Chapter 380: Imitating Others and Failing

Moke... who is Moke?

On the other side of the 178th Void Realm, the scavenger Kyle felt his life passing away rapidly, and vaguely heard a name in his blur.

That voice seemed to come from the void, sounding in the depths of his soul.

Kyle had no time to worry about so much.

The toxins of "rust disease" had invaded his internal organs, and he could feel his flesh and blood becoming stiff and rotten piece by piece, like rusted metal. The cold hand of death was gripping his throat, making him unable to breathe!

Just as his consciousness was about to sink completely into darkness, a warm and holy white light suddenly descended from the sky without warning, completely wrapping his broken body.

Kyle didn't have time to be surprised before he found himself as if soaked in a warm spring, and his consciousness, which seemed to have sunk to the bottom of the sea, gradually floated upward.

That severe pain deep into the bone marrow was receding at an incredible speed.

He saw the rusted, rotten tissues on his body peeling off inch by inch under the power of the Holy Light, revealing healthy new flesh full of vitality!

Incredible—

He, who should have died, actually lived?!

Immediately afterward, that grand and majestic voice gradually became clear, telling him the holy gospel from another world and guiding him to master a supreme power called "Source Power".

Kyle listened in confusion, but he understood a few sentences.

Although it was an unfamiliar language, its ripples triggered resonance in his heart...

"I am Moke, your savior."

"From now on, you are my 'apostle', my first divine messenger on earth."

"Feel this power, master it, and then... act for me."

Regardless, this is a cost-effective deal.

Kyle, with the ecstasy of surviving a disaster and deep suspicion of this mysterious power, stumbled and climbed up from the garbage pile.

He breathed the air full of toxic smoke, but was surprised to find that the smog, which was enough to make ordinary Gray People feel stinging pain, had no effect on him at all.

His "filter gills", composed of countless fine folds, seemed to have been strengthened by that milky white light!

Kyle stepped onto the road back to the settlement.

He had walked this road countless times, but never as clearly as today, even being able to see the mottled graffiti and stains on the wall, as well as the screws scattered in the corners.

He saw those bottom-level scavengers like him, skinny as a rail, fighting for a few pieces of useless scrap iron, and thin children waiting for an opportunity beside them, ready to swarm up at any time to snatch the last bit of things from the losers.

These "Gray People" living at the very bottom mostly couldn't afford expensive protective suits and gas masks.

They could only wrap their mouths and noses with tattered cloth strips, letting the toxins erode their skin, which should have been as tough as leather.

Many people had spots of "rust disease" on their bodies, just like him before. It's just that due to the patience and adaptability exercised by the Gray People over a long period of time, most people had already acquired the ability to be mildly immune to toxins.

When Kyle walked to the gate made of barbed wire in the settlement, several heavily armed guards were leaning against the gate, coldly watching the crowd coming and going.

Their equipment was far better than the scavengers outside, and they even wore old-fashioned gas masks that could filter most toxins on their faces.

An old man who wanted to enter the city to beg for some food was pushed to the ground by them with a gun butt without mercy.

"Get out! Don't bring your plague in!"

The guard's voice was cold and impatient, and then harsh mocking laughter sounded from around, chasing the stumbling old man into the shadows under the dust.

His hungry child was waiting there eagerly, and eventually, that expectant gaze was also covered with a layer of gray-fog-like shadow.

Kyle walked past with his head down, not daring to look at the unlucky old man, nor daring to look into the guards' eyes.

In the wasteland, compassion is the cheapest and most expensive luxury.

Keeping cautious and humble is the only way to survive.

Passing through the gate, the further inside he went, the more different the scene became.

The outermost periphery is a slum built of containers and abandoned pipes, which is also his narrow and warm little nest. As for the relatively tidy central area, it is the territory directly ruled by the settlement ruler "Iron Hand".

It is brightly lit, and there are bursts of noise from the fortress transformed from the wreckage of a huge steam engine. It is said that they will also produce some delicious canned food.

Kyle could even see "Iron Hand" and his cronies through the window, surrounding a campfire, enjoying precious delicacies and clean distilled water.

That is the "tax" that he and other bottom-level scavengers exchanged their lives for from the ruins and handed over.

Thanks to these taxes, they can live as they did before the end of the world, and even enjoy the extravagance that they hadn't even enjoyed when the world hadn't declined.

