Chapter 548: Reboot (4K)

“Sssss—Haaaa—”

Lei Yesi gasped sharply, pushing himself up with his hands, his trembling eyes scanning left and right.

The ground where he lay was still the mountain terrain torn apart by high-temperature plasma streams.

The melted lava had long since solidified into blackened rock; from its degree of hardening, dozens of hours had passed since he fell unconscious.

Others who slowly regained consciousness—Mian Yue, Fungus King, Claudia, and more—each checked their lungs the moment they awoke; Wan Li Feng Dao lifted his head, voice hoarse: “Where’s Piyifu?”

“I’m right here.”

A voice came from behind the slope—Li Cheng held the four-dimensional box, and beside him stood the astronaut, fully restored, walking on his own two legs.

Among the human players, Lei Yesi had slipped into unconsciousness early, like falling asleep in a math class, completely unaware of what followed.

Claudia and Wan Li Feng Dao, however, had twitching eyelids, vaguely suspecting something—the mission required installing the annihilation device at a designated location.

Without entering the Dreamland, the unconscious astronaut would almost certainly be unable to “install” it.

Only by personally experiencing and completing the Dreamland, awakening the astronaut Wil’s individual consciousness, could the next step be unlocked.

“Say one line each: ‘Rain Sister is awesome.’”

Hui Yu stood tall and stepped forward, sincerely remarking: “In the end, it still came down to me. I went all out—time to cross my arms.”

Earlier, on the beach, while eating seafood with coconuts, Hui Yu had never stopped listening for radio signals.

Though no radio waves were received, she heard faint clanging sounds, eventually tracing the hammering noise, drilling through the metal dome—now reduced to mere centimeters—and breaking through the barrier between the two worlds.

“Fine, fine, we’ll praise you.”

Li Cheng sighed, turning slightly to Wan Li Feng Dao and the others: “Prepare for battle.”

Battle? With whom?

The colorful mist rapidly faded; the Alpha Python’s body emerged from within the haze. It shook its head, shedding the illusions’ influence, its mountain-sized head looming down over the players.

Zero-frame initiation—Alpha immediately opened its maw, the accumulated high-temperature plasma blazing like a solar panel.

Step.

At the critical moment, the astronaut stepped forward, raising his palm to point at the Alpha Python.

The fusion engine’s power plummeted; the plasma collapsed and dispersed through gaps in the serpent’s mouth. Sparks erupted across the snake’s body as countless structures shattered and fell away.

This was not a powerful distortion—the players felt no primal force or telekinesis, only some ethereal command.

The astronaut Wil and Alpha were two sides of the same essence, both remnants left behind millennia ago by the Lv40 transcendent, [Yutian Di].

Once Wil reclaimed his memories and consciousness through the Dreamland, he naturally became an entity of equal rank to Alpha, able to directly dismantle it through their latent connection.

Rustle-rustle-rustle—

Metal structures collapsed like a landslide; the serpent’s head retained only 70% of its original mass, one eyeball dislodged from its socket. Its once-kilometer-long body fractured extensively, unable to support its own weight, crashing down with a thunderous roar.

Dust billowed; Bai Ma Mubei’s pupils contracted sharply, lashing out a sideways kick that struck the bewildered griffin, sending it flying hundreds of meters, while he himself recoiled backward from the recoil.

Almost the instant both moved from their positions, a blinding white beam erupted from the smoke, cleaving the hillside in two, carving a gaping chasm.

Most of Alpha’s body had disintegrated, leaving only the head and the metal skeleton of its neck. The fusion engine within the skeleton flickered dimly but refused to extinguish.

“.”

The astronaut Wil collapsed, utterly drained. Li Cheng grabbed him, flung him into the copilot seat of the Edge Fighter, then leapt aboard with Hui Yu, glancing at his Casio watch.

Wan Li Feng Dao’s mission, [Armed Escort], required guarding the four-dimensional box for 48 hours. Now, only five minutes remained.

“Stop it.”

Li Cheng moved like lightning, rapidly programming the flight path on the fighter’s control panel, shouting without looking back: “Give me five minutes!”

“Five minutes is too short! Can I at least hold off Alpha while singing you a song called ‘King of Love Songs’?!”

Wan Li Feng Dao shouted back, but his hands moved without delay, swinging the Sword of the Dragon-Slayer in a move called Ten Thousand Swords Return Home.

Even reduced to just its head, Alpha remained overwhelmingly authoritative to the players; merely the residual heat from its fusion engine incinerated Lei Yesi’s tattooed army and Mian Yue’s arrows.

“Leave it to me.”

Bai Ma Mubei’s voice was as still as an ancient well. This was no longer the Dreamland—death here was final. She slammed her stone coffin into the ground, slapped off the lid, and stared into the eyes of her own corpse—her future self, dead at Lv35.

