Simulating the primordial era? That's way too extreme.

Chapter 381 Innate Bug-like Sacred Body!

Eternal wilderness.

A purple aura stretched across the heavens!

Three streams of pure energy soared into the sky above Kunlun Mountain!

Two golden rays shone brightly on Mount Sumeru!

Saintly auras also surged forth in Nuwa Heaven, Blood Sea, and Asura Realm!

Then, the nine streams of energy gradually disappeared, as if nothing had happened.

But Xue Xuan, who was in the Asura Realm, was now drenched in sweat...

The sudden arrival of nine sages left him bewildered, especially by his elderly father's enigmatic gaze, which made him feel uneasy.

It's over. Without the protection of Pangu's will, if my father really wants to do something, I'm afraid I'll be powerless to fight back...

However, since the saints have successfully returned, doesn't that mean that the junior named Lin Liu has already perfectly cleared the level?

This made Xue Xuan both happy for him and very puzzled:

How exactly did you clear the level? Wasn't Lin Liu's main body unable to get through?

In their previous conversations with Lin Liu, Jin Bing and I had rejected all of his plans for passing the level; none of them were feasible.

A bug is a bug because it has no solution given the given conditions!

So, could it be that Lin Liu found some new key information outside the main text, thereby forcibly eliminating the bug and allowing his true form to descend across worlds?

After much deliberation, Xue Xuan still couldn't come up with a reliable solution. Curious, he decided to ask the Sage about Lin Liu's whereabouts and go talk to him in person later…

"what?"

Just as he was about to speak, Xue Xuan let out another soft exclamation:

Just because there was a helpless monkey standing next to the plump and sage Zhunti!

Xue Xuan recognized the monkey, of course. It was the protagonist of the dream, born from the projection of the wills of nine sages. So, in a sense, it was the embodiment of the sages...

But that's not the key point. The key point is how it came to the primordial world.

The monkey, this dream creature, is essentially just a thought in the sage's dream, an experiment created by the sage to autonomously create a "protagonist anchor point".

Therefore, it does not exist in essence.

If a sage awakens from a dream, that thought will vanish, returning to utter nothingness along with the entire dream world…

This is just like when an ordinary person wakes up from a dream; no matter what happens in a dream, it can never come into reality.

Unless it truly succeeds in cultivating immortality, like those people Lin Liu previously helped to transcend...

However, even a sage cannot control that kind of power!

The process of turning the fake into the real is like creating something from nothing—both are powers that absolutely cannot be touched by anyone. But now…

Seeing the monkeys so bewildered and helpless because they were unfamiliar with the place, Xue Xuan frowned:

This is not a simple matter!

"What brings the Sage here today?"

Xue Xuan mustered his courage and asked.

None of the sages spoke, except for Hongjun, who stepped forward and handed him the two items. When Xue Xuan saw the items clearly, he was stunned and couldn't react for a long time:

A small sand table, and a human-shaped blood clot.

These two items, which had once been his companions, naturally evoked feelings of familiarity and nostalgia in him, but more than anything, they left him feeling bewildered:

How did they get here?

What about Lin Liu?

A strange sense of panic welled up inside me:

"He...didn't come?"

"He's dead."

Hongjun sighed deeply.

Upon hearing these words, Xue Xuan was stunned...

Death is not something unacceptable for the protagonist, because endless restarts are a standard feature of the protagonist; Xue Xuan himself has died countless times.

So he subconsciously thought about the fate that would befall the world after the protagonist's death:

If the anchor dies, then the world that depends on the anchor will soon perish as well...

However, he had anticipated all of this. After all, he was not the protagonist, but a cloned NPC created by him. It was normal for him to be buried with the current protagonist when he died.

After a brief period of sadness, Xue Xuan sighed:

"The world is about to perish..."

"No."

Hongjun shook his head, and in Xue Xuan's bewildered gaze, he sighed:

"Heaven and earth will not perish, for they saved everyone with their own lives!"

……

That's it...

A moment later, Hongjun told Xue Xuan everything that had happened:

"In order to make the dream world no longer a false dream, he promoted knowledge from beyond the realm, causing the dream world to gradually approach the Dharma-ending Age without divine wonders."

"Ultimately, he died of old age because of this, but for some reason, after his death, everyone in the dream became the same protagonist as him, including it!"

He pointed at the monkey and sighed:

"It easily achieved the impossible feigned reality, because it was originally one with us, and thus we were able to safely return to the primordial world..."

Xue Xuan was stunned for a long time before he said:

"So...it became an anchor point?"

Hongjun nodded.

Can the identity of a protagonist really be bestowed out of thin air?!