Everything outside seems to have nothing to do with them.

They neither envy the prosperous past, nor do they want to go back at all.

Why?

Kyle's fists clenched unconsciously.

Why can Iron Hand and his men live in luxury, while other scavengers have to starve outside, dying of illness and rot like maggots?

Of course, his power was too weak; he could only endure this injustice and swallow all his complaints into his stomach.

Not revealing his legendary experience of surviving a disaster, he was afraid of being caught and sliced, so he hid in his drafty "home".

At this time, he, who had calmed down, saw his younger brother lying on the bed on the verge of death.

A strong impulse surged from his heart, and he began to follow the whispers in his mind, trying to use the power that had appeared out of thin air in his body.

He stretched out his hands, which had been reborn and were no longer covered with rust, and learned from the guidance of the voice in his mind, guiding the "Source Power" in his body to his fingertips.

"Holy Light... I beg you, please take away the pain of my loved ones."

A group of soft light really appeared, and with a rich breath of life, slowly shrouded his sleeping younger brother.

Under Kyle's gaze, the miracle happened again!

When he saw his younger brother also recover and open his eyes weakly, the last trace of suspicion in Kyle's heart was completely replaced by fanatical gratitude.

He knelt on the ground, facing the empty wall, grateful to the god from outside the domain, and made a blood oath, willing to spend the rest of his life to be loyal to that great god named "Moke".

Seeming to feel his piety, Moke responded to his prayer and gave the next guidance—

"Coal."

"That is not only the fuel you rely on for survival, but also attached with pure Source Power. If you want to become stronger, go get more coke inhabited by resentment."

"I will teach you the knowledge to control this power, and guide you to become stronger. And you only need to offer me some tributes regularly."

Kyle was moved to tears and was extremely excited.

"Praise my Lord!"

Of course, in his heart, besides gratitude, his own greed also grew quietly.

He longed for more power.

He wanted to let those who had once forced him and his brother into such a desperate situation also taste this despair of struggling helplessly in the abyss!

It wasn't just Kyle who was extremely excited, but also Moke, who was standing on the other side of the Void Realm. On that expressionless face, the ecstasy from the bottom of his heart finally appeared again.

He succeeded!

The spiritual frequency of the "Divine Messenger" is synchronizing with them, and in this process, the Void Realm is also gradually becoming stable!

"Accelerate the experiment!" Moke ordered excitedly, "Let our chess piece run faster on the chessboard!"

The mages in the mage tower began to urge the Source Power, accelerating the flow of time on the other side of the Void Realm, dragging the sluggish progress bar backward.

The "Divine Messenger" is very clumsy; he is just a scavenger at the very bottom after all, even if he has extraordinary power, he can only explore his own path on the wasteland cautiously.

For the researchers in the mage tower, this is undoubtedly a period of "garbage time". But for Kyle, it is completely different.

Kyle returned to the ruins he was familiar with, but this time, his identity had changed from prey to hunter.

He began to consciously look for those scavenger gangs that had bullied him and looted everywhere. He no longer hid, but appeared actively.

When those scavengers, as usual, waved rusted iron pipes and short knives, wanting to snatch the clean-looking clothes on him, a grin appeared on Kyle's face, and he represented the god to descend the wrath of punishment on this group of hyenas.

"Source Power" can't just be used for healing.

It can also be used for killing!

The power that had healed his body shot out from his fingertips, no longer warm and soft, but turned into a spark capable of melting steel!

The screams didn't even have time to sound before they were swallowed by the instantaneous high temperature.

After killing these scavengers, Kyle snatched the coal from them, and this is the so-called "Wraith Coke" that the voice behind the void told him about.

Just the moment he touched these cokes, he was surprised to find that these coal mines stained with blood and violence seemed to harbor more and purer power than those mined directly from the ruins!

A crazy idea grew quietly in his heart.

He began to consciously hunt those predators who were rampant on the wasteland.

He took away the Wraith Coke in their hands, absorbed the power within, and became stronger and stronger in the process.

Of course, the guys at the top of the food chain are limited after all, and he couldn't always find guys who were rampant.

Therefore, occasionally he would also attack scavengers who were not so hateful, and the standard for attacking depended on his mood.

This standard could be because some guy who didn't open his eyes snatched the garbage picked up by the children, or because some impolite brat spat on his back.

