Chapter 25

Seeing Yang Yi's movement, a restrained smile appeared on Wade's lips, yet his body remained motionless, allowing the attack to pass through him.

It missed, like a stone passing through a three-dimensional hologram.

Yang Yi's expression grew serious; this was the first time such a thing had happened. She had clearly struck him, yet her psychic force passed through his body as if he were illusory.

Yang Yi narrowed her eyes slightly, extending her hands. The ground began to tremble; sand, stones, and fallen leaves moved in mid-air, and the earth shook in unison with Yang Yi's psychic power.

The five surviving awakened ones looked on in shock, supporting each other as they retreated.

Wade's expression did not change; he still stood calmly in the distance, looking at Yang Yi as one might look at a mischievous little girl.

Suddenly, Yang Yi's movements stopped.

"You are not here! I cannot sense your existence; this is your projection." Yang Yi's face was filled with surprise: "How did you do it?"

Wade stood clearly before her, yet he seemed to exist in the gap between this world and another; from this world, one could see his projection but could not touch his physical form.

He was clearly within the range of her psychic power; Yang Yi could see him with her eyes, yet she could not "sense" him. This meant Yang Yi could not attack him.

"Of course, it was granted to me by the Great Lord." He looked toward the altar, fervor surging in his gentle eyes; when he looked at Yang Yi again, his gaze returned to calmness: "As long as you convert to the Lord, He will also bestow His blessings upon you."

Yang Yi looked down at the bodies strewn across the ground, her voice suppressed: "So, all of this was done by you, with the sole purpose of sacrificing to your 'Great Lord'?"

"Do you pity these people?" Wade's tone regarding her was noncommittal; when he spoke the word "people," his voice was dismissive, just as humans might mention pigs, dogs, cattle, or sheep—so careless, so indifferent.

"I understand your feelings. Once, I was just like you, sympathizing with the joy and pain of these lambs, alleviating their life's troubles, and empathizing with their joys and sorrows..."

Yang Yi interrupted him: "And then you were betrayed by a patient, captured by a biological research institute, subjected to inhumane human experiments, and from then on you hated humanity. After escaping the lab, you plotted various terrorist events to retaliate against society... If that is what you intend to say, then spare me. I have already heard it once at the United Nations headquarters. Let us get straight to the point: what exactly do you intend to do?!"

Wade was not angered by her rudeness. During his career as a psychologist, he had seen people a hundred times more irritable and rude than Yang Yi; he possessed sufficient cultivation and patience.

"Be patient." Wade remained unshaken and unangered, even offering a gentle smile, the kind of reassuring smile a doctor gives: "Since you already know, I will skip those details."

He spoke slowly and deliberately: "I originally intended to tell you gradually, so that you might accept it more easily. But since you are so impatient, telling you directly is fine as well."

As he spoke, he looked deeply into Yang Yi's eyes with utmost seriousness: "Everything I have done is to save the world."

Silence fell. The five surviving awakened ones looked at one another, their faces filled with confusion.

As if hearing the greatest joke in the world, Yang Yi frowned. She turned to look at Daniel and the other four, who wore similar expressions of incomprehension, and realized she had not misheard.

"Are you joking with me?" Yang Yi's calm facade finally cracked. "You killed so many people to save the world?"

"See, I know you won't believe me. That is why I must start from the beginning." Wade sighed calmly, looked around, and spoke earnestly and sincerely:

"Think of those alien creatures. Do you think there is only one giant crab in the sea? That the Fire Demon in Jin Shan was merely an exception? That there is only one strangling vine in the tropical rainforest? That the alien creature invasion incidents across Earth are merely low-probability events like murder cases? Wake up, everyone! Earth is being invaded! One day, Earth will be like a house rotting from termite infestation, completely occupied by alien creatures. At that time, it will be the end of humanity.

"And all of this is because God is about to awaken from His slumber!" Wade turned to look at the altar, his eyes gradually turning red. He shouted fervently: "Lord, You will eventually descend from the Divine Kingdom, spreading Your glory over this sinful land, transforming this land into a paradise for Your lambs!"

"He's crazy!" Helen Baker whispered. She looked at Yang Yi, whose expression remained impassive, just as in the news reports; no one knew what she was thinking inside.

Wade turned back, resuming his usual gentility and elegance. "Have you ever seen land clearing? Before wasteland is developed into farmland, all the weeds and insects and insect eggs on the original land must be burned away with fire, and then new crops are planted on this land."

