Puzzle Madness

Chapter 112 Dreams and Mindfulness
The experiment was successful, the shooting action was very cool--
But the trouble afterwards was also very big:

The vocal cords are broken and the trachea is not connected; now Doudou can't speak at all.

But the reservoir on the neck showed no sign of stopping at all - the red fluid was surging violently; every time Ruan Jingbo approached, he was staggered by the waves.

Doudou never expected that his body could store such a large amount of blood; maybe it was because the summer was too hot and he drank too much soda.

If I were like this in real life, would I just go to Africa and chop off my own head?

Then, the dry land could be turned into fertile fields! And human blood seems to contain a lot of nitrogen-rich organic matter? Wouldn't that make it perfect for fertilizer?

[Well, that's assuming it doesn't flow indefinitely; otherwise, it might turn into a massive flood.]

Whether there would be a bloody flood or someone would build an ark - this was difficult to verify: after all, he didn't know whether he could survive without his head in reality.

[I lost so much blood in my dream, I need to drink water when I wake up.]

Doudou, with his head full of weird fantasies, grabbed the head, pulled Ruan Jingbo up and ran a little distance away, to prevent the blood from flooding the dance machine Haizao's board and causing these important machines to short-circuit and burn out.

He built an island with arcade machines and let Ruan Jingbo sit on it.

Fortunately, the [Electronic Dungeon] seems to have infinite space - at least the end cannot be seen with the naked eye. Dreams are indeed dreams - blood will not accidentally soak the entire arcade.

Doudou placed his head next to her and stood his body under the "arcade island"; otherwise, blood would splash everywhere and neither of them would be able to communicate through writing.

By the way, I also took a complete screen from the arcade machine and used it as a writing board.

There was so much blood now, and Doudou's neck was oozing blood like a fountain; he had to hold the screen high up to write to avoid getting it stained with blood.

Each word must be written big enough so that Ruan Jingbo can see it from a distance.

The two people began a cycle of writing and drawing - checking each other's text content - and continuing to write.

Doudou couldn’t remember whether he had passed notes to her before, but the experience now was similar; it was quite convenient.

I could only see my body writing from a distance, and the words I wrote were crooked:
My head and body were separated, and my sense of space and balance became a little weird. I bumped into the arcade machine when I walked forward, and my chin felt cold from time to time.

Ruan Jingbo gently tapped Doudou's head to attract his attention, and grabbed the glass plate in his hand:

[Are you crazy? Doesn't it hurt? Is it necessary to help me to this extent?]
Doudou's movements were much faster than Ruan Jingbo's, and he even had enough time to write something a bit long-winded:
[I don't feel anything! I don't know if it's because it's a dream. And helping my classmates is what I should do, so don't take it personally.]
Ruan Jingbo exhaled, his expression relaxed a little:
[I'm glad you're alright. How are you going to get out now?]
Doudou quickly shared the clever idea he had come up with earlier:
[I don't understand either! Don't rush out, I'll see how I can help you.]

[Would you like to try my trick? And I'm telling you: separate your limbs, separate the muscle bundles again, make a lever (or something similar), and you can step on all the dance machine pedals at the same time.]
Ruan Jingbo opened her mouth wide and her eyes were wide open - just like in real life, it looked like her eyelids were peeled off.

She hesitated for a long time, scribbling and revising on the glass plate:

[I need to prepare myself mentally. I'll try later.]
Next to the text was a round crying face with bright red tears streaming down its face. The suggestion wasn't immediately adopted, but DouDou didn't seem to care—besides helping Ruan Jingbo get playing time in basketball, she had other important matters to ask.

