Artifact Report

Chapter 148: Fu Tailan He Won't Be Moved

In the first autumn of his life, the air was cool, crisp and slightly sweet.

The colorful leaves on the trees, layer upon layer, are cut into the blue sky.

The cool breeze blew his thick, soft and shiny red fur, as if gently tickling his skin thousands of times, making him want to open his mouth and let out a sharp, small cry.

The wild rabbits in the neighborhood have grown in number recently, so he can eat his fill every day. When he has nothing to do, he likes to lie in the grass and use his nose to detect the greetings of animals in the air.

Stretching is really--so--comfortable.
The tip of his ear twitched slightly, and Xiao Tai suddenly shrank back, rolling his black eyes.

He sat up suddenly, his ears like two detectors, aiming at the grass in front.

Something had just burrowed under the soil ahead, pushing the clod of earth and making it tremble—was it a groundhog, or a giant earthworm?

Xiao Tai's eyes lit up, and he immediately lost all sleepiness and became alert. In his mind, he had already planned this important capture operation.

The movement happened just two meters ahead, under the ground. He shuffled forward, quickly approaching the patch of grass. He thought, first I have to jump high, then dive down, and land right on top of that guy's head.

This is what his mother taught him -

Fu Tailan shuddered, stopped abruptly, and leaned back - the force was so strong that he almost fell backwards because he couldn't stop.

He blinked, and the grass, trees and sky disappeared from his sight, and a layer of cold sweat broke out on his back.

I was still standing in the corridor on the second floor of my apartment building, with doors open on both sides. The alternating light and shadow from within the doors made the corridor seem to breathe.

The TV in room 202 was right in front of him, only two or three steps away.

If...if I had really jumped towards the Groundhog just now...

He would plunge into the TV and enter the reality of the red fox Xiaotai.

Fu Tailan realized that he was facing the TV in Room 202, so he quickly took a few steps forward and stopped by the door of Room 203. He stayed there for less than thirty seconds, and no one came out of the TV to greet him. Only then did he dare to look back.

On the screen, Xiao Tai also stopped.

It looked left and right at the grass, and its moist black eyes seemed a little confused and lost, wondering if the groundhog had escaped.

With just one glance, Fu Tailan seemed to feel the cool breeze like the clear water flowing through the mountains and forests again, and remembered again his open and free life under the high sky, where he could come and go as he pleased.

He sighed softly, cut off the gaze and turned his head away.

"I'm sorry, Tai."

Fu Tailan said in a low voice.

If he had been born as Little Tai, then living a pure and free life like a wild animal wouldn't seem so bad.

Unfortunately, he has been a human being for so many years.

It is obvious that being a human being is very hard; but he seems unwilling to give up the part that can feel the pain.

The wild fox Xiaotai may just be a prisoner in a cage, occasionally used to comfort his dreams.

Fu Tailan stood by the wall and glanced at the door of Room 203. This time he learned his lesson and immediately looked away.

The woman in Room 201 spoke nicely, but she had bad intentions. She only told half of the story and concealed the most crucial situation, which became a trap.

She never said that before entering the TV, she would experience the reality on TV first.

It turns out that if you stare at the TV for too long, you'll fall into hallucinations, bewitched by the "new life," and step into the TV—eh? But, when he was looking at Xiaotai just now, had he looked at him for a long time?
It seems like just a short while?

If even a few seconds of looking at something can drag you into a hallucinatory experience, then the safest thing to do is to simply walk past it without even looking...

But Fu Tailan didn't move.

On the surface, it seems reasonable and a way out for the boss, but it actually makes people wary, doesn't it?
In fact, he couldn't think of what kind of trap he might trigger if he went upstairs directly; it was more of an intuition developed from years of hunting experience than caution.

Besides, even if he wouldn't choose any other life or reality, he couldn't help but want to see what options he had.

Fu Tailan pulled out a stopwatch from his backpack and set a fifteen-second reminder for himself—about the same length of time he had spent looking at Xiaotai before he fell into hallucination.

When the fifteen seconds were up, it would begin to buzz softly; not as distracting as an alarm clock, but at the moment, with no better choice, I could only hope that it would wake me up from the hallucination.

After all, the element in "Xiao Tai's reality" that makes him aware that something is wrong cannot be expected to appear every time.

Fu Tailan raised her eyes and her gaze fell on the TV screen in Room 203.

Although the contents of television are parallel realities, when they appear on television, they will be flexible and presented in the form of programs or films. At this time, the TV in room 203 seems to be an interview about the life of a wealthy man's son.

"Tai Lan brought us to visit his private island today..."

The voiceover said with a hint of excitement, "We just got off the helicopter. As you can see, the Fu family's luxurious manor is built on the cliff edge of the island, overlooking the entire island and the Pacific Ocean..."

It is true that it is a luxurious manor: if you want to go from the main house restaurant to the home theater after dinner, you have to take the kind of cart you see on the golf course - the swimming pool you pass by on the way is as big as a water park, and even has a waterfall and a bar.

Fu Tailan was a man who had seen money, but he was still dumbfounded.

...Fu Han would probably jump in without hesitation, right?
In this reality, Fu Han seems to have become a remarkable person.

But what is strange is that even though the fifteen-second timer had already expired, he was still a spectator outside the TV and had not at all entered into the illusion that he was the son of a wealthy man.

