Chapter 385: Your Majesty, you have won, but what was the price?

"The Talker!!!"

The Emperor's voice surged toward Zhou Yun, intermingled with billions of other voices, like a whisper imperceptible within an eternal night wind.

A sensation of extreme exertion emanated from that voice, as if a patient with schizophrenia were struggling with all their might to seize control of this body.

"Talker! Eat! Eat! Eat!"

"Get out! Get out! Get out—no! Save!"

"Blue Raccoon Cat!"

"Brother Zhou Yun!"

"Saint Doraemon!"

Thousands upon thousands of faces flashed before Zhou Yun's eyes, but he finally understood the meaning behind those words.

Dialogue, gadget, Talker.

Zhou Yun's fingers reached into his Four-Dimensional Pocket—

A sharp shriek erupted from the mummified corpse's mouth, and a powerful mental shockwave continuously scoured the entire Wang Zuo Room.

That sound, like the scream of a dying man, surged toward Zhou Yun, accompanied by a primal, ruthless, and bone-chilling force.

This force relentlessly battered Zhou Yun's flesh, blood, and bones, even attempting to pierce into the depths of his soul, as if trying to prevent Zhou Yun from acting.

It was clearly He Himself who wanted Zhou Yun to do this, yet now He was turning around to obstruct Zhou Yun, as if many different wills, inclinations, and desires within His body were vying for dominance.

But this contradictory behavior did not affect Zhou Yun's actions.

The immortal body granted by the Siegfried Potion was still in effect; Zhou Yun gently took a grayish-black, soft, glutinous pastry from his Four-Dimensional Pocket.

【Gadget Name: Translation Konjac】

【Origin: 22nd Century Earth — Future Department Store】

【Production Date: 261. M3】

【Function: A konjac pastry with a unique flavor. After consumption, one can converse without barriers with people of different languages (including but not limited to foreign languages, alien languages, parallel world languages, or any form of language). Furthermore, the effect of this gadget can be directly applied to text, allowing one to read any script, even those difficult to identify or understand.】

Translation Konjac, a gadget that can translate all forms of language and allow people to converse without barriers.

Zhou Yun thought in his heart that he wanted to converse with the Human Emperor, and then he swallowed the Translation Konjac in one gulp.

The Translation Konjac slid down his throat, Zhou Yun's throat moved slightly, and then the Emperor's face was reflected in his pupils.

Ten thousand faces, ten thousand scenes, ten thousand impressions.

Too many, too bright, too cumbersome, too false, too real.

He saw an Astra Militarum soldier wearing a Krieg gas mask; artillery fire exploded in the gray trenches, blowing his body to pieces.

He is the Emperor.

He saw a destitute farmer who, unable to endure the exploitation of the Knight Lord, started a rebellion, only to be blasted into fragments by the Knight Lord's rising castle.

He is the Emperor.

He saw a devout believer of the Ecclesiarchy who embarked on a pilgrimage spanning a millennium and dozens of generations, only to be killed by the blade of a pirate on the eve of reaching the Segmentum Solar.

He is the Emperor.

He also saw Lage, who was lingering on in the hive city of Ashford; he died in the medical bay on Baal, obtaining the death he had longed for.

He is also the Emperor.

We are all the Emperor; humanity is the Emperor; the Emperor is humanity.

An entire species stood before Zhou Yun, from the first Homo sapiens whose mind sparked with the brilliance of wisdom, to the last human to die at the end of the universe, all stood before Zhou Yun.

A species stood right here, their wills united; they are all the Emperor, the Emperor is them, souls connected to one another, born as one, cast into the Golden Wang Zuo.

"Do not save us." One Emperor/human accused Zhou Yun.

"Let us die." Another Emperor/human prayed to Zhou Yun.

"Do not give His Majesty false hope anymore." A third Emperor/human said to Zhou Yun with sorrow.

"We are truly fed up! Let's die together!" "Damn it, let's just explode with Chaos!" "Let us stand up! Let us stand up!"

Noisy voices continuously surged toward Zhou Yun; these Emperors/humans were all accusing Zhou Yun, venting their own anger.

They were filled with a strong desire for self-destruction; both the living and the dead wanted a self-destructive fate.

They wanted to stand up from the Golden Wang Zuo, become the Dark King, bring the destined death to the entire galaxy, and let the xenos, Chaos, and everything in this galaxy step into extinction.

This world had too much pain, sorrow, and cruelty; it would be better if this world were destroyed right here and now.

They were persecuted by this world in the most vicious way, and they also cursed this world in the most vicious language.

Such voices occupied the majority of the Emperors/humans.

"No, there is still hope."

"Save us, I beg you!"

"Brother Zhou Yun, look over here."

"My lord, is my child Leina doing well? May she and all of humanity be happy."

"Is Cadia still standing? Even if it is not, we will still hold the line."

"The crusade never ceases; expansion and discovery accompany each other."

"Hope still remains."

There were still some voices that held hope and expectation; these voices occupied a very small proportion, but they still pointed out the direction for Zhou Yun.

His gaze followed those voices that still held hope, looking toward one of the Emperors/humans.

The first one, the most important one.

