The incandescent lights in the interrogation room hummed overhead. Zhou Zheng was strapped to a specially designed chair, the nano-locking rings on his wrists and ankles gleaming coldly.
Long Wu leaned against the door, his heavy sword resting diagonally beside him. The dragon blood that had not been wiped off the blade condensed into dark red spots under the light. Chu Yao stood in front of the terminal, her fingertips jumping rapidly on the holographic screen. A light blue stream of data flowed down her hair like a string of breathing stars.
Lin Yi pulled over a metal chair and sat down, resting his elbows on the table and his knuckles against his chin.
He stared into Zhou Zheng's bluish eyes—the marks of long-term use of nerve sedatives and the sign of years of being gnawed by fear.
"Three years ago, when I killed my first mutated wolf in the newbie village, were you watching the live stream in the monitoring room?" His voice was soft, but the last syllable sounded like an ice pick. "Last month, when we were repairing the spacetime rift in the Northern Desert, did you use sixteen satellites to track my coordinates?"
Zhou Zheng's Adam's apple bobbed violently, and sweat from his forehead slid down his temples and into his collar.
He stared at the silver-blue light patterns flowing in Lin Yi's eyes, which was the unique energy manifestation of a mythical-level profession, like a sharp blade that could cut through all lies.
“You…you can’t know.” His voice trembled. “They say everyone who knows the truth goes mad, they say you will…”
"What will happen?" Lin Yi suddenly leaned forward and placed his palm on the table.
Invisible ripples of time and space spread across the tabletop, and spiderweb-like cracks instantly crawled all over the metal edge.
Zhou Zheng felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He could clearly see the lock ring on his wrist twisting—not a physical deformation, but an illusion of time being stretched, as if the lock ring would turn into a pile of rusty scrap iron or an uncast metal blank in the next second.
"Bang!"
Long Wu's heavy sword suddenly slammed into the ground.
The dragon-blooded awakener tilted his head, a golden glint flashing in his pupils: "The boss is asking you a question." He deliberately emphasized the word "boss," his tone carrying a hint of mocking threat—back in the newbie village, it was this very blade that cleaved through thirty rampaging mutated beasts, and the dragon patterns on the blade still bear fragments of the first boss monster's crystal core.
Zhou Zheng finally broke down.
He trembled violently, tears and snot splattering on his chest, but he stared intently at the faint, almost invisible silver mark between Lin Yi's eyebrows—a divine mark left when the Time and Space Master awakened, and also the unique mark of "Subject 0" in the Bureau's confidential files.
"You...you really are Zero?!" he suddenly screamed. "Impossible! When the lab exploded back then, you clearly..."
"Go on," Lin Yi said. His voice was like a piece of iron pressed on a fire, calm on the surface but burning red-hot inside.
He could feel that from the moment he came into contact with Zhou Zheng, the fragmented images in the other's memory were being reassembled in his mind: people in white coats cheering at the incubation chamber, red data jumping on the monitoring screen showing "0 - Spacetime compatibility rate 99.7%", and an old man wearing a caduceus badge stroking his chin and saying, "This child's timeline is too clean, so clean that it doesn't seem like a natural product."
“The Administration… was established in the 1970s by the military in conjunction with several ancient martial arts families.” Zhou Zheng sobbed, each word sounding like shards of glass. “It’s specifically for managing those… ‘unnatural vessels’ who suddenly awaken abilities. We collect, control, research, and, when necessary… eliminate them.” He looked up at Lin Yi, the fear in his eyes turning into a desperate piety. “But you’re different. You’re Number 0, the ‘perfect vessel’ they’ve selected globally over thirty-seven years. The Faith Project… the Faith Project is to cultivate you into…”
"That's enough," Chu Yao suddenly said.
Her terminal projected a string of green code, and her usually calm voice was unusually tense: "Coordinate location complete." A 3D model of the Qinling Mountains appeared on the holographic screen, and a certain encrypted underground area was flashing red light. "According to the transportation records in his memory, the Bureau's core database is here, as well as... the original files of the Faith Project."
Lin Yi stood up and gently traced the cracks on the table with his fingertips.
The ripples of time and space spread out again, and the cracks healed instantly, as if they had never existed—this is [Time Reversal (Micro)], a basic technique for manipulating time and space that only mythical-level professions can master.
