Yesterday's Events

Zhao Cheng activated the mark on his hand and logged into Spirit Mountain. At once, he saw a golden bridge stretch across the online world, seeking to guide Zhao Cheng out of this "sea of suffering" that was the network. The sea of suffering had no shore; Spirit Mountain was the other shore.

It was a place of transcendence, a land of ultimate bliss!

At the same time, as Zhao Cheng stepped onto the golden bridge, his perspective underwent a subtle change. The entire "sea of suffering" seemed to lie within his sight.

Zhao Cheng knew that this was because Spirit Mountain occupied a higher station. Once he stepped onto the golden bridge, his authority within the online world rose another level. Though he could not perform any actual operations, his browsing privileges had increased by a great deal.

This arrangement had presumably been intentional—letting people glimpse a higher, more wondrous world, so they would strive toward it.

That sea of suffering was a chaotic mixture of vast electronic data streams and fragments of emotional data streams, complicated to the extreme. If one's realm was insufficient, a moment's carelessness could see one lose oneself within it and burn out one's brain.

At the same time, an entire real world unfolded before Zhao Cheng's eyes.

The wilderness, for the most part, had already gone barren. At mine after mine, miners operated massive machinery day and night without rest. Countless resources were shipped to one factory after another, either becoming more mining machines and factories themselves, or turning into the nutrients necessary for human bodies.

The upper levels and core districts of each city were likewise endlessly prosperous and dazzling—towering skyscrapers, flashing neon lights. Some people looked down upon the world and drowned themselves in drink and dreams. But in the slums