Persona Cannot Be Destroyed

So it appeared at random... Hearing this, Yin Ge nodded.

"Does that mean every Son of Heaven Game only has two factions, Daylight and Night?"

Qin Li nodded. "That's right."

"I see." Yin Ge wanted to confirm the factions because she had suffered in the game from not understanding them.

If she had known that people from the Daylight Faction had a chance to come back to life after dying, there would have been much more room for maneuver, and the game could have ended faster.

After thinking it over, she asked, "Is the time allocation in every game fixed? An event at nine in the morning, free discussion at six in the evening, and identifying the Killer at eight at night?"

"Correct." Qin Li nodded. "But we generally call the free activity period Persona Time. Other than that, it is all Godhead Time."

Persona Time and Godhead Time?

That was indeed the case.

Yin Ge and the others were human. Once they entered the game, it naturally became Persona Time.

The people of the Daylight Faction and Night Faction had already died, so their active periods were Godhead Time.

"Mm." Yin Ge nodded, but speaking of time reminded her of another question related to time.

"After the game ended, I found that only ten minutes had passed in the real world. Was that also the result of quantum entanglement?"

"You could put it that way." Qin Li paused before continuing.

"Also, ten minutes is not accurate. According to our observations, after every game ends, only five seconds pass in the real world."

"Perhaps you did not wake up for quite some time after the game ended, so your judgment of the time was off."

"Five seconds." Yin Ge fell into thought.

Because she had fallen into a nightmare after the game ended, and the abnormality in her left eye had delayed her as well, her sense of time was not accurate.

Yin Ge asked again, "What are the Godhead, Persona, and Beasthood you mentioned just now?"

Qin Li smiled and explained with practiced ease. "Put simply, Godhead refers to the six ranks: Son of Heaven, Feudal Lord, Court Minister, Grand Physician, Scholar, and Commoner."

"Beasthood refers to the people of the Night Faction."

"Are the numbers of Godheads and Beasthoods fixed at six and one?" Yin Ge pressed.

"No, they are not fixed," Qin Li answered. "One Son of Heaven Game might have a hundred Godheads and a hundred Beasthoods. Or it might have a hundred Beasthoods and one Godhead."

A hundred Godheads and a hundred Beasthoods?!

A hundred Beasthoods and one Godhead?!

Yin Ge's pupils contracted as she sensed just how terrifying a complex, large-scale Son of Heaven Game could be.

"Of course, that is only a possibility. Such a situation has never actually occurred."

"Most of the time, there are no more than ten or twenty people with Godheads or Beasthoods."

"As for Personas..." Qin Li gave Yin Ge a meaningful look before continuing.

"Personhood can be acquired by people, and their Laws can also be used in reality."

They could be used in reality too?

Hearing this, Yin Ge's heart stirred slightly. "Can Personhood be used outside the game too?"

"Yes," Qin Li replied.

Yin Ge took a deep breath, then asked, "Then what is the price?"

Qin Li spoke calmly. "After acquiring a Persona from the Son of Heaven Game, that Persona is in a state of increasing entropy."

"It will gradually expand and gradually encroach upon your original Persona. From an observational perspective, this increase in entropy is devouring."

"A Son of Heaven Game Persona will slowly devour its owner's will, spirit, and memories. In a sense, a person's will, spirit, and memories are their Persona."

"In other words, a Son of Heaven Game Persona devours the person's own Persona!"

At this point, Qin Li sighed. "Of course, the 'Persona' of the Son of Heaven Game transcends the scope of what we scientifically understand as 'Persona.'"

"This kind of Persona grants you all sorts of special abilities. Since the Son of Heaven Game erupted across the world, we have encountered quite a few people with Son of Heaven Game Personas."

"Their Personas possessed all kinds of bizarre and unusual abilities. For example, some could achieve long-distance movement, while others could turn invisible."

"But as they used their Son of Heaven Game Personas more frequently, the rate at which their original Personas were devoured also accelerated."

"In the end..."

Qin Li fell silent.

Yin Ge was also silent for a moment before softly saying, "In the end, their Personas were devoured. Which meant... they died."

"Yes." After a moment of silence, Qin Li said, "Compared to others, those who use their abilities frequently accelerate the rate at which their own Personas are devoured."

"But even if they do not use their abilities, one day their own Personas will still be devoured."

"This process is irreversible. Therefore, scientists proposed one of the three laws of the Son of Heaven Game..."

"[Persona Cannot Be Destroyed]."

[Persona Cannot Be Destroyed]?

No, it was Son of Heaven Game Personas that could not be destroyed.

As for human Personas?

According to Qin Li, human Personas were like Commoner Divinity, or perhaps even a step lower.

Commoners could use Shattering Jade, could perish together with their enemies.

But once a human Godhead was gone, it was simply gone, without even a ripple.

And when an original Personhood was devoured, or when a bearer of a Son of Heaven Game Persona died, the Son of Heaven Game would erupt anew.

So in the long run, Son of Heaven Game Personas would never be destroyed, unless humanity went extinct.

After learning that the countdown to her death had begun, Yin Ge was overcome by a cold, numb, heavy feeling.

Even the waves of pain in her mind could not outweigh the heaviness in her heart.

Death.

And death after her Persona had been completely consumed.

Any living being would instinctively fear that.

"There is no solution at all?" Yin Ge asked one more time, futilely.

Qin Li remained silent.

Yin Ge fell silent as well.

But after a moment, Qin Li spoke again. "Perhaps there is a way to ease it, to slow it down, but that is beyond what I have the authority to know."

Ease it?

Slow it down?

Yin Ge's eyes lit up. "How?"

Even an ant struggled to survive.

Though Yin Ge was always shouting online that she wanted to die and did not want to live anymore.

What she wanted to end was pain, poverty, boredom, emptiness, or something else—not her life itself.

"As far as I know, quite a few Son of Heaven Games have erupted in various countries in recent years."

Qin Li said, "Many people who acquired Son of Heaven Game Personas have also died after excessively using their Personhood abilities."

"Yet many others survived, and their Personas grew increasingly powerful, even becoming similar to figures from myths and legends."

"However, my authority is insufficient. Much of it is classified, so I have no way of knowing their methods."

"Still, I have heard that among the upper ranks of our Neutrino Persona Order Center, there is someone who successfully completed three Son of Heaven Game missions and was not devoured despite frequently using Persona abilities."

"If you rise to the upper ranks, perhaps you will be able to find out...?"

Even Qin Li's tone was uncertain.

"As long as there is a way, that's enough!"

Hope reignited in Yin Ge's eyes. "Even slowing it down would be enough!"

"One more day alive is one more day."

"So how do I become one of your higher-ups?"