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In the first few years as a posthuman, Wu Yiliu was greatly interested in others’ evolution stories; but gradually, he stopped asking. He became more interested in hearing stories of before people evolved.

“I evolved in a gap between two mini-doomsdays. Just like I told Milan, I planned from the beginning to take advantage of the empty gap. I didn’t want to instantly be affected by a pocket dimension upon evolving, carrying it with me for fourteen months afterward. G.o.d knows what I would bring forth; so, when I sensed I might be on the verge of evolving, I used all my strength to crawl into a narrow alley.”

In the seemingly never-ending pitch-black rainstorm, Wu Yiliu was soaked through, especially his shoes, each filled with a packet of water, and his clothes sticking tightly to his skin – even though his breathing was un.o.bstructed, the enveloping wet fabric made him feel as if he couldn’t breathe.

The rain kept was.h.i.+ng away his body heat, and he had to struggle to keep his teeth from chattering when he spoke. As for other parts of his body, he couldn’t help them.

“There, I seemed to have successfully found a loophole. The ‘individual as a pocket dimension’ rule stipulated that any posthuman encountering a mini-doomsday would be affected and trigger one on themselves. But when I encountered the mini-doomsday, I was not strictly a posthuman yet. When I did become one, I was lying in an alley between two mini-doomsdays without touching either.”

Wu Yiliu’s feet were uncomfortable, soaked in wet shoes and socks, but he held back and did not take them off. The forest floor was full of wet leaves, branches, water-squeezing soil, and sharp rocks.

“Looking back, my evolution involved a ton of luck. Had the two mini-doomsday-carrying posthumans moved towards me as I evolved, the first life-or-death situation I would have faced would have been my own pocket dimension.

“While I was lying on the ground, s.h.i.+vering, I kept slipping in and out of consciousness. I forget what the alley was like, I only remember the black chewing gum-streaked concrete floor, the red brick wall nearby, and the giant human head always staring at me from behind it.”

Abby, who had been listening intently to his past experiences since they escaped into the forest, finally let out a long breath at this point. “What happened next?”

“Afterward… I was lucky enough to escape the fake pocket dimension, although I can’t say I was in good shape. I left Milan’s things for her to retrieve from a certain location, but whether she went or not, I don’t know. I never saw Milan again. She probably doesn’t want to see me.

“As for my original world, things stabilized by the time I teleported. The affected posthumans quickly grasped the situation, knowing that once a doomsday was triggered, they had to stay away from each other. Thus, the mini-doomsdays spread apart, heading to every corner of the world, affecting an increasingly broad area.”

Wu Yiliu looked at his hands tightly clasped together. In the pitch-black curtain of rain, they only had a faint grey outline, as if someone had drained his flesh and blood, leaving him with only a watercolor sh.e.l.l, all blurred by the rain.

“But as for other ordinary people, I don’t know. I didn’t see those NPCs again after the mini-doomsdays began, so I still don’t know if anyone else evolved. The only consolation is probability; in such a vast world, the chance that only I evolved is too low.”

“So, what about the other posthumans?” Abby asked, completely engrossed by his story. In the rain, her wet golden hair looked almost black, with strands clinging to her face, and that small, round face, soaked by rain, looked even paler—although the shape of her features remained unchanged.

“The consular officer… I haven’t seen them either. I’m afraid it’s more likely bad than good,” Wu Yiliu replied with some hesitation. “Bringing danger to posthumans was never my intention, so I went back a few times later to save whoever I could, and incidentally look for the whereabouts of the consular officer because I wanted to get my hands on the [Pocket Dimension Setting]. When I was talking to Milan, she told me that she thought teleporting would negate the ‘individual as a pocket dimension’ effect, but that was just her personal guess based on experience. I was really worried that these posthumans would take the mini apocalypse to the next world, making everything uncontrollable… My original plan was to retrieve the [Pocket Dimension Setting] and deactivate the effect when the Changelings were nearly extinct.”

“It seems she guessed right then,” Abby said, almost sighing. “Otherwise, we wouldn’t have the Twelve Worlds Centrum today, with one infection after another over the years. Milan is really someone who has wholeheartedly delved into Special Items.”

