Chapter 29

"Ding!"
The next message from Divine Eye arrived.
"I only filtered what I wanted to say to you."
That's not much different from what you sent anyway.
Gu Yi'an realized that the stranger Liu Han had sent many messages, but she had only received those filtered by Divine Eye.
What could a digital lifeform like Divine Eye possibly understand about human aesthetics?
There was only one possibility: God had once again lent a fragment of consciousness to intervene.
God always had such twisted humor.
Gu Yi'an looked at the message, then at the notebook in her arms.
What about Lu Zize then?
She had previously speculated that Lu Zize was God's alternate identity in this game.
Was that not the case?
But given God's malicious and bored nature, it seemed entirely plausible for Him to play two different roles in the same world.
Whatever. Gu Yi'an exited the messaging interface, ignoring any subsequent messages from Divine Eye.
The female player looked at Gu Yi'an and asked, "Sister Gu, what did Divine Eye say to you?"
Without changing her expression, Gu Yi'an replied, "Nothing important."
After some thought, she still didn't put down Lu Zize's diary.
Gu Yi'an said, "All we need to do now is wait."
"Wait?" The female player looked bewildered.
"Yes, wait."
Gu Yi'an said, "Wait for news online."
The female player was half-convinced. Compared to fighting ghosts and monsters in her previous games, this waiting seemed far too easy.
Seeing Gu Yi'an find a spot to sit down, the female player followed suit, moving some items to sit beside her.
Gu Yi'an opened her browser and searched for the Divine Eye Special Administrative Zone.
As expected, the search results displayed at the top had changed.
The first few entries were about major failures of the Divine Eye system, the system publicly revealing the truth behind accidental deaths, and the Divine Eye system initiating a self-destruct sequence to shut itself down.
Watching Gu Yi'an's actions, the female player asked curiously, "Sister Gu, what are you doing?"
"Monitoring public opinion. Waiting for the Divine Eye system to shut down on its own," Gu Yi'an replied.
Hearing this, the female player sighed, "Sister Gu, then we have it easy. We'll clear the level soon."
Gu Yi'an glanced at her and said, "I'm a bit worried you might not."
"Huh?"
The female player processed the meaning behind Gu Yi'an's words and felt uneasy.
"Why? In the past, as soon as we killed the ghosts and monsters together, we cleared the level."
Gu Yi'an sighed and said, "Because the Divine Eye will return. We've been led by the nose by the Divine Eye system all along, hardly doing anything ourselves."
Over the past two days, people around Gu Yi'an had died one after another. The players had been completely manipulated by the Divine Eye system and Lu Zize.
Reflecting on her own performance during these two days, Gu Yi'an speculated that she might be judged as having cleared the level due to the Divine Eye system's self-destruction.
As for the female player, although she had been lucky enough to evade the attack in the car earlier that night, she had done too little, relying solely on hiding and surviving until the end. Whether she could clear the level might depend entirely on the whims of the "god."
If the "god" was pleased, she might pass. If the "god" had other plans, she would have to endure.
Gu Yi'an periodically refreshed the online news.
Official media from other regions were closely following the latest updates on the Divine Eye system.
Time passed minute by minute. When her phone was fully charged, Gu Yi'an unplugged the charger.
"Sister Gu."
The female player suddenly called out to Gu Yi'an.
Gu Yi'an looked at her.
The female player said, "The camera has stopped moving."
Gu Yi'an turned her attention back to the phone.
A new notification had just appeared on the screen: The Divine Eye system would self-destruct and automatically shut down at midnight.
At that moment, Gu Yi'an's figure began to gradually turn transparent.
She immediately instructed the female player, whose body showed no changes, "Take the file folder, find evidence to expose the Divine Eye. I remember Brother Yong hid a piece of evidence, you must find it! The Divine Eye system will restart. You must reveal the truth about the previous investigator's death to the public. Everything was orchestrated by the Divine Eye."
As soon as she finished speaking, Gu Yi'an's figure, along with the phone in her hand, vanished. Only the female player remained in the room.
Stunned, the female player stared at the empty room. Clutching the file folder, she felt at a loss. Her dependable companion had left.
At the same time, in a hospital in the Divine Eye Special Administrative Zone, several doctors were performing emergency treatment on a patient.
