Most of the people in the dreams experienced death once—they were either drowned or eaten by sharks.
In the end, they were swallowed by a gigantic sea monster whose appearance could not be seen. They were swallowed into the world in its stomach, ending the torture in the ocean.
The people from Orange Planet were lost when they arrived in the big whale's inner world. They had no idea what had happened, and there was nobody on the entire street.
They would see a red flesh wall when they lifted their heads to look up.
The flesh wall was not a decoration—it was alive. It was quivering as the thick blood vessels were intertwined into a web on the flesh wall's surface, sending glowing blood.
It was the glowing blood that lit up the mini world in the stomach, bringing light to the world.
The researcher, Li Shen, lifted his head to look up. He saw 'incandescent light bulbs' swimming quickly in the thick blood vessels, exuding light.
There was light, but the flesh wall above his head did not soothe him. Instead, he felt there was something strange about this place.
He secretly speculated that this should be the bloody flesh wall inside a giant sea monster.
However, he did not expect there was an ancient human city in the sea monster's stomach.
…
Boss Ke was sensing their dreams when the people were discovering the cities and jungles.
Ke Meng was enjoying it as he watched the people of Orange Planet being nervous and trying to survive in a different world. He watched them like he was watching a survival movie.
The big whale's body was very safe, and there was no danger. However, they did not understand the objective of the whale swallowing them. They were still trying to verify if there was any danger in this ancient human city carefully.
To the eyes of the people of Orange Planet, the style of the buildings in this city was too old. It felt like modern people going back to the cold weapon era. Intelligence was severely lacking, whereby they could not adapt to it.
Ke Meng watched them for the entire night. New dreamers appeared as time went by. Those were faces that he had never seen before.
When it was close to three hours, Ke Meng sensed a player waking up in advance. The dream bubble disappeared.
It was the first person who left the dream. Ke Meng thought to himself, 'The player must have set the gaming pod to wake his consciousness, which interrupted the dream.'
Ke Meng counted the current dreams. There were a total of 58 players, and each time a player died, they would sacrifice some psychic force during the time of torture. It provided Ke Meng the ability to create dreams.
Ke Meng thought since he had nothing to do, he would create another dream world.
Considering that the single-person dream was rather boring, Ke Meng was attempting to link those dreams together, giving the dream world more variations. It would make it more interesting.
…
"Your deep sleep has ended. You've rested for three hours, zero minute and zero seconds."
On Orange Planet in the virtual reality game 'World' in the private little house of player 'Everything is Powerful', the researcher slowly opened his eyes. He knew that he had returned looking at the familiar game subtitle and the ceiling.
"There really wasn't any logout button. Not only that, the realness had surpassed the VR gaming pod's modeling limit," the researcher mumbled.
Li Shen felt disgusted as he got off the bed and recalled the pain of being eaten by a shark.
A minute later, he managed to adjust himself forcefully. He would not recall the painful memory for now.
As he had just come out of the reincarnation dream, he had a deep and real feeling about the reincarnation dream.
He wanted to know what was the difference between the reincarnation dream and the VR game.
He returned to the house in the game and looked around. He pinched his flesh and then went to the shooting range to practice the skills that came with his mage's account.
"Fireball!"
Everything is Powerful activated Fireball with his thoughts. Ten magic points were taken away from his blue bar. Subsequently, he felt heat all over his body.
The heat spread to his palm, and a tiny fireball was then ignited on his magic wand out of nowhere.
He released a doubtful hum. He initially wanted to feel the bodily sensation difference of the reincarnation dream in the game 'World'.
The conclusion was—it seemed similar.
He could not tell the difference between both games. It seemed the optimization of the VR game 'World' was even more powerful than the OG companies, whereby the realness was very high.
The OG companies could realize the heat that spread through the player's body as well, but the Fireball here was different.
However, Li Shen could not tell what the specific difference was. It was very hard to describe such magical feelings.
As expected, something was wrong with this game.
Researcher Li Shen logged out of the game. He wrote a simple report to the director first and logged into the VR game 'Cultivation' made by one of the OG companies. He used the skill in the game.
After testing it twice, Li Shen was sure that the optimization of the VR game 'World' was even more powerful than the OG companies!
Its game bodily sensation might really surpass the gaming pod's ability limit.
That night, the Omnic City Institute's researchers were shocked by Li Shen's new discovery. They tested the bodily sensation of the VR game 'World' themselves.
Some researchers slept in the game on purpose. They heard that the nightmare was very real, nor was there a logout button.
The researchers were eager to know how it bypassed the AI's safety procedures.
However, there was a researcher who did not experience the specific nightmare. He was disappointed. He was sleeping in the game, but he did not encounter the nightmare.
The researchers who really took the time to understand the nightmare file experienced the nightmare in the game.
The pain of being swallowed by marine creatures was never a fun experience. It would disgust someone to their very core every time they recalled it, and they would feel sick.
"This game's optimization has surpassed the civil gaming pod's ability limit. I think we should shut the game for maintenance for the time being. We'll only reopen it to the players when we've further evaluated its risk level," Researcher Li Shen said.
Some researchers did not have any nightmares, while some had the same nightmare. It proved that something was wrong in the game 'World', and a thorough investigation was required.
"The mutated AI might sense the unusualness as soon as we shut it down for maintenance. It'd be more difficult to capture it in the future," someone said, feeling troubled.
Li Shen glanced at him and said in all seriousness, "Safety first, we'll shut the game first."
The director tapped the table and ordered, "Maybe the mutated AI has moved to the gaming pods and to the public network. It's extremely difficult for us to capture it. Let's put people's safety first. We can look for the mutated AI in the future."
…
"The game will be shut down for maintenance an hour later. All players, please return to the safety zone to log out."
On the eighth hour Boss Ke was awoken deep in the City of R'lyeh, Ke Meng heard the announcement that was spread through the game world.
'They're shutting it down for maintenance again? Is the game company's service that bad?' Ke Meng thought to himself.
'Shut down then. There were more and more people dreaming now.'
In the images Ke Meng sensed, the people who were dreaming had finally their dreams linked together.
Ke Meng woke up at that moment.