Superman's End Manual

"Become like me."

As Ke Mingye took off his clothes, leaving only his boxer shorts, he mentally gave him orders.

The appearance and size of the trickster doll changed rapidly, and when it reopened its eyes, it looked exactly like Ke Mingye.

Looking at the doll that was exactly like himself, Ke Mingye felt as if he were looking in a mirror, and he was somewhat disgusted and bewildered by the uncanny valley effect.

But he calmly put clothes on him, ordered him to put on pants, and tidied his hair so that he looked exactly like himself when he walked out of the theater.

Finally, Ke Mingye took off his shoes and let him put them on, while he himself sat on the toilet.

He took a deep breath, then ordered the trickster to leave the cubicle, close the cubicle door, and leave the restroom. He then turned a corner in the audience passage and headed towards the entrance of Theater 3.

At this moment, at the entrance of Yandai Cinema, Ke Yinzhi, dressed in a staff uniform, was writing something in a small notebook with her head down. Then she looked up and examined the traffic light pole lying on the ground on the street.

"The gray monster threw dice off a traffic light sign and exploded to its death; ten naked men disappeared at the end of the street... We searched the area but couldn't find them; they seemed to have vanished into thin air. It seems the Bureau of Anomalies will have another case to file these next two days."

He closed the notebook and put it in his uniform pocket, thinking, "What bad luck, it has to be today. Do I have to report this to the control bureau first..."

"No, I need to take care of things at home first so I can focus on my work."

Thinking this, Ke Yinzhi was about to turn around and walk into the cinema when he noticed a familiar figure passing by him. So he lowered the brim of his hat to cover his eyes.

After Bai Qiuwu left, Ke Yinzhi loosened his hat brim slightly and raised his eyes from his hair.

"Autumn Grass?"

He glanced sideways at Bai Qiuwu's retreating figure, thinking to himself, "Players have the ability to read identities. She most likely recognized me in the movie theater, so she left first. I'll keep that possibility in mind and test her again when I get home. I need to take care of the safety of the other kids first."

Ke Yinzhi stepped into the cinema, skillfully put on a face mask at the corner, and then gently pressed the small metal instrument on her fingertip onto her throat, whereupon the instrument seamlessly integrated with her skin.

He pressed his fist to his lips and coughed softly, the sound of which was completely different from before.

He greeted the ticket seller and entered the audience passage. At the entrance of the dimly lit passage, two other men in staff uniforms were waiting for him, each holding a helmet. Upon seeing Ke Yinzhi, they silently followed behind him, slowly walking towards Theater 3.

At this moment, the movie "Spirited Away" being shown in Theater 3 has ended.

Ke Yinzhi and two "staff members" pushed open the door and entered the theater together.

With standard business smiles on their faces, they stood at the entrance of the theater, quietly waiting for the arrival of Ke Xiaomo, Ke Mingye, Ke Yongzhu, Bai Ziling, and Bai Zini.

Soon, Ke Xiaomo led her group of younger siblings toward the entrance of the theater.

"Sir, the audience members watching this movie in Theater 3 have been selected as lucky viewers for our cinema's event. We will give you a free opportunity to experience the 'brain imaging helmet'."

Ke Yinzhi spoke in a gentle and distant voice, as if carrying the smell of disinfectant, perfectly fitting the image of a staff member.

Before Ke Xiaomo could even speak, two of Ke Yinzhi's staff members approached the group of children and began explaining the impressive-looking, high-tech brain imaging helmet. They said the helmet could capture their brain signals and convert them into realistic images.

Bai Zini was the first to clap her hands and say yes, her eyes shining as she said it sounded like a lot of fun.

Ke Mingye looked down at his phone, saying, "Can you please stop making such a fuss? I want to go home and sleep."

Ke Yongzhu appeared indifferent, but her eyes were secretly glancing at the helmet, as if she really wanted to try it on.

Although Bai Ziling didn't react much, she would occasionally look up from her phone screen with her red eyes, watching the staff demonstrate how to use the helmet.

