Chapter 2 Second Dream

Lin Xian hadn't felt this comfortable in the second dream realm for a long time.

A gun in his hand.

He truly felt like he was back on his home turf.

He and CC stripped off the uniforms of the two corpses and put them on.

Although they were splattered with a lot of blood, the clothes were black, so it wasn't too noticeable.

But they felt sticky and uncomfortable.

"Next time, we can optimize the bloodstain issue," Lin Xian said, summing up his experience.

CC glanced at Lin Xian, not saying anything, seemingly lost in thought.

Lin Xian had accurately predicted the future many times, and even if CC didn't completely believe him, she no longer doubted him.

After a quick cleanup, Lin Xian took the electronic work cards of both corpses.

Lin Xian even pushed out the magazine to take a look… discovering that the bullets were the same as those from 600 years ago.

Although the size was slightly different, they weren't the high-tech lasers or energy beams he had imagined. They were just old kinetic bullets.

"Maybe I really guessed right," Lin Xian murmured.

"What?" CC asked curiously.

"This New Donghai City… might just be a gilded façade." Lin Xian looked up at the sky.

Countless vehicles of all sizes flew in the air.

Like schools of fish in an aquarium, they formed distinct layers, seemingly chaotic but actually orderly.

It was indeed very advanced and futuristic.

But that was it.

Thinking about it, this futuristic city 600 years in the future didn't seem to have any high technology that he couldn't understand.

It was just that the buildings were taller, the cars could fly, and the machines were a little more intelligent…

But in essence, the core of the technology didn't seem to have changed qualitatively.

If this were 2064, this level of development would be reasonable.

But this was 2624…

At least from what he had seen so far, Lin Xian was disappointed with this New Donghai City.

It wasn't as futuristic as he had imagined.

"It seems that in these 600 years, someone has been suppressing technological development."

Could it be the Genius Club?

Lin Xian looked up at the full moon hanging in the sky, the black hand pointing straight towards it.

What was the purpose of doing this?

…

Bang!

After swiping their work cards, the checkpoint gate opened, and Lin Xian and CC strode forward.

New Donghai City.

They had finally entered.

The buildings here were really tall…

Many skyscrapers disappeared into the clouds, and even the shorter buildings had at least dozens of floors. This made you feel like a frog at the bottom of a well, unable to see the whole picture.

Oppressive.

In terms of oppression, Lin Xian felt that New Donghai City was no different from Old Donghai, but even more so…

Just within this limited space, the various colorful light pollution was too much for Lin Xian, and he already felt a little blind.

Humans were adaptable creatures. After living in this light pollution for hundreds of years, perhaps the residents of New Donghai City had already adapted. Or perhaps, in their minds, cities were supposed to be like this.

"Look at those people…"

CC pointed at the men and women walking on the street and said softly:

"Their clothes are so strange."

"This is probably cultural isolation," Lin Xian said, using an inaccurate term.

It was as he had imagined.

Hundreds of years of secluded life behind walls had allowed the residents of New Donghai City to develop a new culture and aesthetic standard.

Almost all the men on the street, regardless of age,

gave off a flamboyant operatic vibe.

Spirited, bright, noble, complex… as if they were ready to turn the street into a stage and improvise a song at any moment.

And the women's clothes were also very bright, giving off an unspeakable sense of "childishness…"

Whether it was clothing, hairstyles, headdresses, or other decorations, everything gave off a very young feeling, like middle school students, or even elementary school students.

CC frowned:

"It's a little creepy."

"Fashion is a cycle," Lin Xian inexplicably thought of his cousin, a Qimat fashionista who gave him an 8-digit QQ number.

He had a high status in the Qimat community, and many Qimat girls revolved around him. The girls' gaudiness was comparable to that of the girls in New Donghai City.

Was it called Harajuku style now?

But Lin Xian preferred to describe this style as a "Christmas tree."

Too messy, too many decorations, like a dream back to the Victorian era.

"Wait, there's another weird thing."

Lin Xian scanned the passing couples again and suddenly felt that it wasn't his imagination:

"Have you noticed… the men and women here are too beautiful, like sculptures… Beautiful to an excessive degree."

"Indeed."

CC nodded.

She had been paying attention to the clothes and hairstyles earlier, and only glanced at their faces. But now that she looked closely… everyone was excessively beautiful.

Exquisitely carved, lifelike.

Logically speaking, beautiful people should be a minority in life.

But now, a quick glance…

Anyone pulled out of the street was a world-class handsome man or beautiful girl.

Lin Xian felt a sense of uncanny valley…

Were they still human?

But then again, in 2023, cosmetic surgery was already very advanced, so it wasn't surprising that there was such a miraculous beauty technique 600 years later.

Perhaps the people of New Donghai City were using other black technologies that he couldn't understand, so that everyone's figure, appearance, skin, and hair were so perfect that it was impossible to tell their age at a glance.

"It seems like there are no elderly people."

CC murmured:

"At least on this street, there isn't a single elderly or even middle-aged person."

"It's also possible… they're all elderly people," Lin Xian felt that this was a truly terrifying city, and dating was more thrilling than Werewolf.

Fortunately, the uniforms that Lin Xian and CC were wearing saved them a lot of trouble, allowing them to blend into the environment without arousing the suspicion of the residents of New Donghai City.

In the distance, Lin Xian saw several patrol robots, and even mechanical police dogs… Lin Xian and CC quickly turned into a side street, unsure of their specific functions.

"How do we get to Tamm Bank? Does your headset have a specific location?" Lin Xian asked.

