This is a story about a little boy that happened a long time ago.
At that time, the boy was nine years old. He had a father who worked as a technical director in a large company, a mother who wrote full-time at home, and a sister who was four years younger than him. The four of them lived in a small country in the middle of the continent, and their lives were peaceful. And no ups and downs.
His father is generous but busy, his mother is strict at home, and his five-year-old sister is usually well-behaved and sensible, but occasionally brings some chaos to the family. The boy's life is neither perfect nor miserable. It is just an ordinary, normal family, normal life. Happiness.
But there is one thing that always makes boys feel troubled, and that is the expectations of their parents, teachers, and even classmates and playmates.
—What do you want to do in the future? What are you interested in? My child is so smart that he will definitely be able to attend a good college. My students' grades are not bad and they should indeed work hard in this regard.
This is the habit of the Siberian people. They like order and a predictable and controllable life. No matter what it is, ranging from social engineering and national construction to child training and planning for the future, they always like to make a lot of preparations in advance and use various techniques and arrangements to make everything go according to their own ideas.
The Sibiya people can make everything run according to their own ideas, even the world - this is what the central government boasted about in the news at that time. At that time, the Sibiya people had developed facilities that could control the weather and suppress earthquakes. They boasted that the entire Nature has been taken into human hands.
So this is what the Zeboites should do.
You should do this, you should do that, you should be this person, you should be that person - under the arrangement of his parents, a young boy studies mathematics, practices musical instruments, he thinks about exercises, studies physics, he is in cram school Accompanying books and copying notes in school, he traveled back and forth every day, learning one kind of knowledge after another in compliance with his parents' requirements, and striving to become the person they expected.
As for his own thoughts, the boy doesn't have any ideas yet, and he doesn't care, because he doesn't mind living according to other people's plans. This is the case for most Sibiya people. At home, they must obey their parents, at school, they must obey their teachers, and if they enter social work, they must obey their bosses and superiors. Most Sibiya people live according to the ideas of others. This is It is the norm in society.
The boy was not dissatisfied with this. He listened carefully to the advice of his elders and completed the things they expected. Life continued in an ordinary way. If nothing happens, the boy should step by step become the same as him in the future. The father-like senior technicians became part of the middle and upper classes of society.
However, this peaceful life did not last long.
On a calm summer night, a huge meteor shower suddenly fell from the sky, covering the entire night sky and even the sky of the entire Hyboria world. Its appearance was completely beyond the expectations of the Central Observatory, and there was no warning at all before it.
Amid the joyful exclamations of pedestrians on the roadside, streams of light streaked across the sky. These colorful meteorites, almost none of which had the same color, seemed to appear out of thin air and then disappear out of thin air. Obviously everyone saw these meteors falling from the sky. fell, but no one found even the slightest fragment of the meteorite.
That year, the boy was ten years old. It was his tenth birthday. When he was looking up at the shooting stars in the night sky with his parents on the balcony of his home, he saw a shooting star shining with dark blue light falling from the sky and falling between his eyebrows.
And the next day, the world was changed.
Because, in the past, "superpowers" that only existed in legends and movies have truly appeared in this world without miracles.
The so-called superpowers are people with abilities beyond what ordinary humans can possess. The first person with superpowers discovered was a drunken middle-aged man, probably because of socializing. After drinking too much alcohol, he lit a fire in his sleep, and raging flames spurted out from his mouth and nose along with his snoring. The entire bar and even half the surrounding block were burned to the ground, and hundreds of people died. This immediately triggered a great social panic and made the central government quickly become vigilant about the existence of people with super powers.
The whole world has shown great yearning and fear for this unknown power that can easily kill other people. They want to get it themselves, but they don’t want others to get it. In order to judge whether this middle-aged man should die, Lawyers from both sides launched a long tug-of-war at the Siberian Court, which aroused great social discussion.
But soon, no one paid attention to that man anymore... Because after that, various other superpowers began to appear on the stage.
Some of them have physical abilities beyond ordinary people, some can control water flow, some of them can transform into thunder and lightning, some can become invisible and fly into the sky... telekinesis, frost, psychic peeping, memory control, gravitational repulsion, transformation... Hold These super-powered people come from all corners of society, including high-ranking officials from the central government and homeless people living on street corners. Since the emergence of these super-powered people, they have quickly disrupted social order.
Some of them relied on their abilities to do evil, and some relied on their abilities to do good. For various reasons, superpowers soon started fighting with each other. They fought in the streets and fought in squares. The government was helpless against them, and the police and The military may still be a bit of a deterrent to those with weaker superpowers, but they have no way to deal with those with powerful superpowers. They are no longer afraid of normal weapons of war. Whether they are missiles or lasers, they are useless. Even long-range snipers will be discovered by some kind of strange sixth sense. Even if the most powerful ones are attacked by fission bombs, they may not die.
