Survivorship Bias

Chapter 147: Warring clan

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"It sounds unreliable to me." Shen Ti leaned over and squeezed between An Wujiu and Zhou Yijue, "I can't meet such a good thing."

Zhou Yijue put away his palms, "Maybe it's an easter egg in the game, many games will put some easter egg programs in a certain level for players to find, it's nothing special."

Noah's shoulders sank, he raised his head, and said to An Wujiu helplessly, "I've already persuaded him."

What An Wujiu finds strange is not the sudden appearance of the Snow Maiden, nor is it an easter egg, but the benefits brought by this kindling—the miracle of rebirth.

How could it be so just in line with Zhou Yijue's greatest wish at the moment

"Then let him hold it." Shen Ti shrugged, "Anyway, it's not our bad luck."

So everyone returned to the temple together, during which An Wujiu asked for more information about the woman just now, Noah recalled some, and thought of something she thought was wrong.

"The elder sister was covered in injuries. After thanking us, she asked us, 'Is it really okay to let her go like this?' It seemed to be emphasizing this sentence on purpose."

An Wujiu frowned slightly, "And then?"

Noah told him, "Then I said since it's all untied, you can go."

Zhou Yijue on the side repeated what the woman said, "It feels like she must have escaped from somewhere. She said that if she hadn't met us, she would definitely die like those people tomorrow."

Shen Ti raised his eyebrows, "Tomorrow? Isn't tomorrow just..." He said, turning his head to look at An Wujiu.

"Well, the festival that the townspeople emphasized." An Wujiu walked in the snow and said to everyone, "These should be the plot lines in this game. Apart from the confrontation between the camps, I guess we also need to solve the problems of the water city." Mystery."

"Speaking of..." Nanshan said, "Wu You and I chatted with the local city residents when we were picking up food, and I heard from them that the leaders and nobles of the water city often go out, but only to the surrounding areas. In some places. Moreover, religion is prevalent here, every household believes in gods, the degree of religious penetration is very high, and there are very grand ceremonies every month."

"What exactly are the ceremonies?" Noah frowned, and those terrible memories flooded his mind again. "Are they all the same as what we did yesterday evening?"

Wu You shook his head, "They didn't say anything about that, they just said that all city residents must participate in the festival. Alcohol is usually prohibited here, but during the festival, the taboos that have been observed before will be cancelled. Everyone drinks and revels, tastes delicious food, listens It’s no different from a holiday when you wake up.”

Just listening to these words, there is indeed no problem, but thinking of the woman who appeared and disappeared in the snow just now, it may not be so simple.

Although the residents of the water city were dressed plainly, they had their own shelters in the face of such a heavy snowstorm, and there was no shortage of living resources for the time being, which was completely different from that woman.

Her appearance meant that besides the citizens of Water City, there was another group here.

Only two days later, three players had already died, and one priest was waiting for the dusk sacrifice. There were only eight people left in the temple.

Entering the room, An Wujiu took off the hat on the cloak and walked towards the stone screen, and finally stopped in front of the statue.

Shen Ti also stood shoulder to shoulder with him, looking up at the giant stone sculpture.

"This fairy looks really ugly."

An Wujiu looked at him, with a smile on his lips, "I'm a priest anyway, wouldn't it be disrespectful to say such things here?"

"It's really ugly." Shen Ti didn't care at all, but turned his attention to another matter. He moved a little closer, lowered his head and asked An Wujiu in a low voice, "I'm not so ugly, am I?"

An Wujiu couldn't help laughing.

"What are you laughing at?" Shen Ti felt bad, "Forget it, anyway, I'm not ugly now."

Not only is it not ugly.

An Wujiu pursed his lips into a smile, "I feel like you just follow my aesthetics."

On ordinary occasions, these words would seem like compliments or flirting to ordinary people, but between Shen Ti and An Wujiu, there are traces to follow.