For the sake of testing, he watched the TV in Room 203 for a while longer. He ended up watching for five minutes straight and he was still standing there conscious - what a waste of time on guard.

"Could it be that..." Fu Tailan tentatively walked past Room 203, muttering to himself as he walked, "Only when I'm moved by reality will it become an illusion?"

Thinking of this, he couldn't help but look back.

"Compared to being the son of a world-class billionaire, I'd rather be a fox?"

Eh, it seems like I shouldn't say this.

The apartment can hear it now; then the next TV shows will have to be all about free and cute animals—

Before the word "animal" was fully formed, Fu Tailan couldn't help but stop.

Because the guy on the next TV is really far from being a cute animal.

"...Are you looking down on me?"

He pointed at the TV inside the door of Room 204, not knowing who he was protesting to: "Who wants to live in your shabby apartment?"

It’s okay if he’s just a resident, but he’s also a resident who needs to go to work.

204 Fu Tailan on TV is an unattractive short man with a dull face. He works as a manager in this apartment building.

The residents on TV weren't very polite when they spoke to him, and when they looked at him, there was none of the dazed look on their faces that he was used to seeing.

"Mr. Fu,"

A plump female resident knocked hard on the administrator's door and complained, "The garbage pipe has appeared again, this time on the fourth floor. Can you please go and take care of it? What's going on? Were you not just evicted not long ago? Mr. Fu, have you taught it a lesson?"

Fu Tailan was so angry.

"What the hell?" He pointed at his face and said to the corridor wall, "If you had my face, would you want to look like him? And he doesn't look smart at all!"

The short administrator on TV, with a dull face, picked up an electric shock rod behind the door and went to the fourth floor to capture and expel the garbage pipe - the fat resident was right, he seemed to be not very good at his job. The garbage pipe was not damaged yet, but he had already shocked himself.

After finally finishing the work, he went downstairs with a dusty face and a big afro caused by an electric shock, just in time to see the residents of Room 607 returning home.

The administrator's face suddenly turned red and he became visibly nervous.

After struggling for a while, he finally took two steps closer to the resident of Room 607 and stammered, "Xing-Xing, Miss Xing, you're back... Waiting for the elevator?"

The resident, who was perhaps considered quite pretty by the standards of the nest, turned around and said "hmm" expressionlessly.

"Well, you seem to be coming home early lately..."

"Oh, the elevator's here," Miss Xing said, looking as if she wanted to escape from the administrator as soon as possible, and she had already stepped out. "I'm leaving."

Before she finished speaking, she lowered her head and pointed it at the paper on the wall - she bent down and disappeared; only a dazed Fu Tailan was left standing in the hallway, stroking her hair in disappointment.

"It's fine that her looks and abilities are average, but there's also a secret crush plot that's obviously not going to work out? How is that any different from scolding me?"

Fu Tailan even felt a little disappointed: "He is so useless, isn't he? Now everyone has a crush on me. If I had lived his life, I would definitely not live such a cowardly life -"

...Oh? Could this also be a way to lure people in?

Use provocation to do the opposite?
If that were the case, the apartment would be naive.

Such a disheartening reality, even if Fu Tailan is very disappointed with his wife, he will not fall into the illusion experience, he can just walk away without any regrets.

Next, Fu Tailan saw several realities again. Among them, the content of the TV in Room 206 almost made him fall into it again - in that reality, he was the underground king who ruled the city of Blackmore.

Fu Tailan, who is nearly thirty years old, has become a leader in the underworld who is not dared to be addressed by name; he is very wealthy and has a wide reach, almost turning the city of Blackmore into a country within a country.

All the hunter families became branches under Fu Tailan. As for the Kai family, Chase Monroe and the like, they had long become stepping stones for him to climb to the top.

"Although that reality is pretty good, it's not good to just go in like that."

Fu Tailan came out of the illusion, turned off the double insurance of mobile phone and timer, and smiled embarrassedly.

I was mentally prepared for the apartment tactics, so escaping was much smoother.

"Isn't that like saying, I can't do it in my own life, so I'm going to pick peaches in other realities? Hmm... not very classy."

The apartment is not big. Walk four rooms forward from Room 206 and you will reach the end of the corridor at Room 210.

Um……?
Fu Tailan felt a strange feeling, but it was fleeting and could not be retrieved.

At the moment, as long as you don't get distracted by the content on TV and don't let it drag you into hallucinations, you can go upstairs smoothly by walking to the end of the corridor step by step.

Up to Room 208, there wasn't much that could move him; who knew how self-satisfied this apartment was that it actually displayed three realities with the apartment as the background - the TV content in Room 208, and even the scene of Mrs. Fu walking down the stairs and entering Room 208.

"Even if I could keep my appearance, I wouldn't want to live there,"

He muttered as he walked past Room 208. Just like before, he stopped at the door of Room 209 and raised his eyes towards the inside.

"...Xiao Tai," a female voice called softly on the TV in room 209.

Fu Tailan didn't even see what was on TV clearly. As soon as he heard the shouting, he fell straight into a hallucination.

　There's nothing dangerous in today's chapter, but I enjoyed writing it. I personally think parallel realities are interesting, and I wonder what you all think.

　　Speaking of which, I must praise Qidian for one thing. Among the current online literature platforms, it seems that Qidian is the only one that is actively combating plagiarism. Anyway, in the writers' backstage, you can often see books that Qidian has banned due to plagiarism.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)