Eternal Night

Chapter 542 Subtle
(PS: This chapter is quite long, so it's a bit late.)

The Mind Civilization is fascinating; there's more to it than what we know so far. A complete description of the first lost world shouldn't disappoint.
After reading the diary, Wu Pifu gained a general understanding of the decline of this civilization.

In essence, it's nothing more than the same old alchemical civilization system. Those in power don't treat those in power as human beings; they treat the common people as food and resources. Their desired future is that a small number of people ascend to heaven, while the ground is filled with the bones of ordinary people to serve as their stepping stones.

So the result was disappointment, and those in power also perished along with them!
Wu Pifu now knows that the most important thing about a civilization is actually its large number of ordinary people.

Transcendence is pollution, so the stronger one's transcendence, the more reality one needs to consume. This reality not only comes from the individual but also draws on the total reality of the civilization. Once the reality is exhausted, the entire civilization will be lost.

Truth can only be produced through the cognition and definition of intellectual beings. Ordinary people do not possess the extraordinary, so they will not lose truth, but will only create it. The number of ordinary people in a civilization determines the amount of truth it contains. What is beneficial to the civilization, to the real world, and to the race as a whole will be reflected back to the individual.

The alchemical civilization that Wu Pifu knew of was lost in this way. In order to fight against the source pollution, the extraordinary beings of that civilization used all mortals to create the so-called Philosopher's Stone. As a result, although they repelled the source pollution, the alchemical civilization was lost in a very short time afterward. He even learned from the surviving individuals of the alchemical civilization that the key word for the loss of the alchemical civilization was the word "children".

When a civilization begins to decline, it does not self-destruct instantly. Instead, signs of decline appear, followed by disasters and catastrophes, until the civilization is completely destroyed, becoming "lost".

Wu Pifu added the diary to his personal space. At the same time, he looked at the exploration progress of the Lost Civilization. After reading the diary, the exploration progress had reached 22%.

But this did not make Wu Pifu happy.

According to the contents of this diary, it explains almost all the reasons for the decline of spiritual civilization.

The unique nature of the extraordinary path of magic potions has made the mortals of this civilization the sustenance for the extraordinary beings. However, these greedy non-humans are far too greedy. They can't even wait to slowly accumulate and slowly seek opportunities for breakthrough. Instead, they plan to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs and squeeze all of humanity dry!

Wu Pifu originally thought that after obtaining this diary, the exploration rate would be at least 50% or higher, but it only reached 22%.
but……

"That's fine, you can never have too many points."

Wu Pifu was so certain that he walked out of the room, and as soon as he stepped out, he was completely stunned.

Because there were pedestrians outside the room, and not just one or two, but more than a dozen people. They were walking leisurely or in a hurry. Moreover, the dormitory corridor looked brand new, with no damage or oldness. It was as if, the moment he stepped through the door, he had pierced through time and space and returned to the past of this lost world.

but……

This is still a world where spiritual civilization has been lost.

Wu Pifu immediately confirmed this, because the simplest explanation was that he still couldn't perceive the emotions of those around him. Clearly, they were either fragments of past information like memory flashbacks, or some strange and bizarre entity playing the role of them.

Just as Wu Pifu was in a daze, a man and a woman ran towards him at the same time. The man reached out and grabbed his arm while shouting, "Leon, we've been looking for you for ages! Where have you been hiding? Hurry, hurry, the mentor told us to come over immediately! They've discovered a suspected third-sequence potion carrier, already in the early stages of beast transformation! Quick!"

Wu Pifu's arm was about to dodge, but after hearing this, he stopped moving and let the person grab him and then run with him all the way out of the dormitory area.

Before long, the three of them arrived at the experimental area from the dormitory area. They then took the elevator down and, after a short while, Wu Pifu followed them to a place more than forty stories underground. When they came out of the elevator, they saw a huge glass cylinder in the center. Inside the cylinder was a human being radiating light, struggling painfully on a mobile hospital bed.

Dozens of people were gathered around the glass cylinder, including security personnel in special gear, laboratory staff in research suits, high-ranking officials and superhumans in other clothing, as well as an elderly man who was clearly of high status. They all looked at the humans inside the glass cylinder with excited eyes.

Upon seeing Wu Pifu arrive, everyone looked at him with fervent eyes. The old man even said, "Leon, quick, use your spiritual vision to locate the potion and pinpoint its position so we can retrieve it!"

