Chapter 20 Mental Exercise

I looked at that hand, and for a moment, I thought it was something deep in the abyss that would save me.

That extremely powerful thought, which seemed to come from my heart and was absolutely certain, almost made me reach out my hand.

But at the same time, there was still a conscious part of me that was frantically screaming in my heart: this thought isn’t yours! It came from the heavenly gift!

This voice in my heart made me understand that for some reason, I was different from others. Maybe it was because I didn’t even trust myself, so when I received the heavenly gift, a conscious part of myself could still be felt and distinguished.

But it was pointless.

My body wouldn’t listen to me at all.

I immediately grasped the dead, branch-like ghostly hand and then heard the sound of insects crawling everywhere. They crawled out of the surrounding rock crevices like countless cockroaches.

Then, suddenly, it all disappeared and I found myself in a dark space. My flashlight fell to the side, illuminating half of the space. It was very small, but not as small as I had originally thought so I could still squat and move around.

In front of me, there was a dry corpse with a very long skull. When it was still alive, it must’ve had a strangely long face like a horse.

I was holding that corpse’s hand, and in my other hand was that cracked ancient sutra.

Was I hallucinating?

No, I was pretty sure it wasn’t a hallucination.

Then, a sharp pain started from my hands and thigh muscles and spread throughout my whole body. This was quickly followed by feelings of extreme hunger and a full bladder that was about to explode.

I immediately let go, and the corpse quickly fractured apart and turned into a pile of dust.

Then the watch on my wrist lit up again.

I looked at it in confusion and saw that it was displaying a very strange number again: 19:67

I looked around. This wasn’t the space where I had been huddled up just now, but another space. I had been holding onto the mummy’s hand in the crevice just moments ago, but now I was suddenly in front of the mummy?

Did I teleport through the stone that had been separating us?

I went to pick up the flashlight, but the strength in my hand was very, very weak so all I could do was let it shine on my hand.

I found that my hands were covered in blood, and several nails were split open.

My mind was muddled, but I reacted immediately.

Wait a minute.

Wait a minute.

I was affected by the heavenly gift. This had happened once before.

We had been walking on the grassland for a long time, but the heavenly gift made us think that only three days had passed.

I thought back on what happened just now.

First, I was dragged down and the protective meteorite was lost. Then I came to a very small hole, and the countdown ended. Then a hand appeared in a crevice, and a voice spoke to me from the other side of the rock wall. Then there was no sound for a while.

The owner of that voice said he was a herdsman and that he wanted to save me and let me memorize a sutra.

I looked at the sutra in my hand, then at the strange numbers displayed on the watch.

No, no, these things didn’t happen according to my own understanding. I had received the heavenly gift, so all of my memories were completely confused now.

That herdsman was real. I must have met him, but the heavenly gift deleted him from my memory, leaving only his voice behind.

I was trapped. That was one thing.

I met a herdsman, which was another thing.

I saw a withered hand in the crevice, which looked like a monster. This was also real, and it was also a thing.

I had been digging through the rocks here for a long time. That was real as well.

The watch kept showing strange numbers, which was also a thing.

I was at the complete mercy of the heavenly gift, so all of my memories were fragmented. My brain tried to rationalize all this, so my reality became such a story.

That was why Poker-Face had to leave marks. He had to leave marks wherever he went and retrace his steps over and over again.

So, the world he saw turned out to be like this. Fuck, so this was how the heavenly gift was. It was an even more despairing feeling than I had imagined, ten thousand times more despairing.

But

But

But

But

When I was under the effects of the heavenly gift before, I must have figured out a way or met a herder who inspired me. Although this me and what I experienced were completely deleted, “he” or “I” set up a hint on the watch.

He used strange numbers to make me realize that I was being affected by the heavenly gift.

Of all the things I still remembered, there must be a hidden way to escape this heavenly gift. Countless versions of myself had been deleted from my memory, and with their defective memory, they tried to tell me.

“Take the sutra with you.”

“Grab the hand and you can get out.”

“Recite the sutra.”

Time displayed as two strange numbers.

I was trembling all over as I looked at the mummy in front me, which had crumbled into dust, and thought to myself, what can I do? How long can I retain my current sense of self?

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