Chapter 454: Beautiful New World (HE Ending: Dawn of Civilization)

Inside the conference room of the Jiangcheng Ghost Investigation Bureau, images of the Shangri-La Snow Mountain, captured by surveillance satellites, were projected onto a large screen.

The millennia-old glacier stood silently, unchanged, devoid of human figures or ghosts, solitary as it had been since ancient times. At a certain moment, the image on the screen vanished without warning, replaced by a vast, blank expanse of white. People knew then that the final wager had begun.

From this point on, no one could know what exactly was happening on the snow mountain; they could only wait anxiously for the outcome.

No one spoke, for any words seemed insufficiently solemn for the situation; everyone remained silent, believing that even if humanity was about to be destroyed, the final words should not come from them.

“Tick, tock, tick, tock…” The mechanical clock installed in the conference room at the turn of the century chimed at an irritating frequency, yet no one rose to turn it off. Under immense pressure, even movement was forgotten; people sat like statues, staring motionless at the screen.

After an unknown period, the sound of rain began outside the window. Starting as a light drizzle, it quickly escalated within seconds into a torrential downpour, sheeting down relentlessly.

Gray-black skies stretched for ten thousand miles, thick with heavy clouds. A massive curtain of water poured down like a waterfall, as if an ocean suspended in the air had been inverted onto the land. Fierce winds howled, stirring up huge waves, and enormous raindrops swirled in the air. The mythical flood that swallowed the world must have been heralded by such a sight, shamelessly venting the wrath of the gods.

The silver-white eye at the center of the dome wept blood and tears, then tightly shut the next second, transforming into a white streak slicing across the sky. The mysterious and eerie aura dissipated at a perceptible speed, like the pristine contrail left by a passing aircraft, spreading, fading under the dilution of the rain, and merging into the gray sky.

The “pitter-patter” of the rain obscured all other noise, becoming the sole requiem between heaven and earth. The spiritual rain fell in every corner, striking the white glass of churches, the gray walls of factory smokestacks, the black roofs of towns… Raindrops smashed onto the ground, splashing up immense fog, heavily grinding over man-made structures and natural landscapes across the land. Everything and everyone was painted in the gray-white of a funeral. A profound sorrow flowed through the water and poured into the soul of every person, and thus they all knew of the death of the god, shedding uncontrollable tears for it.

“Is the Ancestral God dead?” a council member asked, choking up. “This rain is just like the rain that fell in Jiangcheng half a month ago…”

No one knew the exact answer. Electronic equipment suffered severe malfunctions in the rain; the lights flickered twice as if from a bad connection, and the conference room plunged into complete darkness. The projection screen went black, the air conditioning and ventilation systems ceased operation, and the mechanical clock’s “tick-tock” continued at an unwavering frequency, sounding as if it would tick on until the end of time.

All surveillance satellites simultaneously went offline. Not only could they not observe the situation in Shangri-La, but they also had no idea what was happening in other cities. Yet, everyone could feel the extraordinary nature of the rain descending upon the world.

They held their breath, waiting silently and peacefully for judgment to arrive, like corpses lying in a coffin waiting to be buried by the dirt. They waited and waited, until lines of silver-white text suddenly appeared in the darkness before their eyes, accompanied by a solemn and majestic voice:

【In the Land where the God Fell, all strangeness, mystery, and absurdity, past and future, shall perish.】

The declaration of the rule was as cold and detached as always, yet it served as the final verdict for the last wager. People finally knew the outcome, and it was by no means disappointing; on the contrary, it signified immense surprise and hope.

The council members disregarded their usual reserve, standing up one after another to embrace each other. Faces streaming with tears under the residual influence of the god’s demise did not seem out of place in this scene.

They incoherently relayed the news to one another: “The Ancestral God is really dead! Lin Jue won! Humanity is victorious… It feels just like a dream.”

Yes, it was like a dream. Although they had placed Lin Jue as their last hope, they had never imagined that he could truly accomplish this almost impossible feat. After all, that was the Ancestral God—completely different from the Sea God or Si Qi.

How did he do it? What price did he pay? Will he ever return? How should they face him next?

On any normal day, upon learning that Lin Jue had achieved another great feat, certain dissatisfied council members would inevitably scheme about how to use political maneuvers to diminish his gains.

But now, beneath the torrential rain brought by the death of a god, private desires, no matter how elaborately adorned, seemed dark and contemptible. Individual pettiness was so small and weak in the face of absolute grandeur.

It was like how people might deem a lighthouse at sea insufficiently bright and then try to dismantle or modify it, yet they would never conceive of questioning the sun, because the sun is simply the sun.

The council members recalled their past actions and felt nothing but shame. They thought that when Lin Jue returned, whether he was a calculating schemer or a selfless rationalist, they would be willing to let him take the highest position and control the future course of the massive ship named “Humanity.”

Of course, by then, things would likely no longer be up to them. They were not power-hungry individuals; if Lin Jue wished it, they could resign due to fault.

