“You know who built the city…?”

“That’s right.” Qi Xia nodded. “This person used ‘Clever Object’ and constructed this city in an instant.”

Chen Junnan also looked at the street before him, feeling the situation seemed a bit absurd: “Old Qi… it’s not that I’m dampening your enthusiasm, but have you ever worked in construction? If you want to design a city… just having ‘belief’ definitely won’t work. There are too many things to consider, like water and electricity systems, like the different layouts of different shops. Even if this person really believed they could build a city, they must be familiar with the structure of every building. Otherwise, building things purely from imagination, what difference is there from a child stacking blocks?”

“No…” Qi Xia’s eyes kept gleaming. “It doesn’t need to be that troublesome at all… We’re overthinking this…”

“What?”

“To build an entire ‘city,’ you don’t need to know the structure of buildings at all, nor do you need to have done anything related to construction…” Qi Xia murmured to himself. “Because each of us is ‘helpless and isolated,’ we fall into this misconception. We think that to successfully activate an ‘Echo,’ besides the ability of the ‘Echo’ itself being powerful, we ourselves must also have theoretical knowledge that can support the ‘Echo.’ But those people are different. They can have many ‘Echoes’ existing simultaneously, and when combined with each other, they can achieve unexpected effects.”

After listening, Qiao Jiajin still felt he didn’t quite understand. He scratched his head and asked: “But liar boy, if it’s really as you say… what ability does ‘Clever Object’ need to match with to build a city? Among these abilities we already know, I feel like none of them would work…”

“‘Entering Dreams’ would work.” Qi Xia boldly speculated.

“‘Entering Dreams’…?” This answer was clearly beyond the three people’s expectations, leaving them confused for a moment.

“This person entered everyone’s ‘dreams’ and directly replicated the scenes from the ‘dreams.'” Qi Xia said. “Some people were in prison before coming here, so there’s a prison here. Some people were working, so there are high-rise buildings. Others were in school, so there are schools. And because each person’s dreamscape is only a small area, only by combining many people’s dreams together to assemble this city would its scale look so massive.”

“Ah…?”

The three people beside him widened their eyes, at a loss for words.

Qi Xia nodded and continued: “This way, he doesn’t need to conceive and design the buildings himself. Because everyone came from different eras, the buildings in this place are also bizarre and strange, and the things contained within the buildings are also varied and diverse. So this city doesn’t come from a certain city in a certain era at all, but is an empty city assembled from countless memory fragments.”

“Old… Old Qi…” Chen Junnan said. “I can barely keep up with this madman’s train of thought. If what you’re saying is true… wouldn’t that mean each of us could find our own ‘hometown’ here?”

“In theory, yes, but everyone has only seen buildings in their dreams. These buildings are also completely dilapidated now, making it very difficult to connect them with how they looked in our memories.”

“Wait… wait a moment…” Chen Junnan rubbed his forehead and thought for a long time before speaking: “If that’s the case… having both ‘Entering Dreams’ and being crazy enough, it could only be that ‘Heavenly-Dragon’ kid, right? Are you saying this city was established by him?”

“Yes, the possibility is very high.” Qi Xia said.

“But that doesn’t seem right either?” Qin Dingdong asked from the side. “The most important condition for activating an ‘Echo’ is that you yourself have to believe this thing is real. If it really is ‘Heavenly-Dragon’s’ handiwork, then how would he believe this city would really appear here? If he himself doesn’t believe it… even if he saw these scenes, he still wouldn’t have a way to replicate them.”

“This is another misconception.” Qi Xia said. “For ‘Heavenly-Dragon’ who simultaneously possesses ‘Entering Dreams’ and ‘Clever Object,’ there’s a more direct way to make him believe all of this. As long as he used this method, this city would rise from the ground in an instant.”

“What method?”

Qi Xia paused, then answered in a deep voice: “That is to make himself unable to distinguish between ‘dreams’ and ‘reality.'”

Everyone slowly widened their eyes upon hearing Qi Xia’s explanation, not speaking for a long time.

“Holy shit…” Chen Junnan slowly spoke. “Damn… now I get it. This is simply too absurd. As long as ‘Heavenly-Dragon’ believes this place is a ‘dream,’ then naturally things that exist in ‘dreams’ will appear here… and these ‘dreams’ come from us… this is fucking… a smooth little combo?”

“That’s pretty much it.” Qi Xia nodded. “We thought ‘Heavenly-Dragon’ moved buildings from dreamscapes into reality, but ‘Heavenly-Dragon’ has long gone mad. To him, it’s nothing more than moving a scene from one dream to another dream. In other words… he believes these buildings should have been here all along, so these buildings appeared here.”

“Damn…” Qiao Jiajin said in shock. “Then there’s really no difference from a ‘God.’ The church back where I’m from says ‘God said let there be light, and there was light.’ Does ‘God’ also not distinguish between reality and dreams?”

Chen Junnan gasped after hearing this: “Has this ‘Heavenly-Dragon’ gone too insane?”

“However, there are also drawbacks.” Qi Xia said. “‘Heavenly-Dragon’ often has to sleep, so his management and intervention of the entire ‘End’ is very minimal.”

“Sleep…” Chen Junnan frowned and said, “I’m saying, Old Qi… don’t you think things are a bit tricky?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean ‘Heavenly-Dragon’s’ use of ‘Entering Dreams.'” Chen Junnan said. “It’s one thing that this old guy has Entering Dreams… but now the problem is, he believes that whether his eyes are open or closed, it’s all a ‘dream.’ How the hell do we break this?”

“The only way is to make him truly awaken.” Qi Xia answered.

After listening, Qiao Jiajin slowly walked to a utility pole nearby and reached out to touch it.

The cement on this utility pole was mottled, and there were even missing person notices and small advertisements with almost illegible writing posted on it. Every detail was done exceptionally perfectly. Could it actually come from an “Echo”?

No, rather than calling it an “Echo,” it would be better to say these things were the remaining memories of each person, and also each person’s “past.”