Time Traveler Help Hotline

August 26, 1537 (lunar calendar).

Today is the day the program resumes work.

As always, Ji Mo arrived at the program room the earliest, even half an hour earlier than usual.

The entire floor of the company has an automatic cleaning system; even if no one is in charge for a period of time, it remains as clean as if it had just been renovated and is ready to be used immediately upon arrival.

Ji Mo arrived so early just to adjust the equipment.

He hadn't forgotten the announcement posted before the holiday: on the day the program was rebroadcast, dialing restrictions would be relaxed, and it would become a purely human-operated legal education service.

"As a result, I'll have to be the one in charge today." He sighed softly.

The original plan was for Jiu Chonglou to preside over the event, but she has not returned to this day, and there has been no news of her whatsoever.

Even when Ji Mo asked the other people in the [Sanchuan Tailor Shop], no one could answer his question.

"Jiu Chong Lou? Who... Oh, her! She often disappears, and when she does, no one can find her except the Emperor. Praying with incantations is useless; she won't listen."

The general answer is as above.

More than that, Ji Mo wanted to complain that it wasn't just Jiu Chonglou who was pretending and being perfunctory; he felt that the actions of other people in the know who helped cover for them were also perfunctory.

"This should be fine... Sigh, Xiao Jiu didn't even say what it should be changed to before she left. Oh well, she didn't seem to care much, and probably hadn't even thought about it."

Ji Mo checked the new restrictions again:

[Targeted Broadcast]

[Household registration restrictions: None]

[Restriction on Realm: None]

[Status Restriction: Caught in a state of confusion related to the extraordinary]

[Regional Restriction: Currently within the Realm of Mortals]

Just as I was pondering this, the door to the program room was gently pushed open.

Chen Zhuzhu shuffled in with her head down, still lamenting, "I was so energetic at work a month ago, but after a vacation, I feel like I'm going to die when I come back..."

She suddenly stopped, as if remembering something, and complained bitterly, "Wait a minute! I'm a student! Switching back to working mode from summer vacation would be doubly painful!"

Chen Zhuzhu complained to herself for a while before belatedly noticing Ji Mo sitting to the side. She immediately jumped up like a startled rabbit: "W-when did you get here?"

Ji Mo sighed: "Actually, I've been sitting here for a while now, but you just didn't notice."

He was somewhat helpless. After a month-long vacation, how come the child had lost even the most basic vigilance and observation skills?

I have a feeling that if Chen Zhuzhu continues to let her guard down like this, she might unknowingly sign a contract she shouldn't have and be sold to another place.

Ji Mo then asked, "Did you have fun this past month?"

"Hehe, I'm super happy!" Chen Zhuzhu's eyes lit up, and she instantly regained her energy.

"So, did you also cultivate along the way?" Ji Mo asked in a calm tone.

"Uh...yes!" Chen Zhuzhu's voice unconsciously lowered, her eyes starting to dart around. "Well...when I was traveling around, I saw a lot of hidden information and learned about local customs and traditions. That counts as knowledge acquisition, right?...how can it not be considered cultivation?"

"After all, my ability is [Observer]..." Chen Zhuzhu added softly at the end, "That means I have to look around."

"It's good that you have your own ideas." Ji Mo said this, but he didn't really think so.

He could see that Chen Zhuzhu was the type who needed a master to guide her. Expecting her to cultivate on her own and even having a two-days-on-three-days-off rhythm would be a blessing.

After so long, Chen Zhuzhu's second-tier bottleneck has not loosened, which shows that she herself is not very diligent.

Unfortunately, the tailors in Sanchuan are all self-taught. If you want to find a master there, you not only need to be compatible with them, but you also need to be able to endure the harsh, laissez-faire style of education, which is obviously not suitable for Chen Zhuzhu.

"By the way, where is Miss Jiu?" Chen Zhuzhu tried to change the subject.

"She's away on a mission and hasn't been around lately; it's just us."

"So... then am I the only one on the show this time?" Chen Zhuzhu rediscovered the nervousness she felt when she first became a host. She also remembered that today's program was purely for public legal education without any restrictions.

In the past, when Jiu Chonglou was around, although he would have a "don't bother me" look on his face, he would still help explain when he noticed that she was in trouble.

"It's okay, I'll help you."

Seeing that Ji Mo didn't seem busy, Chen Zhuzhu thought for a moment and asked the questions that had been piling up since the beginning of the holiday:

"Um... when I travel, I visit quite a few famous tourist attractions."

"Especially those temples that worship Buddha and Bodhisattvas, they are very popular with worshippers and there are so many tourists. My mother especially likes those places and she has to pray there every time she goes."

"But those famous temples don't seem to have any extraordinary powers; instead, they're too obsessed with money."