The emergence of superpowers and the conflicts between them quickly affected the stability of the entire society. This is true even if the government has begun to recruit some ordinary superpowers on a large scale, because there are still a steady stream of superpowers awakening, and there are no traces of superpowers awakening. There are no rules, including criminals, mental patients and anti-social lunatics. Their existence has made the entire central government anxious. The Sibiya people without superpowers have collectively fallen into panic. They feel that their peaceful lives can no longer be controlled. Life is also in the hands of a superpower who is not known to be a madman.
But the boy felt a lot more relaxed. Almost all the cram schools on the street have closed down, and many schools have even lost their normal teaching functions. Countless students can only stay at home, waiting for the day when classes will reopen, but this day is far away, because Superpower The relationship between writers and ordinary people is gradually intensifying.
As long as individuals have wisdom, character, different stances and thoughts... As long as there are 'differences' between individuals, then conflicts will inevitably arise between individuals.
The huge gap in strength brought about by superpowers will amplify the contradiction hundreds or thousands of times.
Before there were superpowers, there would be a quarrel between two people. As long as it was not too fierce, no one would choose to take action because they would both be injured and punished.
But if one of them has superpowers, he only needs to move his fingers and take a look from a few streets away, or send his own power into the other party's body through the crowd, and choose the time to explode, and he can Easily kill this unpleasant guy in front of you, and no one can find any evidence. Superpowers are too convenient and powerful. Before their abilities, ordinary people are probably not much stronger than ants. This is still an ordinary energy system. If you are a spiritual system superpower, maybe with a look, your self The personality will completely collapse and become a puppet licking the other person's shoes.
If a conflict really arises between the two parties, would a capable person not do this? Perhaps, there will always be people who want to believe in the quality of others and place their lives on the morality and self-control of others.
All in all, today's world only maintains a fragile balance. The relationship between superpowers and ordinary people is tense, but the relationship between superpowers is also extremely contradictory and they cannot unite as one.
The last straw that overcame this fragile balance was a few extremely simple news.
Through battle after battle, the most powerful superpowers discovered that their own abilities could be improved by killing other superpowers and absorbing the source of their abilities - and at the same time, through what someone said, They also discovered that the central government was secretly conducting research on the "anti-superpower interference field" in an attempt to wipe out all superpowers.
As a result, the war between superpowers and superpowers, and superpowers and ordinary people, began suddenly and unnaturally.
That year, the boy was twelve years old. On the day the war started, he was at home with his parents, celebrating his sister's eighth birthday on the second floor of the house. While cutting the cake for his sister and lighting the candles, the boy inadvertently turned his head and looked out the window. Then, he saw a There was a flash of red light, a scorching ray streaking across his home from left to back, shredding all the walls on the first floor.
At the moment when it was too late to scream, the boy's home, along with the houses in the entire surrounding street, were completely destroyed and began to collapse rapidly. However, at this extremely dangerous moment, the boy found that he was curled up due to the sudden fear. His body had re-expanded at this time, and he felt an inexplicable force spreading within his body, making his speed many times faster. He actually avoided all dangers, making everything around him seem to be in slow motion. General.
At this time, the boy's eyes were flashing with a magnificent blue light. This energy overflowing light was the most obvious feature of 'superpowers'!
At this moment, for the boy, time seemed to stand still. After realizing that his home was being attacked by superpowers, he immediately turned around nervously and looked in the direction of his parents and sister. At this time, the boy's parents were being attacked by the building. The collapsed ceiling crushed their legs. Their expressions were horrified and they seemed to be screaming. Their eyes were full of confusion and fear. His sister had been buried by broken rocks and bricks, with only a small hand exposed...
From being cold at the beginning, his heart gradually became hopeful. Although he didn't know why, and he didn't understand what his ability meant for the time being, the trembling boy knew now that he might have the ability to help his relatives. At this time, he just wanted to save his relatives as much as possible. Thinking of this, the extremely nervous boy immediately ran towards his sister who was nearest to him, and ran towards the layers of bricks and debris.
The boy wanted to clean up the debris and rescue his sister from the debris, but it was not until he could barely lift a large piece of gravel that he finally understood.
He can't save anyone.
Even if he has awakened his superpower, he is still just a twelve-year-old boy. His instinct tells him that his current state will not last for five seconds at most, and within five seconds, he will not be able to move away. The rubble on his sister's body couldn't drag away the parents who were pressed by the ceiling from the weight... There was nothing he could do to save it.
