Chapter 287 It’s Not the Right Time yet, and It Won’t Be Long

"Huh?"

Ellie's nose twitched slightly, her eyes turned from excitement to wisdom, and finally her brows knitted together——

"It's done! It's my food!"

She held the spatula high and ran back to the kitchen.

"..."

"Don't worry! Mikael, it's just a little bit mushy. There are other dishes. You can go sit on the sofa for a while. When I finish everything, we can eat together."

Mikael shook his head. Just smelling the smell made him not have much confidence in tonight's meal.

But after all, it’s Aili’s cooking, so no matter how unpalatable it is, you can’t refuse it, right?

There is an indescribable feeling of fatigue under the whole body, no, to be precise, it is a feeling of weakness.

This feeling left him with no motivation to even speak. He just wanted to collapse on the sofa and sit there for a few hours.

"Um?"

There is a pink backpack on the sofa. Just by looking at the color, it is not difficult to guess who it belongs to.

Mikael turned sideways and listened to the noisy noises in the kitchen. After all, he couldn't suppress his curiosity. He gently sat down next to the backpack, and then took advantage of the moment when the spatula collided with the iron pot to pull the zipper.

"Wow——"

"This is……"

Mikael blushed, zipped up the zipper silently, and then headed towards the kitchen, shouting in a medium voice:

"Ellie, why did you bring... a change of clothes?"

"Huh? What? I can't hear what you said?"

"never mind……"

Mikael thought of Kosmo inexplicably. Sometimes, it is better to remain silent.

"..."

Yes, this apartment is somewhat different from the one owned by Kevin and Mei. The biggest difference lies in the number of people living there.

Just like in previous years, Mikael did not live with Ellie. If it is placed on someone else, this situation is mostly because the man is begging for it but the woman is not willing.

But among the two of them, the one who was unwilling was Mikael.

Naturally, other people could not understand the occurrence of this situation. For example, Pado defended "Sister Ai Li" several times openly or secretly.

But Ellie herself knew the real reason very well, so she never put pressure on Mikael in this regard.

The so-called reason is naturally not the ridiculous self-blame of the past, but as far as "ridiculous" is concerned, it seems that there is no change.

On the one hand, for him, the meaning of [Alicia] has gone beyond the definition of "lover" itself. Of course he loves her, but it is no longer the equal love between normal lovers. But when it comes to the fanaticism of a believer, there is also a lot more peace and closeness.

In other words, even if two people really live under the same roof, most likely nothing will happen.

On the other hand, it’s because of choice.

A person's life is a trajectory spun by countless choices. And before the final doom descends...

Ha...he himself once said this to Ellie:

"I am a person who doesn't like others being nice to me."

Because from his perspective, every time he accepts a piece of "beauty" from others, it means that he is burdened with something more besides her.

After all, beauty is indeed the driving force that can make people move forward, but the driving force itself is also heavy.

And if this beauty is given by the original beauty itself...

Ellie should have felt it too. Although he had never mentioned a punctuation mark to her, she could still feel that Mikael had formulated and was executing a plan that was hidden from her and everyone.

At the end of this plan, he may face a dilemma.

And every good thing about others, every good thing Alicia gave him, will be placed on the tray of the scale and become the criterion for his final decision.

Therefore, rejecting Aili at this point was naturally not his original intention, but a sacrifice he had to make.

But what about Ellie herself?

Mikael didn't know that in the kitchen a dozen steps away, Alicia was gently pushing the spatula, but she was thinking about the same thing.

Just as Mikael had her own plan, she also had a choice she thought she had to make, and it was also a dilemma.

She was also afraid if she got close to Mikael. She was afraid that every bit of attachment between being close to Mikael would shift the balance in her heart towards the option she didn't want.

So for a long time, she acquiesced in this close yet distant relationship.

but……

She finally came here, because compared to "making a choice she didn't want," she was more afraid of the regret of not being together until the end.

No matter what, she hoped, she longed for this love to be complete until the end.

Or rather...

If we must separate in the end, let yourself and Mikael leave some unforgettable and unprecedented sweet memories.

Although, although!

If it is true that [Return to the End], even the personality may not be preserved, and the so-called [memory] will naturally become something worthless and meaningless.

She also knew that once she really did this, the sweetness in these memories would be "meaningless" not only to her. In fact, for Mikael, it will become even more unbearable pain.

But people are all selfish...

She didn't want to be alone in her last moments.