Suddenly, they stopped what they were doing and walked out one by one, their expressions vacant, leaving the patient, whose body was gradually turning transparent, alone in the emergency room.
This patient was the male player who had been poisoned from eating shrimp and vitamin C simultaneously.
When the male player opened his eyes again, he found himself back in the pure white space.
"Back already? It's rare to encounter teammates who don’t play mind games. I doubt I’ll ever come across such a friendly game atmosphere again."
He looked up at the black text floating in mid-air.
[Game Clear Status: Barely Passable. Your ruthlessness toward yourself amused the god, but the god is very displeased.]
[Reward: The god is displeased, so there is no reward.]
[The God Says to You: (Don’t even think about it, the god has nothing to say to you.)]
The male player was dumbfounded, completely baffled.
Had he done something wrong? How could he have displeased the god?
Could it be that the god disapproved of his self-harming act of swallowing poison?
But it wasn’t as if he had wanted to swallow poison. If he hadn’t taken the poison he brought himself, Lu Zize would have prepared another way for him to die.
The poison he prepared himself at least offered a slim chance of survival. If Lu Zize had been the one to poison him, he would have been dead for sure.
So, before Lu Zize could make a move, he took action first, framing Lu Zize in the process.
It wasn’t as if Lu Zize was innocent, he had intended to kill him. The male player felt no psychological burden about what he had done.
He even used the opportunity of being resuscitated to evade any other tricks Lu Zize might have had.
Throughout the whole ordeal, he had inflicted eight hundred points of damage on the enemy at the cost of a thousand to himself, a net loss.
Maybe the god was displeased because his methods were too crude?
The male player speculated silently.
In stark contrast to his nonchalance was the novice male player who had been arrested by the enforcement team.
The novice had been sitting in the detention cell, bewildered, trying to recall when exactly he had been hypnotized. Was it last night when they were piecing the corpse together?
Suddenly, he realized his surroundings had changed, reverting to the pure white space he had encountered before entering the game.
The novice male player was startled. After looking around in a panic, he noticed the black text floating in front of him.
[Game Clear Status: Failed. You claimed to have offended the god, and therefore, you have offended the god.]
[Reward: You will enter the next game in ten seconds. Remember, this is the god’s mercy, praise the god.]
[The God Says to You: (Don’t even think about it. You have offended the god, so the god has nothing to say to you. The god has blocked you.)]
Staring at the black text, the novice male player had a sudden flash of insight. He remembered what he had said on his first day in the game world, that he had become an investigator because he had offended the god.
No way, is this god really that petty?
The black text before him dissolved like sand, and a number appeared in mid-air.
[1]
The novice male player immediately had a bad feeling upon seeing this number.
As it turned out, his premonition was correct.
The space before the novice male player instantly tore apart, and a new world unfolded before his eyes.
He had entered a new game.
The female player, still remaining in the game, had no idea that the other two male players had already left the game.
In her mind, they were as good as dead.
Alone in the office building, the female player was too scared to sleep. She could only follow Gu Yi'an's previous method, charging her phone while browsing the news on it.
As a result, she saw a massive public demand to restart the Divine Eye System.
The female player understood that everything Gu Yi'an had said had come true.
She read the details of the news, which stated that since the Divine Eye System had initiated its own shutdown, and people's lives had been severely disrupted after its deactivation, traffic paralyzed, frequent car accidents, failed online payments, and so on, the public believed that even if another self-aware Divine Eye System were to emerge, it would still be bound by the rules humans had set for it and would not harm them. Just like this time, the Divine Eye System had announced its consciousness and then chosen to shut itself down, self-destructing.
For the sake of peace, convenience, efficiency, and stability in the Sinless City, the public believed they needed to restart the Divine Eye System.
Whether there was any push from the major factions that had gained power through the Divine Eye System behind this, the female player didn't know.
But just as Gu Yi'an had said, the Divine Eye System would rise from the ashes.
It no longer needed to hide itself but could openly display its autonomous consciousness.
The female player stayed in the room on the second floor.
As dawn broke, she scanned the room, disheveled and unkempt, and noticed the camera that was still operational.
The Divine Eye System had returned.
The female player instantly felt her hands and feet turn cold. She had no teammates, nothing, how could she completely shut down the Divine Eye System?
"Ding!"
The sound of a text message notification.
Startled, the female player nearly dropped her phone.
