Chapter 134: Choice

“You seem to have lost something very important?” A smiling voice resonated from the depths of his mind.

Qi Si felt his vision blur, and the scenery rotated one hundred and eighty degrees in a single second.

He didn’t know how he had gotten down from the high-backed chair, but he was now sitting in front of a bronze table, with a small stool that had appeared out of thin air beneath him.

The murals on the temple dome transformed into a blood-colored waterfall, pouring down and coalescing into a figure with red clothes and red eyes upon the high-backed chair.

Crimson beams, varying in intensity, swam through the void, churning the space until it felt alternately thin and viscous.

A swarm of whispers murmured incessantly in his ears, stirring fear from the depths of his soul. Every factor composing his spirit and flesh trembled, wanting to scatter and flow away in all directions.

Qi Si recognized the visitor and said indifferently, “Yes, I lost some things. The Eerie Game said it was because of the special mechanism, so they couldn’t be transferred—so, are you here to help me with data recovery?”

The visitor smiled and denied it: “If this were twenty-two years ago, I might have been able to help you open a backdoor, but unfortunately, times have changed, and I am unable to help.”

“Anyway, in your opinion, that finger bone and the so-called Identity Card are of no use, aren’t they?”

Qi Si narrowed his eyes. “You seem to know exactly what I’m thinking. Also, I didn’t know the privacy and security of the Game Space were so poor that entities like Evil Gods could enter without my permission.”

The uninvited guest who appeared in the temple was none other than the Evil God named “Qi.”

At this moment, He leaned back on the high-backed chair and sighed long and slow. “Qi Si, you don’t need to be so nervous. This is probably the last time I will actively come to your Game Space to find you. After reporting that guy, I was, unsurprisingly, heavily monitored by the rule.”

“Looking at your expression, you still have many misunderstandings about me. It really makes me sad. Actually, you can completely trust that my interests are absolutely aligned with yours.”

Qi Si smiled without warmth. “Is this the reason you brought the rule’s attention here and invited yourself in?”

Qi continued, “You can also rest assured that, other than me, no other entities can enter here without your permission. I am appearing here as your hallucination, or rather, as a split personality.”

“Everything I say to you next will not be known by any other entity.”

Qi Si noticed that this time, Qi did not transmit the information directly into his mind, but went through the process of speaking, allowing him to perceive the content of the words in a way that complied with physical laws.

—The situation was very unusual.

What would be said in a moment was likely not some ambiguous divine oracle, but something closer to the truth of the game.

Qi Si wiped the insincere smile from his face, sat up straight, and gave the entity on the high-backed chair a look, signaling Him to elaborate.

Qi spoke slowly, “In the instance that just passed, the guy who made a move against you is called ‘Li,’ who holds the two great authorities of Time and Space and Fate. If you chant His honorific name or think of His name, you will be perceived and watched by Him.”

“The reason I am telling you His name is that He won’t be able to do anything to you for much longer. Making Him think of you constantly, yet be unable to move against you, will make me feel happy.”

Speaking of this, Qi tapped his chin with his index finger. “You should know that He went to Su Clan Village twenty years ago to help me do a small favor. And the only grudge He has against you is probably that you almost killed the proxy He favored.”

“‘Almost’?” Qi Si raised an eyebrow. His memory quickly screened through everyone he had killed but failed to kill since childhood, but he couldn’t find a corresponding match.

Since he was young, he had understood the principle of cutting weeds and eliminating roots. His actions were clean and ruthless, leaving no room for error. Except for when he first entered the Eerie Game and didn’t understand, leaving Chang Xu and Lin Chen as two hidden dangers in “Rose Manor,” he had never left anyone alive.

Hidden dangers?

Qi Si suddenly remembered the content of an analysis post he had seen on the Forum:

‘Is Chang Xu really dead? Didn’t the expert Yuhan say that the main body of the “Hopeless Sea” instance is a dream? Dying in a dream doesn’t necessarily mean death; it might just be a bitter ruse.’

That’s right. Dying in a dream doesn’t mean true death, and rule-based horror is idealistic.

