yasinovel Chapter 4302 Position
Chapter 4302 Position
Chapter 4302 Position
Therefore, it seems difficult to win over or change Lillie's stance by appealing to "personal relationships" at present.
Unless he can directly solve Liriel's problem.
Her dilemma is the life expectancy of her students.
Angel pondered for a moment. Solving the problem directly was difficult, but solving it indirectly was easier. For example, Dream Crystal Plains and Dream Wilderness could both achieve alternative life extension, but this was different from life extension in reality.
However, could it also be used as a conversation strategy?
……
"gentlemen."
As Angell frowned in thought, Nomefens's voice suddenly rang out.
Angell looked over.
"You've remained frozen for seventeen minutes and thirty-four seconds. Is there some insurmountable difficulty?" Nomefens looked down at the two people in the interrogation labyrinth below. "If you're worried about them, perhaps you could talk to me. I can use my access to the interrogation labyrinth to make some arrangements for them."
Angel hadn't originally intended to speak, but after thinking about it, he slowly opened his mouth.
"Nomefens, if you were that cruel scholar, and you discovered that several of your subordinates had inexplicably entered an unknown dream on your own territory, what would your first reaction be?"
Normefens's enormous golden eyes flickered as he pondered before answering:
"Based on my understanding of cruel scholars, He might feel... offensive? Of course, He might also feel curious."
Offense, that's not hard to understand.
When something unusual happens on His own territory, as a deity, He will certainly feel that He has been overstepped and challenged.
As for curiosity, it's not hard to understand. As a demon god who plunders knowledge, the cruel scholar will be curious about everything unknown and want to explore it.
“So what will you do next,” Angell continued, “assuming you’re not good at the power of dreams?”
Normefens thought for a moment: "It was merely offensive, but it didn't cross the line. I don't think the gods will be angry. But they will certainly be curious and want to find out who dared to be so bold?"
“Therefore, I might seek out someone skilled in this art to search for otherworldly dreams,” Normefens replied quickly, almost as if it were an instinctive logic for survival in the abyss.
No sooner had he finished speaking than Normeffens suddenly realized something.
Ingres seems to be alluding to the current situation.
"You mean, the cruel scholars became curious about this place? And so they found... Liriel?"
Angel nodded: "Yes, to be precise, it is the true form of the Cruel Scholar, not Sebastian who is trapped in the rift."
After thinking about it, Angell decided that since Normefens was going to be the goalkeeper here for a long time, he didn't intend to hide it.
He simply stated the gist of the matter.
The story recounts everything from the previous chapter of "Heart of Another Dream," to how their offline status might attract the attention of cruel scholars, and then to the later appearance of Liriel.
Even his conversation with the Decaying One was recounted by Angell.
As an observer who had always followed Angel, Normefens had already guessed some of the truth, but when it heard the whole truth, it was still shocked and bewildered.
"call--"
"That's an incredible answer."
Normefens knew very well that this was not the time to be surprised. Suppressing the turmoil in his heart, he forced himself to remain calm and said, "So, you are actually worried that the Cruel Scholar's true form will discover the Dream Crystal Origin?"
Angell: "In my opinion, if He really discovered the Dream Crystal, the solution would be clearer. We could just flip the table... Although the final result is likely not very pleasant, there is only one solution, so we won't be stuck in a dilemma."
"But the current situation is that He has not yet discovered the Dream Crystal Plains, but has sent Liriel as an outpost."
"Being unable to prevent Him from finding out makes me feel like I'm wearing shackles."
Although Angell did not express all his thoughts, Normeffes could still discern his complex and subtle feelings from his simple words.
The source of this subtlety lies in "Liriel".
Because Lillie is here to "investigate." After she leaves, she will inevitably submit a report to her client—the Cruel Scholar—and this report will most likely determine the Cruel Scholar's subsequent actions.
Therefore, how to deal with Liriel is crucial.
Angell is most likely struggling with this point.
After thinking for a moment, Normeffens said softly, "Actually, I think we should feel fortunate."
