That night, countless people slept out in the street. Despite all the fuss, the electricity hadn’t cut out—this didn’t conform with common sense, of course, but sadly the corpse of “common sense” was already cold. The streetlights were all lit up; it looked like a large-scale nighttime campground. Many people had their families with them. There was also a little girl wearing cotton pajamas and hugging a toy rabbit with a lewd expression, a lollipop in her mouth, standing next to Kou Tong with her limpid eyes open wide. 

The three people in the know…four, counting Yao Shuo, all understood that the earthquake wouldn’t happen again, as the epicenter was in a stable state of downcast emotions. 

But no matter how they reasoned, Kou Tong’s mom wouldn’t go upstairs, insisting on sleeping out in the street, even running a risk “to life and limb” to go up and bring down the whole pile of sleeping bags, pillows, towels, quilts, and such articles lying in a corner covered in dust. Then she occupied a space in satisfaction and uncompromisingly pulled on Kou Tong’s neck and kissed his face, leaving it covered in saliva. 

“Good night, darling. If you’re scared, you can come sleep with mom.” 

Kou Tong woodenly wiped the saliva off his face. 

Kou Tong’s mom sighed, feeling that her son had grown up. She was disappointed. Then she took a pack of playing cards out of her pocket and trotted off to find people to play with. 

Huang Jinchen gave a long drawn-out sigh. “A mother’s love!” 

Kou Tong turned his head to look at him. He suddenly raised his voice: “Mom! Da Huang says he wants a goodnight kiss, too!” 

Kou Tong’s mom instantly turned her head and looked at him almost disbelievingly. Her face looked a little pale in the night. Her hair, which was normally gathered on top of her head, was down, making her face look a little smaller. She looked younger, almost identical to the young, beautiful woman in Kou Tong’s memories. 

She dropped the playing card in her hand. In a slightly trembling voice, she said, “Tongtong, what…did you call me?” 

Kou Tong frowned. As though nothing had happened, he said, “What’s wrong?” 

Kou Tong’s mom was so moved she was babbling. “You just called me, say it again, let me hear you.” 

Tears flashed in her eyes, glittering in the night wind, set off by the city lights, extremely beautiful. She quickly reached up to wipe her eyes. “I don’t know why, but I feel like it’s been a lifetime since you called me that.” 

Kou Tong looked at her, then at last shoddily fabricated, “That’s just how you feel. Enough, mom, it’s fine. Go play.” 

Then, as though avoiding something, he lowered his head and looked at the little girl who starting recently had been standing unmoving at the curb with her head raised, staring at him. “Whose child is this? Why is she running around on her own? Where are her parents?” 

Not saying a word, the little girl cracked her lollipop with her teeth. 

Kou Tong said, “Whose child…” 

“You’re being watched,” the little girl said suddenly. 

Kou Tong patted her on the head. “Good girl. You can watch more cartoons tomorrow. It’s time to sleep.—Whose child is this? It’s so late, why hasn’t anyone come for her?” 

“The rats are watching you,” the little girl added.

Kou Tong squatted down and very patiently asked, “The rats driving a tank, or the rats flying a plane?” 

The little girl’s almost crystal clear big eyes looked at him. Her eyes were truly too clean, like mirrors. Kou Tong saw himself clearly reflected in them. 

The little girl’s expression was very calm, as though whether people believed her or not, how they treated her, had nothing to do with her. She only expressionlessly spat out the plastic stick from the lollipop, then said, “I’m telling the truth.” 

Kou Tong immediately froze—this kid looked eight or nine years old, small and skinny. He was blocking her, so others couldn’t see her clearly—but Kou Tong, while crouching, had noticed with extreme clarity that the little girl didn’t open her mouth when she spoke! 

“What’s your name?” 

“Manman.” 

Kou Tong considered, then leaned down and picked the little girl up. To the others, he said, “I’ll take her to find her family.” 

Then he walked far away carrying her and quietly said, “Tell uncle, what’s going on?” 

“…If you buy me a lollipop.” 

It was as if she sent brainwaves directly to people’s minds. Kou Tong even had the false impression that Manman used her eyes to speak.

Kou Tong realized that this kid was likely one of the seven conscious subjects, so he carried her to a nearby small supermarket that was still doing business. In front of the little lollipop stand, he put Manman down and had her choose for herself.

Manman picked up one and put down another, picking and choosing, looking at her young age like a little woman prudently comparing products—at any rate, Kou Tong couldn’t see what the difference was among the lollipops she was gesturing at. 

Finally, he simply pushed the whole little rack in front of the cashier and said, “Count up for me how much this is. I’ll take all of it.” 

Manman looked up at him. She thought for two seconds, then came to a conclusion. She said, “Uncle, do you have more money than brains?” 

