Chapter 214: The Reversed s.p.a.ce of the Mirror
‘Could we have… entered the mirror?’
As soon as he thought of this, the few women behind Lin Yao felt their scalps go numb, and they shrank their bodies in fright.
Ignoring them, Lin Yao focused his gaze on the four people who had followed him into the house. In comparison to a student like him, these four… three men had combat experience and should be more knowledgeable.
Indeed, the trio confirmed something quickly.
“The situation is not good. There is a high chance we’ve entered the mirror.”
“Is it s.p.a.ce transfer, or have our souls been pulled out?”
“It’s s.p.a.ce transfer. I took many precautions earlier, but none of them worked. d.a.m.n it! We’re down on our luck, or we wouldn’t have encountered such a high-level freak.”
These people were all veteran fighters and had taken precautions after Lin Yao had warned them. However, s.p.a.ce transfer was too advanced, and the various defense moves were useless.
At that moment, after discovering that the situation was iffy, the middle-aged armed police officer immediately led Lin Ru to Lin Yao’s side and tried to protect him as well.
As for the two military fighters, one of them took out weapons to guard the surrounding area, and the other gingerly peeked into the mirror in front of him.
Freaks had diverse abilities, and probing a freak was almost akin to making an unsuspecting trip to the land mine, which was extremely dangerous.
Despite this, the soldier didn’t hesitate to act.
They had encountered many dangerous situations while serving in the military and understood that one might die faster if one didn’t dare fight. In addition, there was a genius here, Lin Yao, who needed their protection. Therefore, they acted without any hesitation.
As for letting others explore? That would be a joke. One could not say the same for other countries, but the Chinese soldiers were always at the forefront when something happened.
“Student Lin Yao, don’t panic. We will protect you. Stay in between us later. If we can escape from the front door, we will protect you and rush out together. Otherwise, follow us somewhere else.”
Both the military and the armed police made the protection of the people of China their first priority. In addition, Lin Yao was a genius and was thus treated very well. The middle-aged armed police officer spared a thought for him immediately and even consoled him.
“Don’t worry, I’m not that timid… I have entered mysterious lands and partic.i.p.ated in night patrols.”
“You actually have such experiences? I’ve underestimated you. That’s the best.”
While talking to the police officer, Lin Yao was also keeping a tight watch ahead, though he didn’t sense any evil, foul emotions, or freak auras. In fact, he had detected the danger earlier only when the elevator had ascended and stopped in front of him. This made him understand that Good and Evil Distinguishment was not omnipotent and couldn’t explore or go beyond s.p.a.ces.
Under Lin Yao’s gaze, the military officer with the rank of second lieutenant walked to the mirror in front of the elevator and smashed the weapon in his hand toward it.
This action made Lin Yao sense an abnormal situation. As he watched that person, Lin Yao had the feeling that his movements were uncoordinated.
‘These uncoordinated movements resemble the movements of a freak. Was this officer replaced by a freak earlier?’
This was not impossible. Lin Yao had been in a trance for a moment during the s.p.a.ce transfer. However, this moment was what he had perceived. No one knew how long the actual trance had lasted.
Lin Yao, who was on his guard, was about to take out a tungsten alloy armor-piercing pellet again.
However, when he stretched his palm toward his pocket, he realized that he couldn’t find it.
Frowning and looking down, he discovered he had stretched out his left hand instead.
‘What’s happening?’
With this thought in mind, Lin Yao moved his right hand to reach into his pocket.
However, just as he moved, something peculiar occurred.
Obviously, he wanted to move his right hand and he mobilized it with his subconscious mind. However, his left hand moved instead.
This strange occurrence left Lin Yao somewhat dumbfounded, but the merits of Agile Mind were brought into play. ‘This is… left-right reversal in the mirror?’
When looking into the mirror, some people would find that their top and bottom were the same, but their left and right hands were reversed. Lin Yao was not clear about the specific reason this happened, but at that moment, he had been affected by this principle.
Upon looking up at the others around him, Lin Yao discovered that he was not the only one affected. The senses of the rest were also somewhat disorientated, as they all mistook their left for right.
When they moved their hands, they realized that they were moving in the wrong direction. When they turned their heads, they would turn in the opposite direction. This applied to walking as well. It would have been fine if they hadn’t realized it, but once they did, they would discover that their footsteps were all wrong.
Left-right reversal might not seem like a big deal.
However, Lin Yao soon found out that he was wrong. Terribly wrong.
Humans had habitual movements, and this habit had even resulted in conditioned reflexes. Normally, humans would not use their minds to control their left and right hand. Their hands would move naturally in tandem thanks to the mind.
However, due to the impact of left-right reversal, the palm would still move after the mind issued the command, but in the completely opposite direction. Moving one arm was still manageable, but it was impossible to coordinate both hands well.
At the same time, the confusion between left and right also meant that humans would have disorientated spatial perception.
Normally, spatial confusion of the left and right was not fatal. Humans could forcibly move. However, if one were to encounter an enemy, one would look to the right when the enemy approached from the left. When the enemy attacked from the right, one would defend oneself with the left hand or dodge to the right and move toward the enemy’s attack. These were all fatal actions during a battle with peers.
After all, fighting with peers required an all-out effort, and even a slight mistake would cause one to end up defeated. Now, this was not a small mistake but one full of loopholes.
With that many weaknesses, how was one going to beat someone of the same level?
Even active manipulation wouldn’t work. With one more command, human reaction would slow down tremendously. What was even more annoying was that in dangerous situations, the human body would subconsciously act in a certain way.