Seeing their expressions, Ke Xiaomo sighed softly and asked Ke Yinzhi, "Is this thing safe? Is there any possibility that it might damage brain nerves or something?"

“Absolutely safe.” Ke Yinzhi looked at him and replied calmly, “Sir, I assure you.”

Ke Xiaomo looked at him for two seconds and said, "Okay, let's give it a try."

(End of this chapter)

Chapter 45 Imagining Time (Part 1)

In the restroom of the screening area, Ke Mingye leaned over the toilet seat, his hands clasped in front of his chest, his heart pounding.

"Can it get any more exciting?"

He muttered to himself, glancing up to plan his escape route should he be exposed, while looking at the staff member standing in the middle from the perspective of the charlatan doll.

At this moment, the appearance of the "staff member" in the theater was completely different from the Ke Yinzhi he remembered: it was as if he was wearing a human skin mask, and even the size and color of his pupils had changed. Perhaps it was due to the contact lenses, or perhaps his elder brother had used some kind of ability to change his appearance.

Ke Mingye was not surprised at all; rather, he was already used to it.

Living in this monster's house, disguising oneself is an essential skill. If everyone wants a second identity and can't change their appearance, they'd at least need a mask to wear, otherwise their family would see through them in no time.

However, what's frustrating is that Bai Qiuwu's sharp eyes saw through most of the characters who could change their expressions; otherwise, Ke Mingye wouldn't have needed to specifically send her away before letting the con artist into the theater.

Based on the results of the experiment on the bus, Ke Mingye believes that Bai Zini's identity may have already been discovered by Bai Qiuwu.

He had observed Bai Zini's transformation process at the time, and in the end, she relied on a mirror to change the details of her face—this kind of illusion rather than physical face change could basically be seen through by Bai Qiuwu's "eagle eyes" without any effort.

Therefore, Bai Qiuwu likely already knew that Bai Zini was "Magical Girl Ash," but she kept this secret to herself and didn't say it aloud.

His thoughts were interrupted when his spare phone vibrated in his pocket.

Ke Mingye turned on his backup phone, and on the prank app, he received a reply from Bai Qiuwu.

"I'm at the Western restaurant, where are you?" she asked.

"Received. Wait for me there for a moment."

Ke Mingye typed and sent the message, hoping to keep Bai Qiuwu hanging in the Western restaurant for a little longer.

Right now, he had to pray that this damned helmet experience would end soon, otherwise if the con artist walked out of the theater and happened to run into the older sister returning from the Western restaurant, it would truly be a horrific tragedy.

"This helmet currently has two functions. One is to replicate what you see by directly extracting signals from the 'visual processing area' in the brain and converting them into a realistic image;"

Ke Yinzhi paused for a moment, then continued speaking.

"The second function is that you can try to imagine some scenes. Similarly, the helmet will try to read your brain signals and convert them into images on the screen. However... due to technical limitations, the current second function is not perfect or stable enough. Sometimes the captured images are incomplete and not very clear."

After listening to his explanation, Ke Yongzhu took the helmet from the staff member and said, "What's the point of the first function? Isn't it just like an eye-tracking camera? Let me try the second function."

Ke Mingye looked down at his phone, thinking to himself, "This helmet's first function wasn't for you guys, it was for me, okay?"

"I'm so excited! I want to try it too!" Bai Zini clasped her hands together like a primary school student, eager to give it a go.

Ke Mingye glanced at her sideways, thinking to himself, Ash, can you stop acting so exaggerated? You weren't this innocent and harmless when you pinned Cinderella to my forehead.

Maybe she'll break into Hollywood and bring back the Oscar for Minions the following year. Being a magical girl is such a waste of her talent.

“Of course, you can try them all.” Ke Yinzhi put her hands behind her back, turned her head and smiled at her. “Although there are only two helmets, everyone here will have the opportunity to try them out, taking turns.”

"I was wrong, brother, you're the real acting genius." Ke Mingye thought disdainfully to himself.