"Long Wu, prepare three stealth vehicles and twenty elite time-space legions." He turned to Chu Yao, the light patterns in his eyes growing clearer. "You stay at the camp and use satellites to monitor the interdimensional fluctuations along the route. If there are any remnants of the Mother Nest or other invaders..."
"Understood." Chu Yao nodded, swiping her finger across the terminal to confirm. "I will activate quantum encryption to ensure your communications are not intercepted."
Long Wu had already shouldered his heavy sword, and the dragon pattern on the scabbard glowed with golden light under the stimulation of his dragon blood: "Boss, I've asked Ah Hu and the others to upgrade the protective shields of the stealth vehicles to the highest level, and to equip each vehicle with three space-type supporters." He paused, then grinned, "Back in the newbie village, you led me to kill the boss monster, now it's my turn to protect you."
Seeing this, Zhou Zheng suddenly let out a sigh that sounded almost like a sob: "It's no use you going... There's a mythical-level defensive formation there, and..."
"That's why we're going." Lin Yi interrupted him, turning and walking towards the door.
Moonlight streamed in through the window, casting a long shadow on his back. "If even I can't break through, then there's no point in this world existing."
The night grew deeper.
Lin Yi stood on the hill outside the camp, watching the lights of the hidden energy vehicle in the distance disappear into the depths of the dense forest like a string of flowing stars.
He pulled out the pale blue inhibitor from his pocket. In the moonlight, tiny shimmering fragments of light seemed to float in the liquid—the same color as the contamination of the Mother Nest core, the serpent staff on the Bureau's badge, and the ecstasy of the white-coated officers in his memory.
"Your current state..."
A familiar voice came from behind me.
Lin Yi did not turn around. He could smell a faint sandalwood scent on the other person—it was Xuan Mingzi.
The original game mastermind's avatar spoke with an unusual hesitation, like a feather floating in the wind, wanting to fall but afraid of disturbing the dust.
A mountain breeze swept up a fallen leaf, brushing past Lin Yi's ear.
He put the inhibitor into his pocket, his fingertips gently rubbing his palm—where the scarlet words "Destroy the World" still lingered in Zhou Zheng's memory.
"I need to know all the possible risks before dawn tomorrow," he said, his voice filled with unwavering certainty, without any questioning.
Xuanmingzi's sigh was swept away by the wind.
Under the moonlight, only two overlapping shadows remained, like two swords about to be drawn, trembling slightly in the night.
The mountain wind, carrying the sound of pine trees, swept across the hillside, and Xuanmingzi's shadow was stretched long and thin in the moonlight, like a solidified ink mark.
As he raised his hand, half of the bronze-lustered pattern on his sleeve was visible—it was the core code left behind by the game's mainframe, which was now slightly burning with his emotions.
“You should remember the pain you felt when your left arm was torn off by the mutated book spirit in the library three years ago, the day 'Infinite' descended.” His voice was as gentle as a leaf falling on the water. “Remember the torrential rain in the newbie village, when you carried the unconscious Long Wu for twenty miles along the mountain road, the smell of blood when your knees were worn raw and exposed to the bone.”
Lin Yi had his back to him, and his Adam's apple bobbed.
The wind ruffled the stray hairs on his forehead, revealing the pale silver divine mark between his brows—the mark of the ruler of time and space, which was now glowing slightly with his heartbeat.
He remembers it perfectly clearly.
I remember Long Wu had a high fever of 41 degrees Celsius at the time, and the awakening reaction of the dragon blood in his body almost burned through his skin; I remember gritting my teeth and chewing up the hemostatic grass and applying it to my teammates' wounds, the bloody taste mixed with the grass juice made my mouth bitter.
Those pains, those burning desires, those hopes clung to on the edge of death, are like marks etched into the bones.
"But what about now?" Xuan Mingzi took a half-step forward, the sandalwood scent mixed with the burnt smell of code filling Lin Yi's nostrils. "You can turn back time three seconds to repair severed limbs, tear open spatial rifts to cross continents, and sense the coordinates of interdimensional invaders as if they were your own heartbeat." His fingertip lightly touched the back of Lin Yi's neck—there was a pale blue birthmark there, shaped like an unopened spatial rift. "When pain, fear, vulnerability—these 'human' anchors—disappear, what guarantees you won't become... the weapon they desire?"
Lin Yi turned around.
Moonlight shone into his eyes, and the silvery-blue patterns of light moved as if they were alive.
