Embers Ad Infinitum

Chapter 734: Investigator Genava

Translator: CKtalon

Mechanical Paradise had plenty of information on the Old World. This allowed Genava to lock onto the principal’s office without much effort.

After a few trial-and-error attempts, he pushed open the right door. Of course, he had already used various methods to confirm that there was nobody in the office. Otherwise, he would patiently wait for someone to report their work to the principal. He would take the opportunity to tailgate them or circle to the back of the building and climb in through the window.

After entering the office and gently closing the door, Genava went straight to the mahogany desk with a computer.

He was in no rush to turn on the computer. He first picked up the photo frame on the table and ‘memorized’ the faces of the principal’s family of three into his storage drives.

During this process, he ‘retrieved’ the data he had previously saved and ‘recalled’ the principal—who had been fuming because of Shang Jianyao during morning assembly—and compared it to the photo.

The similarity is only 86%… Removing the wig on his head boosts the similarity to 10%… Preliminary judgment indicates that this is the principal… Genava—who had no hair—actually found it a little difficult to understand a human’s obsession with hair. But as a smart bot, he only needed to understand this fact.

After putting down the photo frame, Genava stood in front of the office chair in a horse stance.

With a gentle tap, the computer’s various components began operating.

I can indeed turn on a computer. Genava followed his programming and made a simple judgment.

After the system was completely booted up, he held the mouse and tried to click on different documents. However, the computer appeared to be infected with a virus. The mouse didn’t listen to his instructions at all; it jumped right and left randomly.

Genava finally clicked open a document with great difficulty, and it was filled with content that wasn’t related to the filename. The only valuable thing was that they weren’t random characters.

After linking this matter to Shang Jianyao’s recording of his patting into a stick figure, how Jiang Baimian couldn’t determine the words written on her back, and how he couldn’t leave any marks despite using a pen, Genava came to a conclusion: The dreamscape’s rules or hidden powers prevented him from directly exchanging information with the dreamscape.

Of course, the other possibility was that even if this place really belonged to Master Zhuang’s dream—which was lifelike and virtually impossible to determine its authenticity—there were still things that couldn’t be completely detailed. For example, the data on the principal’s computer, the list of all the students in the school, and the teachers and employees’ resumes. If Master Zhuang—who had descended back then—hadn’t seen it, it probably wouldn’t be replicated in the dream. Or rather, there would definitely be a large number of repeats.

After making a few more attempts and confirming that it was impossible to obtain any information from the computer, Genava picked up a signed document to the side and recorded the principal’s name: “Wang Ande.”

Genava then flipped through the various information in the office, and his main program quickly plummeted into chaos.

Every piece of information here was rather detailed and looked real! This was completely contradictory to the other possibility that Genava had guessed.

He didn’t waste any time because of this and instead headed to the teacher’s office.

In those places, Genava memorized the looks and names of most teachers and grasped the names of all the students in the different classes from the workbooks piled on their table. Yes, except for those who didn’t hand in their homework.

There were few names that repeated, and they had their own meaning. They didn’t seem to be randomly produced or copied and pasted.

After ‘taking’ photos of all the teachers in the corresponding office, Genava left and jogged to the teaching building opposite the main gates.

He went to one classroom after another—one table after another—adding ‘photos’ of different students to his storage drives. For this reason, he specially established a model database.

At the same time, he used the textbooks, the teachings, and the names on the scratchpads to connect the different photos with the content he had memorized in the teacher’s office.

Only a robot could cover such complicated, detailed, and shocking amounts of data in a short period of time. If Jiang Baimian were here, it would be impossible for her to complete this mission in a few hours even if she relied on the auxiliary chip in her electric eel-like biomechanical limb.

Genava—who did repetitive labor in each classroom—entered Grade 12, Class 5 again.

He realized that the desk that originally belonged to Jiang Baimian had been ‘appropriated’ by an unfamiliar girl.

She was tall and had a ponytail. She wore an old-fashioned school uniform with blue and white colors, and she often received the teacher’s affirmation. Apart from that, she didn’t have any similarities to Jiang Baimian.

This made Genava suspect that she was the real owner of the desk—a student of Tai City’s No. 1 Senior High School, Grade 12’s Class 5.

After the Old Task Force entered Master Zhuang’s dream, the different members were matched to the person most similar to them and had their corresponding thoughts implanted.

As this high school only had a few thousand people, and there was a relatively limited sample of humans, it was impossible for the matches to be perfect. Most of the time, there were only three to four that shared similarities.

Xu Qiao. Genava memorized the girl’s name.

He then went to the classroom where Bai Chen and Long Yuehong had been. He saw an empty seat and a short boy sitting in the other.

