Chapter 21 The Power of Deduction

Feng Bujue paused for a few seconds, then said, "The distance between the two pillars on either side of that object is exactly nine meters." Almost the instant he finished the word "meters," he yelled, "Run!"

The moment Qiu Feng took a step, the sound of a building collapsing came from behind him. This indicated that at this moment, Qiu Feng's "recognition" had activated SCP-233.

The loud noise behind him didn't hinder Qiu Feng's actions. He rushed headlong to his three teammates before stopping and turning to observe the changes.

SCP-233 only needed 0.23 seconds to destroy matter, and the process was silent. Therefore, when the sound of the collapse rang out, the destruction process had already been completed. The noise Qiu Feng heard was a subsequent reaction, the sound of building materials falling from above the ceiling.

From the perspective of Feng Bujue, Ji Chang, and Honghu, almost at the same time as Feng Bujue shouted "Run," the two supporting pillars themselves, as well as the wall between the pillars, were disintegrated. A section of the ceiling and floor parallel to the wall also suddenly disappeared. Some concrete chunks that fell from the second floor hit SCP-233 and fell with it into the crack in the ground.

A building of this size, covering several thousand square meters, wouldn't undergo any structural collapse just because a wall and two pillars in one corner were destroyed.

After the small-scale collapse, the dust settled. Behind the wall, a pitch-black space appeared. And the rectangular cracks in the ceiling and floor became two passageways.

"What's going on? Anything related to nine gets annihilated?" Qiu Feng asked.

Honghu replied, "Looks like it." He immediately understood why Feng Bujue hadn't intended for him to be the one taking action from the start.

Ji Chang also said, "So you sent Qiu Feng, who's bad at math..." He paused, something flashing through his mind. "Oh, I get it. The first character of the nicknames of three of us has nine strokes. And Honghu is level 29. Is it that kind of association?"

"Ah, that's the idea," Feng Bujue replied.

Qiu Feng said, "But have you considered... from your point of view, my connection to 9 is only the character 'Qiu'. But from my perspective, I can think of n connections."

"That was unavoidable. Before the action, I couldn't tell you the object's properties, nor could I confirm any questions related to nine with you, because that would only speed up your thinking after receiving the information," Feng Bujue replied. "In any case... the fact that you're still alive proves that my strategy was successful."

Feng Bujue shrugged. "I was quite confident in this plan. When I shouted, you were already about twenty meters away from the thing, and its effective range only extended to twenty-three meters. Even an average person in real life would only need two to three seconds to rush to a safe area.

The time it took you to hear that sentence, realize the significance of the number 9, and then think of the first connection to 9 on your own, was enough for you to step out of the object's effective range.

Of course, if from your perspective, you had an exceptionally close connection to this number, and you associated it with yourself within a fraction of a second... then tough luck."

Qiu Feng didn't have any objections to Feng Bujue's attitude or comments, because he thought the other party's words made sense. The success rate of this plan was indeed very high, and the other party's design was already very precise, ensuring his safety to the greatest extent.

However, Qiu Feng raised another question: "Wait... you said the object's effective range is twenty-three meters?"

"Yes," Feng Bujue said.

The other three exchanged glances. Finally, Honghu spoke, "Then the problem arises... now that this thing has fallen into the ground, unless it fell a full twenty-three meters, otherwise..."

"Otherwise, that passageway is still within its range of influence. Now that we know the rules, we'll be annihilated if we get close to that corner," Ji Chang continued.

"You don't need to worry about that," Suddenly, a woman's voice sounded.

A hint of surprise appeared on the faces of the four players, because the source of the voice was in the pitch-black space behind the wall.

Accompanied by the clattering sound of long, high-heeled leather boots hitting the ground, a graceful figure walked out of the darkness.

As with the last time they met, X-23's face was still so pure and beautiful, her skin still delicate and snow-white, and her long black hair draped behind her neck, fluttering in the wind. But the difference was that her outfit had changed to a black, one-piece leather suit, and her curvaceous figure looked even more eye-catching under the wrapping of the leather.

Apart from the clothing, she had hardly changed. Feng Bujue had no reason not to recognize her, after all, Brother Jue had only met two Derivates in total.

"What are you doing here?" Feng Bujue said. "This is a four-player script..."

"Can't you think of any other lines to greet a friend?" Twenty-Three revealed a charming smile, and her sharp teeth were also exposed at this moment, startling Honghu and the other two.

Although Twenty-Three was about thirty meters away from the players, her voice could be heard clearly in their ears.

"Haha... sorry," Feng Bujue also smiled sheepishly. "How have you been lately?" He knew that for Twenty-Three, the last time she saw him might have been a year or two ago, or even longer.

Twenty-Three replied, "As you can see, I'm no longer limited by the rules of level four and level three."