He saw his own reflection in Xuan Mingzi's pupils, the boy who had been chased by mutated wolves and climbed a tree in the newbie village, the madman who used his body to block the spatial turbulence in the spacetime rift, was now shrouded in mythical light patterns, like a god walking out of the river of time.
“I saved Long Wu three years ago because he was my brother,” he said, his voice flat yet as hot as a red-hot iron. “Now I want to save this world because… there are people here I want to protect.”
Xuanmingzi looked at him and suddenly laughed.
His smile held a hint of relief mixed with bitterness: "I should have known. Someone like you... will never be bound by rules." He raised his hand and brushed it across Lin Yi's shoulder, a faint light flashing across the bronze patterns. "Go. I've helped you break through the first three layers of the Qinling Base's defensive formation." As soon as he finished speaking, his figure vanished like smoke in the wind, leaving not even a shadow.
The roar of engines could be heard from the foot of the hill.
Long Wu's voice drifted up on the wind: "Boss! The stealth vehicle is ready. Ah Hu and the others have activated the anti-stealth shield to its maximum, and the space-type brothers have already set up the teleportation array inside the vehicle!"
Lin Yi touched the inhibitor in his pocket, then turned and walked down the hill.
The eerie blue lights of twenty stealth vehicles formed a galaxy in the night. Long Wu stood beside the lead vehicle, his heavy sword slung across his back. The dragon pattern on the scabbard glowed with golden light under the influence of his dragon blood—it was a battle pattern he had nurtured with the crystal cores of thirty mutated beasts, each crack condensing memories of blood and fire.
"Let's go." Lin Yi got into the lead car, and the moment the door closed, Chu Yao's holographic projection lit up in front of the driver's seat.
The data stream at the tips of her hair was faster than usual, and her fingertips flew across the virtual keyboard: "The base entrance has been located at coordinates x - 7, Y - 12. Note that there is strong electromagnetic interference on the third underground level of the base. After you arrive, I will use a satellite pulse to open a three-second window, which will be enough for the space-based brothers to tear open the entrance."
"Received." Long Wu snapped his fingers, and the lead vehicle started moving first.
Twenty vehicles plunged into the dense forest like arrows released from a bow. The tree canopy swept over the vehicles, casting shadows in which the hands of space-type supporters could be vaguely seen pressing against the windows. Pale purple spatial energy flowed along the glass's texture—reinforcing the teleportation array to ensure the entire team could be pulled back to safety at any time.
Two hours later.
Deep in the Qinling Mountains, beneath a cliff, a rock about half a person's height suddenly emitted a blue light.
The space-type support user placed his palm on the rock, and purple energy spread out like a spider web. The next second, a crack appeared on the rock surface, just wide enough for one person to pass through, revealing a metal staircase inside.
Lin Yi was the first to walk down.
The motion-sensor lights on the staircase walls lit up one by one with his steps, the cold white light reflecting off the metal surface and highlighting his taut jawline.
Long Wu followed behind him, his heavy sword drawn half an inch from its sheath. The cold light reflected from the blade swept across every corner—it was too quiet here, unnaturally quiet, without even a trace of dust floating in the air.
"We've arrived." The space-elemental team member at the front suddenly stopped.
They stood before a ten-meter-high alloy door, in the center of which was engraved an ouroboros—exactly the same design as the emblem on the Administration Bureau in Zhou Zheng's memory.
Long Wu narrowed his eyes, his dragon blood boiling in his veins. He could smell the burnt smell of electronic components coming from behind the door, the smell of a server that had been running for a long time.
Lin Yi raised his hand and pressed it against the door.
Ripples of spacetime spread from his palm, and the molecular structure of the metal surface was as clear as a mirror in his perception: between the gaps in the arrangement of atoms, three superimposed defensive arrays were hidden.
He closed his eyes, and divine runes lit up between his brows. The flow of time in the area in front of the door was compressed to one percent—this was [Time Freeze (Micro)], a domain manipulation skill unique to mythical-level professions.
"Click".
The sound of the door hinges turning was stretched out infinitely in the frozen moment.
The moment the door opened completely, Long Wu's heavy sword was already held horizontally in front of his chest—inside the door was a circular archive room with hundreds of holographic projectors suspended in mid-air, each projector displaying yellowish images.
Lin Yi stopped in his tracks.
The projector in the very center showed a room with white walls and a blue ceiling.
