Chapter 14: Balance

Below the Q&A section were hundreds of scattered hyperlinks, each pointing to the official websites of governmental organizations and civilian guilds from various regions and countries. Unfortunately, only registered forum accounts could access them; guests had no permission.

Li Cheng carefully read these organization names and found familiar ones such as the Special Affairs Administration (Special Affairs Bureau), Prometheus Laboratory Corporation, the United Nations-backed Global Supernatural Alliance, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Special Incidents Division.

In the corner, he discovered Changsun Yao's House of World Peace—apparently, the latter was not as makeshift as he had imagined.

"The UK, France, Germany, Russia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, India, and others have all established their own official organizations. The Vatican has the Inquisition. The EU has European Heavy Industry. Middle Eastern nations jointly founded the Middle Eastern Anomalous Item Recovery Office. Clearly, all sides take this seriously."

Li Cheng lightly tapped his temple, opened a search engine, and looked up scientific breakthroughs across different fields over the past four and a half years, comparing them to the pace of scientific advancement over the previous decade.

"As expected."

After carefully searching for nearly an hour, he slowly exhaled a thick breath, his gaze solemn.

People living in an era of rapid development have a severely distorted estimation of the speed of technological breakthroughs.

The Wright brothers invented the first airplane in 1903; just 66 years later, humans officially landed on the Moon.

Today, even a random smartphone has far greater computing power than the navigation computer of Apollo 11.

The explosive development of science and technology over the past century has created a delightful illusion—that technological breakthroughs are inherently inevitable and will always proceed at this pace.

But that is not true.

In 2017, Russia unearthed time capsules buried fifty years earlier across various regions, each containing incredibly optimistic letters—We've only just taken our first steps into space, but you should already be flying to other planets by now. Many natural secrets yet undiscovered today must have been found, nuclear energy must be controllable, elemental quantities must be adjustable by human will, climate must be manipulable, gardens must be cultivated in the Arctic. We're still building communism—surely you're already living in communism?

This letter, which now reads like a dark joke, reveals a simple truth—the pace of human civilization's technological progress is continuously slowing, and the rate of scientific breakthroughs is gradually decelerating.

"This isn't because twenty-first-century people have become dumber, but because the fields of basic science have become increasingly fragmented, the difficulty of mastery has grown ever higher, and scientists, even after a lifetime, can achieve breakthroughs in only one or a few areas."

"Yet over these past four years, the speed of human civilization's scientific and technological breakthroughs has become absurdly fast—far exceeding the pace of the past ten or twenty years."

Controlled nuclear fusion reactors have sustained operation for over thirty minutes with a Q-value (fusion energy gain factor) greater than one, with grid connection and commercial deployment expected within two years;

Gene-editing technology has broken through again, capable of completely curing certain types of diabetes, familial hypercholesterolemia, and even Alzheimer's;

At the Paralympics, mechanical prosthetics enabled paralyzed athletes to stand again, even breaking the Olympic world record for sprinting;

A new space race has begun, with China, the US, Russia, the EU, and others constructing permanent lunar bases;

In recent years, media outlets have unanimously praised humanity's ascent to a new tier, yet wars and chaos in localized regions have never ceased.

Today, a warlord in Africa massacres a village; tomorrow, a South American drug lord hangs a mayor; the day after, a developed nation suffers a terrorist attack.

Due to deliberate media neglect, these news stories rarely surface in public view.

Li Cheng mused: "In the real Earth, all irrational technological progress, anomalous events, and supernatural powers originate from the so-called Killing Fields and the Players. Player selection criteria are based on possessing exceptional traits—whether positive or negative."

This is easy to understand: someone who utterly lacks empathy and guilt is undoubtedly a negative trait in real society, but in the Killing Field environment, it may not be a disadvantage.

Traits are neither good nor bad—only whether they suit the environment.

"The webpage states that the current global number of living Players is approximately 270,000. In the early days of the Killing Field's intervention in reality, 70% of new Players did not survive the first three months. Though we don't know exactly how early 'early' was, a rough estimate suggests that at least half a million Players have ever existed on Earth."

Half a million supernaturals—even if each possessed only the most basic supernatural power—would be enough to trigger societal upheaval.

The reason mass media can still conceal the truth likely has two causes.

One: regional official organizations like the Special Affairs Bureau and European Heavy Industry are fully suppressing the information.

Two: Players and Players, Players and organizations, organizations and organizations have reached some kind of balance.

The webpage specifically notes that a non-chosen person who personally kills a chosen Player may inherit their qualification. Just use your toes to think—this rule contains how much malice.

Players gain supernatural powers and technological achievements from different civilizations through the Killing Field, equivalent to a direct ticket to a mountain of gold.

For powerful state machines, naturally, they want to seize all resources and control every destabilizing factor in society.

Players willing to obey are granted privileges and recruited. Those less willing can be negotiated with. Unruly or disruptive Players are directly tried and executed, their qualifications transferred to reliable subordinates.

For multinational corporations and giant enterprises, everything revolves around profit—they will trample any human law and commit any crime for profit. If chaos and conflict bring profit, they will encourage chaos and conflict.

They will be even less scrupulous than the former, even openly putting prices on Player qualifications—meaning kidnapping a Player and killing them.

For individuals, this hellish, dark-forest-like environment leaves everyone in constant fear.

Even two Players who have never met each other, upon encountering one another, immediately wonder whether the other will attack them for a massive bounty.

After this atmosphere persists for a while, Players who have gained some power will inevitably refuse to become meat on the chopping block and form their own civilian guilds, recruiting allies.

Thus, a balance emerges between these guilds, state machines, and multinational corporations.

"The opening of the Killing Field game has accelerated the explosive development of technology and shaped today's international order."

Li Cheng pondered: "Although urban legends in China never cease, overall, social order remains stable."

Judging from the interactions between the Special Affairs Bureau and Prometheus Laboratory Corporation, all factions have formed a delicate balance—publicly cooperating and jointly developing the Killing Field, while privately maintaining fierce competition."

Thinking of this, his eyes suddenly brightened.

Since the Killing Field implies infinite possibilities, the 【Lord of Worms】 infection, which seems unsolvable to the Special Affairs Bureau, may not be hopeless in other organizations.

(End of Chapter)