Arknights, but Raising Terra in Captivity

Then they saw the sanity-draining Colossal Soldiers, their eyes glowing red like Terminators as they shouted, "Humans!" and chased after them—

Honestly...

Not many people would think those Colossal Soldiers had come to bring them warmth.

Although Chen Ran had done his best to mold those lumps of mud into something ugly-cute,

that so-called ugly-cute appearance depended on the difference in size.

Like how, no matter how fiercely a little kitten meowed or scratched at your shoes, you would only find it adorable—fiercely cute.

But if that little kitten were enlarged several times over, becoming the size of a lion or tiger, one meow would probably make you lie down on the spot, hoping to at least die with some dignity.

Not to mention that, to survivors like Kal'tsit, those Colossal Soldiers were not merely a few times larger.

So, in the eyes of those survivors—

it was as though the Sea Creatures had first swept through the area, discovered that humanity had not been completely wiped out, and then spawned another wave of troops to finish the job.

So they screamed, wailed, and cried out. Their steps toward the outside world were abruptly cut short, and every survivor ran back as though their lives depended on it.

Only after they hid back inside the bunker did the Colossal Soldiers stop pursuing them.

This was because of the Colossal Soldiers' underlying logic. Chen Ran had only ordered them to search for survivors, but had not said what they were supposed to do after finding them.

So, after completing their current orders, they began wandering around like idle game characters.

Yet this only made the survivors even more convinced that as long as they stayed inside the bunker, they would be absolutely safe.

Go outside? They would not go out even if it killed them.

But Chen Ran had no idea why.

He had only just finished molding a lump of mud and sent them to search for survivors. Yet before even a few minutes had passed, those lumps of mud had started howling that they had found surviving humans.

Chen Ran looked closely after hearing that. Hey, it was true.

So he reached out, pinched up the survivor surrounded by several lumps of mud, and brought her closer to inspect.

Oh, it was a woman.

Then again, that made sense. This was humanity's last fortress, after all. Women and children would definitely be prioritized.

But Chen Ran had only just looked at the beast ears atop her head and the beast tail behind her, before he could even make out whether she was an Operator he recognized.

Then he saw the survivor pinched between his fingertips. Upon seeing him, her eyes suddenly widened. Then her entire body convulsed as if she were having a seizure. Finally, her eyes rolled back, and with a croak, she fainted.

Chen Ran: "???"

What was with that reaction—

"Oh, look, that poor lady was fortunate enough to behold the face of a god. What an honor."

"She was shocked, she was terrified, and then she croaked and fainted."

"Because she could not comprehend the grandeur of a god, sanity -1."

"Sanity -1."

"Sanity -1."

"Sanity -1."

"Ah, enough already."

Watching the sanity -1 pop-ups begin to flood the screen, Chen Ran's mouth twitched. He had no choice but to put the survivor he was pinching back into the planet model.

"So what exactly do these... humans? think I look like? Some Cthulhu-esque Outer God?"

Chen Ran knew that his perspective differed from the perspective of these... native humans.

But was the difference really this huge?

And why had Heart of the Corrupted Skadi not... Oh, right. Heart of the Corrupted Skadi was also Cthulhu-esque to those native humans.

Then never mind.

So Chen Ran first turned his head and looked at Heart of the Corrupted Skadi, who sat on the edge of the desk, swinging her little feet while nibbling on a cookie. Apparently finding it a little dry or hard to swallow, she carried the cookie over to dip it in the fish tank before hugging it and continuing to munch on it—

Only then did Chen Ran turn back and look at the survivor he had just put down inside the planet model...

"Hm? Where did she go? Why is she gone?"

The bunker doors were shut, and several additional locks had even been added.

But Kal'tsit said nothing about it, because this was the consensus reached by nearly all the survivors.

Kal'tsit wanted to soothe everyone's emotions, but she was truly powerless to do so.

Because the situation had developed beyond her control.

It was like how she had once been busily working at the front, taking all sorts of roundabout measures to save the country, only to finally get everything settled and turn around to discover that Sargol had stabbed her in the back and started fighting a robot vacuum cleaner.

But this time was even more serious.

A god... or rather, God?

Kal'tsit could not comprehend such an existence, but that did not stop everyone in the shelter from calling Him that.

And precisely because she could not understand, she could no longer make the decisions herself. So Kal'tsit instinctively came here—

before the sarcophagus.

When building humanity's final fortress, Kal'tsit had found a way to transport this sarcophagus here.

This sarcophagus sustained the entire bunker's energy supply and, at the same time, kept the Doctor alive.

The sarcophagus could heal every injury, but it could not eliminate aging.

The Doctor was human, after all, and did not possess such a long lifespan. Therefore, in order to extend that lifespan indirectly, the Doctor entered the sarcophagus more and more often, and slept for increasingly longer periods.

By now, unless something major happened, the Doctor would basically not be awakened.

But—

Kal'tsit raised her head and looked toward the ceiling, as though she could see the god beyond the planet through it.

"A god...? Even in the Pre-Civilization, nothing like this ever happened."

"So even if I awakened the Doctor, could the Doctor... handle the current situation?"

Thus, Kal'tsit hesitated.

On one hand, she wanted the Doctor to return and take charge. On the other, she felt that perhaps even the Doctor would be unable to deal with the current situation, and would only bring more despair and fear.

