Survival in an apartment, starting with a stroke of luck on a plane

The steps are not deep, about twenty steps.

The further down you go, the more noticeable the warmth in the air becomes, as if something underground is continuously radiating heat.

The walls were bare red bricks, covered with a thin layer of water mist, and felt damp to the touch.

At the end of the steps is a short corridor.

Several old-fashioned wall lamps were embedded in the walls on both sides of the corridor. The bulbs were warm yellow, and the dim light cast long shadows in the corridor.

Mr. Fang walked ahead at a moderate pace, the hem of his trench coat sweeping the ground almost silently.

At the end of the corridor was an iron door, much newer than the one at the entrance, with no rust on the surface, and an old-fashioned padlock hanging on the doorknob.

Mr. Fang took a key out of his pocket, inserted it into the lock, and turned it gently.

"Click."

The lock is open.

He pushed open the door and stepped aside to let Lin Yu go in first.

Behind the door is a small room, about thirty square meters.

The room had no windows, and the walls were all bare concrete. A fluorescent light hung from the ceiling, its tube humming and its light a stark white.

In the center of the room was a long table piled with various things—old notebooks, scattered blueprints, several electronic devices that looked like they were already broken, and some metal parts that Lin Yu couldn't name.

But what's most eye-catching is the wall at the end of the long table.

The entire wall was transformed into a huge display panel, not a screen, but something more primitive—a dense network of lines and runes intertwined to form a complex and dizzying pattern.

At the center of the pattern is a slowly rotating sphere of light, its color a pale silver, exactly the same as the primordial crystal Lin Yu had seen in the Rift Corridor.

Around the sphere of light, countless tiny points of light were distributed, each of which was flashing at a different frequency.

Some of the lights were very bright, some were very dim, and some were dimming at a visible speed, like candles about to go out.

"What is this?" Lin Yu walked to the display panel and looked up at the picture.

"The system's underlying topology." Mr. Fang walked to his side, raised his hand, and pointed to the sphere of light at the center of the diagram, "or rather, the part that I can observe."

Lin Yu's pupils contracted slightly.

What is the system's underlying topology?

This person is actually able to observe the underlying structure of the system?

"Who exactly are you?" Lin Yu turned his head and looked at Mr. Fang.

Mr. Fang did not answer directly.

He picked up an old enamel mug from the table, poured himself some water, took a sip, and then slowly began to speak: "I was among the first to come into contact with them."

Lin Yu's heart skipped a beat.

The first group of contacts.

He had seen this word in the Rift Corridor—on the stone tablet of the nine levels of authority, the person who reached the ninth level was one of the first to make contact.

Which floor have you been to?

"The seventh floor," Mr. Fang said calmly, as if discussing something unrelated to himself. "Two floors below the man who carved the stone tablet. I didn't have his courage; I came back after reaching the seventh floor."

He put down his cup, walked to the display panel, and traced his finger across the diagram: "Seventh-level access allows you to see most of the system's underlying structure, but not its core. After I came back, I spent a long time piecing together this diagram using various methods."

He pointed to the sphere of light at the center: "This is the system core. According to my calculations, its current energy output is only thirty-seven percent of its peak."

"Thirty-seven percent?"

"And it's still declining." Mr. Fang's tone was calm, but beneath the calm lay a heavy weight. "The system isn't being maintained, nor is it being updated. It's decaying."

The room was silent for a few seconds.

The fluorescent lights hummed, stretching the silence long.

Lin Yu was processing those words.

The system is failing.

It's not a malfunction, it's not an attack, but... natural failure? Like an elderly person nearing the end of their life, whose organs are stopping functioning one by one?

"Administrator disconnection, weakening boundary barriers, loosening boundaries between game worlds... are these all signs of system exhaustion?"

"It's a symptom, not a cause," Mr. Fang corrected. "I still don't fully understand the cause of system failure."

But the symptoms are clear—insufficient core energy is causing all subsystems that rely on core power to degrade.

The administrator system is a subsystem, the boundary barrier is a subsystem, and the world isolation rules are also a subsystem.

If the core power supply is insufficient, these subsystems will naturally be unable to withstand the strain.

He paused, then added, "And the rate of decline is accelerating."

Lin Yu looked at the dimming dots on the display panel: "What are these dots?"

"Each point of light represents a world connected by the system," Mr. Fang said. "Bright ones indicate stable connections; dim ones indicate connections that are weakening; and those that are off..."

He didn't finish speaking, but his meaning was clear.

What has been extinguished is a world where connections have been completely severed.