Zhou Yun saw a scene.

Ochre-red mud bricks were piled into a small house under date palms swaying in the wind; rough pottery jars leaned against the corner of the wall, facing a winding river shimmering with the luster of bronze.

In the reed marsh by the river, Zhou Yun vaguely saw a boy with brown skin.

The boy was standing by a wooden workbench by the river, his bare feet stepping on the muddy brown ground.

Tied to the riverbank at his feet was a curved wooden boat, docked there like a coffin; lying in the boat was the corpse of a silver-haired boy wearing a laurel wreath, his face both young and old.

And on the left side of the workbench in front of the brown-haired boy was a skull covered in pottery clay; eyes were inlaid on the skull with seashells, and a face was carved out of pottery clay.

Beside the pottery skull were a few small chess pieces; the distance was too far, and Zhou Yun could only barely glimpse their general appearance.

One was an Iron General with strong arms, but the Iron General's head was nowhere to be found.

One was an assassin wearing a hood and tattered clothes; he was like a ghost, having gouged out his own eyes, as if he were fond of being a blind man.

There were two other chess pieces, but they were obscured by other things on the workbench, and Zhou Yun could not see them clearly.

Just at this moment, the brown-haired boy turned slightly, seemingly noticing Zhou Yun's gaze.

Following the boy's movement, Zhou Yun also saw clearly that there was also a chess piece in front of the boy.

This piece was larger and stronger; it was a vigorous centaur, bending its bow and nocking an arrow as if about to embark on a crusade.

But a dagger-like shard of stone was stuck in the centaur piece's chest, and its whole body was shattered into four pieces.

The brown-haired boy seemed to be trying hard to repair this centaur.

". Huang Lao... uh..." Zhou Yun hesitated for a moment and said: "Huang Xiaohan?"

"You have finally arrived here."

The brown-haired boy said softly, his voice as clear as the sound of the first bronze vessel forged by human civilization being struck.

"Do you know how surprised I was when I discovered you in the traces of fate?"

"A product of a children's manga, a happy story, a beautiful fantasy about the future, an animation, a fairy tale, something from a comic book actually appeared before my eyes."

"I hurriedly hid your fate from the sight of the Chaos Gods, hid all information regarding 'Doraemon' in the mists of history, protected your essence from being known by the Chaos Gods, and watched you all the way here."

"Friend, then what exactly are you?"

"A transmigrator? A representative of 22nd-century humanity? A simple Warp product?"

He walked step by step through the reed marsh and arrived in front of Zhou Yun, allowing Zhou Yun to see the boy's appearance clearly.

Black-brown hair hung over a body that looked as if it had been molded from red pottery clay; his upper body was bare, and his muscles were covered in primitive-style body paint.

Those cyan-blue lines formed various bizarre patterns, from the Aquila to the skull, from sacrifice to death, encompassing everything.

And above these paintings, a lapis lazuli pendant hung around the boy's neck, from which the image of a woman vaguely flickered, as if it were a record of a love story that only had tragedies and disasters.

The boy with the Central Asian face tilted his head slightly to look at Zhou Yun, a laurel wreath woven from golden laurel leaves adorning his hair.

Zhou Yun did not know how to describe this face.

He was childish, like a shepherd boy in a race that had just embraced civilization.

He was mature, like an emperor of a race that spanned the stars.

To say he was ordinary, yet he did not seem that ordinary.

To call him handsome, he was indeed handsome enough to be described as beautiful, yet he did not seem beautiful enough to be a god.

He seemed to be just an excellent child, an excellent human, a beautiful template for the human species.

Zhou Yun stared at this face, and after a long silence, he slowly opened his mouth and said:

"No wonder your ass is itchy, if you're not itchy, who is?"

A silence fell by the riverbank of the Zakariya; the reed marsh trembled slightly.

"Hahahaaaha."

Zhou Yun did not know if it was his imagination, but he seemed to hear laughter coming from somewhere.

This laughter seemed to come from the mouth of the silver-haired boy's corpse lying in the boat.

The brown-haired boy listened to the words from Zhou Yun's mouth and that faint laughter; his face, which was not fair to begin with, suddenly darkened a bit.

He raised his head and stared fixedly at Zhou Yun.

Zhou Yun was so creeped out by this death stare that he felt he was almost being killed by the brown-haired boy's gaze.

And he didn't know if it was his imagination, but this brown-haired boy seemed a bit stiff, a bit rigid, and not so full of humanity.

"His spirit is fragmented; converse with him, stimulate him a little." A faint voice sounded, seemingly the silver-haired boy's corpse in the wooden boat speaking.

Stimulate him? Zhou Yun blinked, pondered for a moment, and then spoke:

"Your Majesty, you staring at me like this makes me very uncomfortable. By the way, Your Majesty, I have a question I want to ask you."

"You won, humanity survived. So, Your Majesty, what was the price?"

"Is all of this really worth it?"

"I f*** *Mesopotamian profanity* *Babylonian profanity* *Egyptian 19th Dynasty profanity* *Macedonian profanity* *Mauryan Empire profanity* *Roman profanity* *Frankish profanity*"

(End of Chapter)