Acai's Sky

Chapter 953 Fantasy Island Mental Hospital 4

Ah Cai slumped in the plastic chair in the lounge, staring blankly at the swaying chandelier on the ceiling.

These past few days she felt like she was going insane. The patients in front of her all had special skills, and their words and deeds were bizarre and strange. She felt like she had fallen into a crazy vortex, and she couldn't tell who was the mentally normal person at all.

At first, she was able to remain calm and try to find clues from everyone's words and actions.

But as time went by, she was unknowingly drawn into this absurd farce and became one of the spectators.

That afternoon, the sun lazily shone into the activity room.

Xiao Zhou, the "formula maniac," had gotten a blackboard from somewhere and was explaining his "latest theory" with saliva flying everywhere: "Everyone! I've discovered that there's a quantum connection between the steamed buns in our cafeteria and black holes in the universe! Look—" He held up a steamed bun, "When I took my first bite, it was like a quantum leap to the edge of a black hole!"

"That's nonsense!" Old Zhao, the "Martial Arts Master," leaped onto the table, mop in hand. "It's clear that I fought that fan for three hundred rounds yesterday, injecting my inner energy into it, which caused the draft today!"

Standing nearby, the "chess master," Old Zhou, didn't even look up, concentrating on fiddling with his chessboard made of bottle caps and pebbles. "Stop making too much noise! ​​My game of 'Meteoric Chess' has reached a critical juncture. One wrong move and the universe will be thrown out of balance!"

Ah Cai was laughing so hard that she suddenly caught sight of bed 302 in the corner.

She still sat quietly, the brush in her hand moving rapidly across the paper. This time, she was not painting a star map, but a panoramic view of a mental hospital.

What's strange is that all the doors and windows in the picture are twisted into vortex shapes, and the medical staff's faces are covered with octopus tentacles.

Just as Ah Cai was about to get closer to take a closer look, she heard a commotion coming from the corridor.

Several nurses were dragging the inventor, Mr. Chen, by the hand: "You can't dismantle any more microwaves! This is already the seventh one this month!"

"Let me go!" Mr. Chen struggled, holding up half a circuit board. "I'm developing a 'dimensional teleporter'! Just put a red bean paste bun in it and heat it for three minutes, and it will open the door to another world!"

"Last time you said you wanted to transform the TV into a time machine, but the signal was cut off in the entire hospital!" Nurse Xiao Wang said breathlessly.

"That's because there's not enough energy!" Mr. Chen said confidently, "This time I'm going to use the cafeteria's pressure cooker as a reactor!"

The patients watching were immediately in an uproar.

Xiao Zhou excitedly waved the paper with the formula: "I support it! This is consistent with my 'steamed bun black hole theory'!"

Old Zhao was heartbroken: "Nonsense! How can such a magical tool be used to cook mundane things!"

Ah Cai looked at the chaotic scene and couldn't help but smile bitterly. She suddenly realized that she had been so busy watching the fun these past few days that she almost forgot about the real thing.

But whenever she tried to observe carefully, she would be attracted by the patients' strange ideas and couldn't help but follow them "crazy".

As night fell, Ah Cai lay in bed tossing and turning, unable to sleep. Moonlight streamed in through the window, casting mottled shadows on the wall.

She thought of the strange painting that bed 302 had drawn during the day, and the more she thought about it, the more she felt something was wrong.

The girl always observed everything quietly, her eyes showing a clarity that was out of place here.

At this moment, a strange noise suddenly came from outside the window. Ah Cai stood up and looked over, only to see Bed 302 standing in the garden, looking up at the starry sky.

She seemed to be holding something in her hand, which shimmered faintly in the moonlight. Ah Cai hesitated for a moment, then tiptoed out of the ward.

"What are you looking at?" A Cai asked softly.

Bed 302 turned around and smiled. "I'm waiting for a sign. A sign that proves I'm not crazy."

She held up the device in her hand, an instrument assembled from batteries, wires, and parts she'd found somewhere. "Can you believe it? This thing can receive messages from the depths of the universe."