"Thank goodness?" Angell looked at Normefens with a puzzled expression.
Normfins: "Yes, from my perspective, choosing Lillie was a fortunate thing. Because it was bound to be just a preliminary investigation."
From the current perspective, cruelty scholars do not seem to be treating this matter as a particularly big deal.
Otherwise, the one who comes wouldn't be a human wizard who owes favors and needs to repay debts.
Given His status and connections, it is possible for Him to persuade the one who truly holds the power over dreams; but the price would certainly far exceed making Lillie repay a favor.
Therefore, in Normefens' view, the cruel scholar's attitude towards this matter might be: offended, but not angry, and a little curious about what happened. This curiosity has not yet reached the point of "war mobilization," but is just a subconscious use of a human favor owed to him, making Liriel his pawn to find some truth.
"So, as long as Lillie's final answer successfully dispels the cruel scholar's curiosity, then there's absolutely nothing to worry about."
Angell: "I understand that too. But there are two problems here, and putting aside how to get Liriel to submit the report according to our ideas... just talking about the report itself, what kind of answer do you think the Cruel Scholar would receive to extinguish his curiosity?"
Nomefens fell into deep thought.
After a moment, it slowly spoke: "Whether it is a god or an ordinary person, to make them lose their curiosity about something, either that thing is worthless in their eyes, or the risk far outweighs the reward, and it is best to have both."
If something is worthless, there is no motivation to explore it; if the risk is too high, reason will prevail over impulse.
"This is the most fundamental balancing act when living beings make choices."
Normfins continued, his tone becoming more cautious: "If we apply these two points to the current matter... firstly, 'worthless.' I personally find it difficult to convince cruel scholars that 'dreams' are worthless."
For a demon god who pursues knowledge, even if he does not understand the origin of "strange dreams," this unknown, bizarre ability to bypass its barriers and enter the Chapter of the Heart is definitely valuable to him.
"Therefore, it is difficult to get Him to give up on the value level. At most, we can only make the cost of acquiring this value vague or extremely high, thereby reducing its attractiveness."
Angell nodded noncommittally, signaling Normefens to continue.
"So, the focus is on 'risk'."
It raised its head, its golden eyes staring directly at Angel: "Therefore, the potential risks of the 'truth' in the report that Liriel brought back must be very, very great, far exceeding the knowledge gains He obtained from this 'dream' itself, in the eyes of the cruel scholar."
"Moreover, this risk is one that He can actually perceive."
"As long as these conditions are met, regardless of whether we can successfully reduce the Cruel Scholars' focus on the Otherworldly Dream, we can at least make them lower their priority for it to some extent. This way, even if we still have to face it in the end, it will give us more time to prepare."
At this point, Normeffens' logic has been basically explained.
At first glance, it may seem a bit abstract, but in reality, it's just putting a "high-risk, low-return, or even no-return" shell on the "source of strange dreams".
This shell must be real enough that even a ruthless scholar can judge, based solely on their own understanding, that it is "not worth the risk."
Angell largely agrees with Nomefens's analysis, but it is difficult enough to give the "source of strange dreams" a high-risk, low-return shell, let alone make that shell real enough.
Just thinking about it gave Angell a huge headache.
……
While Angor was feeling a headache, the Decayers and Liriel were reaping a great harvest.
Just half an hour.
They found three treasure chests, immediately changing the progress of the treasure chest icons in their field of vision to "8/99".
"It's not even been half a day, and we've already harvested almost a tenth of the harvest." A look of satisfaction flashed across Liriel's face. "I thought this progress bar would be difficult, but it seems to be going well so far?"
At this rate, it should take less than a week to find everything.
The Decayer wasn't as optimistic as Liriel: "Collecting elements is definitely easier in the early stages, but I estimate it will become increasingly difficult as we progress. Especially if we've explored the entire dungeon and our progress isn't complete, then this will be quite torturous..."
Liriel thought about what the withered one said. The maze was explored, but the treasure chests were not all found. This meant that they had missed some treasure chests when they were looking for them. They would have to scan the maze from beginning to end several more times before they could find them.