Three consecutive hours of heavy rain created extensive standing water. The cold rainwater poured into the Ghost Investigation Bureau building, washing the ground floor slick and wet.

Electronic devices gradually recovered as time passed. Soaked in damp moisture, the council members operated the surveillance satellites with trembling hands.

Images from various prefectures and cities were transmitted back: the entire world was raining. The death of the Ancestral God caused an impact far greater than the death of the Sea God. Centered on the Shangri-La Snow Mountain, the scope of the God-Fallen Land extended infinitely in all directions, eventually covering the entire world.

Leaves that had fallen into the dust flew back to their withered branches. An old locust tree, chopped down to the ground, trembled, its gnarled limbs slowly straightening and reattaching to the uneven stump. Fine granulation tissue sprouted on the surface of a skeleton lying in a foul ditch, weaving layers of fresh flesh and blood. A man, whole and intact, stood up by leaning on a utility pole, looking around in confusion.

“Why is it raining? Why am I lying here?” Countless men, women, and children resurrected from the brink of death across the globe voiced similar questions.

“I distinctly remember being in class at school…”

“Yeah, I remember lying comfortably in bed. Was I sleepwalking?”

Countless ghosts and monsters returned to human form, and countless corpses came back to life. They exchanged glances, found no answers, and groggily headed toward their respective homes.

“What heavy rain. Let’s go home, go home, get some sleep, and rest…”

“See you tomorrow, see you tomorrow…”

In Long Commandery Magic City, an old man with a hunched back pushed a tricycle, walking against the flow of people in the rain curtain. His shoes had unknowingly slipped off, and he stepped barefoot into puddles, stopping hurried pedestrians one by one.

“Have you seen my granddaughter? She only comes up to my waist, and she wears pigtails…” He asked, his face wrinkled with worry, over and over again.

As he questioned the tenth person, a clear, young voice suddenly rang out from behind his ear: “Grandpa, why aren’t you wearing shoes?”

The little girl in the floral dress reached out and grabbed the corner of the old man’s clothes, tugging confusedly. The old man turned around and clearly saw the girl’s face, causing his already wrinkled face to wrinkle further. He grinned uncontrollably, hugging the girl as if he held the entire world: “My good girl, where did you run off to? Grandpa was so worried…”

“Grandpa, I had a really strange dream! There was a very tall, huge snow mountain in the dream!”

“What is a snow mountain like? Grandpa has never seen one in his life.”

“The snow mountain is… hmm, I forgot! But I remember Grandpa promised to catch butterflies for me!”

“Alright. When the rain stops, Grandpa will take my good girl to catch butterflies!”

…One year later, inside the lounge of the Ghost Investigation Bureau Shangri-La Branch.

Lin Chen sat on the sofa, holding his phone to his ear, his tone light: “Mom, everything is fine here. My colleagues are easy to get along with, and the cafeteria food is delicious. I just got promoted to permanent staff recently and signed a ninety-nine-year contract, so it’s a stable job… Mom, don’t worry, it’s definitely legitimate. Our rank is higher than all other departments; we have the Public Security Bureau and the armed forces cooperating with us on every mission… Are you talking about Qi Si? After graduating from university, everyone has their own things to worry about. How would he have time to pay attention to me? I shouldn’t bother him either. Besides, our work has confidentiality requirements… Girlfriend? Not yet. My work and life aren’t stable yet, and the organization has rules; there’s no rush for that…”

After dealing with his parents’ concerns, Lin Chen hung up the phone and gave a self-deprecating smile.

His parents were the most honest and simple people, cut off from news, unaware of the connection between Qi Si and Si Qi, or how many sins their own son carried.

He maintained his parents’ misunderstanding, only reporting good news and hiding the bad, presenting an image of peaceful times. Unconsciously, he had learned the skill of lying without batting an eye.

A year ago, the severe pain of being pierced through the heart had not yet faded. When Lin Chen opened his eyes again, he found himself standing in the downpour, completely unharmed.

He couldn’t sense the existence of his ID badge. He watched blankly as the strange scenes around him twisted, changed color under the cleansing rain, and gradually returned to normal, only then realizing:

The final instance had truly ended, and the Strange Game had completely vanished from this world.

This could certainly be called a good ending. Lin Chen felt genuine joy. He hitchhiked, worked odd jobs, and borrowed money all the way, finally crossing the ocean from North America back to Jiangcheng. There, he encountered the Ghost Investigation Bureau, which was mobilizing former players to participate in post-war recovery efforts.

Yes, although all people and objects affected by the strange phenomena were restored, the prolonged chaos had still created many havens of sin and corruption, leading to the emergence of many criminals who tried to take advantage of the situation. Buildings destroyed by artillery fire also needed repair.