Upon hearing this, Feng Bujue immediately understood that Twenty-Three was at least a level two Derivate, which was why she could appear here. "That's good... looks like you don't have to live that kind of life of struggling to survive every moment anymore."

"Yes, that's right," Twenty-Three replied. According to general conversational etiquette, after finishing this sentence, she should probably ask Feng Bujue how he was doing, but she didn't ask. Moreover, the way she looked at Feng Bujue seemed to reveal a hint of sympathy.

"Um... you suddenly appeared here, it's not like you came here specifically to say hello, right?" Feng Bujue asked.

"I'm doing some retrieval work recently," Twenty-Three replied casually, and immediately changed the subject. "By the way, I can't stay here for long, so I'll make it short." She paused for a second, observed the state of all four players, and then continued, "Your main mission is to enter the Reasoning Club, right?" She didn't wait for the other party to answer, and continued, "The person in charge of that club is a very strange guy, and his strength is second only to the Four Pillar Gods." She glanced at the black space behind her, "He created a buffer space to prevent me from entering the script to retrieve SCP-233. And when you solve this puzzle, the stagnation in the buffer space will disappear on its own."

"So... that person in charge, he also counted you as part of the script's progress," Feng Bujue continued.

Twenty-Three said, "Yes, now I 'must' take this SCP away as soon as possible, so... after I leave, you can continue to move forward." As she said this, she raised her right hand and moved her fingers slightly.

The next second, SCP-233 quickly rose from the cracked ground and hovered beside Twenty-Three.

"He's upstairs..." Twenty-Three looked up, and in her pupils, it seemed that there were bits of light flowing, "Be careful on the way, Feng Bujue."

Feng Bujue replied, "Ah, I will. You take care too... after all, you..."

"I have to leave," Twenty-Three interrupted Brother Jue. She hooked her fingers, and the SCP-233 beside her flew into the black space behind the wall on its own.

"Will we meet again?" Feng Bujue asked.

The last time they parted, Twenty-Three said "farewell forever," but she didn't "die" as he expected, but appeared again. Therefore, Feng Bujue asked this question.

"We will..." Twenty-Three replied, and after saying that, she turned around and stepped into the darkness.

At the moment when her figure disappeared into the darkness, she faintly said again: "...we definitely will."

After Twenty-Three entered that space, the wall that was disintegrated and disappeared miraculously recovered. Luminous data streams poured down like a waterfall, reshaping the wall. However, the gap leading to the second floor and the hole in the ground were still there, and the concrete chunks that fell from the ceiling were still scattered on the ground.

"Uh... Brother Feng." About a minute later, someone among the three teammates finally spoke. The first to speak was Qiu Feng, "Can you explain... what's going on again..."

"That beauty should be an NPC," Ji Chang said. "Why would an NPC mention the word 'script'?"

Honghu said, "What's more, scripts are randomly generated. Why do you and that NPC seem like you've known each other for a long time..."

Feng Bujue really didn't know how to answer them. After all, the game company had already greeted him in advance, and the two GMs, Pan Feng and Hua Xiong, had also discussed this matter with him. It was best to keep the matter of the Derivates a secret if possible.

"Actually... she's a special humanoid program in the game, like a recycling bin," Feng Bujue began to exert his novelist's ability to make up stories on the spot, "As you can see, she's not affected by SCP-233. And you also heard, she said she's doing 'retrieval work'." He said with a serious face, "I've seen her once in another script before, so she knows me." He lowered his voice mysteriously, "Don't spread this around, if it's spread on a large scale, I won't care if Dream Inc. bans your accounts."

After hearing this, the three were dubious, but even if they were skeptical, they didn't have any basis to overturn Feng Bujue's statement.

"Well... indeed, given some of the spoof settings in Dream Inc.'s game, it's not impossible for their employees to design intelligent programs into the appearance of beautiful women and let them wander around in the scripts..." Ji Chang said.

Qiu Feng also buried his doubts in his heart, and joked, "Brother Feng, the other party is a humanoid program, what's with this indifferent attitude when you're talking... you can't have romance across different dimensions."

Feng Bujue was not the kind of person who would remain silent after being ridiculed. He immediately hooked the corner of his mouth and chuckled, "Hmph... I didn't expect you to evolve into a Thunder-Qiu without a Thunder Stone."

"Is the Pokémon reference still not over!"

Honghu watched them silently from the side, with no reaction to their cold jokes.

At this moment, Honghu's mind was integrating information and thinking about problems. He obviously didn't believe Feng Bujue's explanation either, but unlike Qiu Feng and Ji Chang, he quickly thought of a word, a word he had only seen on the forum, and the information related to it was just some unconfirmed legends.

However, the scene just now seemed to be perfectly explained by that word - Derivate.