She also thought, if possible...please let me die in the arms of the person I love the most, even though that would become his nightmare for life and a burden he could not get rid of, but just be willful once, just be willful this time!

Perhaps, Mikael would think so too, right? Compared to the hesitation when facing a choice, he is actually more afraid of not being able to enjoy the sweet regret before the end, right?

It's just that he has always been a taciturn person, no matter how much he thinks in his heart, he rarely puts it into words, right?

The blurring of vision only lasted for a moment, and Ellie hurriedly wiped her tears with the back of her hand, and then opened the salt jar beside her, without even looking at it, she poured two tablespoons of salt into the tomato scrambled eggs.

How many times will there be such opportunities in the future? A few times? A dozen times? Dozens of times? Hundreds of times? Or, just this once?

She didn't know when the twelfth Herrscher would appear, let alone when the end would come, and she believed that Mikael didn't know either.

But she also felt that Mikael and herself, whether as Herrschers or as more special beings in a certain sense, should be able to feel that they have little time left to make a choice.

Adjusting the fire, covering the lid, and collecting the sauce, the technique is so skillful that if Mikael saw it, he would be surprised, right?

However, not everything in this world is like cooking. Except for a very small number of people, as long as they keep repeating, they can definitely make dishes that are not bad.

Or, for Ellie, for most people, cooking is something that can be done.

And for a very small number of people like Mei, cooking is something that cannot be done.

Things that cannot be done will not be done just because you want to do them, nor will they be done because of repeated doing, and even less because of the words "I can do it".

But this is the world. What people can do is often not what they really want to do, and what people really want to do, they can't do anyway.

Ellie thought so, and used a tissue to carefully wipe away every teardrop on the edge of her eye sockets and eyelashes, then quietly blew her nose, patted her cheeks, and then hummed the tune of Eden. After putting the two dishes on the plate, she put on a smile and brought them to the table.

"The dishes are cooked, come and try them!"

Mikael pulled the corner of his mouth and sat down at the table silently.

Ellie handed over the tableware enthusiastically and said with some expectation:

"The stewed beef is indeed a bit mushy, but the tomato scrambled eggs should be fine, try it!"

Mikael blinked, he wanted to ask "Have you tasted it yourself", but he felt that it was not a good idea to say so.

So, he squinted his eyes, with an unyielding determination, first picked up a large piece of charred beef and stuffed it into his mouth, chewing it gently.

To be honest, it wasn't as bad as I imagined, especially the cooking time. After being a little burnt, it was just right for Mikael's taste. Although it wasn't crispy on the outside and tender on the inside, it wasn't old either.

It was just that the taste was particularly bland for some reason, as if there was no salt or any seasoning.

He glanced at the black pepper sauce on the tip of the chopsticks. Hmm... there was no need to add salt after adding so much black pepper sauce.

But Mikael sucked on the chopsticks, and the black pepper sauce also had no taste. There was only a warm but sticky feeling that gradually spread in his mouth.

It was really strange. If there was no salt, it would make sense, but how could the black pepper sauce be tasteless?

Mikael swallowed the beef with great effort, and then raised his head. He wanted to ask Ellie what she had done to completely remove the salty and fresh taste of the black pepper sauce, but facing her expectant and nervous eyes, Mikael decided to try the next dish together.

This time he learned to be smart, and only scooped up half a spoonful of scrambled eggs with tomatoes and put it into his mouth. After chewing briefly, he gently covered his mouth with one hand, and his Adam's apple rolled up to the top. After a while, it gradually fell back, which meant that the food in his mouth was more or less swallowed.

"Ailishia, how much salt did you put in these two dishes?"

"Huh?"

Aili tilted her head and thought about it, and suddenly held her cheeks hard:

"Oh no, the beef is okay, but I seem to, maybe, possibly... put twice as much salt in the scrambled eggs with tomatoes!"

She scooped a large spoonful into her mouth in front of Mikael, and her facial features were instantly tangled together. After swallowing it with difficulty, she breathed a sigh of relief:

"Huh... It's a close call, at least it's not so salty that it tastes bitter. So, I'll put more water in the pot... Uh, no, it will become tomato and egg soup..."

"Pour more rice."

Mikael said with a smile.

"Uh... OK!"

Ellie walked back to the kitchen with a red face, leaving Mikael alone to stare at the two dishes.

"Did you put twice as much salt?"

Mikael looked at the fiery red color and couldn't help but stuff another spoonful into his mouth.

