I chose the safe house, and the Human Alliance regretted it.

"The prophet shouldn't be so selfish; he should die!"

The sound came from one corner, then another, and yet another. A single stone stirred up a thousand ripples.

"Yes! Why should he be the one to cause the deaths of all of us?"

"He is a prophet, he is a savior, he should die for us!"

"The disaster took his life, why should we be implicated?"

Once the wind starts blowing in a certain direction, it can never be stopped.

In all the overseas bases besieged by the beast tide, the people inside began to defect.

Even the six major bases of the Dragon Kingdom are showing signs of instability.

In the living quarters of the Southwest Base, a woman tightly clutched her child, kneeling on the ground and weeping bitterly.

"Prophet... I beg you... go to hell..."

"My child is only ten years old... He hasn't grown up yet... If you die, the monster will leave... Please save him... Please die... I beg you..."

She scraped her forehead, and blood mixed with her tears streamed down her face.

"I have children too!"

"My parents are both over seventy!"

My wife is seven months pregnant!

Cries came from all directions, like a tide, like mournful music.

Everyone was saying that their loved ones couldn't die, and everyone was saying that the prophet's life could be exchanged for theirs.

No one thought there was anything wrong with this logic.

Fear is the best anesthetic, making people forget what shame is.

But pleading is only the beginning.

A middle-aged man stood up, his expression shifting from fear to anger, and then to a near-mad sense of self-righteousness.

"Isn't Chen Junjie a savior? Shouldn't a savior sacrifice himself to save others?"

"He enjoyed such high honors, with all of humanity kneeling before him. Shouldn't he have died for all of humanity? With great honor comes great responsibility! This is only natural!"

"Exactly!" someone immediately chimed in. "If he didn't have this awareness, he shouldn't have become a savior in the first place!"

"If you're going to be a savior, you should have known this day would come!"

"If he doesn't die, how can he face those of us who kneel before him?"

The sounds grew louder and louder, as if Chen Junjie owed them something.

A middle-aged man wearing glasses raised his hands, assuming a gesture of "rational analysis":

"Everyone, calm down and listen to me. Trading one person for thirty years of peace is a fair trade no matter how you look at it."

"Thirty years is enough time for the Alliance to develop the power to fight the alien beasts. The Prophet alone is worth it for the lives of billions of people worldwide for thirty years!"

His words immediately garnered support from a group of people.

"right!"

"Trading one life for billions of lives, it's worth it!"

"His refusal is selfish!"

An old woman pushed her way to the front of the crowd and cried out loudly:

"I have two sons! Are the lives of my two sons less valuable than Chen Junjie's life alone? Tell me, which is more valuable, two lives or one life?"

"What did my son do wrong? Why should they be killed by the monster because of Chen Junjie? Why?!"

As she spoke, she knelt down:

"Prophet, I beg you, die! Die, and my son will live!"

The people around her didn't find her absurd; instead, they were moved by her tearful plea.

Some people wiped away tears, while others gritted their teeth and echoed:

"Exactly! They had two sons, two lives! Chen Junjie's one life was worth it to exchange for two lives, let alone for all of humanity!"

Another middle-aged man suddenly stood up, his expression changing from sadness to indignation.

"What is the prophet waiting for? The calamity is meant to kill him; why doesn't he just hand it over? Why drag us into this?"

"It's better for him to die than for all of us to die, isn't it? Anyone can do that."

"Exactly!" someone chimed in, their voice shrill. "He alone, in exchange for all of us living for thirty years, isn't that a great deal?"

"If he doesn't agree, he'll be a sinner to the whole world! He'll kill us all!"

"That's right! What kind of prophet is he? If he truly cared about us, he should have stepped forward and willingly died!"

"Why bother with disasters besieging us? His lack of initiative means he doesn't care about us at all!"

The pleas turned into accusations, and emotions began to escalate.

The old man in the corner of the southwest base opened his mouth, as if to say something, but his throat seemed to be blocked.

Yesterday, these same people knelt on the ground and shouted "Long live the Prophet!" louder than anyone else.

They say he is the savior of mankind, or the reincarnation of a god.

But now, only a day after those voices faded, they've all become one, shouting "The prophet deserves to die."

The little girl clutched the chocolate cookie, now reduced to crumbs, tightly, her eyes red.

She didn't understand why adults changed so quickly.

Yesterday Brother Chen was a hero, today he's a sinner.

She couldn't help but shout, "Have you forgotten? Brother Chen saved us! Without him, we would have died long ago!"

Her voice wasn't loud, but it was particularly jarring in the noise.