In Ke Mingye's memory, Ke Yinzhi had always been a very neurotic person since childhood. In almost every school he attended, there were strange stories about him.

For example, someone misled others during an experiment, accidentally causing the lab to explode; classmates who had targeted him in the dormitory dropped out of school one after another without any reason within a semester; or someone skipped two grades in high school and was admitted to the best key university, and two years later returned to his alma mater and humiliated the principal in a public speech, criticizing the school's education system without restraint.

Even more outrageous is the claim that "Kaf," the national idol-level panda that disappeared from the Beijing Zoo two years ago, was abducted by Ke Yinzhi—it's utterly absurd.

Despite being the eldest son in the family, Ke Yinzhi was only close to his second brother, Ke Xiaomo, among his siblings. The others didn't really like playing with their eldest brother because you could never figure out how he thought.

Fortunately, after my older brother returned from university three years ago, his previously undisguised neuroticism has subsided considerably, as if he has become a completely different person.

It's like... something was released during my time at university.

"You can freely imagine the scene. If you really don't know what to think of, perhaps I can give you a keyword," Ke Yinzhi said slowly. "For example, what comes to mind when you hear the word 'player'?"

While listening to him speak, Bai Zini closed her eyes and thought while wearing a helmet.

When she took off her helmet and looked up at the image projected onto the giant screen in the theater, what appeared above was a Minecraft-style mosaic world: under a dark sky, the mosaic version of the Perco family stood atop a sky city built of mosaic blocks, pointing guns at each other's heads.

Bai Zini was stunned: "It really did reproduce it... It's amazing."

Ke Mingye raised an eyebrow, thinking to himself that this was too outrageous. Given the current progress of brain imaging technology research in the world, it was simply impossible to do such a thing.

Therefore, this thing must have been brought out by the Big Brother from the Anomaly Control Bureau. Only the Control Bureau could come up with technology that far exceeds the public's understanding.

But how could the second brother not realize this? He shouldn't be that oblivious, right? Or... did the eldest and second brothers really work together from the beginning and know each other's identities?

"Your imagination is truly remarkable." Ke Yinzhi looked at the giant screen and commented with a smile, "It's inevitable that the image will be somewhat incomplete or blurry, after all, this technology cannot yet accurately reproduce the image you imagine completely."

Next, it was Ke Yongzhu's turn to put on the helmet, and the scene he imagined was displayed on the screen.

At the top of the giant screen appeared a white-haired girl wearing a bikini, with a pair of black wings resembling bat wings on her back. She stood expressionless on the beach, with black waves and a blood-red full moon behind her.

He took off his helmet and looked at the giant screen in the theater. He opened his mouth, and his face immediately turned red.

"Pervert!" Bai Zini exclaimed in shock. "You're just a primary school student, and you're already thinking about these kinds of inappropriate scenes!"

Bai Ziling looked up at the scene and paused slightly.

"Somewhat like me?"

She murmured softly, her red eyes wide open, her pupils slightly contracted.

"What is this, a monster girl?" Bai Zini said, then suddenly realized her mistake. "Ah! And it has white hair. You thought it looked like your little Ling sister, right? You perverted elementary school student!"

"No, this is an angel!" Ke Yongzhu argued, her face flushed. "Angels all have blonde hair and black wings. I just accidentally imagined blonde hair as white hair!"

Bai Zini didn't let him off the hook, pressing him aggressively: "What kind of angel has such a sinister background? The angels you imagine are so strange. In short, you can't escape being a lecher!"

"Boring! I'm never playing this again."

As she spoke, Ke Yongzhu frowned, put her helmet on the seat, and her ears turned red.

"Elementary school student, why does the angel you imagine look a bit like a vampire?" Ke Mingye originally wanted the puppet to tease him like that, but he paused for half a second and belatedly stared at the screen for a while.

Wait a minute, so Ke Yongzhu knew that Bai Ziling was a vampire?

Thinking this, he glanced at Bai Ziling.