Wu Yiliu nodded. He was silent for a few seconds, then suddenly chuckled without much humor. “I did see Huanzi from a distance once, can you believe it? She looked just like the day I first saw her, thin and unattractive, without a single scar added.”

“Huh?” Abby was taken aback. “I thought she was so hysterical that she must have…”

“I saw someone selling Huanzi on eBay two months later, to be precise, someone selling a ‘skinny female’ human suit,” Wu Yiliu said flatly. “Whether the Huanzi I met wore the human suit or became the human suit is something I never understood and don’t want to think too deeply about. In many ways, the irony of Huanzi and the human suit is almost synonymous with that world.”

Abby slowly sat up from the rock. She had been leaning in, listening intently to Wu Yiliu recounting past experiences. After Wu Yiliu’s words fell silent for a moment, both were quiet for a few seconds, with only the rustling of the rain hitting the earth and forest.

“Such a long story,” Abby said, gathering her wet hair behind her head. “To end on that note… is very fitting.”

The story was long indeed.

Even on a quiet night, sitting in the lobby of the Twelve Worlds Centrum Inn, warming by a fire, Wu Yiliu might not be willing to tell it from beginning to end – after all, even buying several beers wouldn’t be enough to wet his whistle.

Now he had just escaped from a bizarre pocket dimension, with possibly two transformed posthumans searching for his trail. Sitting in the pouring rain in the woods, enduring cold and s.h.i.+vering, and reminiscing about the past with a woman he didn’t know well, was hardly ideal.

“What I don’t understand is, this place is obviously not your home town’s world, so why have Pence and Cuining also started to deform in your eyes?” Abby asked, frowning.

On this point, Wu Yiliu had an explanation, and one he found quite reasonable.

“I think the two of them are not really ‘deformed,’ at least not like the transformation in my home world,” Wu Yiliu said thoughtfully. “Rather, my experience in my first world has developed an instinct in me…”

“An instinct? What kind of instinct?”

“To put it metaphorically, it’s like I’ve developed a special detector. When people around me start to change – whether physically or mentally – they appear in my eyes as Changelings,” Wu Yiliu said, pondering. “I’ve never encountered a situation like this before, so I never knew I had this instinct… It makes sense.”

Abby wiped the corner of her eye. They both had to constantly wipe the rain from their faces, like cars driving in heavy rain, using wipers to keep the gla.s.s clear. “No longer themselves… Do you have any speculation about their changes?”

Wu Yiliu nodded. “Huanzi and the human body suit,” he said quietly, his voice seemingly washed away by the rain. “It’s quite fitting for the pocket dimension before us.”

“Oh?” Abby said, still hearing him.

“Before I went to sleep under that thin blanket, I saw a strand of golden hair on it,” Wu Yiliu said. “I didn’t think much of it at the time and slept with it covering me. Only after waking up did I realize that it, like the hat and shoes, was one of the things in that pocket dimension, and it likely had the same effect.”

“What effect?”

“Erosion of the self, perhaps,” Wu Yiliu answered. “I didn’t even notice that I was tightly wrapped in the blanket. While wrapped in it, someone was constantly whispering in my ear, telling me not to let go of the blanket, instructing me to think this way or that. The humans in my hometown would slowly transform, no longer being themselves; the posthuman who was ensnared in the log cabin was no longer itself either.

“Pence and Cuining must have come into contact with other hats, shoes, and clothes, but not often, so the erosion was not severe. In my eyes, the ‘transformation’ was not advanced, their faces were in an uncontrollable stage of transformation—judging by the standards of the Changelings in my hometown. After all, they had to appear before others most of the time, and if they wore those things, they would be noticed at once. Later, they were kept under strict supervision, so they rarely had the chance to wear them surrept.i.tiously.”

Abby remained silent.

“But the blanket is different. You, no, Abby, sleep with it at night. No one would specifically look at her quilt,” Wu Yiliu said softly, looking at the woman across from him. “In other words, the reason Abby never appeared transformed in my eyes is because her transformation process had already been completed. Just like the full Changelings in my hometown, they look no different from normal people as long as they don’t remove their face skins.”

He took a breath and asked the person sitting inside Abby’s body, “Who are you?”