This was something beyond his comprehension, which caused Xue Xuan to have a mental whirlwind...

But before Xue Xuan could think it through, the Blood God Child and the Pangu's Possession in his hand suddenly disappeared without a sound.

Hongjun raised an eyebrow:

"This is?"

Xue Xuan snapped out of his daze and looked at his empty hands. Of course, he knew what had happened.

"it's over."

Xue Xuan muttered to himself, seemingly relieved, yet also lost.

Although we don't know exactly what happened, the fact that the freebies and items were taken back, and that the protagonist is anchoring the eternal primordial world, means that this chapter's storyline has ended. From now on, we will no longer be disturbed by that "game," and there will be no major crisis that can threaten the peace of the primordial world.

The price paid was the life of that junior...

But Xue Xuan still didn't understand:

The requirement to clear the game is that the protagonist doesn't die, but Lin Liu clearly died this time, so how did we still clear the game?

Was there a problem with the game system's judgment, or was Lin Liu actually... not dead?

With this question in mind, Xue Xuan decided to find an opportunity to personally explore the dream world that had permanently separated from the rest of the world...

……

After insisting on proving your path through death, you, who sought benevolence and attained it, ultimately died of old age in the process of materialization!

After your death, Li Ziliang ascended the throne and continued your unfinished great cause. One day, the Dream World will truly achieve an independent and peaceful golden age!

[And with your complete demise, the boundless power from beyond the realm began to "refine the false into the real," so that every person in the dream became a protagonist just like you.]

Even monkeys are no exception...

[Riding on your coattails, the monkey unwittingly transformed from a doomed experiment into the true protagonist!]

The experiment was a great success, and the overjoyed Bodhi Patriarch immediately ended his dream and returned to the "Eternal Primordial World" with the monkey, thus bringing the long-awaited anchor point to the primordial world.

Thus, dreams endured, and the primordial world was preserved.

Perfection is the best of both worlds!

However, such perfection is built upon your "death"...

【…】

[Ding! The right choice led to the right outcome!]

[Ding! Enough information has been collected. This round of simulation has ended. Progress has been saved and players can check it at any time...]

[Ding! Settlement in progress. The simulated prizes will be determined based on the final settlement rating...]

[Ding! The aid items for this round have been returned!]

Accompanied by a series of notification sounds, two beams of light flew straight out of the phone screen, transforming into Blood God Child and Pangu.

The two free gifts floated in front of Zhao Si...

But Zhao Si did not collect them immediately; instead, he frowned and fell into deep thought.

"So, the reason the final world can continue to exist without a protagonist is because you'll turn everyone in the world into a new anchor point?"

【Yes. 】

Zhao Si was somewhat puzzled:

Why?

[Because there is only one way. Whether it's a dream world or a primordial world, they are essentially idealistic worlds that cannot exist independently. To preserve them, a protagonist anchor is necessary.]

However, the original protagonist is no longer in this world, so this system must assign a new protagonist to this world.

But Zhao Si was still puzzled:

"If what you're saying is true, then every ending world requires everyone to become the protagonist. Wouldn't Lin Liu have already achieved that ending in his previous two lives?"

"In theory, the three endings he experienced all had the same final effect: after the protagonist disappeared, the whole world became the new protagonist."

"Since the monkeys of this life were transformed into real beings by the ending, then the monkeys of the previous two lives should have become real as well... Once Patriarch Bodhi brings them back to the primordial world, won't that anchor the primordial world in place?"

This is what Zhao finds most incomprehensible:

Even though all three endings end the same, why is it that only the third ending counts as a complete playthrough?

[Because in the first two endings, the protagonist Lin Liu did not survive, which violates the sole requirement of a perfect ending.]

what? !

Zhao Si was stunned:

"So you mean he survived this time?"

Lin Liu was clearly dead, and had even given up on continuing the cycle of reincarnation, thus achieving an "ending world" where everyone was a protagonist, just like Jiao Ming III.

However, Jiao Ming did not achieve a perfect completion after his death, so he had to wait for the second and third birds. It was not until the third bird that he achieved a perfect completion.

How come Lin Liu is clearly dead, yet the system insists that he's still alive?

Is this what privilege is...?

[This system can say with absolute certainty that Lin Liu is not dead.]

But he wasn't really alive.

what?

Zhao Si was even more confused:

Neither dead nor alive... Are you cosplaying Schrödinger's cat here?!

"What do you mean?"

Players might consider: what are the differences between Lin Liu's current life and his previous two?

"different?"

Zhao thought for a moment:

"Other than that, there's not much difference. The only difference is that this time he used the periodic table to materialize something, and ended up killing himself with old age..."