CC shook her head:

"No, there's only a route description, no specific map. I don't know if it originally had this function, but after I cracked the password, many functions stopped working… Now I can only use it to receive garbage disposal information and crack other passwords."

"That's pretty good too."

Lin Xian began to think.

New Donghai City was very large, and it would be difficult to find Tamm Bank by just wandering around aimlessly. They had to ask for directions or find a map.

"We can ask for directions, and if we can't get direct directions, we can ask for the location of a bookstore to find a map or something."

"But what about the blood on us?" CC tugged at the collar, frowning:

"There's blood all over these clothes, it smells terrible. People will definitely suspect us if they smell such a strong smell of blood."

"We can ask children, children shouldn't be so sensitive."

"You have to find a real child," CC chuckled:

"Don't find one that's aging in reverse."

"…"

As it turned out.

They were lucky.

Before the two of them could find a suitable child to ask for directions, they found a very large bookstore.

It had three floors, and the books inside seemed to be very comprehensive.

But it was already closed.

Lin Xian and CC walked up the steps and looked at the closed thick glass door.

"Electronic lock?"

Lin Xian was surprised:

"Can you crack it?"

"I'll try."

CC put the Bluetooth headset-like device on her ear, her eyes moving quickly. After two minutes:

"It's connected, it's easier now that it's connected."

"It seems that electronic locks are still unreliable…" Lin Xian sighed sincerely.

He recalled the eight combination dials on the hafnium alloy safe.

If the safe had also been an electronic lock, CC would have cracked it long ago. He didn't expect that in an era of rapid technological development… mechanical locks had once again become the safest option.

Beep beep.

The glass door of the bookstore made two soft sounds.

The door lock clicked open.

"Cracked it."

CC took off the Bluetooth headset, flicked her hair, and opened the door to the bookstore:

"Hurry up and find a map."

Before long, CC found a map of Donghai City in the dark and confirmed their current location and the location of Tamm Bank:

"Lin Xian, we're out of luck. Tamm Bank is on the other side of the district, about five kilometers away."

"Five kilometers… That's okay, not too far."

Lin Xian calculated that it would take about thirty to forty minutes to walk five kilometers. If they could find a way to steal a car, it would be faster.

He just didn't know if he could drive these flying cars…

Looking at his watch, it was only ten thirty.

Lin Xian decided to stay in the bookstore for a while longer.

"CC, there should be a book search system at the bar. You're more familiar with computers, can you help me look up a book?"

"What's the title?"

"Introduction to the Cosmological Constant."

"Okay."

"By the way, see if there are any history books. I'll look around here first."

"Okay."

CC quickly ran to the computer at the service desk.

Lin Xian looked at the labels hanging from the ceiling, one by one… Picture Book Area… Children's Area… Textbook Area… Video Area…

He walked around the first floor but didn't see any history-related areas.

At this time, CC ran over.

"How is it? Are there any history books?"

"No."

CC shook her head:

"It's strange… It's one thing for such a big bookstore not to have a history section, but I specifically searched and there really aren't any history-related books, not a single one."

"What about Introduction to the Cosmological Constant?"

"That one's there. On the second floor, in the Ancient Books Area, shelf number 3, third layer."

Ancient Books Area?

Lin Xian was a little surprised.

Shouldn't something like that be classified as an academic book?

Knowledge shouldn't be categorized as ancient or not.

With questions in mind, Lin Xian and CC went to the second floor of the bookstore and quickly found the book Introduction to the Cosmological Constant.

On the book cover, there was a prominent celebrity review—

"This is a worthless, completely erroneous academic work, but it miraculously survived in an ancient tomb for 600 years without decaying… This may be a miracle of love, witnessing an immortal and faithful love from 600 years ago."

"What is this nonsense?"

Lin Xian couldn't understand it.

How could a proper academic book be reviewed as a miracle of love?

Lin Xian looked at the two key idioms in bold at the beginning.

Worthless.

Completely erroneous.

This…

Was this book really that bad?

Was that why it was removed from the academic book classification and placed in the Ancient Books Area?

Did Big Face Cat's father research it for nothing?

Lin Xian was incredulous.

He tore off the plastic wrap, opened the cover, and looked at the author's introduction on the book cover…

In the photo, there was a very young scholar wearing black-rimmed glasses, who looked to be only twenty-five or twenty-six years old.

He looked young and innocent, like a college student.

The author's introduction below read:

"Liu Feng, born in Longguo Shanxi in April 1996, entered the Department of Mathematics of Shanxi University in 2014. After graduating with a master's degree in 2021, he devoted himself to the study of the cosmological constant and compiled his research into this book."

Born in 1996…

Sure enough, as he thought.

The original author of Introduction to the Cosmological Constant was from the same era as him.

Lin Xian was a little excited.

This was one of the few major gains in this period of time…

If he told the original author about the cosmological constant 42, could he find out more secrets about 42?

Despite the celebrity review that the book was worthless and completely erroneous, Lin Xian certainly didn't believe it.

In Big Face Cat's words… how many experts were reliable?

The Genius Club's murder of Big Face Cat's father was the most authoritative academic certification.

Lin Xian casually flipped through the book, finding only complex theories until the very last page… In the last book cover, there was actually a printed small card.

This was obviously included with the book.

Could it be that this small card was inside when it was dug out of the tomb?

Lin Xian took it out…

It was written in delicate and slightly trembling handwriting:

"Dear Feng Feng:

Although we didn't wait for the meteor shower…

But I will still make a wish for you in the sky.

One day, everyone will understand how amazing the cosmological constant is.

It's a pity that I won't have the chance to see that day.

I'm leaving, you have to take care of yourself.

—Always loving you, Qi Qi"