Doudou wanted to scratch his head, but found nothing; instead, he scooped up a hand full of blood:

[How did you become like this? Do you have any impression?]
Ruan Jingbo wrote very slowly this time, constantly erasing what he had written:

[The school team had a competition in October, so I went to a training camp during the summer vacation.]
[Last semester I promised my teammates and coach that I would win this semester.]
I'm not feeling well and am very nervous. I've been experiencing chest tightness, tinnitus, and insomnia. Last week, my coach recommended the mindfulness class at the psychiatry department at Mong Cai Hospital.
[There were about a dozen of us, holding hands and dreaming together. Men, women, young and old. The dream wasn't about this arcade: it was a hard place to describe.]
[Ever since then, I've been appearing in this arcade. It feels like a dream, once or twice a day.]
[At first, it wasn't that serious. I thought I'd just bear it and it would pass. But I was afraid of having a seizure during a game, so I asked Ai Xi to order school uniforms, hoping to learn how to control my body.]
[The psychiatrist said I had delusions and asked me to be hospitalized for treatment; I could only lie to him and tell him that I was fine.]
[The closer I get to school, the longer I stay here.]
[At first, it was only a few hours, but after a few days, I couldn't get out at all.]
Doudou knew that "mindfulness" was probably similar to meditation; there was even a correspondence course in the advertisement for "Parapsychological Exploration".

But the situation regarding the "dream" surprised him:
"Ah, it turns out [Taro Dream] isn't the only one! I was right: no one in the Taro Society has this kind of dreaming mania."

Also verified was my own "cockroach theory". But I didn't expect that even this kind of strange dream might be everywhere.

At least in terms of time, the time when Ruan Jingbo was dreaming in this "mindfulness class" was about the same time as the birth of the Taro Society.

[Why does it feel like—all of a sudden, overnight, so many people are dreaming like this? Is there someone specifically spreading dreaming techniques?]

I wonder if this happens in other places besides Mong Cai? If it's caused by ecstasy, the coverage is too widespread.

He smacked his lips with his lonely head, not feeling very happy:

Ai Xi and I were still middle school students, and our intelligence channels mostly relied on radio news and a small part on whispers among classmates; by the time we got the information, it was already the last wave.

Doudou was still grappling with his thoughts, but Ruan Jingbo suddenly raised the glass plate with the words written on it again:
[Also, I have a stupid thing to say, just take a look.]
She seemed hesitant.

Controlling my body with those dance machines seems like my superpower.
Doudou couldn't help but be startled - but he couldn't make a sound.

[Huh? Is she in a frenzy? This is too tragic! And there's no benefit to be seen at all: it's more like a curse.]

Doudou had always thought that this cluster of dancing robots was just a special characteristic of this dream; all he had to do was wake up.

If it is insanity, won't it remain like this forever?
He quickly stained his body with blood and wrote:
[You're not stupid at all. Superpowers do exist! I have superpowers too. I'm a superpowered human.]
[How did you know you had super powers, though?]
Most people wouldn't think that this was something that was tampered with by those people from Asia-Europe Post?
Ruan Jingbo gestured and wrote at the same time, his four "hands" writing faster and faster:
[A “classmate” in a mindfulness class told me this.]
[He also said: Because I was so anxious, my "heart" provided me with this solution, a plan; a superpower that broke through the difficulties and gave me complete control over my body.]
Ruan Jingbo deliberately painted the word "heart" thickly, making it into a bloody mass.

Doudou's body held the glass plate high:

[Makes sense! That's what I've learned. Anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, and the like can trigger superpowers!]
If Ruan Jingbo really has ecstasy, then she must be a [patient]:
The Psychiatric Department of Mong Cai Hospital. It sounds like a place with a lot of "patients".

Doudou still remembered what Richard had said. The [patient]'s ecstasy was out of control; the [sinner] needed to do some strange movements to activate or awaken him.

For example, Richard's chain-smoking partner—could it be that Richard took the doctor to see a doctor and then returned to Mong Cai? Doudou had a lot of questions for him:

[What does that person look like? Is he wearing a black trench coat? And a white shirt underneath?]
Ruan Jingbo shook his head:

[No, I'm dressed like a tourist. Beach shorts/floral shirt/bucket hat.]
(End of this chapter)