Volume 16 Tower of Babel Chapter 878: Eyeballs at the Back of the Head
If you just glanced at it unintentionally, you would be fooled, let alone Ke Lan staring at it so deliberately.
"Ke Lan, what happened to you just now?" Sanshisan asked from the side.
"I accidentally...saw the dome." Ke Lan said.
“What?!” Thirty-three froze in place, “But…but you never raised your head?”
"Listen to me first. Lower your head and stare at the ground. No matter what I say, don't move your eyes. Do you understand?" Ke Lan said.
In the old days, there was a very famous game in psychology and linguistics called "Don't Think About the Elephant". The host of the game would give the players some verbal prompts, such as "Don't think about an elephant". If the player subconsciously thought of an elephant after hearing this sentence, then he lost.
But in fact, when many people emphasize their brains not to imagine something, this thing often appears in their minds uncontrollably.
This is determined by the human thinking pattern. Without special training, it is difficult for anyone to truly "control" their own thoughts.
The reason why Ke Lan asked Sanshisan to stare at the ground first was because he was afraid that after he mentioned rivets, Sanshisan would subconsciously look at the rivets on his body... By the time he realized the problem, it would be too late.
"Understood." Thirty-three did as he was told.
"It's rivets."
“Rivets?” Thirty-three held his breath. “I…I know. You just…”
His eyes habitually glanced at the rivets on his clothes, but fortunately Ke Lan had warned him in advance, so he resisted the urge.
"You just saw the dome...what did you see?"
"It's hard to describe... I saw the Big Bang and the endless starry sky... I felt a huge amount of information pouring into my head, almost squeezing it to pieces," said Ke Lan.
"What about now? Has your body undergone any... changes?" Sanshisan asked. "For example, has it transformed into a corpse?"
"It seems not." Ke Lan shook his head. "At least there are no visible changes in the body... Oh, by the way, the hallucinations you just saw may also come from the dome scene reflected on the rivets... Although I don't know what you saw, it is likely that those things you saw inadvertently changed your cognition."
"I haven't seen it... uh, does it count if I just accidentally glanced at it?"
"That's good. Fortunately you only took a glimpse. If you had stared at it for a few seconds like I did just now... you would probably not have been able to pull yourself back." As Ke Lan spoke, he took out a spray can for marking from his backpack, fumbled for those places on his equipment that might produce reflections, and sprayed them all with black paint - this paint is specially made and can absorb most of the light. The place covered by the paint is like a black hole. No matter from which angle you look at it, it is pitch black, without even that matte luster.
On the battlefield or in ruins, this kind of paint called "black hole paint" and another kind of paint with completely opposite properties, "moon period", which can release long-lasting high-brightness fluorescence have very wide applications. Whether it is for spraying logos, camouflage, or making bait, it is very useful... except for the price, it has almost no disadvantages.
Of course, price cannot be considered a disadvantage of the product, but only a disadvantage of people who cannot afford it.
Ke Lan sprayed a layer of "black hole paint" on all his equipment, and then threw the spray can to Sanshisan: "Use this stuff to cover the reflection first... In addition, this incident also reminds me that we must pay attention to all things that may produce reflections, such as mirrors, polished metal objects, and even a puddle of water on the ground... The images reflected by these things are much clearer than frosted rivets, and the impact on us will definitely be stronger."
"It seems that the safest place on this floor is actually the forest in front of us." Thirty-three smiled bitterly while spraying paint, "After all, the dome of this place is blocked by the tree canopy. Even if the ground is covered with mirrors, we can't see anything."
"It's better to be careful." Ke Lan exhaled a breath of foul air and rubbed his temples, which were still slightly swollen and painful. "Who knows if the canopy will suddenly open up and catch us off guard?"
…
The two men made some adjustments, and after making sure that there was no place on their bodies that could produce reflected images, they once again stepped into the jungle hunting ground.
Although they took the same route as the last time they came in, the jungle was obviously a lot more lively this time.
"On the tree trunk at the three o'clock direction, there is a large beetle similar to a dung beetle lying on the ground. It seems to be able to fly. There are some sparsely distributed purple-brown tiny spikes on its shell. It should be poisonous... and at the eleven o'clock direction, there is a snake hanging on a tree branch three meters above the ground. The head is oval... But I'm not sure whether the head shape of snake mutants can determine whether they are poisonous... So, should we take action to eliminate these creatures?" asked Thirty-Three.
"If they don't attack us, there's no need to provoke them." Ke Lan responded, "The levels of these creatures are not high. They are basically Alpha and Beta mutants with very weak combat power... I guess it's because after we killed that monster, they all rushed into this new no-man's land."
"I think so too." Thirty-three nodded. "When we first came in, all we could see were plants. We didn't see a single animal."
"It seems that the crocodile-like monster should be considered one of the most powerful creatures in the jungle hunting ground, and its territory is really large." Ke Lan said, "But what I didn't expect was that there would be so many weak creatures in the jungle hunting ground. I originally thought that only strong enough species could survive, and weak species would soon be eaten up."