"Maybe it is." Shen Ti smiled and put his arms around An Wujiu's shoulders, "The aesthetics are not bad." He pointed to the statue in front of him and sized it up, "If they have such aesthetics, I would It must have grown into a freak."

An Wujiu didn't like what he said, so he poked him with his elbow.

Shen Ti suddenly felt that he had said something wrong, and immediately made amends, "No, it's ugly."

An Wujiu laughed helplessly, and was about to speak when Nanshan's voice came from behind him.

"You are here too." Nan Shan smiled, this time the clothes fit his needs very well, the cuffs of the robes were very wide, just covering the cage.

Just a person came, Shen Ti turned his head and asked abruptly: "Nanshan, do you think I look good?"

Nan Shan froze for a moment, then turned her eyes to An Wujiu, as if asking for help.

"Look at what he is doing, look at me!" Shen Ti pointed to his face.

"Good-looking is good-looking..." Nan Shan hesitated, "But..."

Shen Ti almost rolled his eyes, "How can there be a but? It must be because of your poor vision." Just after complaining, when he turned his head and saw An Wujiu's eyes crooked with a smile.

He hadn't smiled like this in a long time.

"That's not what it means." Nan Shan explained with some embarrassment, "But I personally might not like this type, it's too high..."

Shen Ti also laughed, "Who makes you like it!" He smiled on An Wujiu's shoulder, and when he had laughed enough, he asked Nan Shan, "Then how tall do you like?"

"Just..." Nan Shan thought for a while, and a person popped up in his mind, which shocked him a lot.

"Just what?" Shen Ti glanced at An Wujiu, "I personally suggest that you rule out a height of around 1.8 meters, it's not suitable."

After speaking, he asked again solemnly, "What do you like?"

"I like it..." Nan Shan stuttered suddenly, before he could describe a clue, a familiar voice suddenly appeared behind him.

"Taoist?" Wu You came over and found Shen Ti and An Wujiu a little strange, "Why are they all crowded here?"

Shen Ti felt that he interrupted their aesthetic discussion, "Oh, you little brat, don't meddle in the affairs of adults, be good, go play alone."

Wu You pulled him away from An Wujiu in disgust, "You should play alone, pestering my Brother Wujiu every day, are you annoying?"

An Wujiu has long been used to the small fights between the two of them, he smiled and looked away, just in time to see Nanshan staring at Wu You in a daze.

"Nan Shan?"

Hearing An Wujiu's voice, Nan Shan regained consciousness and looked at him.

An Wujiu noticed something, but he didn't make a sound, and changed the subject calmly, "You came here to see this stone statue, right?"

Nan Shan nodded, "Yes, I think it's a bit strange." He approached An Wujiu and pointed to the stone statue, "Generally speaking, early human worship of gods often comes from the natural world, so the image of gods is basically It is derived from the animals and plants that appear in their living range, or human beings themselves. But this image carved out of stone... "

An Wujiu said: "Isn't it too weird?"

Nanshan nodded, "Actually, if you want to say it's weird, the content drawn in some religious ancient books I've seen before is not weird, but this one in front of you seems to make you feel uncomfortable just by staring at it. Generally speaking, people There are preferences in shaping the image of gods, some are towards majesty and solemnity, and some are towards the direction of so-called beauty and primitiveness, but basically there is no such type, and it does not look like a positive image of God.”

This reminded An Wujiu of the god he summoned in his childhood, which was Shen Ti's body.

Compared with this disgusting body, which is a mixture of various animal limbs and countless double snake eyes, that image is more ethereal and impermanent, and it is different every time, as if what he sees is only a part of God every time .

"You mean that the gods that people believe in are not right." An Wujiu said.

Nanshan nodded, "Look at their placement, shrines and shrines are used to enshrine gods, but no temple will hide the gods with a whole wall. an offense."

This is true.

"And look at the totems on their murals," Nan Shan pointed to the ceiling and analyzed, "The murals of each religion can reflect what the religion itself admires and what it taboos."