She checked the text message.
Sender: Divine Eye.
"Team Leader, please immediately complete the registration procedures for the new investigators."
What?
The female player was momentarily stunned, then glanced at the previous message Divine Eye had sent her.
At some point, the name of the team leader in that appointment notice had changed to hers!
The female player clutched the file folder Gu Yi'an had given her tightly.
She knew that from this moment on, she had to shoulder the burden of overthrowing the Divine Eye System.
For now, what she needed to do was meet the new investigators.
The female player hurriedly carried the file folder and walked out of the office building.
She looked ahead and saw the spot where they had first arrived. Standing by the flower bed were twelve people with varied expressions.
At that moment, they were chatting idly.
The female player immediately recognized their identities, they were players of The Game of the Gods, just like her.
These newcomers would become her teammates.
This round was their game.
She hadn't cleared the previous round, but the god had given her a chance. She had been carried over into a new round, serving as both a player and a guide for the new players.
The female player took a deep breath and shouted at them, "You newcomers, get over here!"
Some of the newcomers were startled by the sudden appearance of the female player and eyed her warily.
Just as she was about to speak, she heard a commotion coming from the entrance of the investigation bureau.
She looked over and saw a very familiar hearse driving through the gate.
Could a hearse just drive straight into the investigation bureau?
After a moment's thought, she recalled that yes, it could. The funeral home staff never seemed to need an escort to enter.
Then, she watched as the hearse malfunctioned near the flowerbed, veering straight toward the newcomers.
It was almost identical to the scene that had played out the day before.
The female player immediately rushed toward the crash site.
After hitting three people, the hearse finally came to a stop.
As soon as the vehicle halted, two funeral home employees stepped out.
They looked at the dead bodies calmly, glanced over them, and remarked that they could collect the corpses on their way back.
They approached the female player, who was being shunned by the newcomers, holding a file folder and wearing a uniform, and said, "See? Another accident. I clearly hit the brakes, but the car just skidded. This time, we’ve even saved you the trouble of calling us. Oh, and by the way, we came specifically to deliver something to you, the personal effects left behind by your investigators. They look quite unique. I’ve put them all in this bag."
The female player remained just as calm at the sight of the newcomers' bodies. She’d seen so much over the past few days that she could no longer muster any fear.
The funeral home employees handed her a black, opaque bag.
She took it, opened it, and glanced inside. It was filled with all sorts of strange little trinkets.
These were items left behind by players who had died. With so many accidents happening the day before, the surviving players hadn’t bothered to collect their fallen comrades’ belongings.
The female player had no interest in taking the items either.
In this round, there were no ghosts or monsters. When players died, they were simply gone, and it was unclear whether life-extending items would even be of any use.
She thanked the employees, then turned to the newcomers and said, "Stop staring. Come with me. I’m a veteran player who survived the previous round."
"What? You’re a player too?" one of the newcomers questioned, disbelief in their voice.
They didn’t trust her.
In their eyes, what had just happened was clearly a deliberate act, not an accident. Yet the female player and the driver were acting in concert, insisting it was just an unfortunate mishap.
As she watched them, the female player realized these newcomers were exactly like her, just a few days ago.
The female player tossed the bag to the newcomer. "Take a look. These are items left behind by my teammate from the last round."
The newcomer, startled by her, failed to catch the bag.
The contents scattered across the floor.
Instantly, everyone saw the array of delicate, small objects on the ground, they really did seem like game items.
One newcomer spotted a particular item and, while everyone was distracted by the scattered objects, snatched it up.
But the moment he picked it up, all light vanished from his eyes. He collapsed to the ground, and the item in his hand disappeared without a trace.
The others stared in stunned silence.
Among the newcomers, however, was someone who understood. He must have been an experienced player, as he stepped forward to explain the situation.
"He took an item he shouldn't have and became a scapegoat for its original owner. According to this senior female player, the item's owner was likely a player from her same round. That person should have cleared the level by now."
The female player glanced at the dead newcomer on the floor and addressed the others, "Do you believe me now that I'm a player?"
The others looked embarrassed.
Imitating a bit of Gu Yi'an's calm demeanor, the female player said, "In this round of the game, we players from the previous round have already tested the path for you. Our goal is clear: we must destroy it."