"That's not necessarily true. You know cockroaches, commonly known as the indestructible little cockroaches—" Thirty-Three said, "It is said that they already existed when the dominant creatures on Earth were dinosaurs. The creatures that ruled the Earth have changed one after another, but cockroaches have never become extinct from countless billions of years in prehistoric times to the end of the Earth. They even multiplied and prospered on Alpha after being brought to the planet by the Ark... Just because an individual is weak doesn't mean that the species cannot continue..."
Ke Lan didn't say anything, but turned her head, raised the flashlight in her hand, shone it on Sanshisan's face, and stared at him silently.
Thirty-three raised his palm to block the light from shining directly into his eyes and asked, "What's wrong? Is there a bug on my face?"
"No, I'm just a little strange. You wouldn't say such things before." Ke Lan whispered.
"Like that? What kind of words?" Sanshisan thought about it for a moment, and his expression suddenly changed. "I didn't think it was a big deal at first, but after hearing what you said, I suddenly feel a little uneasy... I did say those words just now, but you are not wrong either. According to my personality and thoughts, I would never say such words."
Thirty-three paused for a moment, then slowly said, "It's... as if there is a consciousness that borrowed my mouth to speak these words."
Ke Lan did not respond, but continued to stare at Sanshisan, observing his expression changes.
"Could this be a side effect of what just happened?" Thirty-three said with some concern, "Not only has my cognition been affected... my mind has also been... possessed by some unknown existence?"
"It shouldn't be that serious." Ke Lan shook his head. "Do you remember... what 'Nieto' in the upper city said to us before?"
"What did she say?" Thirty-three showed a trace of doubt on his face, "What she said to you should be different from what she said to me, right?"
"It tells me that what's on the dome is the truth of the universe," Ke Lan said. "So when I see the reflection on the rivets, images like the Big Bang and the endless sea of stars appear in my mind...but what you see may be something else."
"But I really can't remember what I saw... If I still remember, my head should have exploded by now, right?" Sanshisan subconsciously raised his hand to touch the back of his head, but it would have been fine if he hadn't touched it. Once he touched it, his whole face changed. "Ke... Ke Lan... It seems like something has grown on the back of my head. It's... under the skin, it's bulging... and it's moving."
Ke Lan felt his scalp burst into tears and he quickly went behind Sanshisan.
Unlike many veterans who like to keep their hair short after retirement, Sanshisan keeps his hair a little long and ties it into a short ponytail at the bottom of his head... Previously, Ke Lan thought that this was just Sanshisan's personal hobby, but Sanshisan told him not long ago that this hairstyle was to commemorate Lieutenant Tina Lawrence who had passed away long ago.
Ke Lan took a deep breath, took out a small folding knife, opened the blade, cut open Sanshisan's headband, and then carefully parted his hair with the tip of the knife.
At the lower back of his head, there was a bulging, round tumor, about the size of a ping-pong ball. The membrane on the surface of the tumor was stretched very thin. Under the light of the flashlight, Ke Lan could see clearly what was inside the tumor.
"An eyeball." Ke Lan said, "An eyeball that is completely covered by a membrane and has not yet opened. I have seen similar symptoms many times in memetic transmission incidents. People or animals infected by memes will also grow large and small eyeballs on their bodies. The initial stage of the eyeball growth is exactly the same as this thing on the back of your head."
"Then I was also infected by... the meme?" Sanshisan's voice sounded a little dry.
"I don't know. Just because it's similar to you, it's not enough to be used as a basis for judgment." Ke Lan tried to keep his voice calm. "Besides, in that meme infection incident, the meme itself has been completely destroyed by me. Even if you were infected by some kind of 'meme', it was a brand new 'meme' and not the original one."
"Could it be that the 'degree of erosion' in my body has begun to approach the critical point?" Sanshisan thought of another possibility, "Just like Mo Jue... It won't be long before I will also become that kind of monster, right?"
"I don't know." Ke Lan still answered the same way, "The symptoms of erosion vary from person to person..."
"You don't have to comfort me, really." Thirty-three sighed and smiled bitterly. "In fact, I have made up my mind for this trip... I know that it will be difficult for me to return to the Ark alive. I think it is a miracle that I can make it here."
"I'm not trying to comfort you, I'm just stating the facts."
"I know my own situation. You told me all those things. Before Heruni and the others turned into corpses, didn't their bodies also mutate? They heard all kinds of strange whispers and saw all kinds of strange visions... My current situation matches all of them... I think I don't have much time left, right?" Thirty-three said in a low voice.
"..." Ke Lan did not speak. Sanshisan's analysis was indeed correct. His various symptoms were indeed consistent with the situation where the degree of erosion was approaching the critical point.
"Can you help me cut that thing off?" Sanshisan suddenly asked, "Even if I die, I want to remain a normal person ."
"This eye growth has a lot of blood vessels directly connected to your brain. If it is removed directly, uncontrollable bleeding will occur, and there is a more than 90% chance that you will die directly."
"Cut it." Sanshisan said without hesitation.
"What if there is a cure?" Ke Lan let down Sanshisan's hair. "Hruni held out for so long before the erosion exceeded the critical point. Maybe you can hold out longer than him. My intuition tells me that the solution to the erosion should be hidden in this hive city... If it's not in the hive city, then it must be in the 'Tower of Babel'."
"Aren't you trying to comfort me?"
"No, my intuition...is always accurate."