His reputation also spread like a snowball getting bigger and bigger among the bottom-level scavengers in despair.

They didn't think there was anything wrong with what he did; if they encountered the same situation, they would do the same.

The Gray People struggling in the ruins regarded him as a "spirit of revenge" descended from the sky, and they gathered under his command one after another.

Finally, after accumulating enough power, Kyle launched a rebellion.

He led thousands of fanatical scavengers who supported him, like an unstoppable torrent, rushing toward the center of the settlement—the fortress of "Iron Hand".

On the sparsely populated wasteland, this is a force that can be called destructive, enough to drown those poor guards in minutes.

Then, a leader who was more brutal and smarter than "Iron Hand" was born.

His name is "Divine Messenger", serving the "Great Moke".

Time behind the Void Realm was still passing, and the "Divine Messenger" at the top of the food chain began to push harsh religious laws in the settlement, and in the name of the god he believed in—"Great Moke", confiscated all the property of the scavengers, took everything including people and objects under the ownership of the "Church", and then let the scavengers supervise each other.

He knew very well how he succeeded. Extraordinary power is only one aspect, and more importantly, it is because of the lack of order in the slums that allowed powerful people like himself to take advantage of the loopholes.

The settlement under his command must never have similar things happen again; this world does not need a second savior who declares war on the wasteland.

He began to select servants with the potential to perceive "Source Power" among his believers, actively bestowing power upon them on behalf of the extraterrestrial god in the void, appointing them as "Ruins Pastors", and sending them to the more distant wasteland to spread the holy gospel of the "Savior".

A grand holy war began.

A "Divine Messenger" who was ten times more brutal and absurd than the thugs declared that he wanted to declare war on all the thugs on the wasteland and establish a kingdom of god without violence and death.

Although this sounds absurd, for those scavengers struggling on the wasteland, it is simply too wonderful...

Moke is successful, and so is Kyle.

At least, the start is like this.

On this cruel "Steam Skeleton Capital" of the 178th Void Realm, there is no greater power more tempting than that power comparable to gods.

And coincidentally, the object he enlightened is a "Wraith" whose ambition is no less than his own.

This wraith will soon go to assimilate other wraiths.

Time accelerated, and the snowball built by resentment rolled on the wilderness at an incredible speed.

An emerging evil cult called "Ark of Redemption" grew rapidly under the leadership of "Divine Messenger" Kyle, attracting countless scavengers who had nowhere to go.

They grew rapidly, using the flesh and blood of believers and the holy light bestowed by god, conquered and annexed surrounding tribes of all sizes with the most brutal means, and then used false promises and a beautiful future to deceive those fools in the distance.

The initial success made Moke in the observation room extremely excited.

He almost regarded Kelin's paper as a golden rule, believing that he had thoroughly mastered the ultimate mystery of Void Realm interference!

This is too easy!

"Not enough!"

Through the Void Realm lens, Moke greedily watched the theocratic kingdom that was expanding rapidly, continuously issuing new instructions to his "Divine Messenger" Kyle.

"Kyle, your believers are not enough. You shouldn't just covet the enjoyment in front of you. There are more poor people on this ruin waiting for you to save!"

"Go release their potential! Let them embrace your kingdom of god with body and mind, until this filthy wasteland is completely purified!"

Kyle believed Moke's teachings deeply.

Just as he gained inspiration from history, it was precisely because of people's endless pursuit of material things that this world headed toward the abyss of decline.

Now, he saw a better choice.

Why not take his people to embrace a more advanced spiritualism?

Whether for civilization or for himself, this is the most favorable choice!

Greater ambition grew in Kyle's body; he not only wanted to be the king of this land, but also the god of this land!

Just as Moke's mage tower was accelerating the passage of time in the Void Realm, Kyle was also actively discovering more extraordinary people to join his "Salvation Army".

The huge advantage brought by Source Power on one hand indeed accelerated the end of the chaos on the wasteland, allowing the sphere of influence of the "Ark of Redemption" to expand at an unprecedented speed, and even brought a short but incredible prosperity.

However, on the other hand, it also gave birth to new and more terrifying chaos, burying hidden dangers of disintegration for this huge and bloated organization.

Those "Ruins Pastors" who were selected and also mastered extraordinary power soon were no longer satisfied with the worship of bottom-level believers and that ethereal spiritual sustenance.

They began to crave more and more practical things—such as wealth, slaves, and power to do whatever they wanted!

