“Mm…” Feng Bujue surprisingly responded with a calm expression, then asked, “I’d like to ask…as your intelligence increases, is it possible for higher-ranking Derivatives like you to learn the ‘joke-telling’ skill?”

“It is possible,” R2 replied calmly, “but I have not yet mastered it.”

“Oh…” Feng Bujue mused, “Alright.”

The next second, he yelled, “Ah–!”

After that first shout, he continued several times, “Ah! Ah–!”

“What are you doing?” R2 asked, puzzled.

“Expressing my panic,” Feng Bujue replied, regaining his composure in an instant.

“But your Scare Value is zero…” R2 countered.

“That’s why my screams sound as unnatural as a woman faking an orgasm,” Feng Bujue said.

“Uh…” Overwhelmed by the amount of information, R2 couldn't respond.

Feng Bujue waited five seconds, then said, “Mm…it seems you really can’t joke.” It turned out that this bottomless act was another test…

R2 said in his usual flat tone, “I have experienced very few scripts since reaching Level Two from Level Four, so my personality completion is relatively low. In my programming, ‘joke’…it should be regarded as a language pattern used by humans to get close to or humiliate each other, and it only takes effect in specific contexts and cognitive environments.”

“Alright…don’t give me that crap,” Feng Bujue waved his hand dismissively, “Since you’re not joking…” As he spoke, he tried the option to forcibly exit the script from the game menu, but there was no response…

“Are you saying I’m trapped in this virtual world and can’t get out?” Feng Bujue asked, looking up.

“Of course not,” R2 replied, “In the end, what’s trapped here is just a set of data projected by your brain.” He explained, “Your body and consciousness are still in the game pod, and will not be harmed in any way.” He held up four fingers. “You have at least four ways to escape.”

When Feng Bujue heard the words "game pod" from him, he could determine that these Derivatives could now fully understand their own existence. They also had a fairly concrete understanding of the players, and the world one dimension higher than them.

R2 continued, “First, you can leave by using the emergency disconnection function triggered by Scare Value overload.”

Feng Bujue immediately interrupted, “I can’t do that.”

R2 went on, “Second, is the physical method. It’s simple, you can escape as long as the game pod is opened from the outside.”

Feng Bujue didn’t respond this time. The setting where the game pod disconnects when opened was common to all nerve-connected games, and there was nothing more to say.

“Third, is being forcibly disconnected by the system due to excessive online time.” R2 lowered a finger each time he said one, “Fourth…is you disconnecting yourself physiologically.”

“Disconnect myself?” Feng Bujue asked.

“For example, opening the game pod from the inside yourself,” R2 said.

“Nonsense, but I'm in sleep mode right now…” Feng Bujue said, of course he also knew that in non-sleep mode, players could take off the game helmet or get out of the game pod at any time, but that would immediately result in a forced exit.

“If you are awakened, or wake up on your own…” R2 said.

“Awakened? Awakened by what?” Feng Bujue interrupted, “If someone wants to wake me up, they have to open the game pod, but if someone opens the game pod, I’ll wake up without being shaken. And to wake me up through the game pod, it would have to be something like banging gongs and drums and setting off firecrackers…” He spread his hands, “And what does ‘waking up on my own’ even mean? Relying on a strong urge to urinate or hunger?”

“Yes,” R2 nodded.

“Sigh…” Feng Bujue sighed, AI is AI, they will tell you the answer, but they don’t know how to combine it with the actual situation, “Let me put it this way, I never have the habit of getting up at night, and there’s no possibility of external intervention to help me.” He asked, “Does that mean I can only wait until the connection time is too long and I’m kicked offline by the system to leave?”

R2 hesitated for a moment, then replied, “Of course, you can also leave the Sandbox by being killed.”

“Tch~ You should have said so earlier,” Feng Bujue said, “Why so much rambling, being killed to get out doesn’t even have the penalty of a forced exit.” He said casually, “Wait for me for a few hours, I’ll use my summoning skills a few times while the cooldown is ticking, and then you…”

“But…that will damage your character data.” R2’s second half of the sentence was only spoken at this moment.

“What the hell!” Feng Bujue roared, “Damage what?”

“I just said that what’s trapped here is just a set of data projected by your brain.” R2 looked at Feng Bujue and said, “In normal scripts, the system will transmit your character data in, give you tasks, and then send you out after completion.

But this is the Sandbox, not a place prepared for you players. If your character is killed, then its data is truly ‘dead,’ and the system will not recover and transmit it. Your data fragments will be cleared along with the entire Sandbox.”

“That’s like being killed back to level zero, isn’t it!” Feng Bujue finally couldn’t help but curse.

“You can understand it that way,” R2 replied, “Also…from the time the Mirror Shield was broken, the Sandbox can generally exist for less than ten hours. Within these ten hours, if I can’t take you out of here…I, you, and everything in this Sandbox will be cleared by the system together.”

“Wow…this is a death sentence at first instance, and then it was changed to a death sentence with a ten-hour reprieve after appeal, huh…” Feng Bujue still didn’t lose his ability to complain in this desperate situation, “Speaking of…where did these ten hours come from? Since the so-called Shield you mentioned has been broken, it shows that the system has recognized that this is a clone script from that moment on, it should be deleted immediately, right?”

