Only the “Participants” will be annihilated.
Qi Xia understood that this meant the “Natives” and the “Zodiacs” would not disappear with the End.
“But how do you know the ‘Natives’ haven’t been annihilated?” Qi Xia asked. “Are the ones we see… truly their original selves?”
“I’ve conducted experiments.” Chu Tianqiu smiled. “To figure out whether those lunatics would resurrect, I spent ten months experimenting.”
“Ten months…?” Qi Xia frowned, as if realizing something.
“It’s a dirty story—you probably wouldn’t want to hear it.” Chu Tianqiu chuckled. “We’ve digressed.”
“Keep going…”
Qi Xia shot him a disdainful look. Clearly, Chu Tianqiu was even crazier than he’d imagined.
“As you know, every time we ‘Participants’ die, a completely new version of ourselves reappears…” Chu Tianqiu continued with a serious expression. “So there must come a time when… one day, a man named Old A gains an ‘Echo,’ but he doesn’t witness the End—he dies before the tenth day.”
“Right.” Qi Xia nodded. “That’s a common scenario.”
“Good. Then…” Chu Tianqiu raised his left fist. “Assume this is Old A’s corpse.”
Slowly, he extended his left thumb. “This is the ‘Echo’ Old A once obtained.”
Then, he raised his other fist. “This is a new Old A.”
Again, he extended a thumb. “This is a new ‘Echo.’ Doesn’t this scene strike you as odd?”
Qi Xia stared at the two thumbs-up fists before him, trying to decipher Chu Tianqiu’s point.
Before he could figure it out, Chu Tianqiu asked, “Qi Xia, if ‘people’ can be replicated, can ‘Echoes’ be replicated too?”
“Wait—hold on…” Qi Xia felt like he was being brainwashed by a madman. Thankfully, he quickly snapped out of it and countered, “There’s a flaw in your analogy.”
He pointed at Chu Tianqiu’s left hand. “If this is Old A’s corpse, then his ‘Echo’ should have vanished upon death. Your assumption doesn’t hold.”
“No, no, no…” Chu Tianqiu shook his head. “Qi Xia, that’s the flaw in *your* logic. The ‘Echo’ in Old A’s corpse isn’t ‘gone’—it’s just ‘inaudible.’ Understand?”
“Inaudible…?” Qi Xia paused. “What exactly are you trying to prove with this example?”
“Let me put it this way…” Chu Tianqiu lowered his hands. “I’ve collected many corpses, trying to extract the ‘Echoes’ from them. Unfortunately, this place has no morgue, and the bodies rot within days. So far, I haven’t succeeded.”
Qi Xia was stunned.
“Remember, Qi Xia,” Chu Tianqiu continued, “no matter which ‘Zodiac’ we ask, their answer is always the same—they want to create a ‘god,’ a being as great as Nuwa. So if I can gather *all* the ‘Echoes’ onto myself, I’ll become an omnipotent ‘god.’ At that point, this place won’t need to exist anymore, because the organizers will have achieved their goal.”
Qi Xia’s expression darkened.
He had speculated about Chu Tianqiu’s plans many times, but never imagined the man was *this* deranged—utterly beyond normal reasoning.
He wasn’t collecting 3,600 “Dao,” nor was he trying to conquer all the games.
Instead, he was mass-producing corpses to research a path to godhood.
That’s why he’d sacrifice anyone in his team without hesitation.
But this time… was Chu Tianqiu telling the truth?
“When I become that omnipotent ‘god,’ I can send all of you out.” Chu Tianqiu grinned. “That’s my entire plan. Do we have a deal?”
“So you don’t want to leave—you just want to become a ‘god’?” Qi Xia asked.
“Of course.” Chu Tianqiu nodded cheerfully. “What’s the point of being human? If I have a chance to become the ‘Almighty,’ why would I go back to the real world to grow old and die? Don’t be naive.”
Qi Xia slowly straightened up, instinctively distancing himself from Chu Tianqiu. “But due to the ‘Omnipotence Paradox,’ an ‘Almighty’ can’t exist in this world.”
“The ‘Omnipotence Paradox’ was conceived by humans.” Chu Tianqiu scoffed. “After all, humans can’t comprehend an ‘Almighty.’ They mock its contradictions from their narrow perspective—but why would an ‘Almighty’ need to prove itself to humans? Why would it answer their questions?”
Qi Xia took a deep breath. Only one thought filled his mind now—he was racing against time.
Otherwise, he’d inevitably become a lunatic like Chu Tianqiu.
Chu Tianqiu and Lin Qin were the same: outwardly normal, but harboring utterly insane obsessions.
Lin Qin for seven years, Chu Tianqiu for two.
Waking up day after day in the “Land of the End,” they had gradually discarded their humanity—morality, laws, everything.
So was preserving memories for so long a blessing or a curse?
After a long silence, Qi Xia finally asked, “Chu Tianqiu… what does ‘I have never left’ mean?”
Chu Tianqiu smiled again.
“Qi Xia, I believe I’ve existed since the very creation of the ‘Land of the End.'”
“Oh…?”
“I don’t know how many memories I’ve lost, but I’ve definitely been here for a long time…” Chu Tianqiu sighed bitterly. “Traces of my handwriting are everywhere—some seem years old. It’s as if I was investigating something, but now I can only piece together the results from the remnants I left behind. The reason for the investigation? I can’t recall.”
“Investigation?” Qi Xia knew that if Chu Tianqiu’s “Echo” trigger was truly “witnessing the End,” then investigating alone would be extremely dangerous for him. “What did you find?”
“I once wrote a note with my own hands: ‘I must make Qi Xia obtain an Echo.'” Chu Tianqiu smirked. “Are you… perhaps a stepping stone on my path to godhood?”
“A stepping stone, huh?” Qi Xia smiled back. “Chu Tianqiu, is collaborating with me just a way to create more corpses?”
“No…” Chu Tianqiu shook his head. “It’s not that simple. We can pursue both paths. Right now, through ‘selling food,’ ‘Paradise Gate’ has amassed 2,900 ‘Dao.’ I’ll ‘ascend to godhood,’ you’ll ‘gather Dao’—whatever we do next will increase our chances of escape. Like I said, in this place, only you and I deserve to survive… and walk out alive.”
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