At that moment, An Luo desperately wished he had learned Occlumency.
However, he hadn’t received an owl-delivered letter at the age of eleven, making him undoubtedly a Muggle. He never attended a magic school, so he had no chance to learn such advanced magic.
Worse still, the major he chose in ordinary university wasn’t psychology either.
So he had no idea what it meant to guard his thoughts.
How was he supposed to guard them?
Build a firewall in his brain?
How?
It was easy when writing it—just tap the keyboard, and a line of text appeared without any difficulty.
But now that he needed to put it into practice…
An Luo tried hard to think in his mind: Don’t let Meieruita know about the plot, don’t let Meieruita know about Chinese, don’t let Meieruita know about Earth’s situation.
His vision went completely black.
Once sight vanished, the other senses compensated by becoming sharper.
An Luo could feel Meieruita drawing closer and closer. This gradual approach made him shudder instinctively.
Soon, Meieruita’s forehead touched An Luo’s forehead.
Meieruita’s body temperature had always been on the lower side—perhaps a lingering effect from too much exposure to cold in childhood. They were so close that their noses almost brushed together, allowing him to sense the other’s breath up close.
An Luo’s breathing quickened, a mix of tension and a panic akin to being approached by a ferocious beast.
Meieruita’s breathing remained calm and unchanged throughout.
An Luo could almost hear his own loud heartbeat.
The hand Meieruita had placed on An Luo’s shoulder tightened slightly. An Luo leaned back following the force, and he heard the rustle of fabric by his ear. The thick bedding on the edge of the bed compressed under gravity and sank down. An Luo felt Meieruita’s knee pressing up onto it.
At first, it was just this external sensation, but gradually, an intrusive feeling transmitted from the point where their foreheads touched.
An Luo couldn’t describe what it felt like—any language seemed too pale. It was like some icy tendrils probing into his soul, indescribable, making him uncontrollably think of Cthulhu.
The tip of the tendril was very fine, but slowly, more presences surged in, accompanied by the process and sensation of sensing Magic Power.
An Luo’s mind went blank, feeling utterly bizarre, as if something was tentatively poking and prodding carefully at his brain—viscous and slow. The mucus dripping from the tendrils was like rain, each drop containing Meieruita’s process of meditating and sensing Magic Power.
But the sensation of the raindrops hitting his cerebral cortex was extremely strange, like an electric shock—the kind of static one occasionally felt in winter when touching a doorknob, sudden and piercing like a needle, with waves of current rising and falling like piano keys being played.
An Luo instinctively wanted to pull back, but the hand on his shoulder gripped firmly—not enough to cause pain, but enough to immobilize him.
He trembled uncontrollably, breathing rapidly, shoulders hunching, eyelashes wet with physiological tears, teeth chattering with tiny sounds. He shook like a leaf in the autumn wind.
An Luo couldn’t define the sensation; he just felt an uncontrollable trembling throughout his body. His hand tightly clutched the “Dispel Curse” paper in his pocket, crumpling the neatly folded sheet into wrinkles.
His strength seemed drained; he slumped down like a boneless jellyfish. But a hand supported his waist, preventing him from collapsing entirely.
In a daze, An Luo’s chin rested against something resilient—soft yet firm, and cool. He immediately pressed the full weight of his head onto it, eagerly like a ship sighting its harbor.
It felt like a hand adjusted his face to keep their foreheads pressed together, but An Luo’s perception of it wasn’t clear.
Soon, he could no longer sense anything beyond his soul. In this transcendent feeling beyond words, his vision, touch, and hearing all regressed to near zero. Perception of his body vanished, leaving only sensation, sensation, and sensation.
His once intangible thoughts and soul presence had never felt so strong. Dazzling white lights exploded one after another, perception of time faded, leaving only feeling.
Finally, this cross-soul transmission neared its end. The tendrils gradually withdrew, and bodily sensations slowly returned. An Luo felt like he had been washed ashore by the sea—his limbs and torso emerging from the water into daylight.
His mind gradually cleared. An Luo also sensed that during the “Soul Transmission,” Meieruita hadn’t reverse-invaded his brain to extract information; it had been purely one-way input.
Surprised, puzzled.
The hand clutching the letter in his pocket slowly relaxed.
An Luo couldn’t figure it out—why had Meieruita let go of such a golden opportunity?
But soon, his questions were overshadowed by the information Meieruita had transmitted.
Previously, no matter how he tried, he hadn’t known how to sense Magic Power. Now, with Meieruita’s understanding and memories inputted, An Luo instantly mastered it.
