At this moment, he suddenly wanted to conduct an experiment.
He started to stop counting silently, but kept his brain actively thinking, beginning to ask himself questions, calculating numbers in his mind.
"It didn't appear..."
The feeling as if something was awakening and crawling from inside his body didn't appear.
But when Wen Xishu began to think about other issues, like history, philosophy, like the Three Towers—not long after, that sensation of something crawling inside appeared.
He felt a wave of nausea.
Because there seemed to be "them" in his stomach too.
Wen Xishu understood.
"The function of the confinement room is to restrict... Outside the confinement room, or in a normal environment, these parasites inside the body seem to be suppressed by people's active brains thinking about various things."
"But inside the confinement room, there's only one kind of related thought that can suppress them. That is numbers."
"In other words, only when numbers appear in the mind can they be suppressed."
Just as Wen Xishu reached this conclusion—
A woman's voice appeared:
"Chris... Chris... My Chris..."
The silent counting immediately stopped.
For Wen Xishu, multitasking isn't difficult, but if the process suddenly encounters a huge emotional impact, a memory implant, then it becomes very difficult.
Wen Xishu immediately recalled some memories about Chris.
"My name is Chris, I am a soldier, but I don't have much concept of defending the country, it's just that everyone wants me to go, so I went."
"I have a childhood sweetheart lover, her name is Margaret, she doesn't want me to go, because my troops went to the Middle East Region for invasion without a legitimate reason. On TV, those children of Batan Country sit amidst ruins, eyes vacant. Margaret cries every time she sees this."
"And where I am going is to invade that place."
Wen Xishu's brain throbbed with pain, like steel needles piercing the nerve endings.
Chris's memories kept emerging.
He went to the Middle East of this world, starting to massacre people there. He was just following the Officer's orders, but his comrades would hang the bodies of children on the wall to admire, as if they were specimens in a museum.
And all these images would be broadcast to Margaret.
When he returned in glory and the invasion finally ended, Chris enjoyed the cheers and curses of millions, but he didn't care, he just felt he needed money to give Margaret a comfortable life.
But Margaret was killed in a street protest by the radical main war faction.
Suddenly, bugs in the spine, stomach, and arms began to appear.
Chris was in great pain, and Wen Xishu also suffered greatly.
Snot and tears began to flow continuously.
"Margaret! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I am a sinner! I am a sinner!"
Wen Xishu suddenly found he had lost control of Chris.
He wasn't sure if, under extreme emotion, Chris broke free from his control, or if, under extreme emotion, he truly became Chris.
What are millions cheering for, I don't know. But the tenderness I want to hear has disappeared forever.
Tears of remorse poured out of Chris's eyes, and post-war stress is not the real reason Chris estranged from the crowd.
The real reason is, the person he loved most died while praying for peace, and he accepted the medal conferred by the murderers.
This immense irony plunged Chris into endless self-blame.
Oh no!
Wen Xishu realized he had broken the rules.
xxxx you hear someone calling you xxx inside xxx, please do not xxx.
Although the latter part of this rule is veiled, Wen Xishu now understood.
When you hear someone talking to you inside the confinement room, please do not respond.
Chris heard Margaret's voice, and Chris responded.
"It's okay, Chris... You are covered in sins, your mind is filthy from top to bottom, you are a war criminal! But it's okay, just embrace me now!"
"Don't think about anything, I will return to your side, I will forgive you!"
Chris opened his arms, trying to embrace something nonexistent, Wen Xishu only felt... this desire was too strong, starting to suppress other thoughts.
Just like a starving person facing food, he will only think about quickly eating it, during this process, he may not be able to think about anything else.
Wen Xishu even himself desired to embrace Margaret.
The Chris he manipulated, as if a machine with self-awareness. Wen Xishu's control was continuously weakening.
But Wen Xishu still, within his abilities, manipulated Chris's little hand to slap himself hard.
Smack!
The crisp sound made Chris's brain bewildered.
Only that feeling of something crawling grew stronger.
But not long after, they quieted down again.
"One hundred twenty-nine, one hundred thirty, one hundred thirty-one..."
After enduring a round of torment, Wen Xishu started silently counting again.
Gradually, Chris also calmed down.
Wiping away tears and snot, the disheveled Wen Xishu couldn't help but lament.
"This hasn't even touched any intelligence... Knowing little about them, but nearly lost a character."
If Hero died, perhaps Wise wouldn't fare well either?
Outside the confinement room, suddenly a sound was heard. It was the sound of a broadcast.
"Still troubled by your child's lack of enthusiasm for study?"