For some inexplicable reason, Wu Pifu instantly learned how to use the Spirit Vision. He could look directly into the flaws in the mind, find its essential condensation point, mark it, anchor it, and retrieve it using the power of other extraordinary realms.

Upon hearing this, Wu Pifu simply stood still, his gaze sweeping over the faces of the people in front of him before settling on the person inside the glass cylinder.

It was a fat man, weighing at least three or four hundred pounds. He was so obese that his hands and feet seemed to have atrophied. His face was contorted with rage and pain. When Wu Pifu looked at him, he shouted, "Save me! Anyone, save me!"

Seeing that Wu Pifu was not moving, the people around him became anxious. The man and woman who had just pulled Wu Pifu here said at the same time, "Hurry up, Leon, it's up to you!"

"Leon, what's wrong? Aren't you usually very enthusiastic?"

The crowd surrounding the glass cylinder was buzzing with discussion. One of the higher-ups said directly, "Old Xu, what's wrong with your men? Why are they causing trouble at a time like this?"

"Yes, this is a rare Sequence 3 potion!"

"If it hadn't just happened to appear in your area, how could it have been your turn?"

The old man's face also fell. He said sternly to Wu Pifu, "Leon, what's wrong with you? Weren't you actively participating in various affairs before, even writing reports for me, wanting to participate in the research on symbols? If you can't even do this well, I think you shouldn't be researching symbols at all!"

At this moment, all sorts of noises and thoughts kept popping up in Wu Pifu's consciousness.

(Yes, wasn't I supposed to be studying symbolism?)

(Wait a minute, I came here to explore all of this, isn't this the perfect time to blend in?)
(Pretending I am Leon, yes, some strange mechanism has transported me back to the past of the Light Chasers. Isn't this the best time to explore information?)
(I need to be quick, act immediately, and absolutely cannot falter at this time; I must be fast!)

Wu Pifu stood silently. After a few seconds, the people around him became increasingly anxious, and the light emanating from the fat man inside the glass cylinder grew stronger and stronger, as if some terrible change was about to occur at any moment. Suddenly, Wu Pifu burst into laughter.

"It's really interesting. How does it manage to mimic my inner thoughts like that? It's like I have several personalities splitting up."

Wu Pifu laughed as he spoke. With a wave of his hand, the heads of the man and woman beside him exploded, and their bodies immediately crumbled and disappeared.

Those around were shocked. Several security personnel immediately pointed their weapons at Wu Pifu, while the superhumans also displayed spiritual light and extraordinary phenomena. Even the old man was filled with astonishment, showing the characteristics of a superhuman as well. "So what exactly are you expecting?"

Wu Pifu spread his hands and said, "You want me to participate? To make me see myself as that person named Leon? And then? To subtly make me do these inhuman things, and then assimilate me? To make me feel lost? And in the end, to really become a part of this past fragment or a fabricated event? Is that right?"

The dozens of people before him all wore strange expressions. They cautiously looked at each other. The old man said, "Leon, do you feel that you are not Leon? But some other being, whether from another world, the past, the future, or some other kind of being, who suddenly came here because of some strange event and became Leon, right?"

Wu Pifu remained expressionless, simply smiling as he continued walking towards the group of dozens of people. The security personnel glanced back at the old man and the others, then fired their weapons at Wu Pifu's feet.

These were energy weapons or laser weapons. In the blink of an eye, they left charred marks at Wu Pifu's feet. However, Wu Pifu remained calm and walked slowly towards the dozens of people.

The old man immediately shouted, "Foolish! You've become ethereal! You've become beastly, monstrous, ethereal, materialized, and spiritualized—the six calamities you're facing! Your self-personality is collapsing and undergoing a process of reconstruction and iteration, during which you've been influenced by external pollution, leading to drastic changes in your memories and cognition. This has caused you to falsely construct your self. Stop immediately, or you will completely transform into an unknowable monster!!"

Wu Pifu simply shook his head and said, "Foolish... Do you think I would deceive myself like you inhumans? Yes or no, even if I stop exploring, I would never do anything inhuman. One can deceive the heavens, but not one's own heart! I might turn a blind eye to those in need when I'm weak in order to survive, or I might avoid invincible strongmen, but I will not deceive my own heart. Right is right, wrong is wrong, a human is a human, and an inhuman is an inhuman!"

"So you see, this is the difference between me and you. I am a human being, while you are not. So how could you, as non-human beings, possibly deceive me? After all, you are non-human creatures who do not understand pain, joy, or happiness..."

