Chapter 90: The Toy Bear Possessed by a Remnant Soul

Shen Yan’s finger hovered in mid-air, just an inch away from the worn-out toy bear.

He remembered burying one—a red vest, missing its right eye, its left ear scorched by fire. But how could this thing appear on the Western Wastes battlefield? Just moments ago, it had been buried beneath collapsed floor tiles, as if deliberately hidden there.

The Terminal suddenly vibrated, and green text popped up: 【Detected unnatural spatial displacement. Target item should not exist at current coordinates】.

His heart tightened, and he was about to pull his hand back when the bear’s mouth suddenly snapped open with a “click,” playing a recording:

“Big brother, don’t cry… I’ll live for you.”

The voice was childish, carrying the nasal tone unique to a seven-year-old child.

It was his voice.

Shen Yan froze, his fingertips tingling, his breath catching in his throat. This wasn’t a Memory Playback or an illusion—it was a genuinely recorded voice, and he had never heard these words in his entire life.

The Source Code Spiritual Root buzzed as if forcibly awakened, and the Code Interface automatically expanded, the screen flooded with scrolling red Warnings: 【High-risk soul wave intrusion detected. Recommend immediate disconnection of sensory link】.

Gritting his teeth, he forced himself not to retreat. After just enduring Ye Shi’er’s Memory attack, was he going through it again? He refused to believe it.

Just as he was about to reach out and touch the bear’s ear, a stream of black mist “whooshed” out of its mouth, lunging straight for his forehead!

It moved too fast to be a physical entity—more like an anomalous Thread in a Program jumping directly to the consciousness layer.

At the critical moment, a streak of silver light swept across, precisely piercing the bear’s right eye socket.

Star-Shattering Token!

Luo Li flashed in front of him, her nine Fox Tails unfurling, Demon Power surging like a tide. She raised her hand to draw a Rune, her fingertip slicing through the air, droplets of blood splattering and solidifying into a twisted ancient seal in mid-air.

“Seal!”

The Rune exploded, and the black mist let out a sharp, piercing shriek, forcibly suppressed back into the bear’s body. The dislodged eyeball trembled slightly, a thread of blood seeping from its edge, winding around the lens like spider silk.

Shen Yan staggered, steadying himself against a nearby charred tree trunk to avoid collapsing. His head felt as if countless Programs were crashing simultaneously, Error Reporting Windows popping up frantically.

“Don’t use your Spiritual Root.” Luo Li grabbed his wrist, her tone cold as ice. “It’s waiting for you to actively invoke the System. Once you Run Decompilation, the Remnant Soul can slip into your Consciousness Sea along the Data Stream.”

He gasped for breath, sweat beading on his temples. “So… that voice just now was a trap?”

“More than just a trap.” She stared at the bear, her vertical pupils contracting. “It’s bait. A setup specifically designed for someone like you, whose memories have just been tampered with and whose emotions are unstable.”

Shen Yan fell silent.

He knew she was right. Ye Shi’er’s dying words, “Don’t trust the memories they left you,” combined with this inexplicable childhood recording, were essentially a one-two punch—first shaking his beliefs, then exploiting emotional Vulnerabilities to breach his defenses.

But the problem was…

“What if that voice is real?” he whispered. “What if I really… had a past like that, one that was erased?”

Luo Li glanced back at him, her expression complex.

The next moment, without another word, she coiled her nine tails around the toy bear, enveloping it in a faint purple Barrier, and directly stuffed it into her Storage ring.

“Not now,” she said bluntly. “You’ve just been infected with a memory virus. Burning it now would cause residual data to detonate your emotional module in reverse. At best, you’d suffer Qi Deviation; at worst, your Consciousness Sea would collapse.”

Shen Yan’s Adam’s apple bobbed, but he didn’t argue.

He knew she was protecting him. Not as a Medical Cultivator, nor as an ally, but as… something closer.

“Aren’t you worried it’s a ticking time bomb?” he asked.

“More than a bomb, I’m afraid of you digging into those old accounts alone,” she said flatly, yet didn’t avoid his gaze. “Your way of uncovering the truth is too ruthless. Every time, you treat yourself like a Test Machine, running unknown Code without taking snapshots.”

Shen Yan tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Then why don’t you make a System Backup for me?”

