Chapter 45: Interrogation

After fleeing into this confined area, Adam had thought that given how cunning the clown anomaly was, it wouldn't have followed him into the apartment, but to his surprise, that was exactly what it did.

In this situation, its bloodlust outweighed its guile, and all it wanted was to have Adam killed.

With hundreds of illusory clones crammed into the same room, all of the clones began to overlap, making it far easier to identify them as illusions.

Even so, it was still quite difficult to determine which one was the clown's true body in such an overcrowded room.

Furthermore, due to how cramped the room was, the cackling from the clowns had become even more deafening.

Adam focused his attention on his senses of smell and touch, combining his telegnosis with his five senses. In addition to that, the confined nature of the room was also a factor that he could use to his benefit, and he was able to roughly ascertain the clown's location.

In the next instant, the clown pulled the trigger on its revolver.

A flash of muzzle fire erupted, and Adam immediately dodged while pouncing toward his opponent. He was far faster than the clown, and in this small room, he was able to arrive beside the clown in an instant.

He failed to strike the clown with his first attack, but he certainly hadn't missed by much.

As he was pouncing through the air, his wounds were aggravated by the passing breeze, and under the stimulation of pain, his sense of touch became extremely acute.

As a result, he was instantly able to determine his enemy's exact location, and he immediately swept his claws in that direction, tearing off large chunks of skin and flesh from the clown's body.

The clown let loose an agonized howl, and having finally tracked down his target, Adam wasn't about to let this opportunity slip away. He followed the clown's scent and attacked over and over again while rushing through the sea of cackling illusory clones.

His ferocious storm of attacks tore away large sections of the clown's body, inflicting severe wounds upon it.

However, the bad news was that he was unable to capture his opponent, and after withstanding a flurry of attacks, the clown anomaly was able to escape.

In contrast with the previous occasion, the clown really was fleeing this time. As Adam rushed out of the apartment, he saw the clown's clones fleeing through the streets and alleys, and all of them were rushing away in different directions.

Adam wanted to give chase, but he had no idea where to start.

In the open space outside, his senses of smell and touch weren't as potent.

Thus, all he could do was randomly give chase in a few directions to try his luck, but in the end, he could only watch as his severely wounded opponent escaped from right under his nose.

……

A short while later, Adam trudged back to Hook with wounds all over his body. The clown had gone into hiding, but with Hook's tracking abilities, they were able to find it after several hours and a great deal of toil.

However, the clown didn't even engage Adam in battle on this occasion. Instead, it conjured up a bunch of clones once again and fled for its life.

"This is not the way to go," Hook said with a dismayed shake of his head. "We've already been in here too long, and we've accumulated too much psychological fatigue. You, in particular, need rest."

"I know." In the face of failure, Adam didn't throw a tantrum, nor did he allow his ego to get the better of him. Instead, he nodded in response and candidly admitted his failure. "My telegnosis is too weak, so I don't have what it takes to counteract an illusion conjurer. Let's think of a plan after we get out of here."

In the instant that Adam left Chloe's psychic world, all of the physical pain that he was suffering from immediately faded, but he had a splitting headache, and his mind was extremely murky. A wave of overwhelming drowsiness washed over him, and all he wanted to do was lay down on the ground and sleep.

For the first time, he experienced the consequences of extreme psychic energy overexertion.

He forcibly suppressed the discomfort as he looked out at the sky, which had already turned slightly dark, then turned to Karen and Chloe as he said, "Don't worry, I'll think of a way to resolve the problem. That emotional anomaly isn't particularly powerful. As long as we find a way to counteract its abilities..."

Adam's voice trailed off here as he was feeling a little woozy, and only after a few seconds of stupor did he continue, "As long as we find a way to counteract its abilities, we should be able to get rid of it."

"It's alright, you've already tried your best. I've done some research on the internet, so I know that this type of treatment often ends up being unsuccessful on the first try, and several attempts are often required." Karen was quite reasonable and level-headed, and she had witnessed everything that had taken place in Chloe's psychic world. "You need to rest to recover your psychic energy. You can sleep in my room if you want."

"Alright."

Adam didn't turn down the offer. At this point, he was already feeling extremely uncomfortable.

He followed Karen to her room, and inside, he saw a great number of sex toys. Even the bed was made from cutting-edge technology in the form of the latest pushback vibration material.

However, he was too tired to care about any of that, and he laid down onto the heavily scented bed, and without even a second of delay, he closed his eyes and fell asleep.

In the guest hall, Hook was feeling just fine. He hadn't participated in the battle, nor had he sustained any harm to his psychic body, so he was still feeling quite lively.

In fact, he was in the process of discussing potential strategies with Kim Hee-cho.

"Is there any way to eradicate that clown anomaly?"

"If we can find an adapter with extremely potent telegnosis, we'd be able to take care of it easily, but our funds are limited, so we can't afford to hire an expert in the field. Even if we get Nie Yiyi involved, it won't change anything. She's even more of a force in battle than Adam, but that's not going to help us. If the clown anomaly can't beat us, then it'll just run away."

Hook was a bit of a coward and didn't want to get involved in battles, but he was still quite responsible when it came to other areas. He turned on his wristband computer as he spoke and began to search for some useful information.

There had to have been other adapters who had encountered similar situations, so all he had to do was examine how they had overcome this problem.

……

Adam slept like a log for a very long time.

Only after sleeping a full 19 hours did he slowly wake up due to hunger and thirst.

As he caught sight of the electronic clock on the wall, he was shocked at how long he had slept for.

Looks like I really overdid it back there.

He got up from the bed that was laden with "toys", and after opening the door, he was greeted by the sight of Karen and Hook.

"You're awake! Let me get you some food."

Karen clearly wasn't a good cook, so when she was referring to food, it was only ready-made store-bought food like milk and pastries.

Thankfully, Adam wasn't a picky eater, and he turned to Hook as he ate.

"You didn't leave yesterday?"

"I did, but I came back in the morning. You slept for almost 24 hours, and many things have happened during that time."

"Like what?"

"Well, for example, we've already found a solution to the problem, but we'll need the pawn shop's help," Hook replied as he pulled up a webpage detailing a past case.

This was a case from seven to eight years ago, and the circumstances involved were rather similar to the ones Adam was dealing with here.

At the time, the solution that the adapter had thought of was to find the criminal before tying him up, then interrogated the perpetrator for a forced confession in front of the victim, forcing him to reveal everything.

"The perpetrator was a fraudster who had hurt many women in the past..."

"Hold on." Adam felt like something wasn't quite right. "That man deceived women through fraudulent means, but according to what we saw in the psychic world, that wasn't what happened to Chloe."

In the psychic world, she had been assaulted.

Hook had taken far more lessons at the academy than Adam, but he didn't want to explain the situation in front of other people. However, he left Adam with a hint: "In contrast with one's memories, the attributes of their anomalies are far more reliable reference points."

"I see." Adam nodded in response. Perhaps the assault scene hadn't actually taken place in real life. Perhaps Chloe had been lured away, but her sense of shame and her excessive pride had convinced her into believing a false memory.

However, that wasn't important.

"The main problem here is that interrogation is illegal," Adam said with a shake of his head. "I don't think this is feasible for us."