Love, death, and false man

Chapter 8. A Great Cause
Incomprehensible corridors, serotonin, tranquilizers, glucose, electrocardiograms, defibrillators, magnetic therapy, physiotherapy—these transparent nooses, playing cards, pain pumps, IV tubing, and insomnia, muttering, roaring, convulsing, screaming, empty talk, case files, facts, recollections, anecdotes, and glaring confrontations, and hospital shock, iron beds, and execution grounds.

Dreams, illusions, ecstasy, ideals, religion, a whole ship full of sensitive lies.

The painful dam broke, overflowing the riverbanks, churning and the torture on the guillotine, pouring into the flood, revealing the highlands, the decade of animal screams and suicides.

"The savior is watching you."

9/13—13:11
Fang Yan suddenly woke up with a start.

The Fourth Branch of the Binhai Municipal Public Security Bureau.

The interrogation room features white fluorescent lights, one-way glass, an iron table, handcuffs, and an iron chair.

"You don't need to worry about your identity being revealed. Before the truth is confirmed, your classmates will only think you're sick and hospitalized. Now, let's start talking. Begin with the beginning: the specific time you and your uncle Ji Jianguo boarded the ship, and the contents of the contract you signed with the captain of the Chengyun. I'm talking to you."

Black jacket, poker face, and an aggressive tone.

Fang Yan woke up from his daze, and only then did his consciousness become completely clear. He only remembered the stretcher, the blood transfusion, the glucose bag, the person wearing a mask, and the professional wound suturing. Everything was very blurry. After waking up, he ate a free lunch at the police station and still felt weak in his limbs.

"What's the date today?"

Fang Yan asked calmly, his subconscious mind still seemingly still focused on verifying the authenticity of the [Hunter Channel] on the 12th.

"Now I'm asking you about the wounds on your body. Trauma specialists have determined that these wounds are from lances. It's insane! Have you recently joined any medieval European equestrian or lance clubs?"

This is the most bizarre case the interrogator has ever handled, bar none. The suspect, a high school student named Fang Yan, is also the most enigmatic suspect he has ever interrogated.

He couldn't contact anyone in his family, and his maternal grandfather was also not at home. He was very old and frequented nightclubs, so his whereabouts were uncertain. He couldn't be contacted at the moment either.

The most bizarre thing was Fang Yan's bedroom. The possibility of him having a mental illness could not be ruled out. The whole room was covered with insulating tape and newspapers, as well as an old-fashioned radio and more than a dozen antennas. It was too eerie. All the sockets and ceiling lights were also sealed with tape, which even made the criminal police officers feel a little creeped out.

Fang Yan was able to read the interrogator's thoughts. Today was the 13th, so it seemed he had been lying in the hospital for a full day and night before being sent here.

He shook his head; he didn't even know what a lance was.

The interrogators had no choice but to apply pressure.

“Your escape yesterday was extremely serious and can be classified as fleeing to evade punishment. So you should know that you have committed a crime. The other suspects who were arrested gave consistent statements regarding your case. You just need to tell the truth.”

Fang Yan, who had not received any spy training, easily noticed the change in his expression and softened his attitude. "We have already obtained relevant facts that the captain of the Chengyun ship used fake contracts to seize profits and illegally hired crew members to deceive and exploit them. Considering this situation, your identity as a victim, and the special nature of your age, we will handle the matter accordingly."

However, the thought process that Fang Yan read was not like that; it was a roundabout appeasement strategy. Furthermore, the testimonies of others were chaotic and inconsistent, and the so-called prisoner's dilemma did not work on him.

Suddenly, Fang Yan felt a ringing in his ears.

"Could you turn the sound off? I'm feeling a bit uncomfortable."

Fang Yan pointed to something that looked like a buzzer next to the camera in the upper right corner of the room, but it was probably just an ordinary speaker.

"Don't change the subject! There's no sound; you're a suspect now!"

The interrogator slammed his fist on the table with a deafening roar.

Fang Yan felt the tinnitus getting stronger and stronger, the world spinning before his eyes, his stomach cramping, his fingers twitching reflexively, and he felt something warm and soft on his arm.

Looking down, I was horrified to see dark red blood from my nose.

"Oh... it's the lieutenant who's summoning me."

Fang Yan tried to stand up, but with his hands handcuffed, he was too weak to grab anything, and his consciousness quickly faded.

……

……

……

Damp, cold, bone-chilling, black and white slides.

Frames extracted from consciousness flashed by rapidly, as if the eyes were the cameras of the mind-controlled organization, incredibly clear. Even completely forgotten images flashed before the screen like a slideshow: the height of water in a glass, the texture of an insect's shell, the number of leaves, every single ingredient on a shampoo's ingredient list.
It was playing at an overclocked speed, as if its memory was being read.

Severe convulsions, nausea, dizziness, vomiting, and screaming.