This was usually a good thing, and many veteran soldiers fought for their lives with this kind of subconscious reaction. However, because they confused left and right now, a subconscious reaction like that would be fatal.
Lin Yao relied on the thinking speed acceleration to gather these thoughts almost instantaneously. Thus, he could not help praying in his heart.
‘I hope the enemy doesn’t come.’
He wanted to have time to adapt to this process. Unfortunately, perhaps he was not sincere enough, as his prayer was not answered. As soon as he finished praying, a clicking sound was heard at the door next to him. Then, a strange, mysterious figure appeared.
The figure looked like a zombie. Its entire body was rotten, oozing pus and emitting a suffocating stench. As soon as it saw Lin Yao and the group, the rotten figure grinned, exposing the gums in its rotten mouth. It roared furiously and then rushed up to them.
“Die, die, die, die…”
“d.a.m.n it! Police Officer Yang Zheng, guard them well. Leave the enemy to me.”
Two soldiers came forward immediately. One checked the mirror in the elevator, and the other rushed toward the rotten figure.
However, their situation made Lin Yao’s brows furrow even more. Although the two soldiers were responsible, the one who checked the mirror returned without discovering anything.
After Lin Yao and the others had teleported to this s.p.a.ce, the mirror had become ordinary. On the other hand, the soldier dealing with the rotten figure was almost caught by the latter several times.
This was a soldier with the military rank of a captain, so he was very powerful. He had high-level silver ability and was much stronger than the rotten freak.
“The rotten freak doesn’t feel uncanny and has relatively ordinary abilities. It is like an irrational zombie. Obviously, this is not what a freak should look like… This is not a freak. It should be a servant corpse transformed by an ordinary person who has been pulled into this disordered s.p.a.ce.”
‘Well, I hope not many people have been here. It is best to let the servant corpse rot and become weaker with the pa.s.sage of time. If the strength of the servant corpse remains unchanged, we’ll be in great trouble.’
Thanks to Agile Mind, coupled with a thirst for knowledge, Lin Yao had become much smarter during that period and could now a.s.sess numerous situations in an instant.
However, sometimes, the correct a.s.sessment had no effect. Murphy’s law was proven true again. Sure enough, the more one was afraid of something, the more this thing would happen.
After the first rotten zombie was crushed by the captain, whose strength surpa.s.sed it by a level, the disordered apartment first turned silent for a while. Bang, bang, bang. Following that, the sounds of something banging on the door were heard repeatedly.
Within a very short time, dozens of servant corpses rushed out of the apartment and dashed toward Lin Yao and the others.
At the same time, not all the servant corpses that rushed out this time were rotten and weak figures. Monsters with reversed and twisted limbs were crawling on the wall like spiders, and some monsters with eight arms looked like centipedes.
These strange servant corpses were obviously much more powerful than the rotten one earlier. What was more troublesome was that there was not only one or two but dozens of them rushing out at the same time.
Agile Mind came into effect again. As soon as he saw those servant corpse freaks, Lin Yao again clear-headedly deduced their origins.
‘These are still servant corpses. They have likely been transformed by the warlords and martial artists who died in this disordered s.p.a.ce. Although these dead people are rotting, they are not sallow-faced and emaciated. They have wounds on their bodies. Therefore, they were probably not starved to death but killed by freaks.
‘There are certainly freaks in this place. If I was one of those freaks, I’d definitely sneak into the servant corpses and then ambush my enemy.’
As soon as this thought crossed his mind, Lin Yao’s expression changed drastically, and he warned the others.
“Be careful, everyone. Hidden among the servant corpses are…”
Lin Yao initially wanted to warn the others to be cautious, but he soon lowered his voice. He was upset to discover that, due to the impact of the disordered s.p.a.ce, these servant corpses could kill them without the freaks even lifting a finger.
As danger was approaching, the two soldiers stood on either side of Lin Yao and brandished the weapons in their hands to protect him.
The middle-aged armed police officer and the young policewoman also took out their electric batons. A sizzling electric current flowed in the electric batons, making them very lethal against the evil spirits.
They were certainly able to protect Lin Yao under normal circ.u.mstances. Unfortunately, they were now in the disordered s.p.a.ce, and the confusion between left and right caused them to make many mistakes. They were able to fight one-on-one with the weaker servant corpses but couldn’t handle the group of enemies at all.
One of the soldiers subconsciously wanted to move his left foot during the battle. When he sensed something wrong and wanted to control it, both his legs moved at the same time, and he fell straight forward.
The disordered s.p.a.ce had too much impact on humans, especially during fierce battles.
“Xing Xun!”
The soldier who fell to the ground was immediately in danger, and dozens of arms with sharp claws tore at his body. This made the eyes of his teammates bulge with rage. The middle-aged police officer wanted to provide reinforcements immediately, but out of anxiety, he didn’t control his running body well and almost fell flat on the ground.
“We’re finished! This is a mystic realm that changes the rules. Why did we encounter these ghosts?!”
The soldier who had fallen to the ground, the middle-aged police officer who was having great difficulty running, and the other soldier were all in great danger. All of a sudden, Lin Yao and the group were facing a crisis.
Right from the beginning, the freaks hadn’t appeared. Only the servant corpses moved. This made the trio feel utterly desperate. They knew that they wouldn’t be able to leave this place.
Just as this thought appeared in their minds, a crackling sound echoed in their ears.
A moment later, two bright electric currents with dazzling radiance struck toward the left and right sides, causing a string of wails and screams to echo.
“Ah…”
“Ouch… It hurts…”
“Roar…”