Furthermore, just as the strange phenomena had disappeared in almost all regions worldwide, a barrier composed of wind and snow appeared in Shangri-La, enclosing the entire snow mountain and isolating it from the world. People nearby found it difficult to cross the wind and snow, yet they often dreamed of demons and monsters. When they occasionally looked toward the snow mountain, they saw ranks of corpses and looming ghost shadows.

The Ghost Investigation Bureau suspected that some strange entities were hiding atop the snow mountain, capable of resurfacing at any moment. Moreover, Lin Jue had never returned since entering the mountain, and no one knew if he was alive or dead. Everyone felt that a Sword of Damocles hung over their heads, unresolved.

They intended to recruit a group of brave players to investigate the snow mountain. Lin Chen volunteered, and after his identity was recognized, he was immediately pulled in to sign a ninety-nine-year service contract.

The salary and benefits were quite good, but the daily work was relatively dangerous. Lin Chen took it as penance for his past actions.

Someone once expressed sympathy for Lin Chen, saying that he had been deceived by Qi Si from beginning to end, so why should he still be implicated by him now?

Lin Chen, however, earnestly refuted this: “It’s not like that. Even if I could start over, I would still make the same choice. Qi Si saved my life three times. My three lives belong to Qi Si, and I must, absolutely must, repay him.”

He didn’t agree with Qi Si’s actions, but he couldn’t change them. He would just consider that one of his sins was being atoned for on behalf of Qi Si.

“Lin Chen, are you ready? We’re setting off!” Li Yunyang shouted loudly through the walkie-talkie, dressed in a thick protective suit.

Lin Chen put away his phone, pulled the protective mask over his face, zipped up his protective suit, and replied, “I’m ready. I’ll join the assembly now.”

The team heading into the mountain crossed the boundary of the mountaineering preparation area and advanced into the snow mountain. The barrier formed by wind and snow seemed insurmountable, yet it was only so for ordinary people. The men and women who were once players easily passed through this natural chasm and stepped onto the steep slopes at the foot of the mountain.

Ice and snow had sealed time. The footprints left by former climbers were embedded in the mountain path, their scattered impressions clearly visible.

Led by Li Yunyang, Lin Chen and the others followed behind, trudging forward against the mountain wind blowing down from the peak, stepping in the footprints of those who came before.

The distant ice wall showed a strange, weapon-like splay, as if forcibly split open by some power, or perhaps deliberately yielding a path to either side. Tiny icicles grew on the glacier, intertwining new ice shards into the original ice walls. At first glance, the glacier cluster resembled an ice flower blooming around a central flat ground.

On the flat ground stood a crystal-clear ice sculpture, clearly a corpse covered in ice and snow, which had rapidly solidified into a hard statue in the severe cold of tens of degrees below zero. It was fixed forever in the moment of death, unchanged even as the years and seasons passed.

The mountain team approached silently, realizing it was the corpse of a man kneeling on one knee. His hands tightly gripped an ancient bronze sword, which had precisely pierced his own heart. The blood froze the instant it flowed, and through the translucent ice shell, its gilded color could faintly be seen.

That was the blood of a god.

Fear of corpses is a human instinct, yet everyone who saw this body felt no revulsion. Instead, they instinctively maintained silence, as if attending a funeral and offering the most sincere mourning to the sacrifice.

The residual effects of the god’s demise were negligible after a year of settling, leaving only the cold wind whipping ice chips around the frozen body, tracing irregular patterns on the ice layer below.

Li Yunyang gazed at the corpse. After a quarter hour of silence, she said softly, “It is Senior Lin Jue. He became the Ancestral God, then killed himself, transforming the entire world into a God-Fallen Land, insulated from all strange phenomena.”

Lin Chen was also silent. He thought of the few rare interactions he had with Lin Jue. His initial reverence was too vague, and later confrontations were always filled with hostility and vigilance. For a long time, he was unable to truly understand Lin Jue, instead being swept away by his emotions.

Over the past year, because Lin Jue’s whereabouts were unknown, humanity, having just been saved from annihilation, resumed its tradition of conspiracy theories. Many busybodies maliciously speculated, arguing that a person of Lin Jue’s caliber should naturally harbor greater ambitions, so how could he possibly plan wholeheartedly for humanity?

But now, the facts proved that humanity did not understand Lin Jue as well as they thought they did. Perhaps few could truly grasp why Lin Jue, who clearly had the qualifications to become the Ancestral God and create a new world, chose death instead, solely for the sake of humanity.

Lin Chen couldn’t help but think that if he were in that position, he would probably make the same choice. Because he wanted his parents to live, and he wanted the teachers and classmates who had treated him kindly to live. Therefore, no matter how much ugliness and filth existed in this world, he did not wish for its destruction.

The howling wind and snow seemed to subside. Pure white heavenly light filtered through the gray snow mist, illuminating a small patch of the world. The latecomers and the ice sculpture were bathed in the same glow, their expressions blurring in the light and shadow.

Someone turned toward the ice sculpture, raised a hand, and saluted. Soon, everyone else successively raised their hands, unanimously offering a salute.