Upon hearing Baili Qing's account, Yu Sheng knew that the failure of the operation years ago was destined — they had made a colossal mistake, egregiously so.

However, this misjudgment was nearly unavoidable.

The eerie properties of "Fairy Tales" are beyond the imagination of those who encounter them for the first time. Its slow and weak onset, along with targeting only children, are extremely deceptive. More importantly, it possesses a unique "structure" of "Entity-Subset." The true core of "Fairy Tales" hides behind the dream stages it weaves, and the Special Service Bureau decades ago...could not have known this.

Yu Sheng flipped through the file, eyes slowly scanning the operation records code-named "Adults," and at the beginning of the document, there was an addition of information that detailed the emergence and early impact events of "Fairy Tales" from the Exotic Realm, most of which were consistent with what Little Red Riding Hood had shared with him at the orphanage.

The initial outbreak of "Fairy Tales" occurred inside an orphanage called Nuanyang Orphanage, affiliated under a public charity unit of the Council. About half a month before the initial outbreak, there had been several incidents in the orphanage where children wandered about or fainted during the day after waking from nightmares. At night, night patrol staff reported hearing strange sounds resembling wolf howls, wind, or soldier formations marching from within the residential area.

According to the records, these incidents did not go unnoticed by the officials—in fact, the day after the night patrols reported anomalies, a Special Service Bureau investigation team entered the orphanage for a detailed inquiry, accompanied by an Exotic Doctor who conducted physical examinations on the children who experienced nightmares and fainting fits. It can be said that, from a "standard procedure," both the Special Service Bureau and the Council had performed commendably without significant oversight.

However, these investigations failed to identify any traces of the existence of "Fairy Tales"—perhaps due to insufficient technological means or because "Fairy Tales" was still very weak and in an early stage of lurking, so much so that not even the Exotic Doctor, adept with extraordinary skills, could find any clues in those children's nightmares.

Shortly after this initial investigation concluded, "Fairy Tales" finally began to "slightly" show its fangs in the real world.

A wildly growing rose bush took the orphanage's residential area as its center and filled the whole campus overnight—the rose bushes receded at dawn, and one girl along with two night security guards have been missing ever since.

"We later confirmed that the first out-of-control story was 'Sleeping Beauty,' but initially, the Special Service Bureau's judgment of this incident was merely an 'outbreak' phenomenon from some unknown alternate realm, believing that alternate realm to be parasitic inside that orphanage," Baili Qing's voice sounded beside him, "The Council organized the evacuation of all personnel in that orphanage and temporarily sheltered the children in other facilities, and afterward, a squad of elite investigators from the Special Service Bureau entered the orphanage and performed an incredibly thorough search...

"As expected, they found no clues related to the alternate realm in the orphanage, and just when the investigation was at a standstill, the second outbreak occurred—a child who had been temporarily relocated transformed into an uncontrollable gigantic wolf during a sudden fainting episode.

"Fortunately, considering the contamination the children had possibly undergone during their transfer, the new 'containment facility' had a higher security level. The uncontrollable gigantic wolf was quickly subdued, and although we ultimately failed to save that child, the damage didn't spread further. Also, because of the timely intervention, we finally caught some clues about 'Fairy Tales'... We confirmed the existence of the 'Black Forest,' which was the first 'Subset' to be identified and named."

As she spoke, the female director pointed towards the files in front of Yu Sheng.

"Only after this was the 'Adults' operation launched."

Yu Sheng continued browsing the subsequent information in the file without looking up: "Did you initially think the 'Black Forest' encompassed the entirety of this 'unknown alternate realm'?"

"Yes, at that time, we hadn't confirmed the existence of other 'Subsets,'" Baili Qing nodded, "Understanding the 'structure' of Fairy Tales came much later."

Yu Sheng hummed softly, continuing to read on.

He saw that the Special Service Bureau had technically determined the "intervention portal" for the Black Forest and had conducted a "deep dive." The core of the whole so-called "Adults" operation was this deep dive.

Upon seeing the words "deep dive" mentioned in the documents, the first person Yu Sheng thought of was Xu Jiali— that robust man was an experienced deep diver. From previous discussions with him and Li Lin, Yu Sheng understood that "deep divers" were a type of Special Service Bureau Officer even more powerful, versatile, and elite than normal officers. They not only specialized in executing extreme missions in various dangerous zones but were also equipped with special gear and technical means to enter battlefields unimaginable to ordinary people and combat entities beyond reason and common sense.

