Chapter 586
After finishing her meal, Xia'er managed to squeeze out a few minutes to help Charles transcribe the replication rituals and potions for the "Knight" levels 1 to 4. She knew that Charles was helping her for this very reason.
Then, Xia'er headed straight towards the East District.
She needed to find a place with fewer extraordinary beings... to test her first-level abilities.
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**Chapter 301: Returning to Reality**
After bidding farewell to Charles and little Aivina, Xia'er stepped out of the Russell Marquis's residence and made her way toward the East District.
Unfortunately, she had no idea why she found herself in Ansu this time... If she were in Boleun City, experimenting with her abilities would be much easier.
At least Xia'er was familiar with Boleun City, knowing what she could and couldn't touch...
Moreover, compared to Ansu, the number of extraordinary beings in Boleun City was exceedingly rare; in a small city of over two hundred thousand, there might not even be thirty extraordinary beings, both hidden and in plain sight.
As Xia'er walked along the streets, she crossed the Westminster Bridge and continued eastward.
The further she went into the East District, the dimmer the streetlights became, but the number of people gathered by the roadside increased.
It was already one-thirty in the morning, and most shops were closed. The only places still lit were bars, pharmacies, and bakeries that had just started baking bread for the early morning.
These establishments primarily served the night-shift workers from the factories in the East District, and the environment was mostly shabby, with items being extremely cheap.
Xia'er scanned her surroundings, searching for a suitable place to test her abilities.
The side effects of the "Recorder" ability were relatively minor, and in the East District, the likelihood of encountering extraordinary beings while "revisiting" memories through certain texts was almost zero.
Soon, her gaze landed on a coffee stall.
At the corner near a gas streetlamp, a dilapidated handcart was parked. The oilcloth that was originally used for rain protection was folded to the side, and a faded sign on the cart read, "Hot Coffee: One Penny."
A large iron kettle was bubbling on a charcoal stove, releasing a cloud of steam. A stout middle-aged woman, her sleeve stained with coffee, was chatting and laughing with a few workers drinking coffee at the stall.
Xia'er stood behind the workers, waiting. Her presence caught the attention of the middle-aged woman.
The workers seemed to notice Xia'er as well. Perhaps wanting to avoid any trouble, they hurriedly finished their coffee, set down their cups, and left.
The middle-aged woman took the rough ceramic cups from them, rinsed them briefly in a dirty water bucket, and then her gaze shifted elsewhere, pretending not to see Xia'er, as if she were afraid to meet her eyes directly.
"One cup of coffee," Xia'er said, then reached into her pocket.
After a moment of searching, her expression faltered slightly.
It seemed she didn’t even have a single penny in her pocket.
After thinking for a moment, Xia'er took off one of the gem-studded cufflinks from her sleeve and placed it directly on the wooden board of the cart.
Clink—
The sound of the cufflink hitting the wood made the middle-aged woman turn to look. When she heard Xia'er’s words and saw the gem, beads of cold sweat appeared on her forehead.
"Ha ha... Miss, you must be joking... This coffee isn't to your taste..." The woman fidgeted, rubbing her hands together.
"Just get me a cup of coffee, please, ma'am," Xia'er said with a smile. "Add a spoonful of sugar."
"Alright... alright, it's on me. You can take this back..." The woman nodded repeatedly, eager to send Xia'er on her way.
She took a ceramic cup from the dirty water bucket and, using a cloth stained with old coffee, tried her best to clean it. Then she poured a cup of hot coffee with a spoonful of sugar, placed it on the wooden board, and pushed it toward Xia'er.
"Thank you."
Xia'er nodded gently, reaching out to take the coffee cup.
As she looked at the coffee in the cup, she felt a strange, indescribable sensation, recalling how the woman had looked at her earlier.
Just a month and a half ago, she could easily communicate with the street vendors in Boleun City, and they wouldn’t look at her with such strange eyes.
But now, in the eyes of the impoverished, it seemed there was an insurmountable chasm between her and them. Even a lingering glance from her would evoke fear in their hearts.
To Xia'er, it felt like she had only started to pay more attention to her appearance with Aivina's help... Yet these fine clothes seemed to have become a barrier separating classes, leaving her to ponder.
Xia'er lowered her gaze, staring at the coffee cup in her hand.
The cup looked a bit worn, having been used by countless others. It bore dark cracks, and the color of the coffee had seeped deep into it.
The "Recorder" ability could directly "read" texts and objects through extraordinary means, making this ordinary item, which had been used by many but was unlikely to be connected to the extraordinary, perfect for Xia'er to experiment with her abilities.
A faint silver-gray glow flickered in Xia'er’s eyes, tinting her red pupils with silver.
In her vision, the cup before her began to twist, shatter, and reassemble rapidly.
She saw images within the coffee, where silver lines appeared on the dark surface, depicting various people holding the cup, their voices layering in her mind.
Those... were completely reversed Ansu words. Xia'er needed to carefully remember one phrase and play it forward in her mind to understand what it was—this would help avoid too many chaotic voices flooding her thoughts.
The cup in her hand was also rapidly renewing amidst the dense and swift words; the cracks disappeared, and the dark stains were removed...
In the next moment, the cup began to melt, glowing with a fiery red light, transforming into clay in Xia'er’s hands. The clay fell to the ground, scattering—images of a small ceramic workshop appeared in her mind.
Not only did the process of making the clay play in reverse before Xia'er, but the voices of the workers talking while they worked also became clear in her ears.
The reverse playback accelerated, and the buzzing in Xia'er’s mind intensified.
The clay quickly regressed in her eyes, returning from the workers' hands to a freight train, which sped backward until she saw an open-pit mine.
Workers walked backward, shoveling the clay from the handcart back into the ground...
The reverse speed increased further, and a violent buzzing echoed in Xiaer’s mind.
The original mine was buried, rivers began to flow over it, and her perspective followed the river's flow backward...
From here, Xia'er’s vision split into countless fragments—this was the scene of the original rocks being eroded into particles by flowing water, accumulating along the riverbed...
In the next moment, she sensed the impending acceleration of the reverse playback...
Before the terrifying spiritual alarm could ring in her mind, she quickly released the cup, covering her eyes and stepping back several paces.
Clatter—
The ceramic cup shattered, hot coffee spilled everywhere, and Xia'er gasped, watching the rising steam as she slowly calmed her breath...
To think she could directly rewind to the cup's most primitive state... If she continued to rewind, Xia'er had no doubt her perspective would split into countless fragments, perhaps even seeing the ancient rocks...
A simple cup could undergo such a degree of memory rewind... This was something Xia'er had never anticipated...
This was a capability that no other first-level being could possibly possess... Was it because she had merged with "uniqueness"?
Xia'er felt as if she had personally experienced the process of making the ceramic cup, even the mining process. In a sense, she had indeed learned the skill of making ceramic cups.
Even if it was just a cup, it couldn't be rewound indefinitely... Otherwise, her mind would surely not withstand it.
No wonder this ability worked better on artifacts; once a craft was rewound to its raw materials, the mental toll would increase exponentially.
Theoretically, if Xia'er’s mental strength were infinitely powerful, she could even rewind through a handful of soil back to the Holy War Era, or even the Chaos Era...
"I'm sorry... I'm sorry!"
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