111: Only madmen can survive!

Boom!

Two waves of black energy slammed into each other mid-air.

Air currents churned.

The surrounding mirrors instantly shattered into dust.

Chen Mo took half a step back.

The reflection... remained completely still.

"How is that possible?"

Su Qingxue watched in terror while dodging the pursuit of "herself."

Chen Mo lost the clash of strength?

"Purity."

The reflection dusted off non-existent dirt, its tone indifferent.

"I removed all your negative emotions, retaining only pure killing logic."

"I am the perfect you."

"And you are merely a defective product swayed by emotions."

Swoosh!

The reflection's figure instantly vanished.

The next second, a fist wrapped in strong wind appeared beside Chen Mo's face.

It was too fast.

There was no unnecessary winding up, no preparatory movements—it was purely the most optimized attack path.

Bang!

Chen Mo raised his arm to block, but the immense force blasted him backward, slamming him hard against a mirrored wall.

Crash.

Fragments scattered everywhere.

"Cough..."

Chen Mo crawled out of the pile of broken glass, spitting out bloody saliva.

How interesting.

Was this Arthur's old scheme?

Using an absolutely rational data body to counter the original body endowed with human emotions?

"Chen Mo! Don't fight it head-on!"

Nightingale shouted from afar, looking disheveled herself. The "Nightingale" in the mirror completely anticipated all her moves, perfectly parrying every knife strike.

"They can read our thought processes!"

"Read?"

Chen Mo wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth and stood up straight again.

The reflection opposite him walked closer step by step, condensing a black scythe in its hand.

That was Chen Mo's most frequently used weapon.

"I don't think so."

Chen Mo looked at the perfect "himself" and suddenly smiled.

The smile was savage.

"You said you removed my negative emotions?"

"Then you're not perfect shit."

He let go of his hand.

He did not summon the scythe.

Instead, he drew an ordinary tactical dagger from his waist.

"Without fury, how do you swing a blade?"

"Without greed, why do you strive to survive?"

"Without fear..."

Chen Mo's figure suddenly erupted, charging proactively towards the scythe-wielding reflection like an out-of-control beast.

"You know nothing about killing!"

The reflection was expressionless, and the scythe in its hand swung down precisely, sealing off all of Chen Mo's attack routes.

That was the optimal solution derived from millions of calculations.

A certain death situation.

Puncture!

The sound of a sharp blade entering flesh.

Su Qingxue covered her mouth.

Chen Mo did not dodge.

He allowed the black scythe to pierce his left shoulder, pinning him suspended in mid-air.

Blood flowed down the scythe's handle, dripping onto the pristine mirror surface—a shocking sight.

Did it win?

A flicker of confusion crossed the reflection's eyes.

According to calculations, the target should have dodged or blocked.

This suicidal charge was illogical.

"Got you."

Chen Mo's voice was soft, ringing right next to the reflection's ear.

Pinned in mid-air, his face showed no pain, only a chilling fanaticism.

His right hand, the one holding the ordinary dagger, suddenly shot up.

It didn't stab towards the reflection's heart.

Nor did it slash at its throat.

Instead, it violently... plunged into the reflection's eyes, which held no fluctuations!

"Ah!!"

The reflection, which originally possessed neither pain nor emotion, suddenly let out a non-human shriek.

It wasn't physical pain.

When the knife went in, no blood flowed out.

Instead, Chen Mo "poured" something in along the dagger.

That was the madness and chaos of thousands of people that he had yet to digest after consuming the "Gluttony Collective" on the second floor.

It was pure, unprocessed data garbage.

If the reflection was a precisely operating computer.

Then Chen Mo's current action was like pouring a bucket of strong acid onto its CPU.

"You said my emotions were superfluous?"

Chen Mo pulled out the dagger, trailing a stream of black data.

The reflection released the scythe, covered its eyes with both hands, and its body began to twitch violently. Its previously stable form started flickering like a TV screen with poor reception.

"That's what you don't understand."

"In this damned world."

Chen Mo violently pulled the scythe out of his shoulder. Blood spurted from the wound, but he acted as if nothing happened, gripping the scythe with a reverse grip and hacking down fiercely!

"Only madmen!"

"Can survive!!"

Boom!

The "perfect" reflection was split directly into two halves by the strike.

There was no blood.

Only countless broken codes and garbled data scattered everywhere.

The reflections that were chasing Su Qingxue and Nightingale also froze instantly, then burst like broken soap bubbles, completely dissolving.

All the surrounding mirrors shattered.

Revealing the original walls behind them.

They were cold, rusty metal walls.

"Hoo... hoo..."

Su Qingxue slumped onto the ground, gasping for breath, her back soaked in cold sweat.

In that instant just now, she truly thought she was going to die.

Nightingale put away her dagger, walked over to Chen Mo, and looked at the bloody, mangled hole in his shoulder.

"Are you insane?"

"Sacrificing an arm to break the deadlock is a good trade."

Chen Mo pulled a roll of bandage from his coat pocket, wrapped it carelessly around the wound, and tightened it.

The motion was as crude as packaging a delivery.

"Besides..."

He looked at the puddle of garbled data on the ground.

Although the reflection was shattered, it hadn't completely disappeared.

The pile of garbled data was wriggling, seemingly trying to reassemble itself.

Furthermore, that aura... Chen Mo narrowed his eyes.

This wasn't just a program.

In that brief moment of contact, he had sensed a familiar fluctuation.

A fluctuation coming from... the real world.

"Arthur is collecting data."

Chen Mo suddenly spoke.

"What?" Nightingale frowned.

"This reflection wasn't meant to kill me."

Chen Mo stepped on the wriggling mass of garbled data, grinding it with his foot.

"This is a synchronization port."

"He's using the battle here to calibrate something."

"Something... that is waking up in reality."

Buzz—

The broadcast sounded again.

This time, there was no sound of Arthur.

There was only a piercing static sound and a heavy roar, like some massive machinery running.

That sound came from the top of the Black Tower.

"Alert! Alert!"

"Level Three Defense Protocol breached."

"Illegal intruder detected."

"Detecting... Core Sample awakening."

The electronic synthesized voice continued broadcasting, but its tone became somewhat eerie.

"Synchronization rate... 100%."

"Congratulations, Chen."

Arthur's voice finally appeared.

Carrying an undisguised ecstasy, and a hint of tremor.

"You have just personally completed the final debugging."

Chen Mo suddenly looked up at the ceiling.

The feeling of unease was growing stronger.

It wasn't coming from here.

It was coming from... his body.

His body in reality.

Normally, while in the immersion state, his perception of his physical body would be extremely weak.

But now.

He felt a chill.

A chill as if someone was pressed against his back, breathing down his neck.

"What is he saying?" Su Qingxue asked anxiously. "What sample?"

Chen Mo did not answer.

He stared intently at the mass of garbled data he had crushed.

The garbled data no longer attempted to reassemble.

They slowly seeped into the floor, like a puddle of black liquid.

Then, a line of text formed on the ground.

A line the reflection hadn't had time to say.

[I'm waiting for you upstairs.]

[Give me... back to me.]

The handwriting was crooked and exuded an evil aura.

"Go."

Chen Mo turned and strode toward the elevator leading to the fourth floor.

His expression had never been so grim before.

"To the top floor."

"Go kill that old bastard."

"If we don't hurry..."

He touched the wound on his shoulder.

It hurt there.

But in reality, the same spot on his body lying in the connection pod... was also faintly aching.

"I might... truly not be able to go back."

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