Dimensional Hotel-Chapter 569: Scenery Beyond the City

A black luxury car drove out from the underground parking lot of the Special Service Bureau and quickly took off on the "shortcut" leading to the nearest Exotic Realm entrance.

The gray-white cement tunnel kept receding outside the car window, surrounded by monotonous repeated guiding lights and a faint "exotic sense." At this time, the shortcut was quiet, save for the occasional Special Service Bureau patrol robots swiftly gliding along the tunnel walls, with hardly any other moving objects on the road.

Yu Sheng sat in the passenger seat, while Hu Li and Luna were seated in the back. Erin was crawling back and forth between the two rows of seats, unable to stay still for a moment.

This fellow was clearly still excited.

The spring-loaded maid named "Maris" drove while glancing at Erin, who was hanging herself on the passenger seat headrest, through the rearview mirror, with a faint smile on her face: "Miss Erin seems very happy."

"Of course, this fellow has been waiting for this day for ages, always mumbling about her 1.67-meter height," Yu Sheng sighed with a smile, "I’ve tried making her several bodies, but they all ended up unsuccessful. Hopefully, this ’original’ won’t have any issues."

"The mistress is ready; we found the blueprint for an old era doll body in the Garden Network, and the nano print pool can restore that body according to the blueprint—no matter how many pieces it’s shattered," Maris softly spoke, her gaze suddenly landing on Yu Sheng, with micro-lights shimmering in her beautiful artificial eyes, "Salute to you, Mr. Yu Sheng, you not only solved another Angel crisis but also found a lost Alice Puppet. The mistress says this achievement is enough for you to become a friend of all Alice Puppets."

Yu Sheng nodded with a smile, and at that moment, he caught sight of the "shortcut" exit from the corner of his eye.

The Exotic Realm tunnel abruptly ended at a gate flashing with micro-light. The car exited the tunnel, starting to pass through the outer edge district of Boundary City. Yu Sheng glanced back to see the tunnel exit was merely an arch-shaped stain on the exterior wall of an old-style villa—while the roadside buildings appeared to have a sort of antique, dead silence reminiscent of a bygone era.

A seemingly deserted old-style villa, vacant abandoned apartments, a construction site undergoing demolition work, dim streetlights illuminating the chilly night, and an almost empty, quiet road; occasionally, some figures appeared nearby, seemingly agents from the Special Service Bureau.

It felt like a zone abandoned by time, frozen on the edge of people’s memory.

"This is my first time coming so close to the city border..." Yu Sheng widened his eyes, looking at the scenery outside the window, with a tone of reverence, "So this is what the outer areas of Boundary City look like..."

"It’s said that Boundary City’s ’Edge City District’ isn’t for people to live in, but is left for those ’invisible entities,’" Maris mentioned casually, "Some are ’spiritual bodies’ wandering in the suburbs, others are ’exotic substances’ generated during the city’s operation, and even some low-risk entities in tacit agreement with the Special Service Bureau—because the Edge City District’s nature is almost like the Exotic Realm, those entities hide in these seemingly abandoned buildings."

Maris paused, continuing in a tone resembling that of a tour guide: "Beyond the human vision, these abandoned houses are brightly lit and bustling, with a small ’Alien Species Society’ hidden in this circular abandoned neighborhood, monitored by the Special Service Bureau, living in peace with the human world."

Yu Sheng looked somewhat surprised at the spring-loaded maid driving: "...You’re quite knowledgeable, aren’t you guys from elsewhere?"

Maris: "The tourist handbook says."

Yu Sheng: "...Tourist handbook?"

"Yes," Maris nodded, "For visitors from ’outside,’ the Boundary Land is a well-known tourist destination in the universe."

Yu Sheng scratched his head: "Okay, I’ve heard Baili Qing mention something about this."

As he said this, he glanced out the window again, frowning in confusion: "But I can’t see any supernatural stuff... Personally, I think my ’eyesight’ is quite good."

Just as he finished speaking, Maris said: "Because most of the contents of the handbook are actually deceiving outsiders."

Yu Sheng: "..."

"How could the Council really open an area with paranormal anomalies as a tourism project—several private travel agencies set a few old houses, arrange some scenes, and lighting at most. Visitors can use their imagination, since they’ve never seen the real Exotic Realm," Maris mentioned casually, "There are indeed the kind of ’Alien Gathering Points’ I mentioned in the abandoned neighborhood, but they are tightly sealed by the Special Service Bureau and you absolutely can’t drive through directly. Some can’t even be seen with the naked eye."

Yu Sheng blinked his eyes, not having the chance to speak before Erin, hanging on the seat back, chimed in: "...Hey, aren’t you guys from elsewhere!?"

