Chapter 84

After the touch, Gu Yi’an immediately stepped back several paces.
She lowered her gaze, unwilling to look at the person before her.
She must have lost her mind just then, acting on impulse.
As soon as the classmates left, Lu Zize happened to make a promise.
This guy really knows how to seize the moment.
Gu Yi'an somewhat regretted her earlier actions.
However, her actions had put Lu Zize in a good mood.
Gu Yi'an heard Lu Zize's soft chuckle.
He said gently, "I'll let you pass."
Time rewinds to when the eight players conveyed the wishes of their classmates to Gu Yi'an before disappearing together.
In a pure white space.
Xiao Cheng stared at the black text floating in mid-air.
[Game Clear Status: Barely Passable. But you have disappointed the God.]
[Reward: The God has graciously granted you another chance. Please praise the God's mercy.]
[The God says to you: (You have been blocked by the God.)]
Xiao Cheng looked at the black text, her mind replaying what Brother Wei had told her.
Her rationality had been affected by the item, causing her to lose her usual judgment. She had become extreme, stubborn, and overly dependent on those she trusted.
If she didn't deal with the item in her possession, she would only fall into deeper despair.
Suddenly, the black text in mid-air vanished, replaced by numbers.
[5]
The number changed.
[4]
Xiao Cheng knew it was a countdown.
As for what it was counting down to, she didn't want to figure it out just yet.
Right now, all she wanted to know was how to handle the item in her possession.
Should she just throw it away?
But how could she throw it away?
If someone else got their hands on this item, wouldn't she still be toyed with by it?
Xiao Cheng couldn't think of a solution, nor could she see any way out.
What could she do? There was absolutely nothing.
As Xiao Cheng sank into despair, her surroundings transformed into a small garden.
At the same time, several men and women appeared around her.
In mid-air, a line of black text floated.
[Shh! The God is watching you.]
Xiao Cheng watched as the black text in mid-air dissipated like smoke.
She suddenly realized she had entered a new game.
One game after another, what was the point of living?
This thought crossed Xiao Cheng's mind.
Instantly, her emotions amplified to the extreme.
She might as well kill herself. Ending it all would solve everything.
Xiao Cheng paid no attention to the movements of the people around her.
The others were talking among themselves.
"You said the beginner's hint is 'the sin of gender'? Like male and female genders?"
Xiao Cheng took out the dagger from her pocket and, without hesitation, slit her own throat.
As excruciating pain washed over her, the other players around her gasped in shock.
"Is she insane? Is she being controlled by a ghost?"
"Is there danger around?"
Death was not a quick process.
Xiao Cheng endured the unbearable pain tormenting her.
Every second felt like an eternity.
Finally, her consciousness sank into darkness.
Suddenly.
Light broke into Xiao Cheng's world.
[Shh! The God is watching you.]
Xiao Cheng stared blankly at the black text in the air.
She hadn't died.
Why?
Why hadn't she died?
Was the God not allowing her to die?
Xiao Cheng glanced at the players around her.
She remembered seeing these same people just before she died.
The world had reset.
Xiao Cheng realized this.
At the same time, she despairingly discovered one thing, she couldn't even die.
This was the function of the item.
Time rewound and restarted, and the more it was used, the more despair it brought.
Despair to the point where she couldn't even die.
In contrast to Xiao Cheng's experience, the other seven players from the same game had different encounters.
They each received evaluations of excellent, passable, and barely passing, and were granted ten days of lifespan.
But Gu Yi'an's clearance was different from these players.
They had cleared this round of the game.
Her clearance was of the game of the gods.
The gods said to let her pass.
Gu Yi'an, holding Lu Zize's hand, stepped into the void. She walked half a step behind him, and though there was nothing beneath her feet, she still felt solid ground.
The two of them walked among countless stars, like two travelers wandering through time and space.
They might have walked for a long time, or perhaps only for a moment.
All Gu Yi'an could see were countless nebulae passing by.
Later, she realized that what she was seeing might not be nebulae but one dazzling world after another.
Only a short while might have passed.
Lu Zize glanced back at her and said, "I've prepared a clearance reward for you."
Gu Yi'an thought for a moment and asked, "A new body?"
Lu Zize had mentioned twice before that he would help her find a new body.
Lu Zize nodded, his gentle gaze sweeping across the surrounding expanse. "This is your new body."
Gu Yi'an looked at the endless nebulae around her, they seemed within reach, yet impossibly distant.
What was Lu Zize saying?
Gu Yi'an couldn't understand.
Because she couldn't even comprehend what the gods truly were.
She didn't even know where they were walking now.