"Humans are the weeds on this land." He said sorrowfully, "The giant beasts in the sea, the strangling vines, the smiling mushrooms—these alien creatures invading Earth are merely a fire set by Him, just to transform the environment and prepare for His lambs. God intends to leave this land for His loyal lambs!"

Suddenly, his expression shifted from sorrow to madness: "But fortunately, we have awakened! We are no longer useless weeds. Every awakened one is a beneficiary of the alien world's invasion of Earth, which proves that we have also gained the qualification to become His loyal lambs! If He accepts our conversion, we can continue to survive and reproduce in His paradise, and after death, attain eternal life in His Divine Kingdom!

"For the future of the New Humans, we must sacrifice the unawakened Old Humans to God, thereby representing our break with the Old World. Using their life force to comfort the God who is about to awaken, so that when He wakes, He will know He has new lambs, and will allow us to continue to thrive on this land, so that humanity may continue to exist!

"This is my way of saving the world!"

His gaze toward Yang Yi was peaceful yet mixed with a certain firmness, a look Yang Yi had only seen on some religious fanatics who were fervent and devout. His tone was sincere, genuine, and almost entirely from the heart.

"Oh God, he is indeed crazy!" Helen Baker's tone this time held no anger or condemnation, but a genuine sigh.

"Is this the reason you killed so many people?" Daniel looked at the mountains of corpses piled around them. "Your hypocrisy is disgusting!"

Silva spat, spitting a mouthful of saliva at Wade: "Damn it, you are just a murderer! Look at everything you've done; you killed over 4,000 of us!"

Wade shook his head; his brown-black pupils appeared somewhat melancholy, but this melancholy was very slight, insufficient to shake his will.

Yang Yi did not question or mock; she simply looked at him with a hint of incomprehension:

"How can you be certain that a God definitely exists in the alien world? How do you know that Earth's invasion is God's will? Where did you learn the location of this altar? Where did you obtain the method of sacrifice? Will this so-called God really accept the submission of the New Humans? Did He promise you?"

She asked this long string of questions haltingly. Thank Chris; to communicate fluently with him, she had practiced the Arkan language extensively during this period.

"Yes, I received a divine revelation." Wade concealed nothing; as if recalling something, his brown eyes ignited with a blazing fire:

"It was when I was subjected to human experiments. That day, to observe the process of my spiritual power, they drilled a hole in my head. To test the limits of my spiritual power, they used a brainwave amplifier on me. The moment the button was pressed, I fell into a pain I had never experienced before..."

Recalling that time, he paused slightly, his tone suddenly becoming agitated: "I experienced a near-death experience. At the moment of impending death, I received a divine revelation. I saw countless stars and countless worlds in the infinite universe perishing in the apocalypse descended by the Lord. Those worlds were transformed, occupied, and bestowed upon the Lord's lambs. Immediately, I realized that our world is merely one of the most ordinary among them; the apocalypse of humanity is inevitable, only a matter of time.

"And those species possessing wisdom and power, as long as they convert to the Lord and are acknowledged by Him, have the honor of survival. You should still remember the Fire Demon in Jin Shan. The Fire Demon race actively converted during the God's continuous campaigns. A single ordinary Fire Demon could easily destroy a human city, and their worshipped Fire Demon God—Asarade—is merely a foot soldier under the God's feet!

"Humans are so weak. If we do not seek conversion by all means, the extinction of humanity is inevitable." Wade's eyelids drooped, his brown eyes filled with a Father-like compassion.

"How can you prove all this? You have no evidence; all of this is merely your delusion!" Helen Baker took a deep breath and refuted loudly.

She and Daniel had once gone to Jin Shan to observe the Fire Demon's corpse and witnessed the tragic state of Jin Shan, fully understanding the Fire Demon's power. Her denial trembled slightly.

She looked at Yang Yi, hoping to get support from her—after all, she was the strongest person present, and she had personally killed the Fire Demon. Daniel also looked at Yang Yi, his lips moving slightly, wanting to say something.

But Yang Yi was now shocked by the information in Wade's words: Asarade! He actually knew Asarade, and even knew that Asarade was the Fire Demon God.

She could not help but recall the Fire Demon's words before dying: "Asarade heard my curse; you will eventually welcome the apocalypse..."

