Lucky billion players, you've never seen one before / I can accumulate my own luck

The first method is the simplest, most direct, and fastest-acting: first, make the test subject an evolved being, and then let their mind connect to a more easily connected concept under various sensory stimuli, thereby successfully awakening their psychic abilities.

This method is quite inhumane, with a very high casualty rate, but it has the highest accuracy. Those who survive are generally those who have successfully awakened their psychic powers, while those who fail are almost all dead. The accuracy is visible to the naked eye, so it can naturally be called "the highest".

The second method is more moderate—select a group of the best-quality young children, consume a lot of resources, and cultivate their spirit from an early age, so that they can become excellent "concept carriers" and their spirit can be more easily connected to the concept level.

Using this method, whether the experimental subject can awaken psychic abilities, and what kind of psychic abilities they will awaken, are all unknowns.

Moreover, because it takes a considerable amount of time for mental development to reach its optimal state, confirming experimental results is very time-consuming—the data shows that the optimal age is 17.

Fan Xiao carefully reviewed Cassandra's experimental records and found that she was described as "the most perfect experimental subject".

In order to nurture her, Dr. Zhuang shattered hundreds of props with spacetime attributes, restoring them to a fantastical substance with mixed spacetime attributes, and then integrated them all into Cassandra's mind.

This is absolutely a big spender!

Items with time-space attributes are generally of high level, starting from B grade.

They collected and destroyed hundreds of such items, just to gamble on a possibility... whether the test subjects would awaken psionic abilities was an unknown. The experiment itself only increased the probability of awakening.

Even if one awakens psionic energy, it might be a low-level, useless psionic energy.

In this respect, Dr. Zhuang is indeed a complete gambler.

Of course, Fan Xiao admits that it could also be his own way of thinking that led him to fall into the "emperor's golden carrying pole" pattern.

Perhaps a few hundred time-space props are nothing to Dr. Zhuang.

This thing is backed by a large, cross-node organization like "One Wing".

"Why are one-winged beings so obsessed with psychic powers?"

Fan Xiao pondered this matter deeply.

In his view, as long as you don't enter dungeons that restrict the use of items, the effects of items are actually similar to those of talents and psionic powers.

"One-Wing" is so obsessed with psionicists that there must be some secrets he doesn't know about.

And it could very well be a big secret!

Fan Xiao became somewhat curious.

However, now is not the time to delve too deeply into this matter.

He put the documents in his hand into his storage space, and then continued to explore the research institute, trying to find some new intelligence.

Cassandra is an experimental subject managed by Echo. Echo and Shash Sen are now enemies, yet Cassandra has become Shash Sen's adopted daughter... This is very contradictory, and he wants to find out if there is any information in the research institute that can explain this.

While Huiying and Shash Sen appear to be adversaries, they are secretly cooperating... This possibility is unlikely.

Fan Xiao could tell that Shash Sen really wanted to kill Cassandra. This guy was essentially a coward. As soon as he saw a player in the 019 division who could threaten his position, he immediately wanted to wipe them out.

The more ferocious a person's aura, the more cowardly they are inside.

As for Shadow, she genuinely wanted to protect Cassandra—after fighting each other for years, she should know Sash Sen's personality and would never cooperate with him on matters involving Cassandra.

Because the chances of things going wrong are just too high, she can't afford to gamble.

Besides this, Van Shaw was also puzzled by something else—the way Shadow treated Cassandra was somewhat contradictory.

Shadow wanted to protect Cassandra, yet he secretly hinted that Cassandra was inviting him to A1, and then notified Shash Sen to come and kill them... This behavior was too contradictory.

Moreover, back at Base A1, those members of the Holy Sword Alliance... seemed a bit off.

Fan Xiao didn't underestimate their spirit of sacrifice, but this spirit seemed somewhat incompatible with the players.

Of course, he acknowledges that faith exists, and that faith is often even more important than life itself. People may do things that are irrational but still worthy of praise.

However, how many people can achieve this level?

Especially among gamers, even fewer people would do something like this.

Perhaps some members of the Holy Sword Alliance are truly willing to sacrifice themselves for the hope of defeating Shash Sen... that is, to rescue Cassandra.

But Fan Xiao doesn't believe that everyone would think or act that way.

In his view, the behavior of those people who had charged forward so frantically was less noble and more... somewhat bizarre.

and so……

It's highly likely that Echo tampered with their minds!

For example, strong psychological suggestions were given.

Huiying... seems to be deliberately sending the Holy Sword Alliance to their deaths.

And this was happening in front of Cassandra.

Vanshaw recalled a similar situation that had occurred when he dealt with Charles at the A9 base.

Cassandra failed to kill Charles, causing him to return to the mansion. When the people at Charles's mansion requested Shadow's assistance, Shadow... ignored them.

She had a perfect reason not to respond at the time—she was supporting the other team.

Looking back now, this "perfect reason" was probably something she created on her own initiative.

She seems to be intentionally orchestrating the deaths of members of the Holy Sword Alliance, and then linking all of their deaths to Cassandra.

From this perspective, there is no traitor within the Holy Sword Alliance. It is the person in charge, Huiying, who is betraying his own people, and it is His Majesty himself who has rebelled.

The person who collaborated with Charles before was most likely Huiying himself.

"The reflection intentionally put Cassandra in a state of guilt..."

"She established the Holy Sword Alliance several years ago. Did she go to great lengths to create such an organization specifically to harm Cassandra?"

"What does she want?"

Even if Huiying could control others with feelings of guilt, there was no need to make such a big move.

Cassandra was completely obedient to her orders.

Unless... this guy has other plans for Cassandra.