But as expected, he still couldn't taste anything, only the slippery tomatoes, sticky soup, boiling eggs, and the tomato skin that he forgot to remove stirring in his mouth.

"... Hum..."

Following a long and heavy snort, there was confusion.

"Why is this happening? It shouldn't be..."

It really shouldn't be. There may be many reasons for losing the sense of taste. For ordinary humans, it may be a disorder of the nerves or some other disease. For the Herrscher, the memory buried in the brain is not that he has "seen" similar situations.

But Mikael carefully observed his hands, the backs of his hands, his palms, and his arms. He even opened his collar, lowered his head and looked at his chest and abdomen, and then rolled up his trouser legs to take a look...

No matter how hard he searched, he couldn't find a trace of purple.

Perhaps this idea was wrong from the beginning. Kiana was like this because her body could not withstand the erosion of Honkai energy caused by the four cores in her unfeathered state.

But these two problems do not exist for Mikael.

He has experienced feathering, twice.

He only has one core, and the rest of his structure is just to project the Herrscher core into other dimensions to reproduce the corresponding power. Although the Honkai energy endured by his body is unprecedentedly huge, the total amount It's not superimposed, and he never felt "too much".

But it all happened in the end, in some way that was beyond Mikael's control.

He sniffed. His sense of smell didn't seem to be a big problem, and he could still smell the aroma of some food, but his sense of taste was undoubtedly lost.

Why is this?

Alicia's humming sound kept coming from the crack in the kitchen door, and she seemed to spend an extraordinarily long time serving the rice.

Just when Mikael felt like this, he suddenly burst into laughter. Or maybe it wasn't that Ally took a long time, but that his consciousness was completely disconnected from the outside world when he was thinking. Maybe at this moment, Ally had just finished washing. I took out the bowl and turned on the rice cooker, but the second hand only traveled a dozen seconds on the dial.

"Don't think too much about it."

Mikael was so relieved.

Just because you don’t think too much about it doesn’t mean that this phenomenon is normal and can be ignored. No matter which angle you look at it, it should be exactly the opposite.

But since it’s impossible to come up with an answer to this kind of question no matter how hard you think about it, what’s there to think about? It would be better to drop by Mebius for a physical examination tomorrow.

"Or, this may just be an illusion caused by the recent fatigue of using the brain... Oh, no, no!"

The more I emphasize the words "Don't think about it" in my mind, the more my consciousness goes in the opposite direction and becomes irrevocably trapped in the whirlpool.

"Why?"

He slowly typed these three words in his mind.

"Is it because I am a Herrscher, and Herrschers are essentially different from humans, so there will be physiological rejection. It is not obvious at the beginning, but will it intensify as time goes by? No, I'm afraid not. , Alicia is also a Herrscher. As the original Herrscher, she has experienced it longer than me. The same is true for the two Walters. I have never heard of them losing their sense of taste. "

The essence of the elimination method is to select characteristics that may lead to this result. If the corresponding characteristics have appeared in other individuals but did not cause the same result, then they can be eliminated.

And the option left to the end, no matter how outrageous, must be the correct answer.

So there are only two possibilities left. One, it may be the impact of his constant body changes. The restructured body is a "new" body after all, and it is normal for rejection reactions to occur.

From a certain point of view, especially the correlation of time, this possibility is extremely high. The loss of taste is a symptom that has just appeared. To be precise, it is a symptom that appears five days after changing the body. It can be easily detected. The correlation between the two.

but……

Mikael suddenly unearthed a passage from his memory. The memory related to this passage had never appeared before. It was as if someone had arranged to bring this passage to him when he fell into the doubts he now had. in front of:

"When it comes to writing an essay, after reviewing the topic, the first inspiration, or theme, that pops into your mind must be eliminated."

Because the initial inspiration is often superficial and the conclusions reached without deep thought, as long as you calm down and re-examine, you will inevitably find countless flaws - the same is true for this possibility.

Not to mention Walter Young's many body changes, didn't Otto also change his soul steel body frequently? He has so many bodies that they can fill a warehouse, but he drinks red wine and eats steaks, and there is no such rejection reaction.

As for the differential impact brought about by each person's different physiological conditions, that is a small probability event that can explain almost everything, and Mikael does not want to identify it so early.

Then there is only one possibility left... Although it is an incredible way, he has undoubtedly mastered all the powers of the Herrscher so far.