From the first moment An Wujiu entered here, he observed the paintings here, most of them were warriors holding weapons.

"It's warlike here."

Nanshan nodded, "I think so too. These totems reflect their battle scenes. They wear brightly colored costumes and bright feathers on their heads. I'm afraid they are all for the purpose of driving back the enemy with their aura on the battlefield. .”

Shen Ti listened for a while, and stopped fighting with Wu You, "So, the leaders here go out from time to time to fight."

Wu You also suddenly realized, "This is why those city residents said that their leader would bring a lot of food and gifts when he returned. It turns out that those are spoils of war."

If a city was formed by fanatical warriors, their most worshiped god might also be related to battle.

An Wujiu was thinking silently, suddenly, he saw Megan coming out from the corridor of the lounge with a very bad expression on his face.

She glanced at them all defensively, turned her head and left.

"I think this game is not as simple as werewolves killing good people, and good people killing werewolves." Nanshan said to them, "Just like the girl Noah and the others met today, I think there will be more clues in tomorrow's festival."

An Wujiu thought of Yaxia who warmly entertained them that day, and thought of her weird husband, and always felt that the story of the water city would not be so simple.

In this place, their hunger and fatigue were more obvious and serious than usual, so they shared the food donated by the city residents and went back to their rooms to rest.

Shen Ti said that he didn't agree, and that his room was too cold, so he insisted on sharing a small bed with An Wujiu, hugging him from behind.

An Wujiu lay in a safe embrace, but it was difficult to fall asleep.

As long as he closed his eyes, he seemed to be lying flat on an operating table, his arm was shattered alive by the machine, his skin and muscles were cut open, and the cold tweezers stretched in, pinching away the bone fragments bit by bit.

In order to test his pain tolerance, they even carried out these tortures called experiments without injecting any anesthesia. They only put a muzzle on him, tied him up, and locked him in a blank room with nothing. Not even a bed.

He could only lie limp on the floor, unable to get up, like an abused dog. An Wujiu suddenly remembered why he was so sensitive to sounds and events that hadn't happened, even the sound of Shen Ti's earrings colliding could be clearly distinguished.

Because when he was locked up, he was most afraid of hearing the sound, especially the sound of the door opening. After he heard it, he would shrink subconsciously and hide back, because he didn't know what would happen next, whether to stick electrodes on his temples and the top of his head, stimulate the electrodes painfully into the brain, or continue to use the method of mental pollution. Strengthening exercises for mental strength.

One of the many contents of the pollution is the constant broadcast of images of human beings dying, all kinds of people, all kinds of ways of death, for a long time, An Wujiu's brain was numb, he saw the living The researchers also felt that they were walking corpses.

When he calmly accepts any pollution and is indifferent, he will get a small reward-a full day's rest time, but during this rest time, he can still hear the voices that are played repeatedly: about the supreme The moral code, about helping, about sacrifice, about all mankind.

But the frightening thing is that in addition to these experiments in the physical sense, they will also cultivate his abilities. Different people have taught him different knowledge, and everything he has now is endowed by those people.

With his eyes closed, Shen Ti did not fall asleep, he could feel An Wujiu trembling slightly in his arms, and even restrained his trembling.

Shen Ti hugged him tighter, resting his chin on his shoulder.

"sorry."

An Wujiu opened his eyes, and because of Shen Ti's words, he escaped from that nightmare of the past.

"Why do you say that?" He turned around and looked at Shen Ti face to face.

Shen Ti just couldn't accept that he was just a bystander in the past, and it was the first time he felt regret for one thing.

Even though An Wujiu couldn't hear Shen Ti's inner voice, he didn't have such superpowers, but because of love, he could feel Shen Ti's sadness.

He hugged Shen Ti, pressing his face against his warm collarbone.

"You don't know how important you are."