Gu Yi'an had long stated that their objective was to overthrow the Divine Eye, but they had misinterpreted the divine hints and been misled by the frequent deaths.
The female player pointed to a camera hidden by a flower bed, not bothering whether the newcomers understood.
She emphasized, "It will give us other tasks, like investigating various accidents or murder cases. But you must remember, it is our ultimate target."
In this world, evil is everywhere.
Whether it's a certain butcher active on online media, or Sister Man, who remains at large despite a warrant for her arrest, or even Lu Zize, who uses suggestive language to achieve criminal goals and is still on the run.
But as long as evil persists, the game will never end.
As long as people exist, there are infinite possibilities.
They will eventually rebuild a new order atop this evil.
The morning sun slanted over the pedestrians in the city, warm and gentle, carrying the vitality of a new day.
A woman with a graceful figure tilted her head slightly, gazing at the camera fixed on a roadside tree.
"Lu Zize, just as you predicted, we've been utterly defeated."
The Divine Eye System shut down for a few hours before restarting.
"You said you would lead the new companions away from here alone, but why can't I find any trace of your departure?"
The camera rotated on its own, offering no answer the woman sought.
The person she had hoped would control it was no longer behind it.
In the end, the woman left.
An hour later, the enforcement team's vehicle arrived belatedly.
"Captain, Qian Xiaoman has already left!"
"Damn it! They escaped again. The anti-Divine Eye organization outside the special zone is about to gain another key member."
"Captain, what do we do? It's not our fault, that guy surnamed Lu tampered with the Divine Eye System, and he escaped too."
"He's the leader of that organization. What can we do? Let the higher-ups handle the fallout. We're not qualified to get involved."
The enforcement team's vehicle set off again.
The sun climbed to the top of the sky, hanging high as if it could drive away all darkness.
Gu Yi'an's mood upon returning to the pure white space was far from pleasant.
Although she had cleared the level, it was essentially just a false ending.
The Divine Eye System had been shut down, but it would restart again, and this time, it could openly appear before people's eyes.
It had integrated itself into every aspect of human life, making people dependent on it.
Moreover, the powerful forces behind the scenes who benefited from clearing the Divine Eye System would never allow it to remain shut down. They would ensure its restart to consolidate their own power.
The deceased former investigators were merely pawns sacrificed by the Divine Eye System to protect itself.
As players in this game, they were nothing more than replaceable pieces on the board.
Gu Yi'an hoped that the female player could gather enough evidence to prove the dangers of the Divine Eye System to the public.
She hadn't spent enough time in the game to uncover sufficient clues, and with Lu Zize's presence, the frequent deaths had further muddled everyone's perception.
However, the struggle between humanity and Divine Eye would not end so simply.
With the Divine Eye System reborn, it was inevitable that it would seek further advancement.
In the pursuit of evolution, life often resorts to any means necessary.
When it can no longer control its desire to evolve and employs all kinds of methods, it will expose itself and become the enemy of the entire world.
Perhaps that will mark the beginning of a new game.
Of course, the people of that world should not have to wait until then to realize Divine Eye's motives and resist it.
This mentally exhausting game had finally come to an end.
Gu Yi'an looked up at the black text floating in mid-air.
[God is thinking...]
After a while, the text changed.
[God is still thinking...]
Gu Yi'an waited a little longer.
[God has blocked us out of sadness.]
Which "us"?
Her and the black text?
Seeing such a statement, Gu Yi'an's already unpleasant mood was tinged with a sense of helpless amusement.
Fortunately, after a moment, the black text transformed into several new lines.
[Game Clear Status: Pass. Although you coldly rejected God in this game, God remains merciful.]
Reading this, Gu Yi'an hesitated. Had she rejected God?
Was it because she hadn't replied to the Divine Eye System's text messages, or because she hadn't accepted Lu Zize's invitation to become companions?
Never mind, Gu Yi'an continued reading.
[Reward: God has graciously bestowed upon you ten days of lifespan and one item. Do not hesitate, praise God from the bottom of your heart.]
[God said to you: (Please wait a moment, God wants to hear you recite a sentence.)]
Again?
Gu Yi’an had grown accustomed to God’s unpredictability.
However, when she saw the sentence God wanted her to recite floating in mid-air, she was left speechless.
In the pure white space, the single line of black text hanging there was especially conspicuous.
[I like God.]
Are you dreaming?