She had thought they were traversing the cosmos among the stars, but a sudden, inexplicable awareness told her that the nebulae she saw were worlds, more accurately, the infinite collection of parallel worlds of a certain universe. Everywhere her eyes fell, there were endless such worlds.
Gu Yi'an could only turn to Lu Zize for an explanation, but when she looked at him, she suddenly noticed that his eyes held no reflection of her, only the boundless nebulae.
In that moment, Gu Yi'an understood.
She had already become these nebulae.
What Lu Zize had been gazing at so tenderly just now was her.
Is this what a god is?
Gu Yi'an's thoughts drifted to those nebulae.
In an instant, endless information surged toward her.
She knew the past, present, and future of that world in a single moment, aware of infinite possibilities.
If she wished, she could interfere with this world at will.
Gu Yi'an remembered something.
The players she had encountered once speculated that gods were higher-dimensional beings.
To higher-dimensional beings, they knew everything about them, and they would always be insignificant.
At this moment, Gu Yi'an suddenly understood just how small they were.
"Why did you think of creating the game?"
Gu Yi'an withdrew her consciousness from reading those worlds and returned her focus to Lu Zize. She was curious about why a god would create a game of gods.
Lu Zize smiled and answered the question.
"I needed a companion."
So, the god had chosen her?
Gu Yi'an looked at the endless nebulae.
"Why me?"
The more she understood the truth of the god, the less she could comprehend his kindness toward her.
Lu Zize heard Gu Yi'an's question, his gaze still gentle.
He said, "Because when you said those words, I saw that in my future, there was only you."
What words were those?
As Gu Yi'an pondered this question, it seemed to trigger something, and endless information surged toward her.
Scenes flashed through her mind.
Gu Yi'an saw herself in the first game, telling the little boy Xiao Ze to believe in himself. From that moment on, she had become the god's protected one.
Wait, why was she seeing these scenes?
Gu Yi'an belatedly realized that, at this moment, she seemed capable of knowing everything happening in the infinite worlds related to the game of gods.
She could see in her own world, the Hanged Ghost and the little girl fighting to a stalemate, and the little dragon, unable to resist clapping its claws while watching, getting ganged up on by the Hanged Ghost and the little girl.
This was what was happening in her world.
Gu Yi'an wanted to see the past.
Immediately, she saw the past of her own world.
She saw her college roommate summoning the pen spirit, saw her classmates being harmed, and saw herself preparing to travel with her classmates.
Don’t go.
Gu Yi'an had that thought.
Then, she saw her past self, unusually engrossed in watching TV.
Gu Yi'an was stunned.
Was it cause that led to effect, or effect that led to cause?
Gu Yi'an continued to look further into the past. She saw her brother, Gu Tianjing, bullying her, and she saw the moment of her own birth.
It was as if she exchanged a glance with her newborn self.
At that moment, Gu Yi'an suddenly understood why she had always believed she was a transmigrator.
Her past self had seen her future self and gained information from the future.
This caused the world to reject her body.
Gu Yi'an no longer focused on her own world. She turned her gaze to other worlds.
With a single glance, she saw countless beautiful patterns connecting the various worlds.
Those patterns were not physically real but represented some kind of relationship.
"That is the Deicide Organization."
Lu Zize was aware of Gu Yi'an's every move and knew of her confusion about the Deicide Organization.
He said, "The form you see now is only the form you can comprehend. You see me as human. But the self I see is not human."
Lu Zize spoke as countless specks of light converged in his palm, forming an extraordinarily dazzling gem.
He said, "This is how I see it. Quite fascinating, isn't it?"
In Gu Yi'an's current perception, the Deicide Organization was a web sprawling across multiple worlds, but in the eyes of a god, it was a tiny yet brilliant gem.
It could never pose a threat to a god.
But the god found it intriguing.
Gu Yi'an hesitated for a moment before asking, "You've handed The Game of the Gods over to me? Then what about you?"
Her current body seemed to encompass infinite worlds.
She no longer knew what she had become.
If the god had given her the game He created to serve as her body, then what kind of existence was He Himself?
Lu Zize sensed Gu Yi'an's confusion and gently explained, "You could think of it this way, a person removed one of their own ribs to create a new companion."
So, did that mean she was now a new god?
And the administrator of The Game of the Gods had also become her?
Gu Yi'an said, "I still don't quite understand what a god is, nor do I know how to be one."
Lu Zize replied, "That's alright. We have plenty of time. You can slowly learn how to be a god."
Indeed, they had a long time ahead.
Gu Yi'an said, "Then let's return to my world first. I'll gradually learn how to be a god."
This time, Gu Yi'an controlled her own body and appeared atop the mountain peak once more.
Hovering in the air before her were black characters:
[Pleasing the god, praising the god, you shall obtain eternal life.]
[You have obtained eternal life.]