"This mentioned 'deep dive'... what exactly is the process?" Yu Sheng asked, curious.

"You can think of it as a controlled and directed technology that 'descends' toward a specific alternate dimension," Baili Qing did not obfuscate, seemingly because this was not confidential information, "By injecting inducers and performing neural signal overlay, we can artificially pull the consciousness of the operatives to the edge of the rational world, and then with_bespoke equipment,_FRAMEBUFFER_SUBMIT_TRAC these 'hypnotized' personnel can be sent into the alternate realm and awakened on the other side. This technology does not always work, but it is effective against most alternate dimensions."

Beside, Erin muttered: "…sounds awfully complicated, and rather dangerous."

"Yes, it's troublesome and dangerous," Baili Qing nodded, his gaze falling on Yu Sheng, "Especially when compared to your 'door', but the advantage is that its process is controllable, reproducible, and can be promoted for use by more people— to combat that vast number of Exotic Realms and entities, we need an equally vast number of personnel."

Yu Sheng didn't say anything, just continued to turn to the next page.

However, what first caught his eye was a long list.

Upon seeing the list, his expression subtly changed.

He heard Baili Qing's voice, still calm, yet carrying an inexplicable heaviness and seriousness:

"In the operation codenamed 'Adults', a total of twelve deep divers, thirteen Special Service Bureau Officers, and seven logistical and support personnel were killed or went missing. Additionally, four children died on the spot due to loss of control in the Exotic Realm, and six peripheral monitoring personnel were impacted, gradually descending into madness and eventually dying prematurely over the years."

This time, even the usually jovial Erin stopped chuckling; the little doll was stunned, her gaze complex as she looked at the document, remaining silent for a long time.

Yu Sheng, with a serious expression, continued to flip through, skipping over content that was either too technical or already known to him, his eyes scanning line after line of operational records—

The deep divers had conducted three "submerges"; the first attempt failed, the inducer causing the personnel involved to fall into a period of unconsciousness, but in the muddled "Consciousness Frontier", they only found a chaotic Barrier and were unable to enter any part of the Exotic Realm.

During the second attempt, some personnel briefly entered a space described as "spacious, dimly lit, entwined with a large amount of bizarre, net-like structures," and heard "crying-like noise" filling the space — it seemed not to be any subset of Fairy Tales.

During the third attempt, there was a large-scale casualty.

The Deep Diving Team Members who entered the "Alternate Dimension" almost all lost their way instantly, with only two surviving and returning, but they too lived only for a few dozen minutes before rapidly weakening to death from unknown causes. Subsequently, a contamination outbreak occurred, an unknown "something" entered the real world, and it began killing all the adults on-site rapidly.

At a critical moment, the safety procedures were effective, facilities were promptly shut down, and the contamination was contained within the lab, but the cost was those Special Service Bureau Officers and other staff who couldn't evacuate—including four children.

Yu Sheng's brows furrowed slightly as he read the observational records of the second submerge and the loss of control during the third, feeling that something was amiss.

He soon realized where this sense of inconsistency stemmed from.

"...Did they enter the 'Black Forest'?"

He looked up, locking eyes with Baili Qing, and then added, "I've been to the Black Forest. There are indeed dangerous things there, wolves, shadows, and some deadly rules, but from my personal feeling, as long as one is careful, at least for a short period, it shouldn't be fatal— even if adults face targeted malice there, it shouldn't be as mentioned in the report..."

He shook his head, not continuing further.

—Those professionally trained deep divers, with rich combat experience, should not have been wiped out so quickly even after entering the 'Fairy Tales'.

Because the Black Forest doesn't have a 'mechanism' of instantly engulfing invaders, nor is it a space filled with 'crying-like noise' described as 'spacious, dimly lit, entwined with a large amount of bizarre, net-like structures'.

"That's right, this is the crux of the problem," faced with Yu Sheng's query, Baili Qing indeed nodded slightly, "According to the direct observational data left at the time, the place they entered… was actually not the Black Forest."

Yu Sheng's eyes widened: "Then where?!"

"It might be a 'Subset' that only opens to adults, or possibly a 'Void Area' between Subsets, even possibly could be the deeper 'Fairy Tales' entity itself. The possibilities are too many," sighed Baili Qing softly, "You can look at the two records attached afterwards; they were respectively recalled by an external monitoring personnel afterward, and recorded by a sacrificed staff member just before their demise."

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