"Now I understand. Everyone is on the altar. Everyone is a Sacrifice, but at the same time, everyone is also an offerer."
His godless eyes could not see the colors of the mundane world, nor could they see intricate details and patterns. But they could see resonances and vibrations on a higher-dimensional level, the "contaminants" forever stirring beneath the shadows, and the world beneath ordinary life that had long since begun to subtly decay.
". . . The level of 'corruption' in this Small World is at least two grades higher than Earth's."
The great and radiant deities and statues in everyone else's eyes were, in his, horrifying and grotesque beasts.
He had lost the ability everyone else possessed—the ability to pretend nothing had happened and live peacefully—but he had also gained the chance to see the truth.
"Is this the Eye of Truth? If anyone else had gotten these eyes, they would either dig them out themselves or be unable to sleep at night. Sooner or later, they'd be driven mad."
Truth did not always mean correctness, much less benevolence. The privilege of "pretending not to see," granted by the instincts and senses of weak creatures, actually made Lu PingAn somewhat envious.
". . . The 'mutation corrosion level' here is comparable to the Silent Mountain Range World. Heh, so this is the so-called Divine Realm? What a pity. I'm the only one who can see it."
In truth, the "low-pollution worlds" and "heavily polluted worlds" everyone else spoke of had always been more like situation reports, descriptions of the likely difficulty of a current mission.
But to Lu PingAn, the nature of a polluted world was obvious at a glance.
"Tsk, tsk, tsk. This is getting a little disgusting."
The earth was viscous and unstable. Within the distorted