After a long silence, Kal'tsit finally turned and left as though she had given up.

It was not time for despair yet. At least, not now.

Kal'tsit wanted to comfort everyone, but when she arrived at the meeting room, she discovered that in the brief time she had spent visiting the Doctor before the sarcophagus, things had already begun spiraling out of control like a runaway husky.

"He is a god! He is God!"

"I saw it with my own eyes! I was fortunate enough to witness the god's magnificence!"

"The Sea Creature god has been kept inside a fish tank by Lord God! Even we—this land of ours—is nothing more than a Pretty Glass Beads in Lord God's hand!"

"He is so great! He is purging humanity only so that humanity can evolve better!"

"Let us sing praises! Let us cheer! Let us pray to our great Lord God!"

A female survivor stood atop the meeting room table, loudly preaching about the Lord God in her mouth like a fanatic whose sanity had dropped to zero.

Kal'tsit, who had arrived late and had absolutely no idea what had happened: "...?"

011. Your number of believers +1. You have gained the power of faith.

When disasters struck, after the apocalypse, with science dead and God appearing in the world, the rise and flourishing of religion was bound to happen.

Not to mention that even before the apocalypse, religion had already been widespread across this land.

The Laterano Church, the Yergland Church, the Abyssal Church—every kind had flourished.

Although during the Sea Creatures' destruction of the world, the host machine known as "Heaven's Point," which granted those Angels their halos, had been invaded by the Sea Creature Great Swarm. The instant that happened, all Sarkaz had crashed.

But ordinary people did not know the truth.

So whether it was to escape reality, to seek spiritual support, or even simply a tool for those in power to rule people's hearts, the rise of religion was inevitable.

But wasn't the speed of this rise a little too fast?

Kal'tsit was certain that she had merely gone to look at the Doctor. It had definitely been less than an hour from beginning to end.

Yet not only had they established a religion, they had even started preaching it?

Even Kal'tsit, with all her experience, could not help feeling slightly bewildered.

Because in Kal'tsit's understanding, the shock brought by a god appearing in the world should have caused far more fear than delight.

So why had they not first picked up their shattered scientific worldview? How had things suddenly flipped to the opposite extreme...

Left with no choice, Kal'tsit could only ask the people around her.

Amid the overlapping chatter, Kal'tsit roughly reconstructed the full story:

The fanatical believer standing atop the meeting table was the unlucky person who had been chased everywhere by the Colossal Soldiers.

This unlucky person had fainted from fright. Though no one knew why she had not been harmed, after waking up and running all the way back to the bunker, she had begun preaching wildly.

"Everything I said is true! I really did see Lord God's magnificence with my own eyes!"

"That Sea Creature god was truly kept in a fish tank by Lord God! The plan to eliminate humanity was devised by Lord God!"

"I am not lying! Everything I said is true! It really is!"

It was true.

Chen Ran could testify to that.

But unfortunately, even if everything this fanatic said was true, with her crazed yet fervent appearance combined with her earlier experience of being chased everywhere by the Colossal Soldiers...

At least in the eyes of most people, this fanatic had merely been scared mad. That Sea Creature god being raised in a fish tank was nothing but delirious nonsense.

And although Kal'tsit did not rashly choose to believe or disbelieve her, after looking at the growing crowd around them and the increasingly fervent believer, she could not help speaking up.

"Take her away first."

"Find her a psychologist and calm her down."

Kal'tsit was not worried about the rise of religion. She was worried that overly fanatical believers would start performing human sacrifices.

Such matters were also recorded in the scriptures of Yelagund.

So they could only suppress this for now.

Fortunately, Kal'tsit's prestige remained intact. Several medical Operators quickly rushed forward, seized the fanatic, and dragged her away.

But even as she was dragged off, the fanatic continued shouting, "Everything I said is true! It is all true! Turn humans into Sea Creatures, and the Sea Creatures will ascend and return to Lord God's embrace, so this is the correct path—mmph—"

As the believer's mouth was covered and she was dragged away, that fervent, crazed voice finally disappeared.

But the people left in the meeting room remained deathly silent.

Because no matter how unwilling they were to believe it, the appearance of a god was an undeniable fact.

It made it easy for their thoughts to run wild. Could the Sea Creatures have been created by that god, just as He had casually molded mud into Colossal Soldiers? If so, could the Sea Creatures' destruction of the world have been ordered by that god?

Although Kal'tsit knew in her heart that the Sea Creatures were creations of the Pre-Civilization and had not the slightest connection to that so-called god.

But Kal'tsit herself was in turmoil at this moment, and could only say, "Even if that being truly is a so-called god, we cannot rashly assume that He is malicious."

"So far, aside from the person who was just taken away, none of us have been hurt or killed."

"It is like passing by an anthill. Perhaps the other party merely stopped out of curiosity to watch for a while, while we mistook it for an impending catastrophe and panicked."

"We cannot guess what that god is thinking, nor can we judge whether that god is good or evil. But at the very least, we are still alive, aren't we?"

Even if things were truly as that fanatic had said—that Lord God had devised the plan to eliminate humanity in order to make humanity evolve, then their group of survivors were the lucky ones who had been selected—Kal'tsit did not say that aloud, because it sounded far too religious.

Kal'tsit knew she could not speak in riddles now, so she spoke plainly.