Su Ming’an had circled high in the sky, yet he still hadn’t found any trace of Lv Shu.
He glanced at the barrage of ssages, which seed to be streaming exceptionally fast today.
[——So why are you all panicking, as if we’ve ever had control over our destiny? Even if today isn’t about ’all Perfect Pass holders,’ tomorrow there will be ’high-dinsional beings,’ ’Ta Wei,’ and such ssy things to dominate us. Is there a difference?]
[I think if there were a chance to make a wish, most people would wish for ’domination of the World’ or ’to beco a god to everyone,’ right? Look at Mizushima Kawa Sora, wouldn’t she wish to save her sister if she could? And then think about Edward, wouldn’t he wish to rule over everyone? And think about Bei Wang—well, never mind Bei Wang, he’d probably just go back to sleep.]
[The ’truth’ that Dion ntioned hasn’t been confird yet, so why panic?]
[Dion was killed by the Organizers, how could it not be true????]
[I think I suddenly understand the purpose of the Number One Player striving so hard for a Perfect Pass... Isn’t he hoping to resurrect his father?]
[...]
Seeing this, Su Ming’an was slightly startled.
...Right, there are also these kinds of "rebirth" wishes.
But even so, he wouldn’t make such a wish. Reviving a world versus resurrecting a person, this choice couldn’t be simpler. Even if he chose the latter, not choosing the forr would lead to a tragic ending.
He had to permanently end this ga.
Regarding Blair Dion’s death, the United Group said Dion died for [violating so rule of the ga]. This coincided with Su Ming’an’s conjecture— that the Organizers had certain inviolable[rules], capable of executing those who violated them.
Everything revolved around the word [rules], an absolute red line that must not be crossed.
Just like before when soone foolishly attacked the Boss Rabbit statue and was instantly killed by the white light sent down by the Organizers. This situation was similar to Dion’s death—only when a Player actively violated[the rules]did the Organizers have the authority to execute a Player.
Su Ming’an had speculated—The Organizers were rely an entity "utilizing" the existence of the World ga, likely not possessing overwhelming power on their own. They couldn’t instantly kill everyone; they could only, like Ta Wei, rely on indirect ans (like the World ga) to achieve their goal of plundering civilizations.
The standards of the World ga might be beyond the Organizers. The Organizers were rely "maintainers," "hosts," or "judges," while the World ga was their tool for plundering civilizations.
The World ga, the Organizers, the Players; there might be so kind of balance of power among these three. Once one side erged victorious, the situation could turn upside down.
At this thought, he paused slightly.
Wait a second.
He stopped his wheelchair outside the office building in the Core Area, lost in thought.
—Wasn’t this precisely the situation in the Ninth World?
The Dawn System, Ta Wei, Acto; there was also a balance among these three. And the relationships even sowhat matched up.
He felt a pang of panic—the situation of the Ninth World correspondingly mirrored reality. Could it be that the ga itself was hinting at sothing?
Because those who created these instances should be the World ga itself, not the Organizers. Otherwise, the Organizers could simply create an instance where everyone perished, and everything would end.
So... it was very likely that the World ga itself was hinting at sothing.
If he could witness the outco of this Ninth World, if he could understand this balance and the essence of Ta Wei— he might even discover a new path to prematurely end the ga.
He was pondering when suddenly, he heard soone calling him.
"Doctor, Doctor... why are you sitting here?" a middle-aged man in a white lab coat hurried over.
"What’s the matter?" Su Ming’an looked up.
"Mrs. Locati is severely ill. She wishes to see you for the last ti," the middle-aged man said.
Su Ming’an’s thoughts revolved, not recognizing who Mrs. Locati was, as no such na existed in his three tilines.
"I don’t have ti..." he said.
He turned away but heard the puzzled man say, "—Aren’t you going to see Mrs. la Locati?"
He abruptly turned back:
"Who did you say?"
"Mrs. la Locati," the middle-aged man replied.
"Yeah, locate!" he called out to his AI, rushing toward the hospital’s location.
He recalled the information he had just obtained from AI Yeah.
...
[On March 20th, 72 years after the catastrophe, at 2:43 am, a "Peace Bomb" being tested in the Central City laboratory was accidentally detonated due to an operational error. The explosion swept through the entire laboratory, causing the death of 454 people, including 331 students and 123 professors. The Central City laboratory was reduced to ruins, and all the advanced equipnt being developed was destroyed in the blast.