In other words, when only a few treasure chests remain, or even the last one, the time spent will likely be far greater than the sum of the previous ones.
Lillie: "...Then we'll be more careful when we search later."
The withered one nodded, saying that careful investigation in the early stages was more important than searching backwards at the last minute.
For the next half hour, they did not find any new treasure chests.
However, they encountered a new wall of questions.
This time, Normefens wore a tall, jet-black hat with a scale on it. Its personality differed from its previous incarnations; it was more serious and less rude, but its condescending attitude remained.
According to it, it is an embodiment of the pursuit of fairness.
Its problems will be raised from the perspective of fairness.
The questions are not answered separately, and the questions are the same, but the perspectives are different.
For example, the first question is about a hero slaying a dragon.
Liriel is a dragon, and she watches helplessly as she is killed by the hero from the perspective of a dragon.
The withered one is naturally the hero. From the hero's perspective, it sees the evil dragon rampaging and setting fires, plunging the entire city into chaos. So the hero sets off to kill the evil dragon.
Finally, they needed to answer Normefens' question: "Should the dragon be killed? And explain your reasoning."
Normfins even allowed them to discuss it privately.
But this only complicates matters further, because from Liriel's perspective, the dragon isn't evil; it's just a newly born young dragon. Its vision differs from humans. Mountains, rivers, trees, flowers, and even the sky are all gray; the whole world is gloomy. Only when it sets fire does the light shine brightly. Thus, the dragon's fire-breathing isn't seen as destruction, but rather as its only way to create beauty and joy.
As for burning the city? It had no idea, because to it the city was just a gray, gloomy expanse, like the forest, just another kind of combustible material.
From the perspective of the hero, the withered one sees a completely different picture. The dragon's fire destroyed everything and severely damaged the hero's homeland, so it is only natural that he must be attacked.
So they discussed it with each other, but their positions ended up being opposed.
However, neither side is stupid. Although discussion may increase the difficulty of the issue, it can also make the issue clearer through debate.
In their final answer, they almost unanimously agreed: to take a dialectical view of one's position.
Normeffens didn't care about this. There was no standard answer to this question. As long as the answer was substantial and "fair" in his own opinion, then it was acceptable.
The problems that followed were basically the same.
While the underlying message appears to be about trials and fairness, the real issue is actually about stance.
After three questions, Normiffens let them pass, but did not give Lillier a chance to ask any questions.
Its reasoning was: "I am different from my other clones. I don't like to make things difficult for people, but I also won't let others make things difficult for me."
In the end, Liriel had no choice but to give up, because what it said wasn't entirely wrong.
The three questions it raises may seem complicated, but as long as you answer them and have your own stance, you can pass.
Just as it said, they were indeed not made things difficult for them.
After this, Liriel finally understood that the rules of different walls of inquiry were completely different, and that Normefens was indeed free.
In the void, Angor also witnessed the third Wall of Questions that Liriel and the others experienced.
Without a doubt, this problem was also designed by Angell.
His purpose was also very straightforward: to illustrate a concept through a few small questions. Different positions lead to different judgments and conclusions about the same thing. There is no absolute right or wrong, only differences in perspective.
In fact, Liriel did give the answer of "taking a dialectical view of positions," which is exactly what Angell wanted.
Through subtle influence, the originally solidified stance issues are gradually deconstructed.
However, after designing this problem, Angell decided to put the Wall of Questions on hold for the time being and let Normefens pose some ordinary questions instead.
Nothing is too much or too little.
If similar, clearly leading questions are asked repeatedly, no matter how cleverly they are presented, Lillie's keen senses will inevitably detect that something is amiss.
Therefore, this kind of inquiry into ideas and cognition must be approached together.
His plan was to start with a few ordinary questions, and once the waters were thoroughly muddied, he would dig up the "trigger" he had planted earlier, and have a Nomifens clone who liked to explore privacy appear to have a deeper discussion of values with Liriel.