They enslaved in the name of "saving", looted in the name of "alms", and spread ignorance and stupidity in the name of "enlightenment".

A form of exploitation more thorough than the feudal noble system was formed on this advanced and decaying land.

Here, "nobles" are not called nobles, but "saviors". Just like the nobles in the high tower are not called nobles, but professors or mentors.

While exercising supreme power, they do not need to bear any corresponding feudal obligations. And the oppressed "saved ones", besides enduring silently, can only pray humbly, praying that these high-and-mighty saviors can have good personal morality and cultivation...

But on the wasteland, this happens to be the rarest thing.

Moke did not deliberately weave the doctrine of the Ark sect, but inadvertently taught the Academy's model to his "Divine Messenger", and it was cleverly "localized" by the latter.

At the same time, in order to obtain more "Source Power" to please the gods, and also to satisfy their own expanding desires, the "Ark of Redemption" sect began to adopt more radical, and even cruel means to spread the gospel of the Holy Light.

This includes but is not limited to slaughtering all non-believers as evil spirits, and actively descending man-made disasters to spread salvation.

For example, creating a plague or famine, and then saving the survivors when the scavengers are on the verge of death, and praising the death that could have been avoided.

In the end, salvation became the credit of the true god Moke, while how death descended was lightly buried in the dust.

Moke didn't even seriously teach Kyle what to do, and the latter understood this ultimate mystery without a teacher.

Although they flow with blood of different colors, they have almost completely similar spiritual frequencies, and this may also be the reason why they can cooperate so tacitly.

Finally, a monster more twisted and crazy than the wasteland itself was born, greedily devouring everything that came into view.

Just when Moke proudly thought that he would soon achieve final success, even more successful than the 440th Void Realm, an accident suddenly occurred.

The atrocities of the "Ark of Redemption" finally made other pragmatic scavenger tribes on the wasteland feel an imminent threat to survival.

In the face of fear, they united.

These Gray People who saw through the hypocrisy of the kingdom of god finally realized that there had never been any savior in the world; they could only rely on themselves.

They no longer believed in any gods descended from heaven, only believing in the rusted weapons in their hands, and those old-world machines that could be repaired and roared again.

At the darkest moment, a true hero was born.

He was once the most devout believer under the Divine Messenger of the "Ark of Redemption", but after witnessing the various atrocities of the church with his own eyes, he awakened from the lies about the Holy Light.

He escaped, with scars all over his body and an unyielding will, and began to run between the various surviving tribes.

Under his call, those tribes that were originally hostile and suspicious united for the first time, forming a loose but clear-goal military organization—"Wastelander Alliance".

A war revolving around "materialism" and "idealism" broke out on the ruins filled with gray fog, just like the war they broke out for resources hundreds of years ago, except that this time they were fighting for the remaining living space.

Wastelanders used the knowledge recovered from the ruins to transform themselves, also transformed those roaring steam machines, and used the incomplete bodies repaired by prosthetics to launch a fierce counterattack against the "Ark of Redemption" that had fallen into paranoia and madness.

The counterattackers this time were no longer a rabble, but a steel wall forged by the fire of resistance and tempered by countless storms.

The flames of war soon spread to the entire wasteland.

Not only on the battlefield, but the cleansing outside the battlefield also began.

After realizing that the extraordinary power mastered by those "Ruins Pastors" would only bring enslavement and destruction, the wastelanders finally put down their little remaining shame and began to indiscriminately slaughter and cleanse all "aliens" who could use extraordinary power.

They regarded this power as a plague more terrible than "rust disease", and regarded the whispers in the void as evil spirits like "natural disasters"!

This is something that has never happened in the history of the Aus Continent—mortals, for the first time, raised butcher knives against extraordinary people!

Finally, in a decisive siege battle, the army of the Wastelander Alliance surrounded the holy city of the "Ark of Redemption".

Standing on the city wall built of ruins, looking at the black army composed of steel and anger below, "Divine Messenger" Kyle felt fear from the bottom of his heart for the first time.

He staggered back to the temple, closed the door tightly, knelt on the ground, and issued a desperate prayer toward the sky.

"My Lord! Great Moke! Where is your divine power? I beg you to descend boundless mighty power for your servant again! For the sake of my loyalty, please burn those heretics who blaspheme you for me!"