Kou Tong: “…” 

The cashier heard this and snorted a laugh. 

Kou Tong held down her little head. “Nonsense.” 

The cashier had finished settling up and passed over the rack stuffed with lollipops. Manman immediately accepted it with both hands, her little face pulled taut, her expression almost pious. Then she gravely said to her footman with “more money than brains,” “Let’s go.” 

Kou Tong could only follow. 

“I’m eight this year.” Manman sat on the curb and calmly set aside her newly arrived property. She peeled a lollipop and put it in her mouth, hugging her old doll. “One day, I was sitting at home reading, when suddenly the sky went dark. Then I was dropped in here. There were five lollipops in my pocket in all. Now I’ve eaten them all.” 

Kou Tong asked, “Do you know what happened before you got dropped in?” 

Manman thought about it, then shook her head. 

Kou Tong crouched beside her, frowning. 

But Manman suddenly said, “This is that multidimensional frequency-changing projection installation, isn’t it?” 

Kou Tong was immediately horrified. He blurted out, “How do you know?” 

Manman said, “I read about it in a book.” 

“Which one?”  

“There was an article about it in the sixteenth 2041 issue of The Great Era of Psychology.”

Of course Kou Tong knew about this magazine. He had written the article himself. So he continued looking at her in horror. “You understood it? No…do you attend school? What grade are you in?” 

“Second grade. When school starts again, I’ll be in third grade,” Manman said. She shrugged and very calmly said, “In the book, it says that the Projector has a certain working range, normally fifty to a hundred meters. I was home at the time, and there was no instrument within fifty or a hundred meters, so your machine must be damaged.” 

Kou Tong choked. “I’m sorry. Uncle will get you out soon.” 

“It’s all right.” Manman patted him on the shoulder. “Machines aren’t very reliable. Anyway, it’s actually pretty nice here. People can understand me when I talk.” 

Kou Tong asked, “You can’t talk outside?” 

“I can,” Manman said, “but I can’t use my mouth to talk. I can talk like this. But none of them can hear me, and they say I’m stupid. The teacher suggested that my mom take me to the special education class, so she got hysterical and beat me, then locked me in the house every day and ignored me.” 

Kou Tong’s heart tightened. 

“They took me to see a doctor before. That old man in white said I was ‘autistic’,” Manman continued calmly. “But I’m not autistic. I’m not that sensitive. My ears can filter out noise, and my attention doesn’t wander easily—at any rate, not any easier than my classmates.” 

She even knew what ‘autistic’ meant… Kou Tong had already determined that whether this little girl was autistic or not, her intelligence was definitely above average. “And…you read all of that in books?”

“Yeah.” Manman nodded and bit into her lollipop, cracking it. “I lived next to the city library when I was little. When no one was paying attention to me, I went in to read.” 

Kou Tong silently stroked her head. “Come and stay at my house for now.” 

“All right.” Manman nodded. 

“Oh, right, what were you saying about the rats before?” 

Manman turned her head. “You’re being watched by rats. I understand their speech. Their master isn’t very friendly.” 

This time Kou Tong didn’t laugh, because for a conscious subject, anything could happen. She used some means other than voice to communicate with others. It wasn’t impossible for her to also understand the speech of rats. 

From another point of view, in an altered space, everything could be the projection of some consciousness. Even gravity could fail, let alone the attributes of living things. 

“I don’t know whether the rat heard what you were saying. Anyway, I heard it talking to its companion. They said that you’re intruders.” Manman coldly judged, “I think it sounds like they want to do away with you.” 

“Who wants to do away with us?” Huang Jinchen had appeared from somewhere, standing behind the two of them. He frowned, looking at the pile of candy wrappers Manman had piled up on the ground. “Little girl, you’ll get cavities if you eat that much candy. Little worms will nibble away all your teeth.” 

Manman looked up at him expressionlessly, then flatly said, “You don’t get cavities from worms growing in your teeth. They’re caused by a reaction between the bacteria in plaque and the sugars in food. It generates acid, breaking down tooth enamel.” 

Huang Jinchen: “…” 

Manman chewed, making crunch-crunch noises. After looking down upon this tall and strapping uncle’s IQ, she added, “It says so in books.” 

Huang Jinchen said, “Hell, this little whelp is definitely going to become an Abbess Miejue in the future.” 

Manman responded, “No, I won’t. I think Zhou Zhiruo and Zhang Wuji are pretty good together¹.”

Huang Jinchen simpered: “Chief Tongtong…” 

Kou Tong waved a hand and continued to question Manman: “Where is the master of the rats you’re talking about?” 

Rats? Huang Jinchen’s brow suddenly furrowed. 

“Over there.” Manman pointed. 

Kou Tong propped his chin in his hand thoughtfully—“intruders”? How could that be? Could this program itself have some conscious subject?