As Chen Zhuzhu recalled, she looked at the information that had appeared in her mind through the observer at that time.

For example, the information provided for the largest and most prominent Buddha statue in a temple is:

[Item: Exquisitely crafted gilded bronze statue]

【Material: 99% pure electrolytic copper, 24K gold plating on the outside, precision engraving by robotic arm】

Manufacturer: Chouzhou Precision Crafts Co., Ltd., Third Production Line.

This is not an isolated case, but a common finding in detection methods.

Anything relatively new in the temple is man-made and contains no supernatural power whatsoever.

Chen Zhuzhu continued, "Later, I went to a remote Taoist temple, and on that dusty clay statue, I discovered some extraordinary influence."

[Item: A clay statue of a deity imbued with a faint trace of divine will]

【Material: Local clay mixed with believer hair and incense ash, with a core containing a dried, lightning-struck wood heart】

[Status: Absorption of willpower has been interrupted; only weak "exorcising" and "house-protecting" power remains]

[Note: The last valid record of a vow was made seventy-four years ago.]

Because she had only visited one Taoist temple, Chen Zhuzhu was unsure whether it was an isolated case or a widespread phenomenon.

But temples? Chen Zhuzhu felt that the number of temples visited on this trip should be considered as a whole.

"That's normal." Ji Mo gave Chen Zhuzhu a slightly higher opinion of her, surprised that she was actually seriously observing and summarizing something, and explained:

"Because the world was sealed off, the powers of those foreign pantheons could not penetrate in, nor could they hear the prayers of this world. Therefore, the system of obtaining power by praying to foreign gods was almost completely ineffective. On the contrary, some foreign power systems that advocated relying on themselves and benefiting all living beings in exchange for the power of their vows continued to thrive even after the blockade."

"Well, at least the top-level superhumans are living quite comfortably, while the bottom-level ones are mostly swindlers."

The dragon race relies on bloodlines for one reason, and Taoist magic and talisman systems for another.

"Remember, there are no Buddhas or Bodhisattvas in our world." Ji Mo's gaze darkened slightly, carrying a warning tone. "If one day you really encounter someone who claims to be such a being, you should be wary. What exactly is that thing pretending to be?"

Chen Zhuzhu's eyes widened slightly, and combining the information she had seen, she instantly understood: "Does that mean... the bodhisattvas and the like we usually worship are from a foreign pantheon?"

And it's an alien pantheon destined to be unresponsive?!

Considering the difference in the number of Taoist temples and Buddhist monasteries, and the bustling atmosphere among them, Chen Zhuzhu always felt that there were too many dark jokes involved.

Unfortunately, Chen Zhuzhu couldn't explain this to outsiders. If she dared to tell her mother that the Bodhisattva wouldn't respond to her, she would be kicked out of the house with a broom.

In the eyes of many older generations, respecting Buddha and Bodhisattvas is even more important than their children making a lot of money, because they will attribute your wealth to the blessing of the Bodhisattvas, and if the Bodhisattvas stop blessing you, the money will disappear.

"Yes." Ji Mo nodded.

"But……"

Seeing Chen Zhuzhu's hesitant expression, her curiosity almost overflowing, Ji Mo simply brought the topic up completely:

"You're asking why, since they aren't native deities and their proselytizing is almost ineffective, they're allowed to exist, and even enjoy great popularity, right?"

Chen Zhuzhu nodded quickly and decisively, like pounding garlic.

Ji Mo paused for a moment, tapped the table lightly with his fingertips, and continued to explain:

"Leaving aside the fact that our world inherently possesses extraordinary powers and the existence of gods, even under purely materialistic laws, given the inherent weakness of the human body and the individual's inability to change the current reality, disadvantaged groups will yearn for a higher being to redeem them."

"Instead of letting this desire give rise to all sorts of uncontrollable folk sects, it's better to provide a ready-made, mature system. Buddhism has a complete mythological system, philosophical theories, and precepts. We only need to make slight modifications and remove the content that does not conform to the current order, and it can be safely put into use."

Ultimately, religion is one of the most effective tools for uniting people's hearts and minds and guiding their direction.

How to utilize religion without being burdened by its drawbacks is a question that rulers of human dynasties should consider.

"More importantly, a religion that cannot respond to prayers is a safe religion. Since Buddhist deities cannot manifest themselves in this world, they will not interfere with the operation of the local supernatural system, nor will they compete for faith resources."

"If one day, a Bodhisattva truly descends to this world, and is not merely a shell transformed from some evil thought, then there are only two possibilities: either the outer protection of the world has completely collapsed, and the erosion is about to devour everything; or we have become strong enough to independently resist the erosion and no longer need this protective shell."

"If we truly manage to resolve the Void Corruption and make contact with a real otherworld," Ji Mo exhaled softly, "how to deal with these alien pantheons that we've been observing for so long is a question we'll have to consider in the future."

