Chapter 39 – Safety

Lu Anchi was very clear that he had never met Jenny before, yet he marveled at the keen insight of this long-renowned woman.

“Perhaps people just look alike,” Lu Anchi replied calmly.

Jenny arched her slightly masculine eyebrows, smiled noncommittally with a tilt of her head, and waved goodbye to him.

Meng Yi watched her slender, tall figure walk away and sighed, “I never would’ve guessed that Consultant Qin’s mother is Jenny! I feel like my world just shattered.”

Xie Ning, who had just finished organizing the files, passed by Meng Yi and gave him a glance before walking off.

Meng Yi felt that tiny glance carried endless disdain, yet he shamelessly followed her. “Sister Ning, you’ve worked hard! Are your shoulders sore? Let me massage them for you?”

Xie Ning was amused but deliberately kept a stern face. “Get lost!”

Meng Yi immediately bowed in salute. “You’re here to report to the director, right? I won’t get in your way—I’ll go be a receptionist!”

As soon as Xie Ning entered, she saw Lu Anchi sitting behind his desk, reviewing documents. He wore a pair of reading glasses, his brows furrowed as he struggled to make out the words. Xie Ning suddenly realized that beneath the police uniform, this diligent, devoted old officer—this man who had given his all to his position—had truly aged.

“Xiao Xie, Meng Yi just graduated not long ago. Guide him a bit more and don’t take his antics too seriously.”

So Lu Anchi had heard their conversation outside the door. Xie Ning waved her hands awkwardly. “I was just joking with him.”

“Young people like to joke—that’s a good thing,” Lu Anchi said as he closed the book on his desk.

Xie Ning’s gaze inadvertently flicked to the book’s cover, which was colorful and didn’t look like a professional or reference book. But Lu Anchi covered it with a stack of paper documents, his hand resting on the book’s edge to block Xie Ning’s view.

Xie Ning averted her eyes and said, “Director Lu, Xu Anran has already returned the materials, and I’ve finished compiling all the disappearance cases. I just wanted to ask…”

Lu Anchi smiled. “Ask whatever you’d like.”

Xie Ning took a deep breath and voiced her speculation. “Among these disappearance cases is Fu Xiaoling from the Highway Schoolgirl Sudden Death Case years ago. So… these disappearances are also related to Yan Ru’s case, aren’t they?”

Lu Anchi lifted his gaze. Years had carved wrinkles into his face but also honed a hawk-like sharpness in him.

“Xiao Xie, your analysis makes sense.”

Huh?

Qin Yuezhang’s sudden shift in topic caught me off guard. Instinctively, I answered, “It’s… it’s okay.”

Having grown up in the mountains, I knew exactly which wild plants were edible, which were poisonous, which would make you sick, and which were harmless.

Casually, I plucked another blade of grass and handed it to him. “Try this one—it should be sweet.”

Qin Yuezhang narrowed his eyes, studying the unremarkable plant in his hand under the distant light. Its four rounded leaves swayed gently in the night breeze as he tentatively placed it in his mouth.

“Sweet?”

Qin Yuezhang nodded slowly. “It is indeed sweet.”

I raised an eyebrow but said nothing more.

“Since we’re already partners,” Qin Yuezhang said, still chewing the grass, “can you explain the specifics of our cooperation? How does it relate to the Safety Gate?”

After a moment of thought, I brushed aside the slightly overgrown hair on my forehead and said, “I need to open Wei Qinzhou’s Safety Gate. He left something very important inside, and I have to retrieve it.”

“What is it?”

“I can’t tell you,” I said. “If I succeed, you’ll naturally find out once you leave Blizzard. If I fail… I assume you’d rather not know too much.”

Qin Yuezhang was smart enough not to press further. He only asked, “What do I need to do?”

I said, “Safety Gates can usually only be opened by technicians, but ordinary people aren’t entirely helpless. Once the main consciousness is fully awakened, dying within Snowscape plunges you into a chaotic stream of consciousness. But every cloud has a silver lining—within that stream, it’s possible to touch the Safety Gate.”

Before I could finish, Qin Yuezhang’s brows furrowed deeply. “That’s dangerous.”

If one fails to enter the Safety Gate, their consciousness could be swept away, risking brain death.

But by choosing this path, I’d already stopped considering the dangers.

I’d said it before—my entire life had been trapped in the words “proving my innocence” for far too long.

So long that it had become an obsession.

I said, “Of course, I have a way to ensure my own safety. Who would be so selfless as to disregard their own life, right?”

Seeing my determination, Qin Yuezhang seemed to believe me. “Then I’ll go with you.”

“Great. Couldn’t be better,” I replied breezily. “As you probably already know, our main consciousness is shielded by two layers of encryption. The first can be unlocked through the Anchor Point. As for the second, it’s automatically generated by Blizzard—something our subconscious deems the least likely to exist.”

Qin Yuezhang pondered, “I’ve read about that. Because the subconscious assumes it can’t exist, its likelihood of appearing in Snowscape decreases. It’s a form of protection for the user.”

“Right. So I’m very curious—how did you awaken your main consciousness?”

If I wasn’t mistaken, Qin Yuezhang’s Anchor Point should be the copy of The Interpretation of Dreams I carried with me. Because our identities were swapped during loading, Blizzard projected his belongings onto me and mine—the woven bag—onto him.

Qin Yuezhang shook his head. “It’s like waking up from a dream. It’s a natural process, but hard to put into words.”

So even he didn’t know?

How interesting.

Qin Yuezhang might be even more suited to be a researcher at Weiyao Technology than Wei Qinzhou.

“Right now, I need to find the thing my subconscious deems least likely to exist,” I sighed. “To know the unknowable—sounds mystical, doesn’t it?”

But I already had a rough guess.

Blizzard forces people to relive their deepest wounds layer by layer, tearing off their fig leaves for others to see.

It’s cruel.

Making people believe, in their dreams, that they can change the past—under the guise of healing. But when fragile souls return to their bodies and face the irreversible reality, it must be even more brutal.

Qin Yuezhang sighed, “Perhaps Xu Anran has a way.”

As Weiyao’s Chief Technology Officer, he had access to secrets even Wei Qinzhou never knew.

“Perhaps.”

I didn’t pin my hopes on anyone, let alone Xu Anran. The real purpose of this conversation was to reassure and win over Qin Yuezhang—and I believed I’d succeeded.