Planning Ahead

Alex III has concluded a few things so far. 

First, in that dream world, he only connects to another person; he isn't really controlling the person.

Be it Rand or Rob, their actions were independent, and Alex III could not control them in any way.

He only sees and feels what they do and cannot influence anything.

It's as if two worlds are connected, and he witnesses the other world as the person he is linked to. 

Second, if that person dies, the empty feeling comes; to get rid of it, he must kill a person; only when he kills someone would the empty feeling disappear.

He is unsure of some things, like why the interval got so short.

It was once a day at first, but now, it's once every hour.

Why Rob took over the link with Rand when he killed him?

Why does the void feeling come, and why does the feeling disappear when he kills someone?

He has some theories.

As it is, it seems everyone must be linked to another person in the other world, so when their link dies, they must kill someone and take over the other person's link.

But that alone is not enough.

Alex III's link, Rand, died in the hands of Rob.

So, his link was taken over by Rob.

With Rob taking over, Alex III should not have needed to kill another person; after all, Rob was his new link.

Then why did he feel empty chasing him even though Rob was already his link? Why did he have to kill a death row prisoner?

It seems the void comes when the link dies, regardless of whether one has another link.

So, every time a link dies, one must kill another to make the empty feeling disappear.

And, when one kills another, they would create another person with the empty feeling on the other side, who would, in turn, kill another on that side, which would cause another person on this side to get the empty feeling.

It all seems like a domino specifically created to make them all kill each other.

Alex III felt upset by not knowing the answers.

He could reluctantly sigh and put these on the back of his mind.

These could only be left for later.

Now, there are more immediate problems. 

As long as people on both sides are alive, it's okay. 

Sure, dreaming every hour is annoying, but not fatal.

But when one side dies, the void feeling turns even the most loyal soldiers into killers. 

Alex III looked at the ministers cautiously.

"Did any of your doppelgangers on the Five Star's side die?" asked Alex III. 

He named the dream world 'Five Star' and the links they are connected to 'Doppelgangers.' 

The ministers looked at each other; nobody looked suspicious. 

Alex said thoughtfully, "This is what I found out so far; listen carefully!" and started explaining. 

Alex III couldn't do everything himself, so he had to share his findings with the ministers. 

After he finished, some ministers looked nervous, while some remained expressionless.

"That means anyone, even our guards, might suddenly become a murderous killer?" someone asked. 

"Exactly! That's why we should gather the most loyal guards near ourselves; if any doppelgangers on the Five Star side die, we will let them kill a prisoner to fix the void-chasing problem. You must live in the palace after this; we have to concentrate our guards here; the most important thing is to keep the capital, and in the capital, this palace is, of course, the most important building."

He continued, "The next is to keep the top ten cities! Give this critical information to the regional governors; we must not lose control of any city. Also, give this information to the generals of the first, second, and fourth armies as well. I want my army to be ready." 

The Alex kingdom has seventeen armies, with the first four always being respectively on four sides of the capital city.

The first army is in the south, the second in the north, the third in the west, and the fourth in the east of the capital.

Each army has 10,000 soldiers, with most of the elite usually placed on the first four armies.

Alex Kingdom also has a navy, but it's small and not worth mentioning.

The third army is away on a mission, so Alex III could only give up on them.

Then, after an eerie silence, Alex III continued, saying ruthlessly, "In case there is no death row prisoner left, use other prisoners; if we ran out of prisoners, convict people falsely and use them; if too much conviction arouses suspicions, catch the poor and homeless that nobody misses, and use them!" 

Then, he said the last part, "If it wasn't enough, go and catch people from far away villages, and use them!" he said with cold, emotionless eyes.

The ministers heard it, but nobody protested this plainly evil act.

First, nobody ever dares to oppose Alex III, even if they vehemently disagree.

But, this time, all agreed with Alex III.

Right now, this is the most logical course of action. 

It's cruel, it's evil, but not doing it risks the destruction of the entire kingdom. 

They must keep themselves safe, and to do it, they need loyal guards. To have loyal guards, they must find a way to help them if the guard's doppelgangers on Five Star's side die.

Only then would the guards would remain loyal.

As the leaders of Alex's kingdom, their death would be much worse than the death of any beggar or homeless person; at least, this is how they convince themselves.

"Next," continued Alex III. "Write down your identity on Five Star's side! Call the guards too, and let them spell their identity," said Alex III. 

Knowing the identity on the Five Star's side would be very advantageous. 

His servant, Sebastian IV, is the president there! 

Even if he can't directly control the president, there are still many uses Alex III can think of by having the ability to talk to such a high-ranking person.

The president of Five Star is the head of state, while the prime minister is the head of government. 