Just like when the “Puppeteer” wrapped the Puppet Threads around his little finger—even though it had successfully controlled him, it still flipped over due to an operation that was almost like swapping concepts…

So, Chang Xu is still alive?

Qi Si narrowed his eyes and said, “I remember I stabbed him several more times. Even if that guy were a cockroach, he should be dead, right?”

Qi said, “Li, who bet on him, is what you players call the ‘Main God’ of the Eerie Game. After I reached into the gambling game, He wouldn’t just sit there and wait for death. Using the excuse of ensuring the fairness of the game, He rolled back the life status of all the chess pieces to before the cheating began.”

“Main God?” Qi Si revealed an eerie smile. “Is an entity of that level actually so lacking in dignity?”

Qi laughed too. “Under the supreme rule, gods have never been masters; they are merely tools responsible for clearing unstable factors, maintaining the order of the Eerie Game, and collecting sin.”

“To the rule, both we and you players are nothing but straw dogs and sacrificial offerings. It’s just a difference between those usually offered at the shrine and those offered to heaven and earth during sacrifices.”

rule, it’s the rule again… The supreme, irresistible rule that can even exile gods…

Qi Si took the opportunity to ask, “I’ve wanted to ask this for a long time. What exactly is the essence of the rule you speak of? And what is its relationship with sin?”

Qi didn’t answer immediately but snapped his fingers.

Countless golden light spots gathered from all directions onto the bronze table, surging into a tumultuous ocean of light.

Qi raised his hand, and all things flowed. “You can view the entire world as a vast ocean. All people and things, past, present, and future, are droplets that make up the ocean. The existence of these droplets, as well as the tension between them, is called ‘sin’.”

“The rule is like the moon; it can trigger the tides of the ocean and maintain the operation of this world. The rule itself is also composed of countless droplets and is closely connected to the ocean, often having droplets dissipate into the ocean. And you need to know that the total amount of droplets is constant.”

Qi Si pondered, “When the mass of the ‘moon’ becomes small to a certain extent, it will be unable to trigger the tides of the ‘ocean.’ So, in order to maintain the operation of the world, does the rule need to recover sin from the world?”

“You can understand it that way,” Qi said. “If there is no interference, the rule will one day lose all its sin and head toward destruction. Humans once researched a ‘Law of Entropy Increase’ to explain this trend, called ‘Everything in the whole is moving towards disorder.'”

“I have to say, some of humanity’s research has indeed touched upon the essence of the world. If those Scholars who study ‘quantum mechanics’ entered the Eerie Game, perhaps they could find new evidence for the theory that ‘time does not exist.'”

“Heh, hehe.” Qi Si gave a standard three-part dry laugh. “I’ve heard of these theories. So, in summary, for the sake of world peace, the rule created the Eerie Game?”

“To be precise, it’s for survival.” Qi waved his hand, and the undulating sea of light on the bronze table suddenly collapsed, scattering back into golden light spots and merging into various parts of the temple.

“sin cannot be recovered by itself, so the rule created gods as a bridge between the world and the rule. Gods establish connections with low-dimensional beings, either collecting their faith or making them feel fear and despair. sin breeds in these connections and gathers on the gods.”

—You can take a guess at how the rule collects sin from the gods.

His memory touched upon the note for the 【Sea-God Scepter】: 【After the Sea-God was eaten, the authority was recovered by the rule and scattered throughout the world. From then on, false gods ran rampant, and Ghosts ravaged the human world.】

Qi Si’s expression became strange. “I’ve heard that the closer a creature is to the top of the food chain, the higher its toxin content. Looking at it this way, the rule really isn’t picky about what it eats.”

Qi nodded, tapping the armrest of the high-backed chair with his index finger. “In short, to avoid being eaten, I conspired with the gods to design the Eerie Game, allowing the rule to establish direct contact with low-dimensional beings.”

Qi Si raised an eyebrow. “You designed the Eerie Game?”

Qi imperceptibly changed the subject. “So, as the original designer, I can answer three last questions for you. You don’t have much time left.”

Qi Si knew that Qi did not intend to discuss past events anymore.

Although he had considerable curiosity, he also knew when to stop while he was ahead.

