Global Collapse-Chapter 572 - 540: If You Don’t Vote for Me, I’ll Take a Break to Play Games_1

Before Fatty could voice the compliments he had carefully prepared for Gu Mian, Xiao Qiao reached out and snatched the plate, looking very interested in its contents.

Fatty's mouth fell open, and he was about to say something when Liu Ruyan interrupted with a sarcastic tone, "You weren't going to say Gu Mian specifically asked you to bring this to us, were you?"

Fatty deflated. That was exactly what he had planned to say, but Liu Ruyan had seen right through him.

Liu Ruyan continued, still smiling, "He's not that kind of person. Now, if you said Gu Mian made too much, thought it was a waste to feed to the dogs, and so had you bring it to us, that might be somewhat believable."

Fatty's words of praise were stuck in his throat; he couldn't say a thing.

It seemed the mission to expand the Doctor's harem was incredibly challenging. Liu Ruyan wouldn't fall for this.

"Still, thank you," Liu Ruyan said, leaning against the doorframe and looking at Xiao Qiao, who was engrossed in the crab roe soup dumplings. "She seems to really like them."

Xiao Qiao did indeed like them.

So much so that the next morning, when Gu Mian opened his door, he found Xiao Qiao crouching outside like a dog.

At first glance, it really did look like a dog crouching at the doorway.

Only when she heard the door opening did she lift her head, her eyes full of anticipation.

Gu Mian rubbed his temples, then squatted down to look at her. "What are you doing here?"

Xiao Qiao was a quick learner, especially when it came to mimicking speech. She looked up at Gu Mian, her lips moving as she asked, "Do you have anything leftover that you thought would be a waste to feed to dogs?"

Gu Mian was completely puzzled, unable to comprehend what she was saying.

However, Fatty, standing behind him, immediately understood. "Crab roe soup dumplings?"

But they had finished them all the day before, and making a new batch was too much trouble.

Eventually, Xiao Qiao left, completely satisfied, with a bowl of pear and snow fungus porridge in hand. It was the breakfast Fatty had just made.

As Xiao Qiao carried the steaming bowl of porridge back, she bumped into Accompany Me Next Year, who was wandering the hallway, wondering what else there was to eat.

Seeing the actress coming down the stairs with a bowl of porridge, Accompany Me Next Year asked curiously, "What's this…?"

Xiao Qiao stopped and looked at her seriously. "This is leftover from Gu Mian and the others; it would be a waste to feed to dogs."

Accompany Me Next Year's eyes widened as she watched Xiao Qiao carry the porridge downstairs.

Finally, Xiao Qiao disappeared from sight.

That steaming hot, fragrant pear and snow fungus porridge didn't look at all like leftovers that were too good to feed to dogs.

Meanwhile, inside the house, Gu Mian and the others, having finished breakfast, were sitting on the living room sofa. Fatty was curiously asking Gu Mian, "By the way, Doctor, you came back late last night and didn't have time to tell us about the Amnesia instance."

Chu Changge and Fatty had already learned from the announcement that the instance Gu Mian entered was called 'Amnesia'.

"Speaking of which, that name is the same as an Otome game I used to play… Is that instance also related to romance?" Fatty, an avid gamer, mused.

It was indeed related to romance. If Zhao Shuang hadn't started dating Sun Zihao, none of this would have happened.

However…

"What's an Otome game?" Gu Mian turned to ask Chu Changge, who was beside him.

Chu Changge shook his head, indicating he didn't know.

Fatty quickly waved his hand. "Let's not discuss that now. Let's talk about the Amnesia instance first."

As he spoke, he looked at Gu Mian. "Doctor, was that instance difficult? I noticed only you and Miss Keke made it out alive."

Gu Mian shook his head slightly. "It wasn't particularly difficult, but the instance had set significant traps. I guess many players stepped into them the moment they entered."

After shaking his head, he began to describe the Amnesia instance to Fatty.

In the Amnesia instance, if all the players did nothing but flee, then everyone would definitely survive.

But once they started looking for clues, they would step into the illusion carefully woven by the instance.

Ultimately, if even one person awakened Zhao Shuang's memory, then everyone in the instance would suffer for it.

Once Zhao Shuang's memory returned, it was essentially a guaranteed wipe for everyone.

However, because Gu Mian, that BUG, was present last time, what should have been a guaranteed wipe wasn't.

After listening to Gu Mian's description, Fatty pondered, "It seems instances harbor a lot of malice towards players… All that tricking and deceiving to lure players into a trap… But Doctor, next time you describe something, maybe you don't need to be quite so detailed about the corpses?"

"I noticed something in that instance," Gu Mian said, picking up a can of lychee soda. "Sunshine Taxi, you remember it, right?"

Of course, they remembered.

Fatty nodded. "That was the taxi company from that instance, right? I remember the taxi company in that instance was Sunshine Taxi."

He also remembered a psycho driver from that instance.

That driver probably didn't die peacefully.

"I discovered that the Amnesia instance also had the same kind of phone booth and the same Sunshine Taxi company. So, I surmise that the Amnesia instance and the Taxi instance are in the same world."

Since he already knew that some instances existed in the same world, Gu Mian wasn't surprised to see the same company in two different instances.

"Later, I found out that there's a place called Sweet Manor in the city next to the one in the Amnesia instance. Sweet Manor is a station name from the 'Bizarre Train Great Escape' instance—one you two didn't enter."

Chu Changge and Fatty listened attentively.