She could be certain that the Fire Demon's language was a new language never before seen on Earth. Wade must have learned that Asarade was the Fire Demon God through another channel. Could he have truly received the so-called "divine revelation"?!

Yang Yi frowned, lost in thought.

Wade's expression returned to calm: "You all know the alien world is invading Earth. You also know that humanity's awakening is due to the dark matter that suddenly appeared on Earth. But you dare not connect these two things."

He smiled at the crowd before him, his tone seductive: "Admit it. Our awakening of superpowers is precisely because the alien world channel opened, and some dark matter surging from the alien world stimulated the genes within our bodies. It can be said that every awakened one is a beneficiary of the alien world's invasion of Earth.

"Our superpowers, all the glory we possess now, are bestowed upon us by the Lord. It is precisely His grace that allowed the alien channel to open and dark matter to descend upon Earth. We ought to thank the Lord, be loyal to the Lord, and convert to the Lord. We are all the Lord's candidate lambs."

Wade smiled, asking in a low, soft voice like a whisper: "Have you ever thought that once the alien channel closes, the dark matter will vanish, and the hard-won superpowers you possess will also disappear? You will return to being ordinary people, returning to those mediocre, powerless, unremarkable ordinary people. Is this really what you want? Are you really so selfless?

"Truly awaken! The stance of all awakened ones is consistent; we are naturally companions!

"Sacrificing the Old Humans to save the New Humans is a profitable transaction. In the process of human survival and reproduction, one must always face many choices. Even when God sent the great flood, not everyone could board Noah's Ark."

Wade's words were thunderous, stunning everyone.

They could not help but follow Wade's words in their thoughts: If blocking the alien invasion is blocking the awakening of one's own superpowers;

If isolating the alien channel is removing one's own superpowers;

Their superpowers were brought by the opening of a portal to another world; the portal opened because a certain god was about to awaken and required a vast quantity of the Source of Life.

As long as the Awakened ones convert to Him, they can survive the apocalypse and obtain a ticket to the end of the world.

The Awakened ones are qualified to become His followers, and the only price is to kill those ordinary people who have long been different from them; perhaps they need not even act actively, but merely stand by and watch.

Those who have tasted the sweet flavor of power will not easily give up power. Those who have possessed superpowers will not wish to return to their former mediocrity.

Yang Yi's heart gave a jolt; she silently looked at the five people beside her. Daniel's face was full of anger, Helen sank into deep thought, Silva's chest heaved with agitation, Jane gazed at Wade wondering what he was thinking, and Hamid's entire face twitched, alternating between wild joy and struggle.

Yang Yi felt she had to speak up.

"Alarmist nonsense! All of this is merely your assumption. First, let alone whether that god exists, if He does exist, whether the invasion of the other world stems from His command, and whether He is willing to accept the surrender of the Awakened ones—all these are unprovable matters. You say the Lord is so powerful that He annihilated countless planets and worlds; how do you prove it?"

Wade smiled and said, "Of course, I can prove it."

Having spoken, he lowered his head slightly and closed his eyes.

At the same time, everyone present saw scenes unheard of and unseen before playing out before their eyes.

Yang Yi was full of caution, but as those movie-like scenes played out before her, a tremendous shock rose within her heart.

These were civilizations different from Earth: some planets were rust-red, some were shrouded in thick mist, some were wrapped in black liquid, and some were wrapped in blue water like Earth; some planets were like burning stars with raging Xiong Xiong flames, yet harbored creatures like fire demons; some planets were completely covered by deserts, yet upon close inspection, creatures formed of sand moved within those deserts; some planets had their entire surfaces as oceans, where countless giant beasts lived.

There were also planetary civilizations completely beyond human imagination: she saw a gaseous planet where countless ghost-like creatures lived; she even saw warships comparable to planets sailing through the universe, their technology far surpassing human civilization; she saw a civilization composed of silicon-based life, where the entire planet was covered by machines.

These diverse civilizations across the universe, before their annihilation, only exhibited a slight anomaly—just like Earth had just suffered an invasion by creatures from another world, then gradually evolved into an unstoppable apocalypse.

Those intelligent beings went from initially dismissing it, to gradually taking it seriously, to fighting desperately; without exception, their final outcome was that they all became nourishment for the god, withering and weathering under the apocalyptic invasion as the Source of Life was invisibly drawn by the god.