Lin Liu originally only wanted to solve the problem of the Sun God, to transform the Sun God into a material sun composed of "hydrogen" and "helium", so as to provide a stable energy source for future generations.

However, if we want people in the dream world to understand what "hydrogen" and "helium" are, we will inevitably need to use the periodic table and related knowledge as a foundation.

As a result, the power of thought of all living beings was inexplicably aroused, which eventually led to a complete transformation of the world. Not only did the sun god reside there, but the entire world gradually became materialized...

Therefore, if we really have to say what the difference is between this life and the previous two lives, materialization is obviously the most likely suspect!

But what does this have to do with Lin Liu cosplaying Schrödinger's cat?

The problem lies in this materialism.

Before materialization, the consciousness of a person in a dream was their soul, and this non-material thing, the soul, could truly arise from nothing and perish from nothing.

Therefore, if Lin Liu dies at that time, his consciousness will completely disappear...

Zhao Si thought about it carefully:

Indeed, in an idealistic worldview, the soul is not in balance, so once Lin Liu dies, he is truly dead, and the world will permanently lose a soul.

Not only the dream world, but also the eternal wilderness, where things were created out of thin air by sages, can naturally be erased.

[However, once matter is materialized, this problem disappears because matter is indestructible; it can only change its form, not increase or decrease out of thin air.]

Therefore, when Lin Liu died of old age because he himself had also been materialized, his consciousness actually became a kind of matter, and thus became eternally indestructible...

Zhao Si seemed to understand but not quite:

"So, that's why you said he's actually not dead..."

If even consciousness is a kind of matter, then Lin Liu's entire body and mind have always existed in the dream world. According to the idealistic view of life and death, he is naturally not dead!

"That's why, in his later years, he comforted people by saying, 'Matter is indestructible, it simply crumbles,' and that he would accompany people forever..."

Zhao Si suddenly realized:

"It seems Lin Liu truly foresaw all of this. His choice to die when clearing the level wasn't a sign of despair for the future; on the contrary, it was an expression of his hope for the future. He believed this was the true path to a perfect clear!"

"So, he can actually be resurrected, right?"

Zhao Si asked curiously.

Yes, although he materialized the dream world, just as a sage cannot transform the false into the real, Lin Liu cannot turn a purely idealistic world into a truly materialistic one, because that is its fundamental nature.

Rather than saying Lin Liu transformed the world into a material world, it's more accurate to say he exploited a loophole in the world, forcibly simulating a material world from a world of idealism.

Therefore, if the world were to believe again that he could be resurrected, then he truly could be resurrected... but he would not want to.

Seeking materialism within idealism is naturally impossible, just as a sage could never achieve Pangu's creation from nothing, nor could the Bodhi Patriarch make a monkey turn a fake into a real one.

It's perfectly normal that the system can't convert idealism into materialism.

If the system truly has the ability to reverse idealism and materialism, then why would it go through the trouble of turning everyone into a protagonist anchor point while preserving the "ending world"?

Why not just completely change the world?

Therefore, Zhao Si understood the system's explanation.

But regarding Lin Liu's matter, he still wanted to ask one question:

Why?

Zhao Si asked in confusion:

"Since we've already beat the game, why not revive?"

[Why do players think this system should follow the "final world" where the protagonist dies, and make Lin Liu's life a reality for everyone involved in the simulation?]

Because...he's dead?

Zhao thought for a moment, then said uncertainly:

"You mean, if he comes back to life, then you'll turn the monkeys back into their non-protagonist state?"

Of course, in a world where a simulated protagonist exists, there's no room for other protagonists; that's a fundamental rule.

[If Lin Liu were to be resurrected, the monkey would lose his protagonist status, causing the Eternal Primordial World to perish again due to the lack of an anchor point... It is precisely because Lin Liu foresaw this that he has consistently refused to allow anyone to resurrect him.]

For him, forever accompanying all beings in the dream world is the best and most perfect ending!

admire!

Zhao Si couldn't help but sigh:

Lin Liu's actions were incredibly efficient at exploiting bugs!

Or perhaps, he was born to exploit a bug, and upon his birth, he caused the Bodhi Patriarch to be in a state of ecstasy, unable to wake up or remain asleep.

Later, he encountered another bug related to clearing the game: to clear it, you had to die, or you would be stuck in a loop. The protagonist's perk of endless restarts turned into a negative buff.

Now another bug has been detected...

Lao Liu, I would like to call you the innate bug-like holy body!

【…】

[Ding! Settlement complete!]

[This round's rating: Perfect!]

……

(End of this chapter)