God is dead.
Gao Wen stared at the words engraved on the stone for a long time, and he seemed calm because he didn't know how to react for a moment. Behind him, Yuri and the other three also approached, and those distorted dark red marks reflected caught everyone's eyes.
"...all the ancestors of my family..." Magnum's eyes widened, "what does this mean?"
Gao Wen finally recovered from the shock at the beginning. Although he was stunned for a moment when he saw such a profane sentence at the temple gate, he still kept in mind that in the No. 1 sandbox, nothing should be trusted or made lightly. For the rules of any conclusion, the first thing to do at this time is to ask Selina for more information: "Didn't the last group of explorers see this sentence in this city?"
"No, I'm sure," Selena said immediately, "Although the last batch of exploration teams hadn't had time to explore the interior of the buildings in the city, they had already searched the entrance of this temple. If they really saw It is impossible not to report this sentence.”
"The gods are dead..." Yuri muttered to himself, "This sandbox world was empty when we explored last time. Who left this sentence?"
"Think of Phantom Town," Magnum muttered, "empty of people... maybe we just can't see them."
"We should search this temple, what do you think?" Selina said, turning her gaze to Gao Wen—although she and the other two archbishops are "professionals" in the No. 1 sandbox, their specific actions must Listen to Gao Wen's opinion, after all, what they have to face may be gods, and in this regard, the "outsider wanderer" is the real expert.
Gao Wen knew what the Eternal Sleepers thought of him. In fact, he didn't think he was a professional against the gods—this field was too high-end after all. But after all, he has been in contact with many gods and secrets, and he has also participated in the siege and cooking operations against the God of Nature (folk high imitation version). At least in terms of self-confidence, he is much stronger than ordinary people.
Of course, if you add the theoretical knowledge gained from communicating with Veronica and Kamel on weekdays, plus the experience you have accumulated after studying ancient classics and the collections of the Holy Light Sect, he is also really good in the field of theology and anti-god. Call it an expert.
"Search the temple," he said with a nod, "Religious places are the 'channels' for gods to influence the world, and they can often in turn reveal the nature and state of the corresponding gods.
"But remember to be vigilant, and speak out immediately after seeing an abnormal scene or hearing a suspicious voice. Here, don't trust your own mind too much."
The three archbishops nodded, and then walked together with Gao Wen towards the interior of the temple building with a strong desert style.
I don't know how long the temple has been abandoned, and the inside looks old and full of traces of time.
After a short corridor is the hall used for religious activities. The lights originally used to illuminate the hall have long been extinguished. The huge columns and the curtains hanging from the sky interweave layers of shadows in the hall. The sunlight from the narrow high windows shines into the room, and cuts bright "roads" between the shadows. It is the afternoon of the sandbox world, and the sunlight from the slant is not very strong, and it is more vivid. The whole interior space adds a mysterious and ancient charm.
Gao Wen casually turned his head and took a look. Through the narrow high window, he saw the sun in the sky. It was also a huge sun, with wood grain-like patterns faintly appearing on the brilliant corona, which was similar to the "sun" in the real world. It's normal.
Living on a satellite orbiting a gas giant planet, the eternal sleepers can't imagine what the sun of other planets looks like. In this sandbox, they also set up a sun that is no different from the real world.
"This place has been abandoned for at least a few decades... maybe a century, but not longer," Yuri bent down beside a collapsed stone platform, stroking a piece of severely weathered fabric that fell from the stone platform with his fingers , "Otherwise these things cannot be preserved."
"But the words at the door seem to have been engraved not long ago." Magnum muttered, frowning.
Gao Wen watched Yuri's movements, and asked casually, "Will the things in the sandbox world be weathered and decayed like the real world?"
"Yes," Yuri stood up, "and the weathered form and speed are similar to the real world. We directly refer to the reality of these detailed parameters. After all, it is almost impossible for mortals to rewrite a complete set of details. work."
"Alas," Gao Wen couldn't help but shook his head and sighed helplessly, "the real world can give birth to gods, so how could such a world that is highly similar to the real world not have similar religious phenomena?"
Selena, who was walking beside her, shook her head: "Before this, who knew that gods were 'born' instead of 'I AM'?"
The three archbishops were speechless and could only continue to check the clues in the temple in silence.
Magnum walked to the front of the hall, where there is a special circular high window, the light from the high window shines on the platform like a pulpit, and the slight dust particles are flying in the light, being visited here The uninvited guests disturbed the original trajectory.
Yuri came to Magnum and asked casually, "Are you sure you have removed the psychic storm from your subconscious?"
"Damn it, how many times do you have to confirm—of course I removed it!" Magnum stared, "Have I accidentally injured you many times with Psychic Storm? Why are you holding grudges so much?"
"... I even developed an exclusive resistance to psychic storms, what do you think?"
"...I-definitely-removed! Absolutely, removed!" Magnum repeated each word with a pause, while still looking at the pulpit-like platform, suddenly, his scanning eyes It stagnated and landed on a corner of the ground, "... there are also here."
Yuri looked along the line of sight of the other party, only to see a line of crude inscriptions deeply imprinted on the stone slab, which was exactly the same as the handwriting at the entrance of the temple—
God is dead.
