Deception

Cheng Shi opened his eyes and found himself not on the rooftop.

His heart lurched. His first thought was: Could I have guessed wrong? Was what Xu Lu said actually true?

But when he realized that he was in the starry sky, above the stars, his previous thought was disproved.

He had not been wrong.

His body had merely been transferred by some mysterious force.

He had heard other players mention this power during a previous trial.

It was said that when a deity favored one of their followers, they would descend at the end of the trial in a form humans could understand and summon that follower before them.

"Fuck, this is real?"

Cheng Shi's mind was dazed, buzzing loudly.

He had never expected the jokes those bastards made to actually be true.

Just as he held his breath and searched for his Lord of Grace above the resplendent starry sky, a pair of enormous eyes, so terrifying they defied description, suddenly opened before him.

An indescribable pressure surged into his face and struck directly at his soul, leaving his entire body frozen in place.

Compared to those pupils, which were practically black holes, Cheng Shi's body was like a speck of dust in the boundless cosmos.

"Thump—"

"Thump—"

"Thump—"

Cheng Shi stared wide-eyed, his heart pounding wildly.

He felt his heartbeat growing faster and faster. Within a few breaths, it synchronized with the fluctuations of Nothingness beneath this starry sky, and then he gradually lost all sensation of being "human."

If he had to describe the feeling, it was probably like his soul had left his body.

Cheng Shi looked down in shock and discovered that his physical shell had indeed remained where it was, its face blank.

His current self, meanwhile, was transparent and indistinct, like a spirit.

Only then did the terrifying, inexplicable pressure gradually dissipate, and Cheng Shi slowly regained control of his consciousness.

It was also then that an unchanging, anciently cold voice emerged from the eye before him, its sclera covered in spirals and its pupils sprinkled with stars.

"Cheng, Shi."

The voice was unlike any sound Cheng Shi had ever known. It was as if merely hearing it would cause his entire being to merge into Nothingness.

He thought he should be trembling. When he glanced down, sure enough, his body was trembling.

Yet his current spiritual form was not afraid, so he softly answered.

"Yes."

But immediately afterward, he felt that was insufficient.

No one could remain calm as a human before the gods.

Even if someone could, Cheng Shi's strength was nowhere near enough for that.

So he added, in the obsequious tone of a sycophant:

"Praise Nothingness, praise my Lord of Grace. To receive your summons is an incomparable honor."

Staying alive was what mattered. There was nothing shameful about it.

Unexpectedly, however, the all-seeing eye shifted slightly and let out a mocking laugh.

"Frail human. You do not even recognize your own Lord of Grace, yet you dare spout praises."

"!!!"

It was not Deception!

Cheng Shi's eyes widened in terror, but soon narrowed again. His thoughts raced, and he cautiously asked:

"Time?"

Upon hearing that divine name, the eye rotated rapidly like a clock for a moment. Its voice grew even colder.

"You have blasphemed a divine name. You are guilty."

As soon as the words fell, Cheng Shi's spiritual form vanished into Nothingness.

It was as if he had never appeared.

His body likewise crumbled into loose sand, blown by the interstellar wind toward the boundless abyss.

The enormous eye spun around and around. Only after sensing someone's Destiny turn at this point did it close, rather "satisfied."

It was as if it had never appeared.

Time began to pass.

It felt like a century had gone by, yet also like only a second had passed.

Amid the chaotic reckoning of time, no one knew how long had elapsed before those eyes opened once more in the same place.

This time, however, the corners of its eyes lifted slightly. It was clearly smiling.

"Oh my, I'm not too late."

The spiral-and-starlit eyes blinked again and again. With every blink, some bright stardust appeared where Cheng Shi's physical shell had once been.

The stardust drew together, merging and condensing.

When an unseen force once more molded it into the shape of a human being, the clay figure sculpted beneath the starry sky opened its eyes.

"Ugh—huff—"

Cheng Shi gasped for breath, sweat covering his forehead and the back of his neck.

He looked at the eyes before him, clenched his teeth, and forced a single word from his throat:

"Fuck!"

The eyes clearly froze for a moment, but immediately afterward, the deity laughed even more happily.

"According to my understanding of your human language, this word seems to express your desire to share the authority of Birth with me?"

The eye turned twice and giggled.

"Or perhaps you wish to drag me into the Sea of Desire of Filth and Decay and do something shameful with me—no, that should be something shameful before the gods?"

Cheng Shi listened to this in stunned confusion and struggled to swallow the greeting in his mouth, which contained an extremely high concentration of the word "mom."

Regardless of form or tone, this was clearly not the same deity as the one from before.

His thoughts churned for a while. Seeming to have guessed something, he darkened his face and said in a deep voice:

"As your follower was killed by another deity right before your eyes, I would like to ask, as my Lord of Grace, where was this so-called protection of yours?"

The eye beneath the starry sky rotated again and smiled.

"Looks like you've already guessed my identity, but you got one thing wrong.

"I didn't see them kill you.

"I came here with my eyes closed."

"?"

Cheng Shi was shocked.

So there had been a reason he was shameless after all.

They said that if the beam above was crooked, the beam below would be bent as well. Wasn't this precisely what that meant?

But!!!

Was that what he was talking about right now???

Cheng Shi was speechless, but he had also confirmed one thing.

At the very least, the other party had answered him and acknowledged that they were his Lord of Grace.

Deception.

And this so-called "Deity Follower meeting" was not as solemn and dignified as he had imagined.

The first meeting did not count.

"So, could you tell your confused follower what happened just now? That murderer who killed me... Who were they?"

"Do you get familiar with everyone this quickly?"

"?"

Cheng Shi quickly recovered some of his human instincts and retorted:

"I'm socially anxious. I'm not very good at dealing with people."

"I can more or less understand your emotions, so what then?

"Is it only because I saved you and am also your Lord of Grace that you're being so...

"Let me think. The word should be:

"'Reckless'?"

Cheng Shi shook his head, denying Deception's claim.

"That has nothing to do with it."

"?"

"Because you're not human."

"Hahahaha."

A delighted peal of laughter rang across the starry sky. The eyes covered in spirals and stars were laughing so hard that they could no longer control their blinking, twisting and warping out of shape.

The deity looked Cheng Shi over with joyful abandon, as if admiring a precious work of art.

"You are the second work of mine to satisfy me."

Cheng Shi raised an eyebrow. His expression remained calm, but he felt uneasy about the word "work."

"Who was the first lucky one?"

"An interesting little girl named 'Zhen Xin.' To use your nickname for her, she is my chosen one."

Cheng Shi's pupils contracted.

The gods knew about chosen ones.

Of course, the gods should know everything.

But when a deity discussed players right in front of him as if they were merchandise, Cheng Shi still felt strangely uncomfortable.

"Oh? You seem to be feeling anger toward your identity as a player?"

Cheng Shi stopped grinning. He shrugged and replied with an obnoxious expression:

"Is that not allowed? Sorry, I can't control it."

"All anger is merely self-deception. The harder fragile life-forms try to conceal their own incompetence, the angrier they become."

The eye examined Cheng Shi's thoughts and giggled.

"Are you thinking of taking revenge on them?"