There were only 8 survivors, including Cheng Luohe, the captain of the guard, Dr. la, and participants of the Hibernation Plan.
A single surviving bioroid, a dostic bioroid with the code na "Fayse," was 95% scrapped, only its vocal device still operational as it sang the "Song of Freedom", later discarded in the junkyard of The Fringe.
This shocking and extraordinary explosion event information was tightly sealed. The Dawn System claid it was due to a long-term lockdown of Central City to prevent the City-State from being destabilized.]
...
Su Ming’an rembered the day he first t Dong An’an crouching in front of the house, fiddling with a broken bioroid—it turned out that was Fayse.
Today, in the year 102, beside Acto, only la remained.
He drove his wheelchair, charging along, leaping through the corridor window. At the hospital door, the red light of the ICU was lit.
"Doctor, please sit here for a mont," the receptionist nurse respectfully guided him to the side.
He waited outside the door, staring at the red light of the ICU, lost in thought.
...The sprightly old lady in the laboratory who used to joke around with him spiritedly had co to the verge of death in year 102, and could only et him for the last ti.
...
["Ya Sa, you are still so young, a pity, our bodies are too weak to stay young like you."]
["Immortality is very painful."]
...
These were the words Dr. la had said to him when submitting the Hibernation Plan.
The Acto of those days had surely experienced many more departures and deaths than him—over 102 years, enough to change three generations.
In his lengthy life, he had to face countless losses. Those dear to him would die before his eyes, his cherished emotions would disappear with the passage of ti, everything familiar to him gone, while he lived on, powerless.
He simply could not stop the grand river called Death, only to watch all life flow past him.
Even if he tried to resist ti with undying emotions, ti would eventually erase everything.
"..." Su Ming’an stared at the pristine white floor, his weary reflection faintly visible.
In the top right corner, the argunt on the feed continued. One side protected the "Number One Player," furiously cursing the detractors, while another side insulted the "Number One Player," calling them a bunch of guard dogs.
In the face of survival, humans revealed their sheer bestiality.
Suddenly, a "click" sound, the door in front opened, and a doctor in a white coat hurried out.
"Doctor, please go in," the doctor said.
Hearing this from the doctor, Su Ming’an knew la was beyond saving.
His Biochemistry was at level 10, indeed better than that of a doctor, but healing was not so simple; one must understand the patient’s condition in advance, and so irreversible diseases even he could not cure. la was too old, her organs failing, and he could not possibly catch and remove all the viruses.
He stepped slowly inside, saw the emaciated old woman with nearly all her white hair fallen out. Her eyes had grown murky, the brilliance visible 30 years ago nowhere to be seen. Her body was covered in tubes, her complexion as pale as a corpse, no longer resembling a leading luminary and brilliant biochemist, just a regular dying patient.
Seeing Su Ming’an fully encased in a protective suit, she weakly moved her lips:
"Ya Sa..."
"We’ve all grown old..."
A surge of leftover emotion violently struck Su Ming’an’s heart, and he clenched the clothing over his left chest, feeling a sharp pain.
Acto’s body’s empathy intensely affected him, he had never experienced such fierce emotions before.
"Every ti I face you, I dare not honestly say I am in pain, I really want to end it..." la spoke, "but as soon as I leave, almost everyone you know would have left, I can only keep going on.
We can’t just leave you alone... alone in an uncertain new century. I really want, really want to stay with you to the end, even if only I remained.
Ya Sa, so much ti has passed. Do you still... rember those people?"
Su Ming’an stood by her side.
"I rember," he said.
He recalled how Tereya had invited him to eat strawberry cake, how Dong Xu always played the fool outside the door. He rembered Tretiya, Qiu Li, Rong Yuan, Xia Sheng, and Sen, Yao Wen and Sita Xi... He even rembered Noah and Lin Guang.
In the year 102, they were all gone.
He was living in a world where everyone was gone.
Looking at the frail old man before him, he rembered his grandmother. Back then, she had also lain weakly in the ICU, and he hadn’t even seen her for the last ti like this.
He had not been able to hold her emaciated hand; the candy he clutched in his hand was never given to her, and the last words he wanted to say never ca out.
Then she was gone.
Whenever he thought of that childhood scene, he almost suffocated. Thinking of how she went sowhere all alone, he wanted to pull her back.
But he couldn’t stop death, no matter whose it was.
Since childhood, he had always witnessed the deaths of others. Even in the ga instances, it was hard for him to prevent so people’s deaths, as ti cannot be reversed.