The twelve-year-old boy sat on a wooden chair with building blocks and puzzles in front of him. A woman in a white coat squatted down in front of him and gently asked, "Xiao Yi, can you tell Auntie what you're most afraid of?"
Twelve-year-old Lin Yi tilted his head, his eyes shining like two stars: "I'm scared... I'll never see my mother again."
The woman in the white coat suddenly became clear.
She had a cinnabar mole behind her ear and wore a string of sandalwood prayer beads on her left wrist—that was Professor Lin Qing's signature look in Chu Yao's computer.
Chu Yao once said that Professor Lin died in a laboratory explosion when she was sixteen years old, and before his death, he stuffed the core AI program into her consciousness.
"boom."
Lin Yi's temples throbbed.
He could hear his own heartbeat, like the muffled thud of a war drum.
Fragments of memory suddenly flooded his mind: the stray cat he found at the alleyway when he was five, which he crouched in a pool of blood and cried when it was hit and killed by a truck; his mother being seriously ill and hospitalized when he was ten, and him eating a cold steamed bun in the corridor; on his twelfth birthday, his mother said she would take him to the amusement park, but before they left, she received a phone call saying there was an urgent project in the lab...
“These images are recorded in real time.” Long Wu’s voice came from behind, tinged with suppressed shock. “Look at the timestamp, it’s November 17, 2022, which matches the time of Professor Lin’s death that Chu Yao mentioned…”
Lin Yi remained silent.
He walked to the filing cabinet on the right. The metal cabinet door popped open automatically when he touched it, and bundles of paper documents poured down like a waterfall.
On the cover of the top document, written in red pen, is the title "Believer No. 0 - Final Report".
He bent down to pick up the document, and the photo on the inside of the cover made him gasp – it was a laboratory from twenty years ago, with researchers in white coats cheering around a glass culture chamber, in which a baby floated, labeled “0” on its chest.
The back of the photo reads: "99.7% time-space adaptation rate, perfect container."
Turning to the last page, a line of bold black text stung his eyes:
"The ultimate goal of Project Believer Zero is to reshape the world's perception through Zero's spacetime manipulation capabilities—when enough people believe in 'a certain reality,' that reality will become absolutely real."
The air conditioner in the archives room suddenly turned on.
A cold wind rustled the pages of a document, and a yellowed experimental log drifted to Lin Yi's feet.
He bent down to pick it up. It was written in Professor Lin Qing's handwriting: "Number 0 said today that he dreamed of traveling through time and space. This child's timeline is too clean, as if it has been deliberately wiped clean... But perhaps, this is exactly the blank paper we need."
The light from the holographic projector shone on Lin Yi's face, casting a long shadow.
He stared at the last page, “Reshaping the World’s Perception,” his Adam’s apple bobbed, and his voice was as soft as a sigh: “So, all of this… was never just about controlling me.”
Long Wu walked to his side and gently tapped the back of his hand with his heavy sword: "Boss?"
Lin Yi did not answer.
He stared at the digital clock on the wall; each tick of the second hand felt like a tap on his heart.
He recalled the extradimensional fluctuation data that Chu Yao had analyzed last night, the invaders in the core of the mother nest who were roaring "cognitive pollution", and the words "destruction of the world" spoken by the people in white coats in Zhou Zheng's memory.
“Perception is reality.” He repeated softly, his fingertips unconsciously tracing the edge of the document. “If they can rewrite perception… then what we believe, what we uphold, what we protect…”
An alarm suddenly blared throughout the base.
The red lights began to rotate, and Long Wu's heavy sword was instantly drawn, the dragon pattern on the blade emitting a low roar.
The voice of the space-type team member came through the communicator: "Boss! There are spatial fluctuations at the entrance, at least thirty mutants are approaching!"
Lin Yi stuffed the document into his pocket, turned around and walked towards the door.
His steps were heavier than when he arrived, and the divine lines between his brows shone brightly.
In the instant he turned around, the childhood images on the holographic projector suddenly flickered. The twelve-year-old boy looked up, his eyes reflecting the same silver-blue light patterns as now.
The moonlight on the hilltop was obscured by dark clouds at some point.
Deep in the dense forest, the lights of the stealth vehicle moved like fireflies, while underground at the Qinling base, a secret that had been sealed for twenty years was slowly unveiling its final disguise as Lin Yi walked.
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