She and her own rotting corpse simultaneously extended their palms, fingers interlocked, merging as one. Her aura surged violently, wildly, ferociously!

She stomped the ground, cratering it twenty meters deep, leaping high into the air; her right arm, rotted to exposed bone, delivered an uppercut straight to Alpha’s chin, forcibly interrupting the beam aimed at the Edge Fighter.

Claudia unleashed a river of blood; Lei Yesi summoned his God of War avatar again; all the transcendent players unleashed their full arsenal, pinning Alpha firmly in place.

The Edge Fighter, carrying Li Cheng and the astronaut Wil, sped toward the crystal forest they had come through.

Hui Yu, using her nanotech body, clung to the wing, feeling the howling wind, then liquefied herself, slipping through the cockpit window seam, reforming her head to ask curiously: “Where are we going?”

“Zeroing is complete. Time to reboot.”

Li Cheng glanced at the astronaut Wil in the back seat, his mind swirling with a thousand thoughts.

Wil—or rather, Yutian Di—was at minimum a top-tier transcendent from tens of thousands of years ago, the veteran among veterans.

He had the right to gather Michael, the Side of Truth, Han Shui Shi, and others, point at their noses, and ask: “How many years have you even been players?”

From him, Li Cheng would inevitably obtain direct, top-secret clues tied to the Killing Ground.

As if sensing Li Cheng’s thoughts, Wil trembled slightly, pulling a cable from beneath his seat.

Li Cheng instantly understood, yanking a hard drive from the fighter’s computer, connecting it to Wil’s helmet via a makeshift puppet interface.

“The Killing Ground, literally boundless, connects countless worlds capable of selecting Chosen Ones—the Prime Universe.”

Wil whispered weakly: “Each Prime Universe’s Chosen Ones are given a level cap by the Killing Ground—Lv20, Lv30, Lv40, etc.”

“If the top Chosen Ones fail to transcend the Beyond in time and lead their people past the level cap, their entire world will be dragged into the Killing Ground. The Chosen Ones themselves will also, fall into, divine corruption.”

What?!

The instrument panel showed less than two kilometers to the purple crystal forest. Li Cheng steered the fighter into the path he had carved earlier with his light-speed elbow strike.

His mind flooded with shock, pupils trembling: “Divine corruption… are the Chosen Ones actually players?”

He had imagined a thousand possibilities—but never this answer. Before he could ask further, a blinding beam pierced through the rock layer, shearing off one entire wing of the fighter.

Alpha had finally broken free from Bai Ma Mubei and the others, drifting swiftly to catch up.

The Edge Fighter, now wingless, glided toward the crystal ground. Li Cheng instantly retracted the fighter, tossing the astronaut to Hui Yu, who hovered midair via her levitation engine: “Take him to the location marked by the Guidance Radar.” He then flung open his 3D warehouse, hurling its contents forward.

A line of heavy war vehicles, studded with rivets and rugged in design, crashed down, six legs rising to support them; their long barrels rotated in unison under fire-control systems, all pointing at the rock layer.

At the instant Alpha shattered through the crystal rock, every vehicle bearing the codename “Imperial Guard” fired simultaneously—kinetic and electromagnetic shells rained onto the serpent’s head.

BOOM!

For tens of thousands of years, the crystal forest had remained unchanged; now, countless hanging crystal pillars shattered and fell due to resonant shockwaves.

As the flames cleared, Alpha’s damaged head opened its single remaining eye and spat a high-temperature beam, instantly annihilating an entire row of vehicles.

Flames surged; the remaining Imperial Guard vehicles stepped forward methodically, retreating in formation, rotating their barrels for a second, then a third, volley.

Alpha, whom Bai Ma Mubei and the others had failed to stop, could not possibly be halted by these vehicles.

With a casual blast, it sliced through vast clusters of crystals above like a hot knife through butter, sending tens of thousands of tons of crystal crashing down, crushing the remaining vehicles.

But the dozen or so seconds bought were enough.

At the rear of the vehicle line, the 3D warehouse door stood open; in the corner sat a gantry crane, beneath which hung a partially mechanized Daqun.

Crystal arrays filled its hollowed brain; multi-band detectors were implanted into its empty eye sockets; optoelectronic cables repaired its damaged nerves; rotary cannons replaced its broken chelae.

After the London battle, Daqun suffered severe damage and had yet to be fully repaired. Beneath the gantry crane sat an Alec swimming pool, continuously collecting the blood and oil dripping from Daqun’s body, pumping it back in through pressurized pipes.

Industrial robotic arms surrounding the gantry crane now screwed massive bolts into the openings on the mechanical Daqun’s body, stopping the bleeding, then slapped cheap 50-cent band-aids on top of each bolt as comfort.

