Seeking Truth with a Sword-Chapter 654 - 592: True or False _2

"Why not?"

The man spoke calmly. "I’ve been constantly monitoring this project’s progress. In every version of the script, you’re depicted with childhood memories identical to reality—growing up cherished by your parents, and sharing the same interests, worldview, values, and outlook on life. To us, you are our son—just aged a few years."

He’s quite open-minded indeed.

Li Ang turned to Professor Jun. "One last question. In the Dream Realm, I heard a female voice calling me ’Young Master.’ How do you explain that?"

"Ang’er, are you talking about Cui Qiao?" the woman asked, hesitating. "She’s your maid, usually responsible for your daily care. The doctor said that during treatment, we should keep you away from familiar environments as much as possible, so we didn’t have her accompany you."

"Perhaps it’s a whisper from your subconscious," Professor Jun said. "This Dream Realm scenario was much longer than usual. To enhance realism, many characters in the script were based on real people—your classmates, friends, even some people you’ve only met briefly. It’s quite normal to experience some... fluctuations."

Is that really normal? Li Ang lifted his hand, gently clenching his fist. The sensation in his palm felt incredibly real.

This world has parents who love me, a comfortable environment, and no Superpower Users, ghosts, or spirits threatening my life. But...

"I still don’t believe it."

Li Ang strode to his desk, grabbed the large stapler, and pressed it against the edge of his left palm.

"Ang’er, what are you doing?"

The woman looked horrified. Professor Jun, the attendants, and the caregivers were all tense, fearing Li Ang would harm himself.

"Verifying something." Li Ang slowly backed away, raising his palm as a threat to keep the caregivers from approaching. "If even such realistic dreams are false, then how can you prove the environment I’m in now is real? The power of will can affect reality."

He then pressed his left hand onto the windowsill, clenched his right fist, and swung it down hard onto the stapler.

CHUNK!

The staples sank deep into his flesh, the pain piercing straight into his mind.

Blood gushed out.

Black blood.

"Did you see?" Li Ang bit down on a staple with his teeth, pulled it out, and while aiming the stapler at his own neck, calmly showed the flowing blood to everyone. "Black blood. Which means Elemental Material does indeed exist."

"See what? Li Ang, calm down first! Put the stapler down!" Professor Jun grabbed a square mirror from the desk and aimed it at Li Ang. "Look for yourself! It’s clearly red blood. You’ve fallen too deep!"

Li Ang’s mother also quickly took out her phone, snapped several photos of Li Ang, then turned the phone around. "Ang’er, look, the blood is red."

Both the mirror’s surface and the phone screen showed Li Ang’s wound bleeding red.

"You’re still lying to me." Li Ang shook his head and stated firmly, "I’m still in an illusion."

"We’re not lying to you!" Professor Jun shouted. "Your subconscious knows that if you accept the current situation and allow your personality to consolidate, the symptoms of illusion will gradually diminish until they disappear completely. However, parts of your subconscious don’t want this. That’s why they create visual hallucinations, changing the color of your blood to make you believe the illusion is ongoing."

Lies.

Li Ang held his breath, veins throbbing on his forehead, desperately channeling his Thought.

The pitch-black blood flowing from the wound in his palm, just as he imagined, began to flow in reverse, covering his palm and forming a black glove.

He lifted his hand and calmly asked, "Is this also a hallucination?"

"Li Ang, can you put the stapler down first, please?" Professor Jun’s face had gone pale as he said solemnly, "From our perspective, you’re just showing us your continuously bleeding palm. This is reality; it’s definitely not an Illusion Realm. Can you help us, and help yourself?"

Li Ang scoffed. "Help? Right. In this world, if I continue to be ’paranoid’ and harm myself, I’d be considered an ’unqualified personality.’ I’d need to be ’reworked,’ creating a Li Ang Number Nine, correct?"

His left palm tensed, drawing on his entire will to control the black blood, twisting and transforming it into the shape of a Hand Crossbow.

"Now, you should see it, right?"

"See what? Oh, Ang’er, we can’t see anything at all!" Li Ang’s mother cried out desperately. In the mirror, he was indeed making a gun-like gesture with his continuously bleeding left palm.

"The previous world was fake, this world is also fake—everything is fake." Li Ang, holding the stapler in his right hand and aiming it at his neck, calmly said, "The previous world intentionally gave me great power, hoping I would become addicted to it. If I resisted temptation and broke free from their control, they’d just create a new nested world. No, to be precise, this world is the ultimate trap—the existence of the Giant Mountain Sanatorium perfectly explains everything. I’m a carefree young master from a wealthy family, with rich and distinguished parents, a considerate little maid, and a brilliant future awaiting me. All I need to do is one thing: accept the ’fact’ that I once woke up in an Illusion Realm and that this place is the real world. If I don’t accept it, I’ll be ’humanely destroyed’ and ’reworked.’ Heh, the mastermind behind all this is very clever. They deeply understand human nature and designed two, or even more, layers of Illusion Realms just to wear down my will. I won’t let them achieve their goal..."

As Li Ang spoke, he used his elbow to shove at the study room window, which was four stories above the ground.