"At least for now, let's focus on the present."

Chen Zhuzhu nodded, seemingly understanding but not quite.

But this raised another question for her.

If the reason for choosing a foreign religion like Buddhism is that it has a complete system, rich stories, and can safely meet the spiritual needs of ordinary people...

"Then why not just use the local pantheon?" she couldn't help but ask. "Isn't that taking the long way around?"

"It's hard to say about other small worlds, but our mortal realm clearly has a large number of real gods, so we can easily create our own belief system, right?"

Upon hearing this, Ji Mo fell silent, a rare occurrence for him.

Because he had asked Jiu Chonglou the same question before and received a compressed file as the answer.

But the compressed file had long expired, and he hadn't kept the original file, so it was difficult to find a reference for it.

Ji Mo thought for a moment and decided to search Mo Ruqiu's chat history with the keyword "forwarding". Sure enough, she found a bunch of pictures.

"Huh?"

Chen Zhuzhu took out her phone and found that Ji Mo had sent her a bunch of pictures.

The game features a variety of daring anime characters, including female characters with breasts larger than their heads, accompanied by captions such as "Let me see your potential."

It must be said that the artist is quite skilled; even though the clothes in the character illustration could be considered tattered, the viewer can still tell that she is a member of the cult.

Chen Zhuzhu blushed instantly: "Why...why did you post these?!"

If she hadn't known Ji Mo's personality so well, she would have almost thought she was being harassed in the workplace.

"Did you see that?" Ji Mo finally raised his head.

He turned his phone screen toward her, where an extremely explicit illustration was displayed: "Anything that is widely known will be constantly deconstructed over time."

"Nowadays, in the game, animation, and comics industries, it is inevitable to draw inspiration from these well-known entities, especially religions, when creating content."

"If it's a game that involves collecting illustrations, the frequency of deconstruction and adaptation is even higher, and it's perfectly reasonable to even make someone an SSR character."

"They don't even spare men..."

At this point, Ji Mo couldn't help but sigh.

"Male-to-female transformations are quite common now; the explanation is simply different facets of history, or a summoning error causing unexplained changes in the host body..."

Regardless of whether she actually looks like that in religious portraits, in this game, she's a female character with very prominent front armor and a rear end where you can put a wine glass.

Furthermore, some games with a perverse sense of humor even release gender-swapped characters, with the current event boss being the male version of the original character, thus spawning numerous fan-made images.

"The Heavenly Lord of the Beginning Year is an authority related to time, and can see parts of the future. He saw that if the gods of the Three Rivers Tailor Shop intend to continue to recruit believers and occupy the ecological niche of religions such as Buddhism, these second-generation mythological figures will become them."

"This is why the Borderlands pantheon has become a pantheon that is hardly mentioned even in unofficial histories."

"Even when creating fan-made mythological characters, most people draw well-known mythological figures. Very few people actually pay attention to the legends of the borderlands pantheon and are willing to draw them."

"Again, hundreds of thousands of fan-made works in the unspeakable genre, and even niche circles that can't even break a thousand, are within the acceptable range, not to mention that most of them are bland and simple, and the kind of text manuscripts where holding hands is considered a victory."

Chen Zhuzhu had an expression that said, "I don't understand, but I'm deeply shocked."

Ji Mo left her alone to be quiet, scrolling through their old chat history, thinking that she hadn't finished speaking yet, and she couldn't take it anymore.

Although the Heavenly Lord of the Beginning of the Year had warned them, some gods did not heed the warning and continued to use their own names when rescuing people from suffering, instead of transferring the blame to foreign deities.

The compressed file that Jiuchonglou sent initially contained these gods' derivative works, and only a small portion of them.

Unfortunately, Ji Mo had seen that god before and read the contents of the compressed file. To this day, he still cannot look at the original body that had been gender-swapped.

People don't mind the trouble when they're doing bad things. When someone realized that among these gods who didn't listen to advice, there was one who became a popular character for secondary viewing, they started to collect His [indescribable] works and asked the real God how he felt.

The result, of course, was that every time I asked, I was beaten until my divine heart was shattered, and I voluntarily went to other small worlds to carry out missions. All information was disseminated unilaterally.

Later, someone came up with a terrible idea: whenever the victimized deity encountered someone provoking them with their own manuscript, they would directly warn them that they would pay for a commercial manuscript and make them lose their position, adopting an attitude of "if I can't have a good life, neither can you," and only then was the matter considered closed.

After all, the victim god at least has a certain number of legends, and can be portrayed differently by the creator. The other god, however, has no historical records at all, and is a dream girl who is purely anecdotal.

If commercial manuscripts really become popular, then when ordinary people mention themselves, all that will be left is the manuscript.