Lin Yu counted them; there were at least several hundred points of light on the pattern, dozens of which had gone completely dark, while hundreds more were flickering as if they might go out at any moment.

What would happen to a world that has been disconnected?

"I don't know," Mr. Fang shook his head. "It might become an independent drifting world, it might be swallowed by the void, or it might... collide with other worlds."

They collided.

Lin Yu recalled what Old Chen had said—the boundaries between all game worlds are thinning, and some communities have already detected energy characteristics of other game worlds.

If the boundaries continue to thin, the end result will be direct collisions and fusions between worlds.

What would that look like?

Two worlds with completely different rules were forcibly superimposed, causing spatial distortion, rule conflicts, and the creatures living within them...

He dared not think any further.

"You called me here just to tell me this?" Lin Yu asked.

"Not entirely." Mr. Fang walked to the other end of the long table, pulled a folded piece of paper from under a pile of drawings, unfolded it, and laid it on the table. "I called you here because you are the only person I've ever met who simultaneously possesses system permissions, ancient god permissions, and an independent world system."

He pointed to the piece of paper.

The paper contained a relationship diagram with the name "Lin Yu" written in the center. Countless lines extended from it, connecting different nodes—"System - Third Layer of Authority," "Ancient God - Creation Order," "Zerg - Divine Body Network," "Nightmare World," "Mysterious Capital Purple Mansion," and so on.

Each node was marked with detailed information, some of which was even clearer than Lin Yu himself knew.

Lin Yu's face darkened.

This person investigated him, and investigated him very thoroughly.

"Don't be nervous." Mr. Fang seemed to sense his wariness and waved his hand. "I mean no harm. I'm following and observing you not to deal with you, but to confirm one thing—whether you are that 'variable'."

"variable?"

"With the system deteriorating to this extent, according to normal calculations, the core will completely shut down in three months at most. At that time, all the worlds connected to the system will lose their constraints and become chaos. This is inevitable." Mr. Fang tapped his finger on the relationship diagram.

"But you're different. You possess many things that transcend the system's framework, and these things don't entirely depend on the system's power supply. In other words, they can still exist after the system crashes."

He looked up at Lin Yu: "You are a variable that is not completely constrained by the system."

If anyone can stabilize the situation after a system crash, it's someone like you.

Lin Yu fell silent.

He had considered the possibility of the system crashing, but never before had all the possibilities and consequences laid bare before him like this.

Three months.

The system core can last for a maximum of three months.

"What do you mean by 'choosing which side to stand on'?" Lin Yu recalled what Mr. Fang had said earlier.

Mr. Fang's expression changed.

The previous calm and composed expression had disappeared, replaced by a deep weariness.

"After the system fails, many forces will emerge," he said slowly. "Those in the void need no introduction—the Council of Eternal Night, the Hand of Ashes, they've been waiting for this day for a long time."

Furthermore, the local powerhouses in each game world will begin to expand once the system's constraints are removed.

Even more troublesome are the Old Gods—those ancient beings sealed away by the system in various corners of the world. While the system was still active, they dared not move; but once the system collapsed…

He didn't finish speaking, but the meaning was already quite clear.

"These forces will fight each other for the resources and territory left behind after the system collapses."

In that case, no one will be able to remain unscathed. You'll either join one side, or... become one yourself.

Mr. Fang looked into Lin Yu's eyes: "This is the choice I'm asking you to make."

The room fell silent again.

The buzzing of the fluorescent lights sounded particularly jarring.

Lin Yu stared at the flickering lights on the display panel, his mind racing.

What Mr. Fang said completely matched the information that Lao Chen brought.

Administrator disconnection, thinning boundaries, and organized infiltration by void creatures—these are all precursors to system failure.

He himself was indeed a special individual.

His Zerg civilization is rooted in the divine body space and does not rely entirely on the system.

The Nightmare World is an independent, subordinate space, and the power of the Xuandu Purple Mansion and the True Lord Statue does not originate from the system.

Even the Demon-Slaying Sword and the Mountain-Splitting Axe, these two divine weapons, are essentially unrelated to the system.

If the system really crashes, he does have the ability to protect himself.

But he is not alone.

Tangtang, Jinling, the Zerg in the small world, Qingyuan and the Queen of Zerg in the divine body, the neighbors in the apartment building, the players in the community... all these people are tied to him.

What happens to these people after the system crashes?

"I need time to think about it," Lin Yu said.

"You don't have much time," Mr. Fang said. "The system is failing at an accelerating rate. According to my latest calculations, the core shutdown might not last three months, but... one month."

One month.

Lin Yu's brows furrowed even more.

