Chapter 10 The New God
"To celebrate this joyous occasion, I'll wash the dishes for you tonight! You can fix the lights in the yard another day."
Ye Xiao was genuinely happy, piling a bunch of food onto Qi An's plate while she herself devoured half a bowl of fried yellow croaker.
After she finished eating and drinking and wiped her mouth, she surprisingly offered to help Xu Zhuoxing with the housework!
Qi An was shocked, and Xu Zhuoxing also raised his eyebrows in surprise.
However, Xu Zhuoxing could understand Ye Xiao's excitement.
The man, who usually looked lazy, sat upright with his back straight today.
As she sat down on the balcony mat, under the dim light overhead, Xu Zhuoxing couldn't help but look down at her palms.
The inner side of this end limb, which retains a human form, has rows of deep and intricate palm lines.
Xu Zhuoxing felt a little unfamiliar with his own palm, as if he hadn't looked at his palm lines carefully for many years.
Indeed, many years have passed. This year is 2060, and his birthday is in February. Tomorrow, he will be exactly 60 years old.
Xu Zhuoxing used to think that no matter how he thought about it, when he turned 60, he would just be an old man waiting to collect his pension.
Who would have thought that when he actually reached the age of sixty, he would look like this, in this situation?
Xu Zhuoxing clenched his palms and placed his fists flat on his knees.
He adjusted his breathing, slowly suppressing his turbulent thoughts and emotions.
Before becoming an astronaut, Xu Zhuoxing was an air force pilot.
His mother died of cancer when he was 9 years old, and his father remarried when he was in the third grade.
In the subtle and hidden torment of malice, the lively little boy grows into a silent young man, and then into a confused and restless teenager.
He was taken back to the countryside by his maternal grandparents, where he met a girl of the same age who later became his wife.
When he met a mentor who was kind, patient, and supportive, he began to think about his future and what kind of person he wanted to become.
He barely made it into an ordinary high school, and in his first high school class, he truly and earnestly etched knowledge into his mind for the first time.
At this moment, Xu Zhuoxing left the confusion of life behind.
The entanglements, constant wariness, competition, and resentment within those families all became as fragile as a paper tiger after he grew into a strong, 1.8-meter-tall boy, after he achieved excellent grades, and after he calmed down to observe and understand the people around him.
He stepped out of the shadows of chaos and into the light, leaping from an ordinary high school into the National Defense University!
In his sophomore year, Xu Zhuoxing passed the Air Force pilot selection with his top-notch physical qualities and strong ability to withstand pressure.
He went from being a flight trainee to a pilot, and then to an astronaut.
He married the woman he loved.
When Xu Zhuoxing's wife, Ruan Mei, saw him off to the special car at the space center, she smiled and said:
"You've become a commander, and I've been promoted to department manager. We're both at the peak of our careers, so you haven't won by much compared to me!"
Xu Zhuoxing laughed and said, "Indeed, indeed."
Ruan Mei smiled and sighed, "Okay, actually yours is better."
Go forth, great hero!
Xu Zhuoxing took his first step, climbed the gangway, and stepped onto the lunar soil! And then... lost everything.
Xu Zhuoxing's loosely clenched fist tightened slightly, and his breathing rhythm was disrupted for a moment, but he immediately suppressed it and regained his composure.
Qi An once asked him, "We discovered forbidden objects in outer space, which triggered a disaster."
Shouldn't we explore the world beyond?
No, no, of course not.
Xu Zhuoxing thought to himself: There is never anything wrong with seeking knowledge, and courage will always be our virtue.
If fate brings us disaster, all we need to do is fight against it.
Once you step into the light, never turn back!
During the grueling G-force training for pilots, Xu Zhuoxing did not back down.
Despite being entangled by the mutated Qiu Yunmeng to the point of having his bones shattered, Xu Zhuoxing still issued a warning to the center of the ground.
The erosion of the will to pollute is like the tide; when the tide recedes, the water level drops, but it leaves behind deep watermarks and countless shells, fish, and shrimp.
Even when Xu Zhuoxing was lucid, he faced intense questioning, unsure whether it was due to the pollution or his own wavering.
Is your ego the real you?
Is your will free will?
Your values are shaped by your upbringing and the education system, like clay being molded!
How much of your emotions, your love and hate, are controlled by the hormones secreted by your human body?
What is the point of your struggle?
Isn't the difference between becoming a hero, protecting the country and the people, and taking on the duties of an origin priest, polluting all of humanity, just one mandatory order and another?
Just because the former took more than 30 years to implant in your brain, while the latter can be covered in just a few minutes, does the latter mean brainwashing or devouring?
Why suffer? Why resist?
All your loved ones are dead, your loved one has died tragically in the pandemic, what is there left for you to cherish in this filthy world?
Let it go, let it go...
This kind of interrogation, this repeated entanglement and torment, has accompanied Xu Zhuoxing for 23 years.
However, in the past 23 years, Xu Zhuoxing has not retreated even a little bit.
There is nothing wrong with seeking knowledge, and courage will always be our virtue.
If fate brings us disaster, all we need to do is fight against it.
Xu Zhuoxing thought that this was indeed a result of the environment and education that shaped his values.
But can't he be proud of that?
He closed his eyes.
The sea breeze stopped for a moment, and the tide became the background music of another world.
The flow of time is frozen, or it is reversing.
His soul split into countless fragments, existing in countless worlds and at countless points in time, only to revert back to its original state.
Existence and repossession seem to be in parallel states, and the division and reunification of the soul seem to be not two separate concepts!
Xu Zhuoxing was momentarily unsure whether he was dead or alive, and he completely lost his sense of time.
But amidst all the ambiguity, he still managed to grasp a certain "reality"!
His existence stabilized, and he "opened his eyes" to find himself in a void.
The thought reached an incredible level, and Qi An appeared before Xu Zhuoxing's "eyes," along with the scene of Qi An chatting with him.
Qi An had long ago described to him this void, which was neither above nor below, terrifying, and whose nature was incomprehensible.
But Qi An couldn't understand it, while Xu Zhuoxing understood it the moment he arrived.
This place is completely different from the physical reality we inhabit; perhaps it's a reflection of our present world, or perhaps it's some other universe...
This is pure consciousness, pure spirit!
This is the source space of pollution. All humans who have mutated in the present world, and all fallen insects, are nodes in this space invading the present world!
No, it's not space invading the present world, but something in this space invading the present world.
Xu Zhuoxing "looked up".
He should no longer have a head; he has no physical form. All existence is embodied through his cognition and understanding.
Something he understood—something as large as a mountain, something wriggling—had appeared beside him without him noticing.
In an instant, Xu Zhuoxing gained recognition.
This is the spirit of the fallen insects.
This is where the will to pollute comes from.
This is the "Divine Realm".
When a human completely overcomes the will of this god, he/she becomes qualified to enter the "divine realm".
He became the new god!
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