"We are outsiders, you know. We do this in our own place too. Alice’s Cottage even runs a horror puppet house. The largest theme park takes up an entire planet, and every year people get tricked, scared out of their wits by sisters pretending to be out-of-control mechanical servants and cursed puppets..."

Yu Sheng was completely shocked: "You can do that?!"

Maris nodded: "Yes, among the Alice Puppets and us servo robots, ’scaring ignorant outsiders’ is the most popular stress relief project."

Listening to this mechanical girl’s tale, Yu Sheng couldn’t help but marvel at how rich the seemingly mysterious extracurricular lives of those Alice Puppets were in the eyes of outsiders—then he noticed Erin beside him, eyes shining brightly, evidently entranced by the story...

Meanwhile, in the midst of conversation, Maris had already driven past the last "urban area" at the edge of Boundary City. After passing through what seemed like an ordinary barrier, Yu Sheng noticed the scenery and atmosphere around him changing instantly.

For a moment, he felt as if he had passed through an invisible "wall."

Beyond the wall was the so-called "suburbs"—an endless expanse of wilderness extending into the night, bathed in starlight refracting from some unknown dimension. The terrain undulated, with some tall, unknown trees visible in the distance, and looking in any direction, the ground at the horizon seemed to "tilt," even looking as if it "rolled up" near the horizon.

An old, wide highway cut through the desolate area, extending to the edge of view. Street lights lined the way, though some sections seemed to have issues, with shadows interfering with the light and certain stretches falling into complete darkness, giving off an ink-stained appearance.

On the road, Yu Sheng saw a checkpoint set up by the Special Service Bureau—a towering, advanced lookout distinctly different from Boundary City’s "contemporary urban style." The silver-gray tower was surrounded by heavy railguns and undecipherable complex antenna or radar arrays. In the night, the heavy energy shield glimmered with a hazy glow, with armored combat robots guarding the road, and hovering Spiritual Ability Users watching over the unstable spacetime structures off the main path.

He also saw some Gathering Points.

The "suburbs" were unexpectedly inhabited. These Gathering Points looked like villages of various sizes, the largest resembling a town, the smallest no more than low walls glowing with shield light, housing a few families within.

Maris mentioned that these were "Outer Settlement Points" set up by the Special Service Bureau or the Council, established to monitor the periphery of Boundary Land and gather certain special resources, though she wasn’t clear on the details.

Yu Sheng suddenly realized that although he had lived in Boundary Land for a long time, he knew very little about this mysterious "Cosmic Hub"—despite having traveled to the remote depths of the stars, to the Feiyu Star Domain, and even to the Lost Space-Time at the end of the World Bridge, it was the first time he had left that massive "Boundary City," from the carefully protected, artificially constructed "landscape sandbox" by the Council and the Special Service Bureau, to this barren, primitive "suburb."

Even though this "suburb" was right under his nose.

"It’s desolate outside," the little puppet crawled to the front seat, stepping on Yu Sheng’s arm, her face nearly pressed against the car window, "Wow... There’s lightning too!"

"We’re heading that way," Maris said as she steered the car onto a small road towards the flashing light area, "that’s the ’Spacetime Jump Point’ leading to the border. Through specific coordinates on the Jump Point, we can reach the Floating Island where the Alice Embassy is directly—hold on tight, it will be a bit bumpy."

As the mechanical girl spoke, Yu Sheng suddenly felt a jolt beneath him—the car clearly still on a smooth road, yet it felt as if it started shaking!

Gravity was becoming unstable; the seemingly smooth road didn’t seem continuous, and the scenery outside the window began appearing in a disjointed, strange state. Some appearances didn’t seem to belong to normal spacetime, flickering outside the window occasionally.

Erin started chirping excitedly.

However, Maris seemed unfazed by the bumps and noisy commotion at their side, her eyes reflecting a mechanical calm as she focused on precisely controlling the vehicle, flooring the accelerator towards a hazy, bubble-like light screen at the road’s end.

Yu Sheng heard a "buzz" beside his ear, and when the scenery outside the window stabilized again, a grand, luxurious manor exuding a mysterious aura appeared in his view.

The manor stood on a large Floating Island, surrounded by smaller, fragmented islands streaming like auroras between countless broken Floating Islands. Occasionally, distant starlight directly shone through spacetime rifts, illuminating the sky.

A vast, lush garden surrounded the manor, where many faceless, low-level puppets were busily working.

The vehicle stopped at the manor entrance, and as Yu Sheng and the others got out, they saw the Alice envoy named "Marin" standing at the door, smiling.