the fanatical leaders are focusing on seems to be somewhat similar to what the Night's Watch is pursuing... so they intentionally left them behind to continue their research."

Lin Yi said, "Just because the Night Watchers have the power to crush them at any time, they deliberately... raise a group of extremely dangerous units? The risk is far too great!"

(End of this chapter)