I’m Trapped in a Cube - Chapter 266

The little small fry swam in the center of the moonlight, wrapped by light bands, like a pupa forming a cocoon.

Light points scattered into its body, and the scars on the little small fry slowly disappeared without a trace.

The light band gently stroked the little small fry’s head, then slowly drifted toward the distance.

The little small fry looked longingly at that light band. At this moment, moonlight became the most beautiful symbol in its heart.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?”

Jeff suddenly said.

“Beautiful enough to want to possess it.”

Mo Ling was stunned upon hearing this.

“What do you mean?”

“Nothing…”

Before Mo Ling could react, the little small fry turned its head and drilled toward another membrane.

“Where is the next place?”

Mo Ling thought it would be some other natural phenomenon again, but when the little small fry passed through the membrane, everything before his eyes left him confused.

Still endless darkness.

But in this darkness, there were countless white dots suspended in the void. These dots were arranged neatly, extending all the way to the infinite distance.

They were spaced in a grid pattern, with completely identical distances between each other, like soldiers in formation, except they were arranged in neat rows in three-dimensional space.

Mo Ling couldn’t guess what these white dots represented this time, it was far too abstract.

The little small fry had just arrived here and didn’t know what was in front of it either. Curiously, it circled around in the gaps between these white dots, like a troublemaker who had mixed into the ranks.

These white dots had no reaction either, quietly floating motionless.

Finally, the little small fry could no longer contain its curiosity and gently bumped into one of the white dots.

But this collision triggered massive chaos.

The white dot it collided with suddenly expanded like popcorn, instantly beginning to distort and change from its originally very stable spherical form.

It seemed this dot’s change caused structural instability, and the surrounding dots also began to vibrate rapidly.

But this wasn’t over yet. The surrounding vibrating dots also began copying the changes of the first dot, slowly expanding and distorting, beginning to take on the form of little small fry.

Soon, white dots farther away also began vibrating violently…

The dot’s shape rapidly changed, and in the blink of an eye, it actually became exactly the same as the little small fry—identical.

Before long, several more little small fry appeared around them, and they also began looking at each other in bewilderment.

The little small fry looked at this replica that was no different from itself, and the two faced each other in mutual bewilderment.

Mo Ling couldn’t make sense of what was happening and asked, “What are these white dots?”

Jeff fell silent again.

Jeff’s standard mermen language once again echoed in their ears:

“This is ‘Swarm.'”

“The swarm of fish swarm.”

“It was at this time that the mermen race truly became a race, a race that could expand infinitely. This is the ability that the authority of ‘Swarm’ granted us. This was also the first authority the mermen race obtained—you could say it’s our foundation.”

Jeff explained calmly.

“The first authority?” Mo Ling seemed to understand something.

“Correct.”

“Sun, Moon, Sea, Swarm… all of these are authorities?”

Hearing Mo Ling’s question, Jeff answered with relief, “Correct. You understand now. This is authority. The mermen race spent a very long time figuring this out.”

Hearing Jeff’s affirmative answer, Mo Ling’s mind was somewhat confused.

Everything was authority, just what kind of world was the mermen race born in?

The “Swarm” was still continuously expanding, and the little small fry couldn’t wait any longer, so it could only first lead the fish swarm to continue exploring.

With the fish swarm, the little small fry’s adventure journey became much livelier. Often the fish swarm could help it scout ahead. It was also very clever, recording the connections between various membranes and regions, slowly beginning to familiarize itself with this strange world.

Mo Ling also followed the little small fry’s perspective and saw all kinds of scenes:

A desert full of sand, empty and barren.

A void full of trees everywhere, with no soil and tree roots suspended in the air.

And some scenes that looked very abstract, seemingly without any meaning…

These scenes, without exception, all had one characteristic—

Purity, incomparable purity.

Sand was just sand, trees were just trees, without any other impurities. However, these places all had some very wonderful abilities:

Sand could create drought.

Trees could control souls.

While experiencing various scenes, the little small fry also began trying to obtain the same authorities as these scenes.

At first, it could only try to trigger those very abstract, rather bizarre scenes. Once these scenes were affected and destabilized, they would quickly collapse.

After collapsing, the little small fry would obtain the same authority as that scene.

The little small fry distributed these authorities to the fish swarm, then controlled these authorities by manipulating the fish swarm.

Next, the little small fry began trying to touch those authorities with concrete forms.

It discovered that if it couldn’t make the scene automatically collapse.

Then it would manually destroy the scene.

After destroying that forest in the void, the little small fry was surprised to discover that after distributing the trees’ authority to the fish swarm, those replicas that originally only followed orders began to have “souls.”

“Who am I?”

A replica, having just gained a soul, asked the little small fry such a question.

That was the first dot the little small fry had touched in the “Swarm,” and also its first replica. The little small fry had a deep impression of it.

“You are Zero One.”

The little small fry thought for a moment and gave it such a name.

“You are Zero Two.”

It turned its head to the second replica and said.

“From now on it’ll be like this—continue in order: Zero Three, Zero Four… I won’t need to keep thinking of names.”

The little small fry was happy with its brilliant idea.

Just like this, the little small fry tasted the sweetness of destroying scenes. It continued leading the fish swarm, conquering various scenes.

After obtaining more and more authorities, the fish swarm’s abilities also became increasingly powerful, beginning to conquer those scenes that were more difficult to destroy.

After the fish swarm gained souls, many decisions no longer needed the little small fry to make personally. It only needed to hand authorities to the replicas below and let these replicas expand freely, then it could reap the benefits.

Those replicas were very obedient. They wouldn’t resist the little small fry’s commands—this seemed to be the function of “Swarm” as well.

Fish swarm, fish swarm—”Fish” was always before “Swarm.”

During this process, the replicas also became increasingly intelligent.

Among them, Zero One was very satisfying to the little small fry. Zero One was very smart, very good at utilizing the authorities in its hands, even playing with authorities in creative ways, and its management of other replicas was also very competent.

So the little small fry gave it more authorities, and it didn’t disappoint expectations, leading the fish swarm to conquer more scenes.

“Is that you, Jeff?” Mo Ling looked at that replica Zero One swimming back and forth, bustling about, and couldn’t help asking.

“Mm.”

Jeff responded softly.