Chapter 1105: Dolgod — A Miraculous Place |
"This is..."
"As you can see, Zangier has resumed his role as the Doomsday Hanged Man. And everything before you is the [Truth] experiment he does best."
Aph Ros gazed up at the inverted Zangier hanging in the great hall of the tribunal, circling beneath it as He marveled:
"That puppet master truly has a brilliant mind. In merely three or five visits, he found a Time Knot void anchor point on this land that [Time] had exiled.
I'm sure you're wondering what a 'Time Knot void anchor point' is..."
Aph Ros was in rare high spirits, playfully taking on the role of a researcher as He introduced the setup.
Though most of the terms coming out of His mouth were things Wei Mu had said to Him at the time.
His mind flashed back. The puppet master had once stood in this very spot, pointing at a place in midair, and said:
"Lord Aph Ros — without Lord Yu Xi divulging any specifics, I cannot deduce what [Void]'s escape route actually is. But I do have some expertise when it comes to researching [Truth].
Fortunately, Dolgod isn't just the homeland of [Birth]'s followers — it's also [Time]'s prison. And that gives our concept a chance.
If we borrow a single 'brick' from [Time]'s prison 'wall' to build our experiment ground, we could potentially harness [Time]'s power for a [Truth] experiment.
To be specific — [Time]'s power has different properties: continuity, reversal, loops, acceleration, deceleration... We just need to try a few spots and find a void anchor point with the 'expansion' property. Then, using [Time]'s marvel, we could stretch time within the experiment ground infinitely — turning one day in Dolgod into one year inside the lab.
This way, within our current timeframe, we could witness far longer experimental progressions.
I call this void anchor point a Time Knot.
This is my personal insight from studying [Time]. I once envisioned finding such a point to accelerate my own growth. Unfortunately, I had neither [Time]'s power to borrow nor any Authority of my own.
But here... I could help You... give it a try."
Wei Mu never hid his intentions. He was the shrewdest player of all — even when forced to work for Yu Xi, he seized every chance to conduct useful experiments of his own.
And everything he did sprang from genuine will — which, in essence, was desire. In Aph Ros's eyes, such behavior wouldn't be rejected — only encouraged.
So Aph Ros agreed. And that "brick" was indeed found by Wei Mu.
Returning to the present — after Aph Ros finished recounting the esoteric theory, He wanted to see how these three would react. Would they show the same hint of astonishment He'd felt back then?
After all, He'd been imprisoned for countless ages. This was the first time He'd turned [Time]'s power against Him, and the shock had been real.
Yet of the three before Him, Wang Weijin's eyes blazed with excitement, Galusha arched a curious brow — and despite slight surprise, both seemed to fully comprehend.
Only Cheng Shi blinked, his gaze as clear and guileless as Aph Ros's own had once been.
Aph Ros felt warm. Just as He'd thought — only His brother truly understood Him.
But Cheng Shi wasn't thinking about that at all. His mind was entirely on the Benefactor with the black-hole pupils — [Time].
'Isn't this just time relativity?'
'What the hell did Wei Mu do before the game descended?'
Knowing and doing were different things. Doing and building were different things. Most people could be called clever for merely recognizing something they saw. But someone who transplanted real-world science into the game and achieved unity of knowledge and action...
No wonder he was the untouchable number one on the Road to Ascension.
'What a magnificent sacrifice he'd make. How could [Void] not want him?'
While Cheng Shi sighed over this Wise Man's inability to shoulder some of the Fixed Destiny's burden, Wang Weijin and Galusha had already moved close to the inverted Zangier to carefully observe the experiment.
Though Zangier was suspended at the void anchor point, his frame wasn't nearly as colossal as when Cheng Shi first saw him in deep space. Now he was only slightly larger than a normal human, and those eyes of alternating sun and moon appeared hazy and indistinct through the warped flow of time.
As for the Far Dusk Town he held aloft — no details were visible whatsoever.
The two could only vaguely sense that within those cascading torrents of time, countless lives rose and fell. As they were born and perished, the faith in Zangier's eyes hadn't grown more substantial. But the mask on his face — equally distorted by time — had grown ever brighter.
"...Why is there a mask here?!"
Wang Weijin had held back as long as he could, but couldn't resist the question. Even knowing the inquiry might invite Wei Zhi's scorn, he was too curious. He strongly suspected this mask was the very reason two opposing faiths had blended so seamlessly.
Galusha, wearing Wei Zhi's skin, didn't know either. She likewise couldn't figure it out — but to her credit, she held her tongue.
At minimum, the [Folly] follower claimed the moral high ground of silent disdain once again.
What neither could have imagined was that not even Wei Mu himself could have understood this scene — because it hadn't been part of his design. Aph Ros had done this personally.
Though Aph Ros had hoped to achieve faith fusion through [Truth]'s methodology, His recent observations told Him this experiment would produce two new Wild Gods at best — nowhere near fulfilling His dream.
Since it was useless to Him, He might as well plan for His brother Yu Xi.
So, during a dull intermission between cycles, He casually placed a mask on Zangier's face and, through the experiment's mechanisms, propagated a god called "Yu Xi" among the experimental world's inhabitants.
He understood faith. He knew Yu Xi was reclaiming old power. So He wanted to accelerate the condensation of faith through this method.
What He hadn't expected was that as the name of Yu Xi blazed ever brighter in the experimental world, the previously incompatible faiths of [Birth] and [Corruption] actually began to show signs of merging!
This left Aph Ros with one undeniable confirmation: in this [Void] era, faiths truly could merge — and they'd done so under the influence of [Void]'s ruler, [Deceit]!
Even opposing faiths!
And the timing of this act coincided precisely with Cheng Shi's return from San Dales, when he'd noticed the Divinity dripping rate in his [Deceit] container accelerating.
So it had never been someone spreading Yu Xi's name among the players. It was Aph Ros, quietly nurturing an entire town of Yu Xi followers within Dolgod!
If one were to ask where Yu Xi's faithful were most numerous right now, the answer was clear.
Dolgod.
A miraculous place, tied to Cheng Shi in a thousand invisible ways.
...