Player Reload
Chapter 132 - 122 Narrative Cage (12)

Chapter 132: Chapter 122 Narrative Cage (12)

In the strictest sense, the brain capacity of 256GB is a translation ensured by the system so that Li Cheng could understand it, but the final figure should not be much different.

"It’s not like I wanted to forget."

Gray Rain bit her lip and said, "The prison regularly resets, erasing the words carved on the walls and floors, as well as the previously requested newspapers and the like, which means it’s impossible to preserve information externally.

Moreover, every escape attempt inflicts serious mental and physical burdens on the escapee. There are many who lose part of their memory, or even become idiots, like the one in the cell at the bottom right."

"..." Li Cheng seemed to have figured it out. Gray Rain was cooperating with him to escape not only because she didn’t want to be confined to death in prison but also because she was afraid of gradually losing her memory and self.

The self of a person is composed of memories. To forget everything is no different from death.

"Unresolved old questions give rise to fresh doubts...."

Li Cheng rubbed his temples with some headache, "Let’s summarize the current mysteries.

First, in the Main Character Effect Room, the rabbit-eared adjutant seemed to have self-awareness, actively pressed the button, and said to me, ’You do not belong here.’

Second, after pressing the button, Isaac did not return but disappeared into thin air.

Third, the prison periodically resets, so why do the clues like the Firewood Scripture, Final Redemption handgun, and others still remain in the upper left cell (which belonged to Isaac)? Shouldn’t they all have disappeared?"

Gray Rain squinted her eyes and said, "Maybe Isaac was accidentally trapped by the Main Character Effect Room during her escape attempt, which kept her in a sort of undead state? That’s why everything related to her wasn’t reset."

Li Cheng corrected her, "It’s ’she’, not ’he’."

"Huh?"

Gray Rain was stunned for a moment before realising, "Wait, you’re saying Isaac is female? How can you tell?!"

"Bone contours."

Li Cheng shrugged, "Didn’t Isaac claim to have once been a mechanical citizen of the Zeluo civilization? Based on the physical characteristics of those Zeluo refugees on the Blood Eagle, their males and females had objective physiological differences.

During the fight earlier, I cut open Isaac’s military uniform and saw her metal skeleton.

Her upper pelvis and subpubic angle were on the larger side, the skull was relatively thin, the glabella was flat, and the forehead ridge was prominent – all typical female features.

Additionally, I visually assessed the angles and thickness of her skull, sternum, clavicle, scapula, and the long bones of her limbs and inserted the data into a regression function for calculations.

For example, estimating age based on the shape and size of the sternum, Y=14.56+1.46x①+1.25x②+3.66x③+1.99x④+0.47x⑤+0.38x⑥+1.82x⑦+1.2x⑧, with a negative correlation coefficient of 0.9916, standard deviation 1.3290, where x① is the sternoclavicular articular surface, x② is the notch of the first rib, x③ is the outer edge of the dorsal surface, x④ is the body-handle joint surface and the second rib notch..."

Listening to Li Cheng’s recitation-like speech, question marks seemed to pop up above Gray Rain’s head, her eyes spinning dizzily.

"Furthermore, her mandibular angle is 116, the ratio of zygomatic width to temporal width is 1:0.819, and the ratio of zygomatic width to mandibular angle width is 1:0.678, which conforms to the golden ratio. The bridge of her nose is high, and her facial curves are graceful.

Therefore, Isaac is likely a 25 or 26-year-old adult female with East Asian features, nearly two meters tall, with a curvaceous figure and pretty face, meeting the conventional definitions of sexy beauty."

After finishing his statement nonchalantly, Li Cheng smacked his lips, as if there was more to say, and concluded, "If there were a kind of ’Hupu Goddess Contest’ among skeleton groups, she would definitely rank high, even secure the championship."

"..."

Just from the name, Gray Rain could guess what kind of event the so-called Hupu Goddess Contest might be. She took a deep breath, shocked, and asked, "...What exactly did you do before you were imprisoned? You weren’t one of those tomb raiders who steal people’s bones, were you?"

"Hahaha, how is that possible."

Li Cheng laughed heartily, "Cremation is popular in our country."

So you mean you could do it in countries where cremation isn’t popular?

Gray Rain felt like her CPU was overheating.

"Anyway,"

Li Cheng changed his expression instantly, asking seriously, "Can you remember anything else? All information outside of common knowledge."

The two of them were now in the same boat, and only through cooperation could there be a chance to escape.

