Chapter 107: A Successful Wish and a Failure

"Old man, you’re trying to harm me again."

Chen Qing chuckled softly, flicking the sticky note aside. He looked at the coffee machine in front of him, struggling to pull himself up to eye level with it.

There were only three buttons on the machine. Beside them, a smaller note provided instructions: "Request," "Dispense," "Hot Water." That was all.

According to the instructions, once he inserted the currency, he just needed to hold the "Request" button and state his demand to the machine. The machine would then determine whether the request could be fulfilled. Theoretically, the coffee machine could satisfy any request in the world; the only problem was that most drinkers lacked the constitution to survive the requests they made.

"Become a billionaire." After drinking, the person turned into a solid gold ingot of equal weight.

"Cure my cancer." The person transformed into a jellyfish that would never develop cancer.

"Become a god." The wisher became a god—only in that place, and only for a moment too brief for time to record. The duration of his godhood was shorter than the smallest unit of time.

Later on, someone made this wish: "I want a cup of Miss Marisa." That day, the wisher watched as a cup of bright red coffee appeared before him. After the coffee machine sputtered and jammed for three to five minutes, an eyeball shot out, slamming into the crimson liquid and splashing it everywhere. That was a cup of Miss Marisa, distilled from her most essential parts.

Chen Qing stared at the coffee machine, lost in thought for a long time, before using water droplets to list a series of questions on the ground. At the end of every question, there was always one inquiry written: *What is the cost?*

He looked at this question, then back at the tempting visions listed above, and fell into a rare, prolonged silence.

Opportunity comes accompanied by danger, but when the danger far exceeds one’s ability to bear it, it is no longer an opportunity—it is a trap. He sighed softly and wiped away the first two wishes. Underneath the water streaks he had erased, he had once written: *The knowledge of a god.*

And: *A world where I am a god.*

He stared at these, then moved his gaze to the third line: "Restore my memory to the maximum extent within my capacity to endure."

He looked at this line, furrowed his brows in deep thought for a long time, and finally lifted his head. This was his first wish, the wish he had been striving toward for so long. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath to steady his emotions, and suppressed any anticipation of joy or disappointment, setting his expectations to a threshold of extreme highs and lows.

Then, he inserted three pieces of chocolate from his pocket and pressed the "Request" button.

"I want a cup of coffee that will restore my memories to the maximum extent within my capacity to endure."

He released the button. The red indicator light began to flicker. It grew more rapid and frantic, but no matter how it flashed, there was no sign of it turning green.

"Huh?" Chen Qing stared at the red light, stunned.

"Huh!" He stared at the light, dumbfounded.

How could this be? It was impossible! Was he so far gone that he couldn't even bear the weight of a single lost memory? Or did he have absolutely no memories left at all?

As he pondered, his gaze became increasingly confused. "It’s impossible... it shouldn't be possible..."

He shifted his gaze to the side, to the fourth item he had listed earlier. He didn't believe his phrasing was at fault; he had to test it, even if the price was three E-500s. He had to know if the machine was broken.

He closed his eyes and simplified the fourth entry: "Maximize the effectiveness of my traits within my maximum capacity to endure." He modified it to: "Within the drinker’s capacity to endure, enhance trait effectiveness, alleviate negative side effects, and mitigate the Backrooms' suppression of these traits."

After thinking it over and ensuring there were no flaws, he stood back before the coffee machine. The fragrance was within reach, but he didn't know if he would actually get to drink it.

He paused for a moment, inserted the currency, pressed the button, and as the red light flared, he recited the words from the ground.

"Within the drinker’s capacity to endure, enhance the user's trait effectiveness, alleviate negative side effects, and mitigate the Backrooms' suppression of these traits."

The moment he finished, the red light on the machine began to flash wildly. Unlike the previous rapid, erratic blinking, this time the light gradually slowed down. Before he could turn his head, a crisp chime drew his focus back to the machine. As he shoved the paper cup under the nozzle and pressed the pale green "Dispense" button, the sound of liquid flowing filled the air.

The brownish coffee steamed like poison, a faint bitterness dissipating with the wisps of smoke. He looked at the cup, took out an E-500 from his pocket, and downed the drink in one gulp.

At that moment, the seventy-degree coffee was scorching. As it flowed down his throat, the sensation wasn't one of pain; instead, a faint chill, like the sting of peppermint, spread through his mouth. He felt that stimulus diffuse, filling his oral cavity before quietly fading away.

The moment all the sensations in his mouth vanished and he opened his eyes to look at the world, everything suddenly slowed down.

Everything.

He raised his hand, moving it slowly toward his forehead. He reached out and touched it; a pupil stood upright there. He was stunned, bewildered, and in the very next instant, he felt the world return to its normal state.

He touched his forehead again, but the vertical pupil had completely closed; there was no trace of an eye having grown there at all.

Chen Qing didn't test it further. He knew the effect had perfectly realized his request. But then, his brows knit even tighter.

"It’s not my problem... it’s not the machine's problem..." He looked at the device, his expression darkening with worry. "Then, is there something wrong with my memories?"

He looked at everything around him, a sense of unreality surging in his heart. "If even a fragment of memory is too much for me to bear..." he whispered, "yet I can look into the past through artifacts that carry it... Is it that the artifacts are special, or is it because the memories I 're-see' aren't being acquired directly?"

He fell silent, unable to spend his remaining chocolate on this wish.