Chapter 2: I am a believer of [Order]

I am a believer of 【Order】

A gentle breeze blew, and the moon shone with silver light.

On the roof of a super-high-rise building, Cheng Shi sat on the edge, his two legs dangling high in the air, swinging back and forth as he enjoyed today's spoils.

What he was chewing on was the most common fresh blood finger bread from the food trial rewards. The shape of this bread was exactly the same as a human finger, and even the texture was indistinguishable.

Only when tasting the cranberry jam bursting inside the finger upon the first bite could one confirm that this thing was truly just food, not a severed finger.

It was a pity that the bread was like wax and the jam was very sour; C-grade food didn't taste good.

But none of this hindered its ability to provide energy, and providing energy meant it could sustain his life.

Ever since the 【Gods】 descended half a year ago, reality had long been transformed into an absurd 【Faith Game】.

Everyone had to choose to believe in a certain god, living on in this shattered and unreal world with the god's blessing.

The entire world was divided into countless fragments by the gods, and everyone was randomly assigned to survive within a certain fragment.

Just like Cheng Shi, the place he was assigned to was the roof of an unknown building.

The roof was about two hundred square meters. Although the space was large, it had no cover; not to mention being exposed to wind and sun, there wasn't even a piece of cloth to wrap his body.

What was even more extreme was that there were air walls all around the roof. Even though the door to go downstairs was right at his hand, he couldn't pass through the air wall to go downstairs.

Only by opening a "trial" related to extended space and successfully clearing it could he break through the obstruction of the surrounding air walls and obtain more living space.

This was also the biggest rule of this game. In the 【Faith Game】, all "resources" could be obtained by participating in 【Prayer Trials】. From "clothing, food, housing, and transportation" to "divine power," as long as you dared to make a wish, the gods would descend a trial and match you with corresponding teammates.

The more outrageous the prayer content, the higher the trial difficulty.

If you were socially anxious, you could also choose a solo trial, but solo trials wouldn't increase any score, and the rewards given were only barely usable.

Cheng Shi sat on the roof, struggling to swallow the food in his mouth, and looked up at the game information within his field of vision.

【Current Global Believer Count: 8478114678】

In just half a year, only two-thirds of the global population of 12 billion remained.

The 【Faith Game】 was not an absolutely safe game; death in the game meant dying in reality as well.

But if you didn't accept the gods' trials, you couldn't obtain the supplies and resources needed for survival.

"One day left..."

Looking at the eye-catching red text reminder in the center of his vision, Cheng Shi sighed.

The 【Faith Game】 wouldn't let players just muddle along. Every seven days, it would automatically match players for a 【Special Trial】.

This trial was extremely difficult. If players didn't successfully clear it, even if they were lucky enough to survive, they would be deprived of the ability to participate in 【Prayer Trials】 for the next cycle.

In other words, failure meant having no income for the next week, and one could only consume stored food!

"I hope the teammates matched this time are a bit more reliable. After being screwed over last time, I've wasted a lot of food, and the stock in the warehouse has dropped to the warning line..."

Just as he was thinking this, a greeting suddenly came from afar.

"Hey, buddy, how was the harvest today?"

Cheng Shi looked up at the opposite side and found that the voice came from the "resident" on the next roof, a young man with long hair and trendy attire.

The colorful, strangely shaped clothes he wore were all the "newest" styles obtained from participating in trials.

A young man surnamed Xie.

The real world was separated by air walls, and players' movements were restricted, but their vision and hearing were not, and the air walls didn't isolate item throwing.

Therefore, you never knew when your neighbor would pull out a submachine gun and spray you.

The 【Faith Game】 didn't prohibit players from killing each other, which also led to not-so-friendly neighborly relations.

The neighbor on the roof opposite Cheng Shi was surnamed Xie, who claimed to be from Jiang Province and a senior student of civil engineering.

He was a bit neurotic, but not a bad person.

Before graduation, he was worried about how to find a job, but he didn't expect that after the gods descended, he directly became a professional "player."