At that, he asked directly, “What exactly is the Identity Card used for?”

Qi lowered his eyes and replied, “It once picked up the faint traces of the Old God’s scattered authority, reflecting the images of gods traveling through time and space, guiding the lost lambs in the Ruins of the Sunset. As for its role in the Eerie Game, you will know the real answer when the Final Dungeon opens.”

Qi Si pressed, “Is it the key to the clearance of the Final Dungeon? Or rather—an invitation to enter the Final Dungeon?”

Qi looked at him with a smile that wasn’t quite a smile. “Is this the second question?”

Qi Si realized that Qi did not want to delve deeper into the Identity Card issue and shook his head decisively.

He turned to take out the 【Sea-God Scepter】 from his inventory. “The second question: how should this item be used? Judging from your experience, collecting sin doesn’t seem like an easy thing.”

Qi said, “The sin in the Eerie Game belongs to the rule. With your status, you cannot steal even a fraction of it. All you can consider is reality. The Sea-God Scepter belongs to the Eerie, and you must use the Eerie to commit evil.”

He reached out and plucked a leaf from the golden vines beside him, played with it in his hand for a few moments, and then casually threw it off the divine throne.

Qi Si raised his hand to catch it, and a scene immediately appeared before his eyes.

In a misty water town, Xu Yao, dressed in a red wedding dress, was kneeling on the ground, praying devoutly.

The image only lasted for a second before it went black. Qi Si saw red flames ignite on his fingertips. The golden leaf curled and reshaped in the firelight, and it was actually burned and cast into a Statue of the Joyous God about half the size of a palm in an eerie way.

The Idol was draped in red and colorful decorations, its colors exceptionally festive, and a pair of pale faces were beautiful and soft, captivating the soul.

【Name: Statue of the Joyous God】

【Type: ##】

【Effect: Transform a village or a town into a ghost domain】

After the clearance of the “Carnivore” instance, Qi Si knew that the Eerie might invade reality, but that was passive and uncontrollable.

The “Dialectical Game” instance reminded him that he had once created an Eerie incident, but that memory was too ethereal, and to this day, it was hard to tell whether it was true or false.

But now, he clearly knew that he would soon be able to actively guide the Eerie into reality, genuinely detonate Eerie incidents in the world he lived in, and create large-scale disasters…

Tamed lambs will only be ignored and sacrificed; only dangerous people have the value of being wooed and respected. Only by possessing the ability to disrupt order can one earn the qualification to sit at the negotiating table.

Regarding where to test the 【Statue of the Joyous God】 item, Qi Si already had a clear choice.

He looked up at the ceiling. “The third question: why do you intervene so much? To tell you the truth, a gambling game where someone cheats frequently is very boring, and you don’t look like a god who can’t afford to lose.”

Qi revealed a smile that could be called gentle and reached out to trace lines of characters on the table. “I once thought of an interesting question. There is a madman who wants to compete with you in killing. Whoever kills more within a limited time wins. If you win, nothing will happen; if you lose, he will destroy the whole world. I want to know, how would you choose?”

Qi Si converted the words into text in his mind, and a strange smile curled on his lips. “Are you asking me? Or—is this our first day meeting?”

Qi remained unmoved. “So, what is your answer?”

Qi Si imagined the scene of the world’s destruction: tsunamis and earthquakes occurring one after another, the earth covered in uneven sores; crowds whose lives were like ants falling in swathes, the putrid water from corpses overflowing into a vibrant green with the texture of an oil painting; gods who did not love the world sitting high on thrones of bones, coldly casting their crimson gaze…

He laughed happily and leaned over the table between them. “Remember to tell me before you destroy the world. I’ll find a place with a good view and watch while eating popcorn.”

Qi laughed, and Qi Si continued to laugh, laughing even louder.

The laughter of the human and the god infected each other, circling and echoing in the dim temple.

Amidst the laughter, Qi’s figure gradually became transparent, and his outlines and details became increasingly unclear.

And at the moment He completely disappeared, the renewal reminder for the Game Space popped up:

【The duration you can stay in the Game Space per session is 1 hour. More time can be exchanged with points.】