Chapter 438: Infinite Void

After a long while, Li Heng spoke slowly.

"I do indeed know what this sentence means."

Once these words were out, the little golden dragon, who had also been racking its brain, froze. His Excellency actually knew the meaning of this sentence? Could it be a language from before the Immortal God Era?

"Then what exactly is this!"

Wujian was overjoyed upon hearing this, losing a bit of composure.

"Experimental Subject Jiuhao has been born..."

Li Heng answered frankly, not intending to hide anything.

Since he transmigrated, he had encountered much information regarding Earth, including figures that seemed familiar yet were not, and factions that seemed familiar yet were not.

But the only things that could truly capture information about Earth directly were that Salvation Jade Slip written in simplified Chinese characters, and now, this sentence spoken by Wujian!

The function of the Salvation Jade Slip, which allowed one to comprehend various unreasonable rule-based abilities, was very similar to the rule-based power of the Strange, and the Wujian before him was suspected to be a Strange.

The most critical point was this.

He had once performed an Appraisal on the origins and background of the Salvation Jade Slip, discovering it was a product of the so-called Salvation Plan. The essence of the Salvation Plan was to bypass Pollution, bypass Calamity, and reshape the World with power of a higher specification.

Synthesizing the above.

Li Heng had reason to suspect that Wujian was also a product of the Salvation Plan.

Moreover, everything Wujian had done was in line with the goals of this Salvation Plan. For instance, after its birth, it did not stir up trouble, merely occupying the Ascension Road; after the Calamity erupted, Wujian even relied on its own power to shelter the Ascension Road.

In the end, it even re-evolved the Emperor Road.

Was this perhaps the reshaping of the World that was the goal?

However, if he remembered correctly, based on the information revealed in previous Appraisals, this Salvation Plan had failed, right? The Salvation Jade Slip had therefore drifted to the downstream of the river, arriving at the Xianshi Tiandi.

Li Heng frowned tightly.

As this line of thought continued, he discovered numerous suspicious points.

For example, in the Appraisal information, the Salvation Jade Slip had drifted to the downstream of the river, which meant that the Salvation Jade Slip should have been in the midstream or upstream of the river.

But according to the information revealed by Wujian.

That giant hand, suspected to be from the organization behind the Salvation Plan, came from the future instead, and the future, from the perspective of the Time-Space River, was itself located downstream.

Downstream flowing to downstream, what was this?

But if the "downstream of the river" in the Appraisal information did not refer to the Time-Space River, but to the Great Void itself, then why was the giant hand Wujian saw located in the future?

This did not quite match up in terms of time and space.

Various thoughts and suspicions flashed through his mind.

For instance, the most obvious one: Wujian was lying.

But he was too lazy to play mind games with others now, so he had already verified it just a moment ago by sparing no Source Power; Wujian was telling the truth, every word was true, and it was not lying.

Thoughts churned and turned, and Li Heng speculated continuously. Gradually, a rough outline faintly emerged. However, just like the question of where the escaped Immortal Gods had gone, this matter still lacked evidence and a foundation to stand on, so his ideas remained vague.

"Wujian, are you certain the river you saw is the Time-Space River?"

Li Heng asked, wanting to confirm.

He had just ruled out the possibility of Wujian lying, but he had not ruled out the possibility of Wujian seeing it wrong, so he wanted to confirm again.

Wujian's face nodded.

"It is absolutely the Time-Space River, the mother river of the Time-Space River without a doubt. That feeling of spanning above the myriad ancient heavens, with time flowing silently and eternally unmoved, cannot be wrong."

After answering Li Heng, it immediately sighed with emotion.

"So I really am a product of artificial experimentation; there is even a serial number. No wonder I have had a faint sense of mission since my birth; so that's it. Jiuhao—does that mean there are eight other experimental subjects like me above me?"

Wujian murmured to itself.

"Then how do you feel? Do you have any unwillingness? Or perhaps, do you want to defy that so-called sense of mission?"

Li Heng asked with some curiosity.

In his view, Wujian's role was like that of a robot in some science fiction films. If following the usual tropes, once a robot discovered the truth, it should awaken and rebel against human tyranny.

"It's nothing."

Wujian was unexpectedly calm.

"I have long had speculations about this."

"As for unwillingness, or defying the mission?"

"Do not impose the thought patterns of ordinary living beings onto me. To use the simplest explanation: a living being knows it needs to drink water, and if it doesn't drink water it will die, so does it want to rebel against drinking water?"

Wujian asked Li Heng in return.

Li Heng nodded upon hearing this, asking with a smile that was not quite a smile.

"Then is there a possibility that this thought pattern of yours, this way of thinking, was added to you by the person behind the scenes, with the purpose of making you not rebel?"

Wujian spoke slowly.

"What you said is possible, and highly probable, but it has no meaning. Precisely because I have this thought pattern, I am who I am. If it were changed, then it would not be me."

Li Heng nodded, "Then I understand."

He suddenly realized that although Wujian's current role was similar to the positioning of a robot in science fiction films, it was not a robot itself and would not seek updates and iterations like a robot, even if the price paid was replacing its personality with another.

However, this actually extended to an interesting question.

What exactly is the essence of awakening?

Is it the old self passing away and the new self waking up?

Or is it the awakening of the so-called true self?

But how is this so-called true self defined?

Li Heng thought deeply for a moment and then laughed at himself; he realized he was just worrying needlessly. Thinking about such questions at his level of cultivation would yield no results.

Because in a sense, he was different at every moment, constantly living and dying—for example, the self of yesterday and the self of today, the self of the previous second and the self of the next second.

This remains true even if all of these possess continuity of consciousness.

Take the Ship of Theseus, for example.

A ship sailing on the sea has its planks rot one by one and replaced one by one; in this view, it is still the original ship, but in the end, it will always become a brand-new ship with none of the original materials.

"You ask me these things, but I also want to ask you one thing: Outsider, why do you know the meaning of this phrase? Are you perhaps a member of that organization?"

Wujian stared at Li Heng with burning eyes once again.

"No," Li Heng shook his head and said.

"I may have a deep connection with the mastermind behind your birth, but in a sense, I am not considered a member of that organization, unless..."

That organization is a country, and it still holds my ID card.

Li Heng chuckled to himself, but he did not speak these words aloud.

"Is that so... then I understand."

Wujian pondered for a moment and spoke slowly.

"Exalted One, I suddenly thought of a hypothesis, one that was widely circulated during our Immortal God Era, though because there was no evidence, it could only be treated as idle chatter."

Suddenly, the Little Golden Dragon spoke with a solemn expression.

"Speak," Li Heng raised an eyebrow slightly.

"Exalted One, you should know that the Great Void is truly infinite, perhaps even an infinite of a higher order; time has no beginning or end, and space is boundless, so theoretically, there should exist civilizations or factions more powerful than us Immortal Gods."

"But we discovered that there are none."

"Even if they exist, they only exist within our conjectures."

"At the very least, during the Immortal God Era, when the Heavenly Court Immortal Gods suppressed everything, sat in the center, and radiated their influence across the Great Void, there existed no factions or civilizations capable of rivaling us Immortal Gods."

"So, do such factions and civilizations actually exist?"

"If they exist, then why have we not seen them?"

"Are they dead, have they vanished, or where have they gone?"

The Little Golden Dragon slowly posed this question.