Foolish Game of the Chapter 1417: Foreseeing the Future?

'The Universe has no answer...'

Indeed. From Cheng Shi's perspective, the Universe simply didn't have one.

After all he had endured, after all the truths he had uncovered, after all the conjectures he had spun... if the Cheng Shi before inheriting the Pact's Proxy had still wavered over his final hypothesis, now he could all but confirm he had seen through to the very essence of the cosmos.

Not just the essence of the slice universe — but the essence of the Real Universe as well.

Yet none of this he dared share with anyone, because he never forgot what Ti had told him: "Faith is born of trust."

He was afraid that once the hypothesis beca public, he would lose the foundation of others' trust.

That was why he hadn't even dared to look at Wei Mu before — lest a single glance betray sothing. But now, knowing Wei Mu was Folly's Authority, that ant the little puppet of the old gods would not accompany them into the next era — if a next era existed.

And so, today, Cheng Shi had finally found soone who could "see" the world clearly, soone he could actually speak to.

The secret he had bottled up for so long finally had a place to be poured out.

Before long, brilliant constellations rose in the surrounding Void. The Pact's Proxy exerted his power, caging this patch of starry sky so that the Universe could hear nothing spoken here.

Then he exhaled a long, long breath. His shoulders dropped as if an infinite burden had slid off. He lowered his head and said, half laughing at himself:

"In the beginning, I just wanted to find a sliver of possibility for this world.

That was right after the False Curtain Call. I told you about all that — you should rember."

Wei Mu of course rembered. Not only did he rember, but after recovering his true "self," he had also retrieved countless details from that False Curtain Call.

It turned out that Deceit had deduced Wei Mu's identity at that very mont — and, through that mory, conveyed to Wei Mu that in the ga of searching for Folly's Authority, He had not lost.

But that wasn't the crux. The crux was that Wei Mu now recalled the pair of eyes that had flickered for an instant at the very end of that Change!

And that was precisely why he'd said Deceit had handed in the best exam paper His ability allowed.

But at this mont, Wei Mu said nothing. He simply watched Cheng Shi's eyes in silence.

He knew the Lord Yu Xi, who was dragging the world forward, was under too much pressure. He needed to talk. He needed to vent. Besides himself, perhaps no one in the entire Universe was suited for the role.

To put it coldly and practically, only a fellow traveler who was destined to fall with the old era — and whose bond with Fixed Destiny wasn't overly intimate — could fill this position.

Death, Silence, and the other pillars of the Fear Faction were not appropriate listeners for Fixed Destiny's grievances. Nor would Cheng Shi burden those who silently supported him with his own turmoil.

So an absolutely neutral, absolutely calm, absolutely rational puppet who "knew everything" about Folly beca the ideal confidant.

Wei Mu was undeniably wise. He understood that in this confession, he could only listen — not comnt — because he had accepted his identity as Folly's Authority and must therefore avoid contaminating Fixed Destiny with his own will.

And so, Folly once again walked toward Silence.

"I felt hopelessly lost about the road ahead. Nobody knew what Deceit was doing. He never told . Ti didn't have the ti to deal with

either.

The uncertainty of the future made moving forward unbearable. Left with no other option, I could only figure things out on my own. And that was when a thought took root:

Conduct an experint — an experint to foresee the future!

And the inspiration actually ca from you."

Cheng Shi lifted his head, expression complex. He seed to be looking at Wei Mu — yet his slightly hollow gaze appeared to pass straight through the puppet and into the infinite depths of Void.

"Rember the experint you left for Aph Ros in Dolgod — the one simulating the Stars Dagger?

Using a ti knot as a foundation to stretch the length of ti within the experint, crossing ti in that way to asure truth.

It struck

deeply. So I wanted to construct a similar experint, except the content wouldn't be that little Far Dusk Town where only two deities played tug-of-war. It would be...

A real world where sixteen gods looked down from on high, bestowing a Faith Ga upon mortals!

That's right. I wanted to transplant everything before

into an experint. Simulate the crisis I was facing. Let the

inside the experint exhaust every possibility I didn't have ti to pursue.

I'd even worked out the experintal plan:

The Ritual of Truth was still in my hands. Given enough raw materials, I could use it to reconstruct the current world — and I had already obtained 'enough' materials.

mory had been succeeded by the Dragon King. I would simply have him extract my mories and anchor them as the world's backdrop. Then the Cheng Shi inside the experint would face the sa crisis I did.

After that, I'd only need to have my friends play the roles of the gods who still existed. They were close enough to Them — so had already beco Them — so they could portray Them convincingly, giving the experintal

vague, uncertain guidance.

That would be sufficient, because the guidance I'd received was never clear in the first place.

Then I could stand outside the Experint Ground, stretch ti as far as possible, and observe — over and over — how another

searched for his future.

I know that for the Cheng Shi inside the experint, this is cruel. But I had no other way.

I had no ti. The world had no ti.

I would reconstruct that world countless tis, awakening him again and again after each failure. His struggle would be my struggle. His defiance would be my defiance.

I wanted to foresee the so-called future in this way..."

By now, Cheng Shi's voice had gone hoarse. The smile had faded entirely from Wei Mu's face.

Cheng Shi stumbled backward a few steps, and the self-deprecating grin on his face stretched wider and wider.

He laughed and wept at the sa ti:

"Funny, isn't it? This experint to foresee the future hasn't even started yet — and yet I feel like I've already seen the future.

When I returned from the Real Universe for the third ti, when Deceit hurled

into that terrifying spaceti storm, when I watched that pitiless Creator obliterate yet another world — I kept asking myself: who would be so callous toward the living beings inside an experint? Why was He so desperate to spawn world after world after world...?

Countless questions hounded . Countless doubts dragged at . Lost and bewildered, I could only exhaust every faculty I had trying to understand.

And in that instant, I suddenly thought of myself.

In that future-foreseeing experint I was about to launch, my treatnt of the Cheng Shi inside the experint... was just as heartless. Just as desperate.

In that mont, an enormous terror swallowed

whole."

...