Gray Rain tried hard to recall, and slowly said, "Hmm... I must have been a fairly good soldier, the kind that killed a lot of enemies."

This message isn’t particularly valuable. The Narrative Cage is filled with war criminals from the outset, and even Li Cheng has killed nearly a hundred people (in the first escape room script task),

A minor soldier responsible for threading wires probably wouldn’t qualify to be locked up here, Gray Rain’s account must be incomplete.

"Follow me." Li Cheng took the lead, running toward the direction of the cells.

"Where to?"

"The cell in the lower left corner. Come and help me pick the lock."

As a noble, efficient, and clean silicon-based lifeform (also referred to as the ’triple high’), most of Gray Rain’s body was made of liquid metal. She could first liquefy her fingers, pour them into the keyhole, and then solidify, thereby picking the lock.

She had previously used this method to escape from a solitary cell. As for why she didn’t use the same method to transform parts of her body into coins to fool the vending machine and buy corn juice...

It’s probably because there is a baffle inside the vending machine, and after her limbs turned into coins, they couldn’t be retrieved.

Click.

Gray Rain deftly picked the lock on the cell in the lower left corner, which after being opened, revealed a similar solitary cell that was clean and unoccupied.

"I told you there’s nobody in this room."

She pouted and said, "This cell was empty when I was locked up,"

Li Cheng lay on the ground, carefully searching the room. No abnormalities were found on the floor, mattress, or bed frame.

There was only one oddity—at the lower edge of the metal toilet, there was a line of small characters, AMORAONRORTIRAF.

"Is this a riddle?"

Gray Rain frowned and said, "The toilet metal is of unknown material, hard as hell, how could it be inscribed?"

"It’s not inscribed, it’s scratched. Using a softer metal to scratch the toilet, leaving a mark."

Li Cheng immediately thought of the thin needle found in the upper-left corner cell, where the tip was almost worn flat. Which means this line of text was likely left by Isaac.

"As for the content of the riddle, when reversed it reads Fa ritorno a roma, Latin for ’return to Rome’."

Li Cheng did not find the word Rome out of place. Players generally believe, for some unknown reason, that the worlds and histories of script tasks bear similarities to Earth’s real world.

"What does that mean?" Gray Rain asked, clueless.

"It means we need to throw a coin."

In the real world, both East and West have the custom of throwing things into fountains. Zhang Zhuo of the Tang Dynasty wrote in "Universal Chronicles, Volume Six": "In Bingzhou, at the border between She’ai and Shouyang, there is Jealous Woman’s Spring, with a temple of gods, and the water is crystal clear to a depth of a thousand zhang. Worshipers throw coins and sheep bones, and they can be seen shining brightly."

Italy also has the legend that says, "Facing away from the fountain, use your right hand to throw coins over your left shoulder into the fountain while making three wishes, and if one of them is to return to Rome, all three wishes will come true."

Li Cheng had previously gathered 5 Sigma coins from a child’s backpack, which he had used to buy corn juice for Gray Rain. He no longer had any money on him.

"Unless... someone has already thrown a coin in."

His eyes brightened, and he knocked on the edge of the toilet with his knuckles. Sure enough, he heard a faint metallic clinking sound, like that of coins.

"From the sound, we know the coin is likely hidden in the U-bend, which we can’t get out with just our hands." He stood up and looked at Gray Rain, "What about the corn juice you drank earlier? Spit it out?"

"Huh?" Gray Rain indignantly said, "I, as a silicon-based lifeform, also extract nutrients from food, okay? The corn juice has already been digested."

"What about urine, then?" Li Cheng insisted, cajoling her as if urging someone to drink: "How about two jin of it?"

"Don’t even think about it!" Gray Rain quickly crossed her hands in front of her, "Why don’t you urinate yourself?"

"I don’t have any urine."

Humans are most vulnerable when excreting, so players generally use the toilet before entering a script task.

Li Cheng lamented, "Young people these days are truly worse than the last generation, thinking that pee and poop are dirty. Back when I was young and went to the countryside, cow dung could be made into honeycomb briquettes, donkey dung into stove-filling dung cakes, and chicken dung could ferment into organic fertilizer. It was all treasure, wow."

It’s a pity that Gray Rain isn’t a modern person, otherwise she could retort, "Went to the countryside? May I ask how old you are this year? Oh, by the way, do you know that Beijing was successful in its Olympic bid?"

Mumbling to himself, Li Cheng looked around the room for a tool to extract the coin, his eyes finally settling on the showerhead.