Mikael first lamented in his heart. He might not be sure in the past, but now, this fact itself is the cornerstone of his plan.

As for the current...about what the phenomenon of losing the sense of taste actually means, he can't put it into words yet, but he can feel the "weight" of the so-called truth——

That meant there was no way out for what he wanted to do. He must personally reach the deepest part of the world, and then seize the only opportunity to give everything he cares about and everything he wants. Although that means to him...

He suddenly laughed to himself.

So what?

He suddenly felt that he really liked this meaningless turn——

"I never had a retreat."

Such a thing as a way out has never existed from the moment he was born into this world.

So what did he lose?

He has nothing to lose.

"Boom!"

A loud noise came from the bottom of his heart, hitting his brain directly.

It was indeed the sound of a real heartbeat, but the sound was unusually loud. Mikael seemed to have caught a sense of...

"echo" in it.

It was as if the sound did not come from one heart, but two identical hearts from the same source that completed the same expansion and contraction at the same time.

"..."

He closed his eyes silently, and the humming of Alicia, the sound of the rice cooker closing, and her footsteps, all the "real" things almost disappeared.

He opened his eyes in the darkness, and there was neither red sand nor golden giant trees in front of him.

In the final analysis, it was just an imaginary abstract and concrete scenery that humans would not be able to understand.

There was nothing here from beginning to end, and it contained everything.

Then, as expected, he felt a familiar sense of being watched.

But this time he did not escape again, but looked back without hesitation.

"Not enough."

A voice sounded in his ears.

Mikael was not sure if it was a real sound, or if such a thing did not exist in the imaginary space.

And then more and more cold and dry things flooded into his brain--

"Not enough, not complete, not yet time..."

Sure enough, losing the sense of taste is nothing more than a reminder, or a call.

"Ugh!"

He opened his eyes again, his eyes squinted tightly because he could not adapt to the sudden light, but this stimulation also made him realize that he was back to the "real world".

The dining table was empty, Ellie sat opposite him with her head propped up, but upon closer inspection, her eyes were closed, her breathing was long and slow, and she was obviously sleeping.

The frogs outside the window croaked tirelessly, making people both annoyed and not annoyed.

All the hands on the clock came to the interval in the upper left corner, and a few hours passed in a blink of an eye...

Mikael walked into the kitchen, followed the smell and opened the lid of the pot, and then a dish of red, yellow and black collided appeared in front of him.

As expected of Ellie, in order to dilute the saltiness of one dish, she ruined another normal dish.

However, for Mikael, who has no sense of taste, it is not a dark dish.

Of course, he can choose not to eat it, but she will probably be sad tomorrow morning.

…………

"Ugh!"

The kitchen door was closed, and Mikael gently turned on the faucet, letting the water flow out in the slightest manner.

The food just went into the stomach, and it was all vomited out, and the stomach was violently resisting everything that entered.

"Is this also part of the call..."

Mikael filled the pot with water. It was too late, so he didn't rush to clean it.

He turned and walked into the dining room. Ellie still maintained the previous posture, motionless.

Mikael gently picked her up, took her to the bed in the bedroom, took off her coat and trousers, and then wrapped her up with a quilt.

The bed was very large, and Mikael didn't take off his clothes or cover himself with a quilt, but lay directly beside her.

He slowly closed his eyes, making sure that he would not think of anything in his mind - this was the most difficult thing to do when he was insomniac, but with the power of consciousness, this was no longer a problem.

However, even though his mind was blank and he did not think of anything, the lazy and heavy sleepiness did not come.

"Is this also... part?"

Everything reminded him that you are no longer a human being, you no longer have a way out, you must reach the deepest part of the world, and at the same time exist at the end of the world.

But at the same time, you are not enough, you are not complete enough, and it is not the time yet.

Mikael turned over and faced Ellie, wanting to give her a hug, but was afraid that such an action would wake her up, even though the tiny action of hugging was so insignificant compared to the previous one.

He turned over again, and the silver-white light poured in from the gap between the curtains like sand on the moon's surface, and then accumulated on the wooden floor.

Mikael simply turned over and got out of bed and gently opened the curtains.

In the sky of the underground city, there was a full moon that seemed to never change. Not to mention that it was incredibly large, even the traces of the craters on the moon were visible.

Unfortunately, there will never be more craters on it.

Because it is not the real moon.

Despite this, Mikael couldn't help but whisper to Him:

"Well, it's not the time yet, but the wait won't be too long."