“A-level psionicists are so rare, it doesn’t make sense that Cassandra has been awakened for almost a year and Dr. Zhuang hasn’t reacted at all… I thought Dr. Zhuang was busy with something and had temporarily asked Huiying to take care of Cassandra, but Huiying’s attitude is clearly far from taking care of her, so this guess should be wrong.”

"That Huiying guy... he's got some nerve! I bet he's not only bullying his subordinates, but also keeping it from his superiors."

"Cassandra most likely didn't tell Dr. Zhuang the specific details of her awakened psionic abilities; it seems she has her own agenda."

While searching for intelligence, Fan Xiao also pondered the whole story, discovering many suspicious points and deducing the most likely answer.

To his disappointment, the research institute had no information related to Shash Sen.

Why Cassandra became Shash Sen's adopted daughter remains a mystery.

Of course, he didn't come away empty-handed.

He didn't find any information about Shash Sen, but he did find information about the function verification of an A-grade item.

[Rank A Item - Alfonso's Sanctuary] - Upon seeing the information about this item, Fan Xiao immediately thought of the various abilities that Shash Sen had previously displayed.

Random damage transfer, suppression of spatial interference, spatial tearing attacks, spatial barriers... and so on, all of these correspond perfectly!

As expected, the artifact that Shash Sen activated at Base A1 was "Alfonso's Temple"!

This is very strange!

According to the information, "Alfonso's Temple" was the final "main ingredient" in cultivating Cassandra.

It should have been destroyed and pulverized, forming a fantastical substance mixed with advanced spacetime attributes, which would then merge into Cassandra's spirit.

As a result, it ended up in the hands of Shash Sen.

Shash Sen was clearly not one of Dr. Zhuang's people; the latter would not allow such a thing to happen.

Fan Xiao guessed that Dr. Zhuang must have left the 019 section for some reason, leaving everything to Huiying to handle.

"Could it be that Shadow Reflection messed up something, and Shash Sen got the benefit... Hmm, that must be it."

"It's no exaggeration to say this woman is incredibly audacious. Not only did she cause trouble and not report it, but she's also eyeing the test subjects... Isn't she afraid that Dr. Zhuang will find out and kill her?"

Fan Xiao was finally convinced.

These speculations and the truth... should be pretty close to the truth.

At the same time, he also found a way to kill Shash Sen without affecting the innocent civilians at Base A1—simply have the little angel destroy the foundation of the entire Base A1.

Now, "Alfonso's Sanctuary" has clearly been conceptually integrated with the A1 base, and no one except the owner of the item can take it out.

Even mental interference won't work—damage transfer can be active or passive, and mental damage can also be randomly transferred away.

The only way to kill Shash Sen without slaughtering the A1 base is to destroy the foundation... that is, to destroy the item itself.

Only a little angel could do something like this.

Ordinary players cannot attack conceptual items using the foundation as a medium. "Alfonso's Temple" has a physical form, but after merging with the foundation, it becomes a conceptual entity, and its function radiates to the entire area within the foundation's range.

Van Shaw was quite pleased to have found a way to safely kill Shash Sen.

However, since he was currently in a dungeon, he calmed himself down and left the research institute, arriving at a large welfare home located on the ground.

There was still no one else on the ground; the orphanage stood alone in the same spot.

What Van Chau didn't know was that if he had arrived a little earlier, he would have seen Cassandra crouching down with her hands on her head in a defensive posture at the main entrance.

If I take a picture while I'm at it, I can humiliate him severely later.

"This instance looks like it's the experimental site for One-Winged?"

"No, that's not right... This is an independent space type of instance. If you're going to set up a research institute in an instance, why would you need to build it underground and use an orphanage as a cover? That's just pointless."

"Considering the rules and characteristics of this instance, perhaps this place... is simply a world scene solidified from the memories of the Echoes?"

Fan Xiao did not forget his previous speculation.

In this copy, parts of the "id"... that is, painful and guilty memories, will be permanently preserved.

This rule gives the ability to reflect back memories by solidifying them into physical photographs.

Every member of the Holy Sword Alliance carries this photo of guilt.

So, in the instance, in what form will the instance rules themselves be manifested?

Fan Xiao felt that he might have found the answer.

—The Realm of Guilt.

A world formed by memories of guilt.

The correct answer should be that the city today is formed by the guilty memories of the dungeon boss, Echo, under the dungeon rules, rather than the dungeon itself being the original research institute.

This leads to another conclusion—the previous Shadow was likely not a dungeon boss... or rather, not simply a dungeon boss; she could clearly move freely in the outside world as a normal person.

As for why she turned into this horrible state... we don't know for now.

Fan Xiao gradually pieced together the sequence of events.

but……

Even someone like Huiying would feel guilty?

Fan Xiao had doubts from the bottom of his heart.

With nothing to do, he explored the city for a while longer, but still couldn't find anyone except himself.

By this time, it was completely dark.

Fan Xiao glanced at the time on the player panel—9:59 PM.

It's almost 10 o'clock.

People with regular sleep schedules should usually be asleep by this time.

Fan Xiao pondered what to do next.

The current situation is very favorable to him. If he continues to wait, he can complete the three-day survival quest.

However... it probably won't go that smoothly.

Soon, it was 10 p.m.

Suddenly, when Fan Xiao came to his senses, he found himself in a new place.

The surrounding area is an open space, built like a park, with many play facilities.

There are several four-story buildings in the distance, and you can see some uniformed staff members through the windows.

A slightly childish, stern voice suddenly reached Fan Xiao's ears: "Fan Xiao! You just wait, I'll deal with you sooner or later!"