Superman Termination Manual

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The night was deep.

A sharp scream tore through the quiet of the night, resounding in his ears. Ke Youqing suddenly woke up, his eyes alert and bloodshot as he abruptly sat up in bed.

He looked around, the bedroom was tranquil, with no trace of where that crow-like screech had come from.

Looking down, he saw his lower body still wrapped in the blanket. For some reason, there was a faint heaviness in his legs, as if a stone was pressing down on them.

Thus, Ke Youqing slightly lifted the blanket with his hand, looking towards his legs, he could see a crow's head lying on his thigh. Blood was flowing freely, staining his pant leg and heels red.

His face expressionless, he turned his head to look, Bai Wenna was sleeping soundly. Time had not left many marks on her delicate face, the wrinkles at the corners of her eyes under the moonlight were like the tide spreading.

Just then, a hoarse and sharp cry suddenly came from ahead.

Following the sound, Ke Youqing looked towards the master bedroom's connected bathroom—the door was closed, but through the frosted glass door the flickering, fleeting light inside the bathroom could be seen.

The crow was screeching.

Ke Youqing attempted to make as little noise as possible, bearing with his blood-stained pants as he delicately got out of bed and walked towards the strange bathroom. Blood dripped, drip, drip to the floor, staining every inch of soil he passed red.

He stopped in front of the bathroom.

Regulating his breathing, his chest heaving, his hand pressed on the doorknob, with a "click" it turned open.

He then pushed the door open.

Beyond the door was a world of deep red, reflecting off Ke Youqing's face making it flush, slightly squinting his eyes.

A crow was perched on the rack above the bathtub. Apparently, the screeching had come from it. It said, "Illusions make you think you're going mad, giving you an excuse, an unwillingness to admit certain things. Open your eyes and look at those details."

Saying so, the crow lifted its wings, "pointed" at the bathtub.

Ke Youqing looked down, inside the bathtub was the egg of an unknown creature, slightly throbbing, with blue veins and bloody streaks appearing and disappearing, revealing a nauseating strange vitality. The fuzzy shadow inside the egg could be seen through the light; at times it was a young dragon with folded wings, at times a ghoul with protruding fangs, and occasionally a young crow.

That shadow was constantly changing.

"What is this?" he asked.

"I should be asking you that," the crow said.

"This is... an illusion."

Ke Youqing said slowly.

He stood at the entrance of the bathroom, indifferent to all the strange phenomena in front of him.

"No, it's not an illusion. It's a miniature of something real that exists," the crow said, "Have you ever thought that you've never really been mad, you're not insane, but your supernatural abilities have evolved to a bottleneck, slowly birthing a completely new form, but you're not willing to accept it."

"So what?"

The crow said, "Your subconscious, your supernatural abilities, the danger instincts you've nurtured over the years, the pressures in your heart, they are all helping you, helping you to realize some truths."

"What kind of truths?"

"You have to ask your own heart, only you know the answer," the crow said, "But you are just relentlessly in denial, so they've become illusions, become the hurdle you cannot cross."

It paused for a moment, then hoarsely said, "You could have become the strongest supernaturally, you could have."

Suddenly, countless metal pipes from outside the window spread in, like numerous snakes, inching slowly closer to Ke Youqing.

Then the pipes climbed up, connecting to Ke Youqing's whole body, as if turning him into a controllable puppet.

Ke Youqing remained expressionless as he looked up at the source of these metal pipes—the air conditioning unit hanging on the rail.

At this moment, that air conditioning unit turned into a machine glowing with deep blue light, appearing like alien technology.

"Is this an illusion?"

The crow tilted its head.

"This is an illusion," Ke Youqing looked at the bizarre technological product, muttered to himself, "If there were anything here, I wouldn't not know it."

"Is it possible, that this is not an illusion?" the crow said, "But some kind of hint."

"It's an illusion."

Ke Youqing, in a self-assured tone, stated again firmly.

He was very clear in his heart, the day he started treating these illusions as reality, might just be the beginning of his complete descent into madness.

"No, you should accept it."

"This is an illusion."

"This will only make you sicker! And you think you are protecting yourself!" the crow screeched.

"If I accepted the illusions, unable to distinguish reality from fantasy, that would make me even sicker."

Ke Youqing said unemotionally.

"You are too stubborn, your willpower too strong, you blindly trust past experiences, you refuse to accept the strange phenomena that have long appeared around you, this is why you can never realize what those illusions are trying to tell you: because you just constantly reject them, keep them at the back of your mind."

The crow narrowed its crimson eyes as though wanting to crushing in its pupils the reflection of this man.

"Years of experience have taught me, my psyche will not collapse, absolutely not, nothing can affect me. Those madmen, those monks, those followers, they all tried to tame through their own ideologies, but they didn't succeed. I cannot lose to myself, absolutely not possible."

Hearing this, the crow looked at him pityingly and said, "But I never wanted to defeat you, you think what I've shown you is an illusion, but in fact, it's reality."

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