For An Wujiu in the past, those people who had human faces like him wore elite clothes and had high-sounding reasons, but they inflicted cruel atrocities on him and raised him in a ten-square-meter In a small room like a man-made virus living in a petri dish.

But the only thing that comforted him and gave him the courage to survive was a terrifying, frightening, and indescribable god from the perspective of the world. He is countless times higher than all mental pollution experiments, and any one of them may go crazy if they look at it.

Normal fellows turned An Wujiu into a monster that can only be redeemed by monsters.

"I love you, Shen Ti." An Wujiu's voice was almost trembling, "Without you, I would have ceased to exist."

Shen Ti hugged him back, but in fact, a long time ago, he didn't even know how to hug.

How could he not be created by An Wujiu now

An Wujiu felt that he was sad but also happy, at least he could meet Shen Ti, at least when he met him, these memories did not exist, he could love him without any worries.

He understands that amnesia is probably man-made, but at least he who has lost those memories can meet these precious people like a normal person.

If he, who has been trapped in the experiment for ten years, is directly thrown into the altar, it may not be a good result.

No matter how reluctant they were, the evening sacrifice still came as scheduled. Following the urging of the holy voice, the rest gathered in the hall of the temple, and a new sarcophagus appeared, with Matsuura Mori inside.

An Wujiu looked down at Matsuura's face, feeling a little sad in his heart.

A person approached him, and when he looked up, it was Zhou Yijue.

"I want to give you this." Zhou Yijue spread his hand towards him, and inside was the fire seed he got.

"Why?"

"I'm afraid I will still be manipulated this time." He looked at An Wujiu, "You don't seem to be controlled, and so is Shen Ti."

An Wujiu asked: "How do you know?"

"Although you can't do anything when you are controlled, and your mind is blank, but after the end, you will have memories of the sacrifice. You successfully resisted but passed out. Shen Ti was not controlled at all." Zhou Yijue explained to him, He gave him the kindling again in a begging gesture, "Please help me once."

An Wujiu nodded, took the tinder in his hand, lifted the sarcophagus together with the others silently, and walked towards the direction of offering sacrifices.

The wind and snow outside was getting worse, in front of it was the day that was about to sink in the west, and behind it was the rising blood moon emitting endless blood light. Their footsteps were heavy, and every step they stepped on was deep in the snowdrifts. Another long and profound scream sounded in their ears, which made people feel hairy.

This time An Wujiu could clearly feel that he was in a much better state than last time, not so groggy anymore.

It's just that when he put down the sarcophagus and the blue flame appeared out of thin air, a powerful force instantly suppressed his limbs and bones, and a strong resistance appeared inexplicably.

An Wujiu saw it, three transparent pillars vaguely appeared behind the blue flame, like frozen ice.

Long before going up the mountain, he gave the fire to Shen Ti, only Shen Ti is completely uncontrollable, just in case, this matter can only be done by him.

The controlled crowd beat drums and played weird and primitive music, and an uncontrolled believer appeared among them, who disobeyed the will of God and left the worshiping crowd with a kindling in his hand.

It was difficult for An Wujiu to move his body, so he had to hold the sharp obsidian knife. But his eyes were fixed on Shen Ti all the time, watching him run towards the three divine pillars, and also watching the blue flame rush towards Shen Ti!

"Shen Ti!" An Wujiu broke through the control of that force in an instant and shouted.

Shen Ti didn't look back, his whole body was covered by blue flames, but he was unscathed, half kneeling on the ground, stretched out his hand, and ignited the three divine pillars standing in front of him.

The three transparent divine pillars were instantly poured by the small fire, turning into a dazzling blue.

Just when An Wujiu was waiting for a miracle to happen, the three divine pillars suddenly rushed straight up, flying into the half-red and half-white sky.

I thought they would disappear into the sky like this, but I didn't expect that in the next second, a loud noise erupted from the distant sky.

An Wujiu raised his head, he was surprised to find out.

The sky is like a broken mirror, with many huge cracks shattered.