A dark, human-shaped silhouette sat in front of them.

Those fingers reached out towards Fang Yan, some pressed against his forehead, some pried open his eyelids, and some held flashlights, shining them into his eyes. The rusty exhaust fan turned listlessly, the external beam of light constantly being choked by the fan blades. A high-lumen desk lamp, an old-fashioned CRT television playing images of nuclear bombs, mushroom clouds, concentration camps, and barbed wire, and a radio with exaggerated static and noise.

Fang Yan's severely withered and emaciated face showed only the haggardness of a dying man, and his constricted, turbid pupils reacted to the bright light.

"Private Fang Yan, I guarantee your IQ is over 160. You were promoted from Private to Private within three hours of enlisting, breaking the record for the entire 7th Army Group."

The adult woman's voice was very hoarse.

The scene is always so hazy, dreamlike, unreal, and lacking in detail; all you can see is her officer's uniform, officer's hat, one-eyed eye patch, and long, curly black hair.

"It's Lieutenant Sylvia... Why didn't things go as you said? My summer job experiences have already come to light."

Fang Yan's lips moved with difficulty, the bright lamplight making his face appear as white as paper and his body weak. He believed he would soon be executed by firing squad.

"You still care about this? It's negligible to the Salvation Army. Apart from the Soul Eater and the Holy See, you don't need to worry about hunting down false people and keeping your identity from being exposed, Private Fang Yan."

"But I'm about to die."

"The matter will be resolved, but the way it will be resolved will be different. According to the Salvation Army's regulations, an event affecting more than 1024 people can be classified as a historical event. What you experienced this summer, including the police station, the media, the fishing boat's parent company, the maritime authority, relevant personnel, and those who knew about it, involved far more than 1024 people. It is impossible to directly eliminate the impact of this event."

Otherwise, it would cause severe social distortion, what we'd call the Mandela Effect in 2030 terminology. We could completely erase everyone's memories, but high-powered memory erasure would increase the risk of exposing our servers and base stations. As you leave, I'll give you the code: my informant in 2030 will release you within ten minutes without requiring you to participate in any subsequent not-guilty plea proceedings. Simultaneously, the satellite base station will minimize the social impact of your resisting arrest and subsequent detention, allowing you to continue infiltrating the social processes compiled by the Soul Eater and maintain your stable identity.

The officer explained very patiently.

"Oh... I see."

The so-called Mandela Effect is often considered to be an error or bias in collective memory, including incorrect memories of historical events, misspellings of names and places, or minor errors in popular culture.

"But such a thing did happen, didn't it?"

Fang Yan pressed on with his questions.

“That’s right. As long as you jump into the [Hunter Channel], if you are an extremely important target and have a high enough rank, the organization will risk exposing the base station and may even overwrite the memories of millions or tens of millions of related personnel for you. Speaking of the [Hunter Channel], you need to sign this agreement to enter it voluntarily.”

"I find the signing of this agreement very puzzling."

"The Savior will guarantee the free will of each of our members, which is the necessary ideology to fight against the Soul-Draining Lord."

"But what just happened? I feel like my memories have been read."

“We will not allow dangerous information to enter the server. This is a necessary sacrifice. Private Fang Yan, your duty is to obey orders.”

The female officer's tone was cold and left no room for argument.

Fang Yan signed the agreement in a daze.

"There's also this liaison agreement. I'll have the base station liaison in 2030 provide you with monthly supplies and pay for hunting down the fakes."

The female officer spoke calmly.

Fang Yan signed the agreement in a murky manner.

“I just feel lonely, sir. I feel so lonely. There’s no one to fight alongside me.”

"You are currently on a classified mission, you are a classified personnel, and your lifetime contact code is CGX-4469. You cannot contact other PLA agents unless absolutely necessary, except for rescue or special missions. Your current rank is Private First Class. I will periodically assign you tasks and combat operations through a base station contact person. A soldier's duty is to obey orders. Do you have any further questions?"

"What if... after switching to the kill channel, the target I need to deal with, and the people involved, would cause a severe Mandela Effect, and my current rank is not up to par, and I fail to successfully deal with the target?

"Such an extreme situation has never occurred in my operations. It can only mean that the target is extremely adept at concealment and camouflage and is very powerful. It was a serious military miscalculation. If we really encountered this..."

Then please sacrifice yourself gloriously for the greatest cause in the entire history of the universe, for the liberation of all mankind.

Are there any other questions?

"No, sir."

Fang Yan felt only pain and weakness. There was no loneliness in the world that could surpass the cruelty and absurdity of the frozen sun and the long, hazy night.

The code is ██████
Well then, Private Fang Yan, I wish you good luck in your military service.

The female officer stood up, more solemn than any member of the honor guard, and gave a perfectly standard military salute.

(End of this chapter)