Chapter 15: The Entire Aquarium is a Thinking, Living…

Chapter 15 The Entire Aquarium Is a Sentient, Living...

"...Until that day, they found me."

Up to this message, Luo Shengle found no more "messages." She couldn't help but ponder:

These words first appeared in last night's dream, apparently from the dream's owner. But why were they now manifesting randomly everywhere in the aquarium today?

These twisted, dark-red vermiculate script writhed unrestrained—deep inside fish tanks, on ceiling corners, by staff collars, even stretching across employees' faces as they unknowingly carried them around...

Like spreading mildew in a basement, they were omnipresent.

This gave Luo Shengle an ominous feeling, as if no matter where she was, she remained within the grasp of the dream's owner, unable to escape.

As Luo Shengle's gaze shifted between these unknown words, the silver snake quietly coiled in her mind suddenly stirred.

The pencil-thick serpent raised its oval head, undulating lazily. Its shimmering silver scales glistened like liquid mercury, its gilded eyes seemingly peering outward through her own as a window.

At the same time, Yi Fengchu on the other end of the phone went rigid.

In an instant, numerous images projected across his vision—he saw the dark-red words Luo Shengle had just discovered.

The sensation was ineffable. Yi Fengchu could clearly tell this was another person's perspective, yet he also discerned that the "he" in the vision wasn't Luo Shengle herself.

It was as if he was merely hitching a ride through her senses to glimpse what her eyes reflected.

"What kind of strange phenomenon is this now..."

Coming to himself, Yi Fengchu uncomfortably closed his eyes, rubbing his temples with two fingers as he asked the phone, "Why did I just see what Senior Luo was seeing? Was this your doing?"

"...No."

After a brief silence, the phone couldn't resist dripping caustic wit: "Next time you encounter something abnormal, I hope you can divert some of that accusatory energy toward some self-reflection."

"Me? An ordinary, model citizen—what is there to reflect on?"

Yi Fengchu instinctively defended himself before falling silent to process the information he'd just "received" from Luo Shengle.

Most of what he saw related to those unknown words, so he could only roughly deduce that Luo Shengle had entered a mysterious, lightless dreamscape last night—unaware that he too had participated in that dream.

"Is it possible that whether inside the uncanny aquarium in the dream or walking through the normal one in daylight, she's fundamentally within the dreamer's consciousness?"

"If everything she sees is part of the dream owner's body, then the words appearing everywhere makes perfect sense..."

From this perspective, the "child separated from their mother" in the secondary objective was likely the dream's owner—or rather, the entire aquarium itself.

But how to quiet its lamentations? That remained to be investigated.

On screen, Luo Shengle seemed to have reached the same conclusion. She gazed up at the aquarium's dome, her face slightly pale.

Lowering her voice cautiously, she asked, "Mr. Narrator, I suddenly have a bold idea... Could it be that the entire aquarium is a sentient, living..."

"Don't borrow trouble."

Yi Fengchu calmly reassured her: "Focus on the present. Providence will show the way."

Silver words reflected on the glass surface, their quicksilver shimmer resembling cool pond water that silently doused Luo Shengle's disquiet.

Taking a deep breath, Luo Shengle balled her hands in quiet determination and nodded. "Your guidance is correct... I'll investigate the whale bone's whereabouts now."

The most direct source of information would be the aquarium's caretaker staff.

Thus, Luo Shengle picked up her bucket and net again, making a show of harvesting algae in Hall B while casually chatting with the nearest coworker.

At one point, she sighed as if making an offhand remark: "Ah, what a shame. Our aquarium is named after that whale skeleton, yet in all my days working here, I've never seen that fabled leviathan's remains."

"That thing? It's been gone for decades," the coworker recalled distractedly. "I heard it stopped being displayed after the last ground-up renovation of the aquarium."

"But something that famous going missing should've been a cause célèbre, right? Does nobody know where it went?"

After a thoughtful pause, Luo Shengle ventured cautiously: "Could it have been stolen?"

"Impossible. If thieves took it, there would've been reports decades ago."

The coworker, having just scooped a full bucket of rotting algae, leaned the net against the wall and stretched. "Maybe it became a private collection of the hereditary curator lineage."

The director...

When first entering the aquarium, the tour guide's historical account resurfaced in Luo Shengle's memory again, making her grip on the net pause slightly.

Right—since arriving, she'd seen all sorts of visitors, staff, and managers, but never the one person who should be most conspicuously absent: the current director.

Noticing the keyword "family" in the coworker's words, Luo Shengle mused: "So every director is a descendant of the aquarium's Founder?"

"Of course. All facilities and operating funds come from the wealthy Jiang family, generations of shipbuilders and merchants."

Here, the coworker seemed to recall something, sighing with regret. "Pity... Such a kind, generous family seems afflicted by some ancestral curse. Almost none of the directors lived past thirty."

"The current director just assumed the directorship three years ago but has never once visited. None of us have seen them, so the director's office remains unused."

Luo Shengle felt the directors' short lifespans was no accident—the casually mentioned "curse" might be real, even inextricably bound to the Whale Bone Aquarium...

Perhaps the current director knew this and thus avoided the place entirely.

She understood the director's wariness, yet she still resolved to contact them. After all, regarding the whale bone's whereabouts, no one would know better than the directors' lineage.

Silently apologizing in her heart, Luo Shengle continued probing discreetly: "How mysterious... Is there really no one in the aquarium who can contact the director? What about financial reports or emergencies?"

Though her questions were many, Luo Shengle was naturally talkative—someone who could chat with a stone. To her coworker, she was just an eager, efficient, outgoing new hire with heavy curiosity.

Any employee who added value was a good one.

Thus, the coworker answered without suspicion: "The accounts department contacts Mr. Jiang monthly, but regular staff like us don't have access."

Paydirt!

Luo Shengle's eyes lit up. She lowered her head, pressing her lips to suppress a smile before casually steering the conversation elsewhere to muddy the conversational waters.

Gradually, her attention returned to the fish tank before her.

Amidst verdant foliage and pebbles, a large fish hung suspended, only occasionally flicking its tail lethargically.

Luo Shengle initially gave it scant notice until her gaze abruptly locked onto its gills.

There, beside its left gill, was a knuckle-length scar—crescent-shaped, like a burn mark—etched into its dermic rasp.

This scar...

Instantly, Luo Shengle felt as if submerged in glacial dread, her hands shivering autonomically.

The curved scar reflected in her dilated pupils gradually overlapped completely with the scar on the left cheek of the man in the half-torn photo found in the dormitory.

The large fish, as if sensing her terrified gaze, slowly lifted its eerily calm eyes and locked eyes with Luo Shengle.

"This fish..."

It was a transformed player...

Luo Shengle almost choked on her words. She couldn’t bear to imagine that if she had also failed the instance, she might have been trapped in a cramped tank, degenerated into just a fish waiting to be fed—utterly devoid of freedom...

In contrast, Yi Fengchu’s expression remained indifferent. He directed Luo Shengle, who was momentarily frozen in fear: "Go to the finance office. You don’t have much time left."