“Can’t,” she snorted. “Your broken System doesn’t even have API documentation. Who would dare take it on?”

They locked eyes for a moment, then both couldn’t help but crack.

They laughed.

The laughter was a bit bitter, but it was genuine laughter.

Wind swept across the ruins, stirring a few charred leaves. In the distance, sentries were already gathering, their footsteps growing louder.

Luo Li wiped the smile from her face and turned to him, lightly tapping his chest with her finger. “Listen, I’ll keep this bear for now. Once we deal with those stubborn old men in the Elder Council, you can investigate however you want. But on one condition—you’re still alive.”

Shen Yan nodded.

He knew exactly what was coming next. The Demon Clan’s internal strife was far from settled, the Blood Pact had been established, and the elders would never let it go. He and Luo Li were now standing on the edge of a tribunal, awaiting only the final verdict.

But just then, his Terminal vibrated again.

Green text appeared: 【Detected faint soul wave output, frequency consistent with Ye Shi’er’s heartbeat curve before death】.

He glanced down at his phone but said nothing.

The wave was weak, like an aftershock after a Seal, but it was undeniably there. And… it pulsed rhythmically every seven seconds.

Seven seconds.

It was the default Latency time he’d set when writing his basic Loop Function.

It was also the rhythm with which his younger brother, Shen Mo, used to knock on his door every time he finished his homework as a child.

He clenched his phone, his knuckles turning white.

“What are you thinking?” Luo Li noticed his change in demeanor.

“I’m thinking…” his voice was hoarse, “…why a toy bear? Why that recording? If Ye Shi’er really was my brother, he wouldn’t need to play psychological games like this. Unless…”

“Unless what?”

“Unless he wasn’t sure of the truth himself,” Shen Yan slowly looked up. “He was testing me. In the most primitive way, seeing if I’d react, if I remembered him.”

Luo Li frowned. “You mean his Memory was tampered with too?”

“What else?” he sneered. “The Celestial Clan Outcast Splitting Experiment, twin body number zero-seven. One sealed in a Star-Shattering Token for three hundred years, the other abandoned in the mortal world as an orphan. Do you think a project like that cared about ethics? They must have brainwashed them, altered their files, even… implanted false narratives.”

As he spoke, he suddenly remembered something and quickly pulled up his Terminal’s history log.

Just before Ye Shi’er disappeared, he had received a binary message: “Brother, don’t trust the Memory they left you.”

And now, this bear had appeared, playing a recording he’d never heard before.

The timing was too perfect.

It wasn’t a coincidence. It was arranged.

“Someone is guiding us,” his voice grew low. “Revealing the truth step by step, yet never showing the full picture. Making us piece it together ourselves, guess for ourselves, suffer for ourselves.”

Luo Li listened quietly, then suddenly reached out and brushed a stray lock of hair behind his ear.

The gesture was gentle, yet it made his heart tremble.

“Then don’t rush to piece it together,” she said. “What you need most right now isn’t answers, but a stabilizer. Once I settle the Demon Clan’s affairs, we’ll dismantle this black box together.”

Shen Yan looked at her.

Her gaze was steady—no pity, no overprotectiveness, only a near-brutal certainty: You have to live, even if I have to tie you down.

He suddenly felt a lump in his throat.

“What if…” he paused, “one day I discover that I’m actually a bad person?”

“Then you’ll be the bad person under my protection,” she rolled her eyes. “So much nonsense.”

In the distance, a bell tolled, low and solemn.

The Bell of Judgment.

Both turned to look. In the direction of the Demon Clan’s great hall, elders could already be seen standing on the high platform.

Luo Li took a deep breath and reached out to grasp his wrist. “Let’s go. We shouldn’t keep them waiting.”

Shen Yan didn’t move.

He glanced down at his Storage ring, then at hers.

“That bear… is it really safe?”

“For now, yes,” she replied calmly. “But when I sealed it just now, I noticed a small character carved inside its right ear.”

“What character?”

“Dream.”

Shen Yan’s pupils contracted.

Dream?

Not a name, not a serial number, not a password—just a single character: Dream.

The Terminal suddenly went black for an instant.

When it lit up again, there was a hidden folder on the homepage that had never been seen before, its icon a bear with closed eyes.

Its name read: “Childhood Backup_Auto-Syncing.”

(End of Chapter)