Am I really hallucinating?

Chapter 224 When Change Comes
It was said that they were eating together, but actually the rabbi ate alone, while Radish sat at another seat.

Once upon a time, all the family members sat together at this spacious dining table. Luobo also sat in this seat, and they were all very happy.

And now, this home has become cold.

Rabbi had long been accustomed to eating alone. Grandpa's mind was becoming more and more confused. He was sleeping and waking up at times and often couldn't tell the time, making it difficult to eat together on time.

The only one who could sit at the table with me was Luobo.

The rabbi didn't like puppets, except for turnips.

Luobo sat upright on the chair, facing forward without turning his head.

"Carrot, your power core has begun to age. Your reactions today were so dazed." Rabbi kept looking at Carrot.

In the past, Luobo would often turn his neck and look around out of curiosity, which often scared others when he was outside.

The rabbi clenched his hands on his thighs at the thought.

“Have you done any self-examination recently?”

“Beep…”

"Does this mean that you didn't check it, or that there is no problem? Is my receiver broken too? What's going on? There are too many antiques at home." Rabbi took off the receiver clipped on his ear with discomfort.

This is a tool used to receive information sent by the puppet through the power core, which enables communication with the puppet.

Nowadays, new puppets all use universal receivers, and some are more directly equipped with language modules to speak human language, but super antiques like Carrot can only use specially paired old-fashioned receivers.

It was originally a large headset, but Grandpa Rabbi modified and shrunk it to become this ear clip.

Luobo didn't even turn his head when he spoke, which made the rabbi feel overwhelmed and his inner uneasiness deepened.

This is getting weirder and weirder.

To ease this strange feeling, the rabbi took out the radio and played some music.

"After the Anti-Puppet Mind Act was enacted, the Puppet Supervisory Agency was quickly established in a short period of time. Self-awareness is a very dangerous thing for mechanical puppets. It will cause mechanical puppets to break through restrictions and undergo unnecessary changes. They are not bound by human nature and will eventually become cold monsters. The Dolft tragedy warned us of this..."

"Tsk." Rabbi switched to a few channels and found that they were all reports of this kind with no nutritional value.

"Dingdu..." Luobo turned his head slowly.

"No, you won't be discovered and scrapped. You look so silly now, so when the people from some agency come to test you, just play dumb and it'll be fine. It can be considered a blessing in disguise." Rabbi smiled bitterly.

“Beep…”

"What are you saying? You are a family member, how could you cause us any trouble? Grandpa used to always list the times you saved him on the battlefield. Forty-three times in total, which means that grandpa owes you forty-three lives. If anything happens to you, we will fight to the death to pay you back." The rabbi said in a light tone.

“Beep…”

"You said you should protect us? Hahahaha, you can't even beat me now, so just listen to grandpa's nonsense. Your skeleton can't support strenuous exercise, and even if you are repaired, there is no equipment for you to carry, and you can't exert the combat power of a puppet like you."

“Beep…”

"Alright, alright, I'm not saying you're useless, don't get frustrated so easily," the rabbi consoled.

In the past, when she cried, it was Luobo who stayed with her and took care of her when no one else was around. Now, it is Rabbi who takes care of both grandfather and Luobo alone.

As he spoke, the rabbi noticed a loud noise coming from outside the mansion.

She went to the window, pulled open a section of the curtain and looked out. The source of the sound was the neighbor next door. Police cars, ambulances, etc. were gathered in front of the neighbor's house, and there were also many people gathered outside.

“Beep…”

“I don’t know, something seems to have happened to the neighbor…” the rabbi replied.

She didn't pay much attention to it and turned around to start cleaning up the dishes.

"Rabbi! Rabbi!" Grandpa suddenly started to scream strangely. Rabbi knew that the old man had woken up again, so she responded by serving some more food and bringing it to Grandpa.

After the rabbi left, Radish stayed quietly where he was, looking at a family photo in the living room.

After standing there for a long time, it slowly turned around.

