After a day of work, Lu Yao dragged his exhausted body back to his rented apartment.
At a small company with barely more than ten employees, over half were well-connected deadweights. Excluding the boss and partners, only three people actually did any work. After just three months on the job, Lu Yao already felt like every day lasted a year.
Still, he did not dare resign before finding another job. With the economy in a slump, survival came first; only then could he think about what came next.
This was the only time of day when Lu Yao could relax a little. He shifted his mood and temporarily cast aside all the frustrations from the day.
It was game time!
He turned on his old computer, and the mouse cursor slowly moved across the screen.
Let's see what I should play today.
A ranked match?
A round of Dota?
Or Romance of the Three Kingdoms IX?
An inconspicuous icon caught Lu Yao's attention.
The icon sat in the lower-right corner of the screen. Its logo was a green pixel-art island that blended into the grassy computer wallpaper, making it easy to overlook.
God Simulator?
What kind of game was this?
Lu Yao had no memory of downloading or buying it.
He clicked on the file properties to check. The source file was 20 MB, so it was just a small game. Judging by its size, it seemed to be a rather old game.
Lu Yao's computer had poor specs. He had used this machine ever since college and could not bear to replace it. He had to set League of Legends and Dota to their lowest graphics settings, while major titles were only accessible through cloud gaming or watching other people's gameplay videos. Most of the time, Lu Yao played all kinds of classic old games.
He tried opening God Simulator.
The screen slowly went black.
Accompanied by soothing old-school 8-bit electronic music, white Chinese characters appeared one by one against the black screen. It had the classic style of a Pixel Game.
[On this day, the world finally welcomed back the Great God.] [Your arrival has given the world meaning once more. Your divine power will create a brand-new civilization.]
Then the black screen gradually faded, replaced by little people constructing various buildings. Some farmed Farmland, while others raised their arms and cheered. The pixel-art visuals felt fresh and nostalgic, relaxing Lu Yao.
Three white options appeared over the background.
[New Game] [Continue Game] [Exit]
Lu Yao clicked [New Game].
The screen returned to black, and evenly spread green pixels appeared across it, like blocks of paint smeared over a blackboard.
[Capturing world...]
About five seconds later, green pixels filled the screen.
[World positioning complete. Welcome, Great God.]
The pixelated background changed again.
A stretch of level grassland appeared on the screen, surrounded by forest, rivers, high mountains, and desert. At the center stood a white domed building resembling a Temple.
A line of text appeared in the center: This is your Temple. Name it ___ Temple.
After thinking for a moment, Lu Yao casually typed in a character.
Yao Temple.
The words [Yao Temple] appeared above the Temple.
Then the scene fell into a strange state of stillness.
Lu Yao clicked the Temple, but no options appeared.
What was going on?
What company had made this old game? It did not even have a basic tutorial or guide?
Just as he was wondering, two barefoot little people with bare upper bodies appeared in the corner of the screen. They moved toward the Temple and circled around it.
An exclamation mark popped up over one of their heads, followed by a Dialogue Box.
"How exquisite and magnificent this house is. It must have been made by God."
The other little person raised both hands.
"God, God!"
"This must be guidance from God. This is a lucky place. We must bring more people here to settle down!"
"God-Blessed Land! God-Blessed Land!"
Smiley-face symbols appeared over both little people's heads. They ran off the screen, then returned a few seconds later with five more little people.
All seven little people began worshipping around the Temple. They built a small thatched hut beside it, then transplanted several shrubs that looked like berry bushes from beyond the screen and began living beside the Temple.
A prompt appeared on the screen.
[You have gained the first group of believers in this world. The Power of Faith is how you perform Miracles. Gather more faith.]
Lu Yao noticed a small human icon in the upper-right corner representing population, beside which was a palace icon representing faith. Both population and faith were at 7.
It seemed that each believer provided 1 Faith Point.
He clicked the population icon with his mouse, but nothing happened. Then he clicked faith, and this time an icon resembling a cloud of mist appeared.
[Miracle]
Below it was a row of options, each with a corresponding simple illustration. All the Miracles were grayed out, indicating that none could currently be used.
Each Miracle required Faith Points to perform. Even Rainfall, the Miracle requiring the fewest Faith Points, cost 10.
In other words, he needed 10 believers just to perform a Miracle once.
Increasing the population became the top priority.
Unlike other management simulation games, God Simulator did not allow players to directly build houses or produce residents. He could only wait for the Pixelated Villagers to reproduce or gather on their own. At present, [Miracle] was the only option he could operate.
Lu Yao watched the Pixelated Villagers farm while constantly experimenting with his mouse. His stomach began to rumble.
He went to the kitchen, cooked a bowl of noodles, and returned with several cloves of Garlic.
When he returned to the computer, Lu Yao noticed that the little people around the Temple were acting strangely. Sad expressions appeared over their heads, and they all gathered around the Temple in worship.
Dialogue Boxes continuously appeared above the little people's heads.
"Great God, we beg you to reveal yourself!"
"Please bless us, Great God!"
"The Forest Tribe believes we worship a Demon and wants to tear down the Temple. Please show us a Divine Miracle!"
Lu Yao took a bite of noodles. So this is the first crisis.
But he only had 7 Faith Points right now. He could not even make it rain, and the Miracle section was still unavailable.
Lu Yao continued exploring until he finally clicked open a brand-new interface on the Temple.
At the center of the screen was a stone campfire. Before it sat a gray humanoid statue in a seated posture. Its features were blurred, making it impossible to tell whether it was male or female. It seemed to be the image of God imagined by the Pixelated Villagers.
Before the Divine Statue was a long table with two differently shaped slots.
The large slot on the left was labeled [Sacrificial Offering].
The smaller slot on the right was labeled [Blessing].
At present, all the slots were empty.
Sacrificial Offerings were easy enough to understand. They were naturally things these little believers offered to God.
By that logic, Blessings should be powers or items granted by the Temple to these believers.
Could this be the Divine Miracle they wanted?
Lu Yao searched everywhere, but could not find anything he could move or drag. He was at a loss; he had already gotten stuck on the very first problem.
Suddenly, he noticed something strange.
Why did the long table before the Divine Statue seem a little familiar?
No...
Why did that table look exactly like his computer desk?
There were two slots. The Sacrificial Offering Slot was shaped exactly like a rectangular keyboard, while the Bounty Slot was oval-shaped... a mouse?
Looking more closely, the Divine Statue appeared to be sitting at the long table. Was it not simply himself playing on his computer?
The thought gave Lu Yao a fright.
Impossible...
This had to be a coincidence.
Then a bold idea emerged in his mind.
He cautiously placed a clove of Garlic from beside his instant noodles onto the mouse.
Lu Yao watched the mouse expectantly.
Two seconds later, the Garlic clove rolled off the mouse.
"Of course it was a coincidence."
Lu Yao mocked himself, though a faint sense of disappointment rose within him.
Just then, the fallen Garlic clove suddenly vanished into thin air.
Lu Yao instinctively looked at the computer screen.
A pixel icon of Garlic had appeared in the Temple's [Blessing] slot.
[Garlic]: A blessing from God. A special spice and a medicinal herb.
A line of text appeared on the screen.
--Would you like to grant [Garlic] to your believers? [Yes] [No]
The hand holding Lu Yao's mouse trembled.
I've started a new book. Dear readers, please add it to your collections and keep reading~
Before you continue