The two archbishops were silent for a moment before Magnum suddenly said, "Yuri, to be honest, do you believe what it says?"
"There is only one 'god' in the sandbox. If this sentence is true and the god is really dead, then we can go back and celebrate," Yuri said with a wry smile. The polluted and out-of-control sandbox has no sign of recovery, and seeing this god is dead at this time and place, I can only feel doubly weird and terrifying."
Magnum nodded in agreement: "That's right, whoever left these horrible words here doesn't look sane..."
On the other side, Gao Wen and Selena were checking several rooms connected to the hall.
In a showroom located behind the side of the pulpit, which seemed to be specially used to store important items, they saw many things offered by believers, which were placed in square holes on the wall and kept in safekeeping.
Selina frowned slightly, looking at the exquisite gold and silver vessels, jewelry and jewelry: "The upper narrator is devoutly believed by the locals... These offerings are probably only a small part."
"It's a pity that these mundane things shouldn't mean much to a god." Gao Wen said casually, and then his eyes were attracted by a gorgeous and exquisite one-handed sword placed alone—the one-handed sword didn't look like a god. Ordinary offerings are placed in the hole in the wall, but on a platform at the end of the room, surrounded by sigils for protection, and there seem to be words on the platform, which is very different.
Before Gao Wen came to the platform, he saw a line of text on it:
Balmora, most holy and great king, to my lord, the summer day of the year of the chamomile.
"It seems that a king dedicated it to the upper-level narrator..." Gawain said casually as he looked at the line of text.
"King Balmora..." Selena also saw that line of text, and there was a hint of thought in her expression, "I seem to have some impressions."
"Oh?" Gawain raised his eyebrows. Originally he thought it was an insignificant name, but he sensed something strange from Selena's expression, "What did this King Balmora do?"
"According to the data output by the log system, it is a virtual personality automatically generated by the sandbox," Selina said while thinking, "At the beginning of its birth, it was a slave of the city-state of Nim Drow, and then it was set according to the system. , gained freedom by fighting slaves, became one of the guards of the city-state, and was gradually promoted to the captain of the guard... "
"A guard who was born as a slave?" Gawain couldn't help being surprised, "Then how did he become a king?"
"Let me think about it... According to the time in the sandbox, it should be about two hundred years before the loss of control. The Nim Drow city-state was covered by insect plagues, the water source was polluted, and the grain harvest was exhausted. Locusts and black beetles ate most of the stored grain. , the nobles of the city-state fled, and the king took his cronies and treasures to seek refuge in a nearby country. In the critical situation, the people who were still alive in the city-state decided to elect a new king-who could find a way to fight against the pests and find food. He who sources and new water, is the new king.
"As you can imagine, this 'sandbox dweller' named Balmora did these things—he found out the source of the pest outbreak, led the people in the city-state to find a new water source, and led the soldiers to chase Catching up some of the fugitive nobles, and taking back some of the grain they took away... are all remarkable feats, even beyond our preset 'script', and no 'virtual resident' has ever been able to do these things to promote the process of history Big things, things like that tend to be done with outside input scripts...so I was impressed by that."
"Then what happened to this great king?" Gawain couldn't help asking curiously.
Selena seemed to hesitate for a moment before saying softly: "...deleted."
"deleted?"
"The script deviated too much. The sandbox believed that the system was at risk of imbalance, so it automatically corrected it. Balmora died suddenly in his prime, but he was actually deleted—of course, he left behind in the history of No. 1 sandbox. It belongs to one's own reputation, at least this part of reputation has not been reset."
Gawain didn't speak for a while, but just quietly looked at the sword placed on the platform, as if looking at a virtual personality born in a dream world and created by the system, watching him change from slave to soldier, from Soldier becomes general, general becomes king, becomes hero, and finally... deleted.
Suddenly, he had a strange feeling about those sentient beings sinking and falling in the sandbox world.
His attention quickly returned to the temple belonging to the "Upper Narrator".
"Then, according to the clues here, the king of Balmora dedicated his sword to the gods," he said to Selina beside him, "that is to say, in the era when Balmora was active, the upper narrator The faith has already been born, and has even become the core belief of this Nim Sandro city-state."
Selena obviously thought of the same thing, her expression was thoughtful: "It seems... so."
"The sandbox system wasn't out of control at the time - you outside monitors had no idea of the temple's presence or existence."
"Indeed."
Gao Wen raised his eyelids: "Why do you think this is?"
Selena thought about it, and said slowly: "Either... the upper-level narrator distorted time and history after the sandbox got out of control, weaving a world process that didn't exist in the sandbox world, or, the sandbox system got out of control. Earlier than we thought, even the monitoring system has been deceiving us."
Gawain fell silent.
Either way, it's not good news.
If it is the first possibility, it means that the upper-level narrator has more serious erosion and control over the sandbox system than expected. He even has the ability to manipulate time and history in the sandbox world, which is beyond the simple mental pollution;
If it is the second possibility, it means that his pollution leaked earlier than everyone expected, which means that he has most likely left undetected hidden dangers in the real world that may erupt at any time...
In all fairness, Gao Wen would rather encounter the first situation.