In the mage tower, Moke looked at this scene with a pale face, not understanding why a good situation had turned into this.

Until a few Void Realm years ago, everything was still fine, but those "non-believers" who were being suppressed suddenly became powerful.

He had already given Kyle everything he could give.

At this moment, he could only watch helplessly.

"Are these guys crazy?! Resisting their savior?! Do they know what they are doing!"

Moke roared out of control, wishing he could drill into the Void Realm and show those ugly Gray People his strength as a Gold-level powerhouse.

He had no doubt that he would sweep those stupid thugs into the garbage dump without leaving one, just like a god descending to earth!

However—

He couldn't get past that door after all.

That is another world after all, and the interference of Source Power has a limit.

He can fluctuate a screw that no one notices, can ignite a prairie fire, and can even change the relative time flow rate of the two worlds, but he cannot prevent the collapse of the entire building, let alone let the time that has passed flow backward.

He can kill a few wastelanders through Kyle's hand, but it is impossible to kill a group of guys who are not afraid of death.

Not to mention, as the believers continue to die, the Source Power he can call upon is already negligible.

The extraordinary people in this world are too weak after all!

Finally, under the desperate gaze of countless fanatics, the wastelanders raised the rifles in their hands and shot the "Divine Messenger" with flickering light.

With his fall, this absurd farce directed by clumsy imitators finally disintegrated in the cheers of victory.

The mage tower was silent, the teaching assistants looked at each other, not daring to breathe.

Moke stared fixedly at the Void Realm, the wand in his hand trembling slightly, not knowing how this farce would end.

This hard-won victory made all the surviving "Gray People" completely abandon that ethereal spiritual faith, as well as the so-called "Great Moke".

They regarded the rise and fall of the "Ark of Redemption" as a painful lesson at a high price, and erected monuments for the victims.

Gods are untrustworthy, and there is not a single good thing among the evil spirits behind the void; only the tools and knowledge in their hands are real and reliable.

They moved more firmly toward the path of "materialism", began to frantically excavate the ruins of the old world, repaired those forgotten machines, and continued the research that their predecessors had stagnated due to arrogance.

Soon they discovered that although fossil fuel resources had been depleted, there was another thing that could bring them endless energy...

That is the root of "light".

This is a secret they discovered when fighting with cultists.

At first they were just trying to puncture the lies about the Holy Light, but they inadvertently discovered the essence of sunlight—that is two tiny particles, releasing power comparable to stars in a chain reaction!

Through the study of matter, they have a way to bring the light of stars to the ground!

Moke couldn't understand what kind of magic that was, nor could he see it, because beyond the "horizon" that could not be understood, there was no "viewpoint" that could establish observation. He just saw the flames boiling on the horizon at the moment when a secret believer's faith collapsed.

Moke's heart gradually despaired.

The world behind the 178th Void Realm is gradually slipping out of his control, and this slipping is comprehensive; the consensus between the two worlds is disintegrating bit by bit.

The Gray People finally stepped toward their own history, coming to a timeline where no one knew the future.

On this timeline, there are no whispers of ancient gods and unpredictable spells, replaced by a vast and boundless starry universe.

The ideological trend of the entire civilization has changed.

As far as the result is concerned, they seem to be becoming better, more united, and more powerful.

It's just that this kind of "good" that the Gray People love to hear seems to have no meaning for the Academy far away in another world.

In that cold and lonely mage tower, Moke discovered in horror that the lens image of the 178th Void Realm was becoming weaker and weaker, more and more blurred!

It is like an old photo exposed to acid rain, constantly shrinking its blurred edges under the raindrops of time.

"Quick! Quickly close the magic array!"

In order to avoid the complete collapse of the Void Realm and bring himself more trouble, Moke issued the final order in a panic.

Before the last trace of the channel was cut off, the teaching assistants hurriedly cut off the magic supply, freezing the image in the Void Realm at the last second before the suspected collapse.

The light of the Void Realm dimmed instantly.

That lens, which once reflected the rise and fall of a civilization, finally turned into a dead gray mist in the panic.

Although the time when the two civilizations met did not end here, the day of parting seemed not far away.

"... It's over."

Moke muttered in his heart, paralyzed on the seat in despair.

"Wraith Coke" completely became the history of the 178th Void Realm. Although that was a matter of time, it happened in his hands.

He completely messed up the task Professor Alister gave him...

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 381 =====