“What do you mean by ‘wild growth’…?” Dr. Zhao frowned and asked, “Didn’t you say these things were hair?”
“Can’t ‘hair’ ‘grow wildly’?” Chu Tianqiu countered. “When someone’s ‘hair’ is imbued with ‘hardening’ and ‘tracking,’ all it takes is a ‘wild growth’ to turn it into a perfect weapon.”
Chu Tianqiu blew lightly on the powder in his hand, then walked to the window and gazed at the ochre sun in the sky.
From behind that sun stretched countless thin black threads, now shrouding the entire sky. These eerie strands of hair not only possessed extreme resilience but had also thickened significantly.
Without touching them firsthand, one would never mistake them for hair—they looked more like black filaments.
Squinting at the dim sun, Chu Tianqiu murmured, “Hair growing from the sun… So, are you the ‘Mother Goddess’ Aunt Tong spoke of?”
The ‘Mother Goddess’ resembled a massive sphere covered in black threads, now floating midair, brandishing the countless strands atop her head as she slaughtered her own people.
Han Yimo overheard Chu Tianqiu’s whisper and slowly raised his head to look at the sun.
“Is there something strange about the sun in the sky?” Han Yimo asked.
“Isn’t she beautiful?”
Chu Tianqiu’s simple question caught Han Yimo off guard.
“I… always thought the sun here was beautiful…” Han Yimo seemed entranced, murmuring in the same low tone, “It’s like… it’s like…”
“An eye,” Dr. Zhao said. “It looks like a giant eye.”
The three nodded in unison. The ochre sun, surrounded by faint black threads now creeping inward, indeed resembled a massive eyeball, with the threads resembling sprawling blood vessels across its surface.
What should have been a pure white sclera, under the crimson sky of the ‘Land of End,’ took on an eerie ochre hue.
But when had it started?
When had the sky stopped being blue, replaced by this grotesque, enormous ochre eyeball rising into the heavens?
“So, our every move is being watched by a giant eye,” Han Yimo muttered. “The ‘Eye of God’… What lies behind it?”
“But where is the ‘pupil’…?” Dr. Zhao murmured. “Such a massive eyeball, yet it has no pupil.”
It wasn’t surprising. If the colossal eye had a pupil, the ‘Participants’ might have realized long ago that it wasn’t the sun.
Precisely because it was an ochre sclera, hanging in the sky, it perfectly mimicked the sun.
The two men felt Chu Tianqiu had indeed opened their minds to a deranged line of thought—once they accepted that everything here could be explained by ‘Echoes,’ nothing seemed ‘impossible.’
“A giant, pupil-less eyeball…” Chu Tianqiu narrowed his eyes, deep in thought. “The ‘Eye of God’… Could this be my ‘Path’…?”
“Your path…?”
The two turned to Chu Tianqiu simultaneously.
“What a magnificent path of destruction…” Chu Tianqiu let out a hoarse laugh. “This is the path to ‘godhood’…”
“Godhood…”
“Gentlemen, I intend to ‘become a god,'” Chu Tianqiu declared. “I will gather every ‘Echo’ in this place and ascend to supremacy.”
His words darkened the expressions of the other two. They had joined ‘Paradise Entrance’ with the ultimate goal of escape, yet their leader had no intention of leaving at all.
“Don’t be alarmed,” Chu Tianqiu continued. “Once I become the supreme being here, I can freely decide your fates. But until I achieve ‘godhood,’ I still need your help.”
Dr. Zhao frowned and pondered for a moment before asking, “Why us? ‘Paradise Entrance’ is full of capable individuals. Why choose us specifically?”
“Because I care too much about the others,” Chu Tianqiu said with a smile. “I couldn’t bear to harm any of them. So, it has to be you two.”
“What—”
“The path to godhood is never smooth… I need formidable allies.” Chu Tianqiu’s gaze shifted from Dr. Zhao to Han Yimo. “And you two are the ones I’ve chosen. I will step on your shattered bones to reach the summit.”
“You’re insane…” Dr. Zhao muttered, dazed. “Do you even hear yourself? Is this how you ‘seek cooperation’? You become a ‘god’ by trampling over us—what kind of madness would make us agree to this?”
“Don’t fear death,” Chu Tianqiu said. “Here, you can fear anything—except death.”
Seeing their silence, Chu Tianqiu placed a hand on each of their shoulders.
“Normal people choose spears and shields as their tools. But I prefer cannons and explosives. You two are my cannons and explosives—shatter what can be shattered, and if something can’t be destroyed, we’ll take it down with us.”
Han Yimo let out a bitter laugh. “Chu Tianqiu, I thought you might be the ‘Savior.’ Turns out, you’re the ‘Destroyer.'”
“That’s an excellent thought,” Chu Tianqiu chuckled. “Only by maintaining that belief will I stand toe-to-toe with Qi Xia at the critical moment. Remember, you need not fear death—but you should fear me.”
With that, he reached into his coat pocket and slowly pulled out a string of something blood-red.
Han Yimo and Dr. Zhao gasped, instinctively taking half a step back.
In their eyes, Chu Tianqiu’s madness had reached new heights.
In his hand was a string of foul-smelling, rotting, pus-covered eyeballs.
The eyes seemed to belong to different people, varying in size and appearance, but all oozing blood. Strung together like a necklace, there were about a dozen of them.
He ran his fingers over the necklace, smearing his palm with thick black blood, then swept his hair back, revealing his bloodstained forehead. With a single finger, he drew a bloody mark between his brows.
His disheveled locks, now held in place by the blood, gave him a wild appearance. He then removed his glasses and tossed them aside.
His aura had shifted.
At first, he had merely seemed eccentric—now, even his appearance had become grotesque.
Before Han Yimo and Dr. Zhao could speak, Chu Tianqiu draped the eyeball necklace around his neck. His pristine shirt was instantly stained with filthy blood, completing the image of the ‘Destroyer’ Han Yimo had described.
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