And Li Cheng stood at the warehouse exit.

“Initiation complete.”

The mechanical Daqun’s electronic eyes glowed red; all its cables snapped automatically; the chimney-like vents on its back erupted with murky black smoke and blazing fire, propelling it like an arrow shot from a bow, flying out of the warehouse.

Simultaneously, its chest armor plate snapped open, revealing the cockpit.

Li Cheng leapt from the warehouse entrance, landing precisely inside the cockpit, connecting the dense, vein-like cables hanging within to the back of his neck and arms.

Alpha’s attention remained mostly fixed on the astronaut Wil, glancing only briefly at Li Cheng before firing a casual heat beam.

The mechanical Daqun flickered, using its Familiar Swap skill to alter its trajectory, dodging the beam, closing the distance to the serpent’s head, and delivering a condensed air-burst punch with its remaining chela.

Alpha’s size was still immense—even reduced to just its head, to the mechanical Daqun, it was like a tree to a flea.

All physical attack methods were useless; even the Summoning Technique: Farmer was no exception—it possessed no soul.

Fortunately, Li Cheng needed only contact.

Thud-thud!

The mechanical Daqun’s chelae pierced into Alpha’s body; the armor at the tips split open, releasing all the bullets hidden within the [Ape Regression Gun].

Alpha’s mystery level was too high—the regression bullets struck true, but only reduced the fusion engine’s power and abruptly slowed its flight speed.

That was enough.

[Thermal Death Corridor] activated. The Frog God, resurrected after more than 24 hours, stood upright, palms pressed together; fragments of crystal floated around him.

Gravity reversed.

Within the designated area, gravity flipped; Alpha’s massive head, no longer under control, plummeted upward, smashing through countless crystals until it reached the platform.

At that exact moment, the Casio watch’s countdown ended; the four-dimensional box unfolded layer by layer, releasing two beams of light that became two autopsy tables, hovering on the platform.

The astronaut Wil had long known his mission—he lay on the right autopsy table. Alpha struggled desperately, but as the Frog God, far below, released his grip, gravity returned to normal, and Alpha crashed onto the left autopsy table.

A light as bright as a star’s birth erupted from the two, instantly illuminating the entire hundreds-of-kilometers-long crystal rock layer—absolute silence.

The mechanical Daqun’s visual sensors burned out; the intense visual burn signal traveled up the cables into Li Cheng’s brain, making his head throb.

He staggered to his feet, pushed open the cockpit door.

Hui Yu still stood on the platform, arms folded. The astronaut and Wil on the autopsy tables had vanished.

In their place, the platform itself had changed.

The ground turned liquid, seeping into the crystal forest, transforming the crystals into other substances.

Rocks and mountain ranges materialized out of thin air; man-made buildings rose from the ground, and within them appeared countless mechanical child-like lifeforms in deep sleep.

This scene, like the dawn of creation, left Hui Yu stunned. “What the hell is going on?”

“He’s recreating his homeland.”

Li Cheng suddenly understood: the life essence of that Lv40 transcendent, [Devastator], was so profound that even after his death tens of thousands of years ago, he could still warp reality and reshape the environment.

“Wait, it’s not a recreation.”

Li Cheng immediately dismissed his own guess—the mechanical child lifeforms bore no resemblance to the residents he had seen in the Dreamland, and their brains did not operate via air pressure differentials.

The “souls” of the Will folk were, in essence, the ceaseless computational state of golden leaf blades within their brains. Once computation ceased, the “soul” vanished instantly.

Therefore, merely recreating his homeland, copying Will himself, his sister, or his friend Robinson, held no meaning—it would only produce fakes.

What he chose was a complete reboot of his own civilization.

Click-click-click-click—

One by one, the mechanical child lifeforms opened their eyes. They had been implanted with basic intelligence; upon awakening, they could speak immediately, gazing at each other in confusion. “Where are we?”

“Who are you? Who am I?”

The mechanical children soon noticed Li Cheng and Hui Yu, whose appearances differed starkly from theirs. They approached cautiously and asked, “Are you the gods who created us?”

Hui Yu raised an eyebrow. “You see a person and call them a god? That’s classic Android thinking.”

Li Cheng raised a hand to cut off Hui Yu’s nonsense. “I’m not your god. At best, I’m his friend.”

The mechanical children whispered among themselves. Their personalities were as pristine and blank as fresh paper. They asked timidly, “What should we do now?”

What to do?

If other players stood here, facing an entire city and countless general-purpose AI robots they could easily manipulate, they might turn them into slaves, followers, or servants.

But Li Cheng only paused to think, then waved his hand. “For now, cherish every breath, cherish every second of free thought, develop your civilization, and live well—that’s enough.”