The feeling… was like someone who had never ridden a bike suddenly knowing how without practice.
It was simply miraculous.
But there were side effects—An Luo’s brain felt swollen and a bit painful.
The weight of knowledge, probably.
He opened his eyes to a scattering of light spots, brilliant and dreamlike colors jumping disorderly and chaotically.
It took a while for him to realize it was due to the refraction of tears. He blinked hard, flushing out the physiological tears, which slid down his cheeks, passing dried tear tracks and bringing a taut sensation.
His vision slowly focused, and the scene before him sharpened.
Taking up most of his view was a patch of black. An Luo dazedly looked down, feeling his chin rub against fabric. It took him a moment to realize his chin was resting on Meieruita’s shoulder.
Looking further, he was almost entirely in Meieruita’s embrace, one hand clutching his clothing like a koala clinging to a tree.
Meieruita remained as before, with only one knee on the bed’s edge.
One hand gripped An Luo’s shoulder, the other supported his waist. His breathing stayed even, his face expressionless.
An Luo said awkwardly, “Thanks…”
He thanked him while pulling back.
Meieruita let out an “Mm,” released his hands, and stepped back from the bed. Looking down, his gray-green eyes were like a windless lake.
“You need sleep to let this extra knowledge integrate with the rest.”
The protagonist’s voice was unhurried and calm.
With that, he turned and left, saying nothing about An Luo’s inappropriate actions just now.
“I’m going to pick up a task.”
“Oh… okay, sure…”
An Luo was still a bit out of it.
The door slammed shut, accompanied by the sound of a key turning in the lock.
Meieruita was right—he should sleep now.
An Luo sat dazedly on the bed’s edge for a while, like a robot running low on battery. He slowly crawled under the covers and fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.
Meieruita closed the door and walked steadily and at a uniform pace down the long corridor toward the Task Reception Area.
The hand exposed outside his Wizard Robe trembled uncontrollably.
Just as An Luo had guessed, he had originally planned to use this opportunity to reverse-invade An Luo’s brain and steal information about the plot and those ancient runes.
Meieruita thought that if he knew more, and pushed the plot forward faster, maybe he could shake off the Creator’s influence on him more quickly?
That was his plan, and he intended to follow through.
He couldn’t take it anymore. He didn’t want to waste time every day on meaningless things, like picking Man-Eating Flower Fruits to bring back to An Luo as after-dinner fruit.
It was utterly absurd, unbelievably so.
An Luo’s influence on him was too great; it threatened his normal life.
Meieruita had to find a way to resolve this dilemma.
However…
In the instant of soul fusion, he perceived many uncontrolled fragments of thought spilling from An Luo’s mind.
They were like snowflakes, gently landing on his mental tendrils and quickly melting, seeping in.
[Sigh, time to name the protagonist, but I’m terrible at names. What to do? Let’s do a public vote first—these thirty are good, advance the finalists! I’ll pick the best later.]
[This ending might not suit Meieruita; let’s change it. How about the Traveler ending? Seems possible.]
[As expected of my protagonist— so awesome!]
[Mess with me, and you’ve messed with cotton candy. But wait, I’ll have my protagonist teach you a lesson soon! Tremble, mortal!]
[Kill kill kill, no problem. Meieruita, kill whoever you want because you’re the sole protagonist, the son of heaven in this world.]
[All the good things are yours; everything you want will be yours. You can trample everyone underfoot because I’m writing a power fantasy, not an abuse story! Protagonist’s satisfaction is king!]
Dense, fragmented phrases blended with a soft, sweet, drowsy feeling that made him want to close his eyes and indulge.
The deeper Meieruita probed, the more fragments there were—dense as a blizzard. Yet they brought the opposite of cold: a warmth that nearly made him lose control.
Meieruita panicked; he felt his bones creaking. In that instant, he even wished he could dig out his skull, empty it of knowledge and wisdom, and offer it as a golden goblet for An Luo to drink from.
He didn’t dare look deeper.
Otherwise, he didn’t know what he would become.
His mental tendrils froze in place, enduring the snowflake-like thought fragments. It hurt, but not like any pain he’d felt before. He felt like ice melting slowly in warm water—nowhere to escape, only facing this gentle, gradual death.
An Luo had clearly been deeply affected too, slumping powerlessly. Meieruita caught him without thinking.
The Creator’s warm, fragile body left Meieruita utterly at a loss.
What exactly should he do?