"However, I later asked the NPC for the names of other stations, including Shicha Sea and Crazy Game City, but the NPC said it had never heard of those places. Of course, I had a cell phone in the Amnesia instance, and I managed to sneak some time to search for those stations. I found that, apart from Sweet Manor, none of the other locations could be found."

What did this mean? Fatty wondered.

Gu Mian continued, "Either the Sweet Manor in the Amnesia instance and the Sweet Manor in the train instance have no connection and just happen to share the same name, or they are indeed the same place. In that case, the reason I couldn't find the other stations while in the Amnesia instance is because that train travels between different worlds."

Indeed, searching for something from another world while in the current one would yield no results.

If it really was a train that could travel between different worlds…

Fatty looked somewhat dazed. "It's a pity, Doctor. You didn't know about Low-Dimensional Worlds when you entered the train instance."

Otherwise, they could have used that train to travel to different worlds.

Unfortunately, Gu Mian had smashed the train's control room to smithereens. The train was then unfortunately sent back to the factory for repairs, and he wondered if it had been fixed by now.

"So, now we can at least confirm that the Amnesia instance and the Taxi instance are in the same world," Chu Changge said, pushing up his glasses. "Did you search for other instance locations when you were in the Amnesia instance?"

Gu Mian nodded. "I searched for all the ones I could remember. Most either couldn't be found, or the search returned too many places with the same name."

For example, searching for 'Dajiale Supermarket' yields thousands of results, making verification impossible.

"I think if we enter more instances, we'll find more overlapping locations. Then we can group the instances with overlapping locations into several major categories, with each category representing a world."

Fatty rested his chin on his hand. "Will classifying the instances by their respective worlds help us figure out the truth behind this global game?"

Categorizing them wasn't guaranteed to help, but not categorizing them definitely wouldn't.

"By the way, Doctor, you mentioned seeing this new packaging of lychee soda in the Amnesia instance. I guess the other things in the supermarket are also products from instances. Why don't we go and check the production sites of those things one by one?" Fatty thought he'd come up with a great idea.

Gu Mian stroked his chin. "I remember Chu Changge did that."

Back when the global game had just started, the three of them went shopping in a supermarket. Gu Mian and Fatty shopped normally, but Chu Changge was already investigating the manufacturers of the products. He really was a prophet.

Gu Mian felt that if a 'prophet' profession existed, Chu Changge should apply for it. Fatty was the chef. As for those downstairs… Keke didn't seem to have a profession that fit her. Liu Ruyan's persona was that of a charming and alluring proprietress, which somewhat resembled that of a madam. As for Xiao Qiao... a valkyrie? But this valkyrie might be a bit expressionless.

Just then, Fatty's voice pulled Gu Mian back from his thoughts. "So, Doctor, the next instance…"

Gu Mian knew what Fatty was thinking without him having to say it. It was just the usual 'the instance is so big, I want to go see it' kind of idea.

"Better not," Gu Mian shook his head. "If you die in an instance now, it's a real death. I remember you've died twice in instances before, right?"

One time was in the Doctor-exclusive instance, 'Slaughter Game,' and the other was in a werewolf game.

Players nowadays weren't trying to get stronger; they just wanted to survive. Players with enough Game Coins mostly avoided entering instances. Someone like Fatty, who had no worries about food or drink, had even less need to risk himself in an instance.

Seeing the concerned look on Gu Mian's face, Fatty was deeply moved. "Doctor, you even remember that I died twice! I knew you couldn't bear for me to die…"

But before he could finish, Gu Mian's voice cut in, "If you died, there'd be no one to cook, and I'd have to go back to eating instant noodles."

Fatty closed his mouth, tears welling up in his eyes.

Chu Changge glanced at the dejected Fatty and said, "The Amnesia instance and the Taxi instance are in the same world. Both of these instances are very similar to our real world."

They weren't extreme worlds like Slaughter Game or the Old World, nor were they isolated game-show settings like Crazy Guessing Words or Sweet Lovers.

"We only know of two worlds right now: one is the Second World, and the other is the Old World," Chu Changge continued. "As for the other worlds, we haven't figured them out yet, nor do we know their fundamental nature. Based on the current situation, I guess these two instances belong to the Second World."

Based on the current clues about the Second World, it was indeed the world most similar to their real world. It was just baffling why some worlds were so bizarre—namely, the Old World and Slaughter Game.

"Speaking of which, you're actually from the Second World," Gu Mian said, looking at Chu Changge. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

A school from the Second World had descended directly to Earth during the 'College Entrance Exam' event, only to unexpectedly collapse midway and never return. And that place also happened to be where Chu Changge's laboratory stored its failed experiments.

Gu Mian didn't expect to use Chu Changge to differentiate which instances belonged to the Second World. After all, Chu Changge had grown up in a laboratory and had never seen the outside world. The first time he ever saw the sky was the day the old man from the orphanage brought him to Gu Mian.

Thinking about the Old World instance and the Slaughter Game instance, although the worldviews of both were twisted, they clearly weren't from the same world.

The world where the Old World instance is located is called the Old World; Gu Mian had already learned this from Liu Ruyan.

And Liu Ruyan, having come from a twisted world like the Old World, was indeed quite twisted herself.

The name of the world to which the Slaughter Game instance belongs is still unknown…

Gu Mian looked at Chu Changge. "You said every Low-Dimensional World sends out a Guardian. So, the world where Slaughter Game is located also sent a Guardian, right?"

Chu Changge stared at Gu Mian for a few seconds before nodding.

Gu Mian frowned slightly. "Who is it?"