The emperor listened to Huang Ji and smiled with relief.
It felt good to be alive, but unfortunately, he was about to die again. That left him with little excitement, no sense of being given a new life. If anything, he felt even more hopeless...
As he lay dying earlier, he had come to understand a great deal.
Now he could not help clapping his hands. "Well said, Great Emperor Ziwei!"
"In fact, whether you saved me or not, Han Bi could never have become emperor."
The Shacha People present froze, unsure what he meant.
The emperor sneered. "The consortiums can pinpoint the time of my death down to the nanosecond!"
"They've long since worked out exactly how far my vital signs must fade before the Shell System declares me dead."
"As I lay dying, Han Bi appeared to be in first place. In reality, the consortiums were perfectly capable of pushing the Old Nine into the lead one second before I died!"
An uproar swept through the crowd. So that was possible?
Most people paid little attention to how the system made its decisions. During past changes of emperor, they had learned the results from the news. Who cared about the precise second the throne changed hands? But while ordinary people did not care, the consortiums that had shaped every election cared deeply. They had long since figured out how the system worked.
Death was a process. Someone might look dead while traces of life remained in the brain.
A specific standard defined the moment of death, dividing the process into several stages.
The powerful could scan the emperor to determine which stage he had reached, then suddenly push the Old Nine to the top before the emperor died.
By then, Han Bi would have no chance to turn