Phoenix fluttered in the air, her eyes wide and her beak agape: "Huh?!"

"Airwen's doors are all locked with her own permissions. Even we two can't—"

Lin Guang ruthlessly called her out: "If you can bypass her permission locks to find me, then you can open this door."

—The Sacred Tree's door was a door, and the Association's door was also a door. Both were locked with permissions, so why couldn't they open it?

"Uh, well..."

Exposed for making excuses, Phoenix felt a little guilty: "Haven't you already seen everything inside during every cycle? What's the point of looking at those few things again?"

The Cherry-Haired Girl tilted her head and looked at her: "What are you afraid of? Afraid she'll pinch you?"

"I'm not afraid! I'm just—"

Drip.

The next moment.

Before Phoenix could come up with another excuse, Amber had already pressed her hand against the door with a smile.

"Hey, Amber! Why are you going along with this?!"

The door swung open with a click.

What came into view was still that cold, simple room—a hard bed, a desk, and a computer, with no other decorations, not even curtains.

Lin Guang walked straight toward the computer.

"R-really, are you sure you want to look? I can feel there's still a permission seal on it. Sure, it's not impossible to open, but if we do, Airwen might really get pissed off..."

"You can't just rummage through someone else's computer! What if we stumble onto something messed up?"

Phoenix was a bit panicked. "You've got amnesia, so you wouldn't understand, but back when I was young and foolish outside, I hacked into people's personal information all the time. In the end, I got bounties placed on me by a bunch of C-Rank supernaturals... Hell, there was even a B-Rank board member from a Universal Megacorp who wanted to pay to have me killed! If I hadn't joined L Corp, I'd be dead by now!"

"This is all hard-earned experience!"

...She just casually dropped something absolutely insane.

Just what kind of damn magic orb were you in the outside world, you psycho?

Lin Guang shook her head and simply said softly: "If I don't look now, I might never get the chance again."

It sounded like she was stating a fact, but her tone was more like a rhetorical question.

Since this world was already about to end.

She would never get another chance to understand Airwen.

Never get another chance to figure out what her best friend—the one who had gone down a different path from her—was really thinking, really doing.

Wouldn't she regret it?

"..."

Phoenix was stunned.

She was silent for over ten seconds.

Then—

As if she had exploded with fury, her entire bird body began to radiate a golden-red glow.

"Fine, fine, fine! If you want to open it, then open it! I don't care what happens after! If we're going to die, then let's die! You two are coming with me!"

The next moment, she flew onto the desk and viciously slammed her claw down on the power button.

Soon, the system booted up, revealing a password input screen.

"Damn, there's a password. Let me think... It should be—"

Phoenix suddenly roared: "Fuck that! Who's got time to guess?!"

Thump!

Phoenix performed a spinning wing-strike, her fiery red wing glowing with golden specks as it slammed into the side of the computer case, producing a dull thud.

She stood tall and proud: "Permissions, get cracked for me!"

The next instant.

On the monitor, after a brief screen tear, the password input interface vanished, replaced by a clean, minimalist interface.

It was different from the operating systems Lin Guang remembered—more advanced, with a much more pleasing UI.

Was this an operating system from the outside world?

But this page, which could roughly be called a desktop, actually had almost no icons.

In Lin Guang's understanding, translated...

It was just: My Computer, Trash Bin, My Documents.

Only those three.

Yet the seals placed on this computer meant it definitely contained something Airwen cared deeply about.

Lin Guang reached out, gently grasped the mouse, and moved the cursor to the "My Documents" icon. She double-clicked to open it.

Inside were ten folders, simply labeled with numbers from 1 to 10.

Lin Guang tried double-clicking on a random folder.

The folder opened instantly, revealing a dense arrangement of files in all kinds of strange formats.

Phoenix and Amber's gazes froze for a moment.

—These were...

—File formats they had used back when they assisted Su Jingyan in his external work.

These were modeling files, typically blueprints used when operating nano-printers.

Lin Guang clicked on a file named [1134-1].

The next instant.

Some unknown program launched.

The extremely complex interface of a modeling software lit up.

This software should never have been crammed into an ordinary computer like this. It was more like something meant to run on an ultra-advanced supercomputer, maybe even requiring supernatural power to function. Airwen had somehow stuffed it into this machine.

Phoenix's bright eyes locked onto the image on the screen. A flash of unmistakable shock passed through them, and her slightly open beak forgot to close.

Meanwhile, deep in Amber's pupils, a mix of daze and sorrow flickered.

What shocked them wasn't the interface, but the object at its center.

An ordinary brown Relax Bear, its fur curled, showing clear signs of wear.

In the engineering notes, a simple line of text was written.

[The 1,134th time. A Relax Bear that Sakura gave me.]

"......"

Lin Guang exited this file and casually opened another one, [424-2].

In the model was a vinyl record.

[The 424th time. A recording of everyone playing music together.]

"......"

[The 519th time. A group photo of cooking together.]

[The 736th time. Going to see the sea with them.]

[The 846th time. A throwing knife that Sakiya gave me.]

[The 1,032nd time. Fuwawa's violin.]

......

[The 2,473rd time. The black tea that Ba said was the best.]

......

[The 2,907th time. The bow tie Hanako left behind from her last Full Bloom.]

......

Lin Guang's eyes reflected everything on that computer.

[The 3,207th time. A videotape of the song Mengmengxiang sang.]

[The 3,234th time. A custom figurine of herself that Tang Keren made for her virtual avatar.]

[The 3,242nd time. Zihan's eye patch.]

[The 3,272nd time. The group photo.]

The girl quietly stared at the group photo on the screen—the one that included her.

Six to seven thousand files, all with such calm, pale annotations. The meaning was simple, like words left behind by someone who wasn't good at talking, just enough for herself to understand.

But every single model was meticulously detailed to the extreme, almost absurdly so. The technological tree from the outside world seemed to have 3D printers capable of perfectly replicating even the materials and scents.

"How awkward can you get, you idiot."

Phoenix's voice rang out.

"While you keep saying this place is fake, you still want to take those fake memories out with you... But even if you print them out outside, they're still fake, aren't they?"

She was clearly scolding, but the trembling in her voice was nearly uncontrollable. Tears streamed down uncontrollably as her voice choked: "Saying it's all meaningless, but you... didn't you remember every single thing?"

Lin Guang quietly opened the last file.

And then... her eyes suddenly widened.

[The 3,331st time. The strawberry milk she gave me.]

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