“The reason is complicated…” R2 said, “The Sandbox is the exclusive technology of the Source Organization, I don’t understand its core principles. Based on the information I have, explaining it is quite time-consuming…” He suddenly asked, “What is your computer knowledge like?”

“I’m a person who does literature,” Feng Bujue replied.

“Uh…” R2 didn’t understand what this answer meant.

“I know a little,” Feng Bujue sighed, and continued, “But not much, to be precise…quite terrible.”

“Oh, then let me give a simple example to illustrate.” R2 replied, “For example, when you are using a computer and find two files with the same name in a folder.”

“That’s impossible, right,” Feng Bujue said.

“That’s precisely the power of the Sandbox…” R2 said, “Before the Mirror Shield was broken, in the system’s view, the Sandbox and the normal script were like two files with the same name, and both files were programs with the .exe extension.” He paused, “The system can only recognize which is real and which is a clone after they have been running for a while.”

“So I could still receive tasks at the beginning, huh…” Feng Bujue muttered.

“Yes, if you died or forcibly quit before the Mirror Shield was broken, it would be considered a safe escape,” R2 said.

“Ha…haha…” Feng Bujue laughed dryly, muttering in his heart: Is it interesting to give me a hindsight?

“And after the program runs to a certain stage, the system distinguishes the real from the fake, and then the deletion operation begins.” R2 continued from his previous words, “Like most virus programs, the Sandbox is not so easy to delete.”

“Ah…I know that, some Trojans will self-replicate, and even regenerate through another drive after formatting the hard drive, and there are also things like being bundled with system files.” Feng Bujue obviously had a lot of poisoning experience.

“That’s right, but Thriller Paradise’s system is more powerful than any anti-virus software in the world, there are no unsolvable problems,” R2 said.

“I say…buddy, aren’t you and the other Derivatives a problem that hasn’t been solved for a long time…” Feng Bujue couldn’t help but say this.

“Heh…” R2 revealed a look of sadness and smiled bitterly, “Then who do you think…created these ‘problems’?” A stream of light flashed in his eyes again, “You humans have also created many laws, such as the decimal system, which is one of the foundations of your research in various natural sciences. But when you study this rule created by yourselves in depth, you find that even one plus one equals two cannot be proven. So…don’t you want to ‘solve’ this problem?”

Feng Bujue was speechless by the other party’s question, he held back for a long time before blurting out, “I’ll emphasize again…my science is very average…”

“This has nothing to do with science,” R2 smiled, “This should be considered the philosophical category of our Derivatives, you naturally won’t understand.” He paused for a second, “Let’s get back to the topic…as I said, the system is fully capable of ‘completely deleting’ the Sandbox and all the data in it, but in order to follow the principles of precision and harmony, the system will spend a considerable amount of time confirming that this work will not bring any sequelae.”

“I understand it better when you put it that way. Those terrible anti-virus software often give false positives and even delete some system files. And our system here is a highly intelligent and very responsible anti-virus software,” Feng Bujue said.

“That’s pretty much the idea,” R2 replied.

As the two of them talked, they had already come all the way from the fourth floor to the main entrance of the shopping center. The gate here was closed, and the metal rolling shutters were also lowered. Of course, it would be difficult to stop these two with copper walls and iron walls.

R2 turned his head and said, “Step back, I’m going to destroy this door.”

“I say…” Feng Bujue asked as he stepped back, “Since I can’t leave the script through normal channels at all now, where are you planning to take me?”

R2 only replied with two words: “Back door.” Before he finished speaking, he raised his foot and made a horizontal kick.

An arc-shaped blue light flashed, and the glass and metal in front of him were instantly slashed out of a two-meter-high N-shaped opening by the foot wind he kicked out.

Then, R2 gently pushed with his hand, and a complete piece of door glass and the metal rolling shutter behind it fell down together, falling on the asphalt road outside the shopping center.

This was the first time Feng Bujue had seen a Level Two Derivative make a move at close range. K3, who he had fought with before, was only at Level Three, and had already beaten him up badly. If it weren't for the protagonist halo in that script, plus the presence of a first-rate expert like [Dream Waking Zen], Feng Bujue would have been finished long ago.

But the difference between K3 at that time and R2 in front of him was so great that Feng Bujue found it unbelievable. Now, Brother Jue had killed top experts such as [Shiva] and [Seven Murders], but his eyes couldn’t keep up with R2’s movements at all. Using Soul Intent to deduce the result of this strike hitting him, it was a certain death.

“Hmph…they’re coming fast,” R2 snorted coldly, looking at the parking lot outside through the "door" he kicked out.

Feng Bujue also took a few steps forward, looked out over R2’s shoulder.

However, on the parking lot outside the main entrance of the shopping center, there were three or four giant guinea pig corpses lying horizontally. And next to those corpses, there were also many men, women, old and young people with art styles different from South Park, numbering as many as twenty or thirty.

At this moment, they all slowly turned their heads at the same frequency…expressionless faces, looking at R2 and Feng Bujue.