Just then—

The pattern on the display panel suddenly flickered violently.

The central sphere of light suddenly dimmed, and the surrounding points of light swayed like candles blown by the wind. More than a dozen points of light went out during this flicker, like cigarette butts being extinguished.

Immediately afterwards, the entire room began to shake.

It wasn't the kind of shaking that comes from an earthquake, but a deeper tremor that comes from space itself.

Cement crumbled off the wall, and the blueprints on the table were blown about by an invisible gust of wind. The fluorescent light flickered twice and then went out.

In the darkness, only the dimmed orb on the display panel still emitted a faint silver light.

Mr. Fang's expression changed.

"It's ahead of schedule." His voice held a hint of barely suppressed shock. "It's ahead of schedule than I predicted..."

Lin Yu did not speak.

He is perceiving.

He could sense that—the direction of the apartment, the direction of the small world, the direction of the divine body—all of space was experiencing violent fluctuations at the same time. These fluctuations weren't localized, but global, as if the entire skeleton of the world was groaning under unbearable pressure.

His communication talisman suddenly lit up.

Not just one message, but dozens of messages flooded in at the same time. The talisman's light was dazzling, and it emitted a rapid buzzing sound.

He glanced down at it.

All of them were distress signals.

Players from all directions in the neighborhood sent messages with a variety of content, but the core message was the same—something had come in.

"I have to go back." Lin Yu put away the communication talisman and turned to leave.

"Lin Yu." Mr. Fang called out to him from behind.

Lin Yu stopped walking without turning around.

"Remember what I said today." Mr. Fang's voice came from the darkness, deeper than before, "The system will not be restored."

From this moment on, all rules become invalid. What you need to do is not wait for order to return, but establish order yourself.

Lin Yu did not answer, pushed open the iron gate, and walked quickly out along the corridor.

The mist on the steps was thicker than when we arrived, and the warm air had turned into a dry heat, as if something was burning underground.

He took a few steps up the stairs, pushed open the metal door, and returned to the night sky over the warehouse area.

Then he froze.

The sky has changed.

Countless cracks appeared in the originally dark night sky.

The cracks resembled wounds slashed open with a knife, their edges flowing with multicolored light—some were a deep blue void energy, some were a dark red abyssal aura, some were a dark golden divine radiance, and some were colors he had never seen before, colors that could not be described in words.

The crack is slowly widening, like a wound that is healing but turning around—growing bigger and bigger.

Through the largest crack, Lin Yu saw the sky of another world—it was blood red, with two suns hanging in the sky and countless spire-like buildings standing on the ground.

That was a game world.

It is currently overlapping with the world of the community.

"Damn it," Lin Yu cursed under his breath.

Without further hesitation, he unleashed the full power of his Void Walker's spatial abilities, leaving a trail of afterimages in his wake before appearing hundreds of meters away in the next second.

He rushed towards the apartment as fast as he could.

The scenery along the way made his heart grow heavier and heavier.

The streets were no longer deserted. They were teeming with people—players, and... things that weren't players.

A Void Twisted Being, the size of a truck, was rampaging through the middle of the street. Its body was translucent, and inside it surged countless distorted human faces, each one emitting a silent scream.

Wherever it goes, the ground is corroded into deep trenches, and cars parked on the roadside are instantly melted into pools of molten iron by its tentacles.

Several players were attacking it, but with little effect—their attacks hit the twisted creature like pebbles thrown into a mud pit, not even making a splash.

Further away, a dark red spatial rift was widening on the wall of a residential building. Countless pale hands reached out from the rift, gripping the wall and trying to climb out. The residents inside were screaming; some were running out, while others had already been dragged into the rift by those hands.

Lin Yu did not stop to help.

It wasn't that he didn't want to, it was that he knew—this was just the beginning.

If he lingers here and something even more serious happens at the apartment, he will regret it for the rest of his life.

He gritted his teeth and sped forward.

Along the way, he saw even more sights:

A swordsman dressed in ancient costume emerged from a golden crack and stood blankly in the middle of the road, looking at the surrounding high-rise buildings with a bewildered expression.

A group of undead knights, their bodies wreathed in green flames, emerged from the ground, brandishing rusty longswords and hacking at anyone in their path.

In the sky, a huge airship slowly emerged from the crack, its hull bearing insignia that Lin Yu did not recognize, and the cannons on both sides of the ship were beginning to charge.

The entire community is becoming a meeting point for all worlds.

Or rather—the battlefield.

Lin Yu finally arrived at the apartment building.

The situation downstairs was worse than he had imagined.

