With each passing cycle, the vast entity known as the Main God had, in the space of a few short months, quietly extended its reach into more aspects of life than many people could have imagined.
For one thing, there were over two million users. The exact figure was unclear, but those in a position to see the bigger picture had already formed a rough estimate.
A mere two million was an insignificant number beside a population counted in billions. In many less-developed areas, even rumors of the Main God were still dismissed as nonsense.
The way news and change spread—or stalled—could be as unpredictable as wind and water, often beyond ordinary understanding.
Yet in a modern society where information and people moved freely, this unspoken "open secret" was becoming anything but news.
Through public appointments, official business, documents, and still more maneuvering behind the scenes, the Main God's influence was spreading from densely populated cities into rural areas. Meanwhile, the increasingly wild vegetation beyond human settlements was advancing in the opposite direction.
The pace of change was quickening. Everyone sensed it, yet no one could stop it.
A strange kind of "inflation" had even begun to emerge. The purchasing power of currency was slipping, prices were rising unpredictably, and the economy had become unusually "active"—even after the authorities had stepped in to regulate it.
After all, when change threatened everyone's lives, the first rational impulse was to trade useless cash for useful reserves.
Old people sunning themselves by the roadside whispered about the latest rumors: some family's son or daughter had become a user.
Someone else had obtained a potion from that miraculous platform and cured an elderly relative who had been bedridden for years. Now the old fellow could walk again, without even a cane—
Or they smacked