The faces from the past erged in his mind...
Eventually, he rembered a pair of red eyes, fiery like flas.
"Ya Sa..." la clasped his hand:
"Maybe you’ll et many more people and walk much more, but I always hope... you won’t forget the path that our generation walked with you."
"Please... win the world back, even though we can’t see it anymore."
"If you can rember, sowhere in your distant mory, earlier in your life, there was a person nad la..."
She smiled slightly:
...
"—then we will live forever in the tomb of your mory."
...
"Click."
Behind him, the door closed.
Su Ming’an pushed the wheelchair, slowly leaving the room behind him.
Not until he had gone down the elevator, not until he had left behind the pure white hospital, did he hear the voice of the annoucer from the city’s broadcast, trying hard to mask their sorrow—
"The renowned biochemistry Doctor la, unfortunately, passed away today (Catastrophe Year 102, October 6) at 9:34 AM due to illness, at the age of ninety-three.
"Doctor la specialized in the field of bionics and was a researcher during the Dawn War era. Later, she proposed the ’Four Laws of Bionics,’ advancing the perfection of emotional chips for intellects. Her life made indelible contributions to the City-State, a shining jewel of the City of asurent. The deputy councilman of the Core Area on behalf of the City-State extends condolences to her family. Her passing marks the end of an era..."
...
He took a deep breath.
As he breathed in, he felt his breath trembling, his whole body chilled.
In the upper right corner, the barrage continued to argue incessantly, with no one caring about what had happened here.
"[Enough already. Su Ming’an’s efforts are apparent to everyone, and still, you target the hero. Have you nothing better to do?]"
"[Keep defending him, and by the ti a year ends under Su Ming’an’s rule, you’ll know regret!]"
"[Is humanity’s future really so bleak, are we heading towards an era of despotism? One man as a fortress, factions in control...]"
"[I’m so scared, I really want to cry...]"
"[...]"
Loneliness isn’t about cold and solitude; it’s being in a bustling crowd, at a busy eting place, and having no place there.
Ever since becoming the Number One Player, he never seed to fit in.
He returned to the Central City laboratory. With more than six hours to go before Caius was set to return, he could catch so sleep.
He lay in bed.
In a blurry dream, he heard many voices.
"—You are the perfect passer, how could humanity’s fate possibly be in your hands!"
"—You don’t deserve it! I liked the Number One Player in the self-help conference room!"
"—But you could beco like Ming’an, right?"
"—The pendant will always explode on schedule... You can’t see the sun on the third day in the instance... You, a selfish student living in an Ivory Tower, absolutely, absolutely cannot beco the ruler of everyone."
"—He’s now in a low san state, and he’s staying with that tentacle, we’ll drag it out—just long enough for him to go mad..."
The voices overlapped, noisy and jumbled.
In the end, he saw a pair of eyes. Pale eyes that seed to contain everything. They gazed at him, and smiled faintly.
"[Ya Sa, I’ve said it,
you would eventually,
walk towards the sa demise for the sake of the City-State.]"
...
He suddenly woke up.
The wall clock ticked steadily; he threw off the covers and gasped, his black hair sticking to his sweaty face, nearly breathless.
In the upper right corner, the barrage continued to argue incessantly. He turned off the livestream.
He sat in silence for a few minutes, closing his eyes.
"Boss Rabbit..." he murmured softly: "Boss Rabbit?"
With a "swoosh", a pink, adorable giant rabbit appeared beside him, accompanied by beautiful colorful lights.
Whenever he called, it always appeared imdiately.
"Sweet Number One Player, you called , what is it...?" Before it finished speaking, it heard a "pfft" sound.
A fist hit its abdon, and its soft belly caved in.
"Co over," Su Ming’an whispered. "Let throw a punch."
His emotions were too overt; this was a bad save, and he had already planned to reset.
Since that was the case—let him, before dying, test what would happen if he attacked the representative of the Organizers.
He had never been able to prevent the deaths of others.
But he could at least control, or perhaps utilize his own death... This was the only thing he could do.
So long as in the end, he voiced his wish in front of the entire world. All the rumors against him would crumble.
The ones he wished to save were never those who spoke ill of him, but those who had once shown him kindness.
Before that,
let him vent a bit in this tiline destined to be discarded by him.
Now, no one was watching him.
He could cry now.
...
...
"[My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow . And I give them eternal life...]"
"[...]"
"[—no one can snatch them from my hand.]"
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