Several large holes have been punched through the exterior wall of the apartment building, with steel bars and cement fragments scattered all over the ground.

At the entrance of the building, Brother Long was leading a dozen or so security guards from the management office, holding various weapons—steel pipes, fire axes, and even iron woks for cooking.

Opposite them were a group of creatures that Lin Yu had never seen before.

The creatures were about the height of a person, with bodies covered in dark purple carapaces. Their heads were triangular, with no eyes, only mouths filled with fine teeth.

They move quickly and are very organized—in groups of three to five, they take turns attacking, coordinating perfectly.

It's not the chaotic attack method of the Void Twisting Entity.

It's the army.

"Boss!" Brother Long's eyes turned red when he saw Lin Yu. "You're finally back! These monstrous things that crawled out from underground have already made three waves!"

Lin Yu did not speak.

He raised his hand, and a deep blue rose appeared in his palm.

Blue-gold light gathered at the muzzle of the gun.

Charged Shot - Level 3.

Explosive Magic Bullet.

"boom!"

Gunshots rang out.

A highly compressed blue-gold magic bullet was fired, hitting the densest spot of the group of dark purple carapace-shelled creatures.

"boom--!!"

A violent explosion erupted in the middle of the street, and blue-gold hellfire spread in all directions, simultaneously engulfing more than a dozen creatures.

The creatures' carapaces melted rapidly in the hellfire, sizzling as they turned into pools of dark purple pus within seconds.

The remaining creatures let out sharp screechs and turned to retreat.

Lin Yu did not give them a chance.

The Demon-Slaying Sword appeared in his left hand, and golden sword energy swept out, cutting the retreating creatures in two one by one.

Ten seconds.

All the dark purple creatures besieging the apartment building have been eliminated.

Brother Long and the security guards were stunned.

The enemy they had fought so hard to hold off couldn't even last ten seconds against Lin Yu.

"Boss..." Brother Long opened his mouth, as if to say something, but in the end he just nodded vigorously.

"Don't thank me." Lin Yu sheathed his rifle and sword, his face grim. "This is just the advance party. There are many more to come."

He looked up at the sky.

The crack is bigger than before.

The airship had completely sailed out of the crack and was hovering in the air above the center of the community. The light from its cannon was getting brighter and brighter, as if it was gathering power.

"Listen to me." Lin Yu turned to look at Brother Long. "From now on, the apartment building is on the highest alert level. All residents must evacuate to the underground parking lot and seal off the entrance."

The management staff are divided into two shifts, taking turns on duty. No one is allowed to leave the underground parking lot without my order.

"Understood!" Brother Long didn't ask any more questions and immediately began making arrangements.

Lin Yu then took out several pieces of equipment from his storage space—a few automatic defense talismans, a portable energy shield generator, and a box of ammunition.

"Take these. The shield generator is installed at the parking lot entrance, and the talismans are stuck on the wall; they'll provide some protection for a while."

Brother Long took the things, his hands trembling. He wasn't afraid of dying, he was afraid he wouldn't be able to protect them.

"Brother Lin, what about you?"

"I have to deal with an even bigger problem." Lin Yu looked up at the floating ship. "If we don't take care of that thing, the whole neighborhood is doomed."

After he finished speaking, he pushed off with his feet and soared into the sky.

The Voidwalker's spatial abilities allowed him to move through the air as if on flat ground, reaching the height of the airship in just a few steps.

The airship was much larger than he could see from the ground—at least two hundred meters long, with a dark metal hull covered in dark red runes.

There were twelve giant cannons on each side of the ship, all of which were now pointed at the ground, and the light from the muzzles was so bright that it was blinding.

The ship was filled with soldiers—wearing black armor, full-face helmets, and carrying weapons that Lin Yu didn't recognize.

Their auras were very uniform, all ranging from platinum to diamond level, with the leaders even reaching epic level.

This is not a disorganized rabble.

This is a regular army.

Lin Yu landed on the deck of the airship.

The soldiers on the ship spotted him immediately, and dozens of weapons were simultaneously aimed at him.

"Who goes there?!" An officer in dark red armor stepped forward, his voice booming. He spoke in a language Lin Yu couldn't understand, but for some reason, he could comprehend the meaning—probably because the system's translation function was still working.

"Just passing by," Lin Yu said. "Your cannons are aimed at my house."

The officer was taken aback, seemingly not expecting such a response.

Then he laughed, the laughter coming from behind the visor, tinged with obvious contempt: "Your home? This land will soon belong to our Crimson Flame Empire."

If you know what's good for you, kneel down and surrender, and I might spare your life.