Lin Li didn't know if Squidward had a habit of scaring people, otherwise why would he always let the sound come from directly behind him.
Lin Li turned his head. The coral behind him that he could rely on had disappeared. Squidward, who was wearing gray-brown clothes and an employee hat like before, stood there quietly.
His eyelids were drooped, half as much as usual, and his vertical pupils were filled with exhaustion.
"Good morning, Mr. Lin Li." Brother Squidward spoke first.
"Good morning," Lin Li nodded, and then looked at Brother Squidward with some hesitation: "Please sit down? Or should we find a comfortable place to talk?"
Squidward nodded and sat directly on the coral without mind.
But then the surrounding scene began to change, gray-black smoke filled the air, and it looked a little turbid. But when the turbidity dissipated, Lin Li found himself standing in the room.
It's Brother Squidward's studio. In the corner of the room, there is still his work called "Tidy", but it seems that because he didn't take care of it, the paint on it slipped off on its own, making the whole corner very dirty. Messy.
"Want to talk about something." Brother Squidward pushed a chair in front of Lin Li, and then asked very politely.
His gentle manner showed no sign of going crazy.
"My blood is actually red. Most human blood is red." Lin Li pointed to the wound in his diving suit. The wound had healed, but there was still a layer of blue blood spots around it. .
"That's it, I understand." Brother Squidward nodded, just a nod.
There was a silence for ten seconds. Squidward's eyelids drooped even more. After Lin Li spoke for a few minutes, he asked, "Brother Squidward, do you not hate Spongebob at all?"
In "SpongeBob SquarePants", Squidward has always disliked the image of SpongeBob SquarePants and Patrick Star, although he occasionally expressed warmth, such as the episode where he and SpongeBob rode a stone car to deliver food.
Once, he thought SpongeBob ate bomb pie, so he trained SpongeBob to do what he liked for a day.
He made Spongebob cry on April Fool's Day - it was actually SpongeBob who teased him, but Squidward actually apologized.
And at Christmas, he pretended to be Santa Claus and gave away all his stuff in order not to make Spongebob sad.
"He... is a good boy, I don't hate him." Squidward hesitated for a while, then nodded slowly.
"Then why don't you act close at all? I even think that you hate him."
"I don't deserve it." Squidward's answer was very brief.
He turned to look at the window next to him, and the reflection of the Pineapple House appeared in it. It was clean without a trace of dust, and it seemed that he could still hear SpongeBob's high-pitched laughter.
Squidward's eyelids were raised slightly, with a little warmth in his eyes, and a slight smile on the corner of his mouth.
"I can't pollute him, he just stays like this, that's fine."
"So, do you hate me?" Looking at Brother Squidward in front of him, Lin Li hesitated again, "If you hate me, why don't you just deal with me directly? You can get fun out of it with such a twisty plot. ?"
What Lin Li didn't understand was that if the world was dominated by Brother Squidward, then whatever he wanted to happen could happen. Mr. Crab, who was killed by himself with firecrackers, could have been killed the moment he went up to check. He picked up his pliers and pierced his stomach.
Lin Li originally thought that Brother Squidward enjoyed watching him be tortured and collapsed, but looking at Brother Squidward in front of him, he didn't think so.
"That's not the case, Mr. Lin Li." Brother Squidward shook his head seriously, "I don't hate you, you are the only person in the world who understands me, and I like you too, I clearly understand this.
You are willing to accept my music and understand my art. I am very happy to meet a confidant like you. "
"I didn't mean to harm you, please believe me."
Squidward lowered his head and looked at his palm. He raised his hand and showed it to Lin Li.
Dots of teeth sprouted from the suckers of the octopus's tentacles, and they were densely wrapped around each other, with little green packets bulging out around them.
If it were longer and his hands bigger, it would become what Lin Li saw in his dream on the first night.
Squidward put down his arms again, put his hands together on his legs, turned his head again, stared blankly at the pineapple house outside the window, and said softly:
"Mr. Lin Li, I'm going to die."
“I can’t hold on anymore, my head is out of control sometimes, I don’t know what I will say, I don’t know what I will do.
I'm about to turn into a lunatic. "
"No," Squidward shook his head mockingly, "I seem to have always been a madman."
"You know? Mr. Lin Li, I always thought that the Bikini Castle I lived in was completely real. I never thought that it was fake.
When 'I' gradually couldn't hold on anymore, more and more pictures and facts gradually came into my mind, telling me the cruel truth. It turned out that the world I lived in was only what I expected.
Patrick Star, Sandy, Mr. Krabs, they are all fake, Spongebob... is also fake, only you and me are real in this world. "
Squidward had a wry smile on his face. He might still be looking at the pineapple house, or he might be looking at himself reflected in the mirror, and said in a sad voice:
"No, I'm also fake. I'm a imaginary version of myself. Even my present is just what I expected. The real me has long since become ugly."
"I'm sorry that I scared you during this time. I really couldn't control it. Many times I don't know what I did, but it doesn't matter. Everything will end."
"Ahem."
Squidward coughed twice, and what came out of his mouth was dark blue, no longer as bright as blood. Following it, there was a turbid black mist that filled the air.
"Sorry, it seems that your situation has become worse because of me." Lin Li said. He remembered what Xiaowo said, because he accelerated the collapse of this world.
"Yeah, it's all your fault, hahahaha——" Brother Squidward suddenly laughed maniacally.
He raised his hand high, and the teeth inside became even sharper, as if he was about to swing it into Lin Li's face in the next second.
But after he finished laughing, he returned to his previous look, and he just hit his head with his hand in frustration: "Sorry, I couldn't control it for a moment, I was going crazy, sorry, sorry."
"It doesn't matter." Lin Li shook his head.
"You may have accelerated this process. After all, you are reminding me, 'This world is so strange.' But it actually has no impact. My ending will be like this anyway, sooner or later, it doesn't matter.
If 'I' have said anything offensive to you before, please forgive me. I didn't mean it, Mr. Lin Li. "
Squidward said softly, looking increasingly pained.
"I still remember that when I was crazy, I said I would eat you. In fact, I did so. Fortunately, you had a diving suit to protect you. Otherwise, I would be so sorry for you, Mr. Lin Li."
Lin Li lowered his head and looked at Sandy's diving suit.
"It's not this. This is also my imagination. Have you forgotten?" Brother Squidward smiled and shook his head, and Lin Li's diving suit disappeared.
"The one you're actually wearing."
Seawater poured into Lin Li's face, but Lin Li could still breathe, but that didn't matter.
He remembered.
[Unscientific diving suit: It is enough to support the host's survival needs under any water pressure for five days. It is very stable and strong, difficult to be destroyed, and makes the host lose its eating and excretion instincts while wearing it. 】
It turns out that it has been on me all along.