The male student matched to Little Red is called Zhang Huadong… His deskmate seems to be on leave and didn’t come to class today… I can’t determine her name by elimination for the time being. I need to figure out the other classmates’ situation in the classroom first… Genava recorded these questions.

When comparing the previous classrooms one by one, he had already realized that not all students attended school today. The homework on the teacher’s desks that came from yesterday or the day before didn’t match the number of students in the corresponding classrooms.

Genava then repeated his previous work.

Even as a smart bot, he busied until the sun was about to set before he finished gathering all the data.

During this time, Jiang Baimian, Shang Jianyao, Bai Chen, and Long Yuehong had a simple dinner. They filled their stomachs in advance to deal with any subsequent accidents.

Long Yuehong heaved a sigh of relief when he saw Genava jump out of the automatic extendable gate that had long been opened while Tai City’s No. 1 Senior High School remained the same.

Jiang Baimian went forward and asked, “How was it? Any progress?”

Compared to manual screening and comparison, she felt that Genava had many times better identification and database matching abilities.

Genava moved his metal neck from side to side. “None of the names correspond to the ones that appeared in the other three Buddhist Holy Lands; this includes students who didn’t come to class today and teachers on leave. However, a small number of students might not have handed in their homework all along while also missing classes today, so I can’t gather their data.”

Long Yuehong thought for a few seconds and said, “Those who aren’t in school today should have nothing to do with Master Zhuang. Otherwise, the scene displayed in the dream wouldn’t be that day’s scene.”

Bai Chen had just nodded when Shang Jianyao scoffed. “Have you ever had a dream? Don’t we sometimes have dreams that have a bird’s-eye view?”

“But it’s impossible to have such a dream repeatedly appear,” Jiang Baimian retorted simply.

As she thought, she said, “More haste, less speed. We’ll come back tomorrow and come back the day after tomorrow. Old Ge will confirm if the dreams played out here are different. If they are different, what’s the greatest difference… The detailed experimental data is an important premise for any further discussion.”

Bai Chen said, “After we grasp enough information, we have a chance of distinguishing Master Zhuang’s identity in the mortal world. This should be the key to cracking the dream.”

At this moment, Long Yuehong hesitated for a moment and said, “Why don’t we wait a few days for the monks from the Asceticism Department to arrive and observe how they worship the Holy Land? This might contain very important clues.”

Jiang Baimian nodded slightly. “If we fail to find any valuable information in the next two days, we can consider this plan.”

She turned her head to glance at the abandoned and dead Tai City’s No. 1 Senior High School and waved her hand. “Let’s retreat from this city ruin before it’s completely dark. We’ll come back tomorrow morning.”

Just as she said that, Shang Jianyao suddenly laughed. “Give me a few minutes to do another experiment.”

“What experiment?” Jiang Baimian asked in anticipation and worry.

Shang Jianyao pointed at the gates of Tai City’s No. 1 Senior High School and stroked his chin. “I want to enter the Mind Corridor at the edge of the dream and see if the surrounding rooms will be affected by the Kalendaria’s aura and produce the corresponding changes. Yes, if this is really Master Zhuang’s dream.”

This train of thought… That’s right! Some rooms in the Mind Corridor have the Kalendaria’s dream, and they definitely include Master Zhuang’s. This place is suspected to be a dream left behind by Master Zhuang in reality. The two are essentially the same. It might really produce a certain ‘chemical reaction’ and bring about some unpredictable changes… Jiang Baimian slowly nodded. “We can give it a try.”

Shang Jianyao immediately ran toward the automatic extendable gate like a wild horse that had escaped its reins. He then sat cross-legged at the gate without crossing the line.

After some adjustments, Shang Jianyao raised his right hand and massaged his temples.

In the Mind Corridor, his figure appeared in Room 131.

Although Jiang Baimian had previously requested him to explore the depths of the corridor before arriving in Tai City, this matter wasn’t that simple even with a strategy guide. All kinds of accidents would happen. Therefore, Shang Jianyao had only explored eight rooms incompletely. He was still two rooms away from his target.

This was an inaccurate estimate because he had counted the trauma of Iron Mountain City Ruin and the cruise ship as two.

Shang Jianyao straightened his clothes and conjured a small speaker. He pushed open the door and walked out before sizing up the surrounding rooms.

After turning his body and turning his head, his gaze suddenly froze. His expression gradually mixed with excitement and fear.

Beside his 131, there was an additional room that didn’t exist nearby.

The room quietly stood there. Golden numbers labeled the corresponding door number: “102”

‘102!’

The last Mind Corridor room Yama Tiger had entered before sleeping!