Before Acai could answer, the instrument suddenly made a "beeping" sound, and a string of strange numbers jumped on the screen.

The eyes of the person in bed 302 lit up: "Here it comes! This is it! These are the coordinates given to me by the aliens. They said they would come to take me away from this wrong world..."

Ah Cai looked at her excited expression and couldn't tell whether this was another farce or the truth hidden behind the absurdity.

Perhaps, in this mental hospital full of madness and bizarreness, the real puzzle is not to find the normal person, but to distinguish what is truly "normal".

……

When Acai stood at the gate of the mental hospital with the old lady who painted strange paintings.

[Ding, congratulations to player Tong Acai for completing the mission perfectly. You will receive 100 points, 10 experience points, 10 gold coins, and 200 temple crystal coins.]

[Ding, congratulations to the player for obtaining the [Wealth Chest]! ]

Ah Cai was instantly teleported back to her island and saw that the central guard generals had completed their tasks and collected a fragment.

Looking at the fragments in his hands, he didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Ah Er was curious about his young lady's experience. "What mission did the young lady have? Why did she come out looking so confused?"

Behind him, Qin General Bai Qi paused as he wiped the Zhuxie Sword, and the star map unfolded by Emperor Ming Emperor Zhu Di quietly rolled up its corners, and everyone's eyes were drawn to the map as if attracted by a magnet.

Ah Cai complained a lot about her seven-day stay in the mental hospital, "I feel like I'm losing my mind!"

Ah San's eyes widened. "You mean, you couldn't figure out who was the normal person at the time? How did you get through that?"

Others were also concerned about this issue and turned their eyes to Acai.

She spread her hands and said, "If you can't find it, just try them one by one. Fortunately, the tenth person figured it out. It was the old lady with the peculiar painting style..."

Qin General Wang Li: "I'll try them one by one. How could the system possibly let you get stuck?"

Ah Cai slumped down on the glazed steps, casually plucking a handful of leaves from the spiritual plants beside her. "I spent seven days in a mental hospital. Listen, the patients there could calculate the universe using calculus, fight with electric fans with brooms, and some even firmly believed that star maps drawn with ketchup could summon aliens!"

She became more and more excited as she spoke. "I feel like I'm almost assimilated. Every day I'm either watching them make jokes or going crazy with them!"

There were gasps from the crowd, and even the usually calm Qin general Bai Qi raised his eyebrows.

Ah Cai suddenly laughed out loud and took out a crumpled piece of paper from her Qiankun bag: "You really got it right."

She unfolded the paper, which was densely covered with formulas and doodles. "This was forced upon me by that 'formula madman,' Xiao Zhou. He said it was some 'deduction of world loopholes.' I thought it was a joke, but then I discovered—"

She jabbed her fingertips heavily on a certain formula. "When the absurdity value of the environment exceeds the critical point, the system's judgment logic will be disordered!"

Everyone came closer, and Emperor Ming Zhu Di pushed his gold-rimmed glasses: "You mean, the more outrageous those patients are, the closer they are to the truth?"

"That's the truth!"

Ah Cai jumped up excitedly, her skirt sweeping the petals off the steps. "That old lady's drawing of the octopus doctor might be hinting that the rules here are abnormal! I only realized later that the 'normal person' the system is looking for is not someone who conforms to conventional cognition, but..."

She paused deliberately, a cunning glint in her eyes, "Someone who can stay sober in the absurdity!"

Ah Da suddenly slapped his thigh, causing the psychic cannon to buzz. "So, from now on, the more outrageous the missions, the easier it will be to complete them?"

Ah Cai blinked and threw the fragments into the air: "Who knows? But this experience makes me understand——"

She watched the fragments draw brilliant trajectories in the air. "In this fantasy world, the most normal rule of survival is not to think with normal thinking!"

Before he finished speaking, the island suddenly shook violently, and the fragments in the hands of the other generals lit up at the same time.

Ah Cai looked at the rolling clouds in the sky, with anticipation on her lips - what kind of surprises will be hidden in the next absurd adventure?