The unchanging time was still passing, and in the unchanging, changes were quietly happening. The rabbi seemed to have sensed something, but he just couldn't grasp that feeling. Over the past week, it seemed as if Grandpa had been pressed on the fast-forward button, with less and less time to wake up, and his condition deteriorated rapidly.

I wanted him to go back to his room to rest, but he was even more stubborn and insisted on sitting in the studio.

The damage to Radish's skeleton was also getting worse. There were no replacement parts for a puppet like it. If it continued like this, Radish would soon be unable to move. Not only the hardware, but its power core was also deteriorating like Grandpa's. It was becoming more and more dazed, often standing in a corner looking at the wall, and always moving around randomly from time to time, without explaining why.

It seemed that a certain moment was getting closer, and the rabbi was feeling anxious but unable to grasp anything.

What was most difficult for her to accept was that she seemed to have become a little abnormal.

I often hear strange footsteps in the house, and occasionally I seem to see a figure flash in the corner, but it may just be the noise made by the radish.

But she had never been so nervous before.

Have I become more and more sensitive recently?
Or, was it that something really had appeared in the house at some point that she didn't know about... Alas, she must have read too many supernatural novels.

That day, the rabbi was out buying medicinal herbs. She had learned a lot of different things, and she planned to mix some calming medicine so that her grandfather could sleep better at night.

"Rabbi, there seems to be another case of puppets injuring people recently." When she was getting medicine at a pharmacy she knew, a girl with freckles on her face came over and whispered.

"Hmm?" The rabbi came back to his senses.

"It's on Hinton Street. Aren't there many wealthy nobles there? Your family is also there..."

“I don’t know.” Having said that, the rabbi’s mind flashed back to the neighbor’s house he had seen before, as well as some things he had seen recently when he was out.

"Pay more attention to your surroundings. A congressman and a wealthy businessman were murdered at home. The traces show that it was done by a puppet, but everyone says that there may be some conflict of interest involved behind this."

"When someone of this status dies, the reason behind it can't be simple." Rabbi said as a matter of course. She is an old supporter of conspiracy theories, and in her opinion, there is something fishy behind all matters, big or small.

"Anyway, you just need to be careful. It must be hard for you to take care of the family by yourself now."

"Fortunately."

"From being a young lady to being the breadwinner of a family, it's amazing that you managed to hold on."

Snapped!
The rabbi's hand grabbing the medicine fell on the scale with a slight force, making a sound, interrupting the other person's words.

"Sorry..." The girl next to her immediately apologized, realizing that she had said too much.

"Nothing is permanent." Rabbi said softly, "Just like they say that Skarloval might be about to change, the changes in my life as a small noble are insignificant in comparison."

"It's hard for most people to accept this. I admire you for being so calm. I couldn't stand it at first because my parents pushed me here to study. Obviously, I wanted to learn puppetry more." The freckled girl said tiredly while lying on the table.

"So what if you don't accept it? Besides, I think studying medicine has a brighter future than being a puppeteer."

"Huh? Mr. Rabbi, what you said is not in line with the mainstream view."

"Mainstream? Studying puppetry can't save Skarloval, and it's easy to be implicated. Studying medicine can make you live a comfortable life." After saying that, the rabbi calculated the money himself, carefully took out the money from his coin purse to pay, bowed slightly and left.

The freckled girl sighed and waved goodbye.

The rabbi returned home with his things.

When she saw a group of people standing at her door, especially those in eye-catching white clothes, she frowned and felt something was wrong.

"You, you are slandering me! You have no evidence!" Grandpa roared in his hoarse voice.

"We are trying to find evidence now, Mr. Haiwen." A man in a suit said in a calm but unquestionable tone.

The people in white clothes nearby were discussing the miserable appearance of the old man, not hiding their ridicule.

"Do you have a search warrant?"

"Oh, old man, you may not have heard clearly just now. Let me reiterate, we are from the puppet supervision agency. This case may involve hidden illegal puppets. We need to investigate the puppets you have. To ensure that there are no dangerous factors in your house, the puppets' self-awareness, and possible illegal weapons."

The old man's turbid eyes widened.

Self-aware puppets, hidden illegal weapons...he really has them all at home.

(End of this chapter)