Under the brainwashing of Merlin, Lin Qiye and Li Yifei both stood still.

“You mean… the world we are in is not real?” Lin Qiye’s expression was a bit strange.

“Yes.”

“Do you have evidence?”

“We, the mythical beings, suddenly appeared in your world. Isn’t that evidence?”

“… ” Lin Qiye rubbed his eyes and suddenly felt that what Merlin said seemed to make sense.

“But if the world we are in is false, does that mean we ourselves are false?” Li Yifei couldn’t help but speak up.

“Yes,” Merlin nodded confidently.

“If that’s the case, how can you, as a false existence, question the reality of the world?” Li Yifei paused, “Just like you said, fish wouldn’t question the creatures outside the ocean, two-dimensional beings wouldn’t question the world outside the plane…

So, when you start to question the falseness of this world, is your existence itself… also false?”

Upon hearing Li Yifei’s words, Merlin was struck as if by lightning, and he petrified on the spot.

Lin Qiye looked at Li Yifei with a different look in his eyes.

“Do you understand philosophy?” he asked Li Yifei in a low voice.

“No, I just can’t figure it out,” Li Yifei scratched his head.

Lin Qiye looked at him meaningfully, then turned to Merlin. “You said you are a scholar searching for the real world, have you found it?”

Merlin’s eyes lit up again!

“I found it!” he said confidently, “I don’t know how long ago, I used magic to communicate with a mysterious dimension. Although I don’t know exactly where it is, I can vaguely predict that it is the real world!”

“What is that world like?”

“It seems to be underwater, with all sorts of little houses inside, some shaped like pineapples, some like human heads, and there are shops selling strange food, and it seems there’s a strange yellow block…”

Merlin began to recall what he had seen and heard at the time, his eyes widening, and his body involuntarily twitching…

Lin Qiye frowned, realizing that things were not simple, and quietly stepped back with Li Yifei.

“The real world… I saw the real world!!” Merlin’s excitedly gestured, his eyes no longer calm and wise, but replaced with a touch of strange madness.

His body twisted violently, and after a moment, he turned into a pink starfish.

He reached out, and the staff next to the chair turned into a fishing net. He quickly ran to Lin Qiye, dancing with the net in hand.

“SpongeBob!! Let’s go catch jellyfish!”

Patrick Star Merlin circled around Lin Qiye a few times, then ran out of the ward with the fishing net, running in the yard. As he ran, he suddenly jumped up, the fishing net in his hand dancing wildly, as if catching something invisible.

Suddenly, he saw Nyx sitting in a daze on a rocking chair…

“Boss! Boss! Are you here too?” Patrick Star Merlin approached Nyx, asking cheerfully.

Nyx was stunned, staring blankly at this pink, unidentified object, lost in thought…

After a moment, she tremblingly reached out and hugged Patrick Star Merlin, tearfully saying, “Are you… my grandson?!”

“Boss!!”

“Grandson, huh!”

“Boss!!”

“Grandson, grandma is here!”

“…”

Upstairs, the two who witnessed everything…

Lin Qiye: (?????)

Li Yifei: (?????)

“I think I probably know what’s wrong with him…” Lin Qiye looked at the scene silently and said softly.

“Well…” Li Yifei scratched his head, “It looks unexpectedly touching…”

Lin Qiye pushed up his glasses and said in a doctor’s tone, “In the long process of exploration, the ‘real world’ has become Merlin’s inner demon. In order to find it, Merlin has used prophecy and magic countless times, and finally, I don’t know what kind of strange spell he cast, connecting to the so-called ‘real world’, and transferred his consciousness over…

I don’t know if that world is the ‘real world’, but undoubtedly, it has caused some strange impact on his mental consciousness, ultimately leading to mental illness.”

“What should we do?” Li Yifei felt a headache coming on.

“… I don’t know,” Lin Qiye shook his head. After all, he was not a real psychiatrist. Although he could roughly deduce the course of events, he was completely clueless about how to treat it.

Do we have to go back to Sunshine Mental Hospital and repeat the same old tricks? But it’s the Lunar New Year now, and the doctors in the psychiatric department are probably on holiday, right?

Lin Qiye looked at the wildly running Merlin below and sighed slowly.

“Before mentioning the real world, he was relatively normal. This should only be a short-term symptom… Anyway, let’s go and give him a sedative injection first, and see if we can get him back to normal. This is too much of a hassle.”

“Who’s going?”

“What do you think?”

“… “

A lowly nurse, exploited by the heartless boss, sighed and walked alone towards the direction of the pharmacy.

After a while, Li Yifei carried a large syringe and chased after Patrick Star Merlin, who was running around. Nyx also followed closely behind, shouting, “Xiao Fei! That’s your brother, you can’t be so ruthless!”

The three chased each other in the yard for a while, and in the end, Li Yifei successfully injected the sedative into Merlin’s body. He immediately quieted down, turned back into human form, and sat down on the ground with a thud.Li Yifei was equally exhausted, sitting on the ground and gasping for air heavily.

“This job… is just too damn tiring!”

Lin Qiye stepped forward to check on Merlin’s condition and found that he was only a bit disoriented, probably a side effect of the confusion he had experienced earlier, and it was nothing serious.

Although Merlin’s condition was severe, it wouldn’t last long, especially when the real world wasn’t mentioned, he could still communicate normally. Therefore, there wasn’t too much to worry about. The main issue now was to think of a treatment.

He patted Li Yifei on the shoulder, “Take good care of them, I’m leaving first.”

Then, under Li Yifei’s resentful gaze, Lin Qiye disappeared behind the hospital’s door.

…

Early morning.

Lin Qiye slowly woke up from his bed, glanced out the window, and to his surprise, the world outside was draped in a blanket of snow.

“Did it snow that much last night?” Lin Qiye muttered to himself, walked to the window, and gazed into the distance.

The streets outside were already covered in a vast expanse of white, with large snowflakes gently falling from the sky, accumulating on the edges of the windows, and gradually melting away.

Such heavy snowfall was rare in Cangnan.

Just as Lin Qiye was about to freshen up, he suddenly stopped in his tracks, turned his head to look at a corner of the room, and let out a soft exclamation.

In the corner, a small grey mouse lay quietly, motionless.