But, for historical reasons, the president controls the police and intelligence agencies, while the prime minister holds the military.

The president and prime minister must always be from opposing parties. 

There have been many military coups in the history of Five Star, and this division of power is a way to prevent that from ever happening again. 

Alex III already has plans to negotiate with the president.

It wouldn't be bad if one of the guards had a minister or a military general as their doppelganger.

The ministers bowed and agreed. 

Soon, all came forward and wrote their identity and details about how to find them.

It was shared only with Alex III.

"This meeting is done," Alex looked at the clock. It's almost one hour now.

...

Rob locked himself in the home. 

"Interesting!" he reviewed the memory of Alex III just now, especially those names. 

He took out his phone. 

It was a flip phone with a black and white screen, the most advanced phone in the market; he paid a lot for it. 

Many don't have phones capable of the internet. 

But he does!

He checked it and sighed! No internet! 

The wireless internet is still very unreliable.

Then, he took his laptop and connected it to the landline internet. 

Most don't have landline internet, but Rob is relatively wealthy and single; he also was a gamer and wanted low ping, so he bought high-speed fiber. 

He tried, and fortunately, it worked; maybe the chaos hasn't reached the servers; after all, servers are pretty well protected.

He searched the names from the list. 

Fortunately, as intervals of the dream world got shorter, he started remembering the dreams in great detail; he remembered the names in full.

He searched everywhere: on a search engine named Worldwide Search(WWS), on social media, etc. Soon, he found half of the names. 

"Interesting!" He found only half, so either the other half lied, or they didn't have any social media or presence on the internet. 

Rob thinks it's most likely the latter; after all, it's unlikely that they dare to lie to Alex III.

He opened a bag of chips and started eating; after all, he was hungry. 

After looking at the internet for some time, he started crying! 

The burden of killing someone was not apparent at first, but now, he started feeling guilty. 

But soon, he wiped the tear! 

He can be upset as much as he wants later; now, he's got to plan a way to survive! 

Then, he thought of something. 

He could remember everything from Alex III's perspective but couldn't remember what he thought.

Alex III also probably doesn't know what he is thinking now.

To communicate with him, he has to speak aloud.

"Let's talk!" he said.

He started speaking loudly, "Hello, Alex III! I'm you in this world! Well, I guess you already know! I Just want to say hi. I would appreciate it if you tell me your plans. Please speak aloud so that I can remember," he said. 

"As for what my plans are... for now, just sitting here and waiting for the government to take back control," he said doubtfully.

It was clear he didn't have any plans.

Then, Rob looked at the clock while sighing. 

It's time! 

...

Alex III was sitting on his throne. 

"Plans?" he thought. 

Then, he spoke loudly, "First, you are to stay where you are! Do not risk! Second, use the' laptop' to gather as much news as possible. Third, find all important people's names from that device, like names of billionaires, ministers, police chiefs, military generals, intelligence people, etc. Fourth, stop thinking about useless things like killing Rand! In this world, or rather, even in your Five Star world, regret will only make one weaker; it never has any use to regret anything," said Alex III.

Alex III thought of a few more pieces of advice and started spewing his distorted worldview.

"In the world, only one thing matters: oneself! Nothing else has any value! So, do everything that helps you survive, including killing others!"

"I am your lucky card! With me here, you don't need to worry about this side. You only have to keep yourself safe and not die. Things will get better sooner or later; either this dream-shifting nonsense ends, or people get used to it."

He continued, "Let me tell you! Nobody is innocent! Not even children; nothing is innocent. So stop with this 'innocent life' nonsense!" 

Alex III started liking lecturing people about his 'wisdom'.

He continued, "More life advice from me, King Alex III! Never care about what other people say! You restrict yourself for no reason for people who don't even know you and may be happy with your failure!"

Alex III smiled and felt strangely satisfied.

"Maybe I should teach at Alex University? I never knew I had teaching talent!" he started admiring his incredible talent for teaching the young.

Alex III University is the most prominent university in the country.

Alex cleared his throat and continued, "If this dream ends, all will be happy, but if it continues, the society on the Five Star country's side cannot continue as it did until today; according to my prediction, soon, in less than three months, looters will loot all resources from supermarkets and start to eye houses of affluent people like you. At that time, you must kill them all without hesitation." Alex III had his considerations.

Rob is the doppelganger linked to Alex III; who knows if there are methods that can take advantage of him? 

Therefore, he prefers Rob to die rather than to risk him joining any group.

If Rob joins others, with his young mind and weak willpower, he might leak the secret of having Alex III as his doppelganger; then, those people could use Rob to take advantage of him.

His advice to Rob to kill all 'looters' is to make him lonely and reduce the risk of him joining large groups.