There was a moment of silence.

Then, the middle-aged man turned his head, his eyes filled with a coldness that seemed unfamiliar:

"Girl, he saved us, and we are grateful. But now he wants to kill us—that's one thing, that's another. Saving our lives is one thing, but wanting us to die with him is another! We can't risk our lives just because we're grateful, can we?"

The little girl stubbornly explained, "He didn't want to harm you! It was those strange beasts—"

"The beast wants his life!" another man interrupted her, scolding.

"If he disagrees, the beasts will kill us. Isn't that trying to harm us?"

"Tell me, if he really cares about us, why doesn't he step forward? Does he think his life is worth more than all of ours combined?"

The girl trembled all over. She wanted to argue, but didn't know what to say.

She didn't understand why adults could talk about "gratitude" and "betrayal" so confidently.

She still remembers the smile on Brother Chen's face when he gave her the cookies, and the sense of security she felt when he said "It's okay."

Those things, in the eyes of adults, seem to be worthless.

The old man reached out his trembling hand and pulled the girl behind him.

He didn't say anything because he knew it would be pointless.

The underground living quarters of the North American base were packed with people.

Satellite signals had been interrupted by the wind and snow, but they could hear the howling outside and feel the earth trembling.

Every tremor seemed to remind them that the strange beast was outside and could rush in at any moment.

A dark-skinned man stood on a high place, shouting at the top of his lungs:

"What is that prophet from the Dragon Kingdom waiting for? The disaster is going to kill him, so he should just die already! How long is he going to drag this out? Until the monsters rush in and devour us all? His life is his life, but ours isn't?"

"Exactly! He alone has caused global suffering! If he had any conscience, he should have stood up himself; why do we need to shout here?"

"Do you think it's possible that the Dragon Kingdom is unwilling to release them?" someone in the crowd asked, changing their perspective.

"The prophet is from the Dragon Kingdom. Is the Dragon Kingdom trying to protect him? Otherwise, why has it been delayed until now?"

This statement was like a spark splashed into an oil drum.

"Why should the Dragon Kingdom protect him? Is his life more important than all of our lives combined?"

"If disaster strikes the entire world because of Chen Junjie from the Dragon Kingdom, the Dragon Kingdom will also be implicated!"

"Yes! China must give us an explanation! They must hand over Chen Junjie!"

"If the Dragon Kingdom doesn't hand them over, we'll unite and force them to do so!"

Anger spread like wildfire.

At the South American base, a shirtless man roared, "Why isn't that prophet dead yet? If he were dead, the monsters would retreat, right? So, he's keeping us alive to kill us all?"

"Yes! The prophet is dead, and peace will come!"

"Let him die! Let him die!"

"Is it possible that he brought this disaster upon himself?!" a voice cried out. "Why didn't he foresee this beforehand? This global beast tide must be him creating the crisis and then playing the savior!"

"Yes! He orchestrated it all himself!"

"He's not a prophet at all; he's an accomplice to disaster!"

"If he dies, the calamity will be gone! If he doesn't die, the calamity will continue!"

Nearby, someone whispered, "That can't be... The prophet has saved us so many times already..."

"That was in the past!" one of them immediately retorted. "The past is the past, and the present is the present! He saved us before, and we were grateful to him. Now that he wants to kill us, we can't even curse him? One thing at a time! He saved us, does that mean we can repay him with our lives?"

"He saved us of his own volition! We didn't force him! Now that he doesn't want to die, why can't we force him?"

Absurd speculations, magnified by fear, became reality.

No one mentioned Chen Junjie saving their lives from the beast tide time and time again; it was as if it had been erased by an eraser, completely wiped clean.

Instead, a carefully crafted "truth" emerged—Chen Junjie is a sinner, Chen Junjie deserves to die, and it would be an injustice if Chen Junjie didn't die.

In the underground living area of ​​the capital, the atmosphere has also undergone a subtle change.

Someone whispered, "Sacrificing the few to save the many—that's the fundamental law of war!"

"Would the prophet agree?"

"For the sake of the bigger picture, he should be able to understand!"

"......"

Globally, countless people went from pleading to moral and emotional blackmail, to calculating interests, and then to conspiracy theories, step by step, until finally only two words remained—he had to die.

Inside the base in Beijing, Wang Wei leaned against the wall, listening to the hypocritical analysis of those around him.

Under the light, images of every base around the world flashed through his eyes like a revolving lantern.

"Human nature," he said softly. "Indeed."

Wang Wei straightened up and looked at the crowd.

"Then—let's do it this way."