"Now, stop pretending to be human, okay?"

As they spoke, Wu Pifu was less than ten meters away from the security personnel.

Finally, the security personnel opened fire, all the guns hitting Wu Pifu's hands and feet. Even though they were five steps away, Wu Pifu's reputation as a scoundrel seemed to have lost its power. These energy beams easily pierced through his arms and thighs, burning and severing them. In just an instant, he had completely lost both his arms and legs.

The old man immediately shouted, "Hurry up and regain your senses!? No matter what identity you've created, your essence is Leon, a low-level transcendent with spiritual vision. Look, you've lost both your arms and legs. Don't you realize that yet?"

Wu Pifu did feel that his arms and legs had been broken, and the clear, excruciating pain was transmitted to his mind. But what was strange was that he did not fall to the ground; his body was still suspended in mid-air... without the support of his legs, he was still suspended in mid-air!
"It's very realistic, directly affecting my sea of ​​consciousness, making all these changes seem real. But as I said before, I'm different from you, I won't deceive myself."

Wu Pifu's body continued forward, as if his legs were still intact, completely unharmed. Then the security personnel no longer held back, and their powerful beam guns riddled Wu Pifu with bullets, tearing him to pieces. Dozens of people breathed a sigh of relief, their eyes filled with regret.

"Old Xu, it seems we can only lose this Sequence 3 potion," a transcendent said regretfully.

The old man also turned his gaze back to the glass cylinder, his face showing regret. Just as he was about to say something, an invisible hand suddenly grabbed his head.

Behind the old man, security personnel were being reduced to ashes. Several superhumans were being torn to pieces. A few were still alive, all of them wearing expressions of fear and shock. A broken head, with only a third remaining, was floating behind the old man, its brains and blood still dripping. The head had half an eyeball embedded in it. This was all that remained of Wu Pifu that they saw.

"I think I roughly understand the principles behind your extraordinary system."

The floating skull spoke: "Construct a world that exists purely in spirit and mind, and then unfold it to cover the real material world. As long as cognition arises within it, this world will change with that cognition. For example, if you all collectively believe that I am Leon, then I will naturally have Leon's abilities, and at the same time, the subconscious belief that I am also Leon will gradually develop. And if I also do what Leon would do, such as rescuing this ordinary person, then I will be assimilated into Leon."

The old man stared in utter shock at the skull and eyeballs, and uttered through his throat, "Ultimate stage of etherealization... Just what are you...?"

"Shut up, you inhuman thing!"

As if an invisible giant hand had suddenly squeezed, the old man's head exploded, his body twisted and collapsed to the ground. He was killed by Wu Pifu without even using his extraordinary power.

What puzzled Wu Pifu was that the mental illusion had not disappeared. The corpses of the people around him, their screams, and the sudden alarm in the laboratory were all still vivid in his mind. The fat man inside the glass cylinder was also screaming. His body suddenly exploded, and a hideous and terrifying monster hatched from his flesh and blood, immediately beginning to devour his exploded flesh and blood.

"...I see, I understand now!"

The skull and eyeballs twitched, and Wu Pifu's voice came out of nowhere: "Only by killing all the non-humans in the entire laboratory will this hallucination disappear!"

The few survivors, who had been struggling, paused upon hearing the voice. One of the female superhumans cried out, "You monster! What are you?!"

With a loud thud, her body seemed to be crushed by an invisible giant foot, and her screams stopped abruptly.

"I've said it so many times, why do you keep deceiving yourselves?"

"I am the only human being, a pure-blooded human being, while you... are nothing but a bunch of inhuman beings constructed from falsehoods of the heart!"

As the voices spoke, the skull and eyeballs were rapidly healing into human form, while the remaining bodies of the few people were slowly writhing, as if about to turn into some kind of mud, their faces filled with disbelief at all of this.

Meanwhile, in a giant pyramid far away from the laboratory, on its highest level, three different strange entities reside: a large mass of writhing, amorphous flesh, an indescribable thick fog, and a large number of shimmering orbs of light. At this moment, one of the many shimmering orbs of light suddenly dimmed slightly.

"...A backflow has occurred in area H-24-07 of the Garden of Gods. Detecting... Detecting... Detecting..."

"A ethereal entity has appeared!"

"Virtual entity detection in progress... Detection in progress... Detection in progress..."

"Unable to determine, unable to determine, unable to determine..."

"Annihilation procedure initiated..."

"The Guardians of God strike."

(End of this chapter)