The rock pressed down at an extremely slow speed, and the sister's hand twitched at an extremely slow speed. The boy turned his head blankly and looked at his parents. Even though his time was accelerated, he could still see his parents clearly. The slow change in the expression of his eyes is the gradual transformation from being at a loss to fear and panic... despair.
The dazed fear when I was attacked, the confusion when I awakened my abilities, the panic when I thought of my parents and sister being killed, the joy of feeling that I could save them, and now, the helplessness of waiting for the final moment bit by bit - time has been extended. It was meaningless, he could not undo anything, he could only allow himself to be tortured by the pain that became more permanent - the boy suddenly roared, he would never admit this fact!
Five... four... three... two... one... The boy frantically wanted to move the gravel off his sister's body. He yelled with all his strength and threw the rock bricks behind him with all his strength, but the time was too short, and the stone bricks were thrown away. There are too many things. When the duration of the ability ends, time starts to flow again... Bright red blood spilled from the cracks in the rocks, and the little hand still stained with cake cream convulsively raised, and then stopped twitching, while the parents moaned in extreme pain. It also echoed in the boy's ears.
Snap.
The boy sat down in the rubble. He was exhausted. A strong feeling of exhaustion that he didn't know came from spread throughout his body. He stared blankly at the pile of rubble that was leaking blood in front of him, and watched as he was scratched by the rocks. Holding Dakou's hand, he looked at his parents whose legs were crushed and listened to the other party's screams and wailings of pain. His mind went blank... At this time, late at night, a violent explosion sounded in the distant city, and raging fires ignited. The firelight made the surroundings look like day. Under the orange-yellow firelight, the boy's sad and desperate eyes shone with blue light.
Inside the pupils, the hands of the clock rotate. Even if they slow down, they will never stop.
Just like fate.
And this is the war and the prologue to the boy's story.
…
In the vast hall of the palace, forty-two majestic and solemn metal iron pillars support the towering dome, causing it to fade into dark shadows. On the slightly sunken floor of the hall, rows after rows of mysterious and complicated runes extend towards the center. , the spectacular magic circle formed by countless regular lines was shining with light blue light. As the energy surged, countless light particles floated and disillusioned in mid-air, making the palace hall magnificent and almost dreamlike.
But now, there is a 'person' slowly waking up from the throne in the center of the hall. He opened his eyes bit by bit, with a trace of undetectable light and dark fluctuations remaining in his pupils that were shining with dark blue light, and the hands of the clock rotated. But soon, these sad fluctuations dissipated and turned into incomparable indifference.
"dominate."
The immature little girl's voice rang in his ears. It was a petite soul puppet floating in mid-air. At this time, the puppet's calm and rarely ups and downs voice came: "The 319th world line replacement failed. , your observation failed, and you fell into a dream of the possibility of the collapse of the long river of time."
"Yeah."
On the throne, the man was silent. After a long time, he turned his head and said in a cold and calm voice exactly like the soul puppet: "I had another dream that I couldn't even hope to capture."
The man remained silent, and the hall suddenly became silent. The slight hum caused by the flow of magic energy echoed between the light particles of magic power and the dark dome. It could be seen that their light was gradually weakening, as if they had lost the support of something important, and the hall , the dreamlike feeling also quickly faded, as if it was returning to reality from an unknown realm.
And just before the light was about to completely dissipate, he spoke again.
"Then let's start the 320th time."
The man's voice was calm, and because of his words, time around him seemed to stop. Whether it was the fading magic light or the fading dream, everything was frozen and stagnant, with the only exception being the petite figure floating beside the throne. The soul puppet, and this soul puppet was respectfully in the air at this time, bowed and half-kneeling: "Follow your instructions, 'Time Turner', 'Master of Destiny', His Majesty Fatlolvi."
"We are now preparing for the 320th world line replacement, starting to connect the river of existence, starting to ignite the initial light, and starting to activate the 'Observer' system."
In the huge and magnificent hall, countless stars lit up, the pale blue light flourished, and the mysterious runes surged layer by layer, forming two mighty streams of light, one surging, the other calm. rise.
And above these two rivers, the dome shrouded in dark shadows began to glow. As millions of light clusters that seemed to be souls were ignited, billions of stars bloomed in sequence, as if the dome was forged by stars, showing a majestic appearance. -The stars twinkle, as if they envelope everything in the world, reflecting the entire world and the multiverse.
And under such a dome, the originally calm and calm river of light finally began to tremble slightly, as if a drop of water fell in the center of the river, and layers of concentric ripples began to spread. Until the entire river surface is covered.
Until then, the calm voice of the soul puppet came.
"Start the 320th observation."
The first update is 5,000 words
(End of chapter)