So he was one of the few "Descent Sect" members who believed that the gods had saved the world, or at the very least, saved the world's employment rate.

Cheng Shi shook the canned tentacle slime drink he was holding and smiled to indicate that this was his spoil.

"Holy crap, snot water, buddy, I've never admired anyone in my life, but I admire you. How can you drink that stuff?"

The young man surnamed Xie looked shocked, his face turning pale as he looked at the drink in Cheng Shi's hand.

"Snot water" was the nickname for this drink. The tentacle slime was greenish and extremely viscous, looking exactly like the snot one would have during a wind-heat cold, hence the name.

It was very thirst-quenching, and because it was too viscous, it even had some effect of filling the stomach.

Cheng Shi smiled and said, "How to drink it? Once it's in your mouth, you can't bite it off, so it just goes down gulp by gulp."

"..."

The other person's face turned even paler. He retched a few times and said speechlessly, "It shouldn't be like this, buddy. I see your expression is quite stable every time you come out. Your ladder score shouldn't be low, so why do you torture yourself by going into solo dungeons every day?"

Of course, it was because solo trials had lower difficulty and less pressure.

This was common knowledge, so Cheng Shi smiled and didn't speak.

"Oh right, we've been neighbors for so long, and I still don't know which god you follow. Tell me, maybe if we meet in the next match, we can coordinate in advance," the young man shouted again.

"What about you?" Cheng Shi asked back.

"Me? Didn't I tell you? I believe in 【Order】. Doesn't it look like it? Civilization rises, order lasts forever!"

As he spoke, the young man surnamed Xie stood at attention and made a gesture of tapping his left shoulder with his right fist, which was the iconic gesture of 【Order】 believers.

The posture on the opposite side was very standard and practiced, but Cheng Shi knew the other person was lying.

This wasn't a conclusion drawn from observing the other person's micro-expressions and movements, but Cheng Shi's ability, or rather, the faith talent bestowed upon him by the god.

Ever since he believed in "that one," he had been extremely sensitive to lies.

As long as someone lied, he could detect it. Although he couldn't be sure which sentence in what the other person said was the actual lie, combined with the context of the conversation before and after, it was enough for him to guess something.

Cheng Shi didn't expose him. It was quite nice to chat occasionally to relieve boredom with a neighbor, so there was no need to make the relationship too stiff.

"Hey, buddy, I'm saying you're boring for hiding things. Saying it out loud doesn't have any impact. Are you in a competitive relationship with me?" The other person was still probing.

Cheng Shi curled his lips and began to counterattack: "What's your 【Ladder of Audience】 score? What's your ID? Let me see where you're ranked."

Hearing this, the young man surnamed Xie's tone stalled, and he asked with some suspicion: "Are you really a believer of 【Order】?"

Cheng Shi shook his head, his smile playful: "No, I am a believer of 【Chaos】."

"!!!"

The opposite side was clearly shocked. His pupils shrank, and his brows furrowed slightly.

Cheng Shi's tone when saying this was very flat, as flat as if he could really look up the 【Ladder of Audience】 ranking of 【Order】.

In the 【Faith Game】, there were six fates, opposing each other in pairs. Each fate contained 2-3 gods, and there were also opposing relationships between the gods.

Just like 【Order】 and 【Chaos】, they belonged to 【Civilization】 and 【Chaos】 respectively. The essence they pursued was diametrically opposed, and the will they advocated was worlds apart, so their believers were also hostile to each other in the game.

However, the two sides with opposing faiths shared the same 【Ladder of Audience】 ranking, and they could see each other on the leaderboard.

The young man surnamed Xie's face changed again and again. He didn't report his score, nor did he continue to ask, because he was indeed not a believer of 【Order】.

At this moment, the moonlight shone on his face, but it couldn't light up the haze on his face.

He couldn't see through Cheng Shi's reality.

"You didn't